1978 Oscar Shouldabeens

[Reza]

The only sure win I saw for Coming Home was Jon Voight. For me Fonda was a distant second choice behind Ingrid Bergman in Autumn Sonata

Actually even Jill Clayburgh in An Unmarried Woman was far better than Fonda. Even though Bergman was the best of the five Clayburgh should have in fact won that year.

[Cinemanolis]

BEST PICTURE
Autumn Sonata
The Deer Hunter *
Fedora
The Midnight Express
Interiors

BEST DIRECTOR
Woody Allen – Interiors
Ingmar Bergman - Autumn Sonata
Michael Cimino - The Deer Hunter
Terrence Malick – Days of Heaven
Alan Parker - The Midnight Express *

BEST ACTOR
Brad Davis - The Midnight Express
Robert De Niro - The Deer Hunter *
Laurence Olivier – The Boys from Brazil
Peter Ustinov – Death on the Nile
Jon Voight – Coming Home

BEST ACTRESS
Ingrid Bergman - Autumn Sonata *
Jill Clayburgh – An Unmarried Woman
Jane Fonda – Coming Home
Glenda Jackson – Stevie
Liv Ullmann - Autumn Sonata

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Michael Caine – California Suite *
Richard Farnsworth – Comes a Horseman
John Hurt - The Midnight Express
Robert Morley - Who Is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe?
Christopher Walken - The Deer Hunter

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Hildegard Knef - Fedora
Geraldine Page - Interiors
Maggie Smith – California Suite *
Maureen Stapleton - Interiors
Meryl Streep - The Deer Hunter
Mona Washbourne - Stevie

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
Autumn Sonata
Coming Home *
The Deer Hunter
Get Out Your Handkerchiefs
Interiors
An Unmarried Woman

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
Death on the Nile
Fedora *
Heaven Can Wait
Midnight Express
Who Is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe?

[CalWilliam]

BEST PICTURE: The Deer Hunter
BEST DIRECTING: Terrence Malick, Days of Heaven
BEST LEADING ACTOR: Brad Davis, Midnight Express
BEST LEADING ACTRESS: Ingrid Bergman, Autumn Sonata
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR: Christopher Walken, The Deer Hunter
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS: Maureen Stapleton, Interiors
BEST SCREENPLAY: Autumn Sonata
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY: Days of Heaven

[Kellens101]

Best Picture: Days of Heaven
Best Director: Terrence Malick for Days of Heaven
Best Actor: Jon Voight in Coming Home
Best Actress: Ingrid Bergman in Autumn Sonata
Best Supporting Actor: Christopher Walken in The Deer Hunter
Best Supporting Actress: Geraldine Page in Interiors
Best Original Screenplay: Autumn Sonata
Best Adapted Screenplay: Midnight Express
Best Score: Days of Heaven
Best Art Direction: Days of Heaven
Best Costume Design: Days of Heaven
Best Editing: Midnight Express
Best Cinematography: Days of Heaven
Best Sound: Superman
Best Foreign Film: Autumn Sonata

[mojoe92]

Best Picture

The Deer Hunter- WINNER
Days of Heaven- 5th Place
Halloween- 3rd Place
Animal House- RUNNER UP
Autumn Sonata- 4th Place

Best Director

Hal Ashby- Coming Home-5th Place
Terrence Malick- Days of Heaven- 4th Place
Michael Cimino- The Deer Hunter- WINNER
Ingmar Bergman- Autumn Sonata- 3rd Place
John Landis- Animal House- RUNNER UP

Best Actress
Ingrid Bergman- Autumn Sonata-RUNNER UP
Sarah Miles- The Big Sleep- 4th Place
Jane Fonda- Coming Home- 3rd Place
Ellen Burstyn- Same Time, Next Year- WINNER
Brooke Adams- Days of Heaven- 5th Place

Best Actor
Robert De Niro- The Deer Hunter- TIE- WINNER
Gary Busey- The Buddy Holly Story- TIE- WINNER
John Belushi- Animal House- RUNNER UP
Jon Voight- Coming Home- 4th Place
Warren Beatty- Heaven Can Wait- 3rd Place

