The Best Picture race, at least at the moment, is still up in the air. The reason being is we’ve had no large consensus so far tell us what movie they like the most. Those big votes are coming at the end of this month. Let’s take a look at those current numbers.
The Producers Guild — 8,000 members.
Vote method: preferential ballot / 10 nominees for Best Picture
The Directors Guild — 18,000 members.
Vote method: plurality / five nominees for Best Director
The SAG/AFTRA — 116,741 members.
Vote method: plurality / five nominees for Ensemble Cast
The ACE Eddie Awards — 8,000 members
Vote method: plurality / five nominees in each category
The BAFTA — 6,500 voting members
Vote method: plurality / five nominees for Best Picture
Now, let’s look at the current membership of the Academy. These numbers have likely changed since Steve Pond posted this about a year ago, but FWIW:
Actors: 1,336 (-23)
Short Films and Feature Animation: 844 (+26)
Executives: 681 (+18)
Producers: 634 (+20)
Documentary: 618 (+23)
Visual Effects: 606 (+26)
Marketing and Public Relations: 605 (+18)
Directors: 568 (+4)
Members-at-Large: 554 (+11)
Sound: 550 (+14)
Writers: 504 (+5)
Production Design: 387 (+5)
Music: 383 (+9)
Film Editors: 375 (+4)
Cinematographers: 290 (+8)
Makeup Artists and Hairstylists: 231 (+7)
Costume Designers: 171 (+4)
Casting Directors: 150 (+8)
Total voting members: 9,487 (+187)
Associate members: 86 (-9)
Total active members: 9,573 (+178)
Emeritus members: 914 (+33)
Total active and inactive members: 10,487 (+211)
The pie chart for members looks a little like this:
Actors comprise the largest share, at 14 percent. But look at Animated and Shorts. That is the second largest group. Why that matters is that most of the time the shorts come from other countries. They are by far the most international of the categories with the exception of International Feature. Every year I’m shocked by how few American filmmakers are in Live Action short, for instance. In addition to the international members they added to diversify their voting body, they already have a large portion of international voters moving the needle significantly.
When you put the two together, actors + international voters, you can see how a movie like Parasite could win in 2019 where it might not have in a different time.
Predicting what actors will do is, I think, easier than predicting what voters from other countries will do, at least for me. That mainly has to do with having a shared story. Since most of the voters come from different places, whether they have their own shared story, and since America is so polarized now, our shared story is different depending on whom you ask.
The directors have just six percent of the overall share of vote, which seems kind of small and might help explain why they have become mostly decoupled from Best Picture and seem to also have little impact on what does ultimately win Best Picture. That is also because so many directors write their own screenplays now and certainly have this year. For instance, look at Original Screenplay and Best Director:
When was the last time that happened? As far as we can tell, it has never happened before. The closest, Marshall Flores tells me, would be 1998 when there was 4/5 overlap. But this is unprecedented.
To make matters even more strange, there is a long history of directors who wrote original screenplays not winning. In general, directors who wrote their own screenplays can win but usually they have a co-writer. This means Everything Everywhere or The Fabelmans would be covered, but it means that for, say, Banshees or TAR, it’s less likely the director would win for both Screenplay and Director.
These are the films that won Original Screenplay and Best Picture that were written or co-written by the director:
2019: Parasite (director + co-writer) — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
2018: Green Book (director + co-writer) — won Picture, Screenplay
2015: Spotlight (director + co-writer) — won Picture, Screenplay
2014: Birdman (director + co-writer) — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
2005: Crash (director + co-writer) — won Picture, Screenplay
1977: Annie Hall (director + co-writer) — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1960: The Apartment (director + co-writer) — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
And the ones with a separate writer and director:
2010: The King’s Speech — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
2009: The Hurt Locker — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1999: American Beauty — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1998: Shakespeare in Love — won Picture, Screenplay
1988: Rain Man — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1982: Gandhi — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1981: Chariots of Fire — won Picture, Screenplay
1970: Patton — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1954: On the Waterfront — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1951: An American in Paris — won Picture, Screenplay
In years where there were single writers, like Oliver Stone and Platoon, they won Best Director but generally not both Director and Original Screenplay for the same person.
