New Oscar Records (via the 94th Ceremony!)
Monday, March 28, 2022 at 10:10AM We trust that you'll let us know if we got anything wrong. Feel free to add things you noticed in the comments
We've reviewed the Oscar ceremony, but we also have to talk records broken or interesting trivia. CODA broke a ton of records (not all of them flattering) by taking Best Picture with just three nominations. But there's a lot more than just that...
list of winners if you haven't seen that
PICTURE
• CODA is now the lowest grossing film of all time to win the Best Picture prize with a recorded gross of $1 million (globally). It's also, not coincidentally the first film distributed by a streaming service to ever win Best Picture. The previous lowest grossing winners since modern box office tabulations began were The Hurt Locker which had earned $17 million in US domestic release ($49.2 globally). Nomadland, which arrived during the pandemic, was something of a hybrid between theatrical and streaming earned just $3.7 in domestic theatrical release ($39.4 globally).
• CODA is the first film *of the modern era* to win Best Picture with only 3 nominations. All others had 5 or more (Departed and Green Book both won with just 5). Though Grand Hotel won the Best Picture Oscar on its sole nomination, there were fewer categories in the early years. "The Modern Era" is a debatable concept, depending on how old you are or where you draw the line, but we think of it as the time frame where the award categories we are all used to now were all finally in place. That dates back to 1981 when the Makeup and Hairstyling category joined the fray and Visual Effects (which had a much longer history) was about to settle into (mostly) regular nomination patterns. The "Expanded Best Picture Era", which is more accurate to how things are now, though the data is quite small for "trivia" if you will, began in 2009.
• CODA is the first film to ever win the Best Picture Oscar without having received either a Editing or a Directing nomination (since the editing category came into existence). 10 Films have previously won Best Picture without an editing nomination: It Happened One Night (1934), The Life of Emile Zola (1937), Hamlet (1948), Marty (1955), Tom Jones (1963), A Man for All Seasons (1966), The Godfather Part II (1974), Annie Hall (1977), Ordinary People (1980) and Birdman (2014). 3 previous films have won Best Picture without an Directing nomination: Wings (1928), Grand Hotel (1932), Driving Miss Daisy (1989), and Argo (2012)
• CODA is the first film about deaf people to win Best Picture. Other films about deaf people have been nominated for Best Picture including Children of a Lesser God (1986) and The Sound of Metal (2020).
ACTRESSES
From Jessica Chastain's instagram
• Jessica Chastain (The Eyes of Tammy Faye) is the first Best Actress winner playing a evangelical preacher. Burt Lancaster won Best Actor playing an evangelical preacher in Elmer Gantry (1960).
• Ariana DeBose becomes the first female member of the LGBTQ+ community to win an acting Oscar. Jodie Foster (1988/1991) and Linda Hunt (1983) were not "out" as lesbians and Angelina Jolie (1999) was not out as "bisexual" at the time of their Oscar wins. The only previous "out" actor to win was Sir John Gielgud (Arthur, 1981)
• Ariana DeBose's win makes "Anita" the first female role to ever bring two different actors Oscars. The only other roles were male roles, The Joker (Ledger/Phoenix) and Vito Corleone (Brando/De Niro)
ACTORS
• Will Smith is the first actor to win the Oscar after slapping someone live on the Oscars (but more on this later obviously)
• Troy Kotsur is the first deaf male actor to win and the first male acting winner for a role using American Sign Language. The other winners whose performances were in ASL were in the actress categories: Jane Wyman (1948), Patty Duke (1962), and Marlee Matlin (1986), the latter of whom is the only previous deaf acting winner. One previous man won for a British Sign Language performance, John Mills in Ryan's Daughter (1970).
CRAFT AWARDS
• Billie Eilish (born in 2001) is the first Oscar winner born in the 21st century! The second youngest living winner is Finneas (her co-winning brother who was born in 1997). Interestingly enough the third youngest living Oscar winner is H.E.R. who was born in 1997 and won last season in the same category, Best Original Song. She's one month older than Finneas.
• Billie Eilish and Finneas are the first brother-sister siblings to win an Oscar together. Pairs of brothers have won together in several categories together but never a brother/sister. Because Hollywood is often a family business, several other siblings have won though not together including the most legendary brother/sister movie stars, Warren Beatty & Shirley Maclaine.
