There are, I’d say, a small handful of groups that are very influential to the Oscar race. One of them is the National Board of Review, because they’ve been around a long time and their brand means something. That is also true of the Golden Globes. Then we get to the critics groups, which have had to diversify their memberships, just as the other groups have. The three biggest critics groups are the New York Film Critics, the Los Angeles Film Critics, and the National Society of Film Critics.
There are so many other groups — big and small. They aren’t influential in the same way, though. They work more in building a broad consensus, I’d say, for frontrunners. But they can’t put someone in the race the way the NBR, the HFPA, the NYFCC and LAFCA do. When you talk about consensus-building, you talk about the Critics Choice and the newly-formed, Film Twitter-friendly HCA (Hollywood Critics Association, which our own Mark Johnson and Shadan Larki are part of), in addition to the various regional groups like Boston, Chicago, etc. At that point, a frontrunner can just start piling up the wins and the separate awards matter less than the sheer abundance of wins from the critics groups.
New York has been around the longest (other than the NBR). Let’s look at that their track record for Best Picture:
2000 — Traffic
2001 — Mulholland Drive
2002 — Far From Heaven
2003 — Return of the King
2004 — Sideways
2005 — Brokeback Mountain
2006 — United 93
2007 — No Country for Old Men
2008 — Milk
2009 — The Hurt Locker
2010 — The Social Network
2011 — The Artist
2012 — Zero Dark Thirty
2013 — American Hustle
2014 — Boyhood
2015 — Carol
2016 — La La Land
2017 — Lady Bird
2018 — Roma
2019 — The Irishman
2020 — First Cow
And now, Best Actor:
2000 — Tom Hanks, Cast Away
2001 — Tom Wilkinson, In the Bedroom
2002 — Daniel Day-Lewis, Gangs of New York
2003 — Bill Murray, Lost in Translation
2004 — Paul Giamatti, Sideways
2005 — Heath Ledger, Brokeback Mountain
2006 — Forest Whitaker, The Last King of Scotland
2007 — Daniel Day-Lewis, There Will Be Blood
2008 — Sean Penn, Milk
2009 — George Clooney, Up in the Air
2010 — Colin Firth, The King’s Speech
2011 — Brad Pitt, Moneyball/Tree of Life
2012 — Daniel Day-Lewis, Lincoln
2013 — Robert Redford, All Is Lost
2014 — Timothy Spall, Mr. Turner
2015 — Michael Keaton, Spotlight
2016 — Casey Affleck, Manchester by the Sea
2017 — Timothee Chalamet, Call Me By Your Name
2018 — Ethan Hawke, First Reformed
2019 — Antonio Banderas, Pain and Glory
2020 — Delroy Lindo, Da 5 Bloods
Best Actress:
2000 — Laura Linney, You Can Count on Me
2001 — Sissy Spacek, In the Bedroom
2002 — Diane Lane, Unfaithful
2003 — Hope Davis, American Splendor
2004 — Imelda Staunton, Vera Drake
2005 — Reese Witherspoon, Walk the Line
2006 — Helen Mirren, The Queen
2007 — Julie Christie, Away from Her
2008 — Sally Hawkins, Happy-Go-Lucky
2009 — Meryl Streep, Julie & Julia
2010 — Annette Bening, The Kids are All Right
2011 — Meryl Strep, The Iron Lady
2012 — Rachel Weisz, The Deep Blue Sea
2013 — Cate Blanchett, Blue Jasmine
2014 — Marion Cotillard, Two Days, One Night
2015 — Saoirse Ronan, Brooklyn
2016 — Isabelle Huppert, Elle
2017 — Saoirse Ronan, Lady Bird
2018 — Regina Hall, Support the Girls
2019 — Lupita Nyong’o, Us
2020 — Sidney Flanigan, Never Rarely Sometimes Always
Here are our predictions:
Picture
Licorice Pizza — Mark Johnson
The Power of the Dog — Sasha Stone, Ryan Adams, Marshall Flores
Passing — Clarence Moye
Director
Jane Campion, The Power of the Dog — Stone, Johnson, Moye, Adams, Flores
Actor
Benedict Cumberbatch, The Power of the Dog — Stone, Flores
Nicolas Cage, Pig — Clarence Moye
Andrew Garfield, Tick Tick Boom — Adams
Denzel Washington, The Tragedy of Macbeth — Johnson
Actress
Kristen Stewart, Spencer — Stone, Moye, Adams, Flores, Johnson
Supporting Actress
Kirsten Dunst, Power of the Dog — Johnson
Rita Moreno, West Side Story — Stone, Flores
Ruth Negga, Passing – Moye, Adams
Supporting Actor
Troy Kotsur, CODA – Stone, Moye, Adams
Kodi Smit-McPhee, Power of the Dog — Flores
Woody Norman, C’mon C’mon — Johnson
Screenplay
C’mon C’mon — Johnson
Licorice Pizza — Stone, Flores
The Lost Daughter — Moye
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