2026 Oscar Predictions: BEST PICTURE and BEST DIRECTOR (August)

This is the last gasp of ‘good on paper’ predictions. Where most films still haven’t been seen but we bank on a director, a cast, a script, something that propels us, compels us, to find a spot for it on our list. Sometimes there’s a test screening that provides some detail, sometimes we ‘hear’ things and often we’re ‘told’ them. But really, nothing matters until we see them and in less than three weeks time the majority of contenders will have screened and we’ll say things like ‘yep, that was top tier all along’ or ‘what were we thinking?’

With that in mind, August’s top 10 sees It Was Just an Accident and The Lost Bus as upwardly mobile with One Battle After Another and Bugonia taking a tumble. A blunder to make big moves on the precipice of knowledge? Perhaps, or maybe it’s precience. We’ll know soon.

Here are my 2026 Oscar nomination predictions in Best Picture and Best Director for August.

BEST PICTURE

Next up: The Testament of Ann Lee (TBD), The Ballad of the Small Player (Netflix), Materialists (A24) NEW, No Other Choice (NEON) NEW, Nouvelle Vague (Netflix), Sound of Falling (MUBI), Train Dreams (Netflix), Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery (Netflix), Weapons (Warner Bros/New Line Cinema) NEW

Other contenders: Anemone (Focus Features), A Bold, Beautiful Journey (Sony Pictures), Blue Moon (Sony Pictures Classics), Die My Love (MUBI), Eleanor the Great (Sony Pictures Classics), Ella McCay (20th Century Studios), Father, Mother, Sister, Brother (MUBI), Highest 2 Lowest (Apple/A24), The History of Sound (MUBI), If I Had Legs I’d Kick You (A24), The Life of Chuck (NEON), The Mastermind (MUBI), The Phoenician Scheme (Focus Features)

Looks like 2026: At the Sea (TBD), The Drama (A24), Klara and the Sun (Sony Pictures), Pressure (Focus Features)

BEST DIRECTOR

Next up: Mona Fastvold – The Testament of Ann Lee (TBD), James Cameron – Avatar: Fire and Ash (20th Century Studios), Edward Berger – The Ballad of the Small Player (Netflix) ↓, Celine Song – Materialists (A24) NEW, Park Chan-wook – No Other Choice (NEON) NEW, Clint Bentley – Train Dreams (Netflix) NEW, Zach Cregger – Weapons (Warner Bros/New Line Cinema) NEW

Other contenders: Ronan Day-Lewis – Anemone (Focus Features), Kogonada – A Bold, Beautiful Journey (Sony Pictures), Richard Linklater – Blue Moon (Sony Pictures Classics), Lynne Ramsay – Die My Love (MUBI), James L. Brooks – Ella McCay (20th Century Studios), Oliver Hermanus – The History of Sound (MUBI), Mike Flanagan – The Life of Chuck (NEON), Wes Anderson – The Phoenician Scheme (Focus Features), Mascha Schilinski – Sound of Falling (MUBI)

Looks like 2026: Kornél Mundruczó – At the Sea (TBD), Kristoffer Borgli – The Drama (A24), Taika Waititi – Klara and the Sun (Sony Pictures), Anthony Maras – Pressure (Focus Features)

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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), Critics Choice Association (CCA), San Francisco Bay Area Film Critics Circle (SFBAFCC) 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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