5 days til Oscar! The Sound of Music, Cuckoo's Nest and More...
Tuesday, February 19, 2019 at 10:50AM 
The Sound of Music won exactly 5 Oscars, lost exactly 5 Oscars, and won in a year ending in the number 5Today's magic number is 5 and it's too overwhelming a number in Oscar lore for a list of trivia items since it's the 'traditional' size of Oscar shortlists in every Oscar category with the exception of Best Makeup and Hairstyling. We've harped on that one before but we consider it brazenly insulting that Oscar views those craftsmen as the bastard stepchildren of the industry since they've never been allowed more than 3 nominees despite literally every live action film using their services. Several categories have experimented with varying sizes of their nominated lists over the years (Best Picture under the current rules, being obviously the most prominent and inconsistent *sigh* but the number five can safely be called one of Oscar's favourite things...
Every year we fear that Oscar will go further off the deep end and become as amateurishly inconsistent as most other awards shows which generally don't have rules about tiebreakers and way less institutional fortitude in general (which is saying a lot given how weak-willed AMPAS looks of late!). This has resulted in a constant flux of "3 no 4 no 5 no 6 no 7 no 8 no 9 no 10 no 11 (!!!) nominees in this category!" which is always vaguely embarrassing so we hope Oscar never goes there. In fact, we dream that Oscar will stop with the flux in Best Picture. We've accepted the expanded field after years of complaining but we only wish that it were consistent like everything else. Whatever it's going to be just pick that! 5, 8, 9, 10. Whatever. But please stick with it.
This has been today's highly unecessary train-of-thought Oscar rant. HAPPY FINAL DAY OF OSCAR BALLOTING FOR THE SEASON! Oh, except on our Oscar charts where you can keep voting for your favourites in each category, daily, until the big night.
P.S. For fun, here are the Best Picture winners from the '5 years, ranked...
The Sound of Music (1965)
One of the most pleasurable things ever made in any artform. Put simply we don't trust people who don't enjoy this movie. It's been knocked and dragged constantly over the years for its sentimentality which we'll never understand as the delicious sidebar snark of The Baroness and Max Detweiler, the tragedy of Rolfe's trajectory, as well as Captain Von Trapp's stoicism and slow-thaw constantly keep mushiness at bay, and Julie Andrews second-consecutive Oscar-worthy star turn is a marvel of humanity, moodswings, romantic confusion, and comic timing. Plus the glorious music! And anything that inspires spectacular-spectacular silliness in other genius movies deserves our love.
Mutiny on the Bounty (1935)
Not exactly sure why I have such affection for this picture. Is it just my Franchot Tone problem (I dont consider a problem but maybe you or Joan Crawford might?) Or all the shirtless sailors? Or the tropical beauty? Or Gable without a moustache?
Spotlight (2015)
Such a solid humanist entertainment and its modesty remains so appealing, particularly in the annals of Best Picture where modesty is not general seen as a strength.
I hold too many Oscar grudges against this picture. I need therapy!
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975)
Everyone is supposed to worship this movie. I've never been able to get there but I'll give it another go at some point. It's definitely juicy in the acting department but there's something about it that screams "bro favourite!" to me which has kept the love slightly at bay. Well, that and the fact that 1975's Best Picture roster is one of the greatest of all time and Nashville, Jaws, and Dog Day Afternoon are total all-timers, soaring well beyond the reach of Cuckoo's Nest. And then there's the fact that Jack Nicholson and Louise Fletcher beat two of the best performances of all time (Al Pacino's and Isabelle Adjani's) in their categories. I hold too many Oscar grudges; please recommend a good therapist!.
Out of Africa (1985)
To be honest it's a distant distant memory but I was obsessed with it as a kid. Perhaps a rewatch is in order?
I dont know why but I'm always startled when I remember that Marty's supporting actress nominated Betsy Blair was Gene Kelly's wife at the time.
Marty (1955) / The Lost Weekend (1945)
We often get frustrated with the Academy for ignoring contemporary pictures but it's also true that sometimes contemporary pictures don't age particularly well, beyond a kind of time capsule appeal. This is what an indie woulda looked like in 1955 / This was how people were grappling with addiction and the conversation around in in 1945, etcetera.
Crash (2005)
No. Shan't. Not even posting a photo.
Braveheart (1995)
Sheer torture. And that it beat such kindhearted, warm, and beautifully crafted examples of their genres as Sense & Sensibility, Apollo 13, and Babe makes its toxicity that much worse still.