Best Supporting Actress
P.J Soles- Halloween- 3rd Place
Penelope Milford- Coming Home- WINNER
Meryl Streep- The Deer Hunter- 4th Place
Ronee Blakley- The Driver- RUNNER UP
Maggie Smith- California Suite- 5th Place

Best Supporting Actor
Kevin Bacon- Animal House- 4th Place
John Cazale- The Deer Hunter- WINNER
Christopher Walken- The Deer Hunter- 5th Place
Donald Sutherland- Animal House- 3rd Place
Sam Shepard- Days of Heaven- RUNNER UP

[ksrymy]

BEST PICTURE
01. Halloween (dir. John Carpenter)
02. Les rendez-vous d’Anna (dir. Chantal Akerman)
03. In a Year with 13 Moons (dir. Rainer Werner Fassbinder)
04. The Deer Hunter (dir. Michael Cimino)
05. Autumn Sonata (dir. Ingmar Bergman)
06. Days of Heaven (dir. Terrence Malick)
07. La Cage aux Folles (dir. Édouard Molinaro)
08. Watership Down (dirs. Martin Rosen & John Hubley)
09. The Silent Partner (dir. Daryl Duke)
10. Empire of Passion (dir. Nagisa Ôshima)

BEST DIRECTOR
01. John Carpenter, Halloween
02. Chantal Akerman, Les rendez-vous d’Anna
03. Rainer Werner Fassbinder, In a Year with 13 Moons
04. Michael Cimino, The Deer Hunter
05. Ingmar Bergman, Autumn Sonata

BEST ACTOR
01. Volker Spengler, In a Year with 13 Moons
02. Jon Voight, Coming Home
03. Michel Serrault, La Cage aux Folles
04. Robert De Niro, The Deer Hunter
05. Ugo Tognazzi, La Cage aux Folles

BEST ACTRESS
01. Ingrid Bergman, Autumn Sonata
02. Jill Clayburgh, An Unmarried Woman
03. Liv Ullmann, Autumn Sonata
04. Aurore Clément, Les rendez-vous d'Anna
05. Kazuko Yushiyoki, Empire of Passion

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
01. Christopher Walken, The Deer Hunter
02. Christopher Plummer, The Silent Partner
03. John Savage, The Deer Hunter
04. Robert Morley, Who Is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe?
05. Donald Pleasence, Halloween

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
01. Geraldine Page, Interiors
02. Maureen Stapleton, Interiors
03. Maggie Smith, California Suite
04. Stéphane Audran, Violette Nozière
05. Nathalie Baye, The Green Room

BEST SCREENPLAY
01. Autumn Sonata (Ingmar Bergman)
02. La Cage aux Folles (Francis Veber, Édouard Molinaro, Marcello Danon, Jean Poiret, based on the play by Jean Poiret)
03. In a Year with 13 Moons (Rainer Werner Fassbinder)
04. An Unmarried Woman (Paul Mazursky)
05. Interiors (Woody Allen)

BEST FILM EDITING
01. The Deer Hunter (Peter Zinner)
02. Halloween (Charles Bornstein, Tommy Lee Wallace)
03. The Silent Partner (George Appleby)
04. The 36th Chamber of Shaolin (Chi Leong Cheang, Yen Hai Li)
05. Superman (Stuart Baird, Michael Ellis)

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
01. Days of Heaven (Néstor Almendros)
02. The Deer Hunter (Vilmos Zsigmond)
03. Autumn Sonata (Sven Nykvist)
04. Pretty Baby (Sven Nykvist)
05. Superman (Geoffrey Unsworth)

BEST ART DIRECTION
01. Pretty Baby (Trevor Williams, James L. Berkey)
02. Autumn Sonata (Katinka Faragó, Anna Asp)
03. Superman (John Barry, Ernest Archer, Philip Bennet, Stuart Craig, Leslie Dilley, Norman Dorme, Tony Reading, Norman Reynolds, Peter Howitt)
04. The Wiz (Tony Walton, Philip Rosenberg, Robert Drumheller, Edward Stewart, Justin Scoppa, Jr.)
05. Death on the Nile (Peter Murton, Brian Ackland-Snow, Terry Ackland-Snow)

BEST COSTUME DESIGN
01. La Cage aux Folles (Piero Tosi, Ambra Danon)
02. Death on the Nile (Anthony Powell)
03. The Wiz (Tony Walton)
04. Pretty Baby (Mina Mittelman)
05. Despair (Dagmar Schauberger)

