CALENDAR GOES TO THE OSCARS : Predicting Is a Real Beast : Monday night’s main event between ‘Beauty’ and ‘The Lambs’ will be close, but it looks good for the one in which the beasts are human.

To every thing there is a season, and as far as the Academy Awards are concerned, this ought to be the season of consensus. With the Oscar ceremony a mere day away, industry nabobs should be nodding their heads in sage agreement, secure in the knowledge that they know who’s going to come out on top.

This year, however, all bets are off. Not only has no consensus emerged in the critical best picture category, but opinions are so disparate that whatever candidate does win will doubtless do so by no more than a handful of votes. Moreover, a convincing case can be built--and then unbuilt--for every single picture on the list. For instance:

* “Beauty and the Beast.” Of all the films in contention, this is most probably at the top in terms of clear and simple popularity. However, its vote-getting ability among actors, the biggest branch of the academy, is uncertain and it may be hurt by the feeling that, as the first animated feature nominated for best picture, it has already been honored enough.

* “Bugsy.” With 10 nominations, more than any other film, “Bugsy” has demonstrated the across-the-board support essential to winning the top prize. But its partisans tend to be more coolly admiring than passionate, and the film has come to be viewed as similarly lacking in the kind of emotional warmth the academy likes to see.

* “JFK.” On the one hand, the ceaseless controversy made this the motion picture event of the year, but the din surrounding the phenomenon may have finally gotten too insistent for academy members’ tender ears.

* “The Prince of Tides.” The closest to the kind of big emotional picture the academy favors, “Tides” was the pre-nominations favorite, and if Sydney Pollack were listed as director instead of Barbra Streisand, it would still be No. 1. But the academy’s snubbing of Streisand hurt the film’s momentum and it does not seem to have recovered.

* “The Silence of the Lambs.” A huge popular hit directed by critical favorite (and Directors Guild winner) Jonathan Demme, “Silence” suffers from only one drawback: a grisly subject matter that is not in keeping with the academy’s more serene self-image.

The Pick: In a close year, the films with the most passionate support are the best bets, which means a toss-up, maybe even a tie, between the two widely different films that have the most sizable popular appeal, “The Silence of the Lambs” and “Beauty and the Beast.”

While locating a favorite in the rest of the awards is no picnic either, a consensus is threatening to emerge.

Best Actor. Only two nominees have any kind of a chance, Nick Nolte in “The Prince of Tides” and Anthony Hopkins in “The Silence of the Lambs.” The smart money has to remain with Nolte, who fits the classic winner’s profile of a paid-his-dues actor who gives a superior performance in an academy-type film. But Hopkins is a more-than-viable longshot because his literally lip-smacking work was the most indelible of the year.

The Pick: Nick Nolte.

Best Actress. A tricky category to call. The best actress work of the year clearly came in “Thelma & Louise,” but though both Geena Davis and Susan Sarandon were nominated, they seem fated to cancel each other out in the final voting. Which leaves just enough room for Jodie Foster in “The Silence of the Lambs” to squeeze by. Though disadvantaged by having won three years ago with “The Accused,” Foster is extremely well-liked in the industry and the publicity she got for directing “Little Man Tate” has helped keep her in the public eye.

The Pick: Jodie Foster.

Best Director. Never a winner, with a strong body of work behind him, Jonathan Demme’s surprise victory at the Directors Guild for “Silence” has to make him the favorite here, though his being New York-based may end up hurting him. Demme’s major competition would have to be “JFK’s” Oliver Stone, but the academy may blanch at the notion that a third Oscar for Stone would tie him with legends Frank Capra and Wiliam Wyler and put him only one behind John Ford.

The Pick: Jonathan Demme.

Best Supporting Actor. Whatever they paid Jack Palance to be in “City Slickers,” it wasn’t enough, and all signs for this award point to the canny 40-year-veteran, twice nominated (for “Sudden Fear” in 1952 and the classic “Shane” a year later) but never a winner. The only possible longshot would be Michael Lerner, whose industry-wise cameo in “Barton Fink” was terribly amusing but probably not seen by enough voters.

The Pick: Jack Palance.

Best Supporting Actress. “The Fisher King” was popular enough to garner five nominations, and all that positive energy will focus on Mercedes Ruehl, who has won just about every supporting actress award and should add the Oscar as well. The best outside chances would be Kate Nelligan, who underlined the extent of her versatility in “The Prince of Tides,” and veteran Diane Ladd as the sentimental choice for “Rambling Rose.”

The Pick: Mercedes Ruehl.

Best Original Screenplay. The only original to have wide-enough backing to be nominated for best picture was James Toback’s lean and mean “Bugsy” script, and that may yet turn out to be a winner. But equally possible is that “Thelma & Louise” partisans, irked at having to split their votes in the best actress category, will coalesce behind Callie Khouri’s rousing script.

The Pick: “Thelma & Louise.”

Best Adapted Screenplay. “JFK’s” script did process a huge amount of information, but both of the favorites turn out to be adaptations of very popular bestsellers, Ted Tally’s work on “The Silence of the Lambs” and Pat Contoy and Becky Johnston’s on “The Prince of Tides.”

The Pick: “The Silence of the Lambs.”

Best Foreign-Language Film. The very different front-runners are the somber but gorgeous “Raise the Red Lantern” from China and “Mediterraneo,” a light romantic comedy in the Italian style, with Czechoslovakia’s charming but very slight “The Elementary School” lurking just behind.

The Pick: “Mediterraneo.”

Best Documentary Feature. Hands down the year’s most controversial category, not because of the films included but due to ones like “Paris Is Burning” that were left out. The final consensus is not that the the nominees are undeserving (they’re mostly not) but that the academy would have less egg on its face if the documentary committee widened its stubbornly narrow aesthetic criteria and stopped insisting that only the most stylistically conservative documentaries are fit to print. Ironically enough, “In the Shadow of the Stars,” a warm, human look at the San Francisco Opera chorus and the only one of the five that does not wear its social consciousness on its sleeve, is the most likely to best the moving “Death on the Job” and the Nazi-themed “The Restless Conscience.”

The Pick: “In the Shadow of the Stars.”

For the rest of Turan’s predictions, and picks from Times reviewers Peter Rainer, Kevin Thomas and Michael Wilmington, see Page 9.