How reliable is the Director Guild of America (DGA) recipient as it pertains to the eventual Oscar winner for Best Director? In the 21st century, the match has been 19 of 22 times. In 2000, Ang Lee (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) took DGA and the Academy Award went to Steven Soderbergh for Traffic. Ben Affleck was the DGA recipient in 2012 for Argo though he didn’t get an Oscar nod. Ang Lee, for Life of Pi, took the gold instead. Sam Mendes (1917) was DGA in 2019, but Bong Joon-ho (Parasite) was the Academy’s choice. All others years corresponded in the century corresponded.
The DGA Award is revealed tomorrow night and here’s your nominees:
Daniels, Everything Everywhere All at Once
Todd Field, Tár
Joseph Kosinski, Top Gun: Maverick
Martin McDonagh, The Banshees of Inisherin
Steven Spielberg, The Fabelmans
There’s a 4/5 correlation with the Oscar nominees (par for the course). Kosinski is not in the Academy’s quintet while Ruben Ostlund (Triangle of Sadness) is. Therefore it’s safe to rule the Maverick maker out.
Neither Field nor McDonagh have taken any major precursors. The Daniels and Spielberg have. For the Daniels, they were the Critics Choice victors. At the Golden Globes, it was Spielberg. To call this is a two-person (or three technically) race seems accurate. Anyone else winning would be a considerable upset.
A little less than a month before the Oscar ceremony, I do believe Everything stands as your soft Oscar frontrunner. Spielberg saw a surprising omission at the BAFTAs where he didn’t even make their shortlist. Due to his legendary status, it would be foolish to discount him. However, I believe the momentum lies with Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert so…
Predicted DGA Winner(s):
The Daniels, Everything Everywhere All at Once
I’ll make my DGA commentary part of my recap post for the BAFTAs on Sunday evening. Stay tuned!
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