It’s that time again! We all picked our favorites at the end of the year; the guilds have spoken; critics groups have doled out their laurels (and/or fishes); and now, nearly a quarter of the way through 2026 (Thanks, Olympics), it’s finally time for the Academy to put a bow on the movies of 2025 with the Oscars. In advance of Sunday’s telecast – hosted once again by Conan O’Brien – airing at 4:00 PDT on ABC and Hulu (thanks, East Coast), your friends at the SunBreak gathered ’round the old roundtable to make our predictions on how the awards will (and should) go when all’s said and done. 

Best Picture

• Bugonia
• F1
• Frankenstein
• Hamnet
• Marty Supreme
• One Battle After Another
• The Secret Agent
• Sentimental Value
• Sinners
• Train Dreams

SunBreak Forecast: One Battle After Another

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	Sinners	OBAA	OBAA	OBAA	OBAA
Should Win	Marty Supreme	OBAA	Marty Supreme	OBAA	OBAA

Josh: One Battle After Another has won almost every possible guild and critics award and seems poised to finally get Paul Thomas Anderson to the promised land. I’d also give it my vote for what should win. I ranked Marty Supreme higher on my SFCS ballot, but it was close. One Battle After Another is a big, bold, funny, and potent swing that meets the moment and I believe it should win this year’s Best Picture Oscar. 

Chris:  I think I’m going to disagree here. Even though One Battle was on my top 10 list, I’m a little more bearish on it than everyone else. You’re obviously correct that it won all of the big awards but I think Sinners might eek out an upset here because it did break the record for most Oscar nominations (it’s so weird thinking of it as an underdog here) and because I thought it was a better and more enjoyable movie. It would’ve been high on my list if I didn’t get around to seeing it until 2026. 

Marina:  I absolutely love Marty Supreme, so much of that film is perfect in my eyes, but something about it just doesn’t feel like it will beat out these other nominees. One Battle After Another is filled with aspects that make a great Best Picture contender: it’s got Leo, a great ensemble cast, action, a socially important (if not on the nose) message, and some beautiful cinematography. It absolutely deserves to win, but my heart will be with Marty. Aslo—can I just say that this is one of the best Best Picture lineups we’ve seen in years??

Josh: Agree completely, a lot of times, it’s easy to get mad at the Academy for their foolish nominations, but I’m such a normie that nearly all of the nominees were in or near my top ten list for 2025. I even liked F1 (sorry, I mean F1 ® The Movie) for what it was! 

 If I were lucky enough to be an Academy voter, I’d have already watched them all and wouldn’t need to cheat the new voting system to submit my rankings as follows: (1) One Battle After Another; (2) Marty Supreme; (3) Sentimental Value; (4) Hamnet; (5) Sinners; (6) Bugonia; (7) The Secret Agent; (8) Train Dreams; (9) F1; (10) Frankenstein. The other big contender here to be an end of the ceremony stunner is Sinners and while it’s not at the top of my rankings, it’s a top-heavy year with most closely bunched in a “would be thrilled to win” tier. 

Tony: Josh, I’m the Biggest Normie Runner-Up this year, with 7 of my Top 10 2025 views getting Oscar nods for Best Picture. The genre nerd in me feels a bit guilty that I’m passing over Bugonia, Frankenstein, and Sinners for the Top Banana–much as I adored all of them. But One Battle After Another represents that relatively rare Best Picture nominee whose idiosyncratic artistry and smarts ride shotgun (harmoniously) with a legitimately crowd-pleasing sense of storytelling and emotional pull. And its ability to stay the course as a coherent work through myriad tonal shifts stands as a minor miracle. 

Best Directing

• Chloé Zhao, Hamnet
• Josh Safdie, Marty Supreme
• Paul Thomas Anderson, One Battle After Another
• Joachim Trier, Sentimental Value
• Ryan Coogler, Sinners

SunBreak Forecast: Paul Thomas Anderson – One Battle After Another

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	PTA	PTA	PTA	PTA	PTA
Should Win	Safdie	PTA	Safdie	PTA	Safdie

Josh: Paul Thomas Anderson is among my favorite film directors of all time and it’s astonishing that he doesn’t yet have a single Oscar (I am still salty about the year that No Country for Old Men swept past his all-world masterpiece There Will Be Blood). One Battle After Another is absolutely in the upper echelon of his filmography (I’d probably only rank The Phantom Thread higher). Apologies to Ryan Coogler, who made film stocks, perforations, and ratios cool again, but the streak of PTA coming home empty-handed will and should end Sunday. 

Tony: The Always-a-Bridesmaid factor will most likely come into play with Paul Thomas Anderson, whose astonishingly consistent filmography has yet to yield Directorial Oscar Gold. As happy as I’ll be if Anderson wins, though, Josh Safdie’s work in Marty Supreme showcases directorial dazzle and exhilarating go-for-broke energy that’s certifiably infectious.

Chris:  I think it’s a lock for Paul Thomas Anderson for the reasons Josh and Tony give. Still, I think Josh Safdie would get my vote were I to be an Academy voter. It’s been several years since Uncut Gems so I had forgotten how thrilling Safdie movies can be. 

