Oscar odds update: Venice hit ‘September 5’ comes on strong
Almost immediately after it was acquired by Paramount Pictures and given a November 27 limited release date, Venice Film Festival selection “September 5” landed on the radar of hundreds of Gold Derby users who have given it strong odds across multiple Oscar categories. Earlier this week, the fact-based thriller replaced Netflix’s “The Piano Lesson” as the highest-ranked film hovering outside of our predicted Best Picture lineup, with our teams of editors and experts already expecting it to earn a bid for the main prize.
“September 5” is also close to breaking into our original screenplay and supporting actor top fives, with 53-year-old Peter Sarsgaard benefitting from the notion that he is overdue for his first nomination. His recently confirmed involvement in the featured male race has led to increased uncertainty over who will make the final cut, as demonstrated by our editors and top 24 users’ respective solitary support of Samuel L. Jackson (“The Piano Lesson”) and Edward Norton (“A Complete Unknown”) over consensus picks Denzel Washington (“Gladiator II”) and Stanley Tucci (“Conclave”).
General lead and supporting actor frontrunners Ralph Fiennes (“Conclave”) and Kieran Culkin (“A Real Pain”) are weakened by the fact that the top 24 and all-star users are instead staunchly backing pairs from “The Brutalist” (Adrien Brody and Guy Pearce) and “Sing Sing” (Colman Domingo and Clarence Maclin). However, both of said predictor groups did just move “Conclave” to the top of their adapted screenplay lists at the expense of “Sing Sing” while our editors did the exact opposite.
Although several films are currently dividing our predictor subsets, “Emilia Pérez” has only continued to unite them. Since our editors and experts have made it their top choice for Best Picture and Director (Jacques Audiard), it is on track to potentially surpass “Anora” as the overall frontrunner in both categories. The experts and all-stars agree that Zoe Saldana will win Best Supporting Actress for the Netflix musical while the editors and top 24 users are leading the charge for it to become an adapted screenplay nominee.
In the wake of “The Life of Chuck’s” reclassification as a 2026 Oscars contender, our top 24 and all-star 24 users diverged in their necessary selections of replacement Best Picture nominees, respectively going with “A Complete Unknown” and “A Real Pain.” The editors and experts had yet to throw their support behind the Toronto Film Festival darling, which only reached 12th place on our combined Best Picture list prior to its disqualification.
Other recent developments worth noting are “Dune: Part Two” helmer Denis Villeneuve’s reentry into our directing lineup at the expense of Edward Berger (“Conclave”), the top 24 users’ singular support of RaMell Ross (“Nickel Boys”) in that category, and “The Piano Lesson’s” exit from our adapted screenplay list in favor of “The Room Next Door.”
Be on the lookout for new state of the Oscars race updates every Thursday leading up to the nominations announcement on January 17.