Oscar Nominations Predictions 2019

This has been a wild year with the Oscar race, with films that few thought would gain traction ending up winning major awards. (Here's looking at you, BoRhap and the Globes!) I find that the guilds and other industry awards have been pulled in multiple directions this year. Do they go for 'woke' and nominate BlacKkKlansman, and also celebrate where much-needed diversity and the popular have collided with Black Panther and Crazy Rich Asians? When the Popular Film category was announced, people went nuts; but then these films, along with Mary Poppins, A Star is Born, A Quiet Place and now notoriously Bohemian Rhapsody have been making their way onto the lists. But then we have a Netflix film racking up critic and industry awards with Roma, which may just lead the nominations and even win Best Picture. And we also have the more traditional awards fodder in Green Book; the fancy costume dramas The Favourite and Mary Queen of Scots (although Lanthimos' film is certainly not your typical costume drama); and the strangely left-out-of-the-big-categories, but racking-up-the-technical-categories of First Man. So we have a year in which each of these films seem to fit the 'winner' narrative, but none have come out ahead and declared themselves Frontrunner.

That all being said, it seems that the Oscar race has congealed around a dozen films, as you'll see in my predictions. Strangely, I have four films tied for leading the nominations, and none breaking the ten mark. Very much so a 'spread the love' kind of year.

You may also wonder where I get these rankings from. This year I have been following Sasha Stone of AwardsDaily more often than Kris Tapley of Variety, who hasn't been blogging as much lately. I also frequent GoldDerby, which happens to closely match my own gut instincts this time around. But it's also a stats game: how have the guilds gone? The Golden Globes? The BAFTAs? The Critics' Choice, and to a lesser degree, critics' groups like the NYFCC? I say to a lesser degree because the critics don't always care what the industry groups will like: hence we see winners like Regina Hall in Support the Girls, which very few people saw, Steven Yeuh in Burning and the sweep of Ethan Hawke in First Reformed. Of these, I'm only predicting Hawke, and just barely. But I may be a good prognosticator because I've seen few of these films this year, and am not basing these predictions on what I think deserves an award. It's not who you think should win, it's who's going to.


Best Picture

1. Roma
2. Green Book
3. A Star is Born
4. BlacKkKlansman
5. Vice
6. Bohemian Rhapsody
7. Black Panther
8. The Favourite
9. First Man
10. If Beale Street Could Talk
11. Mary Poppins Returns
12. A Quiet Place
13. Cold War
14. Eighth Grade
15. Crazy Rich Asians
16. First Reformed
17. Can You Ever Forgive Me?
18. Widows
19. Boy Erased
20. The Ballad of Buster Scruggs

Director

1. Alfonso Cuaron, Roma
2. Bradley Cooper, A Star is Born
3. Spike Lee, BlacKkKlansman
4. Peter Farrelly, Green Book
5. Adam McKay, Vice
6. Yorgos Lanthimos, The Favourite
7. Damien Chazelle, First Man
8. Barry Jenkins, If Beale Street Could Talk
9. Pawel Pawilkowski, Cold War
10. Ryan Coogler, Black Panther

Actress

1. Glenn Close, The Wife
2. Lady Gaga, A Star is Born
3. Olivia Colman, The Favourite
4. Melissa McCarthy, Can You Ever Forgive Me?
5. Emily Blunt, Mary Poppins Returns
6. Yalitza Aparicio, Roma
7. Toni Collette, Hereditary
8. Nicole Kidman, Destroyer
9. Viola Davis, Widows
10. Saoirse Ronan, Mary Queen of Scots

Actor

1. Christian Bale, Vice
2. Bradley Cooper, A Star is Born
3. Rami Malek, Bohemian Rhapsody
4. Viggo Mortensen, Green Book
5. Ethan Hawke, First Reformed
6. John David Washington, BlacKkKlansman
7. Willem Dafoe, At Eternity's Gate
8. Lucas Hedges, Boy Erased
9. Ryan Gosling, First Man
10. Robert Redford, The Old Man and the Gun

Supporting Actress

1. Regina King, If Beale Street Could Talk
2. Amy Adams, Vice
3. Emma Stone, The Favourite
4. Rachel Weisz, The Favourite
5. Claire Foy, First Man
6. Nicole Kidman, Boy Erased
7. Emily Blunt, A Quiet Place
8. Margot Robbie, Mary Queen of Scots
9. Michelle Yeoh, Crazy Rich Asians
10. Natalie Portman, Vox Lux

Supporting Actor

1. Mahershala Ali, Green Book
2. Richard E. Grant, Can You Ever Forgive Me?
3. Timothee Chalamet, Beautiful Boy
4. Adam Driver, BlacKkKlansman
5. Sam Rockwell, Vice
6. Sam Elliot, A Star is Born
7. Michael B. Jordan, Black Panther
8. Russell Crowe, Boy Erased
9. Daniel Kaluuya, Widows
10. Steve Carell, Vice

Original Screenplay

1. Roma
2. The Favourite
3. Green Book
4. Vice
5. First Reformed
6. Eighth Grade
7. A Quiet Place
8. Sorry to Bother You
9. Bohemian Rhapsody
10. Cold War