Marina:  Paul Thomas Anderson feels like the perfect contender for a directorial Oscar due to his lack of one and his backlog of amazing films. This win feels long overdue for him and I can see the Academy feeling the same way, regardless of his most recent film. Safdie absolutely deserves this one and I can see this dream of mine becoming a reality. That said, all of these directors have earned the right in my mind to take this one.

Actress in a Leading Role

• Jessie Buckley – Hamnet
• Rose Byrne – If I Had Legs I’d Kick You
• Kate Hudson – Song Sung Blue
• Renate Reinsve – Sentimental Value
• Emma Stone – Bugonia

SunBreak Forecast: Jessie Buckley – Hamnet

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	Buckley	Buckley	Buckley	Buckley	Buckley
Should Win	Stone	Byrne	Stone	Buckley	—

Josh: Jessie Buckley is going to win this and might bring home Hamnet’s only prize. As the witchy wife of Billy Shakes, she channels grief in theater shattering ways that moved me (and everyone in the theater) to tears. 

As much as I adore everything Buckley did to make me weep without tilting the literary adaptation into manipulative melodrama, I’d feel compelled to give my imaginary vote to Rose Byrne, whose tour de force central performance in If I Had Legs I’d Kick You was a singular work of acting that captured the very real comedy and horror of parenting in a way that I can’t imagine anyone else pulling off. She also plays against type along with Oscars co-host Conan O’Brien. It’s a singular feat that shouldn’t work but absolutely does. [The Safdie/Bronstein cinema of anxiety is exceptionally my bag.] 

Tony: At the risk of an upset blowing up in our faces, Buckley’s (great) work in Hamnet feels like a foregone conclusion, Best Actress trophy-wise. 

The only other nominated turn I’ve seen to date has been Emma Stone in Bugonia, so it’s short-sighted as Hell for me to eschew three performances I’ve not seen. But the truth is, I preferred Stone’s work in Bugonia to Buckley’s star turn—if only because the former hinges on a simple is-she-or-isn’t-she conundrum that would be completely deflated if it wasn’t delivered with anything but a perfect balance of ambiguity and vulnerability. Having just won the Best Actress trophy for Poor Things a couple of years ago, she’s the longest of long shots for a second win so quickly.  But in my mind, what she does in Bugonia represents an even more challenging (if much less showy) turn. 

Marina:  I’m not sure I can add anything groundbreaking here on the reasons Buckley will no doubt go home with this award. And absolutely, she deserves it; her portrayal of Anne is truly beautiful. But I will never be over Stone’s performance in Bugonia. As Tony said, this role is really one that could not have worked without perfect balance from Stone. Her performance grounds the film, which otherwise could have felt outlandish. I’d love to see her win this category, but given her win two years ago with Poor Things and the love for Hamnet at previous awards, my money’s on Buckley.

Chris:  There’s no reason to doubt that Jessie Buckley is going to win. Her turn as Anne (nee Agnes) Hathaway was emotionally rich and rewarding. The scene where she watches Hamlet performed from the audience is revelatory. Emma Stone has about the same chance of winning here as I do as she’s already won a Best Actress Oscar for another (and better) Yorgos Lanthimos film but she gave the performance I most enjoyed among the nominees. 

Josh: You guys are so right … and now I kinda feel bad for taking Emma Stone for granted! Whether she’s an “alien-alien” or just an out of this world corporate executive almost doesn’t matter (until it does) in Bugonia’s deliciously tense stand-off. 

Morgen: Jessie Buckley has been incredibly busy (the stellar new release The Bride! for example) and I have yet to see a lackluster performance out of her. The rest of the crew has said it all, but I can’t wait to see where she goes from here. She’s been in the scene for quite some time, but it seems now is her time to shine.

This category is stacked with four great nominees and one Kate Hudson, whose Song Sung Blue I had to quit watching after twenty minutes to prevent anaphylactic shock (the movie might be great, but it is a perfect storm of almost everything in moviemaking that I’m deathly allergic to) and read the incredibly wild plot synopsis on wikipedia instead. Wowzers, how again did Amanda Seyfried get left out of this field? The Testament of Ann Lee was my kind of prestige musical.

Actor in a Leading Role

• Timothée Chalamet – Marty Supreme
• Leonardo DiCaprio – One Battle After Another
• Ethan Hawke – Blue Moon
• Michael B Jordan – Sinners
• Wagner Moura – The Secret Agent

SunBreak Forecast: Michael B. Jordan – Sinners

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	MBJ	MBJ	MBJ	DiCaprio	MBJ
Should Win	Chalamet	Chalamet	Chalamet	Chalamet	MBJ

Josh: I’m by no means a member of Club Chalamet but I think it’s bizarre to make male actors suffer the indignity of getting older before letting them win Oscars, but Timmy didn’t help himself with his frankly bizarre campaign in the rollout of Marty Supreme (a movie that I absolutely adored). He was the rocket fuel that gave Marty Supreme its juice and also happens to have been the face of a parade of highly successful films over the last decade. And like many a best actor winner before him, he underwent a physical transformation in the form of a gross little mustache and prosthetic pockmarks and acne scars on his typically pristine visage.

Chris:  I would prefer Chalamet here because I thought there was so much kinetic energy from his performance and I don’t see my favorite movie of 2025 working without him. I try not to pay much attention to his (or anyone’s) antics but he probably did himself no favors with his comments on opera the other day that offended a particular part of the Internet. 

