Welcome to the penultimate installment of “How Many Oscars Will Sean Baker Win in One Night?” Previously, we concluded that Baker is apt to win not only the best original screenplay prize in a squeaker over Jesse Eisenberg (and, not insignificantly, Cannes’s screenplay winner Coralie Fargeat), but also appears to be cruising past The Brutalist’s Brady Corbet to claim an additional Oscar for best direction.
In point of order, the cliffhanger we left you with in our last episode was whether Baker’s 2025 path mirrors that of Woody Allen’s in 1978, when Annie Hall danced past heavier competitors like The Turning Point and Julia (no, fanboys, Star Wars never had a chance) to sweep up four above-the-line Oscars. While Allen only won two awards that night, as he wasn’t a producer on his film, the metaphor of Baker as a Woody-like one-man band still holds true in this year’s race, which is palpably starting to feel like a coronation on the order of Bong Joon-ho’s three wins for Parasite, or possibly even the record four trophies that Walt Disney won in 1954.
It’s easy to forget, given how notably Annie Hall was widely reported to have been rescued in the editing room (when it was called Anhedonia), that the film wasn’t actually nominated for its editing. That means Baker has an opening to leap past Allen with a win here, a feat that at least a few are predicting. Certainly Baker has to be considered in the thick of it as this year’s emerging renaissance man, but here we admit that conventional wisdom feels like a smarter bet.
Conclave’s twists and turns may be more risibly unserious than those of the much derided Emilia Pérez, whose punchy, frenetic rhythms we’d be taking a lot more seriously here were it not for…well, you know. But it’s not lost on us that Edward Berger’s film is also among the rapidly dwindling adult entertainments that don’t overstay their welcome by at least two reels’ worth. As still-ballooning best picture running times continue to make the likes of The Turning Point and Julia look like cakewalks, we’re sure we’re not alone in our sense of relief that Conclave manages to bring the ship in within two briskly paced hours.
Will Win: Conclave
Could Win: Anora
Should Win: Conclave
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