Who Will Win an Oscar This Year?

As of early in the day on February 8th, the speculation can enter phase two. The first phase of Oscar season speculation is who will be nominated, the second is who will win. With the nominees officially released, here are some predictions for each of the categories:

Best Picture: Belfast

The nominees for Best Picture are Belfast, CODA, Don’t Look Up, Drive My Car, Dune, King Richard, Licorice Pizza, Nightmare Alley, The Power of the Dog, and West Side Story. The most likely winner is Belfast because of the subject matter, direction, and era it takes place in. Similar to fan-favorite Licorice Pizza, it is set in a pre-Covid era so it has an inherent nostalgia to it and, while it is set during a period of political upheaval, the story is still a tight, family-driven story that is relatable to modern audiences. While it’s not the best movie up for nomination, it does check the most boxes that makes it an early favorite to win.

Best Director: Jane Campion (The Power of the Dog)

The nominees for Best Director are Kenneth Branagh for Belfast, Ryusuke Hamaguchi for Drive My Car, Paul Thomas Anderson for Licorice Pizza, Jane Campion for The Power of the Dog, and Steven Spielberg for West Side Story. Jane Campion is a clear frontrunner after the powerful performances from the cast of The Power of the Dog, coupled with fantastic set design and managing to elicit emotion through the visual medium from inanimate objects. There is a scene towards the end of the movie that is sure to have stuck in the head of anyone who saw it and that all comes down to the direction. The rest of the movies don’t do anything visually inventive enough to warrant a win.

Best Lead Actor: Andrew Garfield (Tick, Tick… Boom!)

The nominees for Best Lead Actor are Javier Bardem from Being the Ricardos, Benedict Cumberbatch from The Power of the Dog, Andrew Garfield from Tick, Tick… Boom!, Will Smith from King Richard, and Denzel Washington from The Tragedy of Macbeth. While both Denzel Washington and Will Smith’s performances stand out from their movies, Andrew Garfield showed a particular emotional depth as Jonathan Larson going through a quarter-life crisis that is deeply resonant.

Best Lead Actress: Kristen Stewart (Spencer)

The nominees for Best Lead Actress are Jessica Chastain from The Eyes of Tammy Faye, Olivia Colman from The Lost Daughter, Penelope Cruz from Parallel Mothers, Nicole Kidman from Being the Ricardos, and Kristen Stewart from Spencer. Early in the season, Kristen Stewart emerged as a clear frontrunner for the award. While Nicole Kidman’s performance as Lucille Ball has gained a lot of notoriety, it probably will not be enough to unseat Kristen Stewart’s Princess Diana.

Best Supporting Actor: Ciaran Hinds (Belfast)

The nominees for Best Supporting Actor are Ciaran Hinds from Belfast, Troy Kotsur from CODA, Jesse Plemons from The Power of the Dog, J.K. Simmons from Being the Ricardos, and Kodi Smit-McPhee from The Power of the Dog. When two actors get nominated from the same movie they can dilute the voting pool from each other which may harm both Jesse Plemons and Kodi Smit-McPhee’s chances. Regardless, Ciaran Hinds set himself apart as the best part of Belfast with his performance as Buddy’s grandfather Pop.

Best Supporting Actress: Kirsten Dunst (The Power of the Dog)

The nominees for Best Supporting Actress are Jessie Buckley from The Lost Daughter, Ariana DeBose from West Side Story, Judi Dench from Belfast, Kristen Dunst from The Power of the Dog, and Aunjanue Ellis from King Richard. Judi Dench does have a solid performance as Granny in Belfast, but The Power of the Dog does not work as well as it does if Kristen Dunst does not carry her role the way she does.

Best Adapted Screenplay: CODA

The nominees for Best Adapted Screenplay are CODA, Drive My Car, Dune, The Lost Daughter, and The Power of the Dog. Dune is a pretty solid adaptation of the source material, but the story does leave a bit on the table and the third act suffers from the fact that the movie is part one of two. CODA is a coming-of-age story about a girl who is the only person in her family who is not deaf and the movie does a great job of keeping the stakes feel real, have fights hit home, and have family reconciliations fit with the scale of the fights. All of that comes from the script.

Best Original Screenplay: Licorice Pizza

The nominees for Best Original Screenplay are Belfast, Don’t Look Up, King Richard, Licorice Pizza, and The Worst Person in the World. This is the category that Licorice Pizza is going to get its time to shine since it is about young love in the 1970s. It is a crowd-pleasing movie that is not particularly heady to the point where it asks the audience to think too much. It is digestible in a way where the other movies are not.

Best Cinematography: The Power of the Dog

The nominees for Best Cinematography are Dune, Nightmare Alley, The Power of the Dog, The Tragedy of Macbeth, and West Side Story. The Power of the Dog is likely the winner in this debate because the movie does a great job of playing with scale and eliciting emotion through camera movements and angles. There are scenes that play with the idea that the viewer is almost a character in the movie. Surprisingly, Belfast was omitted from this category.

