10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5? How Many Best Picture Nominees Will There Be?

The Academy Awards have had changed the number of nominees for their Best Picture Award throughout its history. 1927/28 had three nominees.  From 1929-1931 there were five nominees.  From 1932-1943 there were ten nominees.  The most consistent period of time was 1944-2008 where the Academy went back to five nominees.  2009 and 2010 both went back to the 10 nominees.  This year based on the the new rules listed below there is no set specific number of nominees.

New Rules for Best Picture nominees

1. A Reminder List of all eligible motion pictures shall be sent with a nominations ballot to all active and life members of the Academy who shall vote in the order of their preference for not more than five pictures.


2. The pictures receiving the highest number of votes shall become the nominations for final voting for the Best Picture award. There may not be more than ten nor fewer than five nominations; however, no picture shall be nominated that receives less than five percent of the total votes cast.

3. The individual(s) who shall be credited for Academy Award purposes must have screen credit of “producer” or “produced by.” Persons with screen credits of executive producer, co-producer, associate producer, line producer, produced in association with or any other credit shall not receive nominations or Academy statuettes. The nominees will be those three or fewer producers who have performed the major portion of the producing functions. The Producers Branch Executive Committee will designate the qualifying producer nominees for each of the nominated pictures. The committee has the right, in what it determines to be a rare and extraordinary circumstance, to name any additional qualified producer as a nominee.

4. Final voting for the Best Picture award shall be restricted to active and life Academy members.

The key piece of information listed above is in section 2 which states that a Best Picture nominee must have five percent of the total votes cast.  This means that when Academy Award members are voting a film with a significant number of number one votes will get a Best Picture nomination.  Sounds overly complicated!  You are probably asking why not set a specific number?  I like the variable, but I think this just creates inconsistency.

So how many nominees will their be, and what will they be?  Two films are a lock, The Artist and The Descendants, which each won Best Film at The Golden Globes.  Hugo, The Help, and Midnight in Paris are also locks, they have a lot of support from the Globes, and the guild awards.  This makes five.  The next question is will their be more?  Dave Karger from Entertainment Weekly has stated he thinks there will be only five.  While I appreciate his rationale, I think he is incorrect about the number.  The number five is out!

What other films have a shot at the Best Picture nomination? Bridesmaids, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,The Ides of March, Moneyball, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, and War Horse.  Let's start with ten nominees and work back to the five to figure out the most likely scenario.  With Eleven options, and potentially The Tree of Life as as twelfth, what would the ten nominees be?  This is the simplest scenario to predict.

10 nominees
The Artist
Bridesmaids
The Descendants
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
The Help
Hugo
The Ides of March
Midnight in Paris
Moneyball
War Horse

Predicting the the tenth nominee is the toughest thing to do.  I would say the weakest films are Bridesmaids, The Ides of March, and War Horse.  Bridesmaids has a lot of guild support, and War Horse has the second most.  I would say the tenth nominee is between Ides and Tinker.  Ides is more traditional fair while Tinke did impressively at BAFTA.

9 nominees


The Artist
Bridesmaids
The Descendants
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
The Help 
Hugo
Midnight in Paris 
Moneyball
War Horse



8 nominees

The Artist
The Descendants
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
The Help 
Hugo
Midnight in Paris 
Moneyball
War Horse


7 nominees

The Artist
The Descendants
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
The Help 
Hugo
Midnight in Paris 
Moneyball


Picking 10 is going to be tough, but when you get down to 6 nominees it's even harder.  What gets eliminated from the 7 is it Moneyball or The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo?  I am going to take cop out answer and state that there will be no less than seven nominees (if I had to pick I would get rid of Dragon Tattoo.)  My prediction is 8 nominees, and it will be the eight I picked.  I would love to see War Horse get booted off the list, but I do think it will end up as a Best Picture nominee.

Posted in: Academy Awards, Best Picture