Cinema Wellman vs. The Academy
I’ve seen all but three movies nominated for Best Picture: The Patriot (1928), East Lynne (1931), and The White Parade (1934). Only about ⅓ of The Patriot still exists, and the only surviving complete prints of East Lynne and The White Parade exist within the UCLA film archive. Aside from this trio, I have seen every film ever nominated for a Best Picture Oscar. And a large number of them are straight up garbage.
Today in Cinema Wellman, we’ll take a look at some of the biggest mistakes ever made by “The Academy.” They have been known to reward epic, overblown pageantry over substance and style since their inception. They have totally whiffed on classic films that have stood the test of time while the films they’ve chosen as the “best” have been relegated into non-relevance.
They are also guilty of awarding Oscars to performers and directors DECADES after passing them by for much better performances and films.
I actually have a lot of contempt for “The Academy.” This from the person who has made it a goal to see EVERY film that was EVER nominated for an Oscar in ANY category. I can be complicated at times.
In some instances, a classic was overlooked, while in other cases they just picked an awful movie to honor when there were sometimes several more deserving films out there to choose from.
I have zero beef with the first 11 Best Picture winners. There are no glaring mistakes during those years, in my opinion. My first problem is with the 1940 awards, and, as you will see, the problems continue from there.
Please keep in mind how subjective all of this is. This post may trash some of your all-time favorite films. Sorry about that in advance. I will also remind you that I’m not here to debate you, Jerry.
What follows is, to paraphrase The Dude, “just, like, my opinion, man.”
Offending year: 1940
Winner: Gone with the Wind
Better Choice: The Wizard of Oz
Yes, Gone with the Wind was visually spectacular for 1939. It won eight Oscars, but the only deserved winner was Hattie McDaniel who became the first African American to be nominated and win an Oscar. It DIDN’T win for Special Effects, which were the best part of the film. Clark Gable is so overrated as an actor, the run time is just under four hours, and it’s so racially insensitive it looks like Song of the South without the music and cartoon birds. It’s so racially insensitive that that idiot clown with the orange hair who used to be president complained when Parasite won Best Picture by saying, “Why don’t we honor movies like Gone with the Wind anymore?” What a moron. I’m surprised he didn’t reference Song of the South.
A more deserved winner would have been The Wizard of Oz. It has stood the test of time, and the music is more memorable than every other musical winner on this list. Countless versions of the story have been told, but this is still the best. It is a beloved classic that has spawned a cult following and merchandising beyond belief. Christmas decorations? Really? In any event, it was much better than Gone with the Wind.
Offending year: 1942
Winner: How Green Was My Valley
Better Choice: Citizen Kane, The Maltese Falcon
This is one of the worst choices ever. Two classic, beloved films were passed by to honor a movie that few people remember at all. I admit that it’s difficult to gauge a classic “in the moment,” but how on earth do you vote for a movie about Welsh coal miners over Charles Foster Kane and “The stuff that dreams are made of?” How does that happen?! I’m sure The Academy’s hatred/jealousy of admittedly arrogant wunderkind Orson Welles was a big part of it. Shame on them anyway.
Offending year: 1945
Winner: Going My Way
Better Choice: Double Indemnity
Double Indemnity is one of the best film noir movies of all time. Billy Wilder directed the tale of marital infidelity and murder starring Barbara Stanwyck, Fred MacMurray, and the always wonderful Edward G. Robinson. I’ve seen it over a dozen times, most recently last month. It stands the test of time and is always counted among my list of favorite movies of all time. It was nominated for seven Oscars and won ZERO!!! Come on, Academy!
The winner in 1945, Going My Way, was a sappy, bland movie starring Bing Crosby as Father O’Malley. He should have been named Father O’Schmaltzy. And that WON seven Oscars! Bing Crosby won for Best Actor! Bing Crosby could never act. Sing, yes, act, no! Inexcusable.
Offending year: 1953
Winner: The Greatest Show on Earth
Better Choice: NONE of the other nominees, but…Rashomon
The Greatest Show on Earth is often mentioned as the worst Best Picture choice ever (along with the next winner on this list). That distinction is well deserved since this movie is horrible. The Academy is once again fooled by sizzle without there being any steak on the plate.
