[Note: Every Friday on First Thoughts we host a discussion about some aspect of pop culture. Today’s theme is movies that should have won the Academy Award's Best Picture. Have a suggestion for a topic? Send them to me at jcarter@firstthings.com]
Next Tuesday the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences will continue its long history of giving an Oscar for Best Picture to a movie that isn’t quite the Best Picture of the year. Avatar will take beat out nine other nominees for the best prize. And while it’s better than most films (e.g., The Hurt Locker) it is slightly less worthy than the enchanting Up.
Nevertheless, it’s likely that the Academy won’t completely embarrass themselves, as they did with almost all of the following fifteen films (seventeen, really) that lost the Best Picture award to an unworthy contender:
1. Citizen Kane (1941)
What won instead: How Green Was My Valley
Although it regularly tops the list of greatest movies of all time, Citizen Kane lost it’s bid for Best Picture. It took the consolation prize of Best Original Screenplay—the only Oscar director Orson Welles ever won.
2. The Third Man (1949)
What won instead: All About Eve
In any other year, the British noir masterpiece would have handily taken the Oscar. But it was the year for Eve, a picture that won in six of the fourteen categories in which it was nominated.
3. The Searchers (1956)
What won instead: Around the World in Eighty Days
Although I consider The Searchers a great, though overrated, film, there is no doubt that it should have won. Yet it wasn’t even nominated for Best Picture! How did Giant get a nomination and The Searchers did not?
4. The Shawshank Redemption / Pulp Fiction (1994)
What won instead: Forrest Gump
What a year for movies! Gump is a personal favorite, but it can’t match the twin masterpieces of Shawshank and Pulp Fiction, either of which should have taken home the top honors.
5. Star Wars (1977)
What won instead: Annie Hall
Sure it may have been Woody Allen’s best film. But it wasn’t Star Wars.
6. Apocalypse Now (1979)
What won instead: Kramer vs. Kramer
Maybe this made sense in 1979, but it sure doesn’t now.
7. Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
What won instead: Chariots of Fire
Do you really think Chariots should have won? Okay, which would your rather watch right now? Be honest. That’s what I thought.
8. Tender Mercies / The Right Stuff (1983)
What won instead: Terms of Endearment
Great year with some tough competition. Any three are worthy but Tender and Right Stuff edge out Terms.
9. Fargo (1996)
What won instead: The English Patient
The Coen brothers’ most human movie really should have beat out the visually sumptuous, but dull work by Anthony Minghella. (Kenneth Branagh’s Hamlet would have been an even more worthy choice, but it wasn’t even nominated.)
10. Being John Malkovich (1999)
What won instead: American Beauty
A decade has passed and yet the Academy has still not apologized for this embarrassment. The fact that they passed over—without even nominating—one of the most quirky and creative films ever made to award American Beauty only compounds the outrage.
11. Saving Private Ryan (1998)
What won instead: Shakespeare in Love
Ryan has its flaws, but the first ten minutes is more worthy than the entire 123 minutes of the entertaining, but slight, Shakespeare.
12. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)
What won instead: A Beautiful Mind
I’m not even a Rings fan yet I recognize the injustice of this snub.
13. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002)
What won instead: Chicago
See above.
14. Munich (2005)
What won instead: Crash
Crash? Seriously, Academy, what were you thinking?
15. The Dark Knight (2008)
What won instead: Slumdog Millionaire
The greatest superhero movie of all time snubbed to honor a film that no one will remember watching five years from now.
What would you add to the list? What are the greatest snubs that I missed?
Related: Thomas Hibbs considers this year’s Best Picture nominees.
March 5th, 2010 | 9:44 am
You forgot one:
1952 – The Quiet Man
What won instead: The Greatest Show On Earth
The American film magazine Premiere placed the movie on its list of the 10 worst Oscar winners, and the British film magazine Empire rated it #3 on their list of the 10 worst Oscar winners. It has the lowest spot on RottenTomatoes.com’s list of the 81 films to win Best Picture.
March 5th, 2010 | 10:12 am
Well, I don’t want to throw off the posts at the outset, but I have a related thought: 1964, which I would consider the toughest competition. The Best Picture nominees were “My Fair Lady”; “Dr. Strangelove”; “Becket”; “Mary Poppins”; and “Zorba the Greek.”
