Ahead of next week's announcement, BBC Culture's film critics forecast the likely contenders – from a musical about a trans crime boss to an architectural epic with Adrien Brody.

Nicholas Barber: Who would have thought it? Even though the writers' and actors' strikes brought Hollywood to a standstill for much of 2023, this has turned out to be a vintage year for best picture contenders. The current favourite is The Brutalist, Brady Corbet's intensely intelligent chronicle of an immigrant architect grappling with the ways of the US in the mid-20th Century. Conclave must be in the running, too: this Vatican-set thriller balances serious themes with gripping entertainment in miraculous fashion. Emilia Pérez has also become an awards season smash, which is not bad going for a multilingual musical about the lawyer of a trans crime boss. And the scale and spectacle (and box-office hauls) of Wicked and Dune: Part Two should put both of them in contention. If the Academy fills all 10 of the potential slots in this category, that leaves room for Anora, the Palme d'Or winner at the Cannes Film Festival; The Substance, one of the year's most talked-about films; Nickel Boys, which reinvents the period drama; and A Complete Unknown, because biopics always go down well. The final slot could go to one of my two favourite films of the year: Jesse Eisenberg's A Real Pain, and Payal Kapadia's All We Imagine as Light, which would surely have been nominated in the best international feature film category if India's Film Federation hadn't put forward a different film instead.

Caryn James: The frontrunners for the big award have been in place for months, and they are a delightfully varied lot. There's the ambitious epic The Brutalist, the bonkers transgender musical Emilia Pérez, the affecting comic take on a sex worker Anora and the compelling thriller Conclave. The rest is just filler now that there are up to 10 films in this category. Wicked will get in and do what the expanded number of nominations was meant to do: give some recognition to popular box office hits. I'm crossing fingers for Jesse Eisenberg's sensitive, funny A Real Pain, whose nomination should follow the pattern of Past Lives last year – that is, give a boost to a fresh indie film and film-maker. And I'm guessing that A Complete Unknown will sneak in to fill the inevitable biopic slot, and maybe The Substance on the strength of Demi Moore's attention-getting performance and the film's audacity. Unlike last year's juggernaut Oppenheimer, the range of films this time makes the best picture race more volatile and engaging than usual.

Caryn James: The best picture frontrunners will also get nominations for their directors, not because those categories always match up (they don't) but because these film-makers are so inventive and authoritative: Brady Corbet for The Brutalist, Sean Baker for Anora, Edward Berger for Conclave and Jacques Audiard for Emilia Pérez, who would all be first-time nominees in the category. That leaves only one slot for the rest. The Directors Guild nominated those four plus the veteran James Mangold for A Complete Unknown, but I think Oscar voters might surprise with something less knee-jerk and a newer name, possibly Coralie Fargeat for The Substance, which speaks so directly to Hollywood's obsession with looks. A nomination for her would also spare them the embarrassment of an all-male lineup. They will still have an #Oscarssowhite problem, and RaMell Ross should be included for his visionary Nickel Boys, but unfortunately the film hasn't made much of an awards ripple outside critics' groups.

Nicholas Barber: Last year, Christopher Nolan was way ahead of the pack in the race for the best director Oscar. This year, there's no frontrunner just yet. But Brady Corbet constructed a monumental international drama for less than $10m (£8.2m), so he should be nominated for The Brutalist. Jacques Audiard manages to cover all sorts of genres, tones and locations in Emilia Pérez.........

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