None of the other nominees were deserving that year, but how about being progressive and giving the award to Rashomon?! Oh, I forgot that the Academy was made up of old, white men who would die before rewarding a movie that wasn’t in English. We’d have to wait 66 years for that to happen! Mind boggling!
Offending year: 1957
Winner: Around the World in 80 Days
Better Choice: NONE of the other nominees, but…Seven Samurai
1957 is almost a mirror image of 1953. Everything written above still stands, including epic garbage being rewarded while ignoring another fantastic film by one of the greatest directors in film history. This is a travesty.
Offending year: 1959
Winner: Gigi
Better Choice: The Defiant Ones
Truth be told, I hate Gigi. A romantic comedy in the worst sense of the word. You know that creepy song “Thank Heaven for Little Girls?” It was sung in this movie by old-ass Maurice Chevalier to a group of prepubescent girls. It is impossible to look at today. Chevalier should have been put on a list after that. This junk won NINE Oscars!
Overlooked was a powerful film that took a hard look at race relations in the country by telling the story of two convicts, one black, one white, who are shackled to each other. They need to work together, and stop hating each other, to elude capture. Sidney Poitier and Tony Curtis are exceptional in this tense, suspense filled film.
I guess the Academy wasn’t ready to reward films with strong social commentary. Chickenshit.
Offending year: 1964
Winner: Tom Jones
Better Choice: NONE of the other nominees, but…The Great Escape
Tom Jones is absolutely awful! IMDb: “The romantic and chivalrous adventures of adopted bastard Tom Jones in 18th-century England.” Adventures? This was a snoozer. Rubbish, as they would say in 18th-century England.
And to think that one of the greatest films about WWII featuring an all-star cast and filled with action and suspense lost to that bastard Tom Jones. IMDb’s words there. They said it first.
Offending year: 1965
Winner: My Fair Lady
Better Choice: Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
The Academy honors a fluff musical with a tired premise (a man picks up and “trains” a woman to be “presentable”) which is always gross and passes by one of the best pieces of political satire ever made. They had a chance to honor Stanley Kubrick and they blew it! Kubrick’s only Oscar win was for the Special Effects in 2001: A Space Odyssey. Zero Best Director or Best Picture wins. They didn’t even have the courtesy to give him one of those bullshit honorary Oscars like the one they gave Hitchcock after whiffing on his entire directorial career.
Dr. Strangelove went 0-4 in the Oscars, while My Fair Lady went 8-12. Mind boggling!
Offending year: 1971
Winner: Patton
Better Choice: M*A*S*H
Typical of the Academy choosing a “rah-rah, we’re the good guys, yay for us” war movie that puts a questionable human being on a pedestal over a film that was making a point about the horrors of war and gave us a realistic depiction of what it’s like to be in a war. Classic Academy!
Offending year: 1977
Winner: Rocky
Better Choice: Network, Taxi Driver
Sorry, all of you Rocky fans out there, but it’s just not worthy of winning Best Picture. Not even close. It’s a decent sports movie about boxing, but decent boxing movies are a dime a dozen. And they didn't win Best Picture. Not even great boxing movies win Best Picture, which you’ll soon see.
The fact that Rocky beat out two phenomenal films, the scarily prescient look at media, Network, directed by the great Sidney Lumet and Taxi Driver, Martin Scorsese’s visceral look at isolation and obsession makes this even worse! How did this happen?!
There is no way Rocky is a better film than Network and Taxi Driver. No way.
Offending year: 1980
Winner: Kramer vs. Kramer
Better Choice: Apocalypse Now, All That Jazz, Breaking Away
For some reason The Academy was all into family dysfunction/divorce in the early 80s. It was as if they suddenly realized that there is strife and discord in the family dynamic. Kramer vs. Kramer isn’t a bad movie, it just pales in comparison to the other choices listed.
Don’t get me wrong, the performances by Meryl Streep and Dustin Hoffman (both Oscar winners for this movie) were amazing, but I would have preferred Apocalypse Now, All That Jazz, or Breaking Away being given the highest award.
