The Academy Awards ceremony, often referred to as The Oscars, is one of the most publicized events in the entertainment industry. The awards are annually handed out by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, and usually garner admiration and respect from onlookers. Fans can expect lengthy speeches, some huge surprises, and, hopefully, an interesting host.
Often, however, The Oscars are given to films that, for one reason or another, shock – and not in the best way. Many films that have won major awards have either not quite stood the test of time, or were up against competition that could be said to be much more worthy of praise. In the worst instances, some films have won awards that come across as either transparently political – behind-the-scenes campaigning, and self-congratulatory praise for bare-minimum progressiveness – or simply the wrong decision.
Sensitive subject matter is discussed throughout pertaining to various films’ themes and stories.
15 Bohemian Rhapsody – Winner Of 9 Academy Awards, Including Best Editing, And Best Actor
91st Academy Awards, 2019
Bohemian Rhapsody was marred by tons of controversies, including many angry Queen fans who felt that the film overly relied on quick cuts. Many cited Queen’s first meeting with their manager as the worst example since it was just a simple conversation that somehow resulted in almost 60 snappy cuts in the span of one minute and 22 seconds. Editor John Ottman has since apologized, saying that Bohemian Rhapsody was not his best work and it only embarrasses him in hindsight.
Aside from others who felt that the film’s use of lip-syncing gave a general sense of blandness to the proceedings, there was the other major controversy of the director, Bryan Singer, who was fired from the film for being noticeably absent from shooting days. During the very same week that Singer was let go, several suits were filed that accused Bryan Singer of sexual assault. In all, the controversies did little to stop Bohemian Rhapsody from being a major success, and the film still has its fans.
Best Editing nominees that lost at the 91st Academy Awards:
• BlacKkKlansman
• Vice
• Green Book
• The Favourite
14 How Green Was My Valley – Winner Of 5 Academy Awards, Including Best Picture, And Best Director
14th Academy Awards, 1942
Today, Citizen Kane isn’t just considered to be one of the most influential watershed movies ever made, but one of the all-time best. The 14th Academy Awards told a different story. Not only did Orson Welles’ movie lose eight of its nine nominations, but it was also effectively shut out by the now-vilified How Green Was My Valley.
John Ford’s generational family drama wasn’t bad by any means, but it was a predictable bet that was rewarded for playing it safe, while Citizen Kane was ostracized for going against the norms of the era. Additionally, Welles’ movie was subjected to a smear campaign from newspaper mogul William Randolph Hearst, who viewed Kane as an attack on his credibility. When all is said and done, How Green Was My Valley is one of the worst John Ford films – in a towering body of work – and Citizen Kane is still just as potent as ever.
Best Film nominees that lost at the 14th Academy Awards:
• Blossoms in the Dust
• Citizen Kane
• Here Comes Mr. Jordan
• Hold Back the Dawn
• The Little Foxes
• The Maltese Falcon
• One Foot in Heaven
• Sergeant York
• Suspicion
13 Out Of Africa – Winner Of 7 Academy Awards, Including Best Picture, And Best Director
58th Academy Awards, 1986
A director with the pedigree of Sydney Pollack and stars like Meryl Streep and Robert Redford, Out of Africa seemingly had all the right ingredients for an Oscar-worthy picture. But upon release, the romantic drama film ended up with more of a lukewarm reception due to a long running time and Redford’s mediocre, phoned-in performance. Even today, critics are baffled by how Out of Africa took the top spot that night, especially over Steven Spielberg’s adaptation of The Color Purple.
No Best Picture winner since World War II has been as poorly reviewed as Out of Africa, Sydney Pollack’s soporific movie about two white people having a romance in Kenya. If the Academy wanted to reward Pollack, they should have given the award to Tootsie in 1983. Additionally, while The Color Purple was a substantially better nominee than Out of Africa for the 1986 Oscars, the Academy really messed up by neglecting to nominate Back to the Future, Ran, or After Hours.