DO YOU WISH ALL OSCAR CATEGORIES WERE FIVE-WIDE? HOW WOULD YOU RANK THESE 9 BEST PICTURES ABOVE?
Reader Comments (27)
Crash (2005)
Braveheart (1995)
Unpleasant reminders that the Oscars are no strangers to sucking.
NOOOOOOO!!!! Marty and The Lost Weekend age really well, especially Marty, which was not only an inspired BP pick but Borgnine is so heartbreaking and such a beautiful Actor win. I know so many drag this film and especially his win, but I just adore it.
That being said...had Oscar actually nominated the best films/performances of the year, things wound be different. I mean, All That Heaven Allows, The Night of the Hunter, Diabolique, Ordet and Lola Montes would have been my choices in BP, with All That Heaven Allows taking the Oscar, and Robert Mitchum is the only choice for me in Actor, but Borgnine would be my runner up and I just LOVE his Oscar win.
Cuckoo’s Nest is overrated. If you want the most literal example of playing exactly what’s on the page and nothing more, Fletcher’s Best Actress win is a place to start. I think the content/mythology around Nurse Ratched overtook the actual performance. She's perfectly fine in it.
Would’ve loved to see Shelley Duvall, Faye Dunaway, Diane Keaton, Vanessa Redgrave, Jill Clayburgh or some other fabulous woman of that moment play that role.
I love The Lost Weekend. Ray Milland is one of my favorite Best Actor wins.
Also, Braveheart is at least mildly rewatchable. Crash has somehow been wiped from cable TV runs.
Put Marty ahead of Out of Africa and I think we agree, although I still need to see all of The Lost Weekend to be sure about its placement.
Best Picture definitely needs to go back to five nominees, as well as bumping up the Best Hair and Makeup category to five nominees as well. Why is it so difficult to keep things consistent?
Anyway, I would rank the '5 best pictures as so:
All-timers:
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
The Sound of Music
Spotlight
Moments of greatness and very rewatchable:
The Lost Weekend
Marty
Dull and/or haven't aged well:
Mutiny on the Bounty
Out of Africa
LOL
Braveheart
Crash
So I don’t like The Sound of Music. I appreciate it and respect it, but it is not a movie I enjoy. I like a few of the songs, but despise others (Rogers and Hammerstein are really hit or miss for me).The romance between Maria and Captain Vin Trapp is lovely and is probably my favorite thing about it. I personally think the writing isn’t that great, but the work done by Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer really elevates it.
I co-sign your hatred of Braveheart and Crash. If had the chance to pick winners from both those years I’d pick Apollo 13 and Brokeback Mountain.
Ooh, fun game!
Love:
The Sound of Music
Spotlight
Like:
Mutiny on the Bounty
OK:
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
No:
Crash
Out of Africa (needs a rewatch but soooo slow)
Braveheart
Marty
The Lost Weekend
Honestly this is a rough group. Can't believe Crash is middle of this pack for me.
Out of Africa holds up well. More than well, I would say. I'ts epic and it's intimate, it's sensual and it's political... and that score.
The Sound of Music is a pitch-perfect movie
I also love Spotlight, its definitely a movie thats in my wheelhouse as I love a good newspaper movie but the story is well told and acted, and with more revelations in the paper each day this story is SO important, still 20 years later! I show it to my Government students when teaching about free press and media
Nathaniel, this ranking is almost on the money, except that I would put Cuckoo's Nest at No. 2--I like it a lot more than you do. Love what you say about SOM--we recently watched it again at Christmas on the 50th anniversary blu-ray. Damn, does it look glorious. And the divine Julie--no words.
P.S. Any detractors on Louise Fletcher's performance--please watch this film again. She is so damn brilliant.
I loathe Sound of Music. Took me 3 tries just to get through the thing. The only part I can hack is the Do-Re-Mi number. And how many times can you hear rhymes for -oatheard before throwing up? Nathaniel, you should be happy to know that Pauline Kael's pan of Sound of Music got her fired from McCall's.
Anyway here are my choices for the Best Pictures of the 5's
Mutiny on the Bounty (agree)
Lost Weekend (Mildred Pierce)
Marty (Mister Roberts - but maybe the weakest field EVER)
Sound of Music (Darling)
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (Dog Day Afternoon)
Out of Africa (Prizzi's Honor)
Braveheart (Babe)
Crash (Brokeback Mountain - betcha didn't see that one comin')
Spotlight (#2 on my ranked ballot after Room)
I’d never seen a Franchot Tone movie until watching Dangerous and Three Comrades for the first time this year, and yeah, I’ve got the same problem. What a beautiful and suave man. I don’t know if I can handle him and Gable in the same frame, much less shirtless. (Red Dust is prime mustache-free Gable.)