BEST ORIGINAL SCORE
01. Halloween (John Carpenter)
02. Superman (John Williams)
03. The Fury (John Williams)
04. Watership Down (Angela Morley)
05. Death on the Nile (Nino Rota)

BEST ORIGINAL SONG
01. Thank God It's Friday ("Last Dance," music and lyrics by Paul Jabara, performed by Donna Summer)
02. Grease ("You're the One That I Want," music and lyrics by John Farrar, performed by Olivia Newton-John & John Travolta)
03. Grease ("Grease," music and lyrics by Barry Gibb, performed by Frankie Valli)
04. Watership Down ("Bright Eyes," music and lyrics by Mike Batt, performed by Art Garfunkel)
05. Eyes of Laura Mars ("Love Theme from Eyes of Laura Mars (Prisoner)," music and lyrics by Karen Lawrence and John DeSautels, performed by Barbra Streisand)

BEST SOUND
01. The Shout (Alan Bell, Tony Jackson)
02. Invasion of the Body Snatchers (Ben Burtt, Susan R. Crutcher, Bonnie Koehler)
03. The Last Waltz (Ed Anderson, Paul Laune, Nelson Stoll)
04. Superman (Gordon K. McCallum, Graham V. Hartstone, Nicolas Le Messurier, Roy Charman)
05. The Deer Hunter (Richard Portman, William L. McCaughey, Aaron Rochin, C. Darin Knight)

BEST MAKEUP & HAIRSTYLING
01. The Wiz (Robert Laden, Stan Winston)
02. Dawn of the Dead (Greg Besnak)
03. The Fury (Rick Baker, William Tuttle)
04. Laserblast (Steve Neill, Ve Neill)
05. La Cage aux Folles (Franco Corridoni, Pierantonio Mecacci)

BEST VISUAL EFFECTS
01. Superman (Les Bowie, Colin Chilvers, Denys N. Coop, Roy Field, Derek Meddings, Zoran Perisic)
02. Laserblast (David Allen, Paul Gentry, Steve Neill, Harry Woolman)
03. The Fury (A. D. Flowers)
04. Invasion of the Body Snatchers (Russel Hessey, Dell Rheaume)
05. Dawn of the Dead (Arthur J. Canestro, Don Berry, Tom Savini, Gary Zeller)

FINAL TALLY
8 nominations: The Deer Hunter (2 wins)
7 nominations: Autumn Sonata (2 wins)
6 nominations: La Cage aux Folles (1 win), Superman (1 win)
5 nominations: Halloween (3 wins)
4 nominations: In a Year with 13 Moons (1 win)
3 nominations: Death on the Nile, The Fury, Interiors (1 win), Les rendez-vous d’Anna, Pretty Baby (1 win), The Silent Partner, Watership Down, The Wiz (1 win)
2 nominations: Dawn of the Dead, Days of Heaven (1 win), Empire of Passion, Grease, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Laserblast, An Unmarried Woman
1 nomination: California Suite, Coming Home, Despair, Eyes of Laura Mars, The Green Room, The Last Waltz, The Shout (1 win), Thank God It's Friday, The 36th Chamber of Shaolin, Violette Nozière, Who Is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe?

[Sabin]

Damien @ Jul. 16 2007,6:37

As for me, the beautiful and heart-breaking Coming Home was easily my favorite of the nominees, although this was the very rare year in which I admired all of the Best Picture contenders. My order of preference is 1) Coming Home; 2) Heaven Can Waiy; 3) The Deer Hunter; 4) Midnight Express; 5) An Unmarried Woman.

I haven't seen Coming Home, The Deer Hunter, Heaven Can Wait, or Midnight Express in ages. I remember liking Midnight Express and The Deer Hunter a little but not the others.

I thought you hated The Deer Hunter, Damien. For whatever reason, I thought you ranked it with Braveheart at the bottom of the barrel. There are few Best Picture lineups I'm less enthusiastic about. There is nothing there that raises any excitement with me. Especially considering it was a 70's lineup.

