“Birdman” star Emma Stone; image via Andrea Raffin/Shutterstock

The Oscars are on Sunday, and eight movies are up for the coveted Best Picture award. While the subject matter of those films stretches far and wide, all are impressive pieces of work – one of which was a groundbreaking feat, having been filmed with the same actors over the course of 12 years.

But will Richard Linklater’s largely plotless, if remarkable, “Boyhood” take the night’s biggest award? According to social media, award-buzz is across the board.

Falcon Social, a social media management platform, partook in the Oscar buzz by pulling Twitter data to see which movie has the most people talking. The platform ran a search query for tweets the contained the title of a Best Picture contender (“Boyhood,” “Birdman,” “Selma,” “The Theory of Everything,” “Whiplash,” “The Imitation Game,” “Grand Budapest Hotel” and “American Sniper”) plus the word “award.” Of course, this doesn’t imply how many people think a certain movie will win the award, but it does give us a clue as to how many people are talking about which nominees.

Here’s a timeline that shows the spikes and dips in mentions for each movie over the past week:

On Thursday, February 12, “Selma” saw a huge jump in mentions, before it fell in with the pack, while “The Grand Budapest Hotel” saw a smaller spike on Sunday, February 15. However, according to Falcon’s findings, it’s “Birdman” that’s seen the most mentions. Falcon also took into consideration whether or not the mentions were tied to news stories, and for “Birdman,” a number of news stories as well as wins at the Golden Globes and Screen Actors Guild Awards has put the film in a top spot.

Below, you can see the breakdown in percentage totals across the board. It’s a close race, but what’s notable is the gap between “Birdman” and “Boyhood,” the top two contenders.

In addition to the number of Twitter mentions, Falcon took into consideration which movies had to most likes on Facebook, and the most Facebook engagements. The answer: “American Sniper” and “Selma,” respectively. As for the least likes and engagements, that was “Whiplash” and “The Theory of Everything.”

It’s worth nothing that the Academy, the group that actually chooses the winners, is predominately white men older than 50. So, whichever film has the most action on social media likely doesn’t mean much when it comes to determining who will win big on Oscar night. But who knows – in the technology-driven future, it just might.

Images via Falcon Social