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TrekBBS Academy Awards #19: Best Picture, 1999

Which Best Picture nominee in 1999 most deserved the award?

  • American Beauty

    Votes: 15 40.5%

  • The Cider House Rules

    Votes: 3 8.1%

  • The Green Mile

    Votes: 4 10.8%

  • The Insider

    Votes: 11 29.7%

  • The Sixth Sense

    Votes: 4 10.8%
  • Total voters
    37
S

Star Treks

Fleet Captain
Fleet Captain
19th in a series of polls examining the opinion of you, the TrekBBS users. Which of the original five Academy Award nominees actually should have won? Up next: Best Picture, 1998... which nominee deserved the award most? Comments encouraged.

Biggest gaffe of the year: No nomination for Magnolia. But this was a great year; Fight Club could have been nominated, too; and there's a lot of fresh interest in Three Kings as well.
 
I'll vote for The Insider, although if Magnolia, Fight Club, or Three Kings had been nominated, it would be a different story. Never cared for The Sixth Sense--I think Unbreakable is a far better film.

P.S.

Even though the Academy Awards from this year are over, I hope you continue these threads. They're fun.
 
I would have gone with Fight Club given the choice but from the options it was a tough pick between American Beauty and The Insider, but the latter just edged it.
 
Count me as another who thinks it should have been Fight Club.

But, from the choices, American Beauty all the way. It was a fantastic movie on so many levels. And that's saying something considering all those movies are pretty great.

And no, I don't think Magnolia should have been nom'ed. It's a god awful movie and I still want those 3 hours of my life back.
 
Hirogen Alpha said:
Even though the Academy Awards from this year are over, I hope you continue these threads. They're fun.
Click to expand...

I plan to. I might even try some of the other categories, like actor/actress, if there's enough interest.

Jonathon, I always thought of American Beauty as very similar, but not as good as, Magnolia - kind of a watered-down, poor man's Magnolia. Still the best of the nominated films, though. To each their own, I guess. It helped that it has my two favorite actors in it - Philip Seymour Hoffman and William H. Macy. If they'd added Edward Norton, they would have hit the trifecta (a reason I love Spike Lee's 25th Hour - it's got Norton and Hoffman).
 
Star Treks said:
19th in a series of polls examining the opinion of you, the TrekBBS users. Which of the original five Academy Award nominees actually should have won? Up next: Best Picture, 1998... which nominee deserved the award most? Comments encouraged.

Biggest gaffe of the year: No nomination for Magnolia. But this was a great year; Fight Club could have been nominated, too; and there's a lot of fresh interest in Three Kings as well.
Click to expand...

Hm, I wasn't terribly impressed with any of the nominated movies that year, and I think Fight Club is overrated also. I think American Beauty was the right choice by the Academy though.

eta: I just saw that 1999 was the year of The Matrix - that movie should have won!
Although later on my enthusiasm faded significantly, when it came into the cinemas originally I was as impressed by that film unlike any movie before or after. I am certain that if the producers had skipped the money making opportunity of releasing the sequels, this would have been one of the all time classic American movies. And in my mind it was definately the best one that year.
 
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Roger Wilco said:
Star Treks said:
19th in a series of polls examining the opinion of you, the TrekBBS users. Which of the original five Academy Award nominees actually should have won? Up next: Best Picture, 1998... which nominee deserved the award most? Comments encouraged.

Biggest gaffe of the year: No nomination for Magnolia. But this was a great year; Fight Club could have been nominated, too; and there's a lot of fresh interest in Three Kings as well.
Click to expand...

Hm, I wasn't terribly impressed with any of the nominated movies that year, and I think Fight Club is overrated also. I think American Beauty was the right choice by the Academy though.

eta: I just saw that 1999 was the year of The Matrix - that movie should have won!
Although later on my enthusiasm faded significantly, when it came into the cinemas originally I was as impressed by that film unlike any movie before or after. I am certain that if the producers had skipped the money making opportunity of releasing the sequels, this would have been one of the all time classic American movies. And in my mind it was definately the best one that year.
Click to expand...

I will agree, The Matrix was the last time I felt really "blown away" by a film. The sequels were kind of disappointing, but that doesn't take away from the revelatory first one. The only other time I can remember being as impressed was, as an 11-year-old kid, I saw Jurassic Park for the first time.

