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Oscars 2014: Who will triumph? Check out our predictions

Who will be bringing home the golden statuettes come Oscar night? Here are our picks.

5. Best Picture

Francois Duhamel/Fox Searchlight/AP
'12 Years a Slave' stars Michael Fassbender (l.), Lupita Nyong'o (center), and Chiwetel Ejiofor (r.).

  • By Molly Driscoll Staff Writer

The Oscar contenders:

–"American Hustle"

–"Captain Phillips"

–"Dallas Buyers Club"

–"Gravity"

–"Her"

–"Nebraska"

–"Philomena"

–"12 Years a Slave"

–"The Wolf of Wall Street"

The Envelope, Please: This is an incredibly close race. While the leading contenders were viewed for some time as being "Hustle," "Gravity," and "Slave," "Hustle" seems to have lost some momentum leading up to the big night. Therefore it's safe to say that either "Slave" or "Gravity" will be taking home the big prize – but which? It's still puzzling.

While "Gravity" has done extremely well in the lead-up to Oscar night, "Slave" did snag the Best Drama Golden Globe ("Hustle" took the Outstanding Cast award at the Screen Actors Guild Awards, the guild's equivalent of Best Picture). It's most likely that "Slave" will take the big prize. While the director of a Best Picture winner often also wins the Best Director Oscar, the prizes have split in past years when the Best Picture race was particularly contentious, as when "Brokeback Mountain" and "Crash" faced off in 2006 ("Crash" won but "Brokeback" director Ang Lee took Best Director). Don't be surprised if "Gravity" director Alfonso Cuarón wins in his category, especially since he captured the British Academy of Film and Television Arts director's award.

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Mark Sappenfield
Editor

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