Best Picture and Director 1997

[Big Magilla]

Big Magilla wrote
Art Direction, Cinematography, Film Editing, Dramatic Score, and Sound go to L.A. Confidential
Makeup goes to Mrs. Brown
I don't see how Titanic's absence tips this award to Mrs. Brown. I think Men in Black was always a strong favorite to win for Best Makeup.

Additionally, I'm not sure L.A. Confidential would win eight Academy Awards. That seems high. Dante Spinotti's lensing was a deceptively subtle and contemporary portrait of a historical era. I think it's very possible that Roger Deakins would've taken his Oscar home twenty years earlier for Kundun. It's also possible the film loses Best Production Design (maybe to Kundun?), Drama Score (Kundun? Amistad?), and Sound (Air Force One).

You may be right on these I would personally give L.A. Confidential seven, throw Art Direction to Kundun.

Pam Grier to take Kae Winslet's slot in Best Actress nominations. Robert Forster's nomination in support bodes well for her.

[Sabin]

Reza wrote
Speaking of The Ice Storm, with Titanic out of the running the obvious inclusion in place of Gloria Stuart would have been Sigourney Weaver.

And who would have replaced Kate Winslet? Maybe Jodie Foster (Contact), Julia Roberts (My Best Friend's Wedding) or Pam Grier (Jackie Brown). Roberts more likely.

The obvious inclusion is Sigourney Weaver although it is possible that Alison Elliot might have gotten the nomination as she was nominated for a SAG award instead of Joan Cusack and Sigourney Weaver. The Wings of the Dove had Miramax behind it and it picked up a fairly robust five nominations whereas The Ice Storm clearly underperformed.

As for Kate Winslet, Pam Grier jumps to mind as the immediate beneficiary as she got a SAG nomination. Jackie Brown may have underperformed in general but its nomination for Robert Forster over the formidable likes of Mark Addy (The Full Monty), Billy Connolly (Mrs. Brown) Rupert Everett (My Best Friend's Wedding), and Kevin Spacey (L.A. Confidential) proves that Jackie Brown clearly got seen enough in some circles. It also had Miramax behind it. Robin Wright (then Penn) was also a SAG nominee for She's So Lovely, which also had Miramax behind it.

I'm quite a fan of My Best Friend's Wedding but it wasn't taken seriously as the time. If Rupert Everett couldn't get a nomination I wonder if Roberts could, and I do wonder if the fact that she was such an overwhelming Oscar favorite three years later adds weight to the notion that the Academy was desperate to honor her. My recollection of 1997 was that Hollywood was thrilled that she was no longer box office poison following some seven-odd years of lousy press and mixed confidence in her marquee ability.

Which brings us to Contact. Ah, Contact. Back in 1997, I was rather obsessed with it. I wasn't alone. I know many on this board loved it quite a bit. Then a backlash set in and much of it felt silly in the clear light of day: John Hurt's miraculous second machine, the climax with her father, Matthew McConaughey in general, etc. It wasn't the box office success anyone expected from Zemeckis following Forrest Gump nor was it overwhelmingly well-reviewed (it has a RT score of 66%) but my sense of the film was that it was generally well-regarded across the board. Also it was Jodie Foster's first on-screen appearance in three years playing a brainy protagonist amidst a zeitgeist for brainy women in pop culture (parallels to Gillian Anderson's Scully should not go unnoticed, nor her own Clarice Starling). Also, without Titanic, Contact becomes (unless I'm mistaken) the most visible (and certainly best-regarded) big-budgeted studio production with a major starring role for an actress...

Y'know, the more I think about it, in a Titanic-less year (or one where Titanic flops), Jodie Foster isn't a bad guess to fill in that last spot. While the critics were pretty much lock-step behind Julie Christie, Judi Dench, and Helena Bonham Carter in their winners and runners up, I'm surprised to learn that LAFCA honored Jodie Foster as their runner up for Best Actress in 1997. A few spots probably open up for Contact elsewhere including Best Sound Effects Editing and Visual Effects.

[Sabin]

Big Magilla wrote
Art Direction, Cinematography, Film Editing, Dramatic Score, and Sound go to L.A. Confidential

Makeup goes to Mrs. Brown

I don't see how Titanic's absence tips this award to Mrs. Brown. I think Men in Black was always a strong favorite to win for Best Makeup.

