WORST of the Best Picture Oscar Noms (Only The '80s Edition)

This is going to take some serious thought.

Few movies offend me as much as Mississippi Burning, so that one easily. Most of the other winners are boring not terrible (Out of Africa, Gandhi, The Accidental Tourist).

My second choice would be On Golden Pond for turning Fonda and Hepburn into Muppets ("The loons! The loons!").

yeah it was not a good decade for aging classic film stars or the white man's take on racial oppression.

on golden pond

A.O. Scott wrote a decent essay last year on Meryl Streep and the unpopularity of mainstream eighties film.

My favorites in order:

Tootsie
E.T.
Dangerous Liasions
Hope and Glory
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Prizzi's Honor
The Elephant Man
Ordinary People

The reputation that Ms. Streep earned for her work in those films retains more luster than most of the movies themselves. Sandwiched between the endlessly mythologized Golden Age of ’70s New Hollywood and the now almost equally sentimentalized decade of the American Indies, the ’80s are comparatively bereft of nostalgic movie-fan affection or revisionist critical love. And yet the respectable films of that era may represent the last gasp of a noble middlebrow ideal. They were ambitious, unapologetically commercial projects intended for the entertainment and edification of grown-up audiences, neither self-consciously provocative nor timidly inoffensive. Some of us grew up on movies like “Sophie’s Choice” and “Out of Africa,” and our fondness outlasts the sense that we eventually outgrew them. Nowadays “Kramer vs. Kramer” and “A Cry in the Dark” would be scruffy little Sundance movies. “Out of Africa” would be in French. “Silkwood” would be “The Blind Side.”

Tootse really isn't all that great imo.

Tootsie

my faves would be:

The Elephant Man
Raiders of the Lost Ark
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
The Verdict
Prizzi's Honor
Hope and Glory

so basically almost the same as alfred's. also basically: the comedies, a light-hearted action adventures, a kids movie, a courtroom melodrama, and a david lynch movie.

xpost (not that it's anywhere near being the worst i just never understood the claims for it)

Out of Africa's the worst of the winners imo, might get my vote

This is too long! :(

Alfred's right in that a lot of the ones I'd be inclined to vote for aren't bad but just really boring.

favourites are

The Elephant Man
Dangerous Liaisons
ET &
The Dresser, maybe.

Reds is pretty bad iirc.

out of africa is pretty terrible/terribly boring but i am glad it exists for the way my mom sometimes says I ONCE HAD A FAHM IN AFREECAH* apropos of nothing.

*a line i am not even sure is in the movie tbh.

Driving Ms. Daisy vs. Dead Poets' Society for me... I can get along just fine with most of these films.

lol XD

voted big chill as the worst

wait, that was a x-post btw

dammit

shortlist of the worst for me:

Ordinary People (sorry alfred)
On Golden Pond
Reds
Gandhi
The Big Chill
Out of Africa
Witness
Platoon
Rain Man
Mississippi Burning
Driving Miss Daisy
Born on the Fourth of July

Yeah, it seems easier to list your favourites. Mine would be Broadcast News[i], [i]Raging Bull, Tootsie, The Verdict, Hannah and Her Sisters[i], [i]Rain Man[i], [i]Born on the Fourth of July[i], and I guess [i]Coal Miner's Daughter. I probably haven't seen whichever one I should be voting for, since I try to skip anything I'm positive I won't like. Of those I have seen (2/3 of the list?), I don't think there's anything I truly hated. I suspect Field of Dreams would get my vote if I ever were to see it.

("[i]" means it's available on Blu-Ray...god, that looks ugly.)

I feel like nobody else is going to so I'm gonna go ahead and rep for (among several others already listed) Terms of Endearment and Dead Poet's Society as favorites.

I saw Reds a few years ago again after its Criterion reissue and was shocked by how conventional and tiresome it is despite a couple of fiery performances.

i got reds and ishtar mixed up in my head for years (lol) and then when i finally realized they were two different movies and one was (at one point) well-regarded i was like oh well i should see and yeah zzzzzz.

lol ishtar

Oh I forgot how good Atlantic City is.