• With 13 nominations and another loss, Diane Warren extends her reign as the most nominated songwriter never to have won an Oscar. Her nearest rival in "always losing" is a VERY distant second. That would be the songwriter Mack David (1912-1993) who was nominated 8 times including for "Bibbidy-Bobbidi-Boo" from Cinderella and the title song from Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte.
• Hans Zimmer now holds the record of longest time inbetween wins for a composer at 27 years for The Lion King (1994) to Dune (2021). The previous record was held by Henry Mancini for Breakfast at Tiffanys (1961) to Victor/Victoria (1982)
NOT A RECORD BUT RARE / INTERESTING
• "No Time To Die" is the third consecutive James Bond song to win Best Original Song. This is a truly bizarre development since, for literally 50 years (1962-2011), Oscar voters all but ignored Bond tunes (many of which were deserving) to the point that they were even rarely nominated.
• Jane Campion is the second consecutive woman and third woman overall to win Best Director (after Kathryn Bigelow for 2009 and Chloe Zhao for 2020). She's also the only woman to ever be nominated more than once for the category. She's the second New Zealander to win the category after Peter Jackson.
• As previously discussed during the nomination period, Sir Kenneth Branagh holds the records for nominations in the most amount of categories (8). He finally won his first Oscar for Best Original Screenplay for Belfast.
• Power of the Dog is the first film to win Best Director ONLY since Mike Nichols took the prize for his work on The Graduate (1967).
• Dune won six awards, the most of the night. It is not remotely the first film to win the most Oscars at a ceremony but still lose Best Picture... but year in and year out we learn that Cabaret (1972) is probably never going to lose its record of 8 wins without taking Best Picture.
• Billie Eilish and Finneas are only the second pair of siblings to win an Oscar in Best Original Song. The first was the Sherman Brothers who won for "Chim Chim Cheree" from Mary Poppins (1964).
• Judi Dench lost her 8th bid at the age of 87 but her nomination sure is notable. She is the third oldest acting nominee ever after Christopher Plummer (who was 88) for All the Money in the World and Gloria Stuart who was 87 (but closer to 88) for Titanic. No actor in their 90s has ever been nominated.
• CODA is only the seventh Best Picture winner to ever triumph in ALL of its nominations. The others were: Wings (1928, 2/2), Grand Hotel (1932, 1/1), It Happened One Night (1954, 5/5), Gigi (1958, 9/9), The Last Emperor (1987, 9/9), and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003, 11/11).
• Best Picture champs used to win more Oscars but the days of sweeps or near-sweeps seem long gone. We think this is good news as longtime proponents of spreading the wealth since one film is rarely the best of everything in a given year. CODA continues the 21st century tradition of Best Picture winning 4 or fewer Oscars. Here are the past 22 years...
CODA (2021) - 3
NOMADLAND (2020) - 3
PARASITE (2019) - 4
GREEN BOOK (2018) - 3
THE SHAPE OF WATER (2017) - 4
MOONLIGHT (2016) - 3
SPOTLIGHT (2015) - 2
BIRDMAN (2014) - 4
12 YEARS A SLAVE (2013) - 3
ARGO (2012) - 3
THE ARTIST (2011) -5
THE KING'S SPEECH (2010) - 4
THE HURT LOCKER (2009) - 6
SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE (2008) - 8
NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN (2007) - 4
THE DEPARTED (2006) - 4
CRASH (2005) - 3
MILLION DOLLAR BABY (2004) - 4
LORD OF THE RINGS: FELLOWSHIP OF THE KING (2003) - 11
CHICAGO (2002) -6
A BEAUTIFUL MIND (2001) - 4
GLADIATOR (2000) - 5
Awards Yet To Be Broken
Only 'celebrity' category remaining that has never been won by someone in their 20s
Director
Only 'celebrity' category remaining that has never been won by someone in their 80s
Director, Supporting Actress
Only non-gendered category that has never been won by a woman
Cinematography. And that didn't change this year with Ari Wegner's work on Power of the Dog losing to Greig Fraser's work on Dune
Only categories remaining that have never been won by a Black person
Director, Cinematography, Editing, International Feature, and Visual Effects
Only categories remaining that have never been won by an Asian person
Lead Actress
Only categories remaining that have never been won by a Latinx person
Lead Actress, Adapted Screenplay, Costume Design, Visual Effects, Documentary Feature, Animated Feature
Only 'celebrity' categories remaining that have never been won by an out member of the LGBTQ+ community
Lead Actress and Lead Actor. (We're making progress here but there's a long way to go)
Related Posts
- Oscar Night Review
- All 20 Acting Clips Ranked
- Best Dressed Supporting Actress
- The Slap: Toxic Masculinity at the Oscars
- New Trivia via the latest Oscar race
- Complete List of Winners
Oscar Ceremonies, Oscar Trivia, Oscars (21)
Reader Comments (59)
I have watched the Oscars every year since I was 10 yo ( and that is quite q few ), but
after watching these I came away with 2 WORDS ....
