When I was a teenager in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s, I didn’t know a single person who loved movies like I did, not even close. I’d watch the Oscars by myself every year. The next day I’d have no one to talk to about my enjoyment of the show and my favorite winners or biggest disappointments. My family and friends loved me, but movies just weren’t their thing. As such, I couldn’t really talk to anyone about how happy I was that Sean Connery had won an Oscar, or how upset I was that GOODFELLAS didn’t win an Oscar, or then how excited I was that my hero Clint Eastwood had dominated the awards with UNFORGIVEN! This was the day and time where there was no social media so I was truly alone in my obsession. Being alone didn’t matter though, because there was just something about the world of film that I was fascinated with from the moment our family got our first VCR. Seeing my favorite stars all together in the same building was just so fun. My favorite host of my youth was Billy Crystal. He was just amazing, and I even remember him riding a horse off the stage at the 1991 show, the year I graduated high school.
I guess after heading off to college and then starting a family a few years later, the Oscars became less and less important to me over the years after that. I still didn’t know anyone who loved movies like me, but now I had a career to focus on and little league baseball games to coach. As much as I still enjoyed the cinema, I guess it’s fair to say my priorities changed. And then I got involved in the world of cinema on social media in 2021. I met people like Eric Todd, who shares my love for the actor Charles Bronson. I met people like Lisa Marie Bowman, Jeff “Who is not Joseph Cotten,” Stewart Moncure, and others on Twitter who love to watch movies together and tweet about them. This is the first time in my life that I actually know a group of people who love movies like I do. These folks take cinema seriously and don’t make fun of me for doing the same. I found my movie people. So I started watching the Oscars again. Watching OPPENHEIMER win 7 Oscars, including Best Picture, a couple of years back was especially enjoyable for me since one of my favorite actors of my youth, James Woods, served as an Executive Producer. I’m watching the Oscars again tonight. It’s just more fun knowing that there really are people out there who care about movies, and the people who make them, just as much as I do.
Ah, the 80s! Ronald Reagan was president. America was strong. Russia was weak. The economy was booming. The music was wonderful. Many great movies were released, though most of them were not nominated for any Oscars. This is the decade that tends to drive most Oscar fanatics batty. So many good films that went unnominated. So many good nominees that failed to win. Let’s dive on in!
Should Have Won: Ordinary People is actually a pretty good film. It may feel more like a made-for-TV movie than a feature film but it’s well-acted and it deserves some credit for not offering up any easy solutions. A lot of people would say that the Oscar should have gone to Raging Bull but, as well-directed and acted as that film is, Jake La Motta is such an unlikable character that it’s hard for me to really get emotionally invested in his story. My vote would have gone to David Lynch’s The Elephant Man. Lynch tells an inspiring story without compromising his surreal vision.
Should Have Won: The victory of Chariots of Fire is an odd one. The music is great but the film itself isn’t particularly memorable. I really, really like Atlantic City but ultimately, my vote would go to Raiders of the Lost Ark, an adventure that doesn’t insult the intelligence of its audience.
Should Have Won: Gandhi is the epitome of the type of Oscar winner that won less because of any cinematic artistry involved in the production and more because of what it was about. To be honest, though, I’m not extremely enthusiastic about any of the other nominees either. Ultimately, I guess I would have to go with E.T. It’s a bit heavy-handed but it works.
(My pick for the best of 1982 would probably be …. I don’t know. Blade Runner? Diner? There are some really good 1982 films but it’s hard to find one that just leaps out and says, “This is the best of the year!” Actually, I’d probably go with Tenebrae, despite the fact that it wasn’t released in the States until 1984 and in a heavily edited version at that.)
Should Have Won: Out of Africa is a pretty boring movie and Robert Redford is totally miscast as an Englishman. (To be honest, Redford is pretty much miscast as anyone but Robert Redford.) There were a lot of good films in 1985 that were not nominated: Brazil, Ran, Runaway Train, The Purple Rose of Cairo, Back to the Future, The Breakfast Club, Mask, After Hours, and quite a few more. Of the nominees, I would have gone for the beautiful and haunting Witness.