Best Film nominees that lost at the 58th Academy Awards:
• The Color Purple
• Kiss of the Spider Woman
• Prizzi’s Honor
• Witness
12 Forrest Gump – Winner Of 6 Academy Awards, Including Best Picture, Best Director, And Best Actor
67th Academy Awards, 1995
The 67th Academy Awards went down in history for having one of the most impressive Best Picture line-ups ever seen. Here, Quentin Tarantino’s countercultural classic Pulp Fiction went up against the epic Stephen King adaptation The Shawshank Redemption for the top prize. Instead, the idyllic and saccharine Forrest Gump won Best Picture in 1995.
At its worst, Forrest Gump was an unchallenging comedic melodrama that seemingly affirmed what could charitably be described as a conservative view of American history. Unlike its Best Picture rivals, Forrest Gump’s retroactive analyses have been unkind, with modern viewers getting more annoyed by Forrest’s naivety than charmed.
Best Picture Nominees that lost at the 67th Academy Awards:
• Four Weddings and a Funeral
• Pulp Fiction
• Quiz Show
• The Shawshank Redemption
11 The King’s Speech – Winner Of 4 Academy Awards, Including Best Picture, And Best Actor
83rd Academy Awards, 2011
Today, The King’s Speech is only remembered for how forgettable it is and how its director went on to make Cats. The historical drama about King George V overcoming his speech impediment just in time for World War II wasn’t the worst of its kind but it paled when contrasted to daring competition like Black Swan, Inception, or The Social Network.
Adding to the vitriolwas how the biopic won shortly after the Academy adjusted its Best Picture rules to make more room for genre movies following The Reader’s backlash. As far as critics were concerned, the Academy was still biased towards dramas that mainstream viewers barely cared about, and The King’s Speech provided them the proof they needed.
Best Picture nominees that lost at the 83rd Academy Awards:
• Black Swan
• The Fighter
• Inception
• The Kids Are Alright
• 127 Hours
• The Social Network
• Toy Story 3
• True Grit
• Winter’s Bone
10 My Fair Lady – Winner Of 8 Academy Awards, Including Best Picture, And Best Director
37th Academy Awards, 1965
Rex Harrison is a fine, reliable actor. But his performance in My Fair Lady absolutely didn’t deserve the Best Actor Oscar in 1965. The best performance by far was from Peter Sellers, who played three different characters in Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, whose virtuoso performance remains iconic. Nowadays, hardly anyone seems to care about Rex Harrison’s role as Henry Higgins, the man who takes it upon himself to turn a working-class woman into a presentable member of society.
Additionally, Peter O’Toole and Richard Burton were both nominated for Becket, an adaptation of a play that did actually win the award for Best Screenplay, despite being nominated for a total of 12 awards. It remains baffling that such easy fare like My Fair Lady can receive critical acclaim and then fall by the historical wayside as time goes on. Dr. Strangelove remains as potent as ever, and a tour de force of directing, acting, and writing.
Best Actor nominees who lost at the 37th Academy Awards:
• Richard Burton, Becket
• Peter O’Toole, Becket
• Anthony Quinn, Zorba the Greek
• Peter Sellers, Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
9 The Reader – Winner Of The Academy Award For Best Actress
81st Academy Awards, 2009
During her appearance on the comedy show Extras, Kate Winslet parodied herself by portraying an actress who was so desperate for an Oscar that she starred in a movie about the Holocaust. Sometime later, this skit became prophetic when Winslet was declared Best Actress for her role in The Reader, a movie about the Holocaust.
What made this controversial wasn’t just Winslet’s character (basically an illiterate Nazi), but what her movie represented. Besides accusations of downplaying the Holocaust, The Reader was rewarded for pandering to the Academy’s prestige biases, letting them ignore genre fare like The Dark Knightand WALL-E. Thiscaused such an uproar that the rules for Best Picture nominees were changed.
