The Oscar Quest: Best Actor – 1993
Ah, 1993. The year that no one can ever refute. Is there anyone that can really speak ill of Schindler’s List? It’s weird to find a film so well made and about such an important subject that the only real grounds you have to speak ill of the film end up saying bad things about you as a person. That’s funny. Even I, who takes such glee in not liking films the rest of the world says are masterpieces, can’t speak ill of that film. The worst thing I can say about it is — it’s long, and it’s heavy, so, it’s not the first thing I’m going to pop on to watch when I’m looking for something. Which, doesn’t really say anything about the film as much as it does about — well, my temperament.
Anyway, this was a year that was pretty much ser in stone from the start. For Schindler’s List to have not won Best Picture would have been a bigger deal than whatever it had beaten. I do, however, have several gripes with their acting choices for this year. Three of the four, anyway. The fourth — whatever.
To keep you informed, Best Director, obviously, went to Spielberg. Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress went to Holly Hunter and Anna Paquin (who was 11 at the time) for The Piano, and Best Supporting Actor went to Tommy Lee Jones for The Fugitive. So, before I start discussing my feelings on those categories, I’m gonna get right into the one I should be talking about.
Though one last bit of trivia before I go, because I find things like this fascinating. This year marked Tom Hanks’s first of two back-to-back Oscars. The only other actor to win back-to-back Best Actor Oscars was Spencer Tracy (1937 & 1938). The great fact about these two is that, at the time they won both of their Oscars, they were both the same age — 37 & 38. That is, they won the first of the two Oscars at age 37, and the following year, both aged 38, won the second. That’s fucking awesome that it happened twice. (more…)
The Oscar Quest: Best Actress – 1982
What can I say about 1982 that hasn’t already been said about 1996?
I haven’t actually said anything about 1996, but this year is analogous to that. The big, sweeping, historical epic that beat the great comedy and the really great drama. It’s hard to argue with it, because it’s an Academy-type film — you just have to shrug and say, “It’s what they like.”
As for the acting categories, I’d say, they got one really right, one was the safe choice, one was a bad choice and the final one was a good choice and also a safe choice. I’ll leave you to decide which is which out of this group. Best Actor was Ben Kingsley for Gandhi, which also won Best Picture and Best Director for Richard Attenborough (whom you may remember from such films as The Great Escape, and most notably Jurassic Park, in which he played the old man running the park. He also directed two of my favorite movies — Magic, featuring a jaw-droppingly brilliant performance by Anthony Hopkins and solid supporting work by Ann-Margret and Burgess Meredith, and Chaplin, featuring a jaw-droppingly good performance by Robert Downey Jr. as Charlie Chaplin. You may also know his brother, David, who narrates all the BBC nature documentaries, specifically Planet Earth. Who hasn’t gotten high and watched Planet Earth? David Attenborough’s voice is the soothing alternative to Robert Osborne. Those men can narrate anything. Fuck Morgan Freeman. I’ll take those two any day). Best Supporting Actor went to Lou Gossett Jr., for An Officer and a Gentleman, and Best Supporting Actor went to Jessica Lange for Tootsie. And now this category. I’ll ruin part of the suspense by saying this is the one they got really right. (more…)
The Oscar Quest: Best Actor – 1963
I hate having to talk about 1963. This is a year where there were no good nominees for Best Picture, and one of the worst choices among the bad choices won. So you get a year where an undeserving film won, but, because they didn’t nominate any good films, nothing could be done about it.
Not only that, they also seemed to get every single award wrong. Every one. I’m not making that up, either. In all the categories, there was clearly a better choice to be made. Let’s start with this one, because, historically, it’s the one that does work, but, when you isolate it — it was a bad choice.