Should Have Won: Here’s one of my favorite exchanges from King of the Hill. It’s Peggy and Hank’s anniversary. They have the house to themselves for the weekend. Feeling that the romance has gone out of their lives, Peggy’s depressed. Hank tries to cheer her up.
Hank: “C’mon, Peg, we’ve got the house to ourselves. Plus, I rented an R-rated movie.”
Peggy (briefly hopeful): “Really? What movie?”
Hank (pauses, looks down): “Uhmmm …. Platoon.”
Some people love Platoon and some people don’t. You can put me in the latter category. Oliver Stone achieves a dream-like intensity but good God, was Charlie Sheen ever a good actor? Of the nominees, I would vote for A Room With A View.
Among the films not nominated this year: Blue Velvet, Aliens, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Stand By Me, Mona Lisa, Something Wild, and Top Gun.
Should Have Won: How about Full Metal Jacket? Oh wait, wasn’t nominated. Robocop? Not nominated. Dirty Dancing? Not nominated. Oh well. Even if those films were nominated, I would still have voted for Hope and Glory.
Should Have Won: This is an odd year. It’s kind of a weak line-up. Not nominated were films like Do The Right Thing, Scandal, Crimes and Misdemeanors, Enemies: A Love Story, and Henry V. Driving Miss Daisy gets criticized for obvious reasons but Jessica Tandy and Morgan Freeman both give strong performances. Born on the 4th of July has some good moments but Oliver Stone’s heavy hand eventually gets in the way and the scene where Tom Cruise-as-Ron-Kovic tracks down the parents of the soldier he accidentally killed only succeeds in making Kovic look like a selfish jerk. Dead Poets Society is, in many ways, just as heavy-handed as Born On the 4th of July but it’s also a lot more likable and I enjoyed the trio of Ethan Hawke, Robert Sean Leonard, and Josh Charles. In the end, Dead Poets Society gets my vote.
Coming up in thirty minutes — it’s time for the 90s!
Ah, the 70s. The decade started with the collapse of the studio system and the rise of the so-called movie brats. For the first half of the decade, Hollywood was producing the type of challenging films on which they would never again be willing to take the risk. The 70s were indeed a second cinematic golden age, full of anti-heroes and dark endings. Then, in 1977, Star Wars changed all of that and ushered in the era of the blockbuster. The 1970s gave the world disco, The Godfather, and some of the best Oscar winners ever.
Should Have Won: I know that there are people who love Patton. I’ve never been able to sit through the whole film, despite the obvious power of George C. Scott’s lead performance. Airport is dull when compared to other disaster films and Love Story will leave you actively rooting for either divorce or death. Of the nominated films, M*A*S*H and Five Easy Pieces are the strongest. Both are flawed, of course. M*A*S*H is frequently misogynistic but, at the same time, it’s still one of the most effective anti-war films I’ve ever seen. (The scene where blood suddenly spurts out of a wounded soldier’s neck still shocks me.) Five Easy Pieces features a great performance by Jack Nicholson but, far too often, it doesn’t play fair by making everyone around him a caricature. In the end, my vote goes to M*A*S*H.
Should Have Won: With the exception of that nomination for Nicholas and Alexandra, this was a strong year and I can make a case for each other four remaining nominees. I love The Last Picture Show but, a few years ago, I saw a showing of The French Connection at the Alamo Drafthouse and it still wowed me, even though I knew everything that was coming. In this case, I agree with the Academy. The French Connection deserved its victory.
Should Have Won: Every time I watch The Sting, I discover that it’s actually better than I remembered. American Graffiti is another personal favorite of mine. That said, I’m a Catholic girl who loves horror movies so there’s no way I’m not picking The Exorcist here.
Should Have Won: This is a great lineup of nominees, with all five deserving a nomination and deserving to win as well. As for which film would get my vote, my mind says Nashville but my heart says Jaws. In this case, I’ll go with my heart.
