What is the worst film that's ever won Best Picture?

90s = crappy era wrote:

Actually, the fact that no one has even mentioned "How Green Was My Valley", winner over "Citizen Kane" (overrated, but still) and "The Maltese Falcon", is proof enough that it's the one we're looking for. No one even remembers it.

I am with you on Kane (albeit not a winner and thus not the point of this thread) being overrated. I had heard so much about that over the years, so eventually I rented it expecting to be wow-ed by the greatest movie ever and it was only average to very slightly above average. Far, far from the greatest movie ever.

Forest gump. Easy question.

Didn't Return of the King win best pic? Ridiculous. Good action and effects but was a terrible movie.

TKTKTK wrote:

Huh. Sterling, there's a difference between using vapid words that sound meaningful and correctly using meaningful words with rich connotations. "Rubbish" and "utter" are vacant - there's no there there - but they sound muscular or definitive. That's the very essence of pretension. But "amplify" is exactly the right word - to make more powerful. And "flaccid," connoting impotence and sterility, is also perfect. So please: don't contribute to the dumbing-down of our culture by mischaracterizing vivid rhetoric as pretentious. Big words (which "amplify" and "flaccid" are not) or unusual words (ditto) are not, by definition, pretentious. But any word or phrase, no matter its length or obscurity, used incorrectly or speciously, can be pretentious.

No, there really isn't a difference. "Rubbish" was, in fact, used as correctly and definitively as any of the words in any of your posts. Somehow, though, you consider "rubbish" be both prissy and tough-sounding, while using "garbage" would have been correct and sufficiently meaningful. Why on earth would your personal preferred usage be relevant in any way? One of the benefits of any rich language is the available vocabulary provides for a wide variety of descriptive metaphor, imagery, analogy, etc., many of which people use without knowing it. Vocabulary is a good thing, pretentious or not. It doesn't make any more sense to criticize someone for using "utter" or "dreck" than it does to criticize you for using "vapid" and "flaccid" rather than using "empty" and "limp". I also don't understand how words like "awesome" or "sucks" could possibly be considered less trite than anything else.

In short: get over yourself.

I have never watched "How Green Was My Valley" but so I can't comment. "Citizen Kane" always comes up as the greatest film ever made. I saw it for the first time 25 years ago in a theatre and left wondering what was the big deal. The Black and White filming techqnique and the acting was fantastic. The whole deal was about a man who went megamoniacal and cut himself off and then dieing last thinking about his sled.

"Gone With the Wind" is better. Masterpiece films don't exist any more and they have to give out an award every year so it has gone to films nobody cares about anymore. "The Hurt Locker", "Driving Miss Daisy", "Dances with Wolves", "Ordinary People".

There probably hasn't been a truly great film made that has been nominated since "The Godfather 2."

All I remember from Chicago is Catherine Zeta Jones dancing around in skimpy outfits for long periods of time. It was great! Outstanding memories!

Anyone who said Chicago was bad is just gay. Nuthin wrong with it but they are gay.

Another vote for Crash. American Beauty was terrible as well and suffered from some of the same faults, though I found it more entertaining. Still awful.

Adrian!!!!!!!!!!!!! wrote:

"Rocky." It was a classic B movie, but didn't deserve best picture, especially against "Taxi Driver."

I knew one heartless, soulless, moron with no personality, no life- full of false hope and a fake confidence would say Rocky. At least there is only one such person who visits letsrun.

There probably hasn't been a truly great film made that has been nominated since "The Godfather 2."

There is one by the same director. Apocalypse Now in 1979. But a recent one that I think that most people have overlooked. "There Will be Blood" That movie is a masterpiece.

Adrian!!!!!!!!!!!!! wrote:

"Rocky." It was a classic B movie, but didn't deserve best picture, especially against "Taxi Driver."

You're dumb. Not because you're hating on Rocky (which is a phenomenal film), but because you're a Taxi Driver fanboy. If Rocky was gonna lose to anything, it was gonna be Network.

spade detector wrote:

Chariots of Fire

This is a horrible movie. I've tried watching it several times since it involved track, but have yet to see the whole thing. Absolutely horrible.

Mr. Spade Detector, you are correct.

break it up wrote:

"Gone With the Wind" is better. Masterpiece films don't exist any more and they have to give out an award every year so it has gone to films nobody cares about anymore. "The Hurt Locker", "Driving Miss Daisy", "Dances with Wolves", "Ordinary People".

There probably hasn't been a truly great film made that has been nominated since "The Godfather 2."

While we're on the subject of masterpiece epics, I love every minute of the 3 hour, 15 minute Dr. Zhivago.

The Sound of Music in 1966 was the worst film to ever win best picture. Simply because it beat out Dr. Zhivago that year. I seriously love everything about Dr. Zhivago.

Also, the older and more particular I get about movies, I've come to view Hollywood's choices for best picture as not the best movies. The best movies I see these days, the ones that capture a more human experience than say an epic rescue like "Argo" or some overplayed race relations like "Crash" or some psuedo-artsy crap like "The Artist" or some gaudy musical like "Chicago"....as I was saying, the best movies these days only get released in indie theaters and film festivals, because they reveal some of the ugly parts of the day-to-day experience of being human. Which really surprised that they considered "Beasts of the Southern Wild" and "Winter's Bone" for best picture nominees, because Hollywood usually goes for the overly dramatized, politically correct stuff.

Well shoot, Barry, I think you just about said it best: "Vocabulary is a good thing."

Derrick Rose

oops, sorry, I thought this was the NBA thread

My students asked me if I had seen "Titanic," and if I'd cried. I confessed that about hallway through I sneaked a peek at my watch and whimpered audibly.

t94bell wrote:

LOOK AT ME, I HATE POPULAR, CRITICALLY ACCLAIMED FILMS, I'M SO EDGY, SMART AND DIFFERENT.

Some good nominees here, but I agree with Crash. Not particularly critically acclaimed, either. It was an upset winner after the now-common Academy -insiders campaign won over the electorate with its shallow and simplistic commentary on race.

I thought LA Confidential was Great too.

Couldn't stand Forrest Gump, too sacharine. Didn't think much of Braveheart or Driving Miss Daisy either.

I liked Crash, but it shouldn't have beaten Brokeback Mountain.

The Departed. So overrated.