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The Oscar Quest: Best Supporting Actress – 1962

Love 1962. Lawrence of Arabia, To Kill a Mockingbird — what more do you need?

Lawrence of Arabia wins Best Picture and Best Director for David Lean (talked about here). Gregory Peck wins Best Actor for To Kill a Mockingbird (talked about here). Anne Bancroft wins Best Actress for The Miracle Worker (talked about here). All perfect. Then, Best Supporting Actor was Ed Begley for Sweet Bird of Youth (talked about here). I don’t like that one so much. But it’s not that bad, so it’s just unfortunate rather than terrible.

And then this category — holy shit. Scout Finch and Helen Keller. The two performances that were achieved here — by children, no less. Wow. Just wow.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS – 1962

And the nominees were…

Mary Badham, To Kill a Mockingbird

Patty Duke, The Miracle Worker

Angela Lansbury, The Manchurian Candidate

Shirley Knight, Sweet Bird of Youth

Thelma Ritter, Birdman of Alcatraz Read the rest of this page »

Posted by  |  March 22, 2012 | Categories: Movies, Oscars, The Oscar Quest | Tags: , , , , , | Leave a comment

Pic of the Day: “Always remember, Frodo, the Ring is trying to get back to its master. It wants to be found.”

Posted by  |  March 22, 2012 | Categories: Movies, Pic of the Day | Tags: | Leave a comment

The Oscar Quest: Best Actor – 1928-1929

1928-1929. The second year of the Oscars. This is the only year that didn’t have any official nominees. That is, people were just given ballots and voted, and whoever won, won. And I think the nominees that were listed were based off of who got the most votes. There are also a couple of issues to deal with for this year, but let’s recap first before we get into that. There were no Supporting categories, so it’ll be quick.

The Broadway Melody wins Best Picture. The first talkie to win, and the first musical to win. Of the nominated films, it was the one that did the most. That is, it used sound to its full effect, and, the industry being in the state that it was, that’s all it took to win. Obviously it wasn’t a particularly strong winner, but it makes sense. They needed to have a sound film win. Best Actress this year was Mary Pickford for Coquette, which — she’s Mary Pickford. She was the biggest female star in the business. Of course they’d give her an Oscar. So that’s fine. And Best Director was Frank Lloyd for The Divine Lady, which seems like a weak choice.

Okay, so now we’re at this category. The problem that gets posed with this one is — The Patriot is a lost film. All we have are some clips from a trailer and stuff that survived. So we have to go in blind  on that. That makes it slightly tougher, since — none of the nominees seemed particularly Best Actor-worthy. So, this is one of those where concessions need to be made.

BEST ACTOR – 1928-1929

And the nominees were…

George Bancroft, Thunderbolt

Warner Baxter, In Old Arizona

Chester Morris, Alibi

Paul Muni, The Valiant

Lewis Stone, The Patriot Read the rest of this page »

Posted by  |  March 21, 2012 | Categories: Movies, The Oscar Quest | Tags: , , , , , | Leave a comment

Pic of the Day

Posted by  |  March 21, 2012 | Categories: Movies, Pic of the Day | Tags: | Leave a comment

The Oscar Quest: Best Actress – 1945

1945 is a solid, if not very memorable Academy year. The Lost Weekend is a strong film and a good Best Picture choice (based on the nominees), but in the whole of the Best Picture history, it’s not one of the more memorable winners. The other categories are strong too, but again, not particularly memorable unless you know them well.

Billy Wilder won Best Director for the film, which was a great decision, since it was the Best Picture winner, and because he probably should have won for Double Indemnity the year before this. Ray Milland also won Best Actor for the film (talked about here), which was a terrific decision all around. Best Supporting Actor this year was James Dunn for A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (talked about here), which was just phenomenal, and Best Supporting Actress was Anne Revere for National Velvet (talked about here), which was also terrific.

