oscars

Aseem Chhabra in New York

The Oscar season has its share of controversies. Last year, there were all sorts of allegations against the producers of Slumdog Millionaire, none of which impacted the film's eight Oscar win.

This year The Hurt Locker -- by some accounts a front runner for the Best Picture race -- has been hit by controversies.

Earlier this week, the Academy punished the film's producer Nicolas Chartier by withdrawing his invitation to attend the ceremony. Chartier, as has been reported, made the mistake of sending e-mails to some Academy members asking them to support his film and not vote for Avatar, the highest grossing film of all time.

All studios campaign during the Oscar season. Harvey Weinstein of Miramax was notorious for campaigning hard for films produced by his studio. But this time, Cartier got caught, perhaps because he sent out e-mails. The Chartier controversy broke out late during the Oscar voting period and it is unclear how it played out with the Academy members.

The final ballots were supposed to be mailed out on Tuesday, so any other last minute controversies -- including a law suit by a former soldier in Iraq who claims that The Hurt Locker script is based on his own story -- should have no bearing on which picture wins the top award on Sunday.

Here's a look at the people and films, who are most likely to win at the 82nd Annual Academy Awards this weekend.