Maybe so (although I’m now curious with how strong the correlation is between, say, Rotten Tomatoes & BP winners is). But I’m not sure this follows:
Let’s look at the Best Picture nominees this year and their domestic box office standing:
http://www.moviefone.com/oscars-academy-awards/nominee-winner
Here are the box office standings for the Best Picture nominees for 2010:
Black Swan is #28.
The Fighter is #38.
Inception is #6.
The Kids Are Alright is #114.
The King’s Speech is #24.
127 Hours is #121.
The Social Network is #32.
Toy Story 3 is #1.
True Grit is #13.
Winter’s Bone is #143.
Here are the box office standings for the Best Original Screenplay nominees for 2010:
Another Year is probably around #160 to #165.
The Fighter is #38.
Inception is #6.
The Kids Are All Right is #114.
The King’s Speech is #24.
(Another Year isn’t in the top 150 movies for box office standings. It’s made $2,155,947 domestically so far, including the beginning of this year. My estimate of where it stands was made by looking at the numbers at the bottom of the list of the top 150 and trying to extrapolate.)
Here are the box office standing for the Best Supporting Actress nominees for 2010:
Amy Adams is in The Fighter, which is #38.
Helena Bonham Carter is in The King’s Speech, which is #24.
Melissa Leo is in The Fighter, which is #38.
Hailey Steinfeld is in True Grit, which is #13
Jacki Weaver is in Animal Kingdom, which is probably around #175 to #180.
(Animal Kingdom isn’t in the top 150 either. It’s made $1,040,032 domestically so far. Again, I made an estimate by looking at the numbers at the bottom of the top 150.)
So the ten Best Picture nominees are spread all over the top 150 domestic box office standings. In some other categories, the spread is even further, with some outside the top 150.
JohnT, I suspect you have never taken a course in statistics and have no idea how to do a correlation coefficient. You have no basis on which to say that box office standings are the most important factor. Look, I’m not saying that you didn’t make a good effort here, but with no knowledge of how statistical argumentation is really done, you simply can’t make a statement about what the biggest factor in influencing what films are nominated and which ones win.
To do this right, you would have to have some numbers for the other factors I mentioned. For critical recognition, you could use the numbers given by Rotten Tomatoes, which claim anyway to measure the average ratings given by critics. For previous Oscar record of nominations (to measure the Academy voters’ tendency to give Oscars to nominees who previously have been nominated several times without winning), you could look up those numbers and enter them into a formula. There is also probably a way to quantify the fact that Academy voters tend to chose actors who are friends.
There are several other factors that are harder to quantify. For instance, there is a tendency for the Oscars to go to movies that support typical Hollywood liberal values. This definitely does not mean wildly radical values. It means values that are just a little more liberal than that of average Americans. Go back and look at the Oscar-nominated films that suddenly discovered that anti-Semitism is wrong, that racism is wrong, that homophobia is wrong, that the Vietnam War was wrong, etc. The years when Oscar-nominated films came out for each of those values were always a little later than when the real leftists had already decided such things were wrong but always a little before the majority of the American public had decided such things were wrong.
If you could quantify all the factors which influence the Oscar voting, you could run some statistical tests on those numbers and say which have the most influence. It would be a rather hard job, and there’s no way I’m going to try to do it myself. Without some statistical testing, you’re purely guessing about what factors have the most influence.
Another thing that influences the voting for the Oscars is the tendency to give them to actors who are playing particularly morally correct characters. So an actor who has given many good performances, some nominated for an Oscar, finally wins one for a character that’s so noble and heroic that the Academy voters are swayed by the sheer wonderfulness of the character. In other words, they seem to think that they are voting for the character instead of for the performance of the actor as that character.
astorian writes:
> But now? Increasingly, the Best Picture nominees are films nobody saw. The
> Hurt Locker may have been a brillant film, but it wasn’t a hit. Neither was
> Slumdog Millionaire. Neither was Crash.
You’re exaggerating things in the opposite direction from JohnT. Clearly from the box office standings I give above it’s neither true that the nominated films are among the most seen ones or among the least seen ones. The factors influencing the choices of the Academy voters are many, including all the ones I list above. Some people seem to have a problem with the notion of multiple causation and are unsatisfied with answers like this.
Consider what’s happening in the voting for the Oscars. There are thousands of voters, all of whom have their own motives for choosing one film above another. Furthermore, each voter probably has several motives for his choices and perhaps different motives in each category. There is no way to separate the relative influence of these motives except by some statistical analysis.
You’re probably right that in recent years the Oscars tend to go less to films with big box office numbers and more to ones with more critical recognition, but it would again take some statistical analysis to show that for sure.
Something that hasn’t been mentioned so far is that it’s probably true that the factors influencing the choice of nominees is slightly different from the factors influencing the choice of winners. I suspect that there is a tendency for the choice of nominees to be slightly more influenced by critical recognition and for the choice of winners to be slightly more influenced by big box office numbers. Again, it would take some statistical analysis to be sure.
