AFI Awards Preview and Predictions – AND POLL!

The AFI will announce their top ten of the year tomorrow. The films are selected by a small group of tastemakers – filmmakers, journalists, critics – around 13 in all. Mark Harris, for instance, has been a voting member 8 out of the past 10 years. Other repeat members include Lisa Kennedy, who writes for the Denver Post, Leonard Maltin, Peter Travers, Amy Nicholson, Claudia Puig, of course AFI’s president Bob Gazzale.

The average number of match-ups between the AFI’s ten choices and Oscar’s Best Picture, since the Academy expanded the Best Picture ballot, have been 6 or 7. We should assume that at least 5 will be the inevitable Best Picture nominees. Depending on whether the Academy ends up with 8 or 9 nominees, there will be at least 1 or 2 films not named by the AFI that still make it in.

Roma is likely not eligible, but it might get one of their special citations, like The Artist in 2011, and the King’s Speech in 2010. In fact, that seems highly likely.

The Favourite is another one that may or may not be eligible for the award, as it’s not a US production.

Let’s start with the locks:
A Star is Born – locked, current frontrunner
If Beale Street Could Talk – locked
First Reformed – locked – Paul Schrader is an American icon, no way it misses here.
Black Panther – they like to go big like that, Wonder Woman, The Force Awakens.
Green Book – if Three Billboards got in… then again, 3BB’s “scandal” hit later than Green Book’s.

Next we have the Probablys. These are most likely in but for whatever reason might drop off.
Eighth Grade – it’s picking up lots buzz, rounding the bases.
First Man – absolutely 100% deserves to be on here but one just doesn’t know anymore, does one.
Can You Ever Forgive Me – I’m thinking, yeah.

Then we have the borderline for Best Picture but very strong for AFI choices:
A Quiet Place
Mary Poppins Returns

Films with big question marks, both with awards season in general and with AFI:

BlackKklansman – it seems to not be hitting anywhere so far. Might the AFI jump start the engine? It might.
Crazy Rich Asians – seems like a strong bet but it’s hard for me to know what it will replace.
Vice – is it a late breaker? Did enough people see it? Is it “too much”?
Widows – seems like a very likely AFI pick. But it is also struggling here in the first half to show up.
The Ballad of Buster Scruggs – the Coens…
Bohemian Rhapsody – seems like a film that would be named one of the best of the year but is getting the cold shoulder from critics.

That is how I see it. Here is how others see it:

Jazz Tangcay
Blackkklansman
Black Panther
A Quiet Place
First Man
Mary Poppins Returns
Vice
Crazy Rich Asians
Green Book
If Beale Street Could Talk
A Star Is Born

Marshall Flores
BlacKkKlansman
Black Panther
Crazy Rich Asians
First Man
First Reformed
Green Book
If Beale Street Could Talk
Mary Poppins Returns
A Star Is Born
Vice

Blackkklansman
Black Panther
Eighth Grade
First Man
First Reformed
Green Book
If Beale Street Could Talk
Leave No Trace
A Quiet Place
A Star Is Born

The history:

2017
Call Me By Your Name
Dunkirk
Get Out
Lady Bird
The Big Sick
The Florida Project
The Post
The Shape of Water
Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
Wonder Woman

Not named: Phantom Thread (late breaker), Darkest Hour (if you follow Film Twitter you will know why).

2016
Arrival
Fences
Hacksaw Ridge
Hell or High Water
La La Land
Manchester by the Sea
Moonlight
Silence
Sully
Zootopia

Not named: Hidden Figures (late breaker), Lion (Weinstein could work miracles back then)

2015
The Big Short
Bridge of Spies
Carol
Inside Out
Mad Max: Fury Road
The Martian
Room
Spotlight
The Force Awakens
Straight Outta Compton

Not named: Brooklyn

2014
American Sniper
Birdman
Boyhood
Foxcatcher
The Imitation Game
Interstellar
Into the Woods
Nightcrawler
Selma
Unbroken
Whiplash

Not named: The Theory of Everything, The Grand Budapest Hotel

2013
12 Years a Slave
American Hustle
Captain Phillips
Fruitvale Station
Gravity
Her
Inside Llewyn Davis
Nebraska
Saving Mr. Banks
The Wolf of Wall Street

Not named: Dallas Buyers Club, Philomena

2012
Argo
Beasts of the Southern Wild
The Dark Knight Rises
Django Unchained
Les Miserables
Life of Pi
Lincoln
Moonrise Kingdom
Silver Linings Playbook
Zero Dark Thirty

Not named (not eligible): Amour

2011
Bridesmaids
The Descendants
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
The Help
Hugo
J. Edgar
Midnight in Paris
Moneyball
The Tree of Life
War Horse
*The Artist – special citation

Not named: Extremely Loud, Incredibly Close

2010
127 Hours
Black Swan
The Fighter
Inception
The Kids Are All Right
The Social Network
The Town
The Kids Are All Right
True Grit
Winter’s Bone
*The King’s Speech – special citation