Updated 2015 Oscar Predictions: Best Actor and Supporting Actor

The Oscar race is in full swing now that the Telluride, Venice and Toronto Film Festivals are coming to a close and for those of you that may be interested, I’ll be chatting Toronto and the Oscar race this afternoon around 1:30 PM PST on Huffington Post Live with Jeff Wells from Hollywood Elsewhere and Anne Thompson from Indiewire as things are starting to shape up in terms of the Oscar race, though this is looking like it could be a particularly volatile year.

In terms of updating predictions, I’m going to begin with the Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor races, neither of which I have really given much attention just yet and the Supporting Actor charts I haven’t touched since first opening the doors back in early August. So how much have things changed? Well, quite a bit and not so much depending on how you look at it.

Best Actor

I had Benedict Cumberbatch (The Imitation Game) and Eddie Redmayne (The Theory of Everything) in 27th and 18th place respectively before today’s update and now they are my numbers one and two, jumping ahead of both Michael Keaton (Birdman) and Steve Carell (Foxcatcher).

It’s tough for me to gauge just how well Keaton will do with the Academy not having seen Birdman just yet, but it sounds to me like it’s a film that simply doesn’t play to the crowd-pleasing aspects of what the Academy is looking for, something both Imitation and Theory have. And Foxcatcher is so damned dark and dreary it just doesn’t seem like a film the Academy will be running to reward with a win, but a nomination seems in the cards.

That fifth slot is a tough one. I didn’t see St. Vincent, but with the Weinstein Co. behind it and it being described as a satisfying crowd-pleaser as well with a strong performance from Bill Murray he seems a solid choice for #5, but then you have the likes of Miles Teller (Whiplash), Jack O’Connell (Unbroken), Timothy Spall (Mr. Turner), Chadwick Boseman (Get On Up), Ben Affleck (Gone Girl), Jake Gyllenhaal (Nightcrawler) and Oscar Isaac in J.C. Chandor‘s A Most Violent Year (which I’ve been assured will be released this year with a trailer in the next seven days or so) to consider. And that’s without having seen anything from Bradley Cooper in Clint Eastwood‘s American Sniper or Brad Pitt in Fury.

Here’s my top five for now and you can see the full field of 30 contenders right here.

Benedict Cumberbatch (The Imitation Game)
Eddie Redmayne (The Theory of Everything)
Michael Keaton (Birdman)
Steve Carell (Foxcatcher)
Bill Murray (St. Vincent)

Best Supporting Actor

Now this field is a mess. I don’t know what to do with it. I have J.K. Simmons (Whiplash) at #1, but he doesn’t care about Oscars and I’m told won’t hire a publicist to do the work to get the win so that seems like a tough call at the top to start.

Then we have Edward Norton in Birdman (which, of course, I haven’t seen), Christoph Waltz in Big Eyes (can he get a nom for a non Quentin Tarantino film?), Robert Duvall in the relatively tame The Judge and Tom Wilkinson in Selma.

I don’t have either of the Foxcatcher boys in the top five because I can’t tell if they are going to push Channing Tatum as lead or supporting (he should be supporting) and Tatum seems to be getting all the secondary love even though Mark Ruffalo is incredibly strong in the film.

Then Paramount has put The Gambler on the schedule so maybe John Goodman can get his first Oscar nomination and it goes on from there. You can see my full field of 24 contenders right here, but just below are my current top five.