Additionally, I'm not sure L.A. Confidential would win eight Academy Awards. That seems high. Dante Spinotti's lensing was a deceptively subtle and contemporary portrait of a historical era. I think it's very possible that Roger Deakins would've taken his Oscar home twenty years earlier for Kundun. It's also possible the film loses Best Production Design (maybe to Kundun?), Drama Score (Kundun? Amistad?), and Sound (Air Force One).

Last night, I re-watched The Sweet Hereafter for the first time in years. I had forgotten just how much of it is constructed like a mystery, peeling one layer back after another, learning more and more about the people in this town and Ian Holm's lawyer and conveying the sense of a world upside-down (as I think Gene Siskel described it), rather than a story. It's a very powerful film but ever so slightly overrated. While the facts tell me that it was indeed quite well-liked with its Best Director and Adapted Screenplay nominations, there's no way I would've predicted it for... really anything before Oscar morning. Even knowing what I know now, I'd be reticent to predict it.

[mlrg]

I recall at the time that the most anticipated movie of the year (awards wise) was Amistad. It was the first film Spielberg directed after Schindler's List and it had all the key factors to be a shoe in for tons of nominations. It performed well at the Globes and the guilds but flopped big time at the Oscars.

I'm with Sabin on this. I think L.A. Confidential is another 90's critics darling that does not win best picture and had Good Will Hunting win best picture, Saving Private Ryan would have easily win the following year.

[Big Magilla]

To expound on my initial post of eight years ago, Titanic was in addition to being a box-office phenomenon, an unexpected critical hit. Gloria Stuart's contribution to the film was a real surprise. In the TV teaser trailers for the film, she was seen so briefly that her character seemed to be played by Kate Winslet in old-age makeup which wouldn't have been a bad idea, but to learn that no, it was a long-forgotten star of the 1930s, who was coaxed out of retirement by the director, playing the part, added to the sense of wonderment the film was generating. Cameron had contacted Stuart after hearing her delightful commentary on the DVD of The Old Dark House and offered her the part.

Rather than look at the year as though Titanic wasn't in it, I prefer to look at it as what if instead of Titanic taking the world by storm, it had been the disaster many were predicting before its release and therefore had no affect on the awards.

Best Picture

I thought then, and still do, that the inclusion of The Full Monty over Boogie Nights was absurd, and still do. If you look at the 20/20 and Community Circuit awards which look at awards twenty years later, Boogie Nights gets its proper place, even winning Best Picture in one of those contests. That had to have been near the top of everyone's minds, as did The Ice Storm, but the inclusion of Atom Egoyan for Best Director certainly gives impetus to The Sweet Hereafter. All three would have been good choices.

I do see the critically acclaimed L.A. Confidential as the winner, though. The writing award given Good Will Hunting and the double acting awards given As Good as It Gets were as good as it was gong to get in the top categories for those two films.

Best Director

Paul Thomas Anderson (Boogie Nights) replaces Cameron for Best Director. Curtis Hanson wins for L.A. Confidential.

Best Supporting Actress

Sigourney Weaver (The Ice Storm), who should have gotten the slot Minnie Driver (Good Will Hunting) took, gets Stuart's slot. Basinger still wins.

Other Awards given to Titanic

Art Direction, Cinematography, Film Editing, Dramatic Score, and Sound go to L.A. Confidential

Costume Design goes to The Wings of the Dove

Sound Effects goes to Face/Off

Visual Effects goes to Starship Troopers

Makeup goes to Mrs. Brown

Song goes to "Journey to the Past" from Anastasia

[Reza]

Does Titanic's absence open up room for The Sweet Hereafter to pick up a Best Cinematography nomination for Paul Sarossy, who came in runner-up at LAFCAA, or Best Original Score for Mychael Danna, who would end up winning for Life of Pi and also had The Ice Storm out that year?

Speaking of The Ice Storm, with Titanic out of the running the obvious inclusion in place of Gloria Stuart would have been Sigourney Weaver.

And who would have replaced Kate Winslet? Maybe Jodie Foster (Contact), Julia Roberts (My Best Friend's Wedding) or Pam Grier (Jackie Brown). Roberts more likely.

And yes, L.A. Confidential would have easily taken the costume design slot left open with Titanic off the list.