How would you like to make that choice?
“My Fair Lady” won, which is of course not at all an apparent injustice; however, given the passage of years, at this point I would have given the nod to “Mary Poppins.” Julie Andrews, I believe, did win Best Actress that year. (Audrey Hepburn wasn’t even nominated, probably because her singing parts were dubbed with someone else’s voice. Also interesting: Julie Andrews was considered for that role, but didn’t get the part, and then went on to “Mary Poppins” and her individual award. As the kids say: Sweet!)
March 5th, 2010 | 10:13 am
This is going to be even more subjective than the music discussions! All I can say is I’m heartily glad “Being John Malkovich” was “snubbed.” It is a mean, hateful, misanthropic film which attempts to impart to its audience nothing other than a general disdain for human beings as a species.
The sound was ok.
March 5th, 2010 | 10:28 am
Okay, here’s one that has already been extensively discussed on the FT site: In 1968, “Oliver!” was the surprise winner. Yeah, it was a pretty good film—but “2001: A Space Odyssey” wasn’t even NOMINATED for best picture.
March 5th, 2010 | 10:36 am
On your #9, “Jerry McGuire” should have been best picture that year, and Tom Cruise should have won best actor. It was the only movie from a major studio nominated that year, and the stars were crossed.
Also, I never agreed with the academy’s snubbing of Jim Carey in the late 90′s. They snubbed his perfomance in “The Truman Show,” and that was a mistake. I think that movie still holds up. It should have been nominated in 1998, though “Saving Private Ryan” still deserved the award.
“Shakespeare in Love” was a joke and should never have made the cut. It could not hold a candle to “Saving Private Ryan” or “Life Is Beautiful.”
March 5th, 2010 | 10:57 am
I like The Third Man, but All About Eve is a great film.
March 5th, 2010 | 11:05 am
In a more positive vein, I’ll give my nod in 1968 to “Lion in Winter” which was nominated but lost to “Oliver!”.
And don’t get me started on O’Toole not winning for best actor that year. Who even remembers Cliff Robertson’s performance in “Charly”?
March 5th, 2010 | 11:31 am
Next to the awards year that followed it, the “Kramer vs. Kramer” win was positively inspired. Films for the year of our Lord 1980 included “Raging Bull,” “The Empire Strikes Back,” “The Shining,” “The Blues Brothers,” and “The Long Good Friday.” What walks away with the Oscar? “Ordinary People,” for pity’s sake.
March 5th, 2010 | 11:52 am
Denny Burk:
Amen, brother on “Jerry Maguire” and Cruise in 1996. The best picture winner “The English Patient” featured two of the most selfish main characters the screen has ever seen. How did Fiennes’ character spend the last half of the film? Adultery, Treason, Suicide. My hero.
Best Actor went to Geoffrey Rush for his one-note performance in “Shine”. Here’s all the direction he needed for that role: “OK, babble quickly and flit from subject to subject. Now look stressed. OK, cut!”
Compared to “Maguire” and Cruise’s character running the on-screen emotional gamut, 1996′s winners left me shaking my head.
March 5th, 2010 | 12:24 pm
Re #7 In answer to your question: “Chariots of Fire.” But then I am a runner, and wasted 2+ hours last weekend watching “Crystal Skull.” It may be a while before I am able to watch the first or third again!
March 5th, 2010 | 1:22 pm
Re: Charly — Don’t disrespect one of the few science fiction films to ever win an Oscar. It’s a pretty good adaptation of Flowers for Algernon, and definitely an actor’s dream part.
March 5th, 2010 | 2:01 pm
Regarding science fiction films to win an Oscar: Did I mention that “2001″ wasn’t even NOM…. Oh, I guess I did. :)
March 5th, 2010 | 2:09 pm
Field of Dreams in 1989 lost to Driving Miss Daisy. Outrageous!
And while Braveheart is a great movie, I still wish Babe would have won…
As for The Lord of The Rings, it is a tragedy that the 3rd one, which was an unwatchable disaster that couldn’t hold a candle to the first two, was given a sort of “group award” for Peter Jackson’s accomplishment in the trilogy.