Ooh, like the "I'd prefer" listings:
1935: Mutiny on the Bounty is great, but so are Alice Adams and Top Hat, so close call
1945: Not a great list, but Anchors Away over The Lost Weekend
1955: So disappointing neither James Dean pic is here... I guess I'd go Picnic
1965: The Sound of Music by far - all time great
1975: I know One Flew... is a classic but Dog Day Afternoon is so incredible, and Nashville is great too
1985: The Color Purple over Out of Africa, easily
1995: Apollo 13 probably gets my vote but Babe and Sense and Sensibility are great picks too. And if Ron Howard needs to win Director, let it be here.
2005: Brokeback, not even close
2015: My vote goes to Room, also loved Brooklyn and Mad Max - but still, Spotlight is one of the best films about serious journalism ever made. Great win.
You said it - Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music, particularly the first hour or so, is a marvel. "She can throw a whirling dervish out of whirl..."
The Sound of Music is one of the most unfairly maligned Best Pictures winners ever. Of course, the public and the Academy gave a big "fuck you" to the critics, as well they should have. Christopher Plummer signing "Edelweiss" (okay, it was dubbed) alone is magical. And come on, that opening shot of Julie Andrews! Brilliant!
Fletcher is amazing (and Lead).
Makeup and Hairstyling certainly deserves to be 5 nominees and people need to remember the category is not just about prosthetic makeup but also great hairstyling.
In term of the 5' years I'd rank them
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest - I love this film a lot, while I'd rank it below it's other nominees Nashville, Dog Day & Jaws.
The Sound of Music - This is a great musical picture and a film while over 60 years old features one of the most sexual couples in cinematic history. Plummer and Andrews set the screen on fire and I wish the former had joined the latter as an oscar nominee (1965 best actor is a tradegy)
Spotlight - A well done feature that I don't blow my load about like some others do.
The Lost Weeend - I very much like Milland in this film and while I've not seen it in ages I do have good memories about the film.
Marty - Seen it only the one time and this is rather meh for me. 1955 had so many great (James Dean) films.
Out of Africa - Meryl is good but I liked her in Plenty better in 85'.
Crash - The less said about it the better.
NOT SEEN
Braveheart
Mutiny on the Bounty
I love the Inside Oscar chapter on 1975, with the bemoaning from Charles Champlin in the LA Times: "Picking the Best Film in a Nonvintage Year." This was a terrific slate of Best PIcture nominations.
Ok, I'm going to be that guy: I don't hate Crash. I don't think it should have won Best Picture (especially not over Brokeback Mountain, which is a mastepiece and has withstood the test of time), but the level of hate it gets is, I think, overblown (and I suspect it wouldn't be this hated if it weren't for that Best Picture win, that can somtimes be the curse of the Oscar). I also think it's a film that may be due for a re-visit in these times we're living in, and here's why (this is something I posted once on Tim Brayton's review of the film):
"While I get all of the criticisms and certainly agree with most of them, there's a certain message in Crash that I think gets lost in all of the arguments about whether the movie deserved Best Picture (because the Oscars make everything incredibly reductive, I guess marketing does the same thing) and which I think is very relevant now. The idea of how easy it is to judge people for doing something wrong, entirely convinced that you yourself would never do something like that. To me, the key character is Officer Hanson (Ryan Phillippe) who watches his partner molest a woman he's pulled over and wants to get as far away from him as possible, thinking he's too good to ever do something like that, ignoring the fact that he was raised with the same prejudice and assumptions about people which later result in him killing an innocent kid. In an age where we're all judging people as soon as we hear rumors about them doing something wrong and so quick to condemn everybody, I think it's important to look at oneself in the mirror and ask oneself, "would I ever do something that I would ever judge myself for? Am I too easy on myself and too hard on other people?"
If the story Crash were telling were just about that, I think it would be a better movie, but I feel Haggis ultimately bit off more than he could chew by making it an interlocking narrative with so many characters, and it's a shame, because there are several character beats I really like. I like the story of Michael Peña's locksmith, I really enjoy William Fitchner's scene which becomes a portrait of systematic racism in government and I really enjoy Ludacris and Larenz Tate's routine as they babble on about the world while hijacking cars. There were probably a few good movies in here, but as a whole, it doesn't quite work (and yeah, it's a rather embarassing Best Picture winner, especially with such an embarassment of riches in that year's lineup)."
