AwardsWatch - 2016 Oscar Predictions: BEST PICTURE

2016 Oscar Predictions: BEST PICTURE

Spotlight is enjoying its frontrunner status with a perfect score in Best Picture from the Gold Rush Gang. But the recent critics awards success for Carol, The Revenant, Mad Max: Fury Road and Room are starting to encroach on that. Most especially Mad Max, which is turning into a formidable opponent for the journalism drama. In this unusual year, Mad Max missing out on a SAG Cast nomination a la Braveheart back in 1995, might not end up being as big a negative as its been for films for the last two decades. The passion vote could push it all the way.

As you can see by the chart, a whopping 14 films have votes for the 5-10 slots that will make up Best Picture and they run the gamut of genres, styles and precursor support. When Beasts of No Nation, The Big Short, Spotlight, Straight Outta Compton and Trumbo received those SAG Cast nominations it turned the Oscar blogging community on its head. Spotlight and The Big Short weren’t surprises but the other three were. That could bode very well for those three or simply be an anomalous year, as this year seems to be. You’ll notice that of that list only Straight Outta Compton doesn’t show up with the Gold Rush Gang. Scott Feinberg has been an early supporter of the film getting in (even before SAG noms) but we aren’t quite there. Are we behind or is he ahead?

The Golden Globes, although not an industry group, gave a boost to Carol, Room and The Revenant as they all made it into Motion Picture (Drama) alongside Spotlight and Mad Max. The Martian got into Comedy, giving it new life after its surprising SAG snub. Bridge of Spies and Brooklyn hang on by a thread. Both missed SAG Cast noms and Golden Globe Motion Picture nominations and now seem like contenders for just Mark Rylance and Saoirse Ronan, respectively. Still, it’s hard to simply discount a Steven Spielberg film that focuses on an era that covers the largest demographic in the Academy. That same demo also contains Brooklyn support.

Looking at the list there are arguments to be made for nearly all of them; actor support, tech branch support, frontrunner status, racial/gender/sexual diversity. Anything you can ask for is in that group.

BEST PICTURE	TOTAL POINTS	RANK
Spotlight	100	1
Carol	80	2
The Revenant	79	3
Mad Max: Fury Road	60	4
Room	57	5
The Martian	50	6
The Big Short	48	7
Brooklyn	40	8
Bridge of Spies	23	9
Inside Out	7	10
The Hateful Eight	3	11
Beasts of No Nation	2	12
Trumbo	1	13
Steve Jobs	1	13

To follow the Gold Rush Gang and their Best Picture predictions and find out how we voted, go here.

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Erik Anderson

Erik Anderson is the founder/owner and Editor-in-Chief of AwardsWatch and has always loved all things Oscar, having watched the Academy Awards since he was in single digits; making lists, rankings and predictions throughout the show. This led him down the path to obsessing about awards. Much later, he found himself in film school and the film forums of GoldDerby, and then migrated over to the former Oscarwatch (now AwardsDaily), before breaking off to create AwardsWatch in 2013.

He is a Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic, accredited by the Cannes Film Festival, Telluride Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival and more, is a member of the International Cinephile Society (ICS), The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics (GALECA), Hollywood Critics Association (HCA) and the International Press Academy. Among his many achieved goals with AwardsWatch, he has given a platform to underrepresented writers and critics and supplied them with access to film festivals and the industry and calls the Bay Area his home where he lives with his husband and son.