The 95th Academy Awards are almost here! They’ll be taking place on Sunday, March 12th at 8PM on ABC. To prepare you all for Hollywood’s biggest night, I’ll be going through all 9 below-the-line categories and give you insights as to how the race in each of them is shaping up going into the Oscars. So let’s get on with it, shall we?

Best Production Design:

1. Babylon
2. Elvis
3. Avatar: The Way of Water
4. All Quiet on the Western Front
5. The Fabelmans

As the editor-in-chief of Gold Derby, Tom O’Neil, keeps saying “in order to win, you gotta have the most of something”. When it comes to Best Production Design, the most scenery tends to win. ​With accolades from the Critics’ Choice, BAFTA, and Art Directors Guild Awards, it looks like this category is Babylon’s to lose. The last time a film swept through all those precursors in this category and lost the Oscar was Inception back in 2010, which came up short to Alice in Wonderland. After all, Babylon recreates Hollywood from the mid 1920s to the early 1950s, which was when the story takes place. That kind of work should definitely appeal to older academy members like how Once Upon a Time in Hollywood did in 2019 and Mank in 2020 as they both won this award for bringing an older era of Los Angeles back to life. However, since the number of Best Picture nominees expanded in 2009, we've only had two winners here that weren't nominated in the top category. Which were the aforementioned Alice in Wonderland and The Great Gatsby in 2013. It is worth noting that the director of the latter, Baz Luhrmann, is back with another film in contention here with Elvis. His wife, Catherine Martin, could just win both this and the next category just like she did before with not only Gatsby, but also Moulin Rouge! in 2001. With that being said, I'm not betting against a sweeper, so I'm sticking with Babylon. The last time we had a film win this category and nothing else on Oscar night was Sweeney Todd back in 2007.

Best Costume Design:

1. Elvis
2. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
3. Babylon
4. Everything Everywhere All at Once
5. Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris

As I alluded to with the previous category, Catherine Martin is a pro at winning these awards. I think she'll be getting another Oscar here at least. She already has wins from BAFTA and the Costume Designers Guild Awards for recreating old Elvis Presley outfits from over the course of multiple decades. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever may have won the Critics' Choice, but since Ruth E. Carter already made history in this category for the first film back in 2018, I don't think there's much of an urge to award her again for the sequel.

Best Cinematography:

1. All Quiet on the Western Front
2. Elvis
3. Tár
4. Bardo
5. Empire of Light

Early on in the season, it looked as if Top Gun: Maverick was winning this category for the impressive aerial sequences Claudio Miranda and his team were able to pull off in that movie. It managed to win Best Cinematography at Critics' Choice. Yet when Oscar nominations were announced, the film was shockingly snubbed. As for the other precursors, All Quiet on the Western Front won the BAFTA while ASC went to Elvis. The former has the advantage of being a war movie, and those tend to do very well in this category. Just look at previous winners such as Glory in 1989, Saving Private Ryan in 1998, and 1917 in 2019. Plus, its win at BAFTA is helpful due to that group having a significant overlap in voters with the Academy. Meanwhile, the latter was shot by Mandy Walker, who could become the first woman in history to ever win this award. Her win at ASC is helpful as they have correctly forecasted the previous three Oscar winners in this category. All Quiet on the Western Front wasn't nominated there, so it's hard to tell if Elvis still would've won with that group. Although it is worth noting that so far, only two films have won the Oscar for Best Cinematography without an ASC nomination. Which were the aforementioned Glory and Pan's Labyrinth in 2006. I'll probably keep going back and forth in my mind about what the hell is happening in this category until the envelope is open, but I'm sticking with All Quiet on the Western Front.

Best Film Editing:

1. Top Gun: Maverick​
2. Everything Everywhere All at Once
3. Elvis
4. The Banshees of Inisherin
5. Tár

Everything Everywhere All at Once managed to sweep the season in this category with wins from Critics' Choice, BAFTA, and ACE Eddie (for Best Edited Comedy). No movie has ever swept through all the major editing precursors, but went on to lose the Oscar here. However, every winner in this category since Gravity in 2013 also won a sound award. Meanwhile, every winner here since The Bourne Ultimatum back in 2007 at least had a corresponding sound nomination. Of this year’s nominees for Best Film Editing, Elvis and Top Gun: Maverick are the only ones that are also nominated for Best Sound. Granted, this is the third consecutive year of not having two separate categories (for Sound Editing and Sound Mixing). So who knows if Everything Everywhere All at Once would’ve been nominated in either one of them in another universe. Although the last two champs here, Sound of Metal in 2020 and Dune in 2021, were movies people weren't sure could actually win for different reasons. Top Gun: Maverick won the ACE Eddie for Best Edited Drama, so it at least has a major precursor win to back it up. Since I do have that film winning the next category, that's what I'm settling on here. I'll just stick with the editing-sound combo stat until I see it break.

