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Identifying the awards-season contenders from the bewildering array of films at this time of year means learning the rules of the game.

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It’s easy to become snow-blind in the storm of announcements from fall festivals. The sheer number of titles announced is disorientating: much-anticipated releases, yes, but also low-key projects that have suddenly blown up into red-carpet gala screenings. We’re heading into the awards corridor, but how do we navigate it?

If you look at Venice, Telluride, Toronto, San Sebastian, New York Film Festival (NYFF) and BFI London Film Festival in the round, you have to factor in issues of quality control versus the festival’s need for name talent: some star-laden premieres arrive only minutes before a streaming release. The sections are important as well: one man’s Venice Critics’ Week is another woman’s Bafta nomination.

It’s hard to read the runes, but it’s also fun, because not only does a film’s fortunes ride on its positioning, but a festival’s reputation depends on it too.

Learn the game

Here are some of the rules, bearing in mind Telluride’s line-up is a secret, making it a wild card. Seeing Conclave, a Venice absentee, listed as a ‘Canadian premiere’ in Toronto means it’s going to Telluride, for example. Also, any film going to Telluride from the Lido needs to screen in Venice on the first weekend so the team has time to pivot.

Venice/Telluride is prestigious; Venice/Toronto too; Telluride/Toronto and any of those combinations with NYFF, London or San Sebastian. A film going everywhere — like some of the Cannes prize-winners from earlier this year — is a definite awards contender. But a film with a single festival and no further bookings is… intriguing.

It may look like Nickel Boys, which opens NYFF as a world premiere, falls into that category, but further festival bookings are secured. Those who have seen the film say this adaptation of Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, directed by RaMell Ross and starring Ethan Herisse and Brandon Wilson, stands head and shoulders above the crowd. Amazon MGM Studios has set a limited theatrical release for October 25.

Another rule of thumb is that awards-corridor films will also be screened around the first weekend of a festival. The general wisdom on subtitled dramas is that they can take longer to percolate, will benefit from being nominated in the international Oscar category, and thus can be scheduled any time. Another piece of conventional wisdom is that premiering in Toronto without a US distributor means the film can’t mount an awards campaign, but that was broken all the way back with I, Tonya. It’s just harder, not impossible. And, finally, there’s also word of mouth, and the entire film industry’s publicity machine is currently hard at work generating it.

So we’re taking a blender, adding every title from fall festival season and copious hype. Then straining the result through the section of the festival it’s programmed in and the day it’s screening, if it’s a world premiere. Re-straining through the number of festivals it’s visiting, and semi-extracting smaller subtitled films, which work to a different set of rules. And also removing films that are clearly using a festival launchpad for an imminent theatrical release.

For 2024 fall festival season, here are the five titles that emerge as top award contenders. Like any recipe, however, a small change in ingredients can make all the difference.