AMATEURISH and BRAINWASHED.
Probably a last for me.
Excellent recap.
I had CODA, I had Belfast and I had Chastain. I always do well when I predict against my wishes.
rdf -- what do you mean by brainwashed. I'm curious.
@Nathaniel. Let's just leave it to open interpretation!!
And how about that good luck charm being cast in THE HELP? Chastain is the 5th actress to nab an Oscar win from that cast after the movie's release (or so the internet told me).
For me, Will Smith set the Black movement back many years. No matter how much crying and apologizing he does (did ), he is still a street thug.
Great trivia. Some others:
Ariana DeBose is now the youngest living actor with an Oscar, five months younger than Jennifer Lawrence.
CODA is only the third film directed by a woman to win best picture after Hurt Locker and Nomadland. I believe it is only the second (after Nomadland) to have been screenwritten by a woman solo and the first to win an award for that screenplay, but I haven't run that down completely or seen that verified.
Will Smith is the fifth African American to win Best Actor after Poitier, Washington, Foxx, and Whitaker.
And though it pains me to say, Power of the Dog's 11 non-winning nominations ties it with The Turning Point, The Color Purple (both 0 for 11), Johnny Belinda, and Becket (both 1 for 12 like PotD) for the most losses by a film on Oscar night.
What about movies with at least 4 acting nominees but not winning any of them? I know there is The Turning Point & American Hustle, is there anything else?
For me, the show fluctuated from terribly cringey to terribly boring.
There were many audience members I felt connected to when I saw the boredom / contempt etched across their face, but the one I remember best is Maya Rudolph.
I’m tired of the performative shit. People are only going to bare to hear “remember, you’re a victim!” propaganda for so long before we are tired of it. It’s simply not empowering, no matter how much they attempt to disguise it as such. This rich, famous celebrity told me I’m less than, so it must be true!
It’s extremely obvious how performative it is when they start stuttering or pause to remember their script… like Jessica Chastain, delivering a perfectly fine speech but then moving to the dramatic activism and stumbling over her words.
Y’all are winning movie awards, not running for office. I would love for someone to just say “thank you so much” rather than trying to virtue signal like everyone else for the past decade. It’s not interesting anymore.
As for Will Smith … I mean, wow. What a can of worms. This man just incited violence on live television and everyone applauds and excuses his behavior?? What if Chris Rock got knocked out? I’m sure the reaction would’ve been much different.
Definitely one of the most awkward TV moments I’ve ever witnessed. Lupita’s face said it all for me. And then he apologized to everyone except the person he just hit in the face on live television. Crying about love and god calling upon him to protect his loved ones, “I forget you have to accept abuse in this industry” umm you just doled out PHYSICAL abuse, sir!
But I’ve seen a video of Will Smith slapping a reporter in the face, not long ago either, so I shouldn’t be surprised. He’s an egomaniac. He’s “not sorry for what he did, just sorry he got caught,” sort of thing. King Richard … life really imitated art last night!
What a mess. The whole thing!
I always love reading these stats. I'm too lazy to track everything so I really appreciate the work it takes to compile all of it!
