Oscars 2019: DGA Awards
DGA just announced.
Sam Mendes just won for 1917. So that’s a done deal. We’ve got four acting categories and Best Director all sewn up before the BAFTAs, which will confirm just about everything else we’ve got here. But even if they go opposite, all that really does is make you go, “Oh, that’s cute.” Because the DGA, as we all know… almost always right. So that’s about a done deal in Director. Picture is still up in the air, and really the only interesting thing BAFTA can do now is give someone else (namely Bong Joon-ho or Quentin, but mostly Bong Joon-ho) Picture and Director and make the Picture race more interesting. Because the door just shut on Director. This shit is locked. Because, didn’t we mention — HE SHOT A WAR MOVIE IN A ‘SINGLE TAKE’. Of course the directors were gonna go crazy for that.
Anyway, ASC still to announce, as if we had any doubt that Deakins was gonna win that shit too.
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Oscars 2019: DGA Nominations
Okay, DGA nominations. Here we go. Last piece of the puzzle and then we’ve got it all.
I’m not wasting time. Here they are:
Best Director
Bong Joon-ho, Parasite
Sam Mendes, 1917
Martin Scorsese, The Irishman
Quentin Tarantino, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
Taika Waititi, Jojo Rabbit
Oscars 2018: DGA Awards
The DGA Awards were handed out tonight. As a reminder, your nominees were:
Bradley Cooper, A Star Is Born
Alfonso Cuaron, Roma
Peter Farrelly, Green Book
Spike Lee, BlacKkKlansman
Adam McKay, Vice
Your Oscar category has Yorgos Lanthimos and Pawel Pawlikowski instead of Cooper and Farrelly, so basically you went into this knowing that Alfonso Cuaron was going to win and had absolutely no doubts about any other outcome.
And surprise, Alfonso Cuaron won. So now with the DGA alone, he becomes something like a 90% odds-on winner of the Oscar. But we didn’t really need the DGA to tell us that, did we? This one seemed pretty obvious all the way through, no matter what way Best Picture winds up going.
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Oscars 2018: DGA Nominations
And your DGA nominations were announced today. Typically they match 4/5 with the Oscars, so one of these people most likely will not end up being nominated. The last time they went 5/5 was 2009. And before that, 2005. And before that, 1998. So three times in twenty years.
Oh, and because I’m nuts — it only happened two times before that: 1981 and 1977. So five times ever. Well… since the DGA went to five nominees in 1970. Before that, the DGA had ten to fifteen nominees a year, which made it way easier to have all five be nominated. And you know what? It still only happened three times in those years: 1953 (12 DGA nominees), 1954 (15 DGA nominees) and 1967 (10 DGA nominees).
So yeah, 5 times in almost 50 years. Odds are, one of these people will not be nominated at the Oscars, and I think we all know who it’s gonna be.
Here are your DGA nominees for 2018: (more…)
Oscars 2017: DGA Awards
The DGA announced their winner last night. As a reminder, the nominees were:
Guillermo Del Toro, The Shape of Water
Greta Gerwig, Lady Bird
Martin McDonagh, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
Christopher Nolan, Dunkirk
Jordan Peele, Get Out
And the winner… was Guillermo Del Toro.
The DGA has matched the Oscar winner all but seven times, ever (and three of those times, the DGA winner wasn’t even nominated). So, at this very moment, there is a 90-94% chance that Guillermo Del Toro will win Best Director at the Oscars. He’s won all the precursors so far, and if he wins the BAFTA, I think it’s completely 100% locked. Look at it — four of these five are up for the Oscar. Paul Thomas Anderson is on the final list over Martin McDonagh, but otherwise they’re the same. BAFTA didn’t spark to Lady Bird or Get Out the way the other groups have, so unless Christopher Nolan is gonna try to pull a fast one (which seems unlikely), I think Guillermo has it in the bag.
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Oscars 2017: DGA Nominations
DGA nominations announced today. Not surprisingly, this will be big in determining who gets nominated for Best Director.
Without further ado, here they are:
Guillermo Del Toro, The Shape of Water
Greta Gerwig, Lady Bird
Martin McDonagh, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
Christopher Nolan, Dunkirk
Jordan Peele, Get Out
Oscars 2016: DGA Awards
Damien Chazelle won for La La Land. Shit’s locked, folks. In case you didn’t know already.
I figured I wouldn’t waste your time with a bullshit introduction and all that stuff.
Damien Chazelle won the DGA Award for La La Land, the award that is so accurate that only seven times in the history of the Oscars has it ever differed from the eventual Best Director winner. And two of those times, the person wasn’t even nominated. So we’re looking at 90% confirmation, and then taking into account the two times the winner wasn’t nominated (and assuming the next obvious choice), 93%.
Shit’s locked, guys. Good night, let’s go home, Picture and Director are sealed and now we just gotta figure out how many Oscars La La Land is winning and focus on some of the technical categories and acting categories to try to get some of the more contentious ones right.