[Bruce_Lavigne]

Best Leading Actor
• Brad Davis (Midnight Express)
• Robert De Niro (The Deer Hunter)
• Dustin Hoffman (Straight Time)
• Richard Pryor (Blue Collar)
• Jon Voight (Coming Home)


Best Leading Actress
• Ingrid Bergman (Autumn Sonata)
• Jill Clayburgh (An Unmarried Woman)
• Jane Fonda (Coming Home)
• Geraldine Page (Interiors)
• Liv Ullmann (Autumn Sonata)


Best Supporting Actor
• Michael Caine (California Suite)
• Bruce Dern (Coming Home)
• Richard Farnsworth (Comes a Horseman)
• John Hurt (Midnight Express)
• Christopher Walken (The Deer Hunter)


Best Supporting Actress
• Dyan Cannon (Heaven Can Wait)
• Angela Lansbury (Death on the Nile)
• Maggie Smith (California Suite)
• Maureen Stapleton (Interiors)
• Meryl Streep (The Deer Hunter)

[Big Magilla]

I never saw it as a February (Coming Home) vs. December (The Deer Hunter) thing.

The Deer Hunter was an epic film. Yes, the wedding sequence goes on annoyingly long and the Russian roulette sequence is pure fiction, but it was the first American film to convey the senseless waste of a generation in a modern war. Coming Home for all its liberal credentials is basically just an old-style Hollywood melodrama complete with an ending right out of A Star Is Born.

How Heaven Can Wait wound up with all those nominations I'll never know. I never doubted The Deer Hunter and Cimino would win. The only sure win I saw for Coming Home was Jon Voight. For me Fonda was a distant second choice behind Ingrid Bergman in Autumn Sonata, and Bruce Dern's hambone performance shouldn't have been on any Oscar ballots.

[Damien]

Because of the release pattern which Penelope mentions,The Deer Hunter was perceived as a genuine Event -- it was quite a coup to score tickets, and became the most widely-discussed film in the early part of Oscar season. (If I remember correctly, Universal brought it back to theatres sooner than planned because demand was so great.)

Deer Hunter early on took the mantle of Oscar favorite (it won the NY Film Critics award, and Cimino won the Golden Globe, although Midnight Express took Best Picture-Drama). But it soon became embroiled in controversy -- specifically the entirely fictional Russian Roulette sequences which were attacked by the Left as a grossly distorted portrayal of the North Vietnamese as cruel savages, and generally the right wing air the film had about it.

Coming Home had been released way back in January or February so initially at Oscar time it felt like Old News. But because it was an unassailably liberal Viet Nam picture, many in the film community rallied around it, and its standing rose as Deer Hunter's fell -- there was a real feeling that had the voting been opened for another week Coming Home would have overtaken Deer Hunter. In fact,early on Fonda was not seen as a favorite but going into Osvar night she had real momentum.

As for me, the beautiful and heart-breaking Coming Home was easily my favorite of the nominees, although this was the very rare year in which I admired all of the Best Picture contenders. My order of preference is 1) Coming Home; 2) Heaven Can Waiy; 3) The Deer Hunter; 4) Midnight Express; 5) An Unmarried Woman.

[Penelope]

Ok, cool!

Damien talks about The Deer Hunter vs. Coming Home battle in Inside Oscar. Legend has it that Universal didn't know how to sell The Deer Hunter so they asked Allan Carr for advice: he told them to play the movie for one week in LA in December to qualify for Academy consideration, then pull it, and let critics awards and word of its greatness spread, then release wide just after the Oscar nominations.

I suspect that precisely because Deer Hunter had an epic quality to it while Coming Home was a mixture of Vietnam drama and Brief Encounter-style romance, the former was seen as the more "serious" choice by voters.

Initially, I found The Deer Hunter to be quite powerful, even if it borrowed its structure from The Godfather--or an inverse Best Years of Our Lives. But on a second viewing I found it to be rather manipulative and pushy, though I agree that its portrayal of their lives in Pennsylvania were extremely strong.

Coming Home, on the other hand, I found--and still do--to be a lyrically romantic and extraordinarily powerful film; today, Jon Voight is known as the hammy actor and estranged father of Angelina Jolie, but once upon a time he was a terrific, subtle, marvelous actor, and his performance in Coming Home is simply devastating. Jane Fonda is terrific, too, though my Best Actress award that year goes to Jill Clayburgh in An Unmarried Woman (which, by the way, would be my second choice after Coming Home for Best Picture).