Best Actress nominees who lost at the 81st Academy Awards:
• Anne Hathaway, Rachel Getting Married
• Angelina Jolie, Changeling
• Melissa Leo, Frozen River
• Meryl Streep, Doubt
8 Shakespeare In Love – Winner Of 7 Academy Awards, Including Best Picture, And Best Actress
71st Academy Awards, 1999
In a vacuum, Shakespeare in Love is an inoffensive-if-disposable historical romance that shined a new light on William Shakespeare’s life and literary legacy. As the 71st Academy Awards’ big winner its victories included Best Picture and Best Actress. However, the Shakespeare rom-com – definitely not Shakespearean – was also a cynical ploy engineered to win Oscar trophies.
From its release, the film’s producers launched a zealous campaign for Shakespeare in Love while smearing the reputation of Steven Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan. The underhanded tactics worked and were even copied by other studios, but in the long run, Shakespeare In Love’s mediocrity was exposed and any merits it had were nullified by how it won.
Best Picture nominees that lost at the 71st Academy Awards:
• Elizabeth
• Life is Beautiful
• Saving Private Ryan
• The Thin Red Line
7 Rocky – Winner Of 3 Academy Awards, Including Best Picture, And Best Director
49th Academy Awards, 1977
Three masterpieces were nominated for best picture in 1977: Taxi Driver, All the President’s Men, and Network. The winner? Sylvester Stallone’s sappy boxing movie, Rocky. While the film remains a Philadelphian classic, and a prime example of the underdog tale done right, it pales in comparison with some of the greatest films of its era.
To put it simply, Rocky has no bite. It’s an easy film that tells you how to feel as it plays out. While it’s certainly a cleanly made film, it’s designed to be an efficient emotional machine, and doesn’t have any of the serious themes that are present in the other Best Picture Nominees. Taxi Driver remains one of Scorsese’s best works, a work of bilious rage at the hypocrisy of the modern world in the wake of Vietnam. And Network remains one of the great all-time films about television, exploitation, and what qualifies as “entertainment.”
Best Picture nominees that lost at the 49th Academy Awards:
• All the President’s Men
• Bound for Glory
• Network
• Taxi Driver
6 The Pianist – Winner of 3 Academy Awards, Including Best Director, And Best Actor
75th Academy Awards, 2003
Ever since winning big at the 75th Academy Awards, The Pianist has been mired in controversy for reasons beyond its actual quality. Issues include Adrian Brody’s method acting, the movie’s subject matter (i.e. The Holocaust) which cynics saw as pandering to the Academy, and everything about its director’s history.
Polanski won Best Director, despite his known history of sexual assault and worse. Notably, Polanski didn’t attend the ceremony in Hollywood, Los Angeles because he was still living in France to evade arrest. In light of the #MeToo movement and more, the Academy’s rewarding of Polanski’s work on The Pianist has been heavily lambasted and scrutinized.
Best Director nominees who lost at the 75th Academy Awards:
• Rob Marshall, Chicago
• Martin Scorsese, Gangs of New York
• Stephen Daldry, The Hours
• Pedro Almódovar, Talk to Her
5 Annie Hall – Winner Of 4 Academy Awards, Including Best Picture, And Best Director
50th Academy Awards, 1978
Even momentarily ignoring director/writer/star Woody Allen’s real-world indiscretions, Annie Hall has not aged well at all. What once was a quirky love story between a charming academic and a free-spirited woman has been exposed as self-pitying wish-fulfillment on Allen’s part, especially since he cast himself as the leading man, Alvy Singer.
Worse, Alvy’s treatment of the titular Annie is now recognized as objectification at best and emotional abuse at worst. Allen’s past accusations of grooming and molestation made it impossible to separate him from Annie Hall, which made its wins in the 50th Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Director, and his legacy more controversial with each passing year.
Best Picture nominees that lost at the 50th Academy Awards:
• Goodbye Girl
• Julia
• Star Wars
• The Turning Point
4 Argo – Winner Of 3 Academy Awards, Including Best Picture, And Adapted Screenplay
85th Academy Awards, 2013
Looking back, the Oscar campaign for Argo is baffling. Ben Affleck, snubbed for a best director nomination, was somehow deemed “due,” so the Academy handed his movie a Best Picture statuette. The film is forgettable, and remains one of the more controversial Best Picture winners. In a year with films by Ang Lee, Steven Spielberg, David O. Russell, Kathryn Bigelow, Quentin Tarantino, and Michael Haneke, it’s a wonder that Argo was even nominated.