Best Sound:

1. Top Gun: Maverick
2. All Quiet on the Western Front
3. Elvis
4. Avatar: The Way of Water
5. The Batman

With wins in this category from the Cinema Audio Society and Golden Reel Awards, Top Gun: Maverick is looking good for the Oscar. It is a very loud movie with all those planes. Although I can see All Quiet on the Western Front repeating its win from BAFTA. War films tend to do very well here with not just Saving Private Ryan and 1917, but also The Hurt Locker in 2009, American Sniper in 2014, Hacksaw Ridge in 2016, and Dunkirk in 2017.

Best Original Score:

1. All Quiet on the Western Front
2. Babylon​
3. Everything Everywhere All at Once
4. The Fabelmans
5. The Banshees of Inisherin

This year, the major precursors for this category all went in different directions. The Golden Globe went to Babylon. Critics Choice went to Tár, which didn’t even receive an Oscar nomination because it was ruled ineligible by the academy. Meanwhile at BAFTA (the only group that has an overlap of voters with the Academy), All Quiet on the Western Front prevailed. It feels like anyone of the five nominees could end up winning. Although I've settled on AQOTWF because of its BAFTA win coupled with the fact that it is a Best Picture nominee unlike Babylon.

For the next category, I've included links to all the nominated tunes so that you the reader can be able to listen to each of them for yourself.

Best Original Song:

1. ‘Naatu Naatu’ from RRR
2. ‘Hold My Hand’ from Top Gun: Maverick
3. ‘Lift Me Up' from Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
4. ‘This is a Life’ from Everything Everywhere All at Once
5. ‘Applause’ from Tell It Like a Woman

'Naatu Naatu' has wins from the Golden Globes and Critics' Choice. It's looking good to repeat here at the Oscars. Although given that RRR isn't nominated anywhere else, it could be vulnerable. If something else were to pull ahead, I can see it being Lady Gaga's 'Hold My Hand' from Top Gun: Maverick. The original film prevailed here back in 1986 for 'Take My Breath Away.'

​Best Visual Effects:

1. Avatar: The Way of Water
2. Top Gun: Maverick
3. All Quiet on the Western Front
4. The Batman
5. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever

Just like with Dune last year, this is pretty much one of the biggest locks of the night, if not, the biggest. Avatar: The Way of Water pretty much swept through Critics' Choice, Visual Effects Society, and BAFTA Awards for even more cutting edge VFX work than what the first film delivered back in 2009. It's no contest. I imagine that'll probably be the case again the next two years with Dune: Part II and Avatar 3 already on the way in 2023 and 2024, respectively.

​Best Makeup & Hairstyling:

1. Elvis
2. The Whale​
3. All Quiet on the Western Front
4. The Batman
5. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever

It's a battle of the fat suits here. The Whale transforms Brendan Fraser into a 600 pound man (which it succeeds in) while Elvis transforms Tom Hanks into Colonel Tom Parker (which it fails in). Both films won in separate categories at the Makeup and Hairstylist Guild Awards. Although at BAFTA (which is voted on by a majority of people who don't work in this field), Elvis prevailed. That movie has showier makeup overall, and had to transform a bunch of its cast into the real life people they were playing. So it's probably a safe bet to predict here.

As a reminder, the Academy Awards will be taking place tonight on ABC. The pre-show will begin at 6:30pm. After that, the 95th Oscars telecast will begin at 8:00 lasting for about three hours or so. Here is a quick rundown of my predictions for the three short categories…

Best Animated Short Film:

1. My Year of Dicks
2. The Boy, the Mole, the Fox, and the Horse
3. An Ostrich Told Me the World is Fake and I Think I Believe It
4. Ice Merchants
5. The Flying Sailor

Best Documentary Short Subject:

1. The Elephant Whisperers
2. Stranger at the Gate
3. How Do You Measure a Year?
4. The Martha Mitchell Effect
5. Haulout

Best Live Action Short Film:

1. An Irish Goodbye
2. Le Pupille
3. The Red Suitcase
4. Night Ride
5. Ivalu