Oscar nominations, for those who care

Only The Departed cracked the top 50 films in terms of box office among the best picture nominations.

From 1980 through 2000 the best picture winner was ranked 9th at the box office for the year. Since then the average winner was ranked 19th.

Ooh... That'd be sweeet. "PASSION OF THE CHRIST 2: THE SECOND COMING"

I haven't seen it, but I hear Forest Whitaker (love the guy to death)
is great as African dictator Idi Amin in ....THE LAST KING OF SCOTLAND?
OKay, history buffs..... Ida Amin has WHAT TO DO WITH SCOTLAND?
Can somebody tell me how Scotland factors into this?

Apparently it is a title Amin gave to himself at one point.

Also, that was the title of the book. In the book, the protagonist is a Scot who becomes Amin's personal physician, and is enthralled by him.

How about looking at the ones that were blockbusters to see if they had artistic merit instead of just junking them out of the running because they were number one at the box office for weeks on end?

/\ Any yet, when Titanic swept the board, people derided them for populism.

Forest Gump as well.

The movie *was* popular, but probably for much different reasons than why it won those awards. All the awards it rightfully won were in special effects and sound categories.

No, catering to popularity would have mean nominting Leo DiCaprio for best actor, which he clearly wasn't, or nominating that generic script for best screenplay.

Here are the awards it won, and the films it beat:
Best Picture
L.A. Confidential, As Good As It Gets, The Full Monty, Good Will Hunting.

Best Director
L.A. Confidential, The Sweet Hereafter, The Full Monty, Good Will Hunting.

Best Cinematography
Amistad, Kundun, L.A. Confidential, The Wings of the Dove.

Best Art Direction-Set Decoration
Gattaca, Kundun, L.A. Confidential, Men in Black.

Best Costume Design
Amistad, Kundun, Oscar and Lucinda, The Wings of the Dove.

Best Sound
Air Force One, Con Air, Contact, L.A. Confidential.

Best Film Editing
Air Force One, As Good as It Gets, Good Will Hunting, L.A. Confidential.

Best Effects, Sound Effects Editing
Face/Off, The Fifth Element.

Best Effects, Visual Effects
Jurassic Park: The Lost World, Starship Troopers.

Best Music, Original Song
Anastasia, Con Air, Good Will Hunting, Hercules.

Best Music, Original Dramatic Score
Amistad, Good Will Hunting, Kundun, L.A. Confidential.

Some of those, I'd agree it deserved to win. Not all of them, though.

I think the most telling thing about Titanic is not only did it not win Best Original Screenplay, it wasn't even nominated.

Meh. The ship sailed. It hit an iceberg. It sunk. A bunch of people drowned, but some survived. What's original about that?

[Lisa Simpson in Poseidon Adventure parody]
There's gonna be a biiig disaaasterrrr.
And most of you will not surviiiiiive.
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