Also, I grew up with The Sound of Music and absolutely adore it, and I've adored it even more since I worked on a High School production of the play and realized just how much Ernest Lehman fixed when adapting it to film (by re-structuring a lot of the numbers, making the tone a bit more consistent and dialing down a lot of the saccharine). It can be cloying at times, but it is also legitimately moving at many others.
Out of Africa is the greatest epic romance to win Best Picture and better than any of the other "5" films (I haven't seen Mutiny or Braveheart).
"Crash" is at least very well acted, in a dramaturgical kind of way. And that song ("In the Deep") still gets me. It's not a great film by any stretch but it's not some unmitigated disaster.
If I remember well, depending on the number of films eligible, the Best Animated Film category can have 3 or 5 candidates.
The Sound of Music
Out of Africa
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
Marty
Mutiny on the Bounty
The Lost Weekend
Spotlight
Braveheart
Crash
Love
1. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
2. The Lost Weekend
Like
3. Mutiny on the Bounty
4. Out of Africa
Meh
5. Marty
6. The Sound of Music
7. Spotlight
NOPE
8. Bravehart
The cinematic equivalent of a bastard love child of a bad idea that fucked itself
9. Crash
All categories should be the standard five. It lends a cache to that select group which the expanded field diminishes. That and the fact that even with the bloated field there are only ever two or three (in a good year) that ever really have to momentum to win.
Geez out of all of these years only one would be my actual pick to win! I ranked the winners, then who I would have chosen out of the nominees and my winner in an open field of all that year’s films.
Mutiny on the Bounty- (Mutiny on the Bounty) (Carnival in Flanders)
I like Franchot Tone but its Gable who is the draw for me here. I prefer him without that pencil thin mustache as well, though he made it work better than anyone else. I’m with MJ that Red Dust contains peak Gable hotness. He and Harlow ooze sex in that picture.
The Sound of Music- (Ship of Fools) (The Flight of the Phoenix)
I like Sound of Music very much (Julie is great and Eleanor Parker is a goddess in it!) but never felt it was the best picture of its year.
Spotlight- (Bridge of Spies) (45 Years)
Spotlight is excellent and I know I shouldn’t but I compare it to its spiritual predecessor All the President’s Men and there it comes up short.
Marty- (Mister Roberts) (East of Eden)
This is the year that none of the actual nominees would even make my list. So much goodness left off and so much mediocrity nominated. How could they ignore All That Heaven Allows, Bad Day at Black Rock, Diabolique and Night of the Hunter as well as East of Eden and pick dreck like Love Is a Many Splendored Thing to compete?
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest- (Dog Day Afternoon) (Dog Day Afternoon)
A pretty good lineup of films but Cuckoo’s Nest would come a distant third behind Dog Day and Jaws. I’d replace Nashville and Barry Lyndon with Picnic at Hanging Rock and Three Days of the Condor though.
The Lost Weekend- (Mildred Pierce) (Brief Encounter)
I don’t fault Ray Milland’s win and he makes the picture worth watching, along with Jane Wyman but the film pales in comparison to the amazing Mildred Pierce. I’d pick Brief Encounter in an open field but even then Mildred Pierce is my runner-up.
Out of Africa- (Witness) (Back to the Future)
Out of Africa just screams I was designed to be a Best Picture Contender!! It’s pretty and well-acted but standard. Witness is a wonderfully tense drama but neither embrace the joy of movie going the way Back to the Future does.
Crash (Brokeback Mountain) (Brokeback Mountain)
I didn’t hate Crash when I saw it in the theatre, nor did I love it. It was passable. When it was nominated the friend I saw it with and I had to jog our memories to remember what it was about. I think that says it all.
Braveheart- (Apollo 13) (Apollo 13)
How did this piece of utter tripe even get nominated let alone win!?! One of the absolute worst winners in Academy history. Apollo 13 wins because of its mastery in making an event with a well-known outcome a nail biter but Sense and Sensibility is thisclose to a tie.
*sigh* Hoes are gonna ho... FLETCHER4EVA
You can tell alot about a person by their preferred number for Best Picture Nominees. Let's just say the 10's are more likely to be 10's. Five, I can jive, but on Ten you can depend!