Road to the Oscars: Rounding Up the 97th Academy Awards Ahead of Sunday Night’s Ceremony

A sex worker, the Pope, two witches, and Bob Dylan walk into an awards ceremony. No, that’s not the beginning of a dirty joke, that’s what’s happening at the Oscars this Sunday night.

The Oscars are a little different this year because, as much as I love playing the game of guessing who’s going to win, there’s not a lot of sport to guessing who’s going to win Best Picture most years. It’s usually a done deal well before the host’s opening monologue. For the first time in a long time, more years than I can really remember, I’m not really sure who’s going to win Best Picture. Anora is currently the Vegas odds* favorite, but is that really a lock? Conclave is gaining a lot of momentum, and, while Emilia Pérez is down for the count, The Brutalist still has a fair chance at winning.

So there’s a lot more anticipation this year as a lot more is up in the air than usual at this point in the game. And frankly, there are some tough choices this year because, aside from The Brutalist, I gave every film nominated a rating of at least 90/100, whereas last year I found a few of the nominated films to be duds. So not only is Best Picture up in the air, but there’s a lot of very deserving movies vying for it.

But before I get to who’s going to win and who I think deserves to win, I want to do something I did last year and talk about the five biggest snubs in this year’s Oscars:

5. Gil Kenan and Jason Reitman for Best Original Screenplay for Saturday Night

I’ve always said that the Academy vastly undervalues genres besides drama, especially in the Best Picture category, and great comedies are often overlooked. Then again, they aren’t always. Jason Reitman is known for his hipster comedies, and he’s received two nominations for Best Director in the past (Juno and Up in the Air) and one for Best Adapted Screenplay (Up in the Air). Meanwhile, Gil Kenan has one Oscar nomination under his belt as the director of Monster House, which received a nomination for Best Animated Feature.

So the Academy is already aware that these two are masters of sharp, witty, intelligent comedies. So how did the Academy not give a screenplay nod to Saturday Night, one of the most tightly-written and outlandishly funny films of the year? Taking place in the 90 minutes before the first airing of Saturday Night Live in 1975, the film takes us on a whirlwind comedic adventure that does justice to comedy history while also taking a little poetic license. It’s a solid character arc and an absolute romp and definitely one of the funniest films of the year. I would even have liked to see it get a Best Picture nod, but, at the very least, this should have gotten a nod for Best Screenplay, a category that tends to be much kinder to comedies than Best Picture.

4. Denis Villeneuve for Best Director for Dune: Part Two

I said this in my review of Dune: Part Two, but how the hell did Denis Villeneuve get snubbed for Dune: Part Two? Science fiction is another genre that the Academy deeply undervalues, and it almost feels like giving Dune: Part Two a Best Picture nod was a reluctant bone thrown to the sci-fi fans, just a little something to show that the Academy isn’t completely disdainful of popcorn cinema (even though they really are). While the Best Director category has a lot of directors who did outstanding jobs, few of them pulled off anything as intricate and complex as the Dune films. In addition to that, Brady Corbet is nominated for The Brutalist and, while I hate to keep repeating myself, I really thought that movie was massively overrated. So there’s no good reason that Corbet should have been nominated over either Villeneuve or RaMelle Ross. Which leads me to our next snub.

3. RaMelle Ross for Best Director for Nickel Boys

I’ve read somewhere that the reason that Nickel Boys isn’t favored to win more awards is because it wasn’t seen by as many people as some of these other films, and I believe that because the only legitimate reason not to nominate this film for every award is if you simply haven’t seen it. Nickel Boys was a beautiful, heartbreaking tale that was filmed in a really unusual way that somehow worked perfectly. RaMelle Ross definitely pulled off a really unique film that, much like the previously discussed film, took a lot more effort than The Brutalist. I know, I’m a broken record, but The Brutalist is really overrated.

2. The Belle From Gaza for Best Documentary

OK, to be fair, Best Documentary isn’t a category I follow closely, and I have not seen any of the films nominated for that category this year. In theory, all five of them could have been better than The Belle From Gaza. But I find that to be very hard to believe. The Belle From Gaza, Yolande Zauberman brilliant documentary about transgender Arab sex workers in Tel Aviv, was the most daring, the most beautiful, and the most politically relevant film that I’ve seen all year. Perhaps there are rules around this that kept it from getting a nomination as the film was French and I don’t know how wide of a release it got in the U.S., but technicalities are pretty much the only excuse for not giving an award to this superb film.

1. The Last Showgirl for literally any awards

This is the one that absolutely boggles my mind, because there was a lot of Oscar buzz around this film and I fully expected a nomination for Best Picture, maybe Best Director for Gia Coppola, maybe Best Supporting Actress for Jamie Lee Curtis, but definitely a Best Actress nomination for Pamela Anderson. Anderson gave the comeback performance of the year, one that I think even outshines Demi Moore’s comeback performance for The Substance.

