Great Movies That Should Have Won An Award (1 Viewer)

[UKReb]

Idea for this thread came about from comments posted by me and Spitfrnd on The General's "Award Winning Movies You Have Never Seen" thread.

Title of this thread is a little mis-leading because rather than just posting endless lists of all our favorite movies that never got the Oscar I'll just toss a few ideas of what I think are either scandalous omissions or absolutely ridiculous winners/nominations and pose the question:-

What worth is the Academy of Performing Arts and Why do they sometimes get it so obviously wrong?

You cannot expect any award ceremony to get it right everytime with the world's opinion but the Academy appears to be run by members who are completely out of synch with the movie going public.

A classic "howler" example of NOT Best Picture: Saving Private Ryan losing out to Shakespeare in Love the sharp intake of breath could be heard around the world followed by the choral multitude of "WHAT?" reverberating from movie-goers.
Exactly the same when Ordinary People beat Raging Bull
Exactly the same when Kramer vs Kramer beat Apocalypse Now
Exactly the same when Oliver beat 2001-A Space Odyssey (not even nominated)
Exactly the same when The Greatest Show on Earth beat High Noon & The Quiet Man
How Green was my Valley beat Citizen Kane???????
And my favorite Titanic beating LA Confidential; Good Will Hunting and as Good As It Gets-sure it made pots of money, it would have done anyway, but is it really the best movie of that year and how many times have you watched it in comparison to the losers?

And just a handful of what I consider to be great movies that were not even nominated!

Close Encounters of the Third Kind
The Shining
Glory
Last of the Mohicans
The Usual Suspects
Heat

I could go on however, you may not agree with the above being better or indeed best movies but just look at the list and ask yourself who today remembers the winners? Yet most of the losers are still fondly remembered and regularly watched by movie-goers across the world as great movies
Sometimes the Academy attempts to put things right such as with Martin Scorsese. After receiving up to 50 different awards from across the world for Taxi-Driver; Raging Bull and Goodfellas but nothing from his peers in Hollywood they make amends to cover their embarrassment by giving him one for The Departed-hardly Scorsese's finest cinematic moment-one only has to view the original Hong Kong movie "Infernal Affairs" to discover that it's a far superior version.
Likewise with John Wayne after years of completely ignoring his work they finally give him the statuette for "True Grit" where he played a parody of all his characters. Once again in my opinion not his finest when compared to his portrayal of Ethan Edwards in Ford's "The Searchers" voted across the world as one of the greatest westerns ever made and Wayne's finest acting performance on screen-the film never received a single nomination in any category.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing but the majority of the above losers were known by the movie-goers to be exceptional films so how come the Academy "experts" didn't know what the great unwashed knew? I could say today that the ceremonial glitz of the Red Carpet is more important than the films themselves and the Academy is failing because the art they originated and are still attempting to recognise no longer exists. But it appears to me they have always managed to get it wrong alongside sometimes getting it right but when they get it really wrong as some of the examples above they just ridicule themselves and the artform they are supposed to be representing.

Reb

 

[theBaron]

It's tough to say, because the topic is so subjective.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is a mutual admiration society, for people in the industry, by people in the industry, and as such, the selections are suspect. It has no direct relation to the real world, in my opinion.

Box office receipts are a good indication of what the public likes, and often, the Academy Awards bear no correlation to box office receipts. On the other hand, just because a lot of people pay to see a movie is not necessarily a sign that it is a good movie.

The People's Choice awards were supposed to be an attempt to rectify the conflict between my two points, or the lack of correlation between the two, but they're still more of a popularity contest than a true measure of how good a film is.

Anyway, I agree with you on your choices, except for "The Usual Suspects", which I thought was just dumb. "Who is Kayzer Sosay?" Who cares, is my question. Though I did enjoy Pete Postlethwaite in that movie, I've enjoyed him in everything I've seen him in, ever since I saw him as Sgt. Hakeswill in the Sharpe series.

Congrats on a great thread idea, there'll be a ton of posts, I'm sure!