[HarryGoldfarb]

Not at all Penelope! I wasn't trying to meant that, specially considering I'm a sucker for The English Patient! LOL...

I enjoyed a lot Coming Home... As I said it looks like a more usual winner for Best Picture: good performances, good script and the love story in that atrocious context (the "love conquers all" issue). But even though I haven't seen the film in recent years, all I can think right now is that The Deer Hunter moved me a lot more; it took me to places where I didn't feel confortable. For moments I wasn't even thinking I was watching a film (a thing I felt the whole time while watching Coming Home), I felt like a voyeur or something, watching those peoples lives at the beginning (with no invitation) and then actually living the horrible things the guys went through... It's not an easy film to see (neither is Dancer in the Dark and I love it) but that's its strenght: it's a challenging film. That's why I made the comment on Coming Home, not because I think it's a bad film and above all I wasn't implifying that love = low quality! It is just that now I think the Deer Hunter is a better film. Nonetheless, it doesn't answer my question... was The Deer Hunter a popular choice back at its time?

Nice avatar by the way!

[Penelope]

How interesting. I'd rank Coming Home considerably higher than The Deer Hunter--the fact that the former is a love story only enhances the impact, imho. I'm sorry, but is there some kind of unwritten coorelation that romance = less quality?

[HarryGoldfarb]

This year is one of the strangest in Academy History, so dark in the films subjects... Heaven Can Wait might be seen as the comic relief of the final list (haven't seen An Unmarried Woman) but what was the general feeling at the time?

Actually, The Deer Hunter, which I first saw only recently, might be one of the most depressing films ever to win the award for Best Picture... how dark and serious a film can be... it's disturbing, specially considering the great light showed in the beginning. Cimino did a great job taking the time to introduce audience (really deep actually) into the lives, common lives, not necessarilly amazing or superb lives, of the characters as long as an hour and plus of the film and then... well... how strange I felt while watching the film... It is its triumph to challenge us to watch a story like that...

But on the other hand, it is difficult for me to imagine a lot of people at the time thinking "This is the best film of the year!". It's not easy to see, way too long, not comercially done, very intimate, with a slow rythm... great performances, indeed, but how was it received? was the clear front-runner all the way down to the ceremony?

Heaven Can Wait managed to score big when the nominations were announced, becoming the most nominated film, but was a serious contender? Usually the film with the most nominations is look up as the one to beat. Coming Home (thank god it didn't win) is a more oscar friendly portrait of (almost) the same panorama... it's serious too, quite dark, quite depressing but the whole time you are watching a love story... If A Beautiful Mind can win Best Picture... And Midnight Express, a very dark and disturbing film too at least have a lot of strenght in its filmmaking... can anybody explain a little how was the general feeling at the time? what was the shock when nominations were announced? Did anybody see Cimino coming home to take an Oscar?

By the way... totally loved DeNiro's scene in the motel room... maybe, in my humble opinion, his highlight in acting!

[Mister Tee]

Magilla's right, the Fonda choice -- in fact, the overall support for Coming Home -- was a big LA thing.

I'd actually spent most of the year thinking Clayburgh (who'd received the same star-is-born treatment from the NY press that Diane Keaton had a year previous) was the clear front-runner. I didn't consider Bergman that big a threat, even with her critics' prize dominance, because 1) she was just off a dubiously-deserved statue only four years earlier and 2) the subtitle thing was bound to be a handicap. But I underestimated the love for Coming Home -- a film I thought only so-so, but which won film/actor/actress from the LA critics, and got a (to me) astonishing 8 Academy nominations.

Also in Fonda's favor was the fact that she'd lost just the year prior (for, I think, a better performance), and that there was sentiment to welcome her back to full-time acting after her anti-war-activist detour. (Also, people wanted to salute her for being right about Nixon all along)

I truly didn't think Page (or, certainly, Burstyn) had a prayer of competing. Interiors did manage an impressive five nominations, but I never got the feeling people really much LIKED it. (As evidenced by the fact that many-time-nominee Maureen Stapleton failed to cash in for the film, despite being fairly widely predicted)