Josh: Indeed, if there’s one thing the reactive internet prizes it’s opera and ballet and anyone saying that they aren’t a wildly popular and highly attended art form. However, this race has the feeling that it’s going to tilt to a win for Michael B. Jordan, who is indeed very good in Sinners as twin brothers Smoke and Stack. In addition to creating two distinct roles, has the advantage of being one of the handsomest most charismatic men in Hollywood who everyone loves in a movie that everyone appreciates vs. an “upstart” who spent most of the year doing self promotional stunts that seemingly channeled his career-obsessed character in a movie that didn’t come out until Christmas Day and that gave way too many viewers an anxiety attack. A youth-weary Academy had nearly a full year of antics, like screaming from atop the Sphere in Vegas, before ever having a chance to see the goods. 

Marina:  I thought Marty was one of Chalamet’s best performances to date. Though he was an unlikable character, Chalamet is able to show his full range as Marty, something many of his other roles didn’t allow. But unfortunately, the Academy and its awards don’t exist in a vacuum of film, and Chalamet’s comments and general vibe lately will probably cost him this win…if it ever was his to begin with. 

Tony: Yeah, Chalamet’s goofy offscreen antics, and the inherent unlikability of Marty as a character, seem doomed to torpedo his shot at a Best Actor trophy this time out. In the end, though, I side wholeheartedly with the odds-on fave. Even setting aside the challenge of successfully playing twins and imbuing each sibling with distinctive personalities, Jordan gives a magnetic yet nuanced movie-star performance from which enduring cults are made. 

Josh: I’m still dreaming big, but the campaign might be DOA. He might not win a statue, but it should be some consolation that the promotional madness actually worked where it matters: at the box office where the film has made more than a quarter billion dollars worldwide (and it’s only recently opened in Asia). It’s A24’s highest grossing film of all time and they’ve restocked their exclusive merch collection just in time for a second boom. [Don’t I feel dumb for how much I paid for some table tennis balls on eBay for Christmas]. 

Morgen: I’m going out on a limb here and saying that DiCaprio might be the big winner this year. It feels like an “Oscar” pick to me rather than going for the beloved and highly sought Timotheé Chalamet. He is absolutely stunning in Marty Supreme, and I have been singing his praises since I saw it late last year. I always wonder if I favor some of these films based on when I see them, I have a notoriously terrible memory, but I have a feeling this one will stick with me beyond 2025/26 as one of his best roles since Call Me By Your Name.

Actress in a Supporting Role

• Elle Fanning – Sentimental Value
• Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas – Sentimental Value
• Amy Madigan – Weapons
• Wunmi Mosaku – Sinners
• Teyana Taylor – One Battle After Another

SunBreak Forecast: Amy Madigan – Weapons

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	Madigan	Madigan	Madigan	Madigan	Taylor
Should Win	Taylor	Lilleaas	Lilleaas	Madigan	Madigan

Tony: Pushing aside the fact that Chase Infiniti’s work in One Battle After Another was robbed by her being snubbed out of this category, I’m gambling that the One Battle momentum will roll forward with Teyana Taylor benefitting (it also doesn’t hurt that Taylor kills it in a prickly, difficult, riveting manner). But damn, is Madigan’s Aunt Gladys a blast of deliciously comic, unerringly creepy fresh air. Calling a performance iconic is about the laziest superlative you can throw at it, but if the shoe fits…

Josh: I agree, if Chase Infiniti had “run” in Supporting, she’d have been a lock. The way it shook out, though leaves this one of the most up-in-the-air categories! I have no confidence in this prediction, but my sense is that Weapons and Amy Madigan are both warmly regarded in the Academy and it could be the chance to reward both of those. My prediction is that she finally gets an Oscar for her nearly unrecognizable turn as Aunt Gladys. I’d have voted for Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas, who unlocks the sometimes chilly Sentimental Value with a quietly revelatory performance. 

Chris:  This one could go any direction but I think Josh is correct. Teyana Taylor was my favorite actor in One Battle so I’m pulling for her here. 

Marina:  I would love to see this award go to either of the Sentimental Value ladies nominated, I don’t think that film could have been what it is without them. But if history is any indicator, I’d bet on Madigan, who gave a wonderful performance in an enjoyable and Academy-loved film.

Actor in a Supporting Role

• Benicio Del Toro – One Battle After Another
• Jacob Elordi – Frankenstein
• Delroy Lindo – Sinners
• Sean Penn – One Battle After Another
• Stellan Skarsgård – Sentimental Value

SunBreak Forecast: Sean Penn – One Battle After Another

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	Penn	Penn	Penn	Penn	Penn
Should Win	Elordi	Del Toro	Elordi	Del Toro	Lindo

Josh: For me, it’s not even close which of the supporting men from One Battle After Another should win. I’d give it to Benicio Del Toro, whose Sensei is a paragon of heart and competence in a loud movie filled to the brim with idiots. A couple small beers to him, forever! But I predict the award will go to Sean Penn as the ramrod-straight walking, sexually bewitched, obsessive evil racist Colonel Lockjaw. It’s a bigger, showier, physical, performance that will issue Penn into the Three Oscar Club (a shadowy cabal even more exclusive than the Christmas Adventurers).