Prost!
Brad

 

[Spitfrnd]

Great post and thread mate. There are so many to fit this category that it is difficult to know where to begin. Of course, the omissions are not always the Academy's fault since in some years there are just too many good works to be recognized. That said, they do indeed often overlook some excellent work for no good reason. Here is my partial list of great movies that did not win:

Taxi Driver
The French Lieutenant's Woman
Dr Strangelove
12 Angry Men
The Maltese Falcon
The Shawshank Redemption
Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs
Rebel Without A Cause
Deliverance
The Birdman Of Alcatraz
Psycho
Marathon Man
Blade Runner
Serpico
Easy Rider
Das Boot
Empire Of The Sun
Master and Commander

Now how about great actors that have never won:

Albert Finney: Tom Jones, Erin Brokovich, the Dresser, Volcano, the Browning Version
Cary Grant: Philadelphia Story, North by Northwest, To Catch a Thief
Robert Mitchum: Story of GI Joe, Night of the Hunter, Cape Fear
Kirk Douglas: Champion, Lust for Life, Ace in the Hole, Detective Story, Spartacus, Paths of Glory
Henry Fonda (except for On Golden Pond that was at the very end of his career and would not have been made but for the tireless efforts of his daughter Jane): Grapes of Wrath, Ox-bow Incident, Twelve Angry Men, Once Upon a Time in the West
Peter O’Toole: Lawrence of Arabia and eight others (lossing to career performances by Gregory Peck, Rex Harrison, Cliff Robertson, Marlon Brando, Robert De Niro and Ben Kingsley)
Samuel Jackson: (1 nomination) Pulp Fiction, Negotiator, Coach Carter, Unbreakable, Time to Kill, Long Kiss Goodnight
Steve McQueen: (1 nomination) Sand Pebbles, Great Escape, Bullit, Thomas Crown Affair, the Getaway, Papillon
Lauren Bacall: (1 nomination) Dark Passage, Key Largo, How to Marry a Millionaire, Designing Women
Bruce Willis: (0 nominations) Sixth Sense, Armageddon, Twelve Monkies, Death Becomes Her, Unbreakable, The Jackal, The Siege, In Country
Harrison Ford: (1 nomination) Witness, Indiana Jones (all 3), Clear and Present Danger, Fugitive
Demi Moore: (0 nominations) G.I. Jane, Scarlett Letter, Indecent Proposal, Few Good Men
Sharon Stone: (1 nomination) Casino, Basic Instinct
John Travolta: Pulp Fiction, Face/Off, Get Shorty, General's Daughter, Basic, Primary Colors

Finally what about great performances that were not even nominated:

William Holden in The Wild Bunch
Humphrey Bogart in Treasure Of The Sierra Madre and High Sierra
Audrey Hepburn in My Fair Lady
Henry Fonda in 12 Angry Men
Anthony Perkins in Psycho
Errol Flynn in Captain Blood and Adventures of Robin Hood
James Stewart in Destry Rides Again
Peter Sellers in The Pink Panther
Kirk Douglas in Paths Of Glory
Mia Farrow in Rosemary's Baby
Henry Fonda in My Darling Clementine
Katharine Hepburn in Adam's Rib
Gene Hackman in The Conversation
Henry Fonda in Mister Roberts
Robert De Niro in Mean Streets
John Wayne in Rio Bravo
Robert Mitchum in The Sundowners
Sean Connery in From Russia With Love
Sidney Poitier In the Heat of the Night
Kathy Bates in Dolores Claiborne
Toshiro Mifune in Throne Of Blood
Marlene Dietrich in A Witness For The Prosecution
Robert Redford in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
John Wayne in The Searchers
Ingrid Bergman in Casablanca
Robert Shaw in Jaws
Michael Caine in The Man Who Would Be King
Sean Connery in The Man Who Would Be King
Jack Nicholson in The Shining
Ed Harris in The Right Stuff
Christopher Walken in The Dead Zone
Alan Rickman in Die Hard and Quigley
Tom Selleck in Quigley
Bill Murray in Groundhog Day
Sean Connery in The Rock, Red October, Last Crusade, Outland, Entrapment and Rising Sun
Nicole Kidman in To Die For
Dennis Quaid in Far From Heaven
Russell Crowe and Paul Bettany for Master and Commander
Robert Duvall for Open Range
Sean Astin and Ian McKellen for The Return of the King
Dennis Quaid in Far From Heaven
Diane Lane for Under the Tuscan Sun
William H. Macy or Chris Cooper or Jeff Bridges for Seabiscuit
Kevin Bacon in The Woodsman
Russell Crowe in Cinderella Man
Gretchen Mol in The Notorious Bettie Page
Daniel Craig in Casino Royale
Maggie Gyllenhaal in Sherrybaby
Russell Crowe in 3:10 to Yuma
Tom Hanks in Charlie Wilson’s War
Keri Russell in Waitress

