FINAL 2025 Oscar Predictions: ANIMATED FEATURE, DOCUMENTARY FEATURE, INTERNATIONAL FEATURE FILM

The Animated Feature race comes down to two films, the indie success Flow and the studio box office blockbuster The Wild Robot. They’ve each volleyed precursor wins; Flow won the Golden Globe, Robot won Critics Choice, they both won their respective Annie categories. Then BAFTA came in and said, how about Wallace & Gromit? While both Flow and The Wild Robot are loved and celebrated films, it’s a real David and Goliath here and sometimes it goes the way of the classic story, like The Boy and the Heron beating Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. It’s tempting to make the case that it could happen again but that pairing came with two huge factors; the potentially final film from Hayao Miyazaki (it’s not) and the middle film of a trilogy. TBATH won both the Globe and BAFTA on the way to its Oscar win and if Flow had pulled that coup as well I think we’d have a closer race. Flow being able to make the International Feature Film cut as well – a first for Latvia – is pretty big, and if you’ve seen the photos and video of the Flow Golden Globe on display in Latvia’s national museum, the countrywide pride speaks volumes. Then being able to win the international film prize at the Spirit Awards over things like All We Imagine as Light and Hard Truths? Impressive. Not industry, but impressive nonetheless. I think there’s still a good chance for it, but The Wild Robot, also nominated in other categories (but missing song is still weird), should be able to eke this out.

Documentary Feature is proving to be one of the most difficult categories this season with what should be an undeniable frontrunner in No Other Land yet still, days before the Oscars, not a single U.S. distributor will touch it. It can’t be understated that after Jonathan Glazer’s Oscar speech last year for The Zone of Interest, backlash from the Jewish community in Hollywood torched the director for referring the ongoing Israeli genocide of Palestinians, pre and post October 7 as an ‘occupation’ was swift, and backed by Variety, the biggest and oldest outlet in Hollywood. Critically the most awarded and lauded doc of the year, it’s hard to say if there is enough support and what a vote for the film says in the overarching narrative of what it means to win an Oscar during social and politically tension-ridden times. If it loses it’s a pretty clear rebuke of all things Palestine and a circling of the wagons. If it wins, I think we can expect a potentially history-making speech from filmmakers Basel Adra, Rachel Szor, Hamdan Ballal, and Yuval Abraham. And that may be enough to keep it from happening. So in the absence of No Other Land, what triumphs? Sugarcane and Porcelain War are the easiest alternates, the former examining missing children at an Indian residential school and the latter set amid the Ukrainian war and the battle to save art. Both are healthy subjects for a win in this category but it’s good to note that only Porcelain War earned PGA and DGA nominations, winning DGA, and by far the ‘safer’ pick. But after two years in a row of Ukraine/Russia-centered winners, voters might want to reward something else.

The rise of I’m Still Here, with it’s shocking Best Picture nomination and (less surprising) Best Actress nod, is something we’ll study for years when it comes to Oscar predicting. Rarely have we seen quite literally an entire country unify over an Oscar contender the way Brazil came to bat for the film and Fernanda Torres. Now obviously, millions of fans are not Oscar voters but even a non-chronically online person would have seen the sheer volume of support the film was given during both Oscar voting periods. And with Emilia Pérez suffering potentially fatal damage between the nominations announcement and winner voting, the perfect storm brewed for an upset. But it’s important to not get overwhelmed by the perception of that damage vs the reality of it. The film still has plenty of support (if you believe the ‘anonymous’ ballots) with supporting actress nominee Isabella Rossellini (Conclave) saying she voted for Karla Sofía Gascón in Best Actress. Sometimes the bubble of controversy is just a bubble. But if Brazil is going to triumph, it’s going to be here.

Here are my final Oscar predictions for Animated Feature, Documentary Feature and International Feature Film for the 97th Academy Awards.

ANIMATED FEATURE

DOCUMENTARY FEATURE

INTERNATIONAL FEATURE FILM

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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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