At least six films are almost guaranteed for best picture, according to a mathematical formula that takes into account awards season data and historical trends.
Published on January 18, 2025
“The Brutalist”, “Conclave”, “Anora” and “A Complete Stranger”
Lol Crawley/A24/courtesy Everett Collection; Focus Features/Courtesy Everett Collection; Neon/courtesy Everett Collection; Macall Polay/Searchlight Pictures/Courtesy Everett Collection
This month, all awards bodies have been forced to grapple with the same debate: continuing with their nominations and honors as planned, to provide some distraction and a sense of normalcy from the Los Angeles wildfires. Or delay and/or cancel their ceremonies, out of respect for those who have lost so much in Los Angeles, and to allow people to focus on the road to recovery.
Personally, I see benefits on both sides of this debate. I experienced the same debate over whether to release these 12th annual mathematical predictions of Oscar nominees, or whether to wait until it was time to predict the winners in a month. Ultimately, I decided to follow the Academy’s lead on this: if they follow Oscar season, so do I.
The predictions that follow are based on weighting the top contributions from the awards season so far, with more weight given to contributions that have done a better job of predicting the nominees in each category in the past. This not only provides a set of predicted nominees, but also a look at the race to win each category. Last year’s model predicted 10/10 Best Picture nominees, but maybe this year we’ll see more upsets. Let’s move on to mathematical predictions…
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Best picture
Image credit: Courtesy of A24
Starting from the top, The Brutalist, ConclaveAnd Anora are locks and pose serious threats to winning everything. A complete stranger received a late boost from the Directors Guild and is set to join Emilie Pérez, Dune: part twoAnd Wicked in the top ten.
Then it gets interesting, with a quintet of films landing in that gray area between 25 percent and 75 percent: You can easily look up the awards season summaries of any of the films. Boys Nickel, The bottom, Sing Sing, September 5Or A real pain and argue convincingly that everyone should be favored among this lower tier. It would be a surprise to see any of them take the Dolby stage, but for now, just hearing their names called out Thursday morning would be a major victory.
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Best Director
Image Credit: Rich Polk/GG2025/Penske Media via Getty Images
Unsurprisingly, the calculations see the same top three for Best Picture and Best Director: The Brutalist (Brady Corbet), Anora (Sean Baker), and Conclave (Édouard Berger).
For the others, all their films have the merit of earning them a nomination, but all their paths to the Oscars are strewn with pitfalls. Coralie Fargeat (The bottom), the leader of the next group of names, missed out on a Directors Guild nomination, and so on down the list.
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Best Actor
Image credit: A24
For a third consecutive category, we have The Brutalist at the top, represented this time by the main actor Adrien Brody. But it’s hard to see much separation between Brody and Ralph Fiennes (Conclave), for those trying to handicap the March race in January.
At the bottom of the list, you don’t see a double: Sebastian Stan (The apprentice, A different man) has not one but two films that could land him on this list. Neither is very likely on its own, so his chances of becoming the first person in Oscar history to receive multiple leading acting nominations in the same year are low.
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Best actress
Image credit: Neon/courtesy Everett Collection
At first glance, this looks like an exciting two-way race between Mikey Madison (Anora) and Demi Moore (The bottom). But there is still a way to go to tell an incredible late story: Fernanda Torres (I’m still here) upset the field to win the Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Drama, and while she doesn’t have enough other honors to rank higher at this point, the Golden Globe honor is a first step important. With only four nominees above 50 percent, that final spot looks like it could come from just about anywhere on the list.
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Best Supporting Actor
Image credit: Earchlight Pictures / Courtesy Everett Collection
Kieran Culkin (A real pain) got off to a strong start this awards season, making a clean sweep of key nominations and ending with a win at the Golden Globes. If anyone is going to derail his momentum, it’s probably Edward Norton (A complete stranger), Youra Borissov (Anora), or Guy Pearce (The Brutalist).
While Jeremy Strong (The apprentice), Clarence Maclin (Sing Sing) and Denzel Washington (Gladiator II) seems to be the fifth most likely nominee, the Screen Actors Guild surprised everyone by opting for Jonathan Bailey (Wicked).
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Best Supporting Actress
Image credit: Shanna Besson/PAGE 114 – WHY NOT PRODUCTIONS – PATHÉ FILMS – FRANCE 2 CINÉMA © 2024
Emilie Pérez has at least a chance of getting a double nomination in two categories (supporting actress and original song). As for the supporting actress, Zoe Saldaña is a lock, while Selena Gomez is going to need a little luck. Other strong competitors here are Ariana Grande (Wicked) and Isabelle Rossellini (Conclave).
Some might raise eyebrows at Felicity Jones’ low ranking for her role in The Brutalistbut the model toppled her for lack of a Screen Actors Guild or Critics Choice nod, potentially opening the door for someone else to take her place on the Oscar shortlist.
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Best Original Screenplay
Image credit: Neon/courtesy Everett Collection
We have two awards season-style comedies (that is, comedies that still deal with serious themes) at the top, in Anora And A real pain. Just behind are The Brutalist And The bottom.
After that, this is in my opinion the most difficult of the major categories where it is difficult to predict the full list of nominees. Challengers is a very weak favorite with only 35 percent. Ball joint made the list thanks to BAFTAs – but almost no one else – recognizing their work. Hard truths is a popular choice despite a series of disappointments in previous nomination announcements. If you’re making predictions here, pick your favorite script and hope for the best.
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Best Adapted Screenplay
Image credit: Focus Features/Courtesy Everett Collection
The model in this category normally has the advantage of relying on the USC Scripter Awards, a good barometer of the best adapted screenplay. But this year, nominations for Scripter were delayed until less than 24 hours before the Oscar nominations were announced, well after this article was published.
In the absence of this data point, the rest of the entries point to the Golden Globe winner. Conclave at the top, followed by Boys Nickel, Emilie PérezAnd Sing Sing. But A complete stranger, Dune: part twoAnd Wicked are not far at all.
Reasonable minds may differ on whether awards season should be happening right now in Los Angeles. But by continuing, we will know on Thursday morning who is still in the race.
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