I've never even heard of AC.

where is the dislike for The Color Purple

'gandhi' cuz we had to watch that shit in this crappy world politics class in high school probably the only time ime high school students would rather have been given an actual lesson than watch a movie. for like three days in a row too

we never learned anything else about india in that class either, or had to write a paper or do anything with w/e knowledge gandhi the film was supposed to give us. man that teacher was lazy

haha we had to watch gandhi, too. only time i've ever seen it, and i don't remember a minute of it, but yes the interminability of those days has spoiled it for me forever.

Your teacher probably took a cue from the movie: I don't remember much of India in it either.

voted big chill as the worst

― apihopatcong weehawkul (get bent), Thursday, July 28, 2011 1:50 PM (17 minutes ago) Bookmark

Yeah, it's either that or Chariots of Fire.

Others I don't mind:

Coal Miner's Daughter
Hannah and Her Sisters
A Room With a View
Witness
Broadcast News
My Left Foot, which is still the best play-a-cripple-win-an-Oscar bait thing made.

In the end, it's one of these three:

On Golden Pond
Out of Africa
Dead Poets Society

yknow what is a good movie tho is working girl. its a well told story imo

Every working girl needs Carly Simon and a black choir shouting over the credits of her life story.

Dead Poet's Society was the worst thing to happen to English education since standardized testing.

Comparative favorites:

Ordinary People
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial
Tootsie
Amadeus
The Color Purple
Broadcast News
Driving Miss Daisy

OK, voting Out of Africa. Equating tedium with quality to the most arrogant degree.

Equating quality with Robert Redford using an English accent.

Of those I have seen (2/3 of the list?), I don't think there's anything I truly hated.

^^^ this. Might be Chariots of Fire for me, but I think it's in the boring but not necessarily BAD category.

that scott essay is pretty interesting because this

the ’80s are comparatively bereft of nostalgic movie-fan affection or revisionist critical love.

is something i was thinking about a few months ago when i re-read a bunch of the kael reviews from the '80s. i know nobody who stumps for 90 percent of these movies, but i wonder if there's something just plain terrible/bland about them, or if some young filmmaker is gonna come along and eventually rework the '80s middlebrow melodrama in a sirk/fassbinder kinda way.

rework the '80s middlebrow melodrama in a sirk/fassbinder kinda way.

yes! todd haines, call your office

voting Fatal Attraction; Children of a Lesser God, Field of Dreams and The Color Purple not far behind. MS Burning too well made even for a big lie.

This is so much better a list than the succeeding two decades would provide.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbF6YoEsfKc

i wonder if there's something just plain terrible/bland about them

There is.

man The Verdict is great isn't it? the one scene that Mason and Newman share alone, where Mason opens his mouth to chastise/lecture Newman but then.. decides to say nothing and walk out of the room is just perfect.

Dead Poets has a lot of bits that do suck but it's got stuff like this neat little scene, so i have to cut it some slack
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3xDI_NXHKQ

i was expecting a v serious and weighty sunday afternoon with amadeus, voting for that because i don't have that many sunday afternoons to be wasting on shite wrapped in oscar

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Amadeus is not serious and weighty.

I'm moving Broadcast News to the enjoyable trash category--must have been hugely impressed with the subtle relationship and ethical plot turns of the movie to not notice its idea of journalistic corruption stops at embedding with the Contras, or that it has no ending.

it sure isn't!

Amadeus is the lithest of all these 80s BP winners.

The non-director's cut version is, anyway.

as lithe as the fat Italian courtier.

Too brutal

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

twenty years on, still running away with awards

There's an episode of an early 90s sitcom (The John Larroquette Show maybe?) where one character says they didn't enjoy DPS and all the other characters are like WHO ARE YOU

(equivalent of elaine not liking the english patient)

I just watched Raging Bull for the first time since the early nineties -- what a boring wonder.

I'd forgotten that almost three quarters of the thing devotes itself to La Motta's jealousy -- a tedious exercise. As written by Schrader the man is so uninteresting that it's like they had to turn the thing into Ulysses or Othello.

crazee!

also, I suspect if Dead Poets Society had been set at a school for teen girls in the '50s it would be a board favorite.

yeah it would be as popular on here as Mona Lisa Smile.

haha i was totally planning on doing a 90s one after this wraps

get to it, jess!