@rdf - if Will Smith "set the Black movement back many years", then how far back have white people been set by Roman Polanski, Woody Allen, Mel Gibson, Casey Affleck, Kevin Spacey, and Harvey Weinstein (just to name a few)? Just curious (but not really).
" Will Smith is the first actor to win the Oscar after slapping someone live on the Oscars "... a record nobody asked for and that should have remained unbroken EVER.
Love your work, and just wish you were in charge of the Oscar ceremony instead of the current team. I've been watching the ceremony since 1968 and maybe I've seen worse, but this was really poor.
Love that another actress from "The Help" took home an award. Just shows that casting should have an award.
Will Smith is a shame... anyhow can explain what he did...
CODA? Watch rather the French original one: La famille Bélier.
That's all. Oscar depreciates year by year...
I'm happy only with Branagh's Oscar.
Also how weird was that Godfather tribute?
1) P. Diddy intro and hip-hop scoring to the montage
2) Pacino and De Niro are there but don't say anything
3) No Duvall, Keaton, Shire, or Caan
4) De Niro isn't even in the first Godfather movie that they are celebrating the anniversary of?
That was a big whiff. I thought the Pulp Fiction and White Men Can't Jump ones were much better executed... make them light and fun, let them present or introduce something. The Juno one was bit stiff too (Michael Cera couldn't make it?)
I also felt really bad for Kirsten Dunst… yes I’m biased, as she has been my favorite since childhood, but compared to most of these Hollyweirdos, she seems to be a very grounded, normal human who was excited to be there for her first nomination (alongside her partner on his first nomination, no less, for the same film!) …
Jane Campion mentions Cumberbatch, Smitt-McPhee, and Plemmons, but no mention of Dunst… so of course the messy producers cut to Kiki immediately after the speech, and she looks quite bummed / sad.
Not too long after, Amy Schumer makes a funny joke about the energy being different (after The Slap™), moving into something about how important every person involved in the show is (I’m thinking it’s a statement about the below the line categories), moving into seat fillers filling your seat if you need to go to the bathroom and cry after losing.
She then moved to Kirsten Dunst, says “oh, here’s one!” - removes Kiki from her seat to which she looked very uncomfortable but clearly had no choice, and then left her standing there in front of everyone as Jesse Plemmons said “uh that’s my wife” and Amy said “you’re married to that seat filler?!” and finished her segue into the next segment … it felt very mean-spirited to me, and Amy otherwise did a great job I thought, all things considered.
Kirsten seemed really excited to finally be invited as a nominee, but I sense that was a less than ideal evening, as life sometimes is.
I'm not usually one to join the "worst show ever!" chorus we've seen in recent years, but man...that was rough. So many uncomfortable moments, Will Smith was the disgraceful icing on the cake but it wasn't going well before that.
And as a huge TPOTD supporter this just made the whole thing unbearable. I love the crafts in Dune but Dog should have easily beat it in editing and score and there will be a Dune part 2! ugh! One of the 4 actors should have won as well. I hate the post-ceremony depression I fall into when a favorite performs so poorly :( happy for Jane though.
What a fittingly mediocre slate of winners (save Jane Campion)...
With the the 2017 ceremony's ridiculous "Best Picture goes to La La Land--whoops nevermind!" mess, I thought the Oscars had reached their nadir. But wow was I wrong.
Last night's brutish, trashy ceremony capped with Will Smith's insane, violent behavior & childish meltdown really took the cake. If we'd forgotten that our civilization is in free-fall collapse, last night's "ceremony" definitely *hit us in the face* with that stark reminder.
I felt truly sad for Judi Dench, Liv Ullmann, and any other rational, civilized human being who had the misfortune of being in that room last night.
There have now been four years with two Black nominees for Best Actor. All four times, one of them has won. Outside of Sidney Poitier's win, these are the ONLY four Black Best Actors (Washington, Foxx, Whitaker, Smith).
Peter: I think The Godfather dudes should have announced best picture because showing Minnelli like that was quite poor taste in my opinion...
Elazul - OH MY GOD - I was so brain dead at that point, i completely erased that from my memory bc it was so. painful. to watch. And it even felt that way after the entire ceremony! Lady Gaga gives me such weird vibes these days, and that whole interaction was very uncomfortable. Poor Liza! I pray for her.
