Oscar Season: Where are We Now?

The 4 Frontrunners: (from left to right) "12 Years A Slave", "American Hustle", "Her", (pictured bottom), and "Gravity" (pictures courtesy of rottentomatoes.com)

2013 has been one of the richest years in films; so many filmmakers have brought their A-game, eliciting equally amazing work from their actors. It's refreshingly competitive after the last couple years of complete sweeps (The King's Speech, The Artist, Argo, etc). By this time last year, we had a frontrunner (granted, that frontrunner didn't make it all the way to win an Oscar, but it was a frontrunner no less) in Zero Dark Thirty; it was dominating the critics, picking up wins for Picture, Director Kathryn Bigelow and lead actress Jessica Chastain every which way you looked. There was some heat from Lincoln and Amour, but it seemed like ZDT was going to take it all the way. This year, we have not 1 frontrunner, but 4.

With the announcement from the major critics organizations: NYFCC (New York Film Critics Circle), NBR (National Board of Review), LAFCA (Los Angeles Film Critics), and the BFC (Boston Film Critics), 12 Years A Slave, American Hustle, Her, and Gravity have each picked up respective Best Picture trophies (in the case of Gravity and Her, the LAFCA couldn't decide which they liked better and awarded both). There's wide support beyond the picture categories: Gravity also won a directing award with the LAFCA, while Her won Picture and Directing honors with the NBR. 12 Years A Slave swept with the Boston film critics with wins for director Steve McQueen, actor Chiwetel Ejiofor, and supporting actress Lupita Nyong'o. American Hustle's Jennifer Lawrence won by a single point over Nyong'o during the NYFCC voting; it also won the screenplay award.

Christian Bale, Amy Adams, and director David O. Russell on the set of "American Hustle" (courtesy of totalfilm.com)

So what do these wins mean exactly? Ever since 2010, the year where The Social Network won every consecutive critic's award for Best Picture and then lost the major guild prizes, prognosticators have claimed that these awards have less of a role in the Oscar race than some would like to believe. "Not true" says Awards Daily's Sasha Stone, "LA and NY film critics are one of the only crucial film critics awards that push contenders into the Oscar race."

Stone is a respected authority in the film-journalism world, and belongs on the prestigious Gurus of Gold panel. She's often very accurate with her predictions, and only missed out in a handful of categories in last year's race. To say she is an expert, is an understatement. "The NYFCC have changed their strategy recently by wanting to be the first booming voice in the awards race. They have accomplished that, and the win for American Hustle puts it squarely in the Best Picture race. Given the history of NYFCC and Oscar, seems near-impossible for this film not to at least be a major player."

The Film Experience's Nathaniel Rogers agrees: "The LAFCA is inarguably an important critics prize in terms of influence and reach to the AMPAS. Why? The answer is three fold. First, geography. Second, they're an institution having handed out prizes since 1975. Third, they don't stray too far from Oscar's own aesthetics which surely make them more accessible to voters. In short they're more likely to gently nudge voters than shout bold statements at them. In their 38 year history to date they've only given their Best Film prize to movies that didn't end up competing for Best Picture 7 times."

In just 2 days, the Screen Actors Guild will be announcing their nominees, and you can bet anything that American Hustle and 12 Years A Slave will be not only competing for individual acting nominations, but for the Best Acting Ensemble award, which gives them major gravitas heading into the race (Gravity and Her don't have much of an ensemble to speak of, but will definitely be present in the individual categories for Sandra Bullock and Joaquin Phoenix's performances) seeing as the actors are the largest voting body in the Academy. Soon after that, the Globes, PGA (Producers Guild), DGA (Directors Guild), and BAFTA (British Academy) will follow suit, and the winners will start winning; patterns will form, and the frontrunners will emerge from the pack of hopeful contenders. 

Sandra Bullock as Ryan Stone in Gravity (courtesy of collider.com)

What ever film wins the PGA and DGA will no doubt win Best Picture; the support of those 2 guilds will translate into votes at the Oscars, and look to see that same support in other acting races. The only category we can call for sure right now, is Best Actress, which is the only category none of the 4 front runner films really have much of a presence in outside of nominations for their leading ladies (and in the case of Her and 12 Years, they're not present at all in this race). Cate Blanchett hasn't lost a critic's prize yet; the closest she came was a shared award at the LAFCA with Adele Exarchopoulos. That happened with Emmanuelle Riva and Jennifer Lawrence last year, and Lawrence was the one who won the Globe, SAG, and ultimately the Oscar.

The ball has only just started rolling, it's only a matter of time until the momentum picks up, and our winner's identity is revealed.

I've compiled a timeline of important dates of nomination/winner announcements, from now until the very end of the season. You'll be able to see how much happens in just a short window of time; within the next month, we're going to hear from A LOT of awards bodies. You can view it here.

(I knew most of the dates from various press releases/tweets advertising nomination announcements/award show dates, but I had some help in constructing this wonderful little timeline from Sasha Stone and her nifty awards season calendar.)