And then this category — I was torn for the longest time on who to vote for. I’m still not entirely certain of who I’ll vote for. Either way though, Joan Crawford having an Oscar is a good thing, so however I vote, this worked out.

BEST ACTRESS – 1945

And the nominees were…

Ingrid Bergman, The Bells of St. Mary’s

Joan Crawford, Mildred Pierce

Greer Garson, The Valley of Decision

Jennifer Jones, Love Letters

Gene Tierney, Leave Her to Heaven Read the rest of this page »

Posted by  |  March 20, 2012 | Categories: Movies, Oscars, The Oscar Quest | Tags: , , , , , | Leave a comment

Pic of the Day: “If you get all of us together, we ain’t got a gang, we’ve got an army.”

Posted by  |  March 20, 2012 | Categories: Movies, Pic of the Day | Tags: | 1 Comment

The Oscar Quest: Best Director – 1965

I love 1965. It’s such a strong year. And the decisions were largely great. In fact, almost all great.

The Sound of Music wins Best Picture. That’s pretty clear cut. Best Actor was Lee Marvin for Cat Ballou (talked about here), which, as I say, is a good decision because Lee Marvin is awesome, but a terrible one because Richard Burton and Rod Steiger gave much better performances. Best Actress was Julie Christie for Darling (talked about here), which is a top ten Best Actress decision for all time. Best Supporting Actor was Martin Balsam for A Thousand Clowns (talked about here), which was a good decision in what was one of the weakest Best Supporting Actor categories of all time. And Best Supporting Actress was Shelley Winters for A Patch of Blue (talked about here), which was a terrific decision. She was awesome in the film.

And, that leaves us with this category, which — what did you think was gonna happen?

BEST DIRECTOR – 1965

And the nominees were…

David Lean, Doctor Zhivago

John Schlesinger, Darling

Hiroshi Teshigahara, Woman in the Dunes

Robert Wise, The Sound of Music

William Wyler, The Collector Read the rest of this page »

Posted by  |  March 19, 2012 | Categories: Movies, Oscars, The Oscar Quest | Tags: , , , , , | 1 Comment

Pic of the Day: “My name is Maximus Decimus Meridius, commander of the Armies of the North, General of the Felix Legions, loyal servant to the true emperor, Marcus Aurelius. Father to a murdered son, husband to a murdered wife. And I will have my vengeance, in this life or the next.”

Posted by  |  March 19, 2012 | Categories: Movies, Pic of the Day | Tags: | 1 Comment

The Oscar Quest: Best Supporting Actor – 1950

Ah, 1950. Everyone has an opinion on 1950. So I won’t editorialize too much. I’ll just recap.

All About Eve wins Best Picture, Best Director for Joseph L. Mankiewicz (talked about here), and this category. It beat Sunset Boulevard for Best Picture and Sunset Boulevard and The Third Man for Best Director.

José Ferrer wins Best Actor for Cyrano de Bergerac (talked about here), beating Jimmy Stewart for Harvey. Judy Holliday wins Best Actress for Born Yesterday (talked about here), beating Anne Baxter and Bette Davis for All About Eve and Gloria Swanson for Sunset Boulevard. And Josephine Hull wins Best Supporting Actress for Harvey (talked about here). That category was pretty strong too.

As you can see — lots of people have opinions on this year.

Then we have this category, which is actually pretty clear cut. So that’s nice.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR – 1950

And the nominees were…

Jeff Chandler, Broken Arrow

Edmund Gwenn, Mister 880

Sam Jaffe, The Asphalt Jungle

George Sanders, All About Eve

Erich von Stroheim, Sunset Boulevard Read the rest of this page »

Posted by  |  March 18, 2012 | Categories: Movies, Oscars, The Oscar Quest | Tags: , , , , , | 1 Comment

Pic of the Day: “He’s a hurricane if things don’t work out after three tries. He’ll get tough again.”

Posted by  |  March 18, 2012 | Categories: Movies, Pic of the Day | Tags: | Leave a comment