The Film Experience

No one predicted I'M STILL HERE in Best Picture. | © Sony Pictures Classics

We're still reeling from this morning's Oscar nominations announcement but it's time to check predictions and assess the numbers. Like last year, various members of the Team Experience put forward their best guesses. While the point of this exercise is to see how different folks see the race, it's also a little competition of sorts, with a pundit ranking at the end. Overall, our collection of writers did better than last year, averaging a 75% success rate when excluding those tricky short film categories. These predictions also help us grasp what the day's big surprises truly were, both in terms of shocking selections or notorious snubs. Without further ado, here's the final score…

PREDICTION SCORES

As always happens, some folks dared to adventure into the short film races while others opted out. That gives us two pundit rankings. The first includes those pesky categories, and the percentages consider all 120 Oscar nominations in the whole gamut of 23 races. The results:

1) Eric Blume – 91/120 – 76%
2) Cláudio Alves – 88/120 – 73%
3) Eurocheese – 85/120 – 71%
4/5/6) Abe Friedtanzer – 84/120 – 70%
4/5/6) Ben Miller – 84/120 – 70%
4/5/6) Nathaniel Rogers – 84/120 – 70%

Without the shorts categories, we can include the best guesses from Baby Clyde, Chris James, and Nick Taylor in the 20 feature categories, from Best Picture to Best International Film. Considering only 105 potential guesses, the results are:

1) Eric Blume – 85/105 – 81%
2) Cláudio Alves – 83/105 – 79%
3) Baby Clyde – 82/105 – 78%
4) Chris James – 81/105 – 77%
5) Ben Miller – 80/105 – 76%
6) Eurocheese – 78/105 – 74%
7) Abe Friedtanzer – 77/105 – 73%
8/9) Nathaniel Rogers – 76/105 – 72%
8/9) Nick Taylor – 76/105 – 72%

Either way, Eric Blume is our champion. Congratulations on making a remarkable leap from last year, when our resident writer only got 82 correct guesses.

Funnily enough, I guessed the exact same number of correct nominations – 88 – while Chris James and Ben Miller dropped one each. Nick Taylor actually improved, getting two more correct predictions than last year. Abe Friedtanzer went from 83 to 77, Eurocheese from 84 to 78, and Nathaniel from 87 to 76. Baby Clyde is a tad trickier to consider since, in the 2023/4 season, he only predicted the so-called "above the line" races. Considering only those, he got the same result, 37 out of 45.

NICKEL BOYS | © Amazon MGM Studios

BIGGEST SURPRISES

Nobody predicted any of these nominations:

I'M STILL HERE and NICKEL BOYS in Best Picture.

WICKED in Best Original Score.

THE WILD ROBOT in Best Sound.

IN THE SHADOW OF THE CYPRESS in Best Animated Short.

INSTRUMENTS OF A BEATING HEART in Best Documentary Short.

THE LAST RANGER in Best Live-Action Short.

Last year, we had eight big surprises. Today, we can only count seven, but two are quite major. While the acting races were more predictable than usual, the Best Picture race threw us all for a loop. The best anyone did was eight out of ten, with Nick and Nathaniel getting only seven. Like most Team Experience members, they went with A Real Pain and Sing Sing, with the former guessing All We Imagine as Light and the latter staying true to those early season September 5 predictions.

Interestingly enough, all the other surprises come from categories for which we had a shortlist. Oh well, better luck next year to the Team Experience wannabe pundits.

CHALLENGERS | © Amazon MGM Studios

BIGGEST SNUBS

But what about the sure things AMPAS outright rejected? Every Team Experience writer predicted these:

CHALLENGERS in Best Original Score.

"KISS THE SKY" from THE WILD ROBOT in Best Original Song.

ONCE UPON A TIME IN UKRAINE in Best Documentary Short.

Again, these all come from the shortlist categories. Challengers joins a number of Best Original Score Globe winners who fail to even get an Oscar nomination. The musical taste of the music branch and international critics remains at odds.

Last year, the only big snub was Margot Robbie in Best Actress.

YUCK! | © Ikki Films

LEAPS OF FAITH

In these cases, only one writer went to bat for an eventual Oscar nominee. We must celebrate these leaps of faith with as much fervor as we mourn our many wrong predictions. These little miracles were:

Nathaniel Rogers was the only writer to predict JAMES MANGOLD in Best Director.

Eurocheese was the only writer to predict WICKED in Best Editing.

Nathaniel Rogers was the only writer to predict EMILIA PÉREZ in Best Cinematography.

Eric Blume was the only writer to predict EMILIA PÉREZ in Best Makeup & Hairstyling.

Cláudio Alves was the only writer to predict FLOW in Best International Film.

Abe Friedtanzer was the only writer to predict YUCK! In Best Animated Short.

Cláudio Alves was the only writer to predict DEATH BY NUMBERS in Best Documentary Short.

Abe Friedtanzer was the only writer to predict A LIEN in Best Live-Action Short.

We get a couple more successful leaps of faith this season, going from last year's six to eight—however, the categories where this manifested and the writers involved are quite different. Nick Taylor and Ben Miller were here for the 96th Academy Award predictions. Conversely, Eric Blume, Abe Friedtanzer, and I can celebrate our first winning "no guts, no glory" hunches.

In terms of categories, last year this happened with the three shorts categories, Best Animated Film, Best Documentary Feature, and Best Sound. Nothing quite as significant as this season's Director, Editing, and Cinematography races.

Some other pieces of trivia and observations include:

Out of 23 categories, only Best Animated Feature was correctly predicted across the board. It's officially the year's most predictable race.

A total of 15 categories saw no one getting a 5/5 score. They include Best Picture, Director, Supporting Actress, and Original Screenplay.

Speaking of those rare 5/5 scores, of the eight races that someone predicted perfectly, one of them was correctly guessed by only one writer. That was me in Best International Film.

Besides the shorts categories, Best Costume Design was the year's most unpredictable race. Abe Firedtanzer came closest to a perfect set, only missing Conclave for The Brutalist.

Though Eric Blume is our overall champion, Chris James got the highest number of 5/5 scores, with six. He correctly predicted the full lineups for Best Actress, Actor, Supporting Actor, Production Design, Visual Effects, and Best Animated Feature.

Furthermore, if you study the predictions closely, you start to see some personal idiosyncrasies. My biggest issue was doubting The Brutalist, missing four of its ten nominations – Best Supporting Actress, Supporting Actor, Original Screenplay, and Editing. On the other hand, Nathaniel Rogers predicted only two nominations for The Substance, missing three major ones – Best Picture, Director, and Original Screenplay. We all underestimated Emilia Pérez, with nobody predicting its historic haul of 13 nominations. Unsurprisingly, Eric Blume got closest, predicting 12 nods, while Abe Friedtanzer was the biggest doubter of them all, predicting the French musical would finish the season with only seven nominations.

That's all, folks. Oscar coverage will continue at The Film Experience until the ceremony's aftermath. The 97th Academy Awards will take place on Sunday, March 2nd.

Who do you think will win at the Oscars? Sound off in the comments.