I was so delighted when the Matrix beat out SW Episode 1 for the best Special Effects Oscar... that whole travesty of a prequel was built on its FX, and the fact that that piece of garbage lost in the effects category to a better movie was just perfect.
 
American Beauty. It's one of my all-time favorite movies. I was really annoyed that Annette Benning didn't win Best Actress.
 
Star Treks said:
I will agree, The Matrix was the last time I felt really "blown away" by a film. The sequels were kind of disappointing, but that doesn't take away from the revelatory first one. The only other time I can remember being as impressed was, as an 11-year-old kid, I saw Jurassic Park for the first time.

I was so delighted when the Matrix beat out SW Episode 1 for the best Special Effects Oscar... that whole travesty of a prequel was built on its FX, and the fact that that piece of garbage lost in the effects category to a better movie was just perfect.
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Yeah, I felt the same way about the special effects Oscar, it seemed to me sort of like the sci-fi Oscar that year. Although I didn't think The Phantom Menace was an awful movie either, it was mostly Jar-Jar who ruined it for me. ;)
 
The Insider.

Regarding American Beauty, and perhaps this isn't to speak of its individual merit, but the whole class of films that set out to deconstruct suburbia and act as if this is a revelation has kind of worn out with me (even moreso when it's 1950s suburbia, see Pleasantville and this year's Revolutionary Road).
 
Star Treks said:
Jonathon, I always thought of American Beauty as very similar, but not as good as, Magnolia - kind of a watered-down, poor man's Magnolia.
Click to expand...

And I always thought of Magnolia as very similar to, but not as good as, Short Cuts. But it's still very good and I wouldn't complain if it had been nominated instead of The Green Mile or The Sixth Sense.

I'll go with the Academy and vote American Beauty. It played with the conventions of domestic comedy for both black humor and to heighten the sense of desperation and impending doom. The characters could have been stereotypes, but were so well played and directed that I was absorbed from the very beginning.

The Insider would be runner-up.

--Justin
 
American Beauty, while somewhat overrated, is still the best on a list of films which, while all classy, never come close to looking like "classics."
 
Of this list I've only seen The Green Mile, The Cider House Rules, and The Sixth Sense. All three were great, but The Green Mile just outpaces Cider House for me.
 
For comparison, the top-rated English language feature films that were eligible for Oscars in 1999 on IMDB are:

Fight Club (8.8)
The Matrix (8.7)
American Beauty (8.6)
The Green Mile (8.3)
The Sixth Sense (8.2)
The Insider (8.0)
Magnolia (8.0)
The Straight Story (8.0)
Toy Story 2 (8.0)
Being John Malkovich (7.9)
The Iron Giant (7.9)
Office Space (7.9)
The Boondock Saints (7.8)
South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut (7.8)
October Sky (7.7)
Boys Don't Cry (7.6)
Sleepy Hollow (7.5)
The Cider House Rules (7.4)
Election (7.4)
Man on the Moon (7.4)
The War Zone (7.4)

Other notable films included The Hurricane (7.3), Three Kings (7.3), The Talented Mr. Ripley (7.2), and Eyes Wide Shut (7.1).

In a year when there were a lot of great films the Academy played it pretty safe with its Best Picture nominations. The overlooked The Ice Storm handled suburban middle class angst better and more honestly than American Beauty did. Out of the nominated films my vote goes to The Insider, and I think Richard Farnsworth should have won Best Actor over Kevin Spacey. I don't know if Reese Witherspoon should have won over Hilary Swank (although there's a pretty good case for it), but she certainly should have been nominated for Election.

Fight Club, Magnolia, The Straight Story, The Iron Giant, and Election would all have been worthy Best Picture nominees. I'd say Fight Club is probably the best of the year.
 
I've only seen three of those films (American Beauty, Green Mile and Sixth Sense). I certainly think American Beauty deserved to win. But had Sixth Sense taken it, I would have been just as happy. I really like both films a lot.
 
Again, Fight Club should have been nominated, and taken it.

But of those nominated, unquestionably The Insider.
 
Oh, this was the year of The Ice Storm? I thought that was a beautiful, tragic movie. Far better material for Ang Lee then, say, The Hulk.
 
No, The Ice Storm was released in 1997. I'm just saying that I think it's superior to American Beauty, even though the latter got far more attention and awards glory.
 
I haven't seen The Insider. But I've seen the rest of them and I vote for The Cider House Rules. Great movie.
 
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