The Oscars sent a tweet predicting The Oscars

The tweet included an image titled My Oscar Predictions which featured South Korean drama Parasite down for Best Picture and Sam Mendes (1917) for Best Director.

Films fans were puzzled by the now-deleted tweet, particularly as the Academy Awards are still in their voting period, but the reason for the error soon became clear.

https://twitter.com/billkuchman/status/1224518831248420864

In preparation for the big event on Sunday night, the Academy has launched a widget on Twitter that allows users to share their predictions in a smartly presented format.

The Academy said in a tweet: "A brief issue on Twitter made some of yours [Oscars predictions] look like they came from our account. They didn’t. This error is now resolved."

See below for an example of the prediction template shared:

https://twitter.com/CINEMA1880/status/1224559061024329729

The frontrunners for Best Picture at this year's Oscars are 1917, Parasite and Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood.

The acting categories have been dominated this year by the same four names: Joaquin Phoenix (Joker), Renee Zellweger (Judy), Brad Pitt (Once Upon a Time...) and Laura Dern (Marriage Story).

The Oscars take place on Sunday 9th February 2020.