It’s a common refrain by now that this year’s Oscars will be short on surprises, what with Renée Zellweger, Joaquin Phoenix, Laura Dern, and Brad Pitt picking up nearly every other statue this season; Bong Joon Ho’s and Taika Waititi’s wins at the WGA Awards last weekend seemingly sealing the screenplay races; and best-picture threat 1917 likely to dominate most of the technical prizes. But there are 24 Oscar categories! Nobody, nobody can realistically claim they absolutely know who will win for best documentary short or production design, and with the original-score race seemingly down to 15-time nominee Thomas Newman for 1917 and 37-year-old newcomer Hildur Guðnadóttir for Joker, who can possibly guarantee what happens next?
On this week’s Little Gold Men podcast, Mike Hogan, Richard Lawson, Katey Rich, and Joanna Robinson gather to make their final Oscar predictions, from all three short categories—discussed in detail last week—to the best-picture showdown between 1917 and Parasite, which has the team evenly split. They also discuss the BAFTA Film Awards and their impact on the race, which mostly comes down to how the acting front-runners, particularly Joaquin Phoenix, made their cases with impactful speeches. And then there’s the whole mess with the Academy seemingly tweeting out all the Oscar winners early—which, in a week that also included the Iowa caucuses, proved that the Oscars aren’t immune from the chaos that seems to grip everything else these days.
Listen to the episode above, and read Vanity Fair’s overall Oscar predictions for more information on who’s picking what, and why. You can also fill out our interactive ballot to make your own picks, read Mark Harris on the Academy’s ongoing awkward growth spurt, see how Charlize Theron and more stars kicked off Oscar week with Vanity Fair, and, well, just poke around VF.com—there’s lots more Oscar coverage where that came from.
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