In the introduction to this, an argument:

UPDATE: By the way, some of you have suggested OUT OF AFRICA, a movie I like but don’t love (though I really should reserve comment, as I haven’t seen it since its release). I would include it on this list, except that 1985 was not all that great a year for British and American cinema. Unless you were willing to go foreign — RAN, VAGABOND, MY LIFE AS A DOG — the choices are fairly limited. Would A ROOM WITH A VIEW be any better? I’d stick with OUT OF AFRICA.

I thought ARWAV was, like Hannah, early '86.

some classics on this list, probably would vote for 'the right stuff' in a "best" poll. the FX really hold up well, considering everything. that epic "so close but so far" yeager flight scene at the end is amazing.

One of my favorite recent threads.

lol these results

I loved Dead Poet's Society when I saw it, but it had been overdubbed into German and I know that a good 60% of my enjoyment was from being able to understand most of the movie.

DPS would have been more compelling if kurtwood smith had just shot off robert sean leonard's kneecaps and tosses a grenade between his legs.

In German.

Man I got roped into watching On Golden Pond recently and BOOOOYYYYY does it stink

Leftover footage of Fonda and Hepburn driving through the New Hampshire countryside, as seen in the opening credits, was later used for the opening of the CBS television sitcom Newhart.

well I guess some good came out of it then

Who is this Pauline Kael woman and how are you all familiar with everything she's ever written?

The loons! The loons!!

But Newhart took place in Vermont. My world has been shattered.

Oooh boy... I'm just tired of all this traffic. I just can't wait 'till I get OUT OF AFRICA!

My main association with Out of Africa, which I've never actually seen, has always been an episode of Golden Girls where Blanche is on a date with frequent hookup Mel Bushman (played by Alan King, perhaps the ideal actor to play a character named Mel Bushman) when they discuss renting Out of Africa and heading over to his place. Blanche notes that they've rented it like five times and never finished it, to which Mel smiles and says "I know." So, as far as I could always tell, Out of Africa was the kind of movie that people watch only to have on in the background while they have sex and then fall asleep.

thx a lot now I get to think about Alan King having sex, you punk.

Out of Africa made it!

http://www.avclub.com/article/whats-your-least-favorite-best-picture-winner-201614?utm_source=Facebook&utm_medium=SocialMarketing&utm_campaign=LinkPreview%3A1%3ADefault

I'm not sure I get why Dead Poet's Society is so widely hated - up there with Crash, Forrest Gump and American Beauty as an object of scorn, practically a punchline. I enjoyed it when I saw it as a teenager and I'm a big Peter Weir fan so I'd need to see it again.

http://i.imgur.com/A2uFTrP.gif

I'm curious enough about Can't Stop The Music to give it a shot if I ever come across it, and nothing with Christopher Atkins in a loincloth could ever be unwatchable.

Classic Takedown: http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/the-blue-lagoon-1980

The Film Experience, as part of its RoboStreep series, gives Out of Africa another look:

o much of Streep’s assignment in Out of Africa seems set up for the actress to simply coast, as you’ve suggested, or else flat-out stumble. By my estimation, Streep does neither. There isn’t a single, decisive moment in the performance at which character and actress suddenly, magically click, setting aside all reservations and paving the way for a bravura interpretation. Instead, Streep just relaxes — into the character, into the accent, and ultimately into the film. Karen Blixen isn’t, by any means, one of Streep’s fuller creations, although there is nary a scene in Out of Africa that does not highlight the character nor explicitly pitch itself from her perspective within the entire nearly three hour runtime. Hold up Karen Blixen next to Karen Silkwood, Sophie Zawistowska, Joanna Kramer, or even The Deer Hunter’s indelibly tremulous Linda and the character and performance shrink to near-microscopic proportions. But Streep, yet again, succeeds in providing a vivid sense of what it feels like to be this particular person, here and now, putting forth an opinionated, uncompromising woman of will where I had anticipated a gauzily distressed damsel or a dewy romantic heroine. Streep does this not by barreling through the role with all the virtuosic technique that, by 1985, was evident to anyone who had gone to the movies at all within the past decade, but through far subtler means that are utterly specific to the character that exists on the page, even though Streep’s Karen often looks to be entertaining far more options than screenwriter Kurt Luedtke has readily envisioned.

This thread inspired me this series!

damn it to Hades

Amadeus is the lithest of all these 80s BP winners.