Chris:  I’m going to be pulling for Jacob Elordi here because I thought he had the most difficult assignment here but knocked it out of the park. I really loved GDT’s Frankenstein and am surprised it hasn’t made a bigger splash during awards season. But, yeah, Sean Penn seems safe and inevitable. 

Marina:  This is another one I’m basing heavily on how I think the Academy is viewing these nominees. Penn feels like a perfect Oscar pick and I’d feel confident putting all my chips in for him.

Tony: Penn does feel like the safe bet here: His full-throttle work represents the kind of grandstanding that never fails to charm Oscar voters. And the sentimental horror nerd in me would be elated to see Elordi nail this as a very belated and lateral tribute to Boris Karloff, whose performance as Frankenstein’s Monster nearly a century ago eternally etched itself in popular culture back when horror was considered far more stigmatic than it is now. 

But my heart belongs to Delta Slim, the irascible, drunken blues musician drawn so richly by Delroy Lindo. He represents the soul of the phenomenal dark fable that is Sinners. And though his screen time’s fairly marginal, there’s an entire novel’s worth of living in every syllable, breath, and gesture that informs Slim. 

Sidebar: Jesse Plemons may be closer to a lead in it, but his failing to receive a nod for Bugonia in this category looks like a major miscarriage of cinema justice to these weary eyes. 

Josh: Fully agree on Plemmons. I don’t know what happened there, but my guess is that he and Franken Elordi wrestled for that last slot and the monster won. 

Original Screenplay

• Blue Moon, written by Robert Kaplow
• It Was Just an Accident, written by Jafar Panahi; script collaborators: Nader Saïvar, Shadmehr Rastin, Mehdi Mahmoudian
• Marty Supreme, written by Ronald Bronstein and Josh Safdie
• Sentimental Value, written by Eskil Vogt, Joachim Trier
• Sinners, written by Ryan Coogler

SunBreak Forecast: Ryan Coogler – Sinners

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	Sinners	Sinners	Sinners	Sinners	Sinners
Should Win	Sinners	Sinners	—	Sinners	Sinners

Josh: Sinners is going to win and Ryan Coogler deserves this Oscar, which is reliable Oscar’s Coolest award in the long view of history. What Sinners does in terms of transmuting a vampire story into one about cycles of cultural appropriation, the birth of the Delta Blues, and a thesis about the potency of music to pierce the veil of time, space, and death is beyond remarkable. That it was such a box office hit should be utterly transformative of how more studios operate. But alas, the studio that made it is about to be gobbled up by a nepo baby who used his daddy’s vast fortunes to throw a tantrum until he got his toy.

Chris:  If Sinners doesn’t win Best Picture, this might be its consolation prize, and deserved for the reasons Josh already stated, though I suppose I’m taking a little more of a wait-and-see approach to Skydance’s acquisition of Paramount. 

Tony:  … Coogler seems like something close to a shoo-in here. With One Battle likely stealing some serious thunder Sunday night in other major categories, the layered graphic-novel vividness and genre-hopping of Coogler’s screenplay showcases a first-rate example of the Tarantino Effect (i.e., when an auteur’s heavily nominated movie fails to when any other major categories, the Best Original Screenplay Oscar makes for a fairly satisfying consolation prize).

Adapted Screenplay

• Bugonia, screenplay by Will Tracy
• Frankenstein, written for the screen by Guillermo del Toro
• Hamnet, screenplay by Chloé Zhao and Maggie O’Farrell
• One Battle after Another, written by Paul Thomas Anderson
• Train Dreams, screenplay by Clint Bentley & Greg Kwedar

SunBreak Forecast: Paul Thomas Anderson – One Battle After Another

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	OBAA	OBAA	OBAA	OBAA	OBAA
Should Win	Frankenstein	OBAA	Frankenstein	Hamnet	OBAA

Josh: I haven’t read Thomas Pynchon’s Vineland but it seems like a gift to a lot of other films for One Battle After Another to be considered an adapted screenplay. Much as I love the sharp paranoid resonance of what Will Tracy did with Bugonia, Paul Thomas Anderson’s night of one statue after another is likely going to start with winning this much-deserved award. 

Chris:  Truth be told, One Battle is my second favorite Paul Thomas Anderson film adapted from a Thomas Pynchon novel. It’s the likely winner and where my chips are going but I thought GDT’s retelling of Frankenstein was masterful. It’s not the most faithful adaptation but I do think it matches the vibes of Mary Shelley’s masterpiece wonderfully. 

Marina:  I’ve been waiting over 100 years for an accurate (at least in essence) and beautiful adaptation of Frankenstein so I so badly want it to snag Best Adapted Screenplay, but if I know the Academy, I know they’ll love One Battle After Another. Aside from my affinity for Frankenstein, One Battle After Another truly is a great screenplay.

Tony:  So many different tonal and genre plates, spinning so perfectly, all at once. Viva One Battle.

Documentary Feature

• The Alabama Solution
• Come See Me in the Good Light
• Cutting Through Rocks
• Mr. Nobody Against Putin
• The Perfect Neighbor

SunBreak Forecast: The Perfect Neighbor

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	The Perfect Neighbor	The Perfect Neighbor	—	—	—
Should Win	The Alabama Solution	The Perfect Neighbor	—	—	—

Josh: Prison abuse, cancer, misogyny, propaganda, neighborhood tragedy. What a wrenching buffet of misery the Documentary Branch programmed for Oscar completists! 

