This one is a dead-heat between Alejandro González Iñárritu for Birdmand and Richard Linklater for Boyhood. Both men have claimed major awards in the run-up to Sunday’s Oscars, but to make the call, you have to defer to the numbers. While Linklater has won a BAFTA and a Golden Globe, Birdman cleaned up at the SAGs and González Iñárritu won the Director’s Guild of America award. That last one is the prize worthy of your attention. In the past 67 years, 60 of the directors who won the DGA for best director also took home the award at the Academy. Statistically speaking, González Iñárritu looks like the most likely winner.

Boyhood certainly has its faults but if there’s a prize it deserves, it’s Best Director. Boyhood’s greatest asset is the novelty of the project; it’s Linklater’s brainchild and greatest cinematic success. He deserves the top prize for ushering Ellar Coltrane through an 11-year project, guiding amazing performances by Patricia Arquette and Ethan Hawke, and successfully keeping track of the millennial pulse. There’s some hope for Linklater; it’s possible that Birdman will simply be too odd (read: interesting) for the Academy to stomach. But they also love films about film (see The Artist, 2011), so González Iñárritu will probably take home the statue.