Unofficial Academy Awards Discussion Board

Similarly: in 1988, I went into the evening thinking Hoffman's best actor win was so sure it was hardly worth opening the envelope. However, after an hour-plus of Geena Davis/Kevin Kline/Bird for sound/Milagro Beanfield War for music, I actually momentarily entertained the notion that mescal had go...

Actually, the placement I often think about is 2002. Because the producer wanted to get the acting awards done so that the year's winners could join in the lineup for the 75th anniversary, the Adrien Brody bombshell came relatively soon, before Actress, the Screenplay awards, and Director. But what...

I'd been looking for a place to break my '06 Oscar season silence, and I'll do it to defend my native city, Columbus, Ohio. Given our giant choke in the BCS game last Monday, we Buckeyes deserve some kind of a break. And, of course, Damien's right. The cry around the nation has become, "Hey ki...

And let's hope we're not offering the same disappointed sighs come March for something like Flags of Our Fathers. I like Eastwood's recent work as much as anyone, but suppose this turns out to be closer in quality to True Crime. Okay, but what if Flags is more like White Hunter, Black Heart or A Pe...

Hi All, I'd say there's a simple answer to the questions about why big-buzz disappointments hang on for Best Picture nominations and why some heavily nominated films get shut out in the awards: Some members nominate films they haven't seen based on the inevitability of their nomination. And some me...

Good posts, everybody. "More than just a comedy" means either some major melodramatic elements to give the comedy "gravitas," as The Apartment and Terms of Endearment have in abundance, and/or an overwhelming literary pedigree, as Shakespeare in Love and Tom Jones unquestionably...

I cannot imagine that it would ever happen that there would be fewer than nine films with eligible original scores. I think what this rule is aiming at is that always nebulous "Scoring of Music" category, which some years they include and some years they don't. That category, which had be...

The Worst (in chronological order): Going My Way My Fair Lady The Sting Chariots of Fire Out of Africa Driving Miss Daisy Forrest Gump Braveheart A Beautiful Mind Crash It's depressing that most of these are from the last twenty-five years, but Magilla's point that around the late-1970s things stop...

A problem with the "historical context" thing is, even in such contexts, there would be dissenters (as in 1941, and, here, 1999). How much deference we give to the predominant view can by governed by whether we were there at the time to be part of the dissent. I'd say, for instance, Forre...

It's interesting that, with the exception of Dennis Bee, nobody seems to remember one of the truly worst Best Pictures in the last decades: "Chariots of Fire". I still remember how shocking this was back then: "Reds", though controversial, was considered to be a sure winner, at ...

Dennis, I'm glad you mentioned Edward R. Murrow's participation in Around The World In 80 Days, as I had completely forgotten about it -- as, I suspect, did the entire rest of the world or elsy SOMEBODY in some entertainment outlet would have mentioned it in connection with David Strathairn's nomin...

It's happily surprising that American Beauty is making these lists now. Damien's book must have really had an impact. Is Farber serious that Cider House Rules and pretentious The Insider were "overlooked"? Mike Clark in USA Today said then that if Cider House scored an upset, it would be ...