BEST ACTOR – 1963
And the nominees were…
Albert Finney, Tom Jones
Richard Harris, This Sporting Life
Rex Harrison, Cleopatra
Paul Newman, Hud
Sidney Poitier, Lilies of the Field (more…)
The Oscar Quest: Best Supporting Actor – 1984
The 80s, I feel, are a pretty ho-hum Oscar decade. The 70s were all about auteurs and gritty innovation. Then the 80s were like, “Fuck that, the blockbuster is back!” and everything went all studio. Which meant the Oscars went back to all these boring, epic “Oscar films.” Actually, I’m pretty sure the 80s is the decade where the “Oscar” film really came into being. 1980 – family drama. 1981 – well, Chariots of Fire. 1982 – historical epic about Gandhi. 1983 – family drama. 1984 – historical epic about Mozart. 1985 – historical epic romance set in Africa. 1986 – Vietnam movie. 1987 – historical epic about a Chinese emperor. 1988 – family drama about a savant and his brother. 1989 – historical, I guess, epic (if we’re counting time span), about a woman and her chauffeur. More of a drama, I guess. Still, you can see where a specific type of movie started getting voted in.
1984, though, might be the best Best Picture choice of the 80s. Amadeus is an amazing movie. And Milos Forman definitely deserved Best Director. That movie is incredible. F. Murray Abraham was great as Salieri and deserved his Best Actor win. Though, Sally Field, for Best Actress, no matter how much they “really liked” her, did not deserve that win by a long shot. Oh, and Best Supporting Actress was Peggy Ashcroft for A Passage to India. See what I mean? Aside from Amadeus, a lot of the choices in the 80s are boring. This one is no different. (more…)
The Oscar Quest: Best Actor – 1955
The great thing about 1955 is, it’s one of those years that’s so bland that it trips you up when you go back to it. It’s not that they made poor choices (far from it, actually), it’s just that it’s one of those years where, when you go back, it’s just a blank. There’s no real excitement or anything to make it stick in your mind. I don’t have enough separation from Oscar years to really know how accurate any example is going to be. But think something like — I don’t know, Super Bowls? One of those boring years, like 2005, when the Steelers beat the Seahawks. I always forget that one. It was boring. You have to think about it for a second (unless you have something that makes the memory catch quicker, like, winning $500 during the game. In which case you know goddamn well who won that game. You did). It’s like that.
Anyway, the reason it’s one of those “dead years” — is because the film that won Best Picture was Marty. Marty is a film that was originally a made for TV movie that they adapted for the screen. It still plays kind of like a play, since it’s mostly two people talking and has about four locations total. And it’s only like 95 minutes, which clocks in as the shortest Best Picture of all time. It does not, however, win for shortest Best Picture title. That goes to Gigi. And, Wings. But, it’s one of those films that, while great, probably would not have won if it were nominated any other year.
Delbert Mann won Best Director for the movie — I guess because it’s one of those, “Well, we’re giving it to one, might as well give it to the other one too,” as most years tend to work. Best Actress went to Anna Magnani for The Rose Tattoo. Who? Exactly. This is why no one remembers this year. Best Supporting Actor went to an actor in one of his first films roles — Jack Lemmon. Best Supporting Actress went to Jo Van Fleet for East of Eden. So it’s one of those years where — nothing makes it stand out from the ones around it. Namely, the year before when On the Waterfront wins and the year after, when Around the World in 80 Days wins. (more…)
The Oscar Quest: Best Supporting Actress – 1974
1974. The year of The Godfather Part II. The year of career achievement awards and veteran awards. the year where they scarcely got anything right besides Best Picture. In fact, in anything not related to The Godfather the Oscars woefully fucked up this year.
Just to get who won out of the way, Coppola won Best Director for Part II and Robert De Niro won Best Supporting Actor. Art Carney won Best Actor for Harry and Tonto, and Ellen Burstyn won Best Actress for Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore. Which leaves us with this:
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS – 1974
And the nominees were…
Ingrid Bergman, Murder on the Orient Express
Valentina Cortese, Day for Night
Madeline Kahn, Blazing Saddles
Diane Ladd, Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore
Talia Shire, The Godfather Part II (more…)
The Oscar Quest: Best Actor – 1940
Oh, 1940, a year which will live in…
Actually, 1940 lives pretty much in obscurity, mostly because 1941 lives in infamy. This year is relegated to forgotten status, even though I bet if more people looked at it they’d probably have problems with the end results. I’m talking of several categories, not just Best Picture.
