“I think it’s ‘Roma,’ but it’s such a tough call!” Keith Simanton (IMDb) confesses when predicting the Oscar race for Best Picture with Alicia Malone (TCM) and me. Watch our video above or listen to the audio podcast below. “It’s going to come down to what’s number 2 on the voters’ ballots. There’s so much passion for so many different films!”
Alicia admits that the preferential ballot has her stumped, too. “That’s why I keep going back and forth with my predictions. Will it be ‘Roma’ or something like ‘Green Book’?”
There’s another frustrating factor, too. “Voters might think: We’ll give ‘Roma’ Best Foreign Film and Best Director and then that’s done so they don’t vote for it for Best Picture,” she adds. “I’m going to stay with ‘Roma’ because it was my number one favorite filmi of last year. But I wouldn’t be surprised if the winner turns out to be ‘Green Book.'”
Keith believes Cuaron is vulnerable in the Best Director category since Spike Lee (“BlacKkKlansman”) is nominated there for the first time ever. “This is a fairly legendary individual – that’s a compelling argument,” he adds.
As for Best Actress, Alicia says Glenn Close (“The Wife”) has all the momentum. “So far she’s won SAG, the Globe, the Critics’ Choice Award. She has so much good will behind her. She gives a wonderfully understated performance that’s so powerful.”
See Keith’s predictions here. Mine here. See how our predictions compare against 19 other Experts. Disagree? Make your predictions here and compete against our Experts and Editors to prove that you are the smartest prognosticator on the planet!
BELOW: Audio podcast version of our chat. Or listen at iTunes, Spotify, Libsyn, Google Play or Stitcher where you can subscribe to our channel.
