It's that time of year again as the Oscars take place this weekend and if you want to impress your friends, you can pretty much tell them who the big winners on the night will be.
With the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Awards taking place over the weekend, all of the major predictor awards have now revealed their winners and history tells us how they'll impact the Oscars.
You can never be 100% sure – and we don't like to boast – but when it comes to the six major categories (Best Picture, Directing and the four acting awards), Digital Spy has a strong success rate when it comes to predicting who will win.
Last year, we correctly guessed five of the six winners as Oppenheimer dominated on the night. It's unlikely that one movie will dominate this year's Oscars though which is a much more open field.
So using history as our guide, here's who will win at this year's Oscars in Best Picture, Directing and all four of the acting categories.
Best Picture
Nominees: Anora, The Brutalist, A Complete Unknown, Conclave, Dune: Part Two, Emilia Pérez, I'm Still Here, Nickel Boys, The Substance, Wicked
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Likely winner: Conclave
This year's Best Picture winner is the toughest to predict in a while as there's history to support both Anora and Conclave winning on the night.
Anora became the frontrunner after winning the top prize at the Directors Guild of America (DGA) Awards, the Writers Guild of America (WGA) Awards and the Producers Guild of America (PGA) Award for Best Theatrical Motion Picture.
The PGA winner has matched the Oscar winner 25 times out of its 35-year history, while there has only ever been one movie (Brokeback Mountain) which has won all three of those awards and not won Best Picture at the Oscars.
Good odds, you might think.
Well, Conclave then won the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture. The SAG ensemble winner has gone on to win Best Picture 15 times out of 29.
What's more, Conclave also won Best Film at the BAFTAs and out of the nine movies to win both the SAG ensemble and the BAFTA for Best Film, seven of them have gone on to win Best Picture (HT Ben Zauzmer).
Oh, and that movie to beat Brokeback Mountain without winning the PGA, DGA or WGA? Crash, which came into the Oscars having won the ensemble award at the SAG Awards.
One thing potentially in Anora's favour is that Conclave director Edward Berger wasn't even nominated for Directing at the Oscars, and it's rare for a movie to win Best Picture without even a directing nomination.
Recent Best Picture wins for Argo, Green Book and CODA – all of which didn't have a director nomination – have suggested that is isn't a knock-out blow for Conclave though.
What's more, the Best Picture is the only Oscar to be decided by a preferential ballot and the only award to be voted on by all Academy members. That tends to favour the most well-liked movie rather than the most-loved, and Anora could prove too divisive compared to the 'safer' Conclave.
We've opted for Conclave here on the balance of probabilities, but it's really a coin-toss and we wouldn't be surprised to see Anora take the big prize.
Spare a thought though for early frontrunner The Brutalist which, bar a major upset, doesn't stand a chance anymore.
Directing
Nominees: Sean Baker (Anora), Brady Corbet (The Brutalist), James Mangold (A Complete Unknown), Jacques Audiard (Emilia Pérez), Coralie Fargeat (The Substance)
Likely winner: Sean Baker (Anora)
Despite a win for Brady Corbet at the Golden Globes, it now looks like Sean Baker will win the Directing Oscar for Anora after a key win at the DGA awards.
There have only been eight occasions in the DGA's history where the winner of its top prize hasn't gone on to win the Oscar. The last time it happened was when DGA winner Sam Mendes lost out to Bong Joon-ho at the Oscars in 2020.
You can't completely rule out an upset given that Coralie Fargeat wasn't even nominated for the DGA top prize, but it seems unlikely at this stage.
Actor in a Leading Role
Nominees: Adrien Brody (The Brutalist), Timothée Chalamet (A Complete Unknown), Colman Domingo (Sing Sing), Ralph Fiennes (Conclave), Sebastian Stan (The Apprentice)
Likely winner: Adrien Brody (The Brutalist)
For most of this year's awards race, it looked like Adrien Brody would coast his way to the Oscar after he won at the Golden Globes, BAFTAs and Critics' Choice awards, largely against the same competition.
And then the SAG Awards decided to completely switch it up and make Timothée Chalamet the youngest-ever winner of Best Actor, marking his first major win of the season.
In its 30-year history, the SAG Awards have matched the Oscars 24 times in the lead actor category, which boosts Chalamet's chances. However, the odds are stacked against him elsewhere in Oscars history.
No actor has ever won the Oscar having only won the SAG award and if you expand it across all four acting categories, only six actors in the SAG's history have won the Oscar with only a SAG win.
That means it's likely still Adrien Brody who will triumph at the Oscars, but history is made to be broken...
Actress in a Leading Role
Nominees: Cynthia Erivo (Wicked), Karla Sofía Gascón (Emilia Pérez), Mikey Madison (Anora), Demi Moore (The Substance), Fernanda Torres (I'm Still Here)
Likely winner: Demi Moore (The Substance)
Like lead actor, it's still a close race in the lead actress category with Demi Moore the current favourite to win her first-ever Oscar.
Moore won at the Golden Globes and the Critics' Choice awards before she also landed the SAG award this weekend. The SAG Awards have matched the Oscars 21 times in its 30-year history, while only seven actors have missed out on the Oscar after winning at the Globes and SAGs.
It's not a foregone conclusion though as Mikey Madison was the surprise winner at the BAFTAs. Madison also beat Moore to win at the Independent Spirit Awards, meaning that you can't rule her out on an Oscars win.
The real curveball is Fernanda Torres who has yet to face Moore and Madison in this awards season. Torres won the Golden Globe in the Drama category, where Moore and Madison were in the Musical or Comedy category.
It's likely still Moore who will go home with the Oscar, but it's another exciting category at this year's Oscars where there's not an obvious favourite.
Actor in a Supporting Role
Nominees: Yura Borisov (Anora), Kieran Culkin (A Real Pain), Edward Norton (A Complete Unknown), Guy Pearce (The Brutalist), Jeremy Strong (The Apprentice)
Likely winner: Kieran Culkin (A Real Pain)
Actress in a Supporting Role
Nominees: Monica Barbaro (A Complete Unknown), Ariana Grande (Wicked), Felicity Jones (The Brutalist), Isabella Rossellini (Conclave), Zoe Saldaña (Emilia Pérez)
Likely winner: Zoe Saldaña (Emilia Pérez)
It's a completely different story in the supporting acting categories which is why we've bundled the two together.
Kieran Culkin and Zoe Saldaña have been on a procession of wins this entire awards season, culminating in them both winning their respective categories at the SAG Awards which all-but secured their Oscars.
The only potential sticking point for Saldaña is whether the recent Emilia Pérez controversy involving her co-star Karla Sofía Gascón has impacted her chances.
It doesn't seem to have yet, but Oscars voting only opened after the backlash started unlike at other awards ceremonies where voting was open beforehand.
The 97th Academy Awards take place on Sunday, March 2 in the US. It will be broadcast live on ITV in the UK.
Movies Editor, Digital Spy Ian has more than 10 years of movies journalism experience as a writer and editor. Starting out as an intern at trade bible Screen International, he was promoted to report and analyse UK box-office results, as well as carving his own niche with horror movies, attending genre festivals around the world. After moving to Digital Spy, initially as a TV writer, he was nominated for New Digital Talent of the Year at the PPA Digital Awards. He became Movies Editor in 2019, in which role he has interviewed 100s of stars, including Chris Hemsworth, Florence Pugh, Keanu Reeves, Idris Elba and Olivia Colman, become a human encyclopedia for Marvel and appeared as an expert guest on BBC News and on-stage at MCM Comic-Con. Where he can, he continues to push his horror agenda – whether his editor likes it or not.