This movie was beautiful, subtle, heartbreaking, and easily one of the most emotionally moving films of the year. The Golden Globes and the Screen Actors Guild both gave Anderson nominations for Best Actress, and the BAFTAs (which are often seen as the British Oscars) gave Curtis a nomination for Best Supporting Actress. So when I didn’t even see this movie nominated for a single Oscar, I was utterly flabbergasted. This is easily the biggest snub of the year.

Next up, let’s round up all the major categories in the Oscars, with all the movies I expect to win (mostly based on the Vegas odds as reported by Covers.com) and the ones I think deserve the win.

Category: Best Adapted Screenplay

Who I Think Will Win: Conclave
Who I Think Should Win: A Complete Unknown

This is a stacked category, and I love the four movies I have seen in this category. Conclave has some momentum right now, and it’s winning the Vegas odds for this category by a lot. I might be a little biased in my love of A Complete Unknown being a big Bob Dylan fan, but I thought James Mangold’s screenplay and directing made for a really delightful portrait of a brilliant man, and it’s one of the few nominated films from this year that I’ve rewatched a second time just for fun. Nickel Boys is in this category, too, and while I do think that movie deserved a ton of awards, the screenplay wasn’t what stood out to me as much as the cinematography and overall direction. So I’m going to have to give my “should win” nod to A Complete Unknown on this one.

Category: Best Original Screenplay

Who I Think Will Win: Anora
Who I Think Should Win: Anora

Anora is sitting as an uneasy favorite for Best Picture. There’s a lot of things about Anora that make it an unusual pick for Best Picture, including the fact that it’s a comedy. Still, it is the Vegas favorite to win Best Picture at the moment, so maybe it actually will pull off the win. Regardless, the Best Screenplay categories tend to be much more favorable to comedies than Best Picture is, so if Anora has a decent shot at winning Best Picture, then it’s a shoe-in for Best Screenplay. And it’s well deserved as Sean Baker’s screenplay does an excellent job of making a sex worker funny without making fun of her in the process. That’s a really tricky balance to pull off, and achieving it is kind of a minor miracle. So I think Anora is a very well-deserved lock on this one.

Category: Best Director

Who I Think Will Win: Brady Corbet for The Brutalist
Who I Think Should Win: Jacques Audiard for Emilia Pérez

OK, so before you crucify me, let me explain. First of all, I already wrote my whole defense of Emilia Pérez months ago, which all happened before the racist posts from one of the film’s stars, Karla Sofía Gascón, came to light, at least to me. I’m in no way defending her posts. In fact, her posts are why I’ve been a little less gung-ho about defending this movie in the past few weeks. But, regardless of the moral character of the actress in the film’s title role, and in spite of the absolute hatred that this film has gotten—especially from the LGBTQ+ community—I still think it’s an outstanding film. It’s also a musical, which means it took a good deal of coordination and smart directing from Audiard. Even though I think Corbet is going to win, the Vegas odds favorite is actually Sean Baker for Anora, but, for me, Anora was more about writing than directing. So I think Corbet walks away with this one, and I think that’s an absolute shame.

Category: Best Supporting Actress

Who I Think Will Win: Zoe Saldaña for Emilia Pérez
Who I Think Should Win: Monica Barbaro for A Complete Unknown

Emilia Pérez has the most nominations out of any film this year and, thanks to Gascón, it’s expected to lose pretty much all of them except for Best Supporting Actress. The general consensus is that, while Gascón tainted a lot of things about the film, Saldaña didn’t do anything to make herself guilty by association. That being said, the main reason I’m opposed to Saldaña winning this award is because I think the Academy has a complete misunderstanding about who the main character was in Emilia Pérez. Despite the title of the film, Saldaña’s character, Rita Castro, is more of the main character than Perez herself is. I think Saldaña should have gotten the nod for Best Actress and Gascón should be in the Best Supporting Actress category. It’s not the first time that the Academy has done that. I think back to 2004 when Jamie Foxx was nominated for Best Supporting Actor for Collateral when his character was clearly the main character of the film.

I almost arrive at Barbaro as my “should win” choice by process of elimination, even though I did enjoy her performance in A Complete Unknown. If you look at the rest of this category there’s Felicity Jones for The Brutalist, and I feel like you’ve gotten my opinion on that movie by this point. Then there’s Ariana Grande for Wicked, who was good but not the best part of that film. And then I don’t know what Isabella Rossellini is doing in this category because she was barely in Conclave. Barbaro gave a great performance as the emotionally abused on-again-off-again lover of Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, and really brought a lot of depth to that role with very little screen time. But I think Saldaña is a solid lock and I’m not that upset about it.

