DGA Preview, Predictions, and Contest, Take Two

On December 30, we did our official DGA preview with charts and whatnot that you can see here. I thought we should revisit the subject since Alejandro G. Iñarritu beat the competition last night at the Golden Globes. Does it change anything? The key to The Revenant’s win last night and the thing to remember is that the HFPA did not award Iñarritu for Birdman last year except for screenplay. They were the first to anoint him and welcome him into the Oscar race in 2006 (back when the Globes really did have an impact on nominations) with Babel. But he only won Best Picture then, not Director. He next won Screenplay, but not Director or Picture for Birdman. With The Revenant, it was their chance to go “full Iñarritu.” That’s something the industry already did last year. If the Globes had awarded Birdman and then The Revenant back-to-back, that would make me sit upright in my seat. As it is, their picking The Revenant isn’t so out of the realm of believability and doesn’t really shift the race that much except in one significant way. If we are really heading into a split year — which I still don’t think we are, but it’s possible — the mismatch recipient of Best Director hasn’t yet been decided. Maybe George Miller for Mad Max: Fury Road, maybe Ridley Scott for The Martian. Maybe Todd Haynes for Carol. No one has been thinking Iñarritu as a stand-alone Best Director winner.

If a split were to happen, it will be an easy call to make because one will likely win the Producers Guild and one will win the Directors Guild. For instance, Spotlight could win the PGA — a popular film, well-liked across the board. The Revenant and Iñarritu could win at the Directors Guild for his high achievement, his level of difficulty, like Oliver Stone who won for Born on the Fourth of July the year Driving Miss Daisy curiously won Best Picture repeatedly in precursors and then received no directing nomination at all at the Oscars. That’s one way this could play out.

I still don’t think we can discount the things we know for sure about this race, the things we always throw out when it all starts to look crazy and unpredictable, but things which we can rely on year after year. One of those things is the SAG Awards Ensemble nomination, which matters, Mr. Crawford. It matters. The other thing we can look to is how the DGA shakes out tomorrow. We know Alejandro G. Iñarritu will be on that list. But what of the others?

Herewith, our DGA Preview and Predictions Contest.

Scenario A – DGA members like Bridge of Spies as much as the BAFTA did:

Ridley Scott, The Martian
George Miller, Mad Max: Fury Road
Alejandro G. Iñarritu, The Revenant
Adam McKay, The Big Short
Steven Spielberg, Bridge of Spies

In that scenario, Spotlight could still theoretically follow the Driving Miss Daisy path by winning Best Picture without a need for a DGA or Oscar nod for directing.

Scenario B – The dreams of The Big Short winning Best Picture wither, possibly die:

Ridley Scott, The Martian
George Miller, Mad Max
Alejandro G. Iñarritu, The Revenant
Tom McCarthy, Spotlight
Steven Spielberg, Bridge of Spies

With The Big Short ostensibly crippled, out of the way, it becomes Spotlight’s to lose (because it has the SAG Awards Ensemble nomination and none of the others do).

Scenario C – A shocker pops up to throw things off:

Ridley Scott, The Martian
Alejandro G. Iñarritu, The Revenant
J.J. Abrams, Star Wars: The Force Awakens
Adam McKay, The Big Short
Tom McCarthy, Spotlight

In this scenario, there is no Spielberg because these 14,000 members didn’t like Bridge of Spies as much as they liked Star Wars. There are a lot of voters here. This will be the single biggest number of voters by any group since the awards season began. The Force Awakens knocked Spotlight out of the ACE Eddie nominations. What did get in for Eddie? Mad Max: Fury Road, The Martian, The Big Short, The Revenant, The Force Awakens, and Sicario.

Scenario D – Todd Haynes makes an historic leap into the DGA:

Ridley Scott, The Martian
Alejandro G. Iñarritu, The Revenant
Todd Haynes, Carol
Adam McKay, The Big Short
Tom McCarthy, Spotlight

Going by the ACE, which is the second biggest group to vote since the season started, I’m going to predict the DGA to be:

Ridley Scott, The Martian
Alejandro G. Iñarritu, The Revenant
Adam McKay, The Big Short
George Miller, Mad Max
Tom McCarthy, Spotlight
Alts: J.J. Abrams, The Force Awakens; Steven Spielberg, Bridge of Spies

If I had any real balls I would predict Abrams in and McCarthy out, but I don’t have the balls nor the heart to do that. I feel fairly confident that the DGA will announce five out of the seven of the names above. And now, it’s your turn.