[Sabin]

Reza wrote
I think you are really underestimating L.A. Confidential and I don't buy the fact that it would have been overlooked for wins in the top two categories just because it was a flop. I think it would have easily won in both categories over the Van Sant bore despite Harvey's efforts. L.A. and Hanson won or were on many critics and awards groups that year as strong second choice nominees for the Academy to ignore.

I think L.A. Confidential is an excellent film and should have won among those nominees (or any in 1997). But just because a film wins every critics award doesn't make it a hit with the Academy. I do think largely the race might have come down to a Good Will Hunting vs. L.A. Confidential hype vs. quality showdown but there's a reason why usually the film that wins the most critics awards (Pulp Fiction, Goodfellas) doesn't always win. It's easy to forget this now but the big knock on the film was that the plot was too confusing to win. This seems insane today but it was the "smart" choice.

That being said, what I think L.A. Confidential has going for it is that without Titanic sucking up all the air out of the room, it's possible that the film gets a second look with Academy voters and who knows? With Titanic out of the way, I think it becomes likelier that L.A. Confidential picks up a couple more nominations, maybe Best Costume Design and Sound Effects Editing, and notches up to eleven nominations, making it the nominations leader and back then the film with the most nominations had a pretty impressive track record of ending up winning.

Full disclosure: Good Will Hunting is a movie that I don't think is a bore nor do I think is a very good film, but I certainly don't think it deserves to get anywhere near winning Best Picture. That said no matter how big a holiday hit it was, As Good As It Gets was bigger. And I suspect an Oscar race without Titanic means that Oscar voters are just a little more open to other possibilities. William Goldman was on record saying that until Oscar morning and James L. Brooks missed out, he was convinced As Good As It Gets could be the movie to beat Titanic. Without Titanic in the race, I think James L. Brooks has a much better chance of getting a Best Director and the film itself becomes a little more viable to win with its eight nominations. Something I forgot until today: As Good As It Gets beat Good Will Hunting at the WGA Awards so perhaps the hype might not have been as widespread as we think. Either way (forgive me for putting it like this) both As Good As It Gets and Good Will Hunting are movies about "people." They're human stories. I think one takes votes away from the other.

Maybe in this alternate reality, you're right.

Reza wrote
Brooks would have been the obvious beneficiary of the empty slot while I think The Sweet Hereafter (over Boogie Nights -too kinky - and Wag - too quirky) would have made the Best Picture list.

You could be right. The Sweet Hereafter clearly had its fans. I had to look up Fine Line Features' list of releases. They do not have many Best Picture nominees to their credit. Only Shine. So, in theory with The Sweet Hereafter they are operating at the top of their power.

Amistad had nominations from the DGA and PGA but it was clearly wasn't connecting like everyone involved had hoped and was plagued by a plagiarism charm that wasn't going away.

Really at the end of the day, the question is if a movie can't get a Best Director nomination over not just Atom Egoyan for The Sweet Hereafter but also Peter Cattaneo for The Full Monty then it has no chance. The Academy wasn't going to honor Amistad, Boogie Nights, or Wag the Dog. They were going to honor The Full Monty and The Sweet Hereafter. The narrative of the indie revolution continues one year after a slate that includes Fargo, Secrets and Lies, and Shine.

Does Titanic's absence open up room for The Sweet Hereafter to pick up a Best Cinematography nomination for Paul Sarossy, who came in runner-up at LAFCAA, or Best Original Score for Mychael Danna, who would end up winning for Life of Pi and also had The Ice Storm out that year?

[Reza]

I think you are really underestimating L.A. Confidential and I don't buy the fact that it would have been overlooked for wins in the top two categories just because it was a flop. I think it would have easily won in both categories over the Van Sant bore despite Harvey's efforts. L.A. and Hanson won or were on many critics and awards groups that year as strong second choice nominees for the Academy to ignore.

Brooks would have been the obvious beneficiary of the empty slot while I think The Sweet Hereafter (over Boogie Nights -too kinky - and Wag - too quirky) would have made the Best Picture list.

[Sabin]

I think three responses mean I can answer. I will say I don't know what film would be nominated in Titanic's stead. I would imagine that James L. Brooks would be nominated for Best Director. For Best Picture, it would be either Amistad, Boogie Nights, The Sweet Hereafter, or Wag the Dog. I truly don't know which it would be.

