Oscars: What Should Have Won Best Picture 1927-1939

Beginning a new series; What Should have won Best Picture for every year at the Oscars. This will be broken up by decade.

This first article will cover the first 12 years of the Academy Awards from the 1st, 1927/28 through all of the 1930s.

I will be picking the Best Picture winner from the crop of nominees of that year. I might do another series opening it up to all eligible films that year.

Since I have seen every film nominated for Best Picture, I thought it’d be more fair to stick with those films.

The Best Picture award should theoretically go to the best film of the year. However, the Academy has rarely done this.

People consider the Academy the height of prestige of film awards. However, they really are just a group of industry people who pick the movies they like each year.

Rarely does this correlate with what is considered the best. Therefore, that’s what I am doing here.

I will go year by year, starting with the first Oscar and say, who won, and then write about who should have won.

This is part one of a nine-part series going through all 95 years of the Oscars.

1927/1928 – The First Academy Awards

What Won Best Picture: Wings

What Should Have Won Best Picture: Wings

Off the bat, the Academy nailed Best Picture. I should say the first year there were actually “two” Best Picture winners; Outstanding Picture and Most Artistic and Unique Picture. I stuck with the films in Outstanding Picture.

If not, I would say Sunrise should have won, but that was the Unique and Artistic Picture winner. Wings is an incredible feat of filmmaking. There is still a tracking shot that is shown today in movie montages. William Wellman directed the hell out of this film.

1928/1929 – The Second Academy Awards

What Won Best Picture: The Broadway Melody

What Should Have Won Best Picture: Alibi

Really a bunch of stinkers from which to choose. In my opinion, this is the worst Best Picture lineup ever. The Patriot, from this lineup, sounds like it could’ve been great but it is completely lost to time.

It was about 18th-century Russian Tsar Paul and the murderous plots that surrounded him. Even if it was serviceable it’d be better than everything else in this cursed line-up. Alibi, however, is a little crime gangster film. I’m always partial to crime films which is why I pick it here.

1929/1930 – The Third Academy Awards

What Won Best Picture: All Quiet on the Western Front

What Should Have Won Best Picture: All Quiet on the Western Front

The Academy got it right again on their third try. All Quiet on the Western Front is an undeniable masterpiece. Showing the horrors of war in the pre-code era of Hollywood. There is just nothing interesting to say here except well done Academy.

Nothing even comes close to this film in the line-up. The only other good film is The Big House. Which was written by Frances Marion and she won the Oscar this year for writing. She would win again next year for writing The Champ. She was the first person to win multiple Academy Awards.

1930/1931 – The Fourth Academy Awards

What Won Best Picture: Cimarron

What Should Have Won Best Picture: The Front Page

If anyone ever tells you what they think the worst Best Picture winner is and they don’t say Cimarron, they have not seen Cimarron. It is truly the only poorly made Best Picture winner. Not only that but also this line-up also has Trader Horn, which may be the worst Best Picture Nominee.

I don’t love this line-up. The best of them is The Front Page. It’s a screwball comedy about investigative journalists.  It’s not a spectacular film, but among these films, it doesn’t take much to stand out.

1931/1932 – The Fifth Academy Awards

What Won Best Picture: Grand Hotel

What Should Have Won Best Picture: Shanghai Express

To date, Grand Hotel is the only film to win Best Picture and its only nomination was for Best Picture. Quite the rare feat. Maybe it had something to do with the Academy expanding the category to more than five films.

The first expanded line-up is ok. The best of them is Josef Von Sternberg’s Shanghai Express. It's a cool crime thriller taking place on a train. It also stars Anna May Wong and Marlene Dietrich.

1932/1933 – The Sixth Academy Awards

What Won Best Picture: Cavalcade

What Should Have Won Best Picture: Smilin’ Through

For me personally, Cavalcade is a bottom-five Best Picture winner. It is insufferable and there is a moment when they use a real-life tragedy that made me flip off my television. This is a decent BP line-up with a few that could’ve been worthy winners.

