Oscars: What Should Have Won Best Picture 2010-2022
Welcome to part 9 and the final part of this exercise. As a reminder, we’re going through every year at the Oscars and looking at which film should’ve won Best Picture. I’m only sticking to the films that were nominated. I haven’t seen enough films from every year to choose from all available films, at least not yet.
Today we’re looking at the Academy Awards of 2010 to 2022.
2010 – The Eighty-Third Academy Awards
What Won Best Picture: The King’s Speech
What Should Have Won Best Picture: The Social Network
Another obvious this should’ve won over the actual winner. The King’s Speech is fine. But for better and worse The Social Network is the film that defines where society is at in the 21st century.
It’s a masterpiece that will forever remain relevant. The King’s Speech is more of the old-school type of film that the Academy loved. No matter, works in The Social Network’s favor. It would no longer be cool if it had won Best Picture.
A good lineup overall. The “worst films” are still decent. The Kids Are All Right and The King’s Speech are at the bottom of this lineup.
2011 – The Eighty-Fourth Academy Awards
What Won Best Picture: The Artist
What Should Have Won Best Picture: The Tree of Life
Famously, a terrible Oscar year in the midst of a great film year. So much so that I did a write-up devoted to redoing the 2011 Oscars. The Artist is one of the last vestiges of the Weinstein patina on the Oscars.
Harvey would aggressively overpay on campaigns and it produced many Oscars wins. It’s what led to the term Oscar Bait because these films had a similar style and feel.
The Tree of Life is Terrence Malick’s crowning achievement. A film about everything, mainly the fight between nature versus nurture. I believe it’s one of the best films I’ve seen.
Hugo and Moneyball are the only other films I think are great films this lineup. War Horse is better than remembered.
2012 – The Eighty-Fifth Academy Awards
What Won Best Picture: Argo
What Should Have Won Best Picture: Zero Dark Thirty
Argo is a good film helped by the fact that many felt Ben Affleck was snubbed for a director nomination. However, there was another director I felt was snubbed and her film should’ve won Best Picture. Kathryn Bigelow for Zero Dark Thirty.
Kathryn’s film about the hunt for Osama bin Laden was controversial from the jump. Essentially saying America resorted to torture to try and locate bin Laden. Controversial or not it’s one of the best films of the 21st century and Bigelow should’ve taken home the Best Director and Best Picture prizes.
Some other good films from this lineup include Amour, Django Unchained, Life of Pi, and Lincoln. I like Silver Linings Playbook but it’s hard to recommend David O. Russell's work now.
2013 – The Eighty-Sixth Academy Awards
What Won Best Picture: 12 Years a Slave
What Should Have Won Best Picture: Her
Steve McQueen is up there as one of my favorite filmmakers. I hate taking away his win here, but he’d be ok because I’d split director and picture. McQueen gets Best Director and Her win Best Picture.
I really love what Spike Jonze’s near future romance film has to say about loneliness and our relationship with technology. Which is becoming closer to a reality with the advancements in AI. It’s a beautiful film and the one that has stuck with me the most.
The Wolf of Wall Street is a personal favorite from this year. Gravity and Captain Phillips are also standouts.
2014 – The Eighty-Seventh Academy Awards
What Won Best Picture: Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)
What Should Have Won Best Picture: Boyhood
I just knew the Academy would reward Boyhood, or at least reward Linklater for the directorial achievement. Alas, they love Inarritu, they also love movies about the industry. I should give it another watch because I haven’t seen it in 10 years. But I’m pretty sure Boyhood would still get my vote.
Linklater’s 12 years spanning film. Not only that but it was filmed once a month for 12 years. Truly an impressive effort. It would be a schtick if the film was not exceptional, which it is. A coming-of-age drama, but for every character, because we watch all of them grow. It’s a remarkable film.
Whiplash and The Grand Budapest Hotel are the only other films I’d recommend from these eight films. Can of a downer year.
2015 – The Eighty-Eighth Academy Awards
What Won Best Picture: Spotlight
What Should Have Won Best Picture: Spotlight
Another capital I important films. Yet, it doesn’t feel old or stale like other “important” Oscar films. Spotlight tells the true story of the investigative journalists uncovering the Catholic Church’s coverup of sexual abuse by priests.
You could make the argument that this is the best journalism movie. Above all the others because it takes the time to show you the work that goes into building a story like this. The quality of the film, with its importance, makes this an undeniable winner.
The Big Short, Brooklyn, Mad Max: Fury Road is exhilarating, The Martian is fun, and Room if you want to be emotionally destroyed. Overall, a good lineup.
2016 – The Eighty-Ninth Academy Awards
What Won Best Picture: Moonlight
What Should Have Won Best Picture: Moonlight
Unfortunately, this film will always be synonymous with the Oscar Best Picture announcement kerfuffle. My wife and I were watching with my mother and were getting ready to leave when the mistake was announced. If we’d been at home the TV would’ve already been off and we would’ve thought La La Land had won till the morning.
