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Florence Foster Jenkins

Of course, the Oscars are nothing if not a political game. Every week, new films are released, reviewed, and hyped by the Hollywood machine. And that means that every week, new frontrunners might emerge. The Oscar Grouch will be back every Wednesday to keep you updated on this year’s Oscar race.

One of the temptations when it comes to covering the Oscar race week-in and week-out is to react to each pre-Oscar development as if it’s a major game-changer. That’s been tough this week in particular, as we’ve had Sunday night’s Golden Globes followed by yesterday’s BAFTA and Producers Guild nominations. Each of those “matters,” at least a little bit. The Globes give a big boost of visibility just when Oscar hopefuls need it; the BAFTA and PGA members have enough overlap with the Academy that we get a little window into what voters are thinking.

So if we’re going by the Globes/BAFTA/PGA triumverate this week, it’s been very good news for:

Aaron Taylor-Johnson, surprise Globe winner for Best Supporting Actor
Nocturnal Animals in general, which took 9 BAFTA nominations, second only to La La Land‘s 11
Meryl Streep, whose defiant anti-Trump speech while accepting the Cecil B. DeMille Award surely reminded many Oscar voters why they like her so much, and whose Best Actress candidacy for Florence Foster Jenkins may have gotten a shot in the arm
Emily Blunt, whose BAFTA nomination for Best Actress in The Girl on the Train pairs with her surprise SAG nomination for same to suddenly put her on the cusp of her first Oscar nomination
Deadpool, whose surprise inclusion on the PGA top 10 (we had some better options) list has people thinking it has a shot at Best Picture.

In the interest of keeping a level head, however, we reached out to veteran entertainment reporter Jeff Sneider for his thoughts on which movies and performers are peaking at the right time.

Decider.com: So, okay, the law requires that I lead off with a question about Meryl Streep. After delivering a speech like she did right as Oscar balloting has begun, how much do you think she boosted her chances of a Best Actress nomination? And if so, which two of Amy Adams, Annette Bening, and Ruth Negga will lose out?

Jeff Sneider: I think Hollywood’s grand dame Meryl Streep struck a chord with her Globes speech that could very well resonate with Academy voters, who obviously adore her already. Florence Foster Jenkins remains the only major “awards movie” that I haven’t seen, so I can’t speak to Streep’s performance in the film, but I think that speech will end up helping her earn yet another nomination. Natalie Portman and Emma Stone are the two locks. Conventional wisdom had Annette Bening in the 3-slot, but 20th Century Women just isn’t gaining the traction it needed (and deserves). I always thought Amy Adams had a better chance than the pundits first said, and Arrival has done well at the box office. Meanwhile, Ruth Negga didn’t really do much for me in Loving, and the industry doesn’t know her as well as the other contenders.

The other actress in the mix is Isabelle Huppert, who in a major upset, won the Globe Sunday night for Elle. That said, the HFPA is a very different voting body than the Academy, and Elle is a difficult film to grapple with. It sends mixed messages. I think Negga is out, and it’s a battle between Huppert and Bening for that 5th and final slot, with Bening taking it in a popularity contest, even though you can’t underestimate the (pro-Huppert) BAFTA contingent within the Academy. But who knows? Maybe they both get in and it’s Adams who gets snubbed. Either way, there’s too much competition for Negga. She’ll get the short end of the stick, because Loving could have and should have been better. There’s no way she gets in over Streep after that rousing speech, which is still trending on social media.

Decider.com: In general, the trend over the last 10 years or so has seen the Golden Globe winners diverge greatly from the eventual Oscar winners. There was a time when the Globes were much more predictive of Oscar success. Do you have thoughts on why this is? And whether it’s a good thing?

I think social media is a major reason behind why you’ve seen the Globes embrace more eclectic nominees over the past few years, in addition to the natural urge to shake up the typical monotony of the overlong awards season. Each voting body, be it a critics organization or the HFPA. is trying to put their own stamp on awards season. They’re not always interested in anointing the “best,” but rather, the most “deserving,” thereby shining a light on someone who hasn’t received enough attention. I think that 10 years ago, the Globes wanted to be seen as a precursor to the Oscars — giving awards to basically the same people, but giving them first. Now, I think the show is content to go its own way and isn’t so concerned with lining up with the tastes of Academy voters. They want their own set of worthy winners, and I applaud them for it.

Decider.com: By this same token, do you think Aaron Taylor-Johnson’s shocker of a win in Best Supporting Actor means anything for the Oscars?

Aaron Taylor-Johnson did phenomenal work in Nocturnal Animals, which I watched again this past weekend. I was beating the ATJ drum as soon as I saw the film in Toronto. His co-star, Michael Shannon, emerged from the fall festival circuit with the most awards buzz, but as much as I love him as an actor, there was never any question in my mind that ATJ delivered that film’s standout performance. The problem with awards season is that everyone gets caught up in group think, and you watch as this hive mind approach to awards analysis take hold. “Kris Tapley and Scott Feinberg think this, so that must be true.” You see this kind of thinking a lot, and there’s a reason behind it… Kris and Scott are two of the best at what they do. They talk to actual voters and do their homework. But sometimes you have to trust your own eyes, hence my positioning ATJ over Michael Shannon all season.

