Oscar 2014 Analysis: How Will the BAFTA's Affect Oscar Race?

The BAFTA awards have given their Best Picture award to "12 Years a Slave," making the Oscar race a bit clearer.

The British Academy Awards is an important origination because the majority of their voters are also Oscar voters.

The organization cleared up one of the most important questions if "12 Years a Slave" had any actual chance of winning the Oscar; taking home Best Film and Best Actor at BAFTA, the film can clearly still win the Best Picture at the Oscars. However, the Steve McQueen film did disappoint given it was nominated for an outstanding nine nominations and only took two awards home.

The Best Picture win was important because the film was on a losing streak with the guilds as it lost the Screen Actors Guild accolade for Best Ensemble and the Directors Guild award. With this win the Steve McQueen film about slavery in America has already racked up awards at the Critics Choice, PGA, Golden Globes and numerous critics organizations. However, it is important to note that back in 2006 "Brokeback Mountain" won these same prizes but the SAG loss foreshadowed the outcome on Oscar night. The Ang Lee film lost the Best Picture race to "Crash" making it one of the most unpredictable Oscar nights in the history of the Academy Awards.

The Best Actor for Chwietel Ejiofor was a huge surprise. Most pundits predicted it would be Leonardo DiCaprio because he had won the Golden Globe and had a lot of buzz. However Ejiofor's win is insignificant when it comes to Oscar predictions as Matthew McConaughey is sure to win. McConaughey's wins at the Golden Globe, Critics Choice and Screen Actors Guild Awards have more resonance then a BAFTA award can. In 2010 when Jeff Bridges and Sandra Bullock failed to win the BAFTA, they still went on to win the Oscar. Bridges and Bullock had won the SAG, Critics Choice and Golden Globe before losing the BAFTA.

McQueen's "12 Years a Slave" was predicted to win the Best Adapted Screenplay award but was surprisingly beaten by the Judi Dench vehicle "Philomena" while Lupita Nyong'o lost the Best Supporting Actress Award to Jennifer Lawrence for her work in "American Hustle." As predicted, director McQueen lost to Alfonso Cuaron in the Best Directing Award. Out of those losses, Nyong'o is most likely going to take home the Best Supporting Actress Oscar. The Academy generally does not hand two consecutive Oscars especially to actors. Of course, Lawrence won the Golden Globe, which was significant, but she failed to take home the SAG award. Additionally, the BAFTAs may have rewarded Lawrence because she lost the BAFTA Best Actress award last year to Emmanuelle Riva for her role in "Amour."

For the Best Adapted Screenplay award, "Philomena" was the most-nominated British film this year and the BAFTAs always like to recognize British films over the more mainstream American films. As a result, expect "12 Years a Slave" to win this prize at the Oscars.

The Best Supporting Actor race also reiterated what most pundits already suspected. While Jared Leto was not nominated at the BAFTA many pundits believed that Michael Fassbender could win the BAFTA and possibly steal momentum from Leto. However, Barkhad Abdi won the award making Leto the only possible Oscar winner.

The Best Actress race saw Cate Blanchett take home yet another award. Having already won the Golden Globe, the BAFTA, Critics Choice and Screen Actors Guild awards, it is unlikely that Blanchett will lose the Oscar.

Cuaron continues to be the front-runner for Best Director and has already won every major award including the DGA, Golden Globe, and Critics Choice.

The Best Animated Film award went to "Frozen," which confirmed what most pundits expected—the film is still the front-runner to win the Oscar.

As for the Best Foreign Film award, Italy took home the award for the film "The Great Beauty." The category remains a mystery given that none of the other films nominated at the BAFTA in this category are shortlisted at the Oscars. "The Great Beauty" has won the Golden Globe and the European Film awards but has yet to compete against any of the films it is nominated with at the Oscars.

"Gravity" once again reigned in the technical categories winning the Special Effects, Sound, Score and Cinematography awards. However, the film lost the editing category once again affirming that "Gravity" is unlikely to win this at the Academy Awards. The film first lost the award at the Editors Guild (EDDIE) to "Captain Phillips" and lost the BAFTA to "Rush." With a variety of winners in this category, the Editing award will be one of the most unpredictable this year.

Overall the BAFTAs offered mixed results and continued to make the annual awards some of the most unpredictable in years.