Ranking the 2026 Best Picture Oscar nominees
We are finally here! After a loooooong awards season (seriously, why is it so damn long?!), the Academy Awards will take place in LA tonight.
I’ve already ranked the Best Actress and Best Actor nominees and now it’s time to look at the 10 titles up for the prestigious Best Picture this year.
Here’s my ranking, beginning with my top choice:
Guillermo del Toro‘s take on Mary Shelley’s famed Gothic horror is absolutely brilliant and such a worthy Best Picture winner. It’s a jaw-dropping technical achievement, with sumptuous costumes, stunning cinematography and sets of an epic scale. I imagine it’ll win costume design and potentially production design but it’s a shame it won’t take home any other awards. I really thought Jacob Elordi would be the frontrunner for Best Supporting Actor but nope!! This is a terrific film, please check it out if you haven’t already.
Yorgos Lanthimos’ latest collab with Emma Stone was actually higher than Frankenstein on my end-of-year list but it doesn’t feel as much like a Best Picture winner. I loved it though – it is so darkly funny and Stone and Jesse Plemons are terrific. I would have loved it to win Best Adapted Screenplay but it seems it’s getting nothing this year. Booo!
Judging by the rest of this season, the Best Picture award is going to come down to OBAA or Sinners. My personal preference would be Paul Thomas Anderson‘s critically acclaimed comedy-drama. I didn’t rate it as highly as most people but I can appreciate that it’s very good. Teyana Taylor is sensational (and I’d be happy if she won Best Supporting Actress), Chase Infiniti establishes herself as a star, and it’s so good to see Leonardo DiCaprio as a bumbling oaf. The final car chase is a nail-biter!
Train Dreams
Clint Bentley‘s beautiful drama is perhaps too quiet and slight to be a Best Picture winner, but I couldn’t bring myself to put it any lower on this list. This is the nominee that made me cry the hardest (yes, harder than Hamnet!). I BAWLED. And if that’s not a sign of a good film, I don’t know what is! Joel Edgerton should have been nominated for Best Actor for his subtly heartbreaking performance.
Hamnet has won at the Golden Globes and the BAFTAs but I don’t see it winning anything other than Best Actress for Jessie Buckley at the Oscars. Her performance is the best thing about the film and I called for her to win months ago. I’m so glad it’s (hopefully) happening! I didn’t love the film quite as much as the majority, but I can appreciate that it’s beautiful and moving.
It’s so good to see a non-English language film cross over into Best Picture. Joachim Trier‘s Norwegian film is so well written and acted that it’ll be a shame if it comes away with nothing. The screenplay is incredible and everyone – Renate Reinsve, Stellan Skarsgard, Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas and Elle Fanning – is excellent. They thoroughly deserved their nominations. I hope it at least wins Best International Feature Film.
I liked Marty Supreme and I’ll be happy if Timothee Chalamet wins Best Actor but it’s not a Best Picture winner in my book. It’s a well-written film and it stressed the hell out of me, but that’s kind of it. I loved the Gwyneth Paltrow comeback though!
I’m sure a lot of people will be shocked to see Sinners so low on my list, considering how well it’s done this awards season. I keep thinking that perhaps I need to watch it again because I just don’t get the hype. I appreciated a lot of Ryan Coogler‘s ideas and Michael B. Jordan‘s impressive dual performance, but I only gave it 3.5 stars at the time. I thought it had amazing moments but it never progressed from like to love.
It feels weird to have such a blockbuster on this list among the critical darlings. But I liked F1 a lot when it came out. It was an enjoyable summer movie and I was entertained, even though I know nothing (and don’t care) about Formula One. Would I vote for it for Best Picture? No. But I recommend a watch? Sure!
This is the only film on the list that I have serious mixed feelings about. The Secret Agent feels like a misleading title; the main story doesn’t show itself for ages and even then, it’s still not very clear. There are a lot of random diversions (the leg!) and the ending left me cold. I don’t even understand Wagner Moura‘s Oscar nomination. I just don’t get it!