Awards season is underway

The ‘for your consideration’ ads have started in the trades, so awards season is underway. The season gets a kickstart on 11 December when the Golden Globe nominations are announced. But momentum really picks up in the first week of January when the nominations are announced for the Producers Guild Awards, the Writers Guild Awards, the American Society of Cinematographers Awards, and the BAFTAs, and the Golden Globe winners are revealed.

The key dates are:
December

• 9 SAG noms 
• 11 Golden Globe noms 

January

• 5 PGA noms 
• 6 WGA noms/ASC noms 
• 8 BAFTA noms 
• 11 Golden Globes 
• 12 DGA noms 
• 14 Oscar noms 
• 23 PGA 
• 30 SAG 

February

• 6 DGA 
• 13 WGA/ASC (tbc) 
• 14 BAFTAs/ASC (tbc)
• 28 Oscars 

At this time, there are no obvious outstanding favourites for Best Film: for example, Todd Haynes’ beautiful Carol is one of the most romantic films ever made and reviews have been stellar, but will Oscar fall for a 1950s-set lesbian drama?

Is Trumbo too light on its feet to be accepted as a searing indictment of the McCarthyist Hollywood blacklist? Are journalistic investigations into important topics just too strident to make the likes of Truth and Spotlight palatable?

Can lightning strike twice for Alejandro G Inarritu with the bleak Revenant? Can a well-reviewed film Steve Jobs deliver in awards season when it hasn’t delivered at the box office?

Other questions: which is the better Cate Blanchett performance, Truth or Carol? And will she prevent Rooney Mara (who has the more challenging role in Carol) or Charlotte Rampling in 45 Years from winning?

If it’s any good, will The Force Awakens be recognised?

Will Charlize Theron and director George Miller be nominated for Mad Max: Fury Road? Does The Martian deserve awards kudos? And what of smaller films like The Big Short, Sicario or Suffragette: can they make hay as the big guns disappoint?

And will Son Of Saul perform that all-to-rare feat of a Best Foreign Film nominee finding its way on to the main category shortlists?

And then there’s the small matter of my own awards, the Golden Stans, which will be revealed on Monday 4 January.

Let battle commence!