Unofficial Academy Awards Discussion Board

Mister Tee wrote:Okay, let's see if I've made this too easy:

Name a film that 1) won an Oscar itself; 2) had its two leading actors and director subsequently win Oscars (though not for this film); and 3) featured two actors whose children subsequently won Oscars.

You're a nosy fella, kitty cat, huh?

Nice piece of Trivia Tee...

Okay, let's see if I've made this too easy:

Name a film that 1) won an Oscar itself; 2) had its two leading actors and director subsequently win Oscars (though not for this film); and 3) featured two actors whose children subsequently won Oscars.

I have so many spreadsheets.

OscarGuy wrote:I have a whole spreadsheet tracking this very thing, Tee.

This is nerd trivia heaven, thank you for this!

I have a whole spreadsheet tracking this very thing, Tee.

Writing, the last couple of decades, has overtaken acting, directing, and editing in importance.

The last film to win Best Picture without an writing nomination was Titanic in 1997. Before that, it was The Sound of Music in 1965.
By contrast:
Directing misses were Green Book in 2018, Argo in 2012, and Driving Miss Daisy in 1989.
Acting misses were Parasite this year, Slumdog in 2008, Lord of the Rings in 2003, Braveheart in 1995, The Last Emperor in 1987.
Editing misses were Birdman in 2014, Ordinary People in 1980, Annie Hall in 1977, and A Man for All Seasons in 1966.

For all-time purposes, Directing is still number one mattered in 87 of 92 cases (94.57%), Writing is second with 85 of 92 (92.39%), Editing is third with 76 of 86 (88.37%), Acting is fourth with 80 of 92 (86.96%), and a distant fifth is Cinematography with 57 of 92 (91.96%).

In the last 5 years, both editing and writing have been required followed by acting/directing in a tie.
In the last 10 years, writing is top, followed by editing/acting in a tie, and then directing.
In the last 15 years, writing is top, followed by editing, then acting/directing in a tie.
In the last 20 years, writing is top, followed by editing, then directing, then acting.
In the last 25 years, writing/editing are top, followed by directing, then acting.
In the last 30 years, writing/editing are top, followed by directing, then acting.

So, essentially, although directing was the dominant requirement for most of Oscar history, writing and editing have both supplanted it and acting remains a third/fourth requirement in recent years.

Having all three of acting/directing/writing was once dominant (83.70% of history), but that number has slowly cratered such that in 30 years, it was down to 80%, 20 years to 75%, 10 years to 70%, and in the last 5, it's been 60%.

Being the most nominated film was also a more dominant trait with historically 61.96% of Best Picture winners being most nominated. That number has plummeted to 56.67% in the last 30, 40% in the last 20, 30% in the last 10, and an anemic 20% in the last 5. This means that it's more likely that the most nominated will lose than the most nominated will win.

Even worse, double-digit nominations, other than in the first decade, were more likely to win Best Picture than they have been in the last few years. The Shape of Water, The Artist, The King's Speech, Slumdog Millionaire, The Lord of the RIngs, and Chicago are the only ones in the last two decades. The average nominations count of the last 5 years is 7.2 with Shape of Water the only film in the last five years to pick up more than 6 nominations.

In terms of winners, historically, the most honored film of the year has been the Best Picture winner with 79.35% of all-time winners. That number is down to 40% in 5 years, 50% in 10, and 70% in 20.

With the decrease in nomination counts of Best Picture winners, the percentage of wins, while historically below the number of films with most nominations or most wins, is now more dominant, but still down. in 20 years, it's 53.32%, 10 years is 44.47%, with an uptick in 5 years at 48.15%. These last 5 years is the first time those positions have been reversed.

Anyway, thank you for coming to my TED Talk.

Remarkable stat: in the past 10 years, Argo is the only best picture winner to take the editing trophy. By contrast, the previous two 10-year stretches had six apiece.

Yet, Birdman aside, an editing nomination is still a vital part of the best picture package. Green Book had it, and Roma didn't. 1917 missed it, and we tried to brush it aside, but look what happened.