Offending year: 1981
Winner: Ordinary People
Better Choice: Raging Bull
It’s amazing that a film that is considered one of the best films of all time, and the best film of the decade of the 80's, lost to Ordinary People. Not sure how this happened. Robert DeNiro won a Best Actor Oscar for his role as Jake LaMotta, but they had another chance to honor Scorsese and they passed him by again. Hopefully they don’t give him a Best Director Oscar for a shitty, lackluster, overrated movie later on. Oh, wait…
Offending year: 1983
Winner: Gandhi
Better Choice: The Verdict
This is a puzzler. Ben Kingsley is a great actor, but this isn’t his best. Richard Attenborough is a wonderful director, but this isn’t his best. And yet this epic (read “too long!”) won eight Oscars. There aren’t many people that have this on their list of favorite or best movies ever. Regular fans and film critics included.
The Verdict won zero Oscars, and yet it’s the superior film in many ways. Once again director Sidney Lumet is overlooked! He joins Kubrick and Hitchcock as great directors who never won. Paul Newman deserved an Oscar for Hud, he deserved an Oscar for Cool Hand Luke, and he deserved an Oscar for The Verdict. Yet he didn’t win for any of these phenomenal performances.
Hopefully they don’t give him a Best Actor Oscar for a performance in a shitty, lackluster, overrated movie later on. Oh, wait…
Offending year: 1991
Winner: Dances with Wolves
Better Choice: Goodfellas
Oh my god, this is terrible. How on earth does this seem to happen over and over and over?
Kevin Costner cannot act. He is terrible. I have no idea why he is popular, and people defend him. He is in many of my most hated movies for a reason. Was this award an example of celebrating movies depicting the “white savior?” Was the Academy trying to be progressive? Fail and fail. Seven, count ‘em seven Oscars went to this pretentious claptrap.
Overlooked in this is one of the all-time greatest gangster movies ever made. I could watch this on a loop for a week and not tire of it. The performances, especially Ray Liotta, are exceptional, and once again Scorsese delivers a stunningly visceral film. This is up there with The Godfather when it comes to mob movies. And it lost to Kevin Costner?
Hopefully they don’t give Scorsese a Best Director Oscar for a shitty, lackluster, overrated movie later on. Oh, wait…how many times is this going to happen?!? Spoiler Alert: a lot.
Offending year: 1995
Winner: Forrest Gump
Better Choice: The Shawshank Redemption, Pulp Fiction
I hate Forrest Gump. I hate it so much. It is one of the most overrated movies in the history of film. Not only is it not worthy of Best Picture, but it’s also an AWFUL movie! Jenny Curran is despicable! The story is so sappy and stupid, and poor Sally Field as Mama Gump is trading her body for…oh I don’t even want to think about how much I hate this movie.
It is so painful to think that this crap won six Oscars when superior films (The Shawshank Redemption/Pulp Fiction) went 1-14 in the Oscar race. An absolute travesty. I was going to write about what makes The Shawshank Redemption/Pulp Fiction great, but I’m just too pissed off to finish the paragraph thinking about Gump. Next!
Offending year: 1997
Winner: The English Patient
Better Choice: Fargo
Seinfeld famously skewered the popularity of The English Patient in a Season 8 episode by having Elaine being dragged to multiple screenings of the film even though she despised it. It made a great point about people being “afraid” to dislike a movie that everyone else thinks is wonderful. I’m rarely that afraid. The English Patient was so boring! NINE OSCARS for this junk! NINE! And both of the leads lost? How good could it have been?
Fargo, on the other hand, runs circles around The English Patient in every possible way. At least it won for Original Screenplay (the Coen Brothers), and the always compelling Frances McDormand as Best Actress. It totally deserved to win Best Picture.
Offending year: 1998
Winner: Titanic
Better Choice: L.A. Confidential, and non-nominees Wag the Dog, Donnie Brasco
Another film that everyone loves, and I despise. Give it technical awards, that’s fine, but not Best Picture. This crap and Forrest Gump may be the two most overrated and insufferable films ever made. It’s unbearable to watch. I remember being dragged to this by a friend who loved it. It was at the end of the run, so the theater was close to empty. My favorite part was a woman and her elderly mother sitting a few rows behind me. The old woman’s loud commentary/questions were way more entertaining than anything and everything James Cameron was providing. During the love scene in the car, the woman said, “What are they doing in a car? I thought they were on a boat!” Spot on, granny!