Should Have Won: This one is difficult for me. For me, the race comes down to All The President’s Men, Network, and Taxi Driver. (I no longer feel as negatively about Rocky as I once did but I still feel like it shouldn’t have been nominated for Best Picture, much less won.) In the end, my love of horror films leads me to vote for Taxi Driver. So, even if I am taking away Rocky’s victory, I’m still voting for a film where an inarticulate man gets a job working for Joe Spinell.
Should Have Won: Annie Hall. Yeah, I know everyone’s pretending like they never liked any of Woody Allen’s films now. Annie Hall is still a charming bittersweet comedy.
Should Have Won: This is a year in which all of the nominees were flawed. An Unmarried Woman gets my vote, despite the fact that the film has its share of “It’s so tough being rich” moments.
Should Have Won: Ugh, I can’t stand Kramer vs. Kramer. Beloved by some, this is a film that makes me want to throw a shoe at the screen whenever I see it. (It’s that smug little smile that Dustin Hoffman gets on his face while talking to Jane Alexander that pushes me to my breaking point.) Though I love Breaking Away, All That Jazz is the film that gets my vote.
Ah, the 60s. Both the studio system and the production code collapsed as Hollywood struggled to remain relevant during a time of great social upheaval. The Academy alternated between nominating films that took chances and nominating films that cost a lot of money. It led to some odd best picture lineups.
Should Have Won: The two best and most influential films of 1960 — Hitchcock’s Psycho and Kubrick’s Spartacus — went unnominated. Of the nominees, The Apartment deserved its victory.
Should Have Won: Again, of the films nominated, the Academy made the right decision. West Side Story earned that victory. When you’re a Jet, you’re the best. That said, I do so wish that Breakfast at Tiffany’s had been nominated. (Of course, if I had the power to go back and change the nominees, I would also have the power to remove all of the scenes with Mickey Rooney as Holly’s neighbor. That’s the good thing about having power.)
Should Have Won: Now, this was a great year for films! With the exception of Mutiny on the Bounty, all of the nominees deserved to be there. There were a lot of other films released that year that probably deserved to be nominated as well: Advise and Consent, The Manchurian Candidate, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, Whatever Happened To Baby Jane, Days of Wine and Roses, Lolita, David and Lisa, The Miracle Worker, and so many others. It’s so hard for me to pick between Lawrence of Arabia and To Kill A Mockingbird. In the end, and this should not be taken as criticism of Lawrence of Arabia at all, I probably would have voted for To Kill A Mockingbird.
Should Have Won: If 1962 featured one of the strongest best picture lineups, 1963 features one of the weakest. In a unimpressive field in which only two best picture nominees also received nomination for best director, Tom Jones seems like the obvious winner. That said, Cleopatra is such an amazing disaster that I’d probably have to vote for it just to make sure that the world never forgot it. From Russia With Love was released in the UK during this year but it wasn’t released in the U.S. in time to qualify for the ’63 Oscars. Still, I’m going to pretend that it was and name it the best film of 1963.
Should Have Won: My Fair Lady is a good example of a film that won because the Academy was trying to pretend that it was still the 1950s. I would have voted for Dr. Strangelove.
Should Have Won: While international cinema was breaking boundaries and challenging audiences, the Academy was honoring My Fair Lady and The Sound of Music. The 1965 best picture line-up is not a particularly strong one and A Thousand Clowns is somehow even more annoying than The Sound of Music. (“Yessir, that’s my baby” — SHUT UP!) That said, for me, Darling is the clear winner.
Should Have Won: Another weird lineup. A Man For All Seasons isn’t bad but it still feels more like homework than cinema. Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? was a groundbreaking film and featured Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton at their best. Alfie made a star out of Michael Caine. That said, the more I thought about it, the more I liked The Russians Are Coming, The Russians Are Coming. It’s a likable comedy. It’s a bit lightweight. But, of all the nominees in this admittedly imperfect lineup, it’s probably the one I would want to watch more than once.
