Ignored By the Oscar: Best Picture Nominees That Should Have Been

[Buscemi]

The biggest snub of 2008 (the year that led to the expanded field) was Wall-E's failure to get a Best Picture nomination. And when the ceremony happened, its failure to win either Best Sound Oscar or any other award besides Best Animated Feature.

2007 (the year it almost wasn't held due to the WGA strike) was absolutely ridiculous in the Best Picture nominations. Michael Clayton was good but not Oscar-worthy. Atonement was typical dreary World War II period piece while the less said about Juno, the better (perhaps the worst Best Original Screenplay winner ever, Ratatouille should have won). Into the Wild, Gone Baby Gone, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, Ratatouille, The Mist (yeah, I said it), The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, Persepolis, Zodiac, Eastern Promises, and Knocked Up would have better choices than those three (and there's the other quality movies from that year that would have had no chance but are worth mentioning such as Grindhouse, Bug, The Simpsons Movie, Hairspray, Walk Hard, Hot Fuzz, The Bourne Ultimatum, We Own the Night, Lars and the Real Girl, and Youth Without Youth).

[Spencer_Kain92]

2014: Gone Girl was SNUBBED!

[AaronJ]

Originally Posted by Spencer_Kain92

2014: Gone Girl was SNUBBED!

It was ridiculous that it received only one nomination (Rosamund Pike, who definitely deserved it).

[LuckyDragon]

Nominee that should have been.

Winner that should have been.

[Spencer_Kain92]

Originally Posted by AaronJ

It was ridiculous that it received only one nomination (Rosamund Pike, who definitely deserved it).

totally agree! should have been nominated for Best Picture, Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Score. yes Rosamund Like should have won IMO

[AaronJ]

Originally Posted by Spencer_Kain92

totally agree! should have been nominated for Best Picture, Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Score. yes Rosamund Like should have won IMO

Honestly,

[Show spoiler]the way she played that character was SO scary. She's one of the creepiest characters in recent film memory. Of course, she's that way in the book too. But I thought Pike took it to another level.

[Spencer_Kain92]

Originally Posted by AaronJ

Honestly,

[Show spoiler]the way she played that character was SO scary. She's one of the creepiest characters in recent film memory. Of course, she's that way in the book too. But I thought Pike took it to another level.

Amy is one of my favorite characters in a film and a book.

[Show spoiler]she's completely insane and Rosamund KILLED it as Amy. pun intended

[Bonzi]

1953: Singin' in the Rain

[See u at da party!]

Without a doubt Terminator 2 should of been nominated in 91. T2 wasn't a typical action movie, it had the action also revolutionary special effects, great acting,directing and story. IMO the only perfect movie ever made. Silence of the lambs was good, but I think 90% of the world would say T2 is a better movie.

[Coenskubrick]

Originally Posted by See u at da party!

Without a doubt Terminator 2 should of been nominated in 91. T2 wasn't a typical action movie, it had the action also revolutionary special effects, great acting,directing and story. IMO the only perfect movie ever made. Silence of the lambs was good, but I think 90% of the world would say T2 is a better movie.

Would they though?

[AaronJ]

Originally Posted by Coenskubrick

Would they though?

I guess I'm part of the 10%.

[Coenskubrick]

Originally Posted by AaronJ

I guess I'm part of the 10%.

As am I. I don't know if 90% of people would really think Terminator 2 was better than Silence of the Lambs. Maybe 50%.

[LuckyDragon]

T2 may or may not be better than The Silence of the Lambs, but it's certainly better than Avatar, which was nominated, and Titanic, which won.

It's all moot though, because I think we can all agree that Ernest Scared Stupid deserved the statue for 1991.

[Scarriere]

Originally Posted by demonknight

What are the movies that should have gotten Best Picture nods from their respective ceremonies but tragically did not?

8th (1935)- The Bride of Frankenstein
56th (1983)- The King of Comedy
61st (1988)- Blue Velvet
65th (1992)- Dazed and Confused
68th (1995)- Se7en; Before Sunrise
69th (1996)- Trainspotting
70th (1997)- Jackie Brown
72nd (1999)- Fight Club
73rd (2000)- Almost Famous
74th (2001)- The Royal Tenenbaums; Mulholland Dr.
75th (2002)- Adaptation; Catch Me If You Can; Confessions of a Dangerous Mind
77th (2004)- Before Sunset; The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou
81st (2008)- The Dark Knight
85th (2012)- Skyfall
86th (2013)- Before Midnight; Inside Llewyn Davis

I think it's insane those bolded movies weren't nominated.