I do think Aaron’s win at the Globes will prompt some undecided voters to give him the nod over Michael Shannon, so in that sense, yes, it does mean something. I don’t think ATJ has a real shot to win an Oscar, but for my money, he was better than Mahershala Ali (whose role in Moonlight is all too brief) and Jeff Bridges (who pretty much plays ‘Jeff Bridges’ in Hell or High Water), and I think his win will force voters to reassess his performance. I couldn’t take my eyes off ATJ when he was onscreen in Nocturnal Animals, and there’s one moment in particular where he gives a look nearly as terrifying as Edward Norton’s “arrest scene” in American History X. He’s so scary-good as a West Texas psycho, it’s hard to believe he’s a Brit. He does everything a memorable supporting actor should, and I’d like to hear his name called when the Oscar nominations are announced. His win at the Globes certainly didn’t hurt him, though Best Supporting Actor is always one of the more competitive categories. I guess we’ll have to wait and see…

That said, here are Decider’s current predictions for who we think will get nominated in all six major categories — not who we think deserves to be (ranked in order of “buzziness”). Enter “The Oscar Grouch“:

BEST PICTURE

Front Runners: La La Land, Moonlight, Manchester By the Sea, Hidden Figures, Lion, Hell or High Water, Hacksaw Ridge, Arrival, Fences, Nocturnal Animals

Potentially Interesting Spoiler: Silence

What’s The Buzz: Anybody holding out hope that Martin Scorsese’s Silence would make the kind of late-year run that The Wolf of Wall Street did were struck a blow when Silence was left off of the PGA list. Which is really a shame since Silence is twice the movie Wolf was (and I’m not just talking running time). Deadpool‘s PGA nod still doesn’t mean it’s Oscar-bound, but I’m getting wary that another bad movie, Tom Ford’s Nocturnal Animals, will sneak in if the field makes it to ten pictures. That massive BAFTA haul signifies something.

BEST DIRECTOR

Front Runners: Damien Chazelle (La La Land), Barry Jenkins (Moonlight), Kenneth Lonergan (Manchester by the Sea), Denis Villeneuve (Arrival), Martin Scorsese (Silence)

Potentially Interesting Spoiler: Theodore Melfi (Hidden Figures)

What’s The Buzz: Chazelle definitively cemented himself as the front-runner here after his triumph at the Globes. Beyond him, Jenkins, and Lonergan, this category is still wildly up in the air. Villeneuve and Scorsese (even if Silence misses) feel like they’re the most likely since their movies are so sweeping and grand. But perhaps we’re overlooking some better contenders. Movies like Hidden Figures, Lion, and Hell or High Water have been Best Picture contenders for weeks, yet nobody thinks their directors have a shot because they’re not big enough “names” in auteur circles, But as Room‘s Lenny Abrahamson proved last year, sometimes you don’t have to be. Hidden Figures has been coming on remarkably strong as of late; don’t sleep on Melfi.

BEST ACTOR

Front Runners: Casey Affleck (Manchester By the Sea), Denzel Washington (Fences), Ryan Gosling (La La Land), Andrew Garfield (Hacksaw Ridge), Viggo Mortensen (Captain Fantastic)

Potentially Interesting Spoiler: Jake Gyllenhaal (Nocturnal Animals)

What’s The Buzz: This top 5 has seemed fairly solid since Garfield and Mortensen pulled down SAG nominations several weeks ago. But the Nocturnal Animals rising tide could lift all sorts of boats, including that of Jake Gyllenhaal, whose miscast and misjudged lead performance somehow got the benefit of a BAFTA nod this week.

BEST ACTRESS

Front Runners: Emma Stone (La La Land), Natalie Portman (Jackie), Isabelle Huppert (Elle), Amy Adams (Arrival), Meryl Streep (Florence Foster Jenkins)

Potentially Interesting Spoiler: Emily Blunt (The Girl on the Train)

What’s The Buzz: All of a sudden, this race is totally up in the air, and not just at the top, where Emma Stone has officially supplanted Natalie Portman as the favorite. The recent ascendance of Streep and Blunt only reaffirms that Best Actress is THE race to watch this year. Now, Blunt’s no sure thing. Nobody seems to like her movie, for one. For another, both her SAG and BAFTA nominations can be explained away: SAG is always friendlier to multiplex-y movies like The Girl on the Train; BAFTA is more likely to go for a Brit like her than an American like Annette Bening. Still, Blunt has to be considered at least a possibility for Oscar. This is, of course, bad news for Bening and Ruth Negga, two actresses whose acclaimed performances may well have topped out with their Globe nominations.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

Front Runners: Mahershala Ali (Moonlight), Jeff Bridges (Hell or High Water), Dev Patel (Lion), Hugh Grant (Florence Foster Jenkins), Aaron Taylor-Johnson (Nocturnal Animals)

Potentially Interesting Spoiler: Lucas Hedges (Manchester by the Sea)

What’s The Buzz: Aaron Taylor-Johnson following up his shocker of a Globe win with a BAFTA nomination sure seems to be painting the picture of an Oscar nominee. More and more, Lucas Hedges’s (much-deserved) SAG nomination is looking like one of SAG’s occasional nods towards youth (Jacob Tremblay for Room; Dev Patel for Slumdog Millionaire) that don’t end up translating to Oscar.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Front Runners: Viola Davis (Fences), Michelle Williams (Manchester By the Sea), Naomie Harris (Moonlight), Nicole Kidman (Lion), Octavia Spencer (Hidden Figures)

Potentially Interesting Spoiler: Greta Gerwig (20th Century Women)

What’s The Buzz: Of all four acting races, this one feels the most sewn up. These five were the Globe nominees, they were the SAG nominees, and but for Octavia Spencer missing out to Hayley Squires from I, Daniel Blake (a nomination that has zero chance of crossing the Atlantic), these were the BAFTA nominees. So just allow me to make one more plea on behalf of Greta Gerwig, whose 20th Century Women performance was a lived-in delight.