Every year in March the Academy Awards are presented, and every year film lovers and analysts worldwide try to predict the winners. Some succeed remarkably well; others are taken by surprise. But predicting the Oscars is not guesswork — it is a combination of understanding the structure of awards season, historical patterns and a sharp eye for what appeals to the Academy as a whole. In this article we explain the mechanisms behind the Oscar race.
Awards season: a months-long circuit
Awards season begins much earlier than the March ceremony. Formally it starts in August and September, when the major international film festivals reveal their programmes. Venice (September), Toronto (TIFF, September) and Telluride (September) are the first major stages where Oscar contenders reveal themselves to the public.
A premiere in Venice or a strong reception at TIFF is historically a powerful signal of Oscar relevance. Films such as The Shape of Water, Roma, Nomadland, The Power of the Dog and Coda — all winners of the Oscar for Best Picture — made their debuts at these festivals. The buzz a film generates at Venice or TIFF becomes a self-reinforcing mechanism: press, distributors and Oscar forecasters begin treating the film as a serious contender, giving it even more attention.
The guild awards: the best predictors
The best predictors of Oscar winners are the awards from Hollywood's guilds. The Screen Actors Guild Awards (SAG), the Directors Guild of America Awards (DGA), the Producers Guild of America Awards (PGA), the Writers Guild of America Awards (WGA) and the American Cinema Editors Awards (ACE Eddie) are handed out by the professionals themselves — and Academy members are those same professionals.
Historically there are strong correlations: the PGA winner for Best Picture takes the Oscar for Best Picture in the vast majority of cases. The DGA winner reliably predicts the Oscar for Best Director. The SAG Ensemble winner is a strong indicator for Best Picture (but not always for Best Actor or Actress). When a film wins at multiple guilds, its Oscar chances increase considerably.
The Oscar campaign
For the biggest studios, awards season is a marketing campaign that costs tens of millions of dollars. Screenings for Academy members, advertisements in trade publications such as Variety and The Hollywood Reporter, "For Your Consideration" campaigns, Q&A sessions, dinners and events — all aimed at convincing the approximately 10,000 Academy members to cast their votes for your film.
The campaign partly determines who gets nominated and who wins. A film that is technically superior but less aggressively campaigned will sometimes lose out to a film with a more forceful campaign. This is an inherent part of the Oscar system that draws much criticism, but it is also a practical reality of how voting dynamics work.
Oscar prediction checklist
- Does the film have positive buzz at Venice, Toronto or Telluride?
- Has the film won the PGA (Producers Guild)?
- Has the film won the DGA (Directors Guild)?
- Has the film won the SAG Ensemble?
- Does the film rank highly on Metacritic and Rotten Tomatoes?
- Is it a film about themes that have historically appealed to the Academy?
- Does the studio have an active and well-funded Oscar campaign?
What the Academy has historically favoured
The Academy has displayed clear preferences over the decades. Films about the film industry itself (Hollywood loves to see itself on screen) have historically done well: The Artist, Argo, Birdman. Biographical dramas about inspiring historical figures perform well: Gandhi, The King's Speech, 12 Years a Slave. Films that address a social problem but end on a hopeful note: Schindler's List, Green Book.
In recent years the Academy has expanded its membership to include more women, people of colour and international members. This has shifted preferences: Parasite (2019), the first non-English language film ever to win the Oscar for Best Picture, and Coda (2021), with an overwhelmingly deaf cast, are examples of a broadened perspective.
The importance of release timing
Timing is everything in awards season. Distributors deliberately schedule their Oscar hopefuls in the fourth quarter — September to December — so they are fresh in the minds of Academy members when voting begins in January. Films released earlier in the year are sometimes forgotten, however good they are.
For cinema programmers, awards season is also practically relevant: a Best Picture nomination brings a film back to cinemas, reviving attendance and extending its run. Films nominated for five or more Oscars deserve to be programmed or kept in the schedule until the ceremony.
Conclusion: recognising the patterns is half the battle
Oscar prediction is never an exact science — surprises are part of the season and make it exciting. But those who understand the structure — the festival circuit, the guild awards, the campaigns, the Academy's historical preferences — have a considerably better sense of which films have a genuine chance. And that is where the fun lies: following the race from Venice all the way to the night of the ceremony.
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