My personal choice is Smilin’ Through, a decades-spanning romance with murder and drama. It features Norma Shearer’s best performance. Leslie Howard who is always great, as well as Frederic March. Go in cold when you watch this one.

Other good films from this lineup: I’m a Fugitive from a Chain Gang, 42nd Street, and Little Women.

1934 – The Seventh Academy Awards

What Won Best Picture: It Happened One Night

What Should Have Won Best Picture: It Happened One Night

Firstly, this is the first Oscar that doesn’t span between two different eligibility years. That’s why there are not two years above like the previous years. It’s also the first of two years with a 12-picture lineup. For the third time, the Academy correctly awarded Best Picture.

It Happened One Night is one of those undeniable classics. Funny, romantic, and all-around charming. It represents everything that Frank Capra does well. Frank wanted to win an Oscar so badly before this, and he finally did.

The only film in this lineup that comes close is The Thin Man.

1935 – The Eighth Academy Awards

What Won Best Picture: Mutiny on the Bounty

What Should Have Won Best Picture: The Informer

Mutiny on the Bounty is an underrated winner. Not one people really talk about, but it should be. However, I would’ve voted for the Critics Darling and Best Director winner The Informer. John Ford won the first of his four Best Director Oscars for this film.

A man “informs” on his friend so he can afford passage to America, but due to his guilt he begins to drink the reward money away as people begin to suspect he was the one who informed. It’s a dark, yet complex film.

Ruggles of Red Gap and Top Hat are both worthy watches.

1936 – The Ninth Academy Awards

What Won Best Picture: The Great Ziegfeld

What Should Have Won Best Picture: Dodsworth

The first year of a 10-film line-up until 1944. A three-hour loosely based on the life of Florenz Ziegfeld and his Ziegfeld Follies. I found this film pretty boring, and something obvious the Academy would fall all over themselves to award multiple Oscars.

Dodsworth is an honest relationship drama between a husband and wife who are at different points in their own lives. I loved the ending of this film. In the Hays Code era Hollywood, you wouldn’t expect this film to end the way it does.

1937 – The Tenth Academy Awards

What Won Best Picture: The Life of Emile Zola

What Should Have Won Best Picture: The Awful Truth

The Academy loves a biographical drama, so it’s no surprise that The Life of Emile Zola came out on top this year. On the other side, the Academy doesn’t really like to reward genre movies like comedy, horror, or Sci-Fi/Fantasy.

The Awful Truth would be a worthy comedy Best Picture winner. Cary Grant and Irene Dunne are at their peak. This has some of the best physical comedy as well as comedic bits. It’s easily the best film in this line-up.

Side note: The Good Earth this year is one of the worst films nominated for Best Picture. It’s an amazing story that should be remade with proper Chinese actors.

1938 – The Eleventh Academy Awards

What Won Best Picture: You Can’t Take it With You

What Should Have Won Best Picture: Grand Illusion

Frank Capra makes another signature family comedy. It’s fine, but pales in comparison to It Happened One Night. This should’ve been the first year the Academy rewarded a foreign language film for Best Picture.

Grand Illusion is not just better than this year’s winner, but it towers above this entire lineup. You can read here: Ranking All Foreign Language Films Nominated for Best Picture as to what makes this film so good. It’s a special war film.

The Adventures of Robin Hood is a fun technicolor adventure film.

1939 – The Twelfth Academy Awards

What Won Best Picture: Gone With the Wind

What Should Have Won: The Wizard of Oz

One of the best +5 film Best Picture lineup. There are a couple of subpar films here but nothing truly bad. This also contains one of the most iconic and controversial winners of all time. Victor Fleming’s epic southern ballad. However, it’s Victor’s other film that should’ve won Best Picture.

The Wizard of Oz is a better film. But, not only is it better but it is the more influential and important American film. The Wizard of Oz has been cited as the most influential film ever made because of its references in subsequent films.

Personally, I don’t care for Gone With the Wind. Stagecoach, Of Mice and Men, Wuthering Heights, and Dark Victory are all worth your time.

Look for Part 2 tomorrow!