The One Category You Don’t Want to Take a Risk On in Your Oscar Pool

February 19, 2024

The Big Picture

Our Best Director nominees at the 96th Academy Awards are Christopher Nolan, Justine Triet, Martin Scorsese, Yorgos Lanthimos, and Jonathan Glazer.
Now that the BAFTAs and the DGA Awards are in the rearview mirror, we’ve hit the point where our frontrunner is essentially a lock to win.
Find out who wins Best Director at the Oscars on March 10th.

Senior Producer Perri Nemiroff is keeping you up to date on the leading contenders for 2024’s Oscar for Best Actress based on her knowledge of industry trends and whispers. Check in for updates because just when you think you’ve got the race figured out, the game changes.

Here’s where things stand as of February 19th, 2024:

As we tease at the beginning of these Oscar prediction reports, “Check in for updates because just when you think you’ve got the race figured out, the game changes.” In most cases, that’s true. But not in the Best Director category.

Christopher Nolan has been the frontrunner here ever since Oppenheimer hit theaters in the summer of 2023. Sure, it’s important to keep an open mind as we make our way through the season and new contenders enter the race, but every single step of the way, Nolan further cemented himself as the #1 in this line-up, and has now pushed it to a point where many consider him a lock to win, myself included.

I’m always hesitant to speak in absolutes, but given the precursors Nolan has secured, he’s so far ahead of the pack that a surprise winner in this category feels impossible. On top of that, no one else has even emerged as a firm #2 in Best Director. Yes, I did settle on a ranking of all five nominees, but in all honesty? I could probably make a case for why any of the other four could be considered the second most likely to win in this category.

Image via Searchlight Pictures

One major factor I’m considering? How many nominations a director’s film received overall. Poor Things is the second most nominated film of the Oscar season with 11 nominations and Killers of the Flower Moon racked up the third most with 10 nominations. However, I’d give Martin Scorsese the edge over Yorgos Lanthimos simply because he’s Martin Scorsese. Both directed phenomenal films, but when the race for the #2 spot is so close, the scale will likely tip in the direction of the more substantial industry icon. It’s also pretty wild to consider that, even with one of the most impressive bodies of work in Hollywood, Scorsese has only won one single Oscar over the course of his career.

As for Justine Triet for Anatomy of a Fall and Jonathan Glazer for The Zone of Interest, again it’s a mighty tight race, but it does appear Anatomy of a Fall has a hair more overall momentum than The Zone of Interest. The Zone of Interest will likely dominate the International Feature category, but it’s fairly low in the ranks in the other categories it’s nominated in. Anatomy of a Fall, however, has a real chance of snagging the Best Original Screenplay Oscar and, if you read my Best Actress report, you already know I think there’s a slight chance that Sandra Hüller could pull off a surprise win there.

But again, these rankings feel a hair arbitrary and ultimately unnecessary. Nolan will go on to win this award. If you rolled into February thinking that maybe, just maybe, someone else could sneak in and take the win, those predictions were just obliterated by Nolan taking home the DGA win and Best Director award at the BAFTAs.

Everything has worked in his favor since July 21, 2023. And best of all, he plain old deserves the Oscar. Nolan made a movie covering wildly significant, complex and tragic material that is so highly enthralling and shockingly intimate that it invites you into J. Robert Oppenheimer’s (Cillian Murphy) headspace. Oppenheimer not only informs but challenges viewers to consider what it means to have and wield world-changing power.

I look forward to seeing Nolan win his very first Oscar on March 10th. (And hopes are high that Best Director will be one of at least two wins for him.)

Most Likely to Win Best Director: