It will all be over soon! One more agonizing week, Oscar watchers, and the whole thing comes to a wild finish. As of now, some have put out their predictions. The Gurus of Gold have turned them in, mostly, give or take a person or two in all of the categories. The pundits have seemed to coalesce around The Shape of Water winning Best Picture. And that is a good prediction, I’d say, over all. If it gets a boost from the BAFTA it’s possible that it can overcome the divisive nature of the preferential ballot and win. It needs to come in at number one or two. If it can do that, it can possibly win.
The only holdouts are me and Greg Ellwood. David Poland has Three Billboards.
Scott Feinberg also has The Shape of Water out front, but does have Get Out at number 2, which says a lot. You have to weigh lack of a SAG ensemble nomination against four Oscar noms and no crafts. Both are great films. My preliminary polling told me that it was Dunkirk vs. Get Out, but I’m going to do it again in one week and see if that changed. Get Out is revealing itself to be pretty teflon by this point. If it was going to deflate it would have already. By the same token, Shape of Water also seems to be growing in popularity, not dipping. So it’s going to be competitive with all of these movies and that’s going to make the preferential ballot do something weird. Or not.
Mostly, though, the prediction consensus is coming into shape, so to speak, and they are mostly what Feinberg has put down, I’d say. There is guess work to be done in documentary feature, foreign language film, and the short categories but the frontrunners look to be in place here in the last moments of the race and those are:
Picture – Shape of Water vs. Get Out vs. Dunkirk vs. Lady Bird vs. Three Billboards
Actor: Gary Oldman, Darkest Hour
Actress: Frances McDormand, Three Billboards
Supporting Actress: Alison Janney, I Tonya (with Laurie Metcalf as potential spoiler because it has a BP nomination)
Supporting Actor: Sam Rockwell, Three Billboards
Director – Guillermo del Toro, Shape of Water
Adapted Screenplay – Call Me By Your Name
Original Screenplay – Jordan Peele, Get Out vs. Greta Gerwig, Lady Bird, vs. Guillermo del Toro & Vanessa Taylor for Shape of Water, vs. Martin McDonagh, Three Billboards. It’s insane. But Peele, having won the WGA, is probably the favorite here.
Editing: Dunkirk
Production Design: Shape of Water
Cinematography: Blade Runner 2049 (but…usually goes to a Best Picture nominee so perhaps Dunkirk or Shape)
Visual Effects: War for the Planet of the Apes (no Best Picture nominee in category)
Costumes: Phantom Thread
Sound & Sound Editing: Dunkirk
Score: Shape vs. Dunkirk vs. Phantom Thread
Animated Feature: Coco
Foreign Language: Fantastic Woman
This is the general consensus heading into voting week. We will check back next Friday after ballots close to see if it still feels like this or if we’ve all changed our minds.