I posted this question because I was thinking about the power of Miramax. This board has been around now for over twenty years and so much time has been spent cursing Harvey Weinstein's ability to steal spotlight from our favorite films. What's remarkable to me about Harvey Weinstein are the different micro-eras of his career. The one thing I think about the most is between 1996 with The English Patient and 1999 and The Cider House Rules. For a span of four years, he got one movie a year (or more) at least seven nominations. It seems as though that was the period of time when Hollywood woke up to his power and even though they didn't like him for a host of reasons, they seemed almost powerless to stop him. He knew how to reach the right viewers and run the right campaigns.

I think his talents are evidenced in how much Good Will Hunting over-performed in the nominations. Everyone expected it to be nominated but how many people thought it would get nine nominations?Best Picture, Actor, Supporting Actor, and Original Screenplay were in the bag. I think its nominations for Best Director (Gus Van Sant), Supporting Actress (Minnie Driver), Drama Score (Danny Elfman), and Film Editing were somewhere in the Maybe realm. Best Original Song was on nobody's radar. It tied L.A. Confidential for total nominations. Nine nominations for Good Will Hunting is such a feat that I wonder if Best Cinematography might've been in the cards as well.

I think the hype around Titanic overshadows just how much Harvey Weinstein got Good Will Hunting out there and how much people liked it. It surpassed Pulp Fiction to become the highest grossing independent film in history. Even with the media blitz around Titanic and Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon was everywhere.

I think that Titanic's record tying eleven Oscar haul and fourteen nominations obscures something else that was happening which was a producer with a golden touch operating in peak form, and the best example of who he was and what he did (selling commerce as art) was Good Will Hunting. I think that Titanic might have been the only film that could've stopped it from winning.

I have no idea what would've won Best Director that year but I think Best Picture, Supporting Actor, and Original Screenplay would've gone to Good Will Hunting. Best Director seems unlikely but honestly splits so rarely happened back then maybe Gus Van Sant could've snuck in as well. Or maybe Curtis Hanson.

Anyway, here's the kicker: if Miramax wins back-to-back Best Pictures for The English Patient and Good Will Hunting, do they really have a chance to win again for Shakespeare in Love? I don't think so. I think if Good Will Hunting wins in 1997, Harvey Weinstein's campaigning becomes a little more toxic even for the retirement homes and Saving Private Ryan wins.

Yup, I'm saying it: if Titanic doesn't exist, Saving Private Ryan wins.

[mlrg]

L.A. Confidential was a critics darling but a commercial flop. I don’t think it would have won.

It could be a race between Good Will Hunting and As Good as it Gets with probably the former winning best picture as it was backed by Miramax.

[Greg]

Contact is my favorite film of 1997. As none of the other Best Picture nominees are tech heavy, I like to think that the absence of Titanic would have at least led to a few additional tech nominations for Contact.

[danfrank]

It’s hard to imagine that L.A. Confidential would not have won. Perhaps Boogie Nights could have slipped into a Best Picture slot as well?

[Sabin]

Let's play another game...

What if Titanic wasn't a thing?

Considering that for two years leading up to this film, there was a pretty regular "Flop Watch" going on. Truly, anything could have iceberged this thing, ranging from the casting is off, to production shuts down early on when the studios realize how much this is going to cost, to James Cameron kills forty people.

What happens if Titanic doesn't come out? Fourteen Oscar nominations are cleared up, countless guild and precursor wins are up for grabs, days and weeks of publicity is up for grabs... What film is the beneficiary?

Rather than bulldoze speculation with my theory, I'll leave it up to the board.

[Greg]

Only a mind that could come up with dialogue that tin-earned and characters that thin could know -- just know! -- that audiences would love every single thing they were watching.

Still, there is nothing in the dialogue of Titanic that is as tin-eared as "Love was when I loved you" in "My Heart Will Go On."

