This is something I actually did a few years ago for fun. I know– I have a strange idea of fun. Still, it’s such an interesting “nerd” idea I decided to do it again: an “All-Time” Oscar ballot.
The premise is simple enough: taking into account the entire breadth of my movie-watching history, from the silent era through to the present day, I basically compiled a list of the best of every category the Academy hands out awards for in feature filmmaking, and what I would consider the greatest accomplishments in each. Of course, such lists are completely subjective. My choices for the greatest performances or visual effects are likely not going to match another’s, sometimes due to personal opinion, sometimes because I just haven’t seen the film cited yet.
I hope you enjoy what I’ve chosen here. It’s a pretty widespread list if I say so myself, with some pretty peculiar choices to go with the “obvious ones.”
Viva La Resistance!
Brian Skutle
www.sonic-cinema.com
To read my thoughts on the current Oscar nominations, click here.
Best Picture
“Vertigo”
“2001: A Space Odyssey”
“Schindler’s List”
“Pulp Fiction”
“Andrei Rublev”
“Sherlock Jr.”
“Fantasia” & “Fantasia/2000”
“Gone With the Wind”
“GoodFellas”
“Ran”
Best Director
Stanley Kubrick, “2001: A Space Odyssey”
Alfred Hitchcock, “Vertigo”
Steven Spielberg, “Schindler’s List”
Andrei Tarkovsky, “Andrei Rublev”
Martin Scorsese, “GoodFellas”
Best Actor
James Stewart, “Vertigo”
Humphrey Bogart, “The Treasure of the Sierra Madre”
Anthony Perkins, “Psycho”
Peter Sellers, “Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb”
Marcello Mastroianni, “8 1/2”
Best Actress
Vivian Leigh, “Gone With the Wind”
Kim Novak, “Vertigo”
Joan Fontaine, “Rebecca”
Frances McDormond, “Fargo”
Gloria Swanson, “Sunset Boulevard”
Best Supporting Actor
Samuel L. Jackson, “Pulp Fiction”
Al Pacino, “The Godfather”
Orson Welles, “Touch of Evil”
Marlon Brando, “Apocalypse Now”
Joe Pesci, “GoodFellas”
Best Supporting Actress
Angela Lansbury, “The Manchurian Candidate”
Mieko Harada, “Ran”
Marilyn Monroe, “Some Like It Hot”
Jodie Foster, “Taxi Driver”
Lilian Gish, “The Night of the Hunter”
Best Original Screenplay
“Pulp Fiction” (Quentin Tarantino & Roger Avery)
“Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” (Charlie Kaufman, Michel Gondry, Pierre Bismuth)
“2001: A Space Odyssey” (Stanley Kubrick & Arthur C. Clarke)
“8 1/2” (Federico Fellini, Ennio Flaiano, Tullio Pinelli, Brunello Rondi)
“Andrei Rublev” (Andrei Tarkovsky & Andrei Mikhalkov-Konchalovsky)
Best Adapted Screenplay
“Vertigo” (Alec Coppel & Samuel Taylor)
“The Godfather” (Francis Ford Coppola & Mario Puzo)
“Gone With the Wind” (Sidney Howard)
“The Lord of the Rings” (Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens, Stephen Sinclair)
“Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb” (Stanley Kubrick, Terry Southern, Peter George)
Best Original Score
“Vertigo” (Bernard Herrmann)
“Star Wars: Episode V- The Empire Strikes Back” (John Williams)
“The Good, the Bad & the Ugly” (Ennio Morricone)
“The Godfather” (Nina Rota & Carmine Coppola)
“The Crow” (Graeme Revell)
Best Original Song
“Over the Rainbow” from “The Wizard of Oz” (Harold Arlen & E.Y. Harburg)
“Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head” from “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” (Burt Bacharach and Hal David)
“When You Wish Upon a Star” from “Pinocchio” (Leigh Harline & Ned Washington)
“Somewhere Out There” from “An American Tail” (James Horner & Cynthia Weil)
“That’s What Friends Are For” from “Night Shift” (Burt Bacharach & Carole Bayer Sager)
Best Animated Feature
“Fantasia” & “Fantasia/2000”
“Wall-E”
“Spirited Away”
“Toy Story 2”
“Ghost in the Shell”
Best Foreign Language Film
“Andrei Rublev”
“Ran”
“Nosferatu”
“8 1/2”
“Metropolis”
Best Documentary Feature
“Roger & Me”
“F for Fake”
“Haxan: Witchcraft Through the Ages”
“Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Red Robin Hills” & “Paradise Lost 2: Revelations”
“Man on Wire”
Best Visual Effects
“2001: A Space Odyssey”
“The Lord of the Rings”
“Star Wars: Episode V- The Empire Strikes Back”
Best Sound
“2001: A Space Odyssey”
“Touch of Evil”
“Amadeus”
“Pink Floyd: The Wall”
“The Crow”
Best Sound Editing
“Wall-E”
“Star Wars: Episode IV- A New Hope”
“2001: A Space Odyssey”
“Stalker”
“THX-1138”
Best Film Editing
“Intolerance”
“Pulp Fiction”
“Inception”
“The Godfather: Part II”
“Andrei Rublev”
Best Cinematography
“Apocalypse Now”
“Vertigo”
“Andrei Rublev”
“JFK”
“The Shining”
Best Art Direction
“Metropolis”
“Dark City”
“Nosferatu”
“Schindler’s List”
“Gone With the Wind”
Best Makeup
“Nosferatu”
“Citizen Kane”
“The Lord of the Rings”
Best Costume Design
“Ran”
“Gone With the Wind”
“Andrei Rublev”
“Intolerance”
“Amadeus”