Looking at a list of winners I see not a shred of evidence this is the case.
Look at the last ten or fifteen Best Actress winners I see no particular trend towards heroines; Sandra Bullock’s role is straight up saint, but Kate Winslet played a Nazi, Charlize Theron played a serial killer, Nicole Kidman played a morose jerk, Marion Cotillard played a person who was accused of helping Nazis, and I don’t see any other straight up heroes save Hilary Swank’s “Million Dollar Baby” role. I don’t see much of a pattern on the male side either; in the last ten years we have an insane tyrant, an evil cop, a greedy murderer, and a lot of conflicated characters.
In the supporting categories we’re on a three year streak of flat-out evil characters winning Best Supporting Actor, and a hell of a mix as far back as you care to look. Actress is quite a mix, too.
Here’s the list of Best Actress winners:
I think you’re mislabeling the roles to prove your point. In particular, you’re failing to note when a character is supposedly someone who has risen above their circumstances to become a better person. (Or at least the movie claims that they were. Whether, in the case of movies based on real incidents, the real person being portrayed was actually as good as the character in the movie is questionable.)
Leigh Anne Tuohy fought racism to take in a poor black teenager and enable him to go to college and become a professional athlete.
Hanna Schmitz was (I think) not portrayed as being any more responsible for Nazi atrocities than any random German soldier.
Edith Piaf rose above her childhood circumstances to become a great singer.
Queen Elizabeth swallows her pride to show that the Royal Family also mourns Diana’s death.
June Carter saves Johnny Cash from his rather messed-up life so that he can be a better person.
Maggie Fitzgerald tries to succeed and, when she can’t, insists on her own way of departing life.
Aileen Wuornos is shown as having an unhappy childhood.
Virginia Woolf is shown as suffering from depression.
Leticia Musgrove suffers through the deaths of her husband and child.
Erin Brockovich helps victims win a case against an unfeeling company.
And so on.
My point is that within the universe of the film itself, the character is shown as rising above circumstances. It’s certainly true that in many cases it can be argued that the real person (when the film is based on a real case) wasn’t really that all-fired noble. Indeed, it can be argued that even the fictional characters weren’t really that moral. If you look at them from a little different perspective than the movie is giving, they don’t look so great. You could argue that Oscar-winning characters are given slants in the films in which they appeared that make them seem more moral than is true if you look with a more jaundiced eye. So maybe these films aren’t really very honest. But my point stands that the character is portrayed as doing their best given their circumstances.
Just looking at the top grossing movies of each of the last 31 years…
How many times has the Oscar gone to the top-grossing movie? Four times. (“Titanic,” “LOTR: Return of the King,” “Forrest GUmp,” and “Rain Man”).
How many times has the Academy shunned the top-grossing movie entirely, and not even given it a nomination? Twenty times.
If the Academy Awards are all (or even mostly) about money, how is it possible that the top grossing movie USUALLY doesn’t get a Best Picture nomination?
Am I saying “Beverly Hills Cop” deserved an Oscar nomination? No- I’m merely asking why, if JohnT is correct, “Beverly Hills Cop” didn’t get a nomination just for raking in dough?
The answer is: because voters DON’T look at money alone. They can’t bring themselves to vote for comic books movies, no matter how well done and no matter how much money they make. Hence, no nominations for “The Dark Knight,” “Spider-Man,” or “Batman.”
They don’t like mindless action movies like “Top Gun.”
They can’t bring themselves to vote for anything that looks like a kiddie movie- hence no nominations for “Aladdin,” “Home Alone,” “Harry Potter,” “The Grinch” or “Shrek 2.”
They can’t bring themselves, as a rule, to vote for anything in the sci-fi or horror genres: hence, no nominations for “Independence Day,” “Jurassic Park,” “Back to the Future” or “Terminator 2.”
They can’t bring themselves to vote for comedies, unless they’re perceived as sophisticated comedies. Hence, no “Beverly Hills Cop,” and no “Three Men and a Baby.”
In short, financial success DOES help win Oscars… but ONLY if the successful picture falls into a category Hollywood is comfortable giving awards to. A middlebrow historical costume drama that made $100 million will ALWAYS be favored over a superhero film that made $400 million.
Well, yes . . . and no, astorian. Films in the genres you mention do get nominated (and even occasionally do win) but not in the acting and Best Picture categories. They occasionally get nominated in the script categories. Other categories do get nominations for those genres of film, things like best song or score, best make-up, best editing, best sound, or best special effects. It’s as though the Academy voters are saying that the lesser known categories can be considered as things to be voted on for the technical quality of the work. In the Best Picture, the various acting categories, and usually the script categories, the film has to have some middle-brow aspirations to be considered by the Academy voters, so they won’t consider those genres of films.
How often do people really “pretend” to like things?
Not often- but when we’re asked to name our favorite ___, many of us want to name things that make us look better in the eyes of the person asking.
When asked, “What’s your favorite restaurant,” most people are more likely to name a fancy restaurant they eat at once every few years than the chain restaurant they really eat at regularly (just as many people tell pollsters that they recycle more than they do, that they go to church more often than they do, et al.).
