Can you smell it? Yup is almost Oscar time. As I searched my brain for a top for this weeks hump day have your say I was drawing a blank. One of those days where you just have no idea what the topic of your blog post should be. Thankfully, I threw it out there to some of the three guys contributors and my brother suggested worst Best Picture winners. And away we go:
Three films that won best picture where other films were more deserving immediately come to my mind.
The year is 2001 I have just moved from Redondo Beach to San Clemente. We buy a house, rescue a dog and I start playing a lot of softball. The winner for best picture is A Beautiful Mind. I am not saying that I hated A Beautiful Mind but it is certainly not LOTR the Fellowship of the Ring which should have won hands down. Despite the fact that they were not nominated Donnie Darko, Mulholland Drive and The Royal Tenenbaums are all better films than A Beautiful Mind.
The year is 1998 my future wife and I have packed up everything we own in my Jeep Wrangler and started driving cross country. We end up in Dana Point CA and shack up in a house with my buddy from High School. The best picture winner is Shakespeare in Love, mothers in law everywhere celebrate and I bang my head against a wall. Somehow Shakespeare in Love beats out the last good Spielberg film Saving Private Ryan and Terrence Malick’s amazing The Thin Red Line. A couple of films that did not even get nominated for best picture are also more deserving. Of course I am talking about American History X and the still underrated Dark City.
The Year is 1989, I have just graduated from high school. I am driving around in hyundai excel that looks like the car from Boyz N the Hood, playing a lot of basketball, drinking miller genuine draft and dating high school girls. I am obviously the man. The winner of the best picture award goes to Driving Miss Daisy. Yeah you read that right, that film beat out Dead Poets Society, Field of Dreams and Born on the Fourth of July for best picture. Some great films including Say Anything, Do the Right Thing and Drugstore Cowboy all fail to even get nominated for best picture.
So those are my picks for some of the least deserving best picture winners. Do you agree/disagree with my selections or even better do you have some other suggestions of worst best picture winners?
{ 20 comments… read them below or add one }
Well, I’ll approach this from the angle of the title, and that’s which Best Picture Winners are the worst movies, not which ones were the biggest upsets. Cause in spite of being upsets, I still like all of those films above.
WORST though, I always go to Chariots of Fire. I’m not usually one to bag on a film because its boring, but that movie is boring as hell. I’m also not a fan of Slumdog Millionaire, I think that film borders on “Bad”…
TDK should have won that year, hands down.
Fogs for some reason I picture you ipod filled with Chariots of Fire theme music
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RY3XiM7oGj0
LOL. Thanks but no.
Ironically that IS the best part of that movie, though.
That is certainly the most exciting part of the film.
I agree about Shakespeare in Love. It wasn’t a bad movie but comparing to other nominees…please. Same goes for Crash. The fact that the Academy awarded that movie over something as beautiful and important as Brokeback Mountain is beyond me. I also disliked Slumdog Millionare and The Hurt Locker – for me they were some of the weakest among the nominees.
All good choices Sati, those old coots were afraid of Brokeback Mountain for sure.
I remember 1996 when my favorite film of that year Sling Blade was not even nominated for Best Picture and therefore did not win best picture. The English Patient which I thought was pretty good won instead. Anoter note is that Billy Bob THorton was nominated for Best Actor and lossed to Geoffrey Rush for Shine. I thought BBT should have won that hands down.
What a year for movies though, Sling Blade, Jerry Maguire, Shine, The English Patient, Fargo, The People Versus Larry Flynt, Ghosts of Mississippi, and Primal Fear to name a few.
O man I saw The English Patient at The Elms Draught House,… zzzzzz
Sling Blade is way better than that film, Fargo would have been a much better choice as well.
Crash gets my vote. I’ll also throw in How Green Was My Valley and Dances With Wolves.
Just realized Dances With Wolves beat out Goodfellas so now I am in 100% agreement
Ckckred, I am gonna have to re-watch Dances With Wolves I think I watched that at the theater back in 1990. I don’t have much recollection if I enjoyed it or not.
I kind of liked A Beautiful Mind, bad taste on my part? Though I do agree Mulholland Drive is the better film.
The Best Years of Our Lives (1946) is probably the most boring best picture winner I can recall struggling to finish.
Nah I did not dislike A Beautiful Mind but it’s certainly not on the same level as Mulholland Drive or LOTR.
Thankfully I have never seen The Best Years of Our Lives
The most recent one I can think is Slumdog. What an overrated, poorly acted pile of schmaltz. Was always disappointed that Fellowship of the Ring never got a win. Well, to be more generalised, always disappointed that quality fantasy and sci-fi films always get shoved out of the best picture race purely because of their genre.
I passed on checking out Slumdog so I can only imagine the horror. Speaking of horror those films don’t get nominated either. Seems like you are better off creating a film about sports, war, gangsters or some sort of historical piece if you plan on winning best picture.
That was quite the trip down memory lane Adam. I could watch Mulholland Drive every night and never tire of it (no pun intended). Born on the Fourth of July is an Oscar oversight on two fronts: Best picture and Best Actor loss by Tom Cruise. He lost to Daniel Day-Lewis for My Left Foot and is a shoe in for Lincoln. Born is Cruise’s best acting ever!
Mark, I must confess I just watched Mulholland Drive for the first time a few weeks ago. What an awesome film. “A shoe in” I see what you did there
It’s an absolute joke that Crash was even nominated for Best Picture, so that gets my vote. Just a terrible film.
BTW, are you guys still planning on doing that blogathon I sent your way? Curious who you will add to the list.
Agreed Eric that was a terrible choice.
Yeah Mark is supposed to get that posted on Saturday, and no I am telling who is thinking of putting in jail. Thanks again for thinking of us with that Blogathon.
I couldn’t agree with more on these, especially Shakespeare In Love…what a sad state that it won over the moving Saving Private Ryan. I would like to add Chicago to the list.