2024 Oscars Best Director nominees: 1 past champ, 2 veterans and 2 rookies

The 2024 Oscar nominees for Best Director are Jonathan Glazer (“The Zone of Interest”), Yorgos Lanthimos (“Poor Things”), Christopher Nolan (“Oppenheimer”), Martin Scorsese (“Killers of the Flower Moon”), and Justine Triet (“Anatomy of a Fall”). Our odds currently show that Nolan (3/1) is most likely to win, followed in order by Lanthimos (4/1), Glazer (9/2), Triet (9/2), and Scorsese (9/2).

Three of these five filmmakers have been nominated at least once before, with Scorsese standing out as the only previous victor in the group. Now on his 10th bid (only two behind category record holder William Wyler), he initially triumphed on his sixth for “The Departed” (2007), which is also the only Best Picture winner in his filmography. He earned his remaining notices for “Raging Bull” (1981), “The Last Temptation of Christ” (1989), “Goodfellas” (1991), “Gangs of New York” (2003), “The Aviator” (2005), “Hugo” (2012), “The Wolf of Wall Street” (2014), and “The Irishman” (2020).

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Having previously ranked as the third oldest directing nominee ever behind John Huston (79, “Prizzi’s Honor,” 1986) and Charles Crichton (78, “A Fish Called Wanda,” 1989), 81-year-old Scorsese has now moved into first place as the category’s sole octogenarian contender. He and his 2024 challengers have an average age of 57 years, which is seven years higher than that of the 2023 bunch and only four years below the category record of 61, which was set in 2012 by Scorsese (69) and four other hopefuls who ranged in age from 44 to 76.

The other two veteran nominees in this lineup are Lanthimos and Nolan, whose respective initial bids in this category were for “The Favourite” (2019) and “Dunkirk” (2018). As qualifying producers of their new films, they will also face each other as well as Scorsese in the Best Picture category. Nolan is also directly involved in the Best Adapted Screenplay race, where his competitors include Glazer plus fellow writer-directors Cord Jefferson (“American Fiction”) and Greta Gerwig (“Barbie”).

Total Oscars newcomer Triet is this category’s eighth unique female nominee and fourth such contender in as many years, following Emerald Fennell (“Promising Young Woman,” 2021), Chloé Zhao (“Nomadland,” 2021), and Jane Campion (“The Power of the Dog,” 2022). As the sole member of said octet to hail from France, she could make history as the first European woman to take this prize, which has only been bestowed upon three female filmmakers in general: Kathryn Bigelow (“The Hurt Locker,” 2010), Zhao, and Campion.

First-timer Glazer joins a group of five other post-2010 directing contenders whose films were simultaneously nominated for Best International Feature: Michael Haneke (“Amour,” 2013), Alfonso Cuarón (“Roma,” 2019), Bong Joon-ho (“Parasite,” 2020), Thomas Vinterberg (“Another Round,” 2021), and Ryusuke Hamaguchi (“Drive My Car,” 2022). Each of said movies took the gold for its country, while Cuarón and Bong also won their individual races. Except for “Another Round,” every preceding film was – like “The Zone of Interest” – further nominated for Best Picture.

The most recent directing victors are Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert (“Everything Everywhere All at Once,” 2023), Campion, Zhao, and Bong. This year’s winner will be revealed during the 96th Academy Awards ceremony, airing March 10 on ABC.

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