This is a start but there are many notable oversights to recognize here.

 

[UKReb]

Actresses are often quoted as saying there are no good parts for women let alone getting a nomination.

Well the Academy appears to be an absolute sucker for any actress who can play the part of a lady with loose morals that redeems herself by the final reel to the extent that it's almost a guarantee to at least get the nomination and a darn good chance of winning Oscar. Evidence- try these:-

Best Actress Oscar Winners all playing such a character

Anne Baxter-The Razor's Edge
Claire Trevor-Key Largo
Donna Reed-From Here to Eternity
Jo Van Fleet-East of Eden
Dorothy Malone-Written on the Wind
Liz Taylor-Butterfield 8
Jane Fonda-Klute
Mira Sorvino-Mighty Aphrodite
Monster-Charlize Theron

And that's not including the twelve actresses nominated but didn't win for playing such characters. What does that tell us about the Academy?

Reb

 

[lancer]

just a word of agreement with UKReb about Wayne as Edwards. the Duke got robbed. should have won hands down. also, Spitfrnd is spot on about Fonda in Once Upon A Time In The West. best bad guy performance i've seen.- lancer

 

[Spitfrnd]

Actresses are often quoted as saying there are no good parts for women let alone getting a nomination.

Well the Academy appears to be an absolute sucker for any actress who can play the part of a lady with loose morals that redeems herself by the final reel to the extent that it's almost a guarantee to at least get the nomination and a darn good chance of winning Oscar. Evidence- try these:-

Best Actress Oscar Winners all playing such a character

Anne Baxter-The Razor's Edge
Claire Trevor-Key Largo
Donna Reed-From Here to Eternity
Jo Van Fleet-East of Eden
Dorothy Malone-Written on the Wind
Liz Taylor-Butterfield 8
Jane Fonda-Klute
Mira Sorvino-Mighty Aphrodite
Monster-Charlize Theron

And that's not including the twelve actresses nominated but didn't win for playing such characters. What does that tell us about the Academy?

Reb

LOL, well that may be true but Liz Taylor, Jane Fonda and Mira Sorvino were absolutely great in those performances. Thing is, it is a common role for actresses.

 

[Cardigan600]

Yo Troopers, you could go on forever with this topic, there have been so many great movies and performances. the No1 all time greats for me was Al Pacino in the Godfather. Another great performance was Kurt Russell as "ELVIS" now being a massive Elvis fan, Kurt played him that well I forgot I was watching somebody taking the King off. Now thats a sure sign of a great performance.
Bernard.

 

[Louis Badolato]

A agree with everything said here so far, and want to add the following: all you have to do to win an oscar is play someone who is mentally handicapped. Dustin Hoffman for Rain Man (didn't really think he deserved it), Tom Hanks for Forrest Gump (well deserved), Bobby DiNero for Awakenings (come on, he was on screen for like 10 minutes, and Robin Williams carried the whole movie) . . .

 

[UKReb]

LOL, well that may be true but Liz Taylor, Jane Fonda and Mira Sorvino were absolutely great in those performances. Thing is, it is a common role for actresses.