(That said, if I was in charge of the ’66 nomination, the Best Picture lineup would have been: Blowup, Juliet of the Spirits, Seconds, Kill Baby Kill, A Man and A Woman, and The Oscar, just to mess with people. The ratings for my Academy Awards would be so low that the Oscars would probably never be televised again.)
Should Have Won: In The Heat Of The Night isn’t bad but it’s also not The Graduate.The Graduate gets my vote, even though I know Benjamin and Elaine probably broke up as soon as they got off that bus.
Should Have Won: What a weird line-up! Consider some of the eligible films that were not nominated: Petulia, Pretty Poison, The Good The Bad and the Ugly, 2001, Planet of the Apes, Rosemary’s Baby. Oliver! is better than My Fair Lady and The Sound of Music but it still feels like a film that won largely because it was a big production. Out of the nominees, I guess I would vote for …. Romeo and Juliet. I know The Lion in Winter is great but Romeo and Juliet brought Shakespeare to vibrant life.
Should Have Won: The Academy was really struggling to find itself in 1969. Here are some of the eligible films that were not nominated: Once Upon A Time In The West, The Wild Bunch, Easy Rider, Medium Cool, Alice’s Restaurant, They Shoot Horses Don’t They?, Last Summer, and Bob & Ted & Carol & Alice. Instead, the best picture lineup was made up of: an international political thriller, a buddy comedy, an X-rated film about New York hustlers, an overproduced musical, and an old-fashioned historical drama. That said, out of the nominees, I think the Academy made the right choice. Though the film has a few pretentious moments, Midnight Cowboy remains an effective portrait of life on the fringes of society.
Now, put on your bell bottoms. Do a line of coke. Turn on the Bee Gees. Coming up in about an hour — it’s the 70s!
Continuing our look at the Best Picture races of the past, it’s now time to enter the 50s! World War II was over. Eisenhower was President. Everyone was worried about communist spies. And the Hollywood studios still reigned supreme, even while actors like Marlon Brando and James Dean challenged the establishment.
Should Have Won: The Academy started out the decade by getting it right. While I love Sunset Boulevard and could definitely make a case for why it could have won, All About Eve was the best film nominated and one of the best films ever made.
Should Have Won: An American In Paris was a bit of an unexpected winner. A Streetcar Named Desire swept almost all of the acting prizes (only Marlon Brando failed to take home an Oscar) but the film itself is a bit too theatrical for me. As much as I Like An American In Paris, my personal vote would have gone to A Place In The Sun.
Should Have Won: Cecil B. DeMille’s The Greatest Show On Earth is often described as being the worst film to ever win best picture. I don’t know if I’d go that far but the Oscar still should have gone to either High Noon or The Quiet Man. With The Greatest Show on Earth, the Academy went for spectacle over …. well, everything else. It was not the first time the Academy did so, nor would it be the last.
Should Have Won: I want to say Rear Window but it wasn’t even nominated. On The Waterfront is the best made and the best acted of all the nominees but that the film’s support for “naming names” will never sit well with me. Like many of Elia Kazan’s films, it also gets a bit too heavy-handed towards the end. (One always got the feeling that Kazan didn’t trust his audience to figure out things on their own.) I’ll go with The Caine Mutiny, if just for Humphrey Bogart’s amazing performance as Queeg.
Should Have Won: This is a difficult one for me. All of the nominated films are fairly weak. The best remember films of 1955 — Rebel Without A Cause, Kiss Me Deadly, East of Eden — weren’t even nominated. Marty‘s likable but it still feels like a made-for-TV movie. I’ll go with Picnic, just for the scene where William Holden and Kim Novak dance on the dock.
Should Have Won: In a year in which all of the nominees were epic in scope, Around The World In 80 Days won because it featured a cameo from nearly everyone in Hollywood. It’s a bit of a drag to watch today, despite the charm of David Niven. Personally, of the nominated films, I would have gone with …. mock me if you will …. The Ten Commandments. As flawed as it may be, it’s still incredibly watchable and never dull. If I couldn’t vote for The Ten Commandments, I’d probably vote for Giant, just because it’s a movie about my home state.
