The award season for the entertainment industry is almost finally over, and the red curtain will finally be unfurled on Sunday at the 90th Academy Awards.
Perhaps everybody had a clear idea on who might be crowned winners on Sunday by just tracking how the nominees fared in the recently concluded 24th Screen Actors Guild Awards, British Academy of Film and Television Arts Awards (BAFTA), the 23rd Critics Choice Awards, and the 75th Golden Globe Awards.
Martin McDonagh’s Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri wasn’t on every film critic’s radar going into the awards season until it won the Golden Globe for best picture, while fan favorites Dunkirk, Get Out, and The Post had been shut out from the category.
In fact, Three Billboards is now in a neck-and-neck race with Guillermo Del Toro’s Shape of Water and is considered to be an Oscar front-runner after it was nominated for 13 statuettes.
With only three days left, the final odds for this year’s awards season are already in.
Best Picture
According to odds published by Bodog, Three Billboards is most likely to take the Best Picture award with a -115 chance of winning while Shape of Water is most likely to pull an upset of the night in the category with +140 odds.
Get Out, a horror film about a black man who uncovers a disturbing secret when he meets the family of his white girlfriend, is considered to be the dark horse in this category with +550 chances of winning. If Get Out wins the coveted award, it will be the second horror film to win the category in Oscars’ history, following in the footsteps of Jonathan Demme’s The Silence of the Lambs.
Also nominated in this category are Lady Bird (+1400), Dunkirk (+3300), Call Me By Your Name (+6000), The Post (+10000), Darkest Hour (+10000), and Phantom Thread (+10000).
Best Actor
Judging the results the recent award giving bodies for movies, it is pretty clear that many of the categories are pretty much already locked up—including the Best Actor and Best Actress categories.
Gary Oldman is considered to be the front-runner in the Best Actor category, with -2500 odds, for his studious, prosthetic-assisted depiction of Winston Churchill. Why wouldn’t he be considered a front-runner when he already swept the Golden Globe, SAG, BAFTA, and Critics Choice Awards ahead of the Oscars?
If there’s a guy who has a greater chance of beating Oldman, then that’s probably newbie actor Timothee Chalamet. His memorable portrayal of a teenager’s coming of age and conflicted attraction to another man made him a contender for the category with +1000 odds of winning.
Also in the running for this category is Daniel Day-Lewis, who said that Phantom Thread would be his final film (+1500), newcomer Daniel Kaluuya(+1600), and Denzel Washington (+3300).
Best Actress
Meanwhile, all eyes are now on Frances McDormand as she tries not only to become the 14th person with multiple Best Actress Oscars but also if she’ll join the exclusive group of Best Actress winners with perfect record after multiple nominations.
Just like Oldman, McDormand is a clear favorite to win the category with (-2500) odds, especially after sweeping the Globe, SAG, Critics Choice, and BAFTA.
If there’s one person who can pull a big upset of the night, that would be Saoirse Ronan of Lady Bird with +750 odds or Sally Hawkins of The Shape of Water (+1400). Margot Robbie of I Tonya (+2500) and Meryll Streep of The Post (+5000) will both celebrate their respective nominations clapping for the other nominees.
Best Director
Guillermo Del Toro finds himself dueling with Christopher Nolan in this category. Based on the odds, Toro has a -1000 over Nolan, who has +600 odds of taking home the award. Behind them are Lady Bird director Greta Gerwig (+800), Get Out director Jordan Peel (+3300), and Phantom Thread director Paul Thomas Anderson (+6600).