My pick for what will win is The Perfect Neighbor. It’s a stroke of genius that Geeta Gandbhir got her innovative and piercing documentary to be picked up at Sundance by Netflix, home to so many cookie-cutter true crime retellings. Breaking the mold of cheap recreations, talking heads, and AI slop, she instead relies on police body camera footage (working for the victims, for once), she tells the story of a neighborhood crank whose unhinged aggressions end in tragedy. 

This is our game, so I’m giving my should win to a film that wasn’t even nominated: My Undesirable Friends: Part I — Last Air in Moscow, Julia Loktev’s five-plus hour documentary about independent Russian journalists in the lead-up to Russia’s war against Ukraine. I’m not even sure the episodic film is even a “movie” but for obvious reasons I haven’t stopped thinking about it and these brave young journalists as they struggle with how much longer they can stay in a country they love as every day tilts closer to absurd dictatorial fascism.

Chris:  I think The Perfect Neighbor has this locked up but it’ll be a shame to me. I found myself liking it less the more I thought about it and learned of the filmmaker’s relationship with the subjects. It seems I took a little more nuance away from the film than director Geeta Gandbhir intended. I had a smidge of sympathy for the antagonist who had no business living in a community with other people, particularly children, and more so owning a firearm because she is severely unwell. Plus, I’m not sure what this film is trying to say about Florida’s Stand Your Ground laws because Susan Lorincz was still prosecuted and will almost certainly die in prison. 

An even more infuriating (and better) movie for me was The Alabama Solution, about the prison system that seems to revel in its cruelty and do so with impunity. I don’t think there’s anyone I’ve seen on a screen that is more malevolent than the real life prison guard Roderick Gadson whose monstrousness continues to be rewarded and he has not impacted his employment one bit. 

Tony: My lame, non-documentary-watching ass abstains from this category.

International Feature

• The Secret Agent (Brazil)
• It Was Just an Accident (France)
• Sentimental Value (Norway)
• Sirāt (Spain)
• The Voice of Hind Rajab (Tunisia)

SunBreak Forecast: Sentimental Value

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	Sentimental Value	Sentimental Value	Sentimental Value	—	The Secret Agent
Should Win	The Secret Agent	Sentimental Value	Sentimental Value	—

Josh: I’m deeply in the tank for Joachim Trier’s Scandinavian restraint and this delicately filigreed multi-layered story of a family working through multi-generational trauma. With nominations in Best Picture, Lead Actress, Supporting Actor, Supporting Actress (x2), Original Screenplay, and Editing, I think it’s got the stuff to win. This team is also due since The Worst Person in the World probably should’ve won them some statues in 2021. [Counterpoint: Brazil is mighty, The Secret Agent is a transportingly great watch and it also has noms in Lead Actor and in Casting.]

Marina:  I agree with Josh, there are so many amazing contenders this year so I’m mostly basing this on the amount of nominations Sentimental Value has in many other categories. Either way, Sentimental Value is worth a watch and absolutely deserves this win.

Tony:  Ill-equipped to pick the Should-Win here as I’ve not seen any. But the buzz around The Secret Agent induces me to place my bets on its victory.

Animated Feature

• Arco
• Elio
• KPop Demon Hunters
• Little Amélie or the Character of Rain
• Zootopia 2

SunBreak Forecast: Kpop Demon Hunters

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	KPop	KPop		Kpop	KPop
Should Win	KPop	—		Kpop

Josh: Animated feature always gets the short end of my see-em-all Oscar deathrace, so I’m not going to say what should win. However, I am confident that KPop Demon Hunters is going to win. It’s one of the few films that everyone I know has seen (I tried, but couldn’t get past the opening sequence) and one that got Netflix to actually put a movie in theaters to make even more money.

Chris:  KPop Demon Hunters was such a phenomenon that I would be very surprised if it didn’t win here. 

Tony:  Among these, I’ve only seen K-Pop Demon Hunters, so I’m again ill-equipped to call a Should-Win on this. That said, damned if it’s not clever and charming as hell. And it’s a nice way for the many geriatric Oscar voters out there to show their grandkids that they’re hip with the K-Pop Lingo.

Morgen: I might have delved into the animation features more than anyone in our group this year. There were a lot of fantastic contenders that didn’t even make it to the nominations so this is an elite group of films up for the award. It’s difficult to say that one of these is “better” than the other since each is so very different. Even the animation differences is drastic, the closest would be Zootopia 2 & Kpop Demon Hunters. In any case, I think Demon Hunters has been the darling in this category thus far and I don’t see that stopping at the Oscars. I’m overjoyed that something so culturally specific is so widely loved.

Casting

• Hamnet, Nina Gold
• Marty Supreme, Jennifer Venditti
• One Battle after Another, Cassandra Kulukundis
• The Secret Agent, Gabriel Domingues
• Sinners, Francine Maisler

SunBreak Forecast: Sinners

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	Sinners	Sinners	Sinners	Sinners	Sinners
Should Win	Marty Supreme	Marty Supreme	Marty Supreme	Sinners	Sinners

Josh: So fun! A long overdue, new category! 

