What was the first ‘Best Picture’ winner to feature a cell phone.
What was the first (assuming there were any at all) ‘Best Picture’ winner to feature a mobile phone [you know, the old timey ones that went thru a mobile operator]. Possibly there weren’t any in this case.
Google-fu failed me.
Rain Man (1988) features Tom Cruise talking on a car phone, if that counts.
I think American Beauty in 1999 is a good guess for the first question.
I see a few folks claiming that Lethal Weapon and Wall Street (both 1987) were some of the first films that had a “mobile phone” in it, and don’t see many good candidates between that year and 1999 in the Best Picture winner lists (lots of period pieces and what-not).
Yeah, I didn’t specifically mean a portable cell phone, althought that would be another interesting trivia point. I think one of the aforementioned ‘Lethal Weapon’ movies featured a bag phone (although it was somewhat short of ‘Best Picture’ 
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It wasn’t a best picture winner or even a nominee but Sabrina featured Humphrey Bogart on a mobile phone in 1954. I don’t remember any other films of the era with a car phone but there must have been some.
As the question is for a “Best Picture” I searched but was not very good in finding if in Vietnam (circa 1970) the military field phones were considered to be early cell phone tech, they were mobile though.
So I wonder if Platoon (1986) is the one.
I watched American Beauty fairly recently and don’t recall any cell phone usage, though that doesn’t mean there wasn’t any.
Parts of Titanic (1997) took place in present day, so that’s another possibility.
Interesting point about Platoon, though I’m fairly confident that was just a two-way radio they were using. (One of the definitions of “phone”, I’m assuming, is the ability to contact multiple parties from the same device.)
If none of the above count, then we’re probably looking at Million Dollar Baby (2004) or The Departed (2006). I’m 90% certain the latter does feature a cell phone at some point; not sure about the former.
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003) features a palantir. 
I based that on a “goofs” page that mentions a cell phone. I didn’t actually recall the scene in question. Cite is here: American Beauty (1999) mistakes
I considered that too. Any chance someone on the boat had a cell phone? Seems a more likely to be a satphone or radio.
That’s more of a party line, right?
This video contains the falling-out-of-briefcase scene (@0:58) but I’m not convinced it’s an actual phone, looks more like a PDA.
Cell phone usage in The Departed confirmed here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xds1NklC-Gs
Related, the main character (played by Jack Lemmon) had a car phone in 1973’s Save the Tiger. Lemmon won an Oscar for best actor and the film was nominated for best original screenplay, though not for best film.
You made me look more, and indeed they called them phones:
Sure they used radio, but that is also what cell phones use, and the OP was talking about mobile phones that needed an operator too.
People were constantly texting each other in The Departed. It was a major part of the plot. Texting was just becoming a popular method of communication at the time. They way that they text on dumb phones instantly dates the movie.
Car phones have been around for a long time. I don’t know if there are earlier BP winners that had one, but you could see them in other movies and television from the 50s and 60s.
I know, it was just the earliest example I could offhand name of an Oscar-winning performance (to clarify, Jack Lemmon won Best Actor, but the film itself was not even nominated for Best Picture) that involved a mobile phone.
Note that “car phone” is being loosely used here.
To most people, a car phone was a cell phone installed in a car. (Remember the little spiral antenna on rear windows?) In the early days of cell phones, they were big, used a lot of juice, etc. So a car was a suitable place to have one nearby without lugging a big heavy bag around and worrying about charging.
There were several radiotelephone systems available prior to cell phones. Even bigger, heavier, etc. Plus a good sized whip antenna. So again, a car/truck was a suitable installation site. But the word “mobile” was usually part of the system name, rather than the keyword “cellular” which was a huge jump in technology. Those started rolling out in 1983.
(But people get loose with terms. E.g., in the UK where “mobile” is the shorthand for a cell phone.)
It would have to be a contemporary movie also, many of the BP winners were not, so there may not be one.