Adapted Screenplay

1. BlacKkKlansman
2. If Beale Street Could Talk
3. Can You Ever Forgive Me?
4. A Star is Born
5. Black Panther
6. First Man
7. The Death of Stalin
8. Widows
9. Leave No Trace
10. Beautiful Boy

Editing

1. Roma
2. First Man
3. Vice
4. A Star is Born
5. The Favourite
6. BlacKkKlansman
7. Bohemian Rhapsody
8. Black Panther
9. Widows
10. Green Book

Cinematography

1. Roma
2. First Man
3. The Favourite
4. A Star is Born
5. If Beale Street Could Talk
6. Cold War
7. Black Panther
8. Bohemian Rhapsody
9. Mary Poppins Returns
10. A Quiet Place

Production Design

1. The Favourite
2. Mary Poppins Returns
3. Black Panther
4. Roma
5. First Man
6. A Star is Born
7. Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald
8. Mary Queen of Scots
9. Crazy Rich Asians
10. Bohemian Rhapsody

Costume Design

1. The Favourite
2. Mary Poppins Returns
3. Mary Queen of Scots
4. Black Panther
5. Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald
6. Bohemian Rhapsody
7. Crazy Rich Asians
8. First Man
9. A Star is Born
10. Colette

Makeup and Hairstyling

1. Vice
2. Mary Queen of Scots
3. Suspiria
4. Black Panther
5. Border
6. Bohemian Rhapsody
7. Stan and Ollie

Original Score

1. First Man
2. If Beale Street Could Talk
3. Mary Poppins Returns
4. Isle of Dogs
5. BlacKkKlansman
6. Black Panther
7. A Quiet Place
8. Annihalation
9. Vice
10. The Ballad of Buster Scruggs

Original Song

1. "Shallow", A Star is Born
2. "All the Stars", Black Panther
3. "I'll Fight", RBG
4. "Trip a Little Light Fantastic", Mary Poppins Returns
5. "The Place Where the Lost Things Go", Mary Poppins Returns
6. "Girl in the Movies", Dumplin'
7. "Revelation", Boy Erased
8. "Suspirium", Suspiria
9. "When a Cowboy Trades His Spurs for Wings", The Ballad of Buster Scruggs
10. "A Place Called Slaughter Race", Ralph Breaks the Internet

Sound Mixing

1. First Man
2. Roma
3. A Quiet Place
4. A Star is Born
5. Bohemian Rhapsody
6. Black Panther
7. Mary Poppins Returns
8. Mission: Impossible - Fallout
9. Ready Player One
10. Avengers: Infinity War

Sound Editing

1. First Man
2. Black Panther
3. A Quiet Place
4. Roma
5. Mission: Impossible - Fallout
6. Ready Player One
7. A Star is Born
8. Bohemian Rhapsody
9. Incredibles 2
10. Avengers: Infinity War

Visual Effects

1. Avengers: Infinity War
2. First Man
3. Ready Player One
4. Mary Poppins Returns
5. Black Panther
6. Solo: A Star Wars Story
7. Welcome to Marwen
8. Ant-Man and the Wasp
9. Christopher Robin
10. Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom

Animated Feature

1. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse
2. Incredibles 2
3. Isle of Dogs
4. Ralph Breaks the Internet
5. Mirai
6. The Grinch
7. Early Man
8. Smallfoot
9. Tito and the Birds
10. Hotel Transylvania 3

Foreign Language

1. Roma (Mexico)
2. Shoplifters (Japan)
3. Cold War (Poland)
4. Capernaum (Lebanon)
5. Burning (South Korea)
6. Never Look Away (Germany)
7. The Guilty (Denmark)
8. Birds of Passage (Colombia)
9. Ayka (Kazakhstan)

Documentary Feature

1. Won't You Be My Neighbour?
2. Free Solo
3. RBG
4. Minding the Gap
5. Three Identical Strangers
6. Hale County This Morning, This Evening
7. Shirkers
8. Crime + Punishment
9. Of Fathers and Sons
10. The Silence of Others

I don't normally do the shorts: Live Action Short, Animated Short, Documentary Short... but I'm sure that Bao will make it in for Animated, as will Bilby.

Tallies

The Favourite - 9
First Man - 9
Roma - 9
A Star is Born - 9
Vice - 8
Black Panther - 7
Mary Poppins Returns - 7
If Beale Street Could Talk - 5
BlacKkKlansman - 5
Green Book - 5 
Bohemian Rhapsody - 3
Can You Ever Forgive Me? - 3
First Reformed - 2
Isle of Dogs - 2

Mary Queen of Scots -2 

A Quiet Place - 2
RBG - 2
Mission: Impossible - Fallout - 1
Avengers: Infinity War - 1
Ready Player One - 1
Cold War - 1
Beautiful Boy - 1
Fantastic Beasts 2 - 1
Shoplifters - 1
Capernaum - 1
Burning - 1
Suspiria - 1
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse - 1
Ralph Breaks the Internet - 1
Mirai - 1
Won't You Be My Neighbour? - 1
Free Solo - 1
Minding the Gap - 1
Three Identical Strangers - 1