2019 Oscar Predictions: BEST DIRECTOR (June) – Spike Lee rebounds; Bradley Cooper’s ‘Star’ rises
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Just as in Best Picture, Spike Lee (BlacKkKlansman from Focus Features) rebounds and lands back in the top spot for June.
Lee’s move pushes last month’s #1 Steve McQueen (20th Century Fox’s Widows) down to #4. Oscar winners Adam McKay (Annapurna’s Backseat), Damien Chazelle (Universal’s First Man) and Barry Jenkins (Annapurna’s If Beale Street Could Talk) stay put in their same spots as May.
Yorgos Lanthimos (Fox Searchlight’s The Favourite) makes the big move though, climbing out of the Next Up section up to #7 on the chart, displacing fellow Fox Searchlight director Marielle Heller for Can You Ever Forgive Me?
Bradley Cooper (Warner Bros. A Star Is Born) ekes closer to the top 5, moving up one to #6 this month. Josie Rourke (Mary Queen of Scots from Focus Features) and Karyn Kusama (Annapurna’s Destroyer) hold on to #9 and #10.
I think there is a lot of potential for a Next Up contender to disrupt this top 10 in the coming months. James Gray’s Ad Astra (from 20th Century Fox) could be his Oscar breakthrough, Ryan Coogler mounted the most successful comic book/superhero movie of all time with Disney’s Black Panther, Mike Leigh is always a formidable Oscar candidate and this year he has Peterloo from Amazon. What if Netflix was able to mount a real campaign for Orson Welles and his finally completed final film The Other Side of the Wind? It seems a near impossible feat but the thought of it is too interesting to not keep in the conversation.
Here are my 2019 Oscar predictions in Best Director for June 18, 2018.
Green – moves up
Red – moves down
Blue – chart debut
| 1. Spike Lee – BlacKkKlansman |
| 2. Adam McKay – Backseat |
| 3. Damien Chazelle – First Man |
| 4. Steve McQueen – Widows |
| 5. Barry Jenkins – If Beale Street Could Talk |
| 6. Bradley Cooper – A Star is Born |
| 7. Yorgos Lanthimos – The Favourite |
| 8. Marielle Heller – Can You Ever Forgive Me? |
| 9. Josie Rourke – Mary Queen of Scots |
| 10. Karyn Kusama – Destroyer |
| NEXT UP |
| James Gray – Ad Astra |
| Ryan Coogler – Black Panther |
| Nadine Labaki – Capernaum |
| Jason Reitman – The Front Runner |
| Mimi Leder – On the Basis of Sex |
| Orson Welles – The Other Side of the Wind |
| Mike Leigh – Peterloo |
| Alfonso Cuarón – Roma |
| Pippa Bianco – Untitled Pippa Bianco aka Share |
| Benh Zeitlin – Wendy |
| OTHER CONTENDERS |
| Felix van Groeningen – Beautiful Boy |
| Bryan Singer – Bohemian Rhapsody |
| Jon M. Chu – Crazy Rich Asians |
| Julia Hart – Fast Color |
| Sebastián Lelio – Gloria Bell |
| Alice Rohrwacher – Happy as Lazzaro |
| Ari Aster – Hereditary |
| Kim Nyugen – The Hummingbird Project |
| Wes Anderson – Isle of Dogs |
| Justin Kelly – JT Leroy |
| Debra Granik – Leave No Trace |
| Paolo Sorrentino – Loro |
| Rob Marshall – Mary Poppins Returns |
| Jonah Hill – Mid 90s |
| Jennifer Kent – The Nightingale |
| David Lowery – The Old Man & the Gun |
| David Mackenzie – Outlaw King |
| Chloe Zhao – The Rider |
| Jacques Audiard – The Sisters Brothers |
| László Nemes – Sunset |
| Luca Guadagnino – Suspiria |
| Jason Reitman – Tully |
| Susanna White – Woman Walks Ahead |
| Robert Zemeckis – The Women of Marwen |
| Lynne Ramsay – You Were Never Really Here |
2019 Oscar Predictions: BEST PICTURE (June) – ‘BlacKkKlansman’ back on top, ‘The Favourite’ moves up
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.
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