March 5th, 2010 | 3:40 pm
The Citizen Kane snub isn’t really that surprising. It’s celebrated for being so far ahead of its time, but being revolutionary doesn’t mean it was particularly great to watch, then or now. How Green Was My Valley is actually quite a solid film, albeit a sentimental one – it’s now known most for being the film that beat out Citizen Kane, and that’s not really just.
March 5th, 2010 | 5:02 pm
Hmm. The academy waited till the third film in Jackson’s Tolkien homage to give due props. That makes sense. They knew three were coming, and in a very real sense they were a single production.
Many Tolkien fans think of Jackson’s awards the way some conservatives view the Gore and Obama Nobels. ;-)
March 5th, 2010 | 5:33 pm
Well, in the case of the Jackson films, they did take several years to make and release. In the case of the Obama Nobel, he was nominated after ten days in office. At least Jackson had something tangible to point to as an accomplishment.
But I do agree with a previous poster: the last LOTR movie was the worst of the three. It’s too bad the Oscar waited for that one.
March 5th, 2010 | 7:01 pm
GeronimoRumplestiltskin:
Consider yourself high-fived, my friend!
March 5th, 2010 | 9:28 pm
The lowest point in the past generation: 1984. Amadeus beat The Killing Fields, A Passage to India, Places in The Heart, and A Soldier’s Story. Sigh.
March 6th, 2010 | 1:29 am
I am still torn over whether No Country For Old Men should have beaten There Will Be Blood. Both are fantastic, but….
March 6th, 2010 | 2:20 pm
The problem with awards like these in general–whether they be of the Pulitzer or Academy sort–are that they honor past work vicariously by awarding present work instead. Why else would Clint Eastwood win Best Director for “Million Dollar Baby” rather than “Mystic River”?
March 7th, 2010 | 11:48 am
The greatest ever exploration of old men who were once young lions, their lost lives, their lost loves, the sweetness of death…Robin and Marian…Connery, Hepburn, Williamson and the brilliant Robert Shaw trumping his turn as Henry VIII…a tremendous, moving, everlasting film about dreams that never come to pass!
March 7th, 2010 | 2:21 pm
Munich should have won in 2005? That’s a joke right? That was easily Spielberg’s worst movie ever. I didn’t see Crash, but it (and the rest of the nominees for that matter) would have to be a horrendous movie to make it an injustice for Munich to have “deserved” it.
March 10th, 2010 | 7:21 pm
Feels like you left out some of the most egregious snubs in history:
1. “Goodfellas” losing out to “Dances with Wolves” in 1990. Inexcusable. Indefensible.
2. “Do the Right Thing” not even being nominated in 1989. Instead? “Driving Miss Daisy.” Seriously. Its kind of ironic. One was arguably the most important modern movie about race relations. The other was “Driving Miss Daisy.”
3. “Raging Bull” losing out to “Ordinary People” in 1980.
4. “Dr. Strangelove” losing out to “My Fair Lady” in 1964.
5. None of Alfred Hitchcock’s best movies ever winning an Oscar (“Rear Window”, “Vertigo”, “North by Northwest”, etc.).
6. “The Maltese Falcon” losing to “How Green Was My Valley” in 1960 (same year as “Citizen Kane”).
There are countless other all-time great movies that didn’t win the Best Picture (“2001″, “Some Like It Hot”, etc.), but its possible better movies were nominated that year (like how “Chinatown” lost to “The Godfather”).
March 14th, 2010 | 8:50 pm
Time always reveals these kind of mistakes. I feel that Avatar losing 2010 is going to end up being 1977 all over again.
The most common complaint I’ve seen is 1994 where Shawshank and Pulp Fiction lost to Forest Gump. I think Shawshank should have won but to be fair there were three masterpieces that year and each of them deserved to win best picture.
The greatest snub of all time is without a doubt Rear Window not winning best picture for 1954. Worst part is that it wasn’t even nominated.
March 25th, 2010 | 5:13 am
The Star Chamber of faceless individuals called “The Academy” loves movies that glorify warfare, which is why the biggest blockbuster movie of all time lost out to a dog that made a paltry 11 million. The theme of “Avatar” was the rebellion of the people against an evil empire, somewhat like “V for Vendetta”. That’s not the kind of message that the people who control Hollywood (as well as much of the media and government) want to promote, especially when they happen to be a large part of that empire. Besides, the thought of scalping Germans seems so much more entertaining.
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