I predict Sinners takes this, both for the discovery of Miles Catton and for ingeniously casting other well known actors into unpredictable roles. There’s also the matter of finding someone equal to the challenge of playing the deeply charismatic Michael B. Jordan’s identical twin brother, which couldn’t possibly have been easy. As impressive as Francine Maisler’s cast is in Sinners (recognizing that Jack O’Connell is a seductive menace might’ve been a gimme, but kudos for pulling together the likes of Hailee Steinfeld, Delroy Lindo, Wunmi Mosaku in a vibrant supporting cast), my personal vote would go to Jennifer Venditti’s work in Marty Supreme, a film that bursts with interesting faces and personalities, from the unlikely pairing of Timothée Chalamet with Gwenyth Paltrow (who gives her best performance in ages) to the broad ensemble of non-professional actors who are instantly unforgettable. 

Chris:  One of the (many) things I love about a Safdie(s) film is the way that they use nonactors for key roles. I would give this award to Jennifer Venditti for casting Mr. Wonderful as Gwenyth Paltrow’s husband, though my favorite bit of casting was the great (and immensely charming) writer Pico Iyer as the head of the table tennis association. Sinners will probably win, though, and I won’t be mad.

Marina:  I’d almost give Jennifer Venditti the award just for casting Mr. Wonderful as business mogul Milton Rockwell, but all of her casting choices made Marty Supreme what it is (and what it is is my top film of 2025).

Tony: Jennifer Venditti almost deserves this for Marty Supreme, just for casting reformed provocateur auteur Abel Ferrara as one of the most chilling heavies to surface in a movie last year. But the sheer volume of great performances amidst a cast of mostly unheralded/unknown actors in Sinners puts Francine Maisler squarely in my personal Oscar Winner’s Circle.

Cinematography

• Frankenstein – Dan Laustsen
• Marty Supreme – Darius Khondji
• One Battle After Another – Michael Bauman
• Sinners – Autumn Durald Arkapaw
• Train Dreams – Adolpho Veloso

SunBreak Forecast: One Battle After Another

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	OBAA	OBAA	Sinners	Marty Supreme	OBAA
Should Win	Frankenstein	Sinners	Sinners	Marty Supreme	Sinners

Josh: Whether you saw it in conventional format or in immersive flickering VistaVision, the River of Hills car chase sequence alone is probably enough for Michael Bauman to win the Oscar for Best Cinematography. The rest of One Battle After Another is fully deserving (the sequence of the skateboarders leaping from rooftop to rooftop amid protests may never leave my mind), but were I a voter, I’d give this prize to Autumn Durald Arkapaw. Her work in similarly large format for Sinners is outstanding, using classic lenses and film stocks to capture rich textures of setting and skin tones in often dark and shadowy settings. [It would also end the absurd run of this award having never once gone to a woman.]

Marina:  I almost don’t want to out myself as a self-proclaimed Sinners hater…but I will admit I am less than thrilled about its record-breaking amount of nominations. However, if I’m going to allow it to win one category, it’s hands down cinematography. 

Tony: I swear to God I’m not copycatting you, Josh. But I really couldn’t argue with that Will Win/Should Win nexus. 

I’m a sap for richly-shot genre movies, so I’d also be happy with a dark-horse win in this category for Dan Laustsen’s sumptuous work in Frankenstein. But Sinners’ equally lush graphic-novel aesthetic just feels more vital, immediate, and sensual than any of the other admittedly top-flight nominees here. 

Morgen: While I am an avid fan of Sinners, there’s just something about the gritty cinematography of Marty Supreme. What’s really funny about that is I could not force myself to get into Uncut Gems which has an incredibly similar feel since both had Darius Khondji at the helm. Why did this one hit me differently? It could be Chalamet, it could be the ridiculousness of a serious, gritty movie involving a charming ping pong player, who knows.

Editing

• F1 – Stephen Mirrione
• Marty Supreme – Ronald Bronstein and Josh Safdie
• One Battle After Another – Andy Jurgensen
• “Sentimental Value” – Olivier Bugge Coutté
• “Sinners” – Michael P. Shawver

SunBreak Forecast: One Battle After Another

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	OBAA	OBAA	OBAA	OBAA	OBAA
Should Win	F1	OBAA	OBAA	OBAA	Marty

Josh: Editing might be the smartest branch with the best taste; being in this category is basically a prerequisite for winning Picture. I like everything in this nicely varied list of nominees but I’d say that because it remains so coherent and effective with so much temporal, geographic, and character cross-cutting means that One Battle After Another both will and should win.   

Chris:  You guys are probably right that this is One Battle’s to lose but I wouldn’t be disappointed to see F1 win the award here. It was a sports film that leaned into all of the cliches but still became something thrilling to watch and the editing is a big reason why. 

Marina:  I can definitely see a world where F1 or Marty Supreme takes this one, but I think Josh is right, this is closely tied to Best Picture and for that I think it’s gotta be (and rightfully so) One Battle After Another.

Tony: Probably putting all of my eggs in One (Battle After Another’s) basket, but I’d be surprised if it didn’t take this one as well. As far as I’m concerned, though, the hypnotic momentum of Bronstein’s and Safdie’s editing for Marty Supreme is the engine that drives the movie, and it straight-up took my breath away. It feels like highway robbery for my Should Win to (most likely) not get the gold in this category.  

