Early Oscar Predictions: Best Picture & Director

If you've been tracking the various films I've been predicting in certain categories, then it should go without saying what I'm anticipating to be Best Pictures players. I'll go the limit and pick ten, even though we all know that'll never happen.

Early Oscar Predictions: Original Screenplay

Guess what, guys: It's officially the first day if Spring (though try telling that to the weather), and what better way to kick off the season of new life than by Springing forward into the new Oscar season with some early predictions!

Each Friday until the end of April, I'll be adding new categories to the sidebar with accompanying articles. In the spirit of the filmmaking process, the category order will be based on the order of steps of making a movie. "Loosely" based, at least. There's nothing about these early guesses that isn't completely loosey goosey anyway. But one thing we can assume with some degree of certainty is that most films start with a screenplay, so too will that be our starting point.

First off, even though some pundits have already read many of 2015's buzz-
worthy scripts, landing a nomination depends much more on how well the film is received overall than on the calibre of the writing. It makes spitballing these categories as much of a crapshoot as Best Picture, but there are some distant Best Original Screenplay contenders that certainly look promising enough on paper.