[Blumacaw]

Kill Bill 2 deserved BP.

[Talleyrand]

Originally Posted by See u at da party!

Without a doubt Terminator 2 should of been nominated in 91. T2 wasn't a typical action movie, it had the action also revolutionary special effects, great acting,directing and story. IMO the only perfect movie ever made. Silence of the lambs was good, but I think 90% of the world would say T2 is a better movie.

Ohhhh, I don't know if I'd go that far. There were lots of great movies in the year of my birth, but I would say Kafka is the best of all of them. As I noted earlier, it should definitely have had Prince of Tides' spot. And, yeah, T2 is a classic and should probably have taken Beauty and the Beast's spot. But I think I do prefer SotL to T2.

That being said, Terminator 1 (a much even better film imo) definitely deserved a nomination in 1984, although hot a win, as that was the year of ONCE UPON A TIME IN AMERICA. The nominations that year were a disaster, though, so whatever.

[Darth Marcus]

2015: Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Creed, Sicario
2014: Gone Girl, Calvary, A Most Violent Year, Nightcrawler
2013: Rush, Prisoners, Inside Llewyn Davis
2012: Skyfall, Looper, The Master
2011: Drive, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Shame
2010: The Ghost Writer, The Town
2009: Fantastic Mr. Fox, A Prophet
2008: The Dark Knight, Wall·E, Let the Right One In
2007: American Gangster, Eastern Promises, Zodiac
2006: Casino Royale, The Prestige, Children of Men, The Lives of Others, United 93, Pan's Labyrinth
2004: Downfall, Collateral, Hotel Rwanda, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Kill Bill: Vol. 2
2003: Finding Nemo, Kill Bill: Vol. 1
2002: Catch Me If You Can, Road to Perdition, Minority Report, City of God
2001: Black Hawk Down, The Royal Tenenbaums
2000: Memento, Almost Famous, O Brother, Where Art Thou?
1999: Fight Club, Three Kings, The Matrix
1998: The Truman Show, The Big Lebowski, American History X
1997: Boogie Nights, Jackie Brown
1995: Heat, Se7en, Casino
1989: Glory, When Harry Met Sally...
1988: The Last Temptation of Christ
1987: Full Metal Jacket
1985: Back to the Future
1984: Paris, Texas, Once Upon a Time in America
1983: Das Boot
1982: Blade Runner
1980: The Empire Strikes Back
1979: Alien
1978: Days of Heaven
1977: Close Encounters of the Third Kind
1975: The Man Who Would Be King
1974: Young Frankenstein, Serpico
1969: The Wild Bunch
1968: Once Upon a Time in the West, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Rosemary's Baby, Planet of the Apes
1967: The Producers
1966: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
1963: The Great Escape, 8½
1962: The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
1960: Psycho
1959: North by Northwest
1958: Vertigo
1957: Paths of Glory, Sweet Smell of Success
1956: The Searchers
1955: Rear Window, Diabolique
1954: Seven Samurai

[RickDee]

Originally Posted by Talleyrand

Well, I can't go back to the beginning right now, but:

88th - Quite good on the whole, but no Hateful Eight or Sicario is problematic. Brooklyn was horrible and has no business there.

87th - Terrible selections, on the whole, the best of them are only pretty good and the worst are BAD. Nightcrawler and Inherent Vice are the obvious snubs. John Wick would have been nice, but no real chance. The Raid 2 for best foreign language.

86th - Not bad at all. I would have liked to see The Counselor up for Picture, Director, Screenplay, Actor, Supporting Actor (x2) and Supporting Actress (x2) but yeah, that wasn't going to happen. Most of the selections are pretty good though and even a lot of the winners are okay choices.

85th - Mix of very good and pretty bad choices. Obvious snubs are Killing Them Softly (which should have won best picture, director, screenplay, actor, and had three or four supporting actor noms as well, and a win) and End of Watch, and Dredd (a much better "popularity contest" choice than Mad Max imo). Extremely strong Foreign Language category that year, too bad THE GREAT LAND OF DENMARK produced TWO masterpieces with my boy Mads and only one could get in!

