From the Awards Editor: 2025 Golden Globe Nominations Predictions

Continuing our discussion from The Awards Tape, where we break down the Oscar race, I lay out my predictions for the 2025 Golden Globe nominations. 

The 82nd Golden Globe Nominations will be announced on December 9th. This will be the second year where the new voters of the Globes will continue to differentiate from the Hollywood Foreign Press, which was disbanded after the rights were sold to Dick Clark Productions. The new membership increased the number of foreign press journalists to over 300, with “sixty percent being racially and ethnically diverse.” Last year, the Globe nominations saw an increase in non-English language films like The Zone of Interest (2023), Anatomy of a Fall (2023), and Fallen Leaves (2023) placed in categories like Best Drama, Director, Screenplay, and Acting categories. 

My biggest leap with my respective predictions will be Walter Salles’s I’m Still Here (2024), a real-life period drama about a wife investigating and protesting against a dictatorship in Brazil due to her husband’s disappearance. Predicting it for nominations in Best Drama Actress for Fernanda Torres and Best Non-English Language Film, I can’t help but consider that this internationally expansive group could nominate the film in other categories such as Screenplay and Drama. It has the critical praise to warrant these nominations and feels relevant promptly in battling against institutions of corrupt power.

Depending on how Sony Pictures Classics campaigns I’m Still Here and Pedro Almadovar’s The Room Next Door (2024), it will be unique as to what international-coded film will receive a boost due to being nominated. 

Mubi’s The Substance (2024) hopes to make a big splash in setting itself as an Oscar contender, but this will be the first time a horror film will be presented to this group of voters. Despite its Cannes prestige, it’s hard to decide whether they will be receptive to this genre. 

Wicked (2024) is exploding at the box office and into the Oscar conversation, with many pundits feeling this could affect the races of previous contenders that have been in play throughout the season. The Brutalist (2024) is enjoying its glow from winning the New York Film Critics Circle for Best Film, while Sing Sing (2024) is on a high from its Gotham Awards domination, as A24 is positioning both films as their main contenders for the Oscar race. Lastly, A Complete Unknown (2024) is slowly surging in the awards race, appearing on both the NBR and AFI Top Ten lists. Musical biopics are no strangers to the Oscar race, and the James Mangold-directed biopic about Bob Dylan is sure to click with industry voters, starting with the Globes.

My predictions are as follows: 

Best Film Drama

1. The Brutalist
2. Conclave (2024)
3. Sing Sing
4. Dune: Part II (2024)
5. A Complete Unknown (2024)
6. I’m Still Here (2024)

Best Film Drama Actress

1. Angelina Jolie – Maria (2024)
2. Nicole Kidman – Babygirl (2024)
3. Marianne Jean-Baptiste – Hard Truths (2024)
4. Fernanda Torres – I’m Still Here
5. Saoirse Ronan – The Outrun (2024)
6. Tilda Swinton – The Room Next Door (2024)

Best Film Drama Actor

1. Adrien Brody – The Brutalist
2. Ralph Fiennes – Conclave
3. Colman Domingo – Sing Sing
4. Timothee Chalamet  – A Complete Unknown
5. Sebastian Stan – The Apprentice  (2024)
6. Cillian Murphy – Small Things Like These (2024)

Best Film Comedy/Musical

1. Wicked
2. Anora (2024)
3. Emilia Perez (2024)
4. A Real Pain (2024)
5. Challengers (2024)
6. The Substance (2024)

Best Film Comedy/Musical Actress

1. Mikey Madison – Anora
2. Karla Sofía Gascón – Emilia Perez
3. Cynthia Erivo  – Wicked
4. Demi Moore – The Substance
5. Zendaya  – Challengers
6. Emma Stone – Kinds of Kindness (2024)

Best Film Comedy/Musical Actor

1. Glen Powell  – Hit Man (2024)
2. Jesse Eisenberg  – A Real Pain
3. Sebastian Stan – A Different Man (2024)
4. Hugh Grant – Heretic (2024)
5. Joaquin Phoenix – Joker: Folie à Deux (2024) 
6. Michael Keaton  – Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (2024)

Best Film Supporting Actress

1. Ariana Grande – Wicked
2. Zoe Saldaña  – Emilia Perez
3. Felicity Jones – The Brutalist 
4. Danielle Deadwyler – The Piano Lesson (2024)
5. Selena Gomez – Emilia Perez
6. Isabela Rossellini – Conclave

Best Film Supporting Actor

1. Guy Pearce – The Brutalist
2. Kieran Culkin – A Real Pain
3. Clarence Maclin – Sing Sing
4. Denzel Washington – Gladiator II
5. Jeremy Strong – The Apprentice
6. Edward Norton– A Complete Unknown 

Best Film Director 

1. Brady Corbet  – The Brutalist 
2. Sean Baker – Anora 
3. Jacques Audiard – Emilia Perez 
4. Edward Berger – Conclave 
5. Denis Villeneuve – Dune: Part II 
6. John M. Chu – Wicked

Best Film Screenplay

1. Anora – Sean Baker
2. The Brutalist – Brady Corbet & Mona Fastvold
3. A Real Pain – Jesse Eisenberg
4. Conclave – Peter Straughan 
5. The Substance – Coralie Farageat
6. I’m Still Here – Murilo Hauser & Heitor Lorega

Best Animated Feature 

1. The Wild Robot (2024)
2. Inside Out 2 (2024)
3. Memoir of a Snail (2024)
4. Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl (2024)
5. Flow (2024)
6. Moana 2 (2024)

Best Non-English Film

1. Emilia Perez
2. I’m Still Here
3. All We Imagine As Light (2024)
4. The Seed of a Sacred Fig (2024)
5. Vermiglio (2024)
6. Grand Tour (2024)

Best Original Score

1. Daniel Blumberg – The Brutalist
2. Volker Bertelmann – Conclave
3. Clément Ducol – Emilia Perez
4. Hanz Zimmer – Dune: Part II
5. Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross – Challengers
6. Alberto Iglesias – The Room Next Door

Best Original Song 

1. “El Mal” – Emilia Perez
2. “Mi Camino”   – Emilia Perez
3. “Kiss The Sky” – The Wild Robot
4. “Like a Bird” – Sing Sing
5. “Piece by Piece” – Piece by Piece (2024) 
6. “Forbidden Road” – Better Man (2024)

Best Cinematic and Box Office Achievement 

1. Deadpool & Wolverine (2024)
2. Wicked
3. Dune: Part II
4. Inside Out 2 
5. Beetlejuice Beetlejuice 
6. Alien: Romulus (2024)
7. Moana 2 
8. Gladiator II 

Article Courtesy of Amritpal Rai

Feature Image Courtesy of Balkan Insight; EPA-EFE/ALLISON DINNER