Critics awards are fun and they can help create potential narratives (or bolster existing ones) but it’s the film and television guilds that really tell us where the wind is blowing for Oscar nominations. Many guild members are also members of their corresponding Academy branch and next week is going to bring us the Art Directors Guild (9th), Cinema Audio Society (10th), Costume Designers Guild (10th), American Cinema Editors (11th) and the Motion Picture Sound Editors (13th).
Eligibility is key in many of these guild races (which is what makes the Writers Guild such a strange batch of noms every year) and sometimes the list of eligible films to choose from can come from a relatively small pool (like the ADG). Still, it takes a bit of knowledge and instinct to know what they’re going to go for and what it will actually mean. Three of these groups split their nominations by categories including comedy or drama for ACE and period, fantasy and contemporary for ADG and CDG. That gives us 15 nominations each from which to figure out how to get it to five for an Academy Award nod.
Sometimes these guilds follow the path for a film we already know it’s on but sometimes, like last year with Bohemian Rhapsody, it highlights that a film is potentially a tech behemoth that we need to be in front of rather than behind. What looks like that this year? I think Joker is the biggest, most likely candidate to be a huge guild getter. It could show up at every one of these. This might be where Downton Abbey shows off its best finery or where a straightforward drama like Marriage Story asserts itself as a Best Picture frontrunner. Ad Astra, 1917 and Ford v Ferrari should be major players here as well. But there’s also always those films that perform really well at this stage and then just seem to disappear right at Oscar nomination voting. A Quiet Place did that last year, across multiple guilds (including SAG and PGA) and ended up with a single mention, for Sound Editing.
Here are my predictions for the Art Directors Guild (ADG), Cinema Audio Society (CAS), Costume Designers Guild (CDG), American Cinema Editors (ACE) and the Motion Picture Sound Editors (MPSE).
Art Directors Guild (ADG)
Period Film
Spoilers: Downton Abbey, Ford v Ferrari, The Irishman
Fantasy Film
Spoilers: Ad Astra, Alita: Battle Angel, Dumbo
Contemporary Film
Spoilers: Us
Cinema Audio Society (CAS)
Spoilers: Avengers: Endgame, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
Costume Designers Guild (CDG)
Excellence in Period Film
Spoilers: The Aeronauts, Downton Abbey, The Irishman, Jojo Rabbit
Excellence in Fantasy Film
Spoilers: Ad Astra, Captain Marvel
Excellence in Contemporary Film
Spoilers: Knives Out, Parasite
American Cinema Editors (ACE)
Best Edited Feature Film (Dramatic)
Spoilers: Parasite, Richard Jewell, The Two Popes
Best Edited Feature Film (Comedy)
Spoilers: Dolemite Is My Name, The Farewell, Rocketman, Uncut Gems
Motion Picture Sound Editors (MPSE)
Outstanding Achievement in Sound Editing – Feature Animation
Outstanding Achievement in Sound Editing – Foreign Language Feature
Outstanding Achievement in Sound Editing – Feature Motion Picture – Music Underscore
Outstanding Achievement in Sound Editing – Feature Motion Picture – Musical
Outstanding Achievement in Sound Editing – Feature Motion Picture – Dialogue/ADR
Outstanding Achievement in Sound Editing – Feature Motion Picture – Effects/Foley
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