What Everyone Thinks: Spotlight is widely considered to be the front-runner for the Best Picture Oscar short of a major miracle, and so many have also put their support behind director Tom McCarthy to win the Best Director Academy Award, because that's just the done thing, right? The Truth: Do people really think that McCarthy did a better job than, ooh, George Miller (Mad Max: Fury Road), Alejandro González Iñárritu (The Revenant), Ridley Scott (The Martian), Todd Haynes (Carol), Lenny Abrahamson (Room) and so on? If anything, the directing is the film's really obvious weak link: terrific though the acting and script are, it's filmed with all the passion of a TV movie, and though flamboyant direction would be inappropriate for such a sobering subject, it could do with a little more verve and imagination, surely? If McCarthy wins the Best Director Oscar, it'll be the laziest, most nonsensical winner in years and years.