Hollywood ? Where can hard-core fans of the Oscars and the merely contender curious go for solid insider insights? There are multiple prognosticators opining on the Web and in print. But the truly savvy insider will check the scores at Rotten Tomatoes to parse a film’s chances for gold.

Forget such words as “superb” or “knockout” or the other general superlatives that dot Oscar campaigns. Film review aggregators — including Rotten Tomatoes, Metacritic and newcomer Movie Review Intelligence — poll the critics, summarize their opinions and assign a simple numeric score to each film. Each aggregator has slightly different methodology, but all aim to be the Zagat Guide of film criticism, offering up a handy, no-frills sketch of current consensus opinion.

And as it turns out, films with aggregated review scores above 90 percent more often than not land an Oscar nomination.

Last year’s best picture winner, “Slumdog Millionaire,” garnered a 93 percent freshness score on Rotten Tomatoes, while the 2007 winner, “No Country for Old Men,” earned 94 percent and the 2006 winner, “The Departed,” pulled in 92 percent.

But don’t go calling your bookie just yet. Matt Atchity, editor in chief of Rotten Tomatoes, notes that snagging the tip-top score of the year on the so-called Tomato-meter doesn’t always translate directly into Oscar gold. “We did research last year to see if we could come up with a prediction. As a general rule, once the nominees are established, the highest rated movie rarely wins and the lowest reviewed movie rarely wins.” Note to filmmakers: Aim high, but not too high.

The notable exception over the last two decades? “Crash,” Atchity says. The 2004 best picture winner was the lowest rated of that year’s nominees with a mere passing grade of 75 percent fresh.

A movie with 10 positive reviews and 10 negative reviews is thus 50 percent fresh. To get a “certified fresh” imprimatur from the Web site, a film must be critiqued by at least 40 reviewers, including five reviewers from top publications and 75 percent or more of the reviews have to be positive.