It's Oscars Time... Which 2013 Films Will Get Nominated?

Once again, it's awards season. With the People's Choice Awards and the Golden Globes under our belts for 2014, it's hard to believe that we're already halfway through January.

Which, of course, means that it's Academy Awards season and time to place your bets on which movies will get Oscar nods this go around. But don't worry, you still have a little time left.

The Oscar nominees get announced on Thursday morning, practically an eternity to speculate on which of your favorite flicks will get a shot at taking home the little golden guy on Sunday, March 2.

If you're like me, you've probably heard a lot of titles tossed around in recent weeks, many of them winning major critics awards or nominations for a whole slew of prizes given out this time of year. Whether it's Gravity, 12 Years a Slave or The Wolf of Wall Street, it seems everybody is giving out an award, expressing an opinion or submitting a critique (or blog!) on which film is the BEST PICTURE OF THE YEAR, and their many reasons why.

Well, we'll leave the "who's the best" speculation for another blog entry down the road. For now, I'm only interested in which films will get nominated by the Academy for Best Picture.

As usual, there's a wide field of possibilities to choose from. It's fully expected that there will be, once again, 8-10 nominees to choose from, as has been the case since 2009, when the field of nominees was expanded from the traditional five to accommodate films that would likely never get a nomination otherwise.

Interestingly, while in 2009 and 2010 there were ten nominees each, since then we've had slates of only nine films apiece. I strongly suspect that's what we'll get this time around, too. It seems that the Academy has settled into a nice pattern for the number of nominees, so let's take a look at which one's they'll likely be.

There's a good field of films from which to choose. There's also a diverse group of filmmakers getting attention this time around, with a number of cinema warhorses (Martin Scorsese, the Coen Brothers, Woody Allen) and younger directors with a growing body of work to showcase (Steve McQueen, David O. Russell, Alfonso Cuaron). That being said, here's the pool of likely nominees, followed by the movies I believe WILL be nominated:

Wolf of Wall Street
12 Years a Slave
Philomena
Gravity
American Hustle
Dallas Buyer's Club
Lee Daniels' The Butler
Captain Phillips
Nebraska
Saving Mr. Banks
Her
Blue Jasmine
Inside Llewyn Davis
Rush
August: Osage County

Certainly, there are other films from which to choose the coveted nominee slots. But in the end, the Academy is only going to nominate nine of them (unless, of course, I'm wrong and they nominate ten).

That being said, here are the ones I think we'll see announced tomorrow morning:

1. 12 Years a Slave
2. American Hustle
3. Blue Jasmine
4. Captain Phillips
5. Dallas Buyer's Club
6. Gravity
7. Her
8. Nebraska
9. Wolf of Wall Street

I struggled a bit with this list. While any of the films from the full list above could be nominated, I think it's going to come down to these nine. Still, I'm leaving myself a little wiggle room here. I struggled with putting Inside Llewyn Davis up instead of Dallas Buyer's Club. But I'm going with my gut on this one. If I'm wrong about any of these, I think it'll be these two. Or perhaps Woody Allen's Blue Jasmine, although in Woody's case, I have a feeling that the Academy will give Woody a nod for his latest offering.

Either way, I think all of the other films on my list will make the cut. Will I be right? Who knows? We'll soon see.

In the meantime, let me know what you think before we all find out bright and early tomorrow.

Stay tuned...