Should Have Won: The Bridge on the River Kwai is a worthy winner but my favorite of the nominees is definitely 12 Angry Men. And I’ll admit that I’ve always enjoyed Peyton Place as well.
Should Have Won: Gigi’s good but I would have to vote for the overheated but always entertaining melodrama of Cat On A Hot Tin Roof. Of course, the best films of the year — Vertigo and Touch of Evil — were not nominated.
Should Have Won: I actually like Ben-Hur but I absolutely love Anatomy of a Murder. It’s one of the best courtroom films ever made and it features James Stewart at his absolute best.
Ah, the 40s! For most of the decade, the world was at war and the Academy’s nominations reflected that fact. The best picture lineups alternated between patriotic films that encouraged the battle against evil and darker films that contemplated both the mistakes of the past and what threats might be waiting in the future.
Should Have Won: Rebecca was the only Hitchcock film to win Best Picture and while I hate to take that honor away from him, it simply cannot compare to the power of John Ford’s adaptation of The Grapes of Wrath. Considering that people nowadays tend to assume that FDR just waved a magic wand and ended The Great Depression as soon as he was elected, The Grapes of Wrath is still an important historic document of just how bad things truly were in the 1930s. (World War II ended the Great Depression for more effectively than the New Deal ever did.)
Should Have Won: Mrs. Miniver was a heartfelt tribute to the strength of the British people and it’s certainly understandable why the Academy honored it. That said, today, the over-the-top melodrama of Kings Row is a lot more fun to watch.
Should have Won: The Academy went from nominating ten films to only nominating five this year. (Decades later, it would go back to nominating ten.) Darryl F. Zanuck launched an all-out blitz to convince the Academy to honor Wilson, a film about one of our worst presidents. The Academy instead went with Going My Way, a pleasant crowd-pleaser. I would have voted for Double Indemnity, a film that was perhaps too cynical to win at a time when America was at war.
Should Have Won: The Best Years Of Our Lives was one of the first films to deal with the struggle of returning veterans. It’s a great film. That said, I still have to vote for It’s A Wonderful Life, a film that is far darker than its reputation as a holiday favorite might suggest.
Should Have Won: Crossfire. Like Gentleman’s Agreement, Crossfire deals with anti-Semitism. Crossfire, though, does so in a far more direct, angry, and effective manner.
Should Have Won: Hamlet is an excellent film but The Treasure of the Sierra Madre is one of the best ever. John Huston’s look at the power of greed gets my vote.
Should Have Won: In this case, I think that Academy got it right. All The King’s Men is a film that seems rather prophetic today. Willie Stark would have made out like a bandit during the COVID lockdowns.
Up next, get ready to like Ike and hate commies because we’re heading into the 50s!
Ah, the 1930s. America was mired in the Great Depression. FDR was plotting to pack the courts. In Europe, leaders were trying to ignore what was happening in Italy, Spain, and Germany. As for the Academy, it was still growing and developing and finding itself. With people flocking to the movies and the promise of an escape from reality, the Academy Awards went from being an afterthought to a major cultural event.
Should Have Won: This is a tough year. None of the nominees are really that great. The two main contenders were Cimarron and Trader Horn but neither one has aged particularly well. Of the film that were nominated, The Front Page probably holds up the best. The best of the film eligible for these split-year Oscars — Little Caesar and The Public Enemy — were not nominated for Best Picture.
Should Have Won: Cavalcade is one of the more forgotten best picture winners and for good reason. It’s just not that interesting. Of the other nominees, I Am A Fugitive From A Chain Gang is the most powerful and 42nd Street is the most entertaining. In the end, my vote would have gone to 42nd Street. The original King Kong was eligible but not nominated.
Should Have Won: Oh wow. I really love The Thin Man but seriously, nothing beats Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert in It Happened One Night. For the first time this decade, the Academy got it right.
Should Have Won: The Great Ziegfeld is a good example of a film that won because it was big. It was a spectacle. It overwhelmed audiences and voters with how overproduced it was. Seen today, it’s entertaining but overlong. My vote would have gone to the far more low-key (but also far more intelligent) Dodsworth.
