2025 Oscar Predictions: ‘Good As Gold’ October Update and Middleburg Film Festival Winners

The Middleburg Film Festival has unveiled its Audience Award winners for its twelfth edition. Notably, ten of the last eleven Audience Award recipients (for Narrative Feature) have gone on to receive Best Picture nominations.

Two of the films we expected to be in the running for their top Audience Award pulled off an unprecedented tie. Both Edward Berger’s Conclave and Tim Fehlbaum’s September 5 were declared the best of the festival. Middleburg’s top prize, Best Narrative Feature, recognizes “the films that resonated most with filmgoers” at the four-day festival.

Martha takes home the award for Best Documentary and The Seed of the Sacred Fig upsets Emilia Perez as the Best International Film. 

So that puts a bow on Middleburg, and with just a handful of festivals remaining, we’ve entered the most thrilling phase of awards season – post-major film festivals – where many films have been screened, moving beyond predictions based solely on trailers or the reputations of directors, casts, and crews. Festivals like Venice, Telluride, and Toronto have showcased nearly all of the major contenders, with a few notable exceptions such as Gladiator II (which Erik saw last week), A Complete Unknown, Juror #2, Here, Nosferatu, and Wicked.

As we transition from educated speculation to informed predictions, we’re leveraging historical trends alongside our understanding of the evolving preferences of the Academy. For example, at this point in 2021, few predicted CODA would emerge as the eventual Best Picture winner. Similarly, All Quiet on the Western Front was not widely expected to dominate the awards in 2022. Last year was an anomaly, as many of us were already championing Oppenheimer as a frontrunner from the spring.

Heading into November, there’s no clear frontrunner, and consensus on the ten nominees is still elusive. There are, however, some strong contenders making the rounds: Conclave, Emilia Pérez, Anora, and The Brutalist are frequently mentioned among awards experts. Tech-heavy blockbusters like Gladiator II and Dune: Part Two also appear to be solid picks for the top tier. Beyond that, the field gets murky, adding to the excitement of this stage in the race. Soon, critics groups and guilds will weigh in, helping to clarify which films we’ll be talking about heading into winter.

What films are vying for those remaining four slots? Strong contenders include Steve McQueen’s Blitz, Pedro Almodóvar’s The Room Next Door, James Mangold’s A Complete Unknown, Jason Reitman’s Saturday Night, Jesse Eisenberg’s A Real Pain, Tim Fehlbaum’s September 5, Greg Kwedar’s Sing Sing, John Chu’s Wicked, Malcolm Washington’s The Piano Lesson, Ali Abbasi’s The Apprentice, Mike Leigh’s Hard Truths, and RaMell Ross’ Nickel Boys. Others like Luca Guadagnino’s Challengers (or Queer), Pablo Larrain’s Maria, or Coralie Fargeat’s The Substance could still be dark horses. Given the Academy’s recent trend of including international films – evident in the past two years with five primarily non-English language nominees in Best Picture – it wouldn’t be surprising to see another international entry like Mohammad Rasoulof’s The Seed of the Sacred Fig or Payal Kapadia’s All We Imagine As Light join the ranks.

Here’s an overview of my current predictions following the films I observed at Middleburg:

I’ve maintained Conclave as my frontrunner since my initial predictions in March. My rationale remains strong – an election year zeitgeist, a skilled director, a respected adaptation, a large ensemble cast, extensive craftsmanship appealing to guild members, and crucially, it resonates with audiences. I believe it has the stuff needed to succeed on a preferential ballot. I also wonder how a foreign language musical, a chaotic film about strippers, and a nearly four-hour epic, Conclave’s toughest competitors, will be perceived by Academy voters.

It was tough to remove Sing Sing from my predictions, but I suspect A24 may focus more on The Brutalist. If Wicked proves strong, its passionate fanbase could drive it to a top spot on their ballots. It’s a bit of a flier, for the moment, but what fun is it if you don’t roll the dice a little?

At this stage, I typically align my Director predictions with the films I believe will be strong contenders for Best Picture. This strategy is informed by the historical trend of Picture winners often receiving Director nominations. We all know the stat Ben Affleck (Argo), Peter Farrelly (Green Book), and Sian Heder (CODA) ended by watching their films win Picture without them being nominated in Director. I feel that those abnormalities are more glitch in the matrix than something you would want to try and predict at this stage. I still believe in placing my chips on the eventual Picture winner’s film being nominated for Director.

I’ve also had Ridley in front since my initial predictions because God damn it, let me dream! But seriously, I anticipated Gladiator II would be the big spectacle that it seems to be, and felt if he can recapture 80% of what he did with the first film, it might be time for the Academy to finally award him for a career spanning six decades.

If Timothée Chalamet wins, he would become the youngest recipient of the Lead Actor Oscar. His strongest competitor may well be Adrien Brody, ironically, who currently holds the record for the youngest winner in this category – Chalamet could surpass him by just a few months.

This is the toughest acting category to pick a front-runner. Any of those first three have a narrative – the young, pretty ingénue (Madison), the seasoned veteran delivering her career-best performance (Jolie), and a history-making turn that might be hard to deny (Gascón).

This category is the most challenging to predict, especially in the lead spot. Each of the top three contenders has a compelling narrative: Madison as the young, pretty ingenue, Jolie delivering what many consider her career-best performance, and Gascón potentially making history.

Culkin is a strong frontrunner, and I believe he’ll help A Real Pain secure a spot in the Best Picture lineup. Meanwhile, September 5 has the potential to be a contender as well, which could pave the way for John Magaro to sneak into the Supporting Actor race. His performance is the driving force of this outstanding film, and following his impressive work last year in Past Lives, I’m hopeful that Academy voters will consider him for a nomination.

Saldaña is the safest bet for a nomination in any acting category this year, though there’s debate over whether she should be campaigned for Lead instead. I would love to see Rossellini earn her first Oscar nomination for her scene-stealing role in Conclave.

Since 2000, every Best Picture winner has been nominated for Screenplay, with the winners matching up seventeen times in those twenty-four years (71% of the time). The introduction of the preferential ballot in 2009 shows an even higher win-rate, underscoring the importance of these categories in predicting the eventual winner.

That will wrap things up. You can find my full slate of 2025 Oscar predictions over at Gold Derby (Experts).

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Mark Johnson

Mark Johnson has been a prominent voice in film coverage and the Oscar race since 2009. He launched his career with his own website, Award Contenders, before joining forces with Clayton Davis at Awards Circuit from 2011 to 2020. After continuing his insightful work at Awards Daily from 2020 to 2024, Mark now contributes to both The Contending and AwardsWatch. His renowned Oscar predictions column, The Awards Alchemist (formerly Good As Gold), has solidified his reputation in the industry. A member of the Critics Choice Association, Mark regularly attends major film festivals, including Telluride, Nantucket, and Middleburg, offering in-depth analysis and predictions throughout awards season.

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