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Oscars 2015: DGA Awards
They gave out the DGA Awards earlier tonight. Or, I guess yesterday, since it’s like 3am now.
Alejandro G. Inarritu won for The Revenant.
So Best Director is pretty much a wrap. The DGA is the most accurate precursor of all of them.
The back-t0-back Best Director feat has only happened once before: Joseph L. Mankiewicz in 1949 and 1950, for A Letter to Three Wives and All About Eve. Mankiewicz also won Best Screenplay for both of those efforts on top of that. The Revenant wasn’t nominated for Screenplay this year, otherwise that also would have been in play.
BAFTA announces in a week. They’re the only ones that could potentially pull for an alternate winner. Though at this point, who could that even be?
Oscars 2015: DGA Nominations
The last major guild we were waiting for has announced. It’s DGA time.
Typically, the DGA matches the Oscars four out of five. This year, they theoretically could go five out of five.
Nothing seemed overly surprising with their choices. There was only one moderately surprising entry, but even that was a film that’s looking to be a major player. So really it’s just gonna be about figuring what could knock any of these nominees off the final list.
Here are your DGA nominees for 2015: (more…)
Oscars 2014: DGA Awards
The DGA Awards were tonight.
And… while the result was a distinct possibility, I somehow did not expect it to happen.
Alejandro G. Inarritu won for Birdman.
Which means Birdman has now won the PGA, the DGA, Best Ensemble at SAG, yet lost the Globe and BFCA. Though the two that matter, it has. And it’s the most nominated film at the Oscars. This might happen, guys. It feels weird.
BAFTA is tomorrow, though. Really interested to see which way they go.
I’m not willing to say the tide has turned until I see which way BAFTA goes. If that happens, and it wins BAFTA, look out.
Oscars 2014: DGA Nominations
The DGA announced their nominations today.
Not a very surprising list, honestly.
Here it is:
Best Director
Wes Anderson, The Grand Budapest Hotel
Clint Eastwood, American Sniper
Alejandro G. Inarritu, Birdman
Richard Linklater, Boyhood
Morten Tyldum, The Imitation Game (more…)
Oscars 2013 Update: DGA Awards
So, Alfonso Cuaron just won the DGA.
That about sews that one up.
Unless we’re in for a real shocker.
Which no one expects.
Best Picture race — still interesting. Now we actually have to look to the BAFTAs for help. (Boy, that’ll be interesting.
Oscars 2012 Update: DGA Awards
Ben Affleck won the DGA Award for Argo.
It’s now going to be 7 times.
(That is, seven times that the DGA and the Oscars have differed. Ever. And now everyone’s gonna be wondering what the directors branch did with their Oscar nominations this year. This is fun. Best Director at the Oscars is officially meaningless this year.)
Oscars 2011 Update: DGA Awards
…and that’s the sound of the Oscar race being over a month in advance.
The Artist, specifically Michel Hazanavicius, won the DGA Award for Best Director for a Feature Film just now, which all but assures that it’ll win Best Picture and Best Director come February 26th and the Oscars.
I’m not that upset, honestly, since I love the film. But, a PGA win puts the film at a big favorite to win the Oscars (at least 75%), and a DGA win puts it at a 90+% chance that Hazanavicius will also win Best Director for the film as well. Of 64 DGA awards, the winner has differed from the Oscar winner 6 times (it’ll be 7/64 if someone else wins this time). So it’s hovering at a 10% chance someone like Scorsese will win Best Director. Not only that, but 3 of the 6 times DGA and Oscar have differed, the person who won the DGA wasn’t even nominated for the Oscar. So, really, it’s like a 5% chance that Scorsese (because let’s be real, who else will beat him?) wins. Though, for renegades: the other three times the winners differed: Carol Reed won over Anthony Harvey, Bob Fosse won over Francis Ford Coppola, and Steven Soderbergh won over Ang Lee. So, basically, more established names won over relative newcomers. (Coppola wasn’t known before The Godfather, and Ang Lee… well, actually, that one’s probably more about him being a foreigner than anything.) So it’s possible Scorsese stil wins. But still, 5% all time. Take your chances. And the worst thing that could happen now is if Hugo wins Best Picture, but Hazanavicius wins Best Director. Because if anything, it should be opposite. Even Hazanavicius says so.
Anyway, to wrap this up, the only other DGA award that matters (the rest were TV) is that Project Nim won the Best Director for a Documentary award, which means the Academy is once again out of touch with their nominations, since Project Nim wasn’t even nominated for Best Documentary. Good job once again, Academy. But at least the Documentary branch isn’t the Music branch. Right? (So yeah, The Artist is like a 90% odds-on winner next month. Isn’t it great that it’s all figured out so early? And the Academy thought bumping everything up would add more surprise to the race. Surprise, motherfuckers!)
