The first major Guild award of the awards season was handed out last night. The Directors Guild of America awarded Best Director to Paul Thomas Anderson for his work on One Battle After Another. This is the latest win for the epic political action comedy, which many have considered the frontrunner of the race so far. What does last night’s win mean for its Oscar chances down the line? Truly, consider one category a lock this race.

DGA Best Director Win	Oscar Best Picture Win	Oscar Best Director Win
Brokeback Mountain	No	Yes
The Departed	Yes	Yes
No Country for Old Men	Yes	Yes
Slumdog Millionaire	Yes	Yes
The Hurt Locker	Yes	Yes
The King’s Speech	Yes	Yes
The Artist	Yes	Yes
Argo	Yes	No (Not Nominated)
Gravity	No	Yes
Birdman	Yes	Yes
The Revenant	No	Yes
La La Land	No	Yes
The Shape of Water	Yes	Yes
Roma	No	Yes
1917	No	No
Nomadland	Yes	Yes
Power of the Dog	No	Yes
Everything Everywhere All at Once	Yes	Yes
Oppenheimer	Yes	Yes
Anora	Yes	Yes
Total Best Picture Wins in 20 Years	13
Likelihood Film Wins Best Picture After Winning Award	65%
Total Best Director Wins in 20 Years	18
Likelihood Film Wins Best Director After Winning Award	90%

As you can see in the 20 year sample above, 18 of the previous Best Director winners at the Directors Guild of America awards (90%) have gone on to win Best Director at the Oscars. There were only two films in that 20 year sample that won at the DGA but did not win Best Director at the Oscars. The first one, Argo, had a controversial snub in Directing that year despite the film’s frontrunner status, the fact it won Director at DGA and the other Guilds showed the strong support for the film from the get go. The second one, 1917, was considered a lock in the category early in the season until Parasite‘s support grew organically in voting bodies which lead to Sam Mendes losing to Bong Joon-Ho at the Oscars that year. Considering those two situations in the past twenty years are more outliers than the normal, consider Paul Thomas Anderson a lock to win Best Director this year with this win and multiple other precursor wins under his belt.

As for Best Picture, this is more of a wait and see game given the other two major Guilds have not announced their winners yet. 13 of the previous films that won in this 20 year sample (65%) ended up winning Best Picture. The remaining 7 that won Director at DGA but not Picture all had a common theme: each lost or was not nominated in at least one other major Guild award. Brokeback Mountain was the only film that won at DGA and PGA that lost the Actor Award for Best Ensemble. The other six (Gravity, The Revenant, La La Land, Roma, 1917, and Power of the Dog) were not even nominated in the Best Ensemble category for the Actor Awards despite wins or nominations at the PGA. Since One Battle After Another has the Best Ensemble nomination at the Actor Awards and the PGA nomination for Best Picture, all it would take for One Battle After Another to not win Best Picture at this point is for another film to gain momentum in the other voting bodies like what happened to 1917 that awards season.

Saying all of that, does winning Best Director at the Directors Guild of America bode well for One Battle After Another winning Best Picture and Best Director? Based on the 20 year sample provided, I believe Paul Thomas Anderson is a lock to win Best Director considering the two times a DGA winner lost the Oscar that same year were both outlier seasons. As for Picture, it is still looking favorable for One Battle After Another but until we see the results of the other Guild awards, I cannot say for sure. I do believe that it’s a safe pick for a Best Picture prediction as of this moment though. Happy for Paul Thomas Anderson regardless considering he’s been long overdue for awards recognition.

Thank you all for reading this and please feel free to comment your thoughts! I look forward to interacting with all of you this awards season and sharing with all of you how The Oscar Code can help determine what will win Best Picture long before the awards begin.