Category: Best Supporting Actor

Who I Think Will Win: Kieran Culkin for A Real Pain
Who I Think Should Win: Edward Norton for A Complete Unknown

I admit that I have not seen A Real Pain, but the Vegas odds favor him so heavily that I know not to argue with them. Maybe I need to see this movie before Sunday night just to see what I’m missing. I also admit that I haven’t seen The Apprentice, so I can’t comment on Jeremy Strong’s performance as Roy Cohn. Guy Pearce was, admittedly, one of the bright spots of The Brutalist. And Yura Borisov was excellent in Anora. But I feel like Edward Norton really disappeared into the role of Pete Seeger for A Complete Unknown to the point where I did not see Edward Norton anymore. And, despite Seeger always wanting to seem like the happiest person in the world, Norton showed layers of emotion beneath that that seeped through the cracks. But yeah, Kieran Culkin is definitely taking this one.

Category: Best Actress

Who I Think Will Win: Demi Moore for The Substance
Who I Think Should Win: Fernanda Torres for I’m Still Here

This is becoming a closer race than I expected it to be, as Demi Moore really looked like a lock in this category, not only because of her performance in The Substance but also because the Academy sometimes likes to take an actor’s entire body of work into account with these awards. So someone like Moore who’s been around for a long time and never won an Oscar looks really appealing in this category. But Mikey Madison is building up some well-deserved momentum for Anora, and it could really go either way between the Madison and Moore at this point.

But, for my hypothetical money, Torres’ performance as Eunice Paiva, activist and widow of politician Rubens Paiva who was disappeared by the Brazilian military dictatorship in the 1970s, was simply stunning. To me, the movie wasn’t about Rubens Paiva, but about the strength and endurance of Eunice Paiva in the face of insurmountable odds and the amazing fortitude she showed for the sake of her children. I think the main reason that Torres isn’t more likely to win this award is because not as many people saw I’m Not There, and I think, if they did, she’d be in the conversation a lot more than this. Some people have also pointed out that Torres winning would be vindication for her mother, Fernanda Montenegro, who was nominated for the same award for her role in Central Station in 1999 and lost to Gwyneth Paltrow. But I don’t see that vindication happening because it’s pretty clearly down to Madison and Moore.

Category: Best Actor

Who I Think Will Win: Timothée Chalamet for A Complete Unknown
Who I Think Should Win: Timothée Chalamet for A Complete Unknown

Even though the Vegas odds slightly favor Adrian Brody for this award, I feel like a lot has been made about the use of AI to enhance his Hungarian pronunciation, and Timothée Chalamet is closing the distance on those odds. Covers.com picked Chalamet for the upset on this one, and I agree with them. Where Brody needed AI assistance to speak Hungarian, Chalamet learned to play the guitar and sing like Bob Dylan, which tells me that he worked at his role more. And, while I keep joking that Chalamet’s Bob Dylan looks more like Billie Joe Armstrong from Green Day than Bob Dylan, he nailed the folk singer’s personality. So I think Chalamet pulls the upset on this one.

Category: Best Picture

Who I Think Will Win: Conclave
Who I Think Should Win: Anora

As I mentioned before, Anora is the Vegas odds favorite to win Best Picture right now, but somehow I just can’t see the Academy giving the Best Picture award to a clever comedy about a sex worker marrying her client. They should because it’s absolutely wonderful, but I just can’t imagine it happening. Meanwhile, Conclave has momentum, as I said before, and it presents itself as the more “serious” film, which I think is something the Academy favors. They always like to award the darkest, driest, most depressing film of the year. Anora is a bright, fun, smart, feminist comedy. It’s a movie full of everything that the Academy doesn’t normally give awards to but really should. So, while I think Conclave pulls the upset here, I’ll be overjoyed if the Vegas odds are right and it goes to Anora.

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And that’s a wrap on my Oscars predictions for this year. But, unlike last year’s Oscars’ coverage when I finished my series with my predictions, this year I’m going to come back for a wrap up after the Oscars are over and give my thoughts on what did and didn’t win. I’ll be watching the ceremony at the Sie Film Center for Denver Film’s “Brightest Night in Hollywood” Oscars watch party and I’m looking forward to seeing the whole thing on a big screen. RSVPs are already full, but there’s a standby line if you want to come and join me. I’m especially excited to see Conan O’Brien host the Oscars this year, having been a fan of his from way back. So I think this is going to be one hell of an Oscars, and I hope you get to enjoy it as much as I do.

*I’m going to be referring to the Vegas odds on the Oscars because I think they’re a handy guide to gauge the likelihood of a film winning a particular award, but I do want to emphasize that betting on the Oscars is not legal in the state of Colorado, and this is just something I bring up for fun in my predictions. We are not endorsing anyone gambling on the Oscars in an area where it isn’t legal.

The Oscars air on Sunday, March 2 on ABC.

Photo credit: Disney/Andrew Eccles