The predictions for this year’s Oscars are wide open with a close race for Best Director between Sean Baker from “Anora” and Brady Corbert from “The Brutalist.” Other nominees include Coralie Fargeat from “The Substance,” Jacques Audiard from “Emilia Perez,” and James Mangold from “A Complete Unknown.”
| Director | Film | Implied Probability | Odds |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sean Baker | Anora | 60% | -175 |
| Brady Corbet | The Brutalist | 38% | +163 |
| Coralie Fargeat | The Substance | 2% | +2500 |
Corbert was the betting favorite entering the awards season and his odds peaked after a victory at the Golden Globes. However, a recent controversy involving the use of AI has negatively affected Corbert and thrust Baker to the front of the two-man race. While audience might relate more with Baker’s raw realism in Anora, critics tend to favor Brady’s rigid storytelling and spatial compositions in The Brutalist.
Anora is currently the betting favorite to win Best Picture as well after overtaking The Brutalist. It is important to point out that the film that wins Best Picture does not always win Best Director. The Academy has often split the winners in these prestigious categories, which occurred six times since 2013 and last happened in 2022. There’s a chance that split recognition will happen again this year. Then again, if you look at historical trends and predictions regarding the guild awards, then Anora will win both Best Picture and Best Director at the Oscars.
Sean Baker (Anora)
Baker prides himself as an indie filmmaker who made a name for himself with 2017 hit “The Florida Project.” His most recent creation, Anora, was truly an independent film with a modest budget of $6 million. Baker strives for heightened realism in his films. Anora is both humorous and deeply emotional while providing a modern-day adaptation of a Cinderella-like story and class struggle.
Baker’s Anora drew initial buzz when it won the Palme d’Or at Cannes. Although it was only nominated for two Golden Globes, it earned four nods at the Oscars including Best Director, Best Film, Best Original Screenplay, and Best Editing. Baker also wrote the screenplay, which recently won for Best Original Screenplay at the Writer’s Guild of America Awards. Anora recently won the Producers Guild of America Award for Best Picture. In recent weeks, Anora also won Best Picture at the Critics Choice Awards and Producers Guild Awards.
At the Indie Spirit Awards this past weekend in L.A., Anora won Best Feature, Best Director for Brady, and Best Actor for Mikey Madison.
Baker won Best Director at the Directors Guild of America Awards. The DGA winner is often an historical indicator of who will win the Oscar because they have many of the same voters. The DGA winner has not won Best Director at the Oscars only eight times in history, which most recently occurred in 2020 when Sam Mendes lost out to Bong Joon-ho.
Between Baker’s victory at the DGA and The Brutalist’s controversy using AI, Anora’s chances to win Best Picture drastically increased in recent weeks. Baker also saw his chances to win Best Director skyrocket. Baker is the new betting favorite to win Best Director at -175 odds at most sportsbooks, compared to +550 in early February.
Baker has a 60% chance of winning at Kalshi, which is the equivalent of -150 on the moneyline. He was as low as 8% in early February before making a huge surge in the last two weeks. He was neck-and-neck a week ago at 48% with Corbet.
Baker is also the directing favorite at Gold Derby at 9/5 odds, which is +180 odds.
Brady Corbet (The Brutalist)
The Brutalist took over seven years to make for Corbet, and the budget was around $10 million with most of the filming occurring in Hungary. Corbet’s patience paid off when The Brutalist earned 10 nominations at this year’s Oscars. Brady was the early frontrunner to win Best Director after his victory at the Golden Globes. However, that epic moment would be his high-water mark.
His film about a visionary architect and Holocaust survivor drew harsh criticism from the architecture world for Brady’s depiction of Brutalist architecture. The lengthy run time was also under fire as self-indulgent by some critics. Even with an intermission, many viewers were turned off by the film that clocked in over 3 hours and 35 minutes. Those were minor gripes compared to the huge backlash that occurred over the use of AI in the editing room.
There was an immediate backlash when The Brutalist’s editor revealed that AI was used to fix the Hungarian dialect of two main actors — Adrien Brody and Felicity Jones. The writing and acting guilds in Hollywood were embroiled in a strike last year where the usage of AI was a bone of contention. The anti-AI purists in Hollywood and the international filmmaking community were incensed that Brady employed the use of AI. Many other tech-friendly filmmakers came to Corbet’s defense that he simply used a piece of technology to improve a creative aspect of his film, and in this case, to make sure the Hungarian accents were accurate.
Despite the blowback, it was unknown if the AI controversy could impact voters when it came to Best Picture and Best Director. Some older voters and intellectuals might relate more to the themes in The Brutalist like institutional oppression and dehumanization, while being turned off by a story of a sex worker in Anora.
Corbet was a huge favorite to win Best Director in early February at -700 odds at major sportsbooks, but as the awards season continued, Corbet’s chances quickly diminished. After losing to Baker at the DGA Awards, Corbet’s Oscar odds slipped to -105. Over the last week, his odds continued to fall to +160 even though he won the BAFTA Award for Best Direction. The predictions at Gold Derby are not favorable either after Corbet slipped to 3/1.
Corbet was as high as 86% to win Best Director on Kalshi in early February. His numbers began to slide after the AI story broke, but they dropped off a cliff after the DGA awarded Baker as Best Director. Corbet is currently 38% at Kalshi, which is the equivalent of +165 odds on the moneyline.