L.A. Confidential now carries the “Kevin Spacey Stink,” but it’s a very good movie, and it’s better than Titanic. Wag the Dog and Donnie Brasco were also better, and they weren’t even nominated!
Sink, Titanic, just sink! And stay at the bottom of the sea!
Offending year: 1999
Winner: Shakespeare in Love
Better Choice: Life is Beautiful, Saving Private Ryan
Shakespeare in Love should be included in the list of straight up bad movies to be given film’s highest award. It is pompous and pretentious. Seven Oscars? Gwyneth Paltrow given an acting award? Unbelievable. This is just crap.
Life is Beautiful is a touching Holocaust story that is wonderfully told. It did win Best Foreign Language Film but was worthy of Best Picture as well. But we know we still have to wait another 20 years for a foreign film to win top honors.
Saving Private Ryan is arguably one of the best war movies ever made and it won director Steven Spielberg his second Best Director Oscar. It’s always odd to me that a director could win for a movie that’s not considered the Best Picture of the year. Did the movie just make itself?
Offending year: 2000
Winner: American Beauty
Better Choice: The Green Mile
This certainly falls under the category of films affected by the “Kevin Spacey Stink,” but it was overrated back in 1999, and has not stood up at all, especially due to the “KSS.” Decent film with some excellent performances, but not Best Picture material. Spacey perving on his high school daughter’s friend is so much more cringe-worthy now. I’m sure Mena Suvari throws up in her mouth a little every time she thinks of making this movie.
The Green Mile is a Top 10 prison movie, and it has stood up over time, as many prison movies seem to do. It would have been a much better selection as the top film of the year. Great performances, great story by Stephen King.
Offending year: 2006
Winner: Crash
Better Choice: EVERY OTHER nominee! Brokeback Mountain, Capote, Good Night, and Good Luck, Munich
I mentioned this topic to a friend, and he asked if Crash was on the list. It wasn’t at the time, but I included it here because of his suggestion and the fact that this is one of the rare occasions where all of the other nominees would have been a more worthy selection. Crash is easily the weakest of this quintet. Any other film on this list would have been fine. You don’t see that too often. An especially weak effort by The Academy.
Offending year: 2007
Winner: The Departed
Better Choice: NONE of the other nominees, but…Pan’s Labyrinth
I think The Departed is terrible. It’s a subpar remake of a very good Japanese movie and just about everyone in it is overacting, especially Nicholson. It’s kind of embarrassing. Not as embarrassing as the Boston accents being used. Even Mark Wahlberg’s accent is trash, and he’s FROM Dorchester, MA!
And, yes, this is the shitty, overrated movie that Martin Scorsese was finally awarded his first and only Best Director Oscar. Not for Mean Streets, not for Taxi Driver, not for Raging Bull, not for The King of Comedy, not for Goodfellas, not for Gangs of New York...he won for THIS!
We’re still a dozen years away from a foreign language film winning Best Picture, but Guillermo del Toro’s Pan’s Labyrinth should have won the honor in 2007.
I have other beefs with Best Picture winners, but I’ll end it here. I hated when they increased the field of Best Picture nominees to 10, and I have so many complaints about those winners, but I’ve ranted enough for one day. I think the worst thing The Academy ever did was enlarge the field of Best Picture nominees to up to 10 movies. The greedy sons of bitches did it for one reason and one reason only…to make more money. They are guilty of that and, you know, everything else I just mentioned. Do better this year, Academy!
A special thanks and shout out to my good friend, my “non-movie guy” friend who suggested this episode. Once again, he proves to me that he actually is a movie guy. No matter what he says.
Our next episode is going to be the first in an ongoing series of “City Spotlights.” We’re going to begin with films set in San Francisco.
I hope you’ll join me for that visit to cinematic Frisco, and for all of the upcoming episodes here at Cinema Wellman.
Until then…take care.