Well Bill we all now know what kind of films you like viewing

 

[trooper]

John Wayne was a great actor and I will happily watch his films, with the possible exception of some of his very early potboilers. The only thing that causes me grief is the fortunately brief instances where saccahrine sentimentality or "comedy" punch ups occur. Great actor, yes, but comedian he wasn't. In my book his best roles were in " The Searchers" and "Wings of Eagles" where he played straight characters.

 

[theBaron]

I thought he was very good in "The Quiet Man", too, although there are many very good performances in that movie, in my opinion.

Prost!
Brad

 

[Spitfrnd]

Well Bill we all now know what kind of films you like viewing

OK , now tell me you all just hate watching any one of these beautiful lasses (in their prime for two) in a sleazy role. Exhibit A for those that need a reminder.

 

[UKReb]

Have to agree with our Irish "Yo Troopers" you could go on forever putting lists together of films/actors/directors that we all consider should have won the "covetous" naked Art Deco Man.

But Louis got closest to what I was really trying to get at with this thread-the Academy loves mental illness as well as redeemable scarlet women so much so it becomes almost predictable on what films will be selected and what films will not be.

As well as the above the Academy prefers high production-preferably with an American theme-box office success is not always necessary but it helps- must have a worthy subject matter such as a good heart triumphing over adversity interjected of course with large amounts of sentiment. It must not be any kind of genre work-horror; science fiction; film noir; comedies and WWII gore all appear to be considered "unworthy" for best picture category unless the type of genre becomes mainstream and heaven forbid if it's quirky or expressing a contrary view. And most importantly it's absolutely essential that it's presented in God's language-English (we will not have any of these foreign sub-titles thankyou very much)

Quality and innovation are rarely at the forefront of criterion for selecting nominations but appears to be more following a certain code peculiar to the 5000 odd academy members. Inevitably their selection then becomes so clearly unrepresentative of the extraordinary diversity currently being expressed around the world by foreign and American independent film-makers as to be practically meaningless.

In the 30's all actors and directors had their Academy membership paid for by the studios and then ordered to vote for whatever their studio movie had been nominated. This "local voting" was supposed to have stopped when the studio cartels were broken up....but I'm not so sure a disguised version is still not in use.

My theory is more like that the majority of movies selected invariably paint the picture of America that moviemakers, for whatever reason, most want to convey to the world-simplistic almost mythical- a veritable good guy's America

But then again as Freud said-You can learn as much from a society's dreams as you can from it's reality.

Reb

 

[theBaron]

You must not have been watching any movies made since around 1967, because you're more likely to find themes of America bad, men bad, white men bad, captialism bad, religion bad, everything and everyone is corrupt, than of uplifting or postive, patriotic themes.

My father and I have had a discussion about Hollywood during WWII and now, and how many actors enlisted, after they were already famous, and how many other future stars also served in the armed forces, during the war. Even lesser-know celebrities. Heck, I just learned yesterday that Mr. Wizard, Don Herbert, flew bombers with the 15th Air Force in Italy, winning the Distinguished Flying Cross.

And we compare that to the subsequent generations. We agree that it certainly seen as duty to country, and pretty much everyone agreed what "our country" meant.

No point here, just an observation.

 

[UKReb]

You must not have been watching any movies made since around 1967, because you're more likely to find themes of America bad, men bad, white men bad, captialism bad, religion bad, everything and everyone is corrupt, than of uplifting or postive, patriotic themes.

I've watched quite a few but- How many of the above won Best Picture? Was the point I was trying to make

 

[The General]

Great post and thread mate.

Hear, hear!

 

[Spitfrnd]

…..
As well as the above the Academy prefers high production-preferably with an American theme-box office success is not always necessary but it helps- must have a worthy subject matter such as a good heart triumphing over adversity interjected of course with large amounts of sentiment. It must not be any kind of genre work-horror; science fiction; film noir; comedies and WWII gore all appear to be considered "unworthy" for best picture category unless the type of genre becomes mainstream and heaven forbid if it's quirky or expressing a contrary view. And most importantly it's absolutely essential that it's presented in God's language-English (we will not have any of these foreign sub-titles thank you very much)

Well on the language issue, I must agree with the Academy. It is after all, an American film award where (for a while longer at least) English is the primary language. Frankly I am not a big subtitle fan, I just find it too distracting.