The reason 1940, especially the Best Actor race, is important is because, aside from how staggeringly wrong they got it, it’s actually the first real obvious makeup Oscar on record. The early Oscars, like Mary Pickford’s, are more career achievement and more — “these new awards just started recognizing the ‘best’ in the industry, and you’ve been considered aces for a while now, so we feel you ought to have one.” I don’t count those. This is the first real instance where they gave a performer an Oscar irregardless of film or performance. It’s pretty clear when you watch the film that the performance is not very worthy as a Best Actor-winning performance. And it’s also pretty clear which ones on this list are. So, in terms of history, this is the beginning of the cycle of makeup Oscars that continues to this day.
Also, so we can place this in context of what else happened this year, Best Picture went to Rebecca, Best Director went to John Ford for The Grapes of Wrath, Best Actress went to Ginger Rogers (Fred Astaire’s dancing partner, in case you were going to skip over the name for lack of recognition) for Kitty Foyle, Best Supporting Actor went to Walter Brennan for The Westerner (his third), and Best Supporting Actress went to Jane Darwell for The Grapes of Wrath (Good ol’ Ma). (more…)
The Oscar Quest: Best Supporting Actress – 1997
I did one of each of the other acting categories so far. Might as well round it out with a Best Supporting Actress. I’m saving Best Director because I have a lot of those done, and I think I’m going to do them all in a row. Also, I’ve been doing older categories, so I also thought I’d do a more recent one. My guess is most people have seen all or most of these movies.
1997 was one of those pass over years. The ones where you see what won, go, “Well, yeah, it’s (whatever),” and move on. Titanic, Ben-Hur, Schindler’s List — films that are so big and huge that you just gloss over the rest of the films because, “What’s gonna beat them?” These are the years I try to look more closely at, just because, while you can’t completely say something else should have won (Watch me.), you can still discover good films that generally fall by the wayside more than films in other years. (Note: This is not a concrete theory. I just assume the casual person is less likely to look in a year with a definitive winner than one where, “Chariots of Fire — what the fuck did that beat?”). So, I’m gonna try my best to turn you onto films that you may not have seen. (But, if you’re around my age and haven’t seen them, what the hell have you seen?)
Before I do that, let’s cover what else won this year. Best Picture went to Titanic, and Cameron won Best Director in one of the least surprising races of all time. Best Actor and Best Actress went to Jack Nicholson and Helen Hunt for As Good As It Gets. Best Supporting Actor went to Robin Williams for Good Will Hunting. Those were all the winners. Now let’s get into this category, which is a surprisingly — I don’t really have a problem with the nominees, but I’m not ecstatic about them either. This year seemed to be one of those films years where the films were good, but not many acting performances were standout. Some years you get great performances but shit films, other years you get both — this one seemed to produce films that felt like ensemble pieces, where you couldn’t really be like, “that performance is the one.” So the result is a decent, but mostly unmemorable category. (more…)
The Oscar Quest: Best Actress – 1932-1933
I wanted to get in a really old race as early as possible. To show that the Academy did actually spend time growing into the traditions they have today.
At first, they had a small board that voted the best performances, and there weren’t even ballots. Then the second year there weren’t even official nominees. Then after that, they had official nominees, but it depended on how the board voted. Some years had 8 nominees for Best Picture, some had six, one had twelve. It wasn’t until 1934, the year after this one, that the standard system was formulated — 10 Best Picture nominees (5 after 1943) and 5 acting nominees. Before that, however, it was kind of arbitrary who was gonna get nominated. There were quite a few write-in nominees that came very close to winning. Back then the Academy announced some years (especially in three-person categories) who finished second and who finished third.
It’s interesting to look at these early categories, because you really do get a sense of a body building its own identity from the ground up. Also of note, since the first six years of the Academy had years that were numbered by two. You had 1927-1928, 28-29, 29-30, 30-31, 31-32 and 32-33. After this was 1934. So the way you tell what year the picture is actually for is by looking at the last one in the set. The 1932-1933 Oscars were for films released in 1933. They soon figured out that cutting off the first year makes it easier to keep track of. (more…)
The Oscar Quest: Best Actor – 1939
Since today is the birthday of the man who won this award, I figured it would be an optimal time to pick this one.
1939 is widely considered one of the best single years for movies in the history of Hollywood. You’ll understand why when we get to Best Picture, but just looking at the nominees here, you can get a pretty good understanding of why that is.
