Except for the summer movie season, the biggest time of the year is for churchgoers, that is, cinema. Awards season is in full swing, and the Golden Globes are already behind us. More to the point, it's Oscar season, with the full list of nominees for this year's Oscars recently announced. There have been surprises and snubs, and now the race for Best Picture is on, with critical darlings and blockbusters vying for the night's top prize. But which of this year's nominees stands above the rest as far as the box office is concerned?

The box office is not a great way to determine quality. Many great films were made with almost no money (check out the much-loved Sing Street), while a few not-so-great movies have taken in a lot of cash (see the 2016 Oscar-winning hit Suicide Squad). That said, the box office is important in terms of providing some context for Hollywood's biggest night. Are the most nominated movies also the movies people actually care about? That question has become increasingly important in recent years as the Oscars try to stay relevant.

So, let's take a look at how each of these movies fared at the box office, shall we? Before we dive in fully, we should note that several of these movies have just hit theaters in the last few weeks, and some of them haven't expanded yet. Others come from streaming services that don't care much for theatrical releases. With that out of the way, here's how the Best Picture nominees fared at the box office.

1. "Dine: Part Two" – $714.6 million

2. "Wicked" - $710.2 million

3. "Conclave" – 77.9 million dollars

4. "The Substance" – $76.5 million

5. "A Complete Unknown" - $62.9 million

6. "Anora" – 33.6 million dollars

7. "I'm Still Here" – $14.1 million

8. "Brutalist" – $5.8 million

9. "Emilia Perez" – $10.7 million

10. "Nickel Boys" - $1.2 million

Denis Villeneuve's Dune: Part II is the clear winner here - for now. Wicked is still in theaters and its Oscar nominations will only boost its profile. Soon, it will surpass "Dune" to become the top-grossing film of this year's Best Picture nominees. It's been a steep drop-off from there, with the announced Pope drama "Conclave" pulling in just $80 million. Meanwhile, "Emilia Perez," which leads the pack with 13 nominations, is a Netflix release and barely had a profile in the country's theaters.

When all is said and done, Wicked could be closer to $800 million than $700 million, which means an awful lot of people will be invested in its performance at the Oscars — especially since Wicked Part 2 hits theaters later this year. Regardless of which film ends up on top, the nomination of two blockbuster films nominated for Best Picture will help draw attention to the telecast.

Several of these films will likely get re-releases and boosts in light of the nominations ("Anora" feels like a safe bet there). Meanwhile, The Brutalist is gearing up to expand and numbers to add a lot to that total. A Complete Unknown is also still selling overseas and has gas in the tank at home. It should easily cross $100 million worldwide on the big night. Compared to the box office of last year's Best Picture nomineesthere are clear differences. Barbie led the pack with more than $1.4 billion. However, most of the other nominees failed to clear the $30 million mark by the time the nominations were announced.

This year we have at least five films that could fairly be classified as popular, which is good news for the Academy as ratings for the Oscars telecast have struggled in recent years. The show hit a four-year high in 2024, thanks in no small part to the popularity of films like Christopher Nolan's "Oppenheimer," which grossed nearly $1 billion and went on to win Best Picture. But viewership hasn't cleared 20 million since 2020, and we're light years away from the 43.7 million viewers brought in during the 2014 telecast.

The show will probably never get that kind of viewership again, but having popular movies in the mix helps keep the average viewer on board. Those viewers are much needed to help keep the Oscars relevant, which in turn helps ensure that studios continue to invest in original and/or bold ideas. In that way, the box office and the Oscars have a necessary relationship.

The 97th annual Academy Awards take place Sunday, March 2 on ABC.