Gold Rush Gang 2016 Oscar Predictions: Adapted and Original Screenplay (July)

Adapted Screenplay this year has three very strong contenders in Carol, The Danish Girl and The Revenant. All have stayed in the top 3 since the beginning of the year and probably will for months to come. It’s the #4 and #5 slot that we have some wiggle room. Aaron Sorkin’s adaptation of ‘Steve Jobs’ by Walter Isaacson seems like a safe bet, especially after the full-length trailer was released last week. A very Oscar-y October release date and coming from a pair of Oscar winners (Sorkin for The Social Network and director Danny Boyle for Slumdog Millionaire) position it in a very good spot. The screenplay for Brooklyn feels a bit a placeholder as it’s far down in points from the top 4 and, in fact, tied for 5th with Beasts of No Nation (no graphic). I suspect that after this week’s announcement of Netflix’s October rollout for the film that Beasts will shoot up past Brooklyn and make a strong play for 4th or possibly even 3rd place. Elsewhere on the list the Hank Williams biopic I Saw the Light has some support from two Gold Rush Gang Members as does Me & Earl & the Dying Girl but I suspect that’s more of an issue of forgetful GRG members not updating their predictions on time. We’ll see next month.

Joy continues to lead this category just as it does in Best Picture and Best Director, by a very healthy margin. While many thought that David O. Russell was going to receive the Original Screenplay Oscar for American Hustle, he still ended up losing, just as the film lost all 10 of its nominations. You have to wonder if the Academy is just toying with Russell or if we’ll see a ‘due’ factor attached to him this year for Joy. Inside Out still remains a strong contender though and its box office and critical successes only bolster that. Suffragette makes strides in all categories this month, including here. Quentin Tarantino’s The Hateful Eight is still chugging along but almost feels like a given, a placeholder even. His recent win for Django Unchained is clearly a major reason why. Youth hangs on as it has also played well in other categories but Bridge of Spies, despite strong placement in Director and Picture is languishing out of the top 5 this month. Trainwreck, which opens next week and as of this writing sits at 100% on Rotten Tomatoes, has the stuff for a ‘comedy’ entry for Original Screenplay. If Amy Schumer’s television show blows up at the Emmys and the film is a box office success, look for this film to break the top 5.

As it happens every year there is always some confusion about category placement of certain screenplays. While there doesn’t seem to be too much debate about the top 5 in Adapted and Original this month, the lower levels of contenders are seeing conflict. Freeheld and Our Brand is Crisis are both based on documentaries but unless the screenplay is based on the script of the doc, they should end up in Original. But these things have a strange way of not going where you think they will sometimes.  Former Gold Rush Gang member and super sleuth Dennis Kelly dug up a few reports on the both films and seem to lean towards them going Adapted but then it’s all about submission, viability and the dreaded Writers Guild of America. We’ll be keeping our eyes peeled though.