Best Picture went to Gone With the Wind, in one of the least exciting races and most deserving (if not most deserving) choices of all time. Best Director went to Victor Fleming, who was the director that lasted long enough on the film to receive the nomination. Really it was David O. Selznick’s film, but, we’ll get to the details of Best Director when we come to it. Best Actress went to Vivien Leigh — once again, probably the most deserving choice of all time there. I’m not even going to sugar coat who I’m voting for in these races. Gone With the Wind is in one of my top ten, if not top five, favorite films of all time, and, I think only a fool would argue against the brilliance that is the performance of Scarlett O’Hara. The interest when I go over them will be what else was nominated, because there is a tendency to just see — “Oh, Gone With the Wind,” and move on. There’s some great stuff nominated in the other areas as well. This wasn’t “the golden year for film” for nothing. Oh, yeah, Best Supporting Actor went to Thomas Mitchell for a little film called Stagecoach. Oh, yeah, The Wizard of Oz was up for Best Picture this year too. Just sayin’. (more…)
The Oscar Quest: Best Supporting Actor – 1973
And The Oscar Quest is back.
I have a lot of categories banked up now. Since we’re out of Oscar season, I don’t need to do two categories at once. It’ll just be one at a time now. And since many of the things I want to write for this blog require many days of research, it’s nice to have things like this I can go to for a post, while I get all the good stuff prepared. Plus, this is actually the reason this blog exists. So I probably should be chronicling it as often as I can. I think what I’ll do is go back to the categories for a bit, and then if something strikes me that isn’t a major post (like the How to Read a Hollywood Release, or the script stories or whatever), I’ll just post it in addition to the category post that day. And when I feel like switching it up I’ll post something different. No one really knows when that’ll happen.
To remind you, this Quest is me, trying to see all the movies nominated for Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actor, Best Supporting Actress, and Best Director. (And I’m sure once that’s done I’ll move on to the Editing and Cinematography. Because I’m crazy like that.) It allows me to expand my viewing history as well as be able to, without guilt, say what I think should have won at the Oscars that year. It’s an ambivalent relationship — me and the Oscars. I recognize that it’s nothing more than a bullshit, back-slapping ceremony where the industry rewards people they like. They don’t care about what the public wants anymore than a filmmaker when some douchebag comes up, wanting them to read their script. On the other hand, I like the Oscars. There’s something about it that excites me. Kind of in the way people like predicting which player an NFL team is going to draft. It’s just one of those things. I realize it’s pointless, but it’s fun trying to predict things, especially when you have some sort of interest in it — I like to see the movies I like get some recognition (which then becomes, “What the fuck? How could it lose to that?”) — and I get to see a lot of, by default, well-looked upon movies I probably hadn’t known existed. And the best part — now you get to find out from me which ones the good ones are without having to do any work. Seems like a good deal to me. Everybody wins. (more…)
The Oscar Quest: Best Picture & Best Director – 2004
If there were ever a corollary year for Best Picture to this one, in the last decade (because 1998 is obviously the best) 2004 is it. Obviously 1998 fits better, as the film that won is a big, lush period piece campaigned for hard by Harvey Weinstein that beat a film that was regarded at the time, and still is regarded, as a modern classic. The jury is still out on whether the film that got beat is a modern classic, so, that’s why I go with 2004. A film that plays right into the Academy’s sensibilities, using emotion to mask a general blandness, instead of brilliant filmmaking. That much can’t be denied. As it stands, the film that is going to lose Best Picture, despite being the critical and social (based more on the pun than the actuality. I really don’t know what the idiots like or don’t like) choice, will be great filmmaking losing to a film that’s meant to be “emotional” (which, it didn’t make me cry, which, I cry at Speed Racer — love that movie).
Makes no goddamn sense. But, the only thing that matters is personal opinion, and that’s theirs. Now I get to have mine.
Best Picture – 2004
And the nominees were…
The Aviator (Warner Bros., Miramax)
Finding Neverland (Miramax)
Million Dollar Baby (Warner Bros.)
Ray (Universal)
Sideways (Fox Searchlight) (more…)
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