After seven triumphs at the BAFTAs, how many Oscars can ‘All Quiet on the Western Front’ actually win?

Christopher Tsang
·7 min read
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Since breaking multiple records at the BAFTA Awards, many pundits are wondering how many trophies “All Quiet on the Western Front” can win at the Oscars. After surprising at the British ceremony with seven wins, the German war drama is the most awarded non-English film at the BAFTAs ever, breaking the previous record of “Cinema Paradiso,” which won five awards in 1991. The Netflix film also is the first to win the BAFTA for Best Film without receiving any of the top category nominations at the Golden Globes, the Critics’ Choice, the PGA, or the SAG Awards. But how many will it actually win come Oscar night? Since BAFTA is one of the biggest reliable precursors, let’s look at the categories it won that it is also up for at the Oscars and examine the odds of where it stands at possibly winning. (This excludes Best Director since Edward Berger is not nominated at the Oscars.)

Best International Feature Film: Perhaps one of the biggest locks of the night, “All Quiet on the Western Front” leads this category with 31/10 combined odds and 5677 users predicting it for the win. With having the second most Oscar nominations with nine and getting into Best Picture, it is pretty much a done deal. Though “Argentina, 1985” does sit behind with 4/1, since it bested the movie at the Golden Globes.

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Best Cinematography: Another pretty safe choice for the movie as it leads the odds with 16/5 and 5509 users. But “Elvis” may have some legs as it is in second with 4/1 odds and has veteran Mandy Walker – the only woman nominated in this category, and third overall – and won at the ASC (American Society of Cinematographers) Awards (where “All Quiet” cinematographer James Friend was not nominated). That’s similar to two years ago when “Mank” triumphed over BAFTA winner “Nomadland.” But with the exclusion of “Top Gun: Maverick,” “All Quiet” fits more in line with previous winners of war, action, and epic movies such as “1917,” “Dune,” “The Revenant,” and “Blade Runner 2049.”

Best Sound: This race is much tougher as “Top Gun: Maverick” did make this category and leads the odds with 16/5 and 4878 users, while “All Quiet” is second and has only 890 predicting it for a win and 19/5 odds. Both films triumphed at the Golden Reel Awards for Motion Picture Sound Editors – “Top Gun: Maverick” in Feature Effects/Foley and “All Quiet” in Foreign Language Feature – so it is up to the Cinema Audio Society Awards for sound mixers where they both compete in the Live Action category to determine if “All Quiet” can maintain its BAFTA momentum.

What also makes it more complicated at the Oscars is that for the last nine years, the winner for Best Sound (either editing/mixing before 2021) also picked up Best Film Editing, a category where “All Quiet” is not nominated. But with “Everything Everywhere All At Once” sweeping the editing precursors and looking like the frontrunner while not nominated in sound, the BAFTA win for “All Quiet” definitely works in its favor.

SEE MPSE Golden Reel Awards may set up Oscars sound showdown between ‘Top Gun’ and ‘All Quiet on the Western Front’

Best Original Score: This category is a nailbiter as there have been three different winners at all the major precursors. As it stands, “Babylon” looks to be a clear frontrunner with 17/5 odds, and composer Justin Hurwitz does have a Golden Globe to its name. However, its loss to “All Quiet” composer Volker Bertelmann at the BAFTAs and especially to Hildur Guðnadóttir for “Tar” (which got in nowhere else) at the Critics’ Choice is foreboding, not to mention “Babylon” has only three nominations at the Oscars all in technical categories. But Bertelmann has the only industry award in his pocket, hence the film’s second placement with 19/5 odds. And because this category is so fickle, never underestimate legendary composer John Williams for “The Fabelmans,” who is not far behind with 4/1 odds.

Best Adapted Screenplay: Probably the closest race according to the odds as “Women Talking” is ahead with 69/20 while “All Quiet” has 18/5. I am unsure what to make of “Women Talking” at this point, but the movie did secure a Best Picture nomination at the Oscars and won the Critics Choice, WGA and USC Scripter honors for writer Sarah Polley.

But the massive overperformance of “All Quiet” at the BAFTAs could spell trouble for “Women Talking” since “All Quiet” won picture, writing, and directing. Since 1994, all films that have won all three major non-acting prizes at least won one of them at the Oscars if they were nominated: “The Artist,” “The Hurt Locker,” “Slumdog Millionaire,” “Brokeback Mountain” and “Schindler’s List.” The last one not to do it was “The Commitments” in 1992, which was only nominated for editing at the Oscars. Since “All Quiet” might have a tougher road to win Best Picture but has more support across the Academy than “Women Talking,” this may be another place the voters want to reward if the support is strong. It is also a way to reward Berger as he shares this nomination with co-writers Lesley Paterson and Ian Stokell.

SEEMPSE Golden Reel Awards may set up Oscars sound showdown between ‘Top Gun’ and ‘All Quiet on the Western Front’

Best Picture: Aside from Best Director, this win at the BAFTAs was the most shocking of the night for “All Quiet on the Western Front.” Becoming the first non-English language film to win this category since “Jean de Florette” in 1988, it also continues the trend of international films making the Best Picture lineup at the Oscars since 2019. Unfortunately, with the exception of “Nomadland,” the BAFTAs have not predicted the Oscar Best Picture winner correctly since “12 Years A Slave” in 2014, so the top category doesn’t hold much water. Therefore it currently has its lowest placement in 5th with 17/2 odds and less than 100 users predicting it.

But with its overwhelming dominance with seven wins, it proves it has major industry support internationally, and could arguably be the alternative to frontrunner “Everything Everywhere All At Once,” which has PGA and SAG, and 6/1 odds. Between them are “The Banshees of Inisherin” with 15/2, and “The Fabelmans” and “Top Gun: Maverick” with 8/1, but none of those films have an industry award win, so perhaps “All Quiet on the Western Front” may be higher than people think and voters may want to reward it if they’re looking elsewhere. It would be the second international film to win after “Parasite.”

The other categories “All Quiet” is contending in include production design, hair/makeup and visual effects. VFX looks like one of the biggest locks of the night for “Avatar: The Way of Water,” which also won for effects at BAFTA. Hair/makeup is more of a tossup between “Elvis” (BAFTA winner) and “The Whale,” for its featured prosthetics. Finally, production design appears to be “Babylon’s” to lose after the BAFTAs for its extravagant film sets. However, given that film’s low nomination count, “Elvis” could also take that award for its colorful settings and stage backgrounds. “All Quiet” sits in the bottom half and has 9/2 odds in all of those categories.

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