In 48 hours, there will be a new Best Picture winner of the Academy Awards (unless what happened last year happens again). So I thought it’d be interesting to take a glance through the last 13 years of winners and see how they’ve fared since.
I’m starting with 2003 because that was the year in which my interest in both cinema and the Oscars started.
2003
Winner: The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
Nominees: Lost in Translation, Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, Mystic River, Seabiscuit
Thoughts: I love The Lord of the Rings trilogy. It’s the movies that made me fall in love with filmmaking. But if I had to pick the best of the three, it wouldn’t be The Return of the King. I suspect it won mostly as a recognition as a whole than separately; yet since this was the last time it had a stab at the Oscar for Best Picture, I can’t fault the choice. It’s the only instance of a fantasy film winning the top prize.
Should Have Won: In a different year, I’d argue for Lost in Translation or Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World. Bad timing.
2004
Winner: Million Dollar Baby
Nominees: The Aviator, Finding Neverland, Ray, Sideways
Thoughts: Disclosure: I haven’t watched Million Dollar Baby, so I can’t really comment on whether the win is justified. But I’ve watched Sideways twice already and I feel it’s a more deserving candidate. Not very objective, I know.
Should Have Won: Sideways
2005
Winner: Crash
Nominees: Brokeback Mountain, Capote, Good Night and Good Luck, Munich
Thoughts: Another disclosure: I haven’t seen Brokeback Mountain. But I’m fully aware of the controversy. That said, I remember watching Crash a long time ago… and finding it enjoyable. I did find Munich great: it was the first Steven Spielberg film I watched in the cinema (and given the nature of its material, I still can’t believe I convinced my parents to take me to see it- at age 11!).
Should Have Won: No comment.
2006
Winner: The Departed
Nominees: Babel, Letters From Iwo Jima, Little Miss Sunshine, The Queen
Thoughts: It’s not a question of whether The Departed is a good film (spoiler: it is) so much as whether it’s as good as the other great Martin Scorsese films- and that’s a sizeable list. The short answer is both: yes and no, but that’s because Scorsese’s best at that time already included classics like Mean Streets, Taxi Driver, Raging Bull and Goodfellas. That said, it’s a damn fine film, so I can’t complain here.
Should Have Won: The Departed, simply because Scorsese was long overdue.
2007
Winner: No Country for Old Men
Nominees: Atonement, Juno, Michael Clayton, There Will Be Blood
Thoughts: This is actually a great crop of films vying for the award. I’d have liked Juno to win but No Country for Old Men is probably one of the Coen brothers’ best films after Fargo. They deserved it even if only for creating nerve-wracking tension over Javier Bardem asking a shop owner the most he’s ever lost in a coin toss. Now that is master-class filmmaking!
Should Have Won: No Country for Old Men
2008
Winner: Slumdog Millionaire
Nominees: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Frost/Nixon, Milk, The Reader
Thoughts: The Dark Knight was robbed of a Best Picture nomination over The Reader and it was the snub heard around the world. It was also the indirect cause of the Best Picture category expanding to include more than five nominations. Therefore, given the selection, I like that Slumdog Millionaire won. It’s a feel-good film, but isn’t that what films are meant to be? They are created to entertain, uplift and inspire us- and that is precisely what Danny Boyle’s hyper-kinetic film about a poor boy from the Indian slums finding himself winning on the game show, ‘Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?’. Pity it ruined it by inserting a dance sequence in the end credits.
Should Have Won: The Dark Knight– which should have been nominated in the first place!
2009
Winner: The Hurt Locker
Nominees: Avatar, The Blind Side, District 9, An Education, Inglourious Basterds, Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire, A Serious Man, Up, Up in the Air
Thoughts: I’ve only ever gotten through half of The Hurt Locker and that’s because it’s pretty harrowing. I have no complaints about it winning over the other nominees- it deserved to.
Should Have Won: I’ll stay with this choice, though I did like Inglourious Basterds.
The Snarky Quill 
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