I also forgot to mention … how are you going to remove all those technical categories from the ceremony, and then proceed to make the show EVEN LONGER?! I’m baffled by the whole thing.
@ the film junkie
Every guy you mentioned was a sexual situation... Smith took to the STREETS with his bad behavior .... violence and obscenity. You only read what you wanted to read in my piece!!!!
So defend him if you must.... but he was TOTALLY out of line in his behavior.
The slap is just mortifying. I don't think I can add anything that others have not already said.
That aside, I don't like when the hosts and presenters "joke" that they haven't seen particular movies or they couldn't get through some movies or no one saw X movie. Not that I am a huge Billy Crystal fan, but he genuinely watched all of the nominees and seemed to have something fun to say about all of them. Even Kimmel seemed to make more fun of himself than of the nominees.
Getting these hosts who seem to relish in having not watched the nominated movies ... yeah, let's stop that.
Otherwise, IMHO, that was a sad bunch of winners. I think the phrase a friend used to describe the winners was "for the dumbed down set."
I'm so exhausted with the social media giving all the attention to the infamous moment of Will Smith but you made me crack up with the mention of the record he broke.
I have no idea about this but, there is a record for the most consecutive years where at least one of the acting categories winners plays a character based in a real person? because if I'm not wrong this is the 5th year in a row that this happened.
Me: I don't need to watch another awards show, EVER.
Also, me: Oh, the Grammys are next Sunday? Yay.
I only have 3 things to say. So many of you who commented before me took care of certain subjects.
Not happy about Will Smith physically abusing someone because he, Smith, was angry. That's something I imagine happening in my father's time, but not now. Kathy Griffin had an interesting comment on Twitter, basically saying all comedians now have to worry about someone charging at them, ready to abuse them.
Very happy about Jessica Chastain. I thought she did such a good job as Tammy Faye. I also loved her in The Help and thought she handled a difficult role in Zero Dark Thirty.
Rather disappointed that CODA won BP. It seemed just an average show to me. Certainly was not as good as Drive My Car, or POTD.
Actually rather relieved it's all over.!
@César Gaytán
Yes, it is five straight years where at least one of the winners has played a real person.2016 was the last year that didn't happen. However, it is far from a record. As far as I can tell, prior to that 2016 slate of all fictional portrayals, the previous 18 years all saw at least one winner playing a real person. 2016 was really the anomaly.
I'm wondering about this possible stat:
Is this the first time in the 8-10 nom era that a film has won BP and not presumably been in the top 5 noms? I'm assuming CODA at the time of nominations was ranked somewhere in the 6-10 part of the pack (and therefore would not have even made the cut 20 years ago)...
Totally get those who are re-evaluating their relationship with this awards show this morning.
Kotsur is the second man to win an Oscar directed by a woman.
Alan Arkin was the first.
Smith is the eighth black actor/actress to win an Oscar directed by a black man/woman.
He's the second Best Actor winner after Denzel in 2001.
@jps1984 Whaaat?!
I knew I was disconnected of the Oscars but now I realize how much. Thanks for the response.
Elazul - I agree. I was hoping to see Liza but in that condition it was not a good spot for her. Letting the Godfather cast do Best Picture would have been more appropriate.
Another trivia: Ariana DeBose is the first Actress that Steven Spielberg has directed to an Oscar win. Only the third acting winner overall for Spielberg (which is relatively high in overall terms surprisingly low to me given the length and depth of his career) after Daniel Day Lewis and Mark Rylance.
I was shocked to see Liza last night. It seems like only yesterday she was jumping in the aisle, hugging Lupita after her win!
The Godfather tribute was very weird, with De Niro and Pacino doing nothing. I forgot De Niro wasn't even in the 72 film! I thought the Juno clip was odd too, is that weird to show before bringing a transitioned Page on stage? I'm guessing he didn't care since he agreed to appear.
A sad showing for Power of the Dog. I'm glad this season is over.
What about Timmy Chalamet? Is he the first person ever to attend the ceremony shirtless? Lol
Liza was comfortable being seen in that condition. Not everyone is lucky enough to age like Judi Dench or Rita Moreno, but that doesn't mean they shouldn't be seen in public.
