Our friends at Fandor have created a cool digital flip book detailing an “alternative history” of the Academy Awards. In its pages, you won’t find a dry recap of the films that have won Oscar gold over the years. Instead they have opted for a less traditional approach, featuring:
- Films that might have won Oscars, if the award had existed before 1927
- Films that should have been nominated, but were snubbed
- Films that were nominated and should have won, but lost out
- A video essay series discussing this year’s nominees
Fandor is a streaming film service specializing in award-winning and acclaimed independent and classic films. If you haven’t discovered them by now, this is a fantastic introduction.
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Fandor’s mission is to create a community of film lovers and makers connected by meaningful and entertaining cinematic experiences. Fandor is the home of thousands of handpicked, award winning films from around the world, of all lengths and genres. By investing in strategic partnerships with festivals (F|FA) and individual filmmakers (FIX) Fandor is generating greater opportunities for filmmakers, while their member-based service reaches audiences through TV set-top, desktop, and mobile devices, as well as through Keyframe, Fandor’s digital film art and culture magazine. Fandor supports great cinema by investing half of all membership fees back to the films watched.
I think someone ought to go through the prestigious British Film Institute poll, taken every 10 years since 1952 and see which won an Oscar for best film.
01. Vertigo
02. Citizen Kane
03. Tokyo Story
04. La Règle du jeu (The Rules of the Game)
05. Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans
06. 2001: A Space Odyssey
07. The Searchers
08. Man with a Movie Camera
09. The Passion of Joan of Arc
10. 8½
Some of these are obscure and not even eligible for an academy award.
8 1/2 did win Best Foreign Language Film.
Who even remembers Oliver?!
Of course the Oscars are really only for fun, only history decides a ‘best’.
Danny Peary’s book “Alternate Oscars” from the mid-80s was one of my favorite books — lots of interesting arguments for who should have won.
Just the last 20 years – English language films only, unless nominated for Best Picture or Director
1994 – The Shawshank Redemption (over Pulp Fiction)
1995 – Toy Story (over The Usual Suspects)
1996 – Breaking the Waves (over Fargo)
1997- LA Confidential
1998 – Saving Private Ryan
1999 – The Sixth Sense or Fight Club
2000 – Almost Famous
2001 – Mulholland Dr. (over Fellowship of the Ring)
2002 – The Pianist
2003 – City of God
2004 – Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
2005 – Brokeback Mountain
2006 – Children of Men
2007 – There Will Be Blood
2008 – wall-e
2009 – District 9 or Inglorious Basterds
2010 – Black Swan (over The Social Network)
2011 – Drive (not a fan of Tree of Life though its revered)
2012 – Beasts of the Southern Wild (over Amour)
2013 – 12 Years a Slave – first time I agreed with the Academy in 20+ years, and I think the critical/directorial consensus similarly agrees that the Oscars are almost always wrong (see the 2012 Sight & Sound poll of the world’s top critics and directors)
If you include foreign language films that were not on the Academy’s radar, I change a few of my choices for Best Picture, as follows:
1994 – Satantango or Chunking Express
1998 – The Celebration
1999 – All About My Mother
2000 – In the Mood for Love
2004 – Spring Summer Fall Winter Spring (over Cache)
2006 – close between Water and Pan’s Labyrinth and The Lives of Others, all great – would also have nominated Volver and Syndromes and a Century as top 5 of year
2007 – I keep There Will Be Blood but by a thread over 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days
2009 – A Prophet
2011 – A Separation
2013 – Blue is the Warmest Color or The Grandmaster (over The Great Beauty)
2014 – The Tale of the Princess Kaguya
Some of the past “errors” I would fix are:
City Lights and Modern Times are nominated and win Best Picture in 1932 and 1937
The Wizard of Oz wins Best Picture in 1940
Psycho is nominated and wins Best Picture in 1961
2001: A Space Odyssey is nominated and wins Best Picture in 1969
Chinatown wins Best Picture in 1975
Jaws wins Best Picture in 1976
E.T. wins Best Picture in 1983
Goodfellas wins Best Picture in 1991
The Social Network wins Best Picture in 2011
Those are what I’d change in the Best Picture category
There was a glitch in this flipbook embed that made all the comments sling to the “Oscar Bits and Bites” post —
— so anyone who tried to comment here, please go find your remarks in “Oscar Bits and Bites” and bring them back here to re-submit
I think we’ve fixed the glitch now.
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