While I certainly greatly respect your opinion Bob, I think the Academy proscriptions are not quite as rigid or as bad as all that. There are certainly examples to support the biases you note but conflicting examples as well. Sci-Fi, comedies, film noire and battle gore and other less mainstream genre films have won and sometimes it has been justified when they do not. Below I have set forth some examples.

Sci-Fi / Fantasy
Return of the King 2003
Nominees that should have won
2001: A Space Odyssey (vs Oliver), 1968
Star Wars (vs Annie Hall, a closer call), 1977
Losers to great pictures
E.T.: The Extra-terrestrial (to Ghandi)
Classics not nominatedKing Kong, 1933
Blade Runner, 1982

War / WWII
Gladiator 2000
Braveheart, 1995
Dances with Wolves, 1990
Platoon, 1986
Deer Hunter, 1978
Patton, 1970
Lawrence of Arabia, 1962
From Here to Eternity, 1953
Nominees that should have won
Apocalypse Now (vs Kramer Vs. Kramer)
Guns of Navarone (vs West Side Story), 1961
Losers to great pictures
Twelve O’Clock High (to All the Kings Men) 1949
Caine Mutiny (to On the Waterfront)
Longest Day (to Lawrence), 1962
Sand Pebbles (to Man for All Seasons), 1966
Saving Private Ryan (to Shakespeare in Love), 1998
Classics not nominated
Das Boot, 1982
Last of the Mohicans, 1992

Comedies
American Beauty (Dark), 1999
Shakespeare in Love 1998
Annie Hall, 1977
Cuckoo’s Nest 1975, (Dark)
The Sting, 1973
Around the World in 80 Days, 1956
Nominees that should have won
Philadelphia Story (vs Rebecca), 1941
Mister Roberts (vs Marty), 1955
Losers to great pictures
Graduate, Guess Who’s Coming to Diner (to In the Heat of the Night) 1967
Mash (to Patton) 1970
Heaven Can Wait (to Deer Hunter), 1978
Tootsie (to Ghandi), 1982

Film Noire
In the Heat of the Night (hybrid), 1967
French Connection (hybrid), 1971
Pulp Ficton (hybrid), 1974
Atlantic City (hybrid), 1981
Nominees that should have won
Citzen Kane or the Maltese Falcon (vs How Green Was My Valley), 1941
Double Indemnity (vs Going My Way), 1944
Spellbound (vs Going My Way), 1945
China Town (vs Godfather II), 1974
LA Confidential (vs Titanic), 1997
Losers to great pictures
Witness for the Prosecution (to Bridge on the River Kwai), 1957
Anatomy of a Murder (to Ben-Hur), 1959

Westerns
Unforgiven, 1992
Dances with Wolves, 1990
Butch Cassidy and Sundance Kid (vs Midnight Cowboy), 1969
Nominees that should have won
High Noon (vs Greatest Show on Earth), 1952
Losers to great pictures
Shane (to From Here to Eternity), 1953
How the West Was Won (to Tom Jones), 1963

So what to make of all this? I think the academy clearly makes mistakes and like the society is represents, has some unfortunate biases that fortunately are not always consistently applied. So in some years some good films get slighted or overlooked but often one or more good films lose to another equally good or better good film. Over the years there have been many tough calls and likely we would not agree here on the correct choices for many of these. That said, quality and innovation are frequently rewarded, as seen in the above list of winners and I don’t think all the choices are unrepresentative. It is notable that of the AFI list of 100 greatest movies, over 75% were nominated for best picture and over 60% were winners. Does that mean the Academy always gets it right, certainly not but it does mean they get it right more often than not and that much is really a matter of differences in personal choice. I do agree there have been certainly glaring errors in their selections, more for actors and directors perhaps than pictures but that is topic for another post. Any way, I expect this should spark some further discussion.