Well, spending almost all of their lives living in the U.S., except for some early childhood years that they probably don't remember anything about, makes me think of them as American.

Heksagon wrote:But they emigrated at a young age so I would consider them to be more American than Korean any way.

In exactly what way would you consider them to be more American than Korean?

anonymous1980 wrote:As far as Korean nominees go, Jennifer Yuh Nelson (nominated for Best Animated Feature for Kung Fu Panda 2) is Korean-American and Karen O (nominated for Best Original Song for Her) is half-Korean on her mother's side. Su Kim nominated last year for Best Documentary is also Korean.

Here's kind of sad piece of trivia: If neither Greta Gerwig nor Krysty Wilson-Cairns win for Screenplay, the 2010's would be the first decade since the 1960's that a female didn't win a Screenplay Oscar.

I completely missed Su Kim. I blame it on the fact that they increased the number of people receiving nominations for Documentary Feature last year so I didn't pay that much attention to the individual nominees.

I had forgotten about Yuh and O. But they emigrated at a young age so I would consider them to be more American than Korean any way. I'm more interested in the nationality rather than ethnicity.

Unless I'm forgetting someone: Sam Mendes could become the first director since Bob Fosse to win a Tony and Oscar within a calendar year.

Of course, Fosse had the distinction of winning his Oscar just a few days after his Tony victory, and capping the year off winning an Emmy a few months later, so he'll continue to rule the roost. But it's notable that (again, unless my memory's failing) no one else has matched even this feat.

DWS: to answer your question, yes, that is the oldest average age of a category ever. 71 years and 166 days. The prior record was set in 2017 with 65 years and 151 days (Dafoe, Harrelson, Jenkins, Plummer, and Rockwell). Matter of fact, this is only the fourth year in Oscar history where Supporting Actor has had an average age of nominees of 60 or higher. The other two years were 2011 (63y 153d) & 2012 (63y 164d).

It's also the narrowest year between eldest and youngest person in the category since 2013 when the age difference between eldest Jared Leto (42) and youngest Barkhad Abdi (28) was only 14 years. This year, it's 26 years between Pitt and Hopkins.

Did an article on ageism and the Oscars, so I created a spreadsheet to track this kind of thing.

Interestingly, only Al Pacino and Anthony Hopkins enter into the top ten oldest actors ever nominated in the category.

dws1982 wrote:Best Supporting Actor, with an average age of 7I.2 years old, has to be the oldest acting lineup in Oscar history.

They also have a combined total of 28 nominations (25 not counting Pitt's 3 producing nods) and 7 wins (6 not counting Pitt's producing win). That has to be a record for this category.

Greta Gerwig becomes the second woman to direct two Best Picture nominees. As with Bigelow, she was nominated for Director for the first film, but not the second. (Like Bigelow, I like her second Best Picture nominee more than her first.)

Best Supporting Actor, with an average age of 7I.2 years old, has to be the oldest acting lineup in Oscar history.

Each acting category has a nominee playing a real-life character who is still alive.

Not really trivia, but an interesting note: Tom Hanks finally got nominated this year, for the first time since Cast Away in 2000. In the 19 years since, he's been in five Best Picture nominees, and he's been in several other movies that have had other Oscar nominations. He hasn't been nominated, but his career has never been far off of the Oscar radar. It's strange that when he finally gets back in the lineup, he's the only survivor from his film's Oscar campaign.

Two obscure stats:
Michael Minkler shares a Sound Mixing nomination with his son Christian Minkler. Several years ago he shared a nomination in the same category with his uncle Bob Minkler.

Alan Robert Murray, with his tenth nomination, now has the most Sound Editing nominations of any person.

I find that when I remember to put in the ellipse (…), I get it right, but when I forget, my mind goes back to 1984.

Franz Ferdinand wrote:

Big Magilla wrote:
Not sure Once Upon a Time in America fits the narrative. Deaths, yes, but not of what I'd call significant characters.

Are you referring to Once Upon a Time...in Hollywood perchance?

You have no idea how many times I've mixed up those titles this year. Total mental block.