Best Animated Feature Film: The Mitchells vs. the Machines

The nominees for Best Animated Feature Film are Encanto, Flee, Luca, The Mitchells vs. the Machines, and Raya and the Last Dragon. This category tends to get looked at as a vehicle for children’s movies to win an Academy Award so when movies like Anomalisa or Flee get nominated for the category as movies for adults, they tend to get overlooked. Of the other movies, The Mitchells vs. the Machines is hands down the most entertaining and would not be the first time that Phil Lord and Christopher Miller managed to take down Disney in the category (see Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse)

Best Costume Design: Cruella

The nominees for Best Costume Design are Cruella, Cyrano, Dune, Nightmare Alley, and West Side Story. Cruella is a frontrunner for this category because of how well it leans into the 1970s British punk aesthetic and wears this influence on its sleeve (no pun intended). The costumes are all visually unique and unlike other things seen this year.

Best Original Score: Dune

The nominees for Best Original Score are Don’t Look Up, Dune, Encanto, Parallel Mothers, and The Power of the Dog. Of these options Dune has the most memorable score and has a very alien feel to it, which fits the movie perfectly.

Best Sound: Dune

The nominees for Best Sound are Belfast, Dune, No Time To Die, The Power of the Dog, and West Side Story. Since the merger of “Best Sound Mixing” and “Best Sound Editing” into one category, this one has always been a bit of a toss-up since these are two entirely different skillsets and crews that go into finishing the sound for a movie. That said, Dune manages to balance both well.

Best Original Song: “No Time To Die” (No Time to Die)

The nominees for Best Original Song are “Be Alive” from King Richard, “Dos Oruguitas” from Encanto, “Down To Joy” from Belfast, “No Time To Die” from No Time to Die, and “Somehow You Do” from Four Good Days. The only real conflict in this comes between “Be Alive” and “No Time To Die,” but Billie Eilish’s theme to the latest James Bond movie will likely win out over “Be Alive”.

Best Documentary Feature: Summer of Soul (…Or, When The Revolution Could Not Be Televised)

The nominees for Best Documentary Feature are Ascension, Attica, Flee, Summer of Soul and Writing With Fire. Because of how Flee’s nominations are spread out (Best International Feature, Best Documentary Feature, and Best Animated Feature), it is likely it walks away with none of these categories unfortunately. Summer of Soul is fantastic as it tells the story of the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival and outlines how it was a kind of tipping point for how music would change in the coming decade.

Best Film Editing: Tick, Tick… Boom!

The nominees for Best Film Editing are Don’t Look Up, Dune, King Richard, The Power of the Dog, and Tick, Tick… Boom!. Don’t Look Up is a divisive choice because the crosscutting it utilizes throughout the movie is a polarizing technique. That alone is something that is going to keep people from voting for it. If there is one scene from Tick, Tick… Boom! that is going to be what pushes it over the edge, it is how the song “Therapy” is portrayed.

Best International Feature: Drive My Car

The nominees for Best International Feature are Drive My Car representing Japan, Flee representing Denmark, The Hand of God representing Italy, Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom representing Bhutan, and The Worst Person in the World representing Norway. Drive My Car probably gets the win considering the past track record of foreign films nominated for Best Feature in the category (Parasite and Roma). As for why Flee likely misses, see above.

Best Makeup and Hairstyling: The Eyes of Tammy Faye

The nominees for Best Makeup and Hairstyling are Coming 2 America, Cruella, Dune, The Eyes of Tammy Faye, and House of Gucci. While both Jared Leto and Jessica Chastain went through massive transformations for their roles, Jessica Chastain’s performance is not an anchor that is going to be what people associate negatively with the role.

Best Production Design: Dune

The nominees for Best Production Design are Dune, Nightmare Alley, The Power of the Dog, The Tragedy of Macbeth, and West Side Story. This was the hardest category to pick a winner of because all these movies did a great job, so it came down to personal preference. While the minimalist aesthetic of The Tragedy of Macbeth is appealing, Dune built its designs from the ground up in an aesthetic that looks like the world created Frank Herbert.

Best Visual Effects: Dune

The nominees for Best Visual Effects are Dune, Free Guy, No Time to Die, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, and Spider-Man: No Way Home. Dune is a clear frontrunner and is leaps and bounds above all the other nominees. Free Guy’s nomination is a surprise, as is No Time to Die and the omission of The Eternals.

For the three short film categories, I have not seen any of the movies. Because of this I cannot make a prediction as to which will win. Here are the nominees:

Best Animated Short Film

The nominees for Best Animated Short Film are “Affairs of the Art,” “Bestia,” “Boxballet,” “Robin Robin,” and “The Windshield Wiper.”

Best Documentary Short Subject

The nominees for Best Documentary Short Subject are “Audible,” “Lead Me Home,” “The Queen of Basketball,” Three Songs for Benazir,” and “When We Were Bullies.”

Best Live Action Short

The nominees for Best Live Action Short are “Ala Kachuu – Take and Run,” “The Dress,” “The Long Goodbye,” “On My Mind,” and “Please Hold.”