Gaga was incredibly thoughtful and kind to her.
jules: To me it seemed she almost had no clue where she was. I also didn't get the point of Gaga announcing best picture when her fans were upset by her snub anyway.
Also, Frances McDormand couldn't have bothered to show up for Denzel at least? Of course in hindsight she made the good decision but still felt weird a random cast (not even an anniversary like 25 or 50 years) announcing best actor.
Why do they keep honouring the latest and worst of the Bond songs,mumbled nosense without a tune,none have the range and power of a Bassey.
Mr Ripley79: I'm so shocked by this acclaim to No Time to Die because it is basically a rehash of the previous theme song. Not to mention that how many times are they are planning to rehash "die" in the title anyway.
CODA is the second remake of a non-English-language film to win Best Picture (following The Departed).
Well, for a long time, the ceremony featured two mismatched stars coming on stage after a clumsy introduction, making about 30 seconds of awkward banter, then announcing the nominees and opening the envelope. Yes, it was pretty lousy. But then again, if it was so lousy, how come every attempt to "fix" it has been demonstrably worse? And these are supposed to be the cream of the Hollywood professionals!
Seeing all the films that have won with 4 or less really makes me think if that's because of the size of the Actors branch. It's clear they're really influential, and I do wonder if what they love ends up winning out unless there's a clear technical favorite. Anyway, I love how the wealth gets spread.
Seeing Dune's dominance makes me think that, if Denis pulls it off again, the second film will be run the board much like Return of the King did. I also thing Denis will be in for director (even Jackson missed for the Two Towers). The film is clearly well loved, and it only lost two of its technical nominations. Of course, the second half will be much harder to adapt than the first.
Paul Thomas Anderson is now 0 for 11. I am not sure where that ranks amongst writer-director-producer combos, but I feel like it has to be up there. I hope he and Diane Warren team up on a project that nets them both Oscars. And that Maya Rudolph sings the song that Warren writes. And that Rudolph can at least present at that show (seriously, watching her just sitting there last night when her amazing improv skills would have come in handy many times over was somewhat painful).
I’ve been following the Oscars since 2000, and while several ceremonies have been a bit disappointing for various reasons, with this year’s combination of removing 8 categories from the telecast (and STILL managing to be 3 1/2 hours long), the pointless Twitter bullshit, the enormously underwhelming winners, and of course the fact that none of it mattered anyway because there’s only one thing this year’s Oscars will be remembered for and it has nothing to do with the awards themselves, I have to say this is the first time in my 22 years of following them that the Oscars have left nothing but a bad taste in my mouth.
They need to make some serious changes next year, and not the kind of changes that ABC keeps forcing on them. This year’s Academy Awards were simply depressing, and it pains me to say that but it’s true.
Elazul Atwater: That is Liza's personality. She has always seemed flighty, it's part of her charm.
I'm Gaga's fan and I was glad to see her at the ceremony. There was a ton of praise for Gaga on social media, not just from fans, but from cultural critics and film writers.
Gaga and Liza are superstars, and superstars present Best Picture. That made a whole lot more sense than most of the presenters last night. Tiffany Haddish and Simu Liu presented Best International Film while Liv Ullmann sat in the audience. Three athletes presented a Bond tribute while Judi Dench sat in the audience. Jake Gyllenhaal and Zoe Kravitz presented Best Song while Rita Moreno sat in the audience. Etc., etc., etc.
First of all: Nathaniel, thanks to you and your team for all the coverage in the run-up to last night's ceremony. I've read and enjoyed it all, but just haven't commented, as work has been so busy (plus I had Covid a couple of weeks ago). But thank you as ever for the best Oscar coverage online.
A few trivia points, in case others haven't mentioned them:
Dune, with 6 Oscars, becomes the film to win the most Oscars without a Directing nomination. The previous champ was The Bad and the Beautiful, with 5 Oscars (and which is still the champ for most Oscars without a Best picture nomination).
Also, after 85 years of Oscar in which only three films won more than 5 Oscars without winning Best Picture (Cabaret with 8 and A Place in the Sun and Star Wars with 6 each), it's now happened four more times in the past nine years: Gravity with 7 Oscars and Mad Max: Fury Road, La La Land and Dune with 6 each.
