Oscars 2024: Full List of Predictions

Jeremy BeckOscars
Selena Gomez in Emilia Perez

Tonight’s the big night, so for your convenience, we’re combining all of our predictions in the 20 feature categories at this year’s Oscars into this omnibus post. It’s curious that, while I’m (tentatively) picking Anora to win Best Picture, I’m also pegging it to take just one other prize; if that holds, it would be only the second Best Picture winner to do so since 1952 (along with Spotlight).

Of course, that won’t hold; a number of these picks will be wrong. Last year I went 18-for-20, thanks in part to Oppenheimer’s dominance; I expect to do far worse this time around. Which is cool! Praise be to a suspenseful and unpredictable 97th Academy Awards. (Categories are arranged alphabetically; click on the header link to be taken to our analysis for that specific race.)

Best Actor
Will win: Adrien Brody—The Brutalist (confidence: 2/5)
Should win: Ralph Fiennes—Conclave
Worst omission: Glen Powell—Hit Man Read More

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Oscars 2024: Best Picture and Best Director

Jeremy BeckOscars
Mikey Madison in Anora; Ralph Fiennes in Conclave

You know what’s cool about this year’s Oscars? They’re uncertain. One could even use the word “exciting”! After back-to-back years of heavy sweeps (by Everything Everywhere All at Once and Oppenheimer), we’re looking at genuine races in a number of major categories, including these two. The suspense is, well, suspenseful. I’m basically guessing in at least five above-the-line fields, and that lack of confidence is oddly freeing.

Fun times. Before we finish our analysis, if you missed our rundowns of the other 18 feature categories at this year’s Academy Awards, you can find them at these links:

The lead actors
The screenplays
The supporting actors
The big techies
The odds and ends

BEST DIRECTOR

NOMINEES
Jacques Audiard—Emilia Pérez
Sean Baker—Anora
Brady Corbet—The Brutalist
Coralie Fargeat—The Substance
James Mangold—A Complete Unknown Read More

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Oscars 2024: Best Actor and Best Actress

Jeremy BeckOscars
Demi Moore in The Substance; Timothee Chalamet in A Complete Unknown

We’re saving our analysis of the Best Picture race for tomorrow, but for today, a quick confession: Of all of the Oscar categories that I run through every year—and so far in 2024 we’ve looked at the supporting actors, the screenplays, the big techies, and some odds and ends—the lead acting fields are always my favorite. Not because they’re competitive (though both races this year are more intriguing than typical), but because they yield the ceremonial creation of my own ballots—a torturous annual exercise, but one I find valuable as a historical matter. It’s easy to exclaim that a specific performance was “snubbed,” or to express bewilderment that a certain actor has never been recognized in their entire career. It’s harder, or at least requires more precision, to point to a rigid five-person field in a given year that you assembled and memorialized at the time. So when I declare that Saoirse Ronan should have received nine Oscar nods already, I’m not (just) randomly raving; I also have the (subjective) data to back it up. Take that, internet!

BEST ACTOR

NOMINEES
Adrien Brody—The Brutalist
Timothée Chalamet—A Complete Unknown
Colman Domingo—Sing Sing
Ralph Fiennes—Conclave
Sebastian Stan—The Apprentice Read More

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Oscars 2024: The Screenplays

Jeremy BeckOscars
Ralph Fiennes in Conclave; Yura Borisov in Anora

We’re moving right along in our analysis of this year’s Oscars. Having previously weighed in on the supporting actors, plus various below-the-line categories, it’s time to wrestle with the world’s dumbest profession: writing. People get paid to do this? Seems absurd.

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY

NOMINEES
A Complete Unknown—Jay Cocks and James Mangold
Conclave—Peter Straughan
Emilia Pérez—Jacques Audiard
Nickel Boys—RaMell Ross and Joslyn Barnes
Sing Sing—Clint Bentley, Greg Kwedar, Clarence Maclin, and John “Divine G” Whitfield

WILL WIN
Conclave. No multiple rounds of voting required. Read More

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Oscars 2024: The Supporting Actors

Jeremy BeckOscars
Kieran Culkin in A Real Pain; Zoe Saldana in Emilia Perez

Now we’re cooking. The past few days, we’ve looked at 2024’s miscellaneous Oscar categories great and small, which means it’s time to dig into the races that might actually interest normal people. First up, the supporting actor races, where the outcomes are virtually assured but my personal preferences are rather less clear.


BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

NOMINEES
Monica Barbaro—A Complete Unknown
Ariana Grande—Wicked
Felicity Jones—The Brutalist
Isabella Rossellini—Conclave
Zoe Saldaña—Emilia Pérez

WILL WIN
Saldaña. It helps that she’s the lead of her movie, but that’s not her fault. You can make a half-convincing case for Grande (also a co-lead) if you argue that the Emilia Pérez backlash will preclude Academy members from voting for it in any major category. But Saldaña has been saying all the right things on the circuit, where she’s been scooping up every trophy in sight. With luck, she’ll use her speech to accuse the audience of acting like a baby, making noise, don’t know what to do. Read More

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