Thanks to Jordan for supplying Peter Travers’ Top Ten List. Travers has an uncanny knack for picking films that end up in the Oscar race for Best Picture. With the exception of one time since 1999, he has always included the winner in his top ten. And much of the time, multiple titles on his list get in.
PETER TRAVERS
01. Boyhood
02. Birdman
03. Foxcatcher
04. Selma
05. Gone Girl
06. Whiplash
07. Grand Budapest Hotel
08. Unbroken
09. Under the Skin
10.Interstellar
Travers Top Ten in the past few years:
2013:
1. 12 Years A Slave
2. Gravity
3. The Wolf of Wall Street
4. Before Midnight
5. Her
6. American Hustle
7. Captain Phillips
8. Nebraska
9. Blue Jasmine
10. Inside Llewyn Davis
2012
10. The Dark Knight Rises
9. Moonrise Kingdom
8. Life of Pi
7. Les Miserables
6. Silver Linings Playbook
5. Argo
4. Lincoln
3. Beasts of the Southern Wild
2. Zero Dark Thirty
1. The Master
2011
1. Drive (“too bloody, too creative, too ambitious and too polarizing to comfort audiences”)
2. The Artist (“style to burn and unexpected soul”)
3. The Descendants (“orchestrated without a false note”)
4. Moneyball (show us “how to find value in what others miss.”
5. Midnight in Paris (“Woody’s love letter to the City of Light”)
6. Hugo (“An irresistible bedtime story for movie lovers”)
7. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (“the acting artistry of Gary Oldman”)
8. Margin Call (“blue-chip acting as Wall Street gets it in the teeth”)
9. The Tree of Life (Malick’s “one-of-a-kind film strives even when it falls short”)
10. War Horse, The Help, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2
2010:
- The Social Network
- Inception
- The King’s Speech
- True Grit
- The Kids Are All Right
- 127 Hours
- Black Swan
- The Fighter
- Winter’s Bone
- Toy Story 3
(thanks vcb, & wb!)
To check Traver’s track record in matching up with the Oscars, take a look at his past Top 10 Lists going back more than a decade, after the cut.
**Best Picture winner, bold means nominated:
2009:
- Precious
- Up in the Air
- The Hurt Locker**
- An Education
- Up
- Where the Wild Things Are
- A Serious Man
- District 9
- (500) Days of Summer
- The Messenger
2008:
1. Milk
2. Slumdog Millionaire**
3. The Dark Knight
4. Frost/Nixon
5. WALL-E (won animated)
6. Revolutionary Road
7. The Visitor
8. Doubt
9. Rachel Getting Married
10. Man on Wire (won Doc)
2007:
1 No Country for Old Men**
2 Atonement
3 Into the Wild
4 Eastern Promises
5 Sweeney Todd
6 American Gangster
7 There Will Be Blood
8 Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead
9 I’m Not There
10 Knocked Up
(tie) Juno
2006:
1 The Departed**
2 Dreamgirls
3 (tie) Letters from Iwo Jima
(tie) Flags of our Fathers
4 Volver
5 Babel
6 United 93
7 The Queen
8 Borat
9 Little Miss Sunshine
10 A Prairie Home Companion
2005:
1 A History of Violence
2 Brokeback Mountain
3 Syriana
4 Good Night, and Good Luck.
5 Munich
6 Capote
7 The Squid and the Whale
8 The Constant Gardener
9 Crash**
10 (tie) King Kong
(tie) Wedding
2004
1 Sideways
2 Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind
3 Milliion Dollar Baby**
4 The Aviator
5 The Incredibles
6 Kinsey
7 Closer
8 Finding Neverland
9 Kill Bill: Volume 2
10 Fahrenheit 9/11
2003
1. Mystic River
2. Lord Of The Rings: Return Of The King**
3. Lost In Translation
4. Master and Commander: The Far Side Of The World
5. Cold Mountain
6. American Splendor
7. Big Fish
8. A Mighty Wind
9. Kill Bill: Vol. 1
10. Angels In America [HBO]
2002
1. Gangs of New York
2. Far From Heaven
3. Adaptation
4. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
5. Y Tu Mama Tambien
6. Chicago**
7. Talk To Her
8. Road To Perdition
9. About Schmidt
10. 8 Mile
2001 (two lists)
01. The Lord Of The Rings: The Fellowship Of The Ring (Peter Jackson)
02. Ali (Michael Mann)
03. The Royal Tenenbaums (Wes Anderson)
04. Shrek (Andrew Adamson and Vicky Jenson)
05. Vanilla Sky (Cameron Crowe)
06. Moulin Rouge (Baz Luhrmann)
07. Black Hawk Down (Ridley Scott)
08. A Beautiful Mind (Ron Howard)**
09. A.I. Artificial Intelligence (Steven Spielberg)
10. Ocean’s Eleven (Steven Soderbergh)
List 2
01. Memento (Christopher Nolan)
02. Mulholland Dr. (David Lynch)
03. Waking Life (Richard Linklater)
04. Ghost World (Terry Zwigoff)
05. Hedwig And The Angry Inch (John Cameron Mitchell)
06. Sexy Beast (Jonathan Glazer)
07. In The Bedroom (Todd Field)
08. The Man Who Wasn’t There (Joel Coen)
09. Gosford Park (Robert Altman)
10. Amelie (Jean-Pierre Jeunet)
2000
01a. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (Ang Lee)
01b. Almost Famous (Cameron Crowe)
02. Gladiator (Ridley Scott)
03. Traffic (Steven Soderbergh)
04. Billy Elliot (Stephen Daldry)
05. Croupier (Mike Hodges)
06. You Can Count on Me (Kenneth Lonegran)
07. The House of Mirth (Terence Davies)
08. State and Main (David Mamet)
09. Best in Show (Christopher Guest)
10. Requiem for a Dream (Darren Aronofsky)
1999
01. American Beauty (Sam Mendes)**
02. Topsy-Turvy (Mike Leigh)
03. Being John Malkovich (Spike Jonze)
04. The Insider (Michael Mann)
05. Magnolia (Paul Thomas Anderson)
06. Three Kings (David O. Russell)
07. Boys Don’t Cry (Kimberly Peirce)
08. The Straight Story (David Lynch)
09. The Winslow Boy (David Mamet)
10. The Sixth Sense (M. Night Shyamalan)