Although Best Picture winners in the past ten years have been winning on average the fewest awards of any decade since the Oscars began (I mean, ten years with no Best Picture winner winning more than 4?!), the four films I named above are all sweeps of the sort that we used to see Best Picture winners do. Those victories were largely in the technical categories. It's so odd how the Academy has all but stopped awarding technical Oscars to Best Picture winners. The last twelve winners (from The King's Speech to CODA) have won a combined total of 6 technical Oscars. Compare that with the 1990s, when the ten Best Picture winners won a total of 30 technical Oscars, and the 2000s, when they won a combined total of 25 Oscars. The move to 10 Best Picture nominees seems to have had effect almost immediately.
CODA, as everyone notes, is the lowest-nominated winner since Grand Hotel in the 1931/32 season. Six films in total have won Best Picture without a Directing nomination. (Nathaniel, you left out Green Book.) Three of those six have occurred in the past ten years. Again, is this an effect of the expanded Best Picture ballot?
Not sure, but Riz Ahmed might be the first acting nominee to go on to win a Short Film Oscar?
I can't think of too much other trivia for this year's results so far...
The biggest highlight of the night (and there weren't many to choose from) were the acting clips. In recent years, whenever the Oscars have chosen to show acting clips, they felt disrespectful to the performance in how short and abrupt they played. This year, I could tell the producers took the time to pick a scene that generously featured each performance and showcased what was so special about them. My favorite ones were probably Kirsten Dunst's and Ariana De Bose's.
bvrs90: Agreed - it was lovely to have the acting clips back to full power! They're always one of the bets parts of the Oscars.
Edwin: I agree with everything you say. I usually love the Oscars (or find a way to love them despite all the negativity - not here but elsewhere) but I felt flat after last night's ceremony - largely because of what Will Smith did but also because so much of the show was sort of terrible. I used to look up to the show - it was spectacular - but in recent years, it's been pretty mediocre (despite some great winners - Parasite above all). I really hope they can sort it out for next year.
bvrs90: I'm surprised you mention Dunst because I thought they chose a poor clip for her. It should have been one of the piano scenes, in this one her face is not even properly visible. In comparison, they picked the very best scene for Olivia Colman.
I'm not sure if I'm ever going to check out Spencer, so can anyone explain why that scene was picked?
@Jules
Yes, Liza is flighty
No, that was not her problem last night. Drugs and alcohol have taken her out. I saw her a few years back in San Francisco at a retrospect and she must have weighed over 250 pounds. She could not walk. She has not dealt well with being unknown and unseen ... except to the gay crowd.
Elazul: You're so right, how could I forget Olivia Colman's clip? That was probably the best one. As for Kirsten Dunst's, I agree that one of the piano scenes would have been perfect, but I still think that moment when Phil finally drags Peter away represents the moment Rose had been dreading the entire time up until that point in the movie, and Dunst plays it so well.
@ Ryan T
All told, the women of The Help have seven competitive Oscars, one honorary and a passel of nominations (including Aunjanue Ellis' this year). And I'm sure there's more to come.
@Edward L. - interesting trivia. To answer your question, though, Riz is not the first acting nominee to go on and win for a short film. Christine Lahti did it first.
This should have been PotD and Dune’s Oscars. Dune did it’s bit by winning the majority of the art and tech categories but PotD failed to live up to it’s deserved expectations. Why? Is the 10 movie prefernential voting system leading to a wide distribution of first preferences with second preferences going to audience friendly, easy to digest, non thought provoking fare? Did those who gave CODA a first preference not give PotD their second preference? Did Dune, Nighmare Alley, Liquorice Pizza, Don’t Look Up, Belfast, Drive My Car, West Side Story and King Richard voters all decide that they would give their preferences to a film that was non-threatening to the chances of their favourite? Is that how it works? Watching the Oscars since Star Wars lost to Annie Hall, I’m used to my favourites not winning best Picture (yes Dune was my fav this year) but to lose to lesser cinematic achievements is disheartening. I enjoyed CODA for a Sunday arvo feel good and appreciated it’s representation of the deaf community, but an awards worthy cinematic achievement, it was, imho, not.