[Sabin]

The Oscar-cast of 1997 was just desserts for my Braveheart worship two years prior (although it felt like an eternity later). It was a very, very, very long evening of hearing the same music again and again. Unlike five years later with the sweep of The Return of the King, its sweep felt like a zeitgeist not retribution. Titanic gave audiences what they wanted like very few films of my lifetime. It even delivered them scorn, the ability to feel above a phenomenon, and I believe the corniness intrinsic in Titanic is key to its success. Only a mind that could come up with dialogue that tin-earned and characters that thin could know -- just know! -- that audiences would love every single thing they were watching. I remember hearing at the time that James Cameron was a huckster who simply saw the story as a means to film the spectacle, but I don't buy it. I like Titanic, and as not simply a teenager but a teenager who was entrenched in awful first love, it's impossible for me to hear that music and not feel nostalgia for the Clinton era.

When The Return of the King swept the Oscars, I rooted for Master and Commander and Lost in Translation but I can't say I was adamantly offended when both them lost. In the case of L.A. Confidential, I was so darn livid. My first viewing of L.A. Confidential (like Braveheart) was at the Ciné-Capri in Phoenix, Arizona, and it was one of the great kick-the-door-open-to-your-brain move experiences of my life. I first realized "Holy shit! Somebody wrote all this!" For such a lauded screenplay, the first hour of the movie constitutes a first act. That's insane! And it's so damn awesome! I could wax rhapsodic about different aspects I love about this film, and I think that's the right approach. Auteur-minded critics are right that it wears its aspirations on its sleeve, but can't all fakers be this good! Although in the end, I don't think the Oscar came down to Titanic vs. L.A. Confidential, I think that both films were loved by their constituencies for the same reason. There isn't much art. To praise one or the other, you just rattle off a list of things that you loved in true popcorn fashion.

It most likely came down to Titanic vs. Good Will Hunting, although it is the male weepie answer to James Cameron's film, complete with its own blond haired rogue who cries like a bitch in the end. The most interesting thing to me about Good Will Hunting is how that script went from "Troubled genius on the run from the CIA" to "Troubled genius gets in touch with his feelings". It's often derided as an anonymous sell-out film by Gus Van Sant (although I have no idea how or why this man picks his projects) but it looks beautiful and he gets some wonderful laid-back scenes. I love a movie about knuckleheads and for a good, long while, Good Will Hunting is exactly the movie I wanted it to be. For a heartstring-pulling drama, it's fucking hilarious, and the one Oscar I would give it would be Matt Damon's lead performance which is miles above the boring work by his competitors in the same category. The Oscar it won is probably the least deserved thing it could have gotten. The second half of the second act of the film just bubbles from subplot check-in to subplot check-in and then the movie just decides to wrap itself up. It feels long. As I'm about to do again in a moment, I'll cop to liking Good Will Hunting but it's incredibly overrated.

As for As Good As It Gets, see above. It's impossible for me to remove all memory of this film from watching it over holiday break with my family. There is a tight, strong film inside of it yearning to get out, but it's miserably cast. Jack Nicholson's character makes very little sense. Helen Hunt cannot for the life of her sustain any accent and she's very sitcom flat. But I can't quite dislike it because I'm a sucker for any movie that pulls off laughs and characters who yearn to be better people against their will. Greg Kinnear is quite good and it has a wonderful dog in it. It also has one of the best, most underrated scores of Hans Zimmer's career. It's an enjoyable mess mostly for what it occasionally makes you think of what it could be.

I have very few memories of The Full Monty outside of how good Mark Addy was in it. I'm a little surprised he didn't get nominated. We're not likely to see another left-field surprise like The Full Monty's astonishing Best Picture and Best Director nomination again. In a field with so many movies that could have factored in, they all cleared the path by covering similar territory and feeling a bit samey. Amistad satisfied nobody. Miramax bailed on The Wings of the Dove the minute they realized what they had in Good Will Hunting. I wonder if it's worth another viewing. I'm guessing if Boogie Nights, The Ice Storm, and The Sweet Hereafter hadn't all come out in the span of a month, one of them could have pulled through. All three are excellent.

In my heart I know I should give Atom Egoyan a Best Director Oscar for doing something more poetic than L.A. Confidential but the sheer number of craftsmanship decisions that Curtis Hanson had to make in the creation of his film deserves mentioning as well. For a few short years with L.A. Confidential, Wonder, and to a lesser degree 8 Miles, he was a very exciting artisan and he seems to have lost his footing permanently. Because I'm feeling nostalgic, I'll vote down the line L.A. Confidential.