1. Steve McQueen - Twelve Years a Slave
Perhaps above all other branches (with the possible exception of the Writers branch), the Directors branch is inclined to stick up for artistic achievements that fall on the outside of mainstream cinema. Whether it be foreign auteurs, such as Truffaut, Bergman, Fellini, Kurwosawa, and Haneke, or simply directors expanding the boundaries of cinema like Stanley Kubrick with 2001: A Space Odyssey or Terrance Malick with the Tree of Life, the Directors branch have time and again showed their willingness to fight for directors and films that the Academy as a whole tends to ignore. This is why it is key when considering the Best Director category to always keep your eyes open for auteur-oriented films that would undoubtedly prove too esoteric for almost any other branch of the Academy. Sometimes, these are well established directors who take a chance outside their comfort zone and are thusly rewarded by their peers for stretching their pre-established abilities. Other times, the branch chooses to reward a relatively new director who has been gaining esteem for sometime and then finally galvanizes significant support among the artistic community by making a breakthrough film that is almost impossible to ignore. This second case is a possible scenario I could see happening with director Steve McQueen and his newest film, Twelve Years a Slave. McQueen thus far has had two feature films: Hunger and Shame. Hunger, a movie starring Michael Fassbender as an inmate of a Northern Irish prison who leads the other inmates on a hunger strike, received good notices from those who saw it, but still remained mostly as background noise of 2008's cinematic conversations. In 2011, McQueen teamed up with Fassbender again, this time to tackle the taboo subject of sex addiction in the movie Shame. Shame received much more attention (no doubt in part due to its focus on sex), but the film proved too toxic for the Academy to even nominate Fassbender as Best Actor, despite the plethora of fawning reviews thrown his way. With McQueen's newest outing though, Twelve Years a Slave, he may finally earn the recognition of the Academy. The film, based on the memoirs of a free black man living in the North who was kidnapped into slavery in the Deep South during 19th Century, pre-Civil War America, has an all star cast in place, including the ubiquitous Michael Fassbender, Brad Pitt, Benedict Cumberbatch, Paul Giamatti, Paul Dano, Scoot McNairy, and Michael K. Williams. My biggest concern for the film's chances with the Academy is that the film may simply be too bleak and uncompromising in the way it depicts slavery for some Academy members to stomach, but I suspect this may actually be a plus in the Directors branch. For McQueen to generate enough support to pull off a stealth nomination though, Twelve Years a Slave must be the unquestionable pet project of the high-minded critics community, such as The Tree of Life and Amour where in the previous two years. If for instance, equal love among cinephiles is split between McQueen's film and say Alfonso Cuaron's Gravity, neither will likely get a nomination and someone like John Wells will probably sneak in instead.
This concludes my preview of 2014's Best Directors, but there were a number of great filmmakers I had to leave on the table, so if you feel other auteurs are more likely to be recognized next year, let me know which ones in the comments section below.