Let’s look at Adapted just for fun:
2021: CODA (director + co-writer) — won Picture, Screenplay
2016: Moonlight (director + co-writer) — won Picture, Screenplay
2013: 12 Years a Slave (director + co-writer) — won Picture, Screenplay
2007: No Country for Old Men (director + co-writer) — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
2003: Return of the King (director + co-writer) — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1987: The Last Emperor (director + co-writer) — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1983: Terms of Endearment — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1979: Kramer vs Kramer — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1974: The Godfather Part II (director + co-writer) — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1972: The Godfather (director + co-writer) — won Picture, Screenplay
1950: All About Eve — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1945: The Lost Weekend (director + co-writer) — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
And the Adapted Best Picture winners with a separate writer and director:
2012: Argo — won Picture, Screenplay
2008: Slumdog Millionaire — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
2006: The Departed — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
2001: A Beautiful Mind — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1993: Schindler’s List — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1991: The Silence of the Lambs — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1990: Dances With Wolves — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1989: Driving Miss Daisy — won Picture, Screenplay
1985: Out of Africa — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1984: Amadeus — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1980: Ordinary People — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1975: One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1971: The French Connection — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1969: Midnight Cowboy — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1967: In the Heat of the Night — won Picture, Screenplay
1966: A Man for All Seasons — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1957: The Bridge on the River Kwai — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1956: Around the World in 80 Days — won Picture, Screenplay
1953: From Here to Eternity — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1946: The Best Years of Our Lives — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1944: Going My Way — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1943: Casablanca — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1942: Mrs. Miniver — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1939: Gone With the Wind — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1937: The Life of Emile Zola — won Picture, Director
1934: It Happened One Night — won Picture, Director, Screenplay
1930: Cimarron — won Picture, Screenplay
1929: All Quiet on the Western Front — won Picture, Director
So obviously, in the eras without the preferential ballot, Picture, Director, and Screenplay often went together. There has never been a Best Picture winner that won Original Screenplay and Director with a sole writer. There have been sole writers in the adapted category, however. Those are in red and bold.
However, since the trend is for directors to write their own scripts and for writers to direct their own scripts, we now have a situation where all five directors and all five original screenplays are exactly the same.
There are three screenplays that are adapted that are also nominated for Best Picture and Adapted Screenplay:
Top Gun: Maverick
All Quiet on the Western Front
Women Talking
None of these have a Best Director nomination, which is kind of shocking too.
I don’t know if the Academy will shrink their nominees back to five, but I really hope that they do. There is power in having a movie win all of the top awards and at the moment that rarely happens anymore.
Most Best Picture winners now win either Screenplay or Director, very rarely both. Unless the consensus of thousands for the Producers Guild, Directors Guild, and SAG align behind one movie, which is possible only with these films:
Everything Everywhere All At Once
The Fabelmans
The Banshees of Inisherin
Only those three can win all of the guilds. But they might only need one, as we’ve seen in recent years with CODA, Spotlight, and Moonlight.
Ultimately it will come down to two things:
How does the movie make people FEEL?
What is the “Oscar story”?
The Oscar story for EEAAO is that it’s a fresh, vibrant, intersectional video game hybrid set in the multiverse. It is a zeitgeist movie with a warm-hearted message. Strong box office. It makes people feel confused with its high concept sci-fi mixed with its wacky humor, but also inspired, moved, and happy.
The Oscar story for Top Gun: Maverick is that it is, without question, by most people’s standards the Film of the Year. To deny it the top prize is to illustrate to everyone that Hollywood no longer cares about what the public thinks. It’s a fun action movie that is flawless in its execution. Solid Record-breaking box office. It makes people good. Satisfied. Hopeful. But it’s not exactly high brow and what will the actors do?
The Oscar story for The Fabelmans is that it’s a deeply personal film for Steven Spielberg, much like Schindler’s List was but for different reasons. It’s an American Jewish story too, for those who grew up feeling like outsiders. Box office not a factor.It makes people feel sentimental. But there isn’t a sense of urgency.
The Oscar story for The Banshees of Inisherin is that it’s just a brilliantly written, acted, and directed film about the fundamentals of human nature. Funny and sad all at once. A masterpiece by Martin McDonagh. Box office not a factor. It makes people feel sad. But it also reminds people of what great filmmakers can do.
The Oscar story for TAR is that it is the first movie to tackle this odd moment we find ourselves living through where younger generations (harshly) judge older generations for their behavior. It is timely, disturbing and unique. It makes people feel confused, angry but also satisfied that someone made such an intricate, complex film about a subject people can’t really talk about.
I personally don’t think any other films have a shot to win, at least right now. Maybe that will change. Either way, it’s an interesting, unusual year that might come down to the battle of the screenplays.
