Mark Kermode's Prediction for Best Picture

"Nothing takes the sting out of these tough economic times like watching a bunch of millionaires giving golden statues to each other,” said host Billy Crystal in 2012, and it’s easy to dismiss The Oscars™ as a back-slapping festival of self-congratulation that’s intended to sell movies.

The Oscars™. They’re literally The Oscars™ of the film world. Bearing in mind last year’s unfortunate debacle, the votes from the 6,000 members of the Academy of Motion Pictures and Sciences have been counted, and probably counted again, the envelopes have been checked, checked and thrice checked, and those gold statues will be adorning the marble mantelpieces of the great and good of Hollywood.

Perhaps the most prized statue will be Best Picture.

On the UK’s flagship film programme, Kermode and Mayo’s Film Review, we have reviewed each and every one of the best picture nominees, and we now present a reminder of what Mark & the team thought about the films at the time.

Director: Luca Guadagnino
Stars: Timothée Chalamet and Armie Hammer.
Summary: Coming-of-age drama set in Northern Italy in 1983.
Total Box Office: £21m
Mark says: “I really liked it, but I wasn’t quite as knocked out as some people. A genuinely touching sensuality about it. I like it enough. It’s not going to win.”

Our supersub Clarisse Loughrey reviewed the film in October.

Director: Joe Wright
Stars: Gary Oldman
Summary: An account of Churchill’s early days as Prime Minister, as Nazi Germany swept across Western Europe.
Total Box Office: £98m
Mark says: “Gary Oldman’s going to win because it’s his turn… but the film is not going to win Best Picture.”

Director: Christopher Nolan
Stars: Kenneth Branagh, Cillian Murphy, Mark Rylance, and Tom Hardy
Summary: Ensemble cast war film about the evacuation of Dunkirk in 1940.
Total Box Office: £381m
Mark says: “Wonderful, overwhelming experience. I don’t think it’s going to win.”

Director: Jordan Peele
Stars: Daniel Kaluuya
Summary: American horror as a young black man is abducted from a suburban street.
Total Box Office: £185m
Mark says: “I loved it, I thought it was just great. It’s good that it’s nominated, I don’t think it’s going to win.”

Director: Greta Gerwig
Stars: Saoirse Ronan
Summary: Coming of age comedy drama set in 90s California.
Total Box Office: £39m
Mark says: “The thing with Lady Bird is that lots of people like it and nobody hates it. I thought at one point that Lady Bird was going to win but now I’m not too sure.”

Clarisse Loughrey reviewed the film in February.

Director: Paul Thomas Anderson
Stars: Daniel Day-Lewis
Summary: Drama set in London's couture world in the 1950s.
Total Box Office: £24m
Mark says: “I love Phantom Thread, I’ve seen it four times… Total outsider but the fact that it’s nominated is great. Paul Thomas Anderson’s best film since Punch Drunk Love.”

Director: Steven Spielberg
Stars: Tom Hanks and Meryl Streep
Summary: Historical drama political thriller set around American newspapers’ attempts to publish the Pentagon Papers.
Total Box Office: £106m
Mark says: “I really liked it… Particularly relevant at the moment, I don’t think it’s got a cat in hell’s chance of winning Best Picture.”

Director: Guillermo Del Toro
Stars: Sally Hawkins & Michael Shannon
Summary: Fantasy drama set in Baltimore at a high-security government laboratory.
Total Box Office: £82m
Mark says: “I loved Shape of Water. It’s Guillermo’s best film since Pan’s Labyrinth. There’s a possibility that it may win.”

Clarisse Loughrey reviewed the film for us.

Director: Martin McDonagh
Stars: Frances McDormand
Summary: Black comedy about a mother who rents three billboards to call attention to her daughter's unsolved murder.
Total Box Office: £89m
Mark says: “It’s done really brilliantly well despite getting caught in a negative publicity storm about whether or not its racial politics were properly investigated. All the smart money is on Three Billboards.”

And here's Mark and Simon discussing all this year's nominees... Join Mark and Simon for some post-Oscars analysis next week when our guest will be Oscar regular Michael Caine.