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Heading into the Oscar race, the Screenplay categories tend to look like two large, grey, nebulous clouds. You have a general idea what's going on inside of them, but it is impossible to get any sort of clear picture. Every year there are one or two frontrunners in each category, and beyond that there is a hodgepodge of epics, blockbusters, witty comedies and dark dramas. Trying to guess which the Academy will embrace, and which they will ignore, is like trying to predict which animal will emerge as the dominant species once humans become extinct (my money is on molerats). But the most frustrating thing about these categories is that the precursors are less helpful here than they are in any of the other major categories.

The two most important precursors are the Guild awards (because they are the only awards groups that include Academy members) and the Golden Globes (because they're whores who make it their goal to be relevant to the Oscar race). But the Screenplay categories benefit the least from these precursors for two very odd reasons. In an attempt to distinguish themselves from the Academy, the HFPA (who run the Globes) decided to have only one screenplay category. This means that, although at least four of the Globes Screenplay nominees go on to be nominated for Oscars every year, the Globes don't give us anything close to a full enough picture of what the contenders will be in both categories.

The Writers Guild is unhelpful as a precursor for even stranger reasons. For reasons too confusing for us non-lawyers, every year several films are ineligible for this award. Last year The King's Speech was not in the running for the WGA, and everybody had to pretend that the indie drama Please Give was an Oscar contender. The year before, only WGA nominees in each category matched up with the Academy choices. So with the precursors not helping us too much, we are left to read smoke signals, interpret facial expressions, and rummage through the garbage cans of Academy voters to try to figure out what movies have the best chance (don't do that last one though. Diablo Cody really doesn't like it when you do that). Here are the contenders, in order of the likelihood that they will be nominated.

Best Original Screenplay:

The Locks:

The Artist

Obviously the film to beat is going be a contender in every major category, and a nomination for this one seems like a gimme. Typically, the major Best Picture contenders that don't score a screenplay nomination are the big epics that are more about spectacle than story (Avatar, Gladiator, Titanic) and The Artist is not one of those films. Will the fact that it is silent make some voters feel that it does not belong in a category so focused on dialogue? It's possible, but we won't know the validity of such a bias claim until the nominees are announced, as it is not eligible for the WGA awards. A Globe nomination will solidify its frontrunner status in this category, though.

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