84th - Almost complete trainwreck. Killer Joe, We Need To Talk About Kevin, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, Drive, Drive Angry, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Shame, The Raid, Take Shelter, all missing? Hugo, Midnight in Paris and Moneyball are the only good films of the set.

83rd - Good front end, poor back end. I Saw the Devil should at least have got a foreign language nom if not best picture nom.

82nd - Disaster. One film of ten deserves to be there. Well, 2009 was very weak so maybe not, it was a bad year to expand the category. Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans is missing, though.

81st - I snicker at Nolan getting turned down because he really didn't deserve it. Hunger, In Bruges and Doubt did, however.

80th - Excellent top end (although they went with the wrong grim neo-Western) but terrible back end. This might be the only year I can think of offhand where both the best and worst film of the year got nominated. Zodiac, Gone Baby Gone and Jesse James are missing.

79th - No major complaints, this might be the only year where the best film of the year not only good nominated but won, although Casino Royale should be in over Little Miss Sunshine

78th - Mostly good choices, although War of the Worlds and Jarhead are better than the actual winner. Never seen Brokeback and never will, so I can't speak to its quality.

77th - Nothing severely wrong here although Collateral and Passion of the Christ are missing.

76th - Mystic River should have won.

75th - Decent, although we are now back far enough that I've seen a lot less than above. Count of Monte Cristo should have been up there, I guess.

74th - Mulholland Drive.

73rd - Requiem For a Dream, Snatch, American Psycho over Gladiator, Chocolat and Erin.

72nd - Disaster. Magnolia, Boondock Saints, Fight Club, Eyes Wide Shut, Talented Mr. Ripley, Matrix are all better than any of the nominees.

71st - Pretty good. Wouldn't mind a Dark City nom.

70th - Okay choices in strong year. Titanic is ridiculous, however, and its success is no less irksome for its inevitability. Strong year, however, and ten nominations could easily have been reasonable filled, Boogie Nights, Amistad, Conspiracy Theory, Nil by Mouth, being great films. However, given the strength of the year, only Boogie Nights is a truly glaring mistake.

69th - Okay.

68th - Casino should have won every category. At least it got Sharon Stone a nod.

67th - Forrest f***ing Gump???!! This should be up for Razzies and winning them, not Oscars??? Appallingly bad film. Actually, my earlier comment about 2007 was wrong, as in 1994 they also apparently nominated both the best and worst picture of the year. That all aside, besides the glaring nonsense of Gump being there, good choices. Literally ANY other film from 1994 would be better than Gump, but for the sake of naming one, Leon.

66th - Excellent choices. Too bad Falling Down and True Romance were omitted, though.

65th - Bad Lieutenant?

64th - Kafka over the Prince of Tides for sure, otherwise, excellent choices.

63rd - King of New York? Wild at Heart?

The only thing I can say is WTF?

[Kevinicus]

Originally Posted by demonknight

What are the movies that should have gotten Best Picture nods from their respective ceremonies but tragically did not?

8th (1935)- The Bride of Frankenstein
56th (1983)- The King of Comedy
61st (1988)- Blue Velvet
65th (1992)- Dazed and Confused
68th (1995)- Se7en; Before Sunrise
69th (1996)- Trainspotting
70th (1997)- Jackie Brown
72nd (1999)- Fight Club
73rd (2000)- Almost Famous
74th (2001)- The Royal Tenenbaums; Mulholland Dr.
75th (2002)- Adaptation; Catch Me If You Can; Confessions of a Dangerous Mind
77th (2004)- Before Sunset; The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou
81st (2008)- The Dark Knight
85th (2012)- Skyfall
86th (2013)- Before Midnight; Inside Llewyn Davis

The only one I agree with is The Dark Knight. Quite a few of those I didn't like at all.

[AaronJ]

Originally Posted by Kevinicus

The only one I agree with is The Dark Knight. Quite a few of those I didn't like at all.

That's truly head-scratching. I can't imagine how someone could not like "quite a few" of those films, or at least acknowledge that they were excellent films.

Hmm.

Anyways, I think Fight Club easily should have not only been nominated but won. The problem with, though, is that it's just a little too out there for the Academy voters (who, remember, have a median age of ~62) to wrap their heads around.