Production Design

• Frankenstein – Production Design: Tamara Deverell; Set Decoration: Shane Vieau
• Hamnet – Production Design: Fiona Crombie; Set Decoration: Alice Felton
• Marty Supreme – Production Design: Jack Fisk; Set Decoration: Adam Willis
• One Battle After Another – Production Design: Florencia Martin; Set Decoration: Anthony Carlino
• Sinners – Production Design: Hannah Beachler; Set Decoration: Monique Champagne

SunBreak Forecast: Frankenstein

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	Frankenstein	Frankenstein	Frankenstein	Frankenstein	Sinners
Should Win	Frankenstein	Marty Supreme	Marty Supreme	Sinners	Sinners

Josh: Frankenstein’s production is very loud and everyone loves Guillermo del Toro’s social media posts about making detailed little monster models for fun; so it’s probably going to win here. This means that Marty Supreme’s legendary production designer Jack Fisk, who once again created a fully realized world of 1950s New York, Tokyo, and London, will spend another of his 80 years without a much-deserved Oscar. 

Marina:  This is one of my most anticipated categories and not least because the nominees are all beautiful films I’d be happy winning. I’m putting my money on Frankenstein (though I think Sinners is going to be a close runner up) mainly because it’s a beautiful period piece (which the Academy can never say no to) and it’s a remake of many films (in which we’ve seen the Creature created so poorly). But the sheer scope of Jack Fisk’s work on Marty Supreme and the way his vision fully pulled me into the world will make me vote for him every time. 

Tony: Tamara Deverell’s production design on Frankenstein draws heavily from comic book artist Bernie Wrightson’s illustrations, in vivid cinematic brushstrokes, so I’d be happy to see it take the prize. And Fisk has over 50 years of stunning design work under his octogenarian belt, so seeing him get a victory lap for his sterling work in Marty Supreme would tickle me pink. 

That said, I have a bit more faith in Oscar voters recognizing Hannah Beachler’s evocative and immersive production design on Sinners. And technical categories tend to be bestowed pretty heavily on high-volume nominees that get shut out of most major categories by a clear favorite like One Battle. 

Costume Design

• Avatar: Fire and Ash, Deborah L. Scott
• Frankenstein, Kate Hawley
• Hamnet, Malgosia Turzanska
• Marty Supreme, Miyako Bellizzi
• Sinners, Ruth E. Carter

SunBreak Forecast: Frankenstein

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	Frankenstein	Frankenstein	Frankenstein	Frankenstein	Frankenstein
Should Win	Frankenstein	Sinners	Frankenstein	Sinners	Frankenstein

Josh: The work in Frankenstein is showier, so it will probably win. But the costumes in Sinners also tell a story without yelling and I’d give Ruth E. Carter my vote here.  

Marina:  Like with PD, I think Sinners will just barely lose this one to Frankenstein (though it would not surprise me in the least if it wins).

Tony:  Shout that Frankenstein story in my ear, Kate Hawley. I devour it with relish.

Makeup and Hairstyling

• Frankenstein
• Kokuho
• Sinners
• The Smashing Machine
• The Ugly Stepsister

SunBreak Forecast: Frankenstein

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	Frankenstein	Frankenstein	—	Frankenstein	Frankenstein
Should Win	Frankenstein	Ugly Stepsister	—	Frakenstein

Josh: My prediction is another crafts category win for Frankenstein, which I didn’t love, but I suspect the Academy will award the impossible feat of making Jacob Elordi look like a super hot monster.  

I will say this was one of the categories where I had the most gaps prior to the Academy Award nominations. I’m glad that this category “forced” me to see Kokuho and spend three hours becoming immersed in the world of onnagata in traditional kabuki theater (as well as learning that Japan has an official designation for “living national treasure”), which is more than I can say for having watched The Smashing Machine. With that said, even though the gory feminist retelling of Cinderella didn’t entirely work for me, I’ll toss my “should win” vote to The Ugly Stepsister, which made it into this category on a relative shoestring budget and skeleton crew of talented artisans.  

Tony:  I’ve only seen two of these nominees, but after a lot of undistinguished monster makeups in the last 30+ years of Frankenstein retellings, the team behind del Toro’s take really seem to have hit on a design that’s beautiful, memorable, and eerie all at once. A myopic but enthusiastic thumbs up.

Sound

• F1
• Frankenstein
• One Battle After Another
• Sinners
• Sirāt

SunBreak Forecast: F1 ® The Movie

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	F1	F1	F1	F1	F1
Should Win	F1	Sirāt	Sinners	Sinners	Sinners

Josh: F1 ® The Movie and Sirāt both have a lot of sound, I predict the one about race cars will win (since it was also a Best Picture nominee), but would probably vote for the one about ravers at the end of the world if I had a say. 

Chris:  I stand corrected, the editing and sound are reasons for F1 being more enjoyable than it had any right to be. 

Marina:  Amen to that, Chris. In my opinion, F1 doesn’t belong in Best Picture, but since it’s there, I can’t see it not taking the one category it may have some actual merit in.

Tony:  I haven’t seen F1, but I’ma totally piggy-back on your forecast of it taking the gold here, Josh. Oscar voters: “car vroom-vroom gooood, give Oscar.” But the stunningly layered sonics in Sinners’ masterful juke-joint music montage alone deserve penultimate props. 

