With the 2024 Oscars now fast approaching, the frontrunners for the top prizes are slowly emerging—though a few jaw-dropping surprises are still possible. Here’s the Vogue verdict on who will win, who should win, and who should’ve been a contender in 13 key categories, from best director to best original song.
Best Picture
Will win: Oppenheimer
Should win: Poor Things
Should’ve been a contender: May December
Christopher Nolan’s eye-popping epic is as close to a lock for best picture as it’s possible to be—it’s so far taken home the top prizes at the Golden Globes, Critics’ Choice Awards, BAFTAs, and SAGs. Its presumed frontrunner status could lead voters to place other releases ahead of it on their ranked ballots, but even so, the support for its competitors is scattered and no other consensus choice seems to be emerging. If there was, somehow, a shocking final twist on the night—and it would certainly enliven the ceremony if there was—I would love to see Yorgos Lanthimos’s hallucinatory coming-of-age fantasy spoil things. In a post-Everything-Everywhere-All-at-Once Oscar landscape, it would be a fittingly wacky and exciting choice, while Oppenheimer feels like a return to the serious, stiff-upper-lipped status quo.
Having said that, though, Anatomy of a Fall, The Zone of Interest, and The Holdovers arguably have the same chance of swooping in as Poor Things does (which is to say, a very, very small one). This category is the strongest it’s been in years, but I would’ve liked to see Todd Haynes’s soapy family drama May December in the mix, too. It proved to be too challenging and provocative for the Academy (particularly in its less than flattering portrayal of actors and their profession), but remains one of 2023’s most thrilling cinematic experiences.
Best Director
Will win: Christopher Nolan for Oppenheimer
Should win: Yorgos Lanthimos for Poor Things
Should’ve been a contender: Greta Gerwig for Barbie
With the Golden Globe, Critics’ Choice award, BAFTA, and, crucially, the Directors Guild of America award already in his grasp, there’s no doubt that Nolan will be walking away with the best director statuette, and it’s hard to begrudge him—this is the auteur’s eighth Oscar nomination, following nods for Memento, Inception, and Dunkirk, and it’s high time he had this particular prize on his mantlepiece, though Oppenheimer isn’t my favorite film in his oeuvre. Meanwhile, there’s Yorgos Lanthimos, who has also, over the last decade, proven himself to be one of the most ambitious and provocative filmmakers working today, and does some of his best work to date in Poor Things. Anatomy of a Fall’s Justine Triet would also be highly deserving, as was the unfairly snubbed Greta Gerwig for Barbie.
Best Actress
Will win: Lily Gladstone for Killers of the Flower Moon