Surviving Operation Dynamo would have been a snap compared to having to write about both sound categories for many years in a row. And while I, as a result of having to return to this particular well so many times, probably know about as much the difference between the two categories as your average AMPAS voter, there have been times where that knowledge has frankly been a liability when it comes to predicting the eventual winner. Maybe less so this year, since for the first time in the five-nominees-per-category era, both sound mixing and sound editing nominated the same five films. In the past, sound mixing has been the category where musicals have over-performed against ricocheting bullets and rolling explosions. So Baby Driver would have already been a strong pick as our spoiler here even had it not taken the Association of Motion Picture Sound award. And it would delight us and wouldn’t necessarily surprise us if the film, which dances from speaker to speaker just like music does from Baby’s earbuds, pulls it off. But there’s something about that loss La La Land suffered last year against the indescribably loud Hacksaw Ridge that feels like a terrain-altering sea change for this category. The slates match, and we’re betting the winners do too.
Will Win: Dunkirk
Could Win: Baby Driver
Should Win: Baby Driver
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