Visual Effects

• Avatar: Fire and Ash
• F1
• Jurassic World Rebirth
• The Lost Bus
• Sinners

SunBreak Forecast: Avatar: Fire and Ash

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	Avatar	Avatar	—	—	Avatar
Should Win	Avatar	Avatar	—	—

Josh: There’s nothing on any screen that compares to the immaculate and transporting work that James Cameron and his armies of VFX creators put on screen, not even cloning Michael B. Jordan. Avatar: Fire and Ash should and will win. 

Tony:  … I’ve only seen Sinners among this batch, so no Should-Win from me on this one. But it’s a fair bet that the Academy will hand this low-stakes (to most non-nerds, at least) Oscar to the team behind the splashiest visuals in a reportedly highly proficient sci-fi extravaganza.

Original Score

• Bugonia, Jerskin Fendrix
• Frankenstein, Alexandre Desplat
• Hamnet, Max Richter
• One Battle after Another, Jonny Greenwood
• Sinners, Ludwig Goransson

SunBreak Forecast: Sinners

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	Sinners	Sinners	—	Sinners	Sinners
Should Win	Sinners	OBAA	—	Sinners	Frankenstein

Josh: It makes me irrationally angry that Jonny Greenwood still doesn’t have an Oscar for even one of his film compositions (I just looked up what his score for The Phantom Thread lost to and am irrecoverably crashing out). Somehow, I think Jonny will be fine with all of his money, fame, and success from his little side project band Radiohead because alas, he’ll likely go home empty handed again as Ludwig Goransson will join Sean Penn as a three time Oscar winner, taking home his third statue for his admittedly outstanding fusion of genres that made the sonic texture of Ryan Coogler’s vampire musical Sinners so successful. The man’s a prodigy. At age forty, he’s on track to surpass John Williams’s five wins within a decade, and will probably win one well deserved award after another for the next fifty years. 

Tony:  … What Josh said re: Goransson. And I’ll readily second the huzzahs for (if not the Hulk Smash rage over the snubbing of) Jonny Greenwood. Dude’s welded the experimentation of his band’s latter day output in the service of some of the most singular, striking scores committed to cinematic posterity. 

But I’m an unapologetic fan of succulent, classically rendered film scores in the Franz Waxman/Max Steiner tradition, and Alexandre Desplat’s Frankenstein score scratches that itch for me in grandly cinematic fashion. 

Original Song

• “Dear Me” from Diane Warren: Relentless; music and lyric by Diane Warren
• “Golden” from KPop Demon Hunters; music and lyric by EJAE, Mark Sonnenblick, Joong Gyu Kwak, Yu Han Lee, Hee Dong Nam, Jeong Hoon Seon and Teddy Park
• “I Lied to You” from Sinners; music and lyric by Raphael Saadiq and Ludwig Goransson
• “Sweet Dreams of Joy” from Viva Verdi!; music and lyric by Nicholas Pike
• “Train Dreams” from Train Dreams; music by Nick Cave and Bryce Dessner; lyric by Nick Cave

SunBreak Forecast: “Golden” – KPop Demon Hunters

	Chris	Josh	Marina	Morgen	Tony
Will Win	Golden	Golden	Golden	Golden	Golden
Should Win	Golden	Train Dreams	Train Dreams	Golden	Train Dreams

Josh: I refuse to acknowledge the validity of this, the worst Oscar category. If I were king of the Academy, I’d can it, if only to end the cruel run of the Music Branch propping up Diane Warren year after year  just to watch her lose, and create a category for Best Music Supervision. 

WIth that said I predict that “Golden” to win, but I’d vote for “Train Dreams” just to see Nick Cave and one of the brothers from The National give an acceptance speech.

Marina:  I don’t think it takes a genius to predict a song from an animated musical about Kpop singers will take this one, but I wish with category was perhaps a bit more specific so Train Dreams could shine here. 

Tony:  A lot of the time, the Best Original Song rides shotgun with the Best Animated Feature Oscar winner. So that makes “Golden” a pretty predictable adjunct to the likely Oscar-winning movie in which it appears. It’s a perky, inoffensive ditty that pops up in a clever, entertaining animated movie: no more, no less.

And yes, the acceptance speech would be great, but for me, “Train Dreams” also marks the only genuinely great song in this bunch. It’s more of an atmospheric tone poem than a legit hummable song, so forget about it winning. But it’s ragged, haunting, evocative of its parent film, and I kinda love it.

Short Films

SunBreak Forecast: Cloudy with a chance of surprises (to us)

Josh: This is where Oscar pools are won and lost, yet none of us did our homework. I did not watch any of these, so I have no predictions. For Animated, I’ll probably pick “Butterfly” at my Oscar party. I’d say would be cool if Geeta Gandbhir won two oscars in one night (she’s nominated for directing Best Documentary Feature as well as co-directing “The Devil is Busy”). For Live Action, I happened to chat with the filmmakers for “Two People Exchanging Saliva” one year during a delayed flight layover on the way into Telluride. They were extremely nice; so I hope they win an Oscar!

Tony:  I am a bad movie geek and did not watch any of these.

Josh: With that whimper toward the finish line, our Oscar Prognosticating and Pontificating is complete. Always a pleasure, on with the show! (And please, Academy, move this ceremony earlier next time around. We can’t sustain the brainrot, hot takes, and faux outrage that bubbles up as campaign season stretches this deep into a fresh year!)