― third-generation stripper (Eric H.)

It really is. Nowhere near the best of 1984, but consistently entertaining, and compared to the rest of the winners it's a...Mozart opera.

And the rest come on so lofty you’d think they shit marble

Grazie, signore.

I think Amadeus is definitely the best Best Picture winner of the 80s. Along with Stranger Than Paradise, Stop Making Sense, The Times of Harvey Milk, and Paris, Texas it is also among the best films of 1984.

Once Upon a Time in America was pretty good too, but I wasn't persuaded it was better than Once Upon a Time In the West or The Good, The Bad and The Ugly among Leone's films

The Verdict didn't deserve any votes, it's really good. Working Girl is pretty good too - it wouldn't rank among my favorites, but it doesn't deserve any votes here either.

My vote goes to that abomination of historical revisionism, Mississippi Burning.

Julian Bond explains it all here, but his appearance on Nightline is cringe entertainment gold. I don't have a video, but here's an excerpt from an article reporting on it:

In the latest verbal go-round, actor Gene Hackman, who is the star of Mississippi Burning and a likely candidate for an Academy Award nomination next month as Best Actor, took heat from Julian Bond, former Georgia politician, on ABC’s Nightline on Monday. Parker was asked to appear, but he refused.

Bond’s point was that the film fictionalizes what happened in the South 25 years ago during the struggle for civil rights. “People are going to have a mistaken idea about that time,” he said, saying that a better name for the film would be “Rambo Meets the Klan.”

The film’s lack of a black protagonist is another criticism made by some critics. Most events are shown from the FBI’s point of view. These federal agents are portrayed as heroes, whereas the blacks are innocent victims.

Bond wanted the plot to reveal why three young civil rights workers were killed. He also disliked the portrayal of the FBI and the South: “It’s just wrong. These guys were tapping our telephones, not looking into the murders of (Andy) Goodman, (James) Chaney and (Mickey) Schwerner.”

As these brickbats were hurled, Hackman looked increasingly uncomfortable in a satellite hookup from a Chicago TV studio. “I would apologize for making people feel uncomfortable. But I still think it’s a good film.”

Asked by substitute Nightline host Forrest Sawyer about the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s likely opinion of Mississippi Burning, Bond said, “I think he would have hated it. He knew the FBI — spreading gossip and innuendo about him — was his enemy.”

In response, Hackman said, “I feel a little depressed on this Martin Luther King Day that Mr. Bond felt that Dr. King wouldn’t like it. I was a fan of Dr. King’s. I don’t feel the film needs defending. But I performed it to the best of my ability.”

Hilariously, decades later, that segment's producer revealed what happened after they went to commercial:

I asked British director Alan Parker to appear on ABC’s Nightline to explain his portrayal of one of the horrific moments in this country’s civil rights era. He declined, but surprisingly we were offered the film’s star, Gene Hackman.

During the broadcast, civil rights pioneer Julian Bond confronted Hackman, who was appearing remotely from a Chicago TV studio. “People are going to have a mistaken idea about that time,” Bond said. The FBI was “tapping our telephones, not looking into the murders of Goodman, Chaney and Schwerner.” He suggested Rambo Meets the Klan would have been a better title. All Hackman could say was, “I would apologize for making people feel uncomfortable. But I still think it’s a good film.”

Within seconds of us getting off the air, the phone rang in the green room. It was Hackman, who laced into me for making him a punching bag. I responded as politely as I could: “Mr. Hackman, the person you should be upset with is not me or anyone on Nightline, but your public relations person, who knew this was a debate about whether a filmmaker should remake history.”

Also re: 1984, my personal favorites in descending order:

Love Streams [John Cassavetes]
Stranger Than Paradise [Jim Jarmusch]
Swing Shift [Jonathan Demme, “Director’s Cut”]
Davandeh [Amir Naderi]
Stop Making Sense [Jonathan Demme]
Once Upon a Time in America [Sergio Leone, "Long Version"]
Broadway Danny Rose [Woody Allen]
Choose Me [Alan Rudolph]
Next Of Kin [Atom Egoyan]
Paris, Texas [Wim Wenders]
Nineteen Eighty-Four [Michael Radford]
Un dimanche à la campagne [Bertrand Tavernier]

One person hated The Verdict that much?