That’s not lying, but it’s fudging the truth. People know what they’re expected to like, and are inclined to give that expected answer.
This movie strikes me as essentially about ten-ish years too late. I havent seen all of it, but…hokey “commentary” on race combined with Altman-esque “strangers coming together” concept. I dunno.
Forrest Gump aged terribly, I must say. Can anyone here legitimately say they would enjoy watching that movie, tomorrow?
One Flew Over is another im a major detractor from, but I understand why people like it. It was kinda the Robin Williams schtick before he did it. Huh.
Agree on this one. The recreation of Elizabethan England, seeing the rough lives the actors and playwrights tended to leave, the many references and in-jokes (which I missed almost all of), and especially Judi Dench as the Queen. Has there ever been a better portrayal?
Wow, really? I still enjoy that movie. My girlfriend and I watched it just the other night. It shows up on TBS and AMC pretty often, so a lot of people still like it. It is a unique story and the special effects are well done, IMO. The acting was good, too. Honestly, what more can you ask?
I especially like the part where Gump says he was invested in “some kind of fruit company” and an Apple letterhead is shown in the movie. That is actually more relevant now that it was back in '94. 
With due respect, that is absolutely not what you said. What you wrote was that the Academy prefers to give the award to portrayals of “particularly morally correct characters,” or " a character that’s so noble and heroic that the Academy voters are swayed by the sheer wonderfulness of the character." That’s not the same thing as just accomplishing something.
Looking at your list that is quite clearly not the case.
I’ve had a look over the past winners of Best Picture and of the 82 current winners (and 1 potential winner from this year) there are still 25 I haven’t watched, so can’t fully comment on the quality (or lack of it) of the entire list.
Perhaps the hatred of Crash is a uniquely American thing? Crash, The Departed, Gladiator and Forrest Gump are all entertaining and passible movies that I definitely enjoyed watching. Should they be winning awards at this level? Doubtful. But they shouldn’t necessarily be berated or described as rubbish either.
Braveheart was ahistorical nonsense I’m surprised it hasn’t been featuring more on people’s hate-lists. And I’m actually a little amazed that Shakespeare in Love is on the original list at all – I don’t remember it winning. To me it was a bubble-gum movie, for popcorn munching and trivial, relaxed enjoyment, rather than anything remotely special. It would be the equal of 4 Weddings and a Funeral, or *About a Boy *in my mind; worth a watch but hardly Academy Award material.
The weakest winning (sensible) movies for me are On the Waterfront, Patton and The French Connection, but I fully understand that I am judging these on a different intellectual level than the others, as I somehow expected more from them (they disappointed me) when I finally got around to watching them. Maybe it was a case of their reputation preceding them, and this lead me to expect something special that just didn’t materialise. Conversely, the older movies like It Happened One Night I found entertaining, exciting and riveting throughout due to my complete lack of expectation.
I guess this whole thread is truly testament to the level of subjectiveness within artistic forms of expression such as moviemaking. 
Look, what can I say? For me, “rising above one’s circumstances to be a better person” is the same thing as being morally correct. I think you’re too narrowly defining “moral.” You think I’m too widely defining it. Is this worth discussing?
Aro, I don’t think any of the films that won Best Picture are rubbish, and I suspect that most of the people posting in this thread don’t really think they are either, at least not in the sense that you are using the term. In this thread, as in many others on the SDMB, people seem to think that they can’t get their point across except by exaggerating their dislike of something that someone else thinks is great. This is something that I’m really tired of on the SDMB. People here seem to think that the only way to communicate their disagreement on the quality of some work of art (book, movie, TV show, song, etc.) that another poster recommends is to claim that it’s actually worthless and to imply that the poster must be pretty worthless himself for claiming that it’s pretty good.
What a worthless post, Wendell. WTF is wrong with you? 
The only thing threads like this prove is that there is no movie, no matter how beloved, revered, successful, or well-received by critics, that isn’t nonetheless going to be called utter shit by significant numbers of anonymous people on the Internet.
Just yesterday I tried to make my way through Cavalcade (1933), on VHS because it it’s hard to find DVD. It’s a tough slog, let me tell you. It is by far the worst best-picture winner of the 30 or so that I’ve ever seen, certainly worse than Forrest Gump, How Green Was My Valley, Driving Miss Daisy, or Chicago, all of which I found at least moderately enjoyable. If it weren’t for my recent decision to try to see all 83 best-picture winners I would have made the decision to be kind and rewind after the first 45 minutes.
It follow the tribulations of two British families from the Boer War till after WWI. The characters all all two-dimensional, and yet somehow incredibly annoying as if in three dimensions. The only bright spots are when the characters are killed off tragically one by one. The tragedy is that they’re not all killed after the first half hour when the only almost-interesting character is bumped off.
I still have 20 minutes to go and I suppose I’ll steel myself and suffer through it later today, just so I can check it off the damn list.