We'll never now how close this race was between Jennifer Lawrence and BAFTA-winning dark horse Emmanuelle Riva, but Lawrence's startled reaction suggests she too thought it was tight. Still, the 22-year-old starlet, the apparent frontrunner since Toronto, prevailed. - Guy Lodge

Good Bets

• Jennifer Lawrence ("Silver Linings Playbook")
  1.
• Emmanuelle Riva ("Amour")
  2.
• Jessica Chastain ("Zero Dark Thirty")
  3.
• Quvenzhané Wallis ("Beasts of the Southern Wild")
  4.
• Naomi Watts ("The Impossible")
  5.

Other Possibilities

Dark Horses

The Rest of the field