The film tells the story of a real-world incident that took place in 1979, in which armed militants storm a U.S. Embassy in Tehran. Argo turns the story into a sensationalist puff piece, in which the events – which actually featured artwork by Jack Kirby – becomes a by-the-numbers heist-like rescue tale. It’s not that the real incident isn’t worth remembering, it’s that there’s nothing texturally interesting about the entire film’s execution of interesting events.
Best Picture nominees that lost at the 85th Academy Awards:
• Amour
• Beasts of the Southern Wild
• Django Unchained
• Les Misérables
• Life of Pi
• Lincoln
• Silver Linings Playbook
• Zero Dark Thirty
3 Crash – Winner Of 3 Academy Awards, Including Best Picture, And Best Original Screenplay
78th Academy Awards, 2006
Even when it was named Best Picture in 2005, Crash was a controversial and already despised winner. The ensemble drama tackled discrimination patronizingly, and its themes can be summarized as “racism exists.” Most controversially, the openly racist Sgt. John Ryan was excused and made sympathetic because he had a terminally ill parent.
In the years since, and especially in light of anti-racism movements and demands for police reform, Crash has been routinely deemed one of, if not the worst, Oscar winners of all time. Crash’s stars rarely, if ever, talk about the film, and director Paul Haggis even expressed doubt and regret over his movie’s victory at the 78th Academy Awards.
Best Picture nominees that lost at the 78th Academy Awards:
• Good Night, And Good Luck
• Match Point
• The Squid and the Whale
• Syriana
2 Green Book – Winner Of 3 Academy Awards, Including Best Picture, And Best Supporting Actor
91st Academy Awards, 2019
Black Panther wasn’t just one of 2018’s biggest blockbusters, but a cultural phenomenon. T’Challa’s movie was a great step forward for Black representation in popular film, with many thinking it was an obvious Best Picture winner. Instead, it lost to the conservative Green Book, unfortunately echoing Driving Miss Daisy’s controversial win over Do The Right Thing in 1990.
As a Civil Rights-era biopic told mostly from a white man’s perspective, Green Book was already controversial before it won. In light of political movements, Chadwick Boseman’s passing, Black Panther‘s legacy, backlash from Dr. Don Shirley’s family, and revelations of director Peter Farrelly’s past sexual indecency, Green Book fell into first into infamy and then into obscurity just months after its big night.
Best Picture nominees that lost at the 91st Academy Awards:
• Black Panther
• BlacKkKlansman
• Bohemian Rhapsody
• The Favourite
• Roma
• A Star is Born
• Vice
1 Driving Miss Daisy – Winner Of 4 Academy Awards, Including Best Picture, And Adapted Screenplay
62nd Academy Awards, 1990
Much like Green Book, Driving Miss Daisy is a film that panders to a very specific audience with a very limited view of race relations in the United States. It’s the sort of feel-good filmmaking that allows everyone to safely sit in the theater for an hour-and-a-half and feel like they’ve had an “experience.” While the film itself isn’t entirely unwatchable, it’s the fact that Miss Daisy won an Oscar for Best Picture that seems particularly out of touch with the real world.
When considering that Spike Lee’s early masterwork Do the Right Thing came out the very same year as Driving Miss Daisy, it’s hard to not feel sour that Lee’s film wasn’t even nominated for Best Picture. Do the Right Thing was nominated for a measly two Oscars, including Best Actor in a Supporting Role, and Original Screenplay – winning neither. For films that were nominated, it’s hard not to see the feel-good charm and timelessness of Field of Dreams as at least being worthy of some praise for becoming a dad favorite everywhere. The rest of the films are more serious-minded, and any one of them would be a better pick than a film that has faded into obscurity – unless it’s brought up as a joke.
Best Picture nominees that lost at the 62nd Academy Awards:
• Born on the Fourth of July
• Dead Poets Society
• Field of Dreams
• My Left Foot