Best Director
David O. Russell for American Hustle Alfonso Cuaron for Gravity Alexander Payne for Nebraska Steve McQueen for 12 Years a Slave Martin Scorsese for The Wolf of Wall Street Despite the incredibly tight race for Best Picture, Best Director appears to be one of the more settled races of the whole night. Just as Best Cinematography has recently gone the route of leaning toward the most visually dazzling movie, with Ang Lee's win for Best Director for Life of Pi last year, Best Director seems to be increasingly moving towards the director with the most spectacular visual imagery, and that is definitely Alfonso Cuaron for Gravity this year. Even when 12 Years a Slave has taken the Best Picture from critics groups or the Golden Globes, Cuaron has still managed to win Best Director, so at this point the award is really Cuaron's to lose. The only other candidate who is even slightly plausible is Steve McQueen for 12 Years a Slave. The correlation between Best Picture and Best Director throughout the history of the Academy Awards is incredibly high, and although the split does happen on occasion (such as last year when the director of the Best Picture-winning Argo, Ben Affleck, wasn't even nominated for Best Director), it is a rare occurrence. Under this precedent, McQueen's chances should be pretty strong if you believe 12 Years a Slave is going to win Best Picture, but it's fairly clear that the split is all set up if the Academy does give its biggest prize to 12 Years a Slave. I will say this: If Gravity somehow manages to lose Best Director, there's no way it takes Best Picture, but Alfonso Cuaron better prepare his acceptance speech, because in a few days, he will be an Oscar winning-director.