Awards analysis is provided by Sean from @MathTeacherMovies.

The Golden Globes ceremony went off with limited controversy with a down to earth host of Jerrod Carmichael who poked fun at the night while also keeping it classy and knowing how to schmooze the stars just the right amount. 

In terms of the winners, television was quite unpredictable and due to the different dates of eligibility it both solidified Emmy domination from last year and will make some solid predictions for next year’s Emmys, but those will be addressed at a later date. Therefore, with Oscar season in full force and the SAG Nominations coming out this week, it would be prudent to use these awards to discuss the narrative of Oscar nominations. 

While Everything Everywhere All at Once dominated in the performance categories, solidifying nominations for Michelle Yeoh and Ke Huy Quan in Best Actress and Best Supporting Actor, respectively, both by winning and also giving stunning and heartwarming speeches currying favor with the crowds, the film missed out on its win for Best Picture Musical/Comedy, Best Screenplay, and Best Director. Therefore, while this film has been considered the frontrunner for some time, its odds have probably dropped slightly. 

Yet, most recently, the Globes have not been great at picking Best Picture as another film other than the Drama and Comedy winners. The Best Picture Drama and Comedy winners that have won at the Globes have been more standard and safe picks recently and usually another film emerges as the front runner, which in this case could be the much less conventional Everything Everywhere All at Once. 

Angela Bassett was going to be a fairly obvious win for Best Supporting Actress in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, mainly because of her star power, a common trend of the reputation of the Globes, but she does also deserve the award for such a powerful performance. However, at this point she definitely solidified a nomination and is definitely a possible front runner for the Oscars with a speech that brought the house down.

One film that truly won the night is The Fabelmans winning Best Picture (Drama) and Steven Spielberg winning for Best Director helping a movie that was dwindling in popularity and now rises as one of the front runner at the Oscars for Picture and is almost definitely going to at least win Best Director for Spilberg. 

The other film that won the night was The Banshees of Inisherin winning Best Picture (Comedy) over the leader of Everything Everywhere All at Once and also winning Best Screenplay this solidifying it in the top spot for Best Original Screenplay and close to the top for Best Picture at the Oscars. The film also helped Colin Farrell become a front runner for Best Actor in a race that is presently, fairly crowded at the top. 

The other two performance wins were Austin Butler for Elvis and Cate Blanchett for Tar. While Brendan Fraser is still one of the front runners for The Whale, his controversial history with the HFPA probably hindered a win for this category, but Butler is also a very solid front runner for the Best Actor award with Warner Bros running a great campaign for Elvis. He also had a very gracious acceptance speech where he easily turned on the charm. At this point, Best Actor is between Fraser, Butler, and Farrell. 

Blanchett, was not there to give a speech, but her performance is so undeniable that she is still considered a great possibility to win even with two other Oscars on her mantle. 

One of the largest surprises was best Foreign Language Film surpassing frontrunners All Quiet on the Western Front and RRR by going to Argentina, 1985. This was most likely due to a vote split between those two leading movies, but this definitely solidifies a nomination in Best International Film for Argentina, 1985 and also just a reminder that RRR will not be nominated for Best International Film due to eligibility restrictions. 

While Babylon is a fairly divisive film from critics and audiences, there is no doubting its technical superiority and therefore it will dominate in many below the line awards and will therefore also end up working with that momentum to get a nomination for Best Picture. This was solidified with its Best Original Score win at the Globes last week. 

While Lady Gaga’s Song, “Hold My Hand” was definitely the popular pick to win, “Naatu, Naatu” from RRR was definitely a dark horse as its a jovial song from a film rising in popularity and the Oscars want to find a way to honor it and while there are many awards that it can receive this seems like an easy way to do it. Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio was already a very clear lock for Best Animated Feature and now it is even more certain even if there is some genuine competition. 

As said many times before, the Golden Globes are not always the best predictor for the Oscars but there is definitely a narrative that is forming and it is catapulted by these awards. 

It’s almost imp

ossible to decipher the television section of the SAG Awards into predictions for the upcoming Emmys not just because of eligibility dates but also because of their very misguided rule of blending lead and supporting performances in the same category. Therefore, due to this issue and also the fact that it is Oscar season, the film awards will be the only ones examined at this time. 

In the Supporting Actress category the frontrunner of Angela Bassett is right here in the category for Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. The biggest surprise is Hong Chau getting nominated for The Whale and while this nomination is definitely earned it might be too little too late for her to get an Oscar nomination. 

Kerry Condon from Banshees of Inisherin and Jamie Lee Curtis of Everything Everywhere All at Once are pretty much locked at this point and finally the nomination for Stephanie Hsu in Everything Everywhere All at Once was much needed for her journey to an Oscar nomination, which she was most likely getting and now definitely will.

It is becoming less and less likely that anyone from the cast of Women Talking will be nominated for an Oscar but Jessie Buckley would be the most probable if it does happen. 

With all of his nominations for Best Supporting Actor it feels apparent that Ke Huy Quan is essentially a lock to win for Everything Everywhere All at Once while Brendan Gleeson and Barry Keoghan also seem like locks for Oscar nominations for their performances in Banshees of Inisherin. Paul Dano getting a nomination in this category definitely helps his case for an Oscar nomination for The Fabelmans while Judd Hirsch missing a nomination doesn't bode well for his prospects.

While it still feels strange, it is difficult to deny Eddie Redmayne being nominated for The Good Nurse. He is a tremendous veteran of the Academy and received many accolades thus far. He also has the big Oscar scene while Dano’s performance is more understated. It feels very unlikely that two actors from Banshees of Inisherin and two actors from The Fabelmans are very unlikely for the nomination list, but at this point it isn’t entirely impossible. 

In the category of Best Actress, Danielle Deadwyler really needed this nomination for Till and will probably help push her to an Oscar nomination which she already had a lot of buzz around. Michelle Williams not being nominated for The Fablemans is a tremendous snub so much so that she still will most likely be nominated for an Oscar. However, Viola Davis from The Woman King and Ana de Armas from Blonde have been nominated for several precursor awards and the both of them will be difficult to ignore. 

At this point, the Best Actor race has four locks in terms of nominations. Austin Butler for Elvis, Colin Farrell for The Banshees of Inisherin, Brendan Fraser for The Whale, and Bill Nighy for Living. The fifth nomination could have been several possibilities: Tom Cruise for Top Gun Maverick, Jeremy Pope for The Inspection, Paul Mescal for Aftersun, Hugh Jackman for The Son, or Diego Cavla for Babylon. However, the SAG awards threw an absolute wild card into the mix by nominating Adam Sandler for Hustle. This does not seem terribly likely to lead to an Oscar nomination, but his stock definitely went up with this nomination.

 

The Best Cast award is sometimes but not always synonymous to Best Picture and with the three front runners for Best Picture, The Banshees of Inisherin, Everything Everywhere All at Once, and The Fabelmans, being nominated this will be the case this year. 

It is interesting that the other two nominations, Babylon and Women Talking, are nominated here but none of the performers in the cast are nominated. However, this will most likely lead to these two films also getting nominations for Best Picture. 

While the SAG Awards can sometimes be unpredictable and very different from the Oscars, they are also the best barometer to use them as a prediction as they are voted on by actual actors which is also the case with the Academy.

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