Should Have Won: The Life of Emile Zola isn’t a bad film but it’s not the best of the nominees. Dead End features one of Humphrey Bogart’s best pre-Casablanca performances and The Awful Truth is a classic screwball comedy with Cary Grant and Irene Dunne. In the end, my vote would have gone to The Awful Truth.
Should Have Won: Damn. As much as I hate to vote against any movie starring Jimmy Stewart, there’s no way that I can take You Can’t Take It With You over either The Adventures of Robin Hood or Grand Illusion. Robin Hood is the most entertaining of the nominees but Grand Illusion is the most important. My vote goes to Grand Illusion.
Should Have Won: This is such a difficult year because I can make a case for all of the nominees, with the exception of the creaky Love Affair. In the end, my vote goes to …. argh! This is so hard. I’m juggling Gone With The Wind, Mr. Smith Goes To Washington, Wuthering Heights, Stagecoach, Ninotchka, and The Wizard of Oz in my head. Can I pick all of them? No? Okay, I’ll go with …. Hell, I have to go with Jimmy Stewart holding the Senate hostage. Sorry, Wizard of Oz. I vote for Mr. Smith Goes To Washington, which has Jimmy Stewart and no munchkins.
And that’s it for the 30s. Up next, in about 30 minutes, it’s time for the 40s!
When Louis B. Mayer first proposed setting up what would become the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in 1927, he wasn’t really that interested in giving out awards. Instead, he saw the Academy as an organization that would mediate labor disputes between the studios and the unions. He also felt that the Academy could basically be used to improve the film industry’s image, which had taken a hit from the rape trial of Fatty Arbuckle, the overdose of Wallace Reid, and the murder of William Desmond Taylor. When he and the other 35 founders of the Academy met to draw up the organization’s charter, the idea of giving out awards was mentioned only in passing. A committee would be set up to give out yearly awards to honor the best that Hollywood had to offer.
The first Academy Awards ceremony was held in a hotel ballroom in 1928. It occurred at the end of a private dinner and the awards were handed out in 15 minutes. The 2nd ceremony was the first to be broadcast on the radio. It was only when the Academy got around to the third ceremony that the Oscars started to transform into the spectacle that we know today. It was only then that people started to really pay attention to what was and was not nominated for Best Picture.
Today, for Oscar Sunday, we’re taking a a decade-by-decade look at the Best Picture races of the past. We start with those first three ceremonies.
Wings (1927, dir by William Wellman)
1927–1928
Uniquely, the very first Academy Awards saw the presentation for two best picture trophies. Best Production went to the most entertaining film. Unique and Artistic Production went to the most artistic film.
Should Have Won: The first time out, the Oscars got it right. People tend to be a bit dismissive of Wings but it has that one amazing tracking shot and it also features the wonderful Clara Bow. Sunrise, meanwhile, is a triumph in every way. Among the eligible films not nominated: Buster Keaton’s The General and Fritz Lang’s Metropolis.
Sunrise (1927, dir by F.W. Murnau) Won Best Unique and Artistic Picture
1928–1929
Uniquely, only the winners were announced for the 2nd awards ceremony. The “nominees” listed below are taken from a list of notes that were taken while the judges were discussing who and what to honor.
Should Have Won: The Broadway Melody was the first musical to win but it’s aged terribly. I actually prefer The Hollywood Revue of 1929, which has no plot but which does feature a bunch of MGM stars singing, dancing, and showing off that they were having no problem transitioning for silent cinema to sound films. Or, at least, that was the idea. Poor John Gilbert.
Here to get you in the Oscar spirit is today’s song of the day, the main title track to 1966’s The Oscar.Listening to this music, you’ll be more than ready to walk the red carpet!
Tonight will mark the 92nd year that the Oscars have been awarded. The Academy Awards are now an American tradition and, just as America has changed over the past 10 decades, so have the Oscars.
Through the Shattered Lens 