Moonlight is a truly special film. The best indicator of what the rank voting system can yield. A tragic film with a hopeful ending. Moonlight is the kind of film that comes along maybe once every ten years.
A very good lineup. I’d recommend all of these films. Arrival, Hell or High Water, La La Land, and Manchester by the Sea are the standouts.
2017 – The Ninetieth Academy Awards
What Won Best Picture: The Shape of Water
What Should Have Won Best Picture: Dunkirk
As happy as I am that Guillermo Del Toro is an Oscar winner. He had the sixth-best film in this lineup of nine films. The Shape of Water is not a bad film on its own, but when you put it against the other films here it does not hold up.
Dunkirk is Nolan’s best film. That includes Oppenheimer. It feels like his most personal because it is his most emotional. I love the structure of the film as well as the pride it has for its country. Dunkirk had quite an impression on Christoper Nolan.
A good lineup. Call Me by Your Name, Get Out, Lady Bird, Phantom Thread, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri. The Post is fine but unforgettable.
2018 – The Ninety-First Academy Awards
What Won Best Picture: Green Book
What Should Have Won Best Picture: Roma
One of the poorer plus five film lineups. Roma and The Favorite stand above the rest. Green Book is Driving Miss Daisy 2.0. Roma was pushing for a Best Picture win as it was a critical favorite that year. But the war on streamers with Netflix as the lightning rod pushed against Roma winning.
Spielberg and other Academy members started a campaign that a vote for Green Book was a vote for movie theaters. Little did they know they were only delaying the inevitable as a streamer would in the top prize just three years later.
Roma is a great film and would’ve made a worthy winner. It’s a character study and a look into Mexico in the 1970’s. Layered and visually stunning, it’s a film that will envelop you if you allow it to.
The fact that Green Book and Bohemian Rhapsody were both nominated for Best Picture is embarrassing.
2019 – The Ninety-Second Academy Awards
What Won Best Picture: Parasite
What Should Have Won Best Picture: Parasite
Can you believe it took 92 years for a foreign language film to win Best Picture? Not surprising, since the Academy Awards are not voted by a committee. Rather regular people voting for the films they like. If this was more of a critical award it wouldn’t have taken this long.
Bong Joon-Ho's film about class resonated with everyone. Bong is one of the few filmmakers that can meld genres into one film. His films never fit into one category because of it. Its win is one of the best of all-time and one of the coolest.
This is one of the best movie years in recent memory. The Oscar pretty well followed suit, there are only about three films here I wouldn’t recommend. Ford v Ferrari is a thrill. The Irishman is Scorsese proving he still has it.
Gerwig’s Little Woman is the best adaptation and deserved to win adapted screenplay. 1917 is good. Once Upon a Time in Hollywood is like if QT himself asked me what kind of movie I wanted to see.
2020 – The Ninety-Third Academy Awards
What Won Best Picture: Nomadland
What Should Have Won Best Picture: Judas and the Black Messiah
The Covid Oscars. The eligibility window was larger due to theaters closing for months. Eligibility ran to 2/28/2021. Any film released between 1/1/2020 to 2/28/2021 was eligible for the Oscars. This led to confusion for people like me as to ranking 2020 films and 2021 films. I use the Oscar eligibility as a marker.
Maybe it was because of how weird the year was with Covid, but Nomadland steamed rolled to three wins at this Oscars. There never felt like there was another film that was going to challenge it for the win.
Judas and the Black Messiah was a late release, coming out on February 1st, 2021. If this had dropped around Christmas and was allowed to gain some steam, maybe this could’ve garnered the acclaim and support to win the top prize.
The last 40 minutes of this film are some of the best filmmaking in the last five years. It’s an important story that unfortunately too many Americans do not know. Anchored by two great performances this film has gotten better every time I watch it.
This was the last year of more than five films but not the required ten. A film needed at least 5% of the nominations to be nominated for Best Picture and if only eight films received that 5% that’s how many were nominated in this category. We had eight this year.
The Father, Mank, Promising Young Woman, and Sound of Metal are all great from this set of eight films.
2021 – The Ninety-Fourth Academy Awards
What Won Best Picture: CODA
What Should Have Won Best Picture: The Power of the Dog
The infamous slap. Choosing not to air eight categories at the ceremony and letting everyone find out via Twitter who won in those specific categories. Having non-film people present awards.
Doing the fan votes for Best Cinematic Moment and other BS. Megan Thee Stallion twerking during the in memoriam. This was the worst telecast I have ever seen. It was a middle finger to film fans as well as lovers of the Academy Awards.
The awards didn’t get much better. CODA is a fine film but to say it was the best film of the year, especially over The Power of the Dog is insane. It makes sense as to how it won. It makes you feel good and the Academy can pat themselves on the back for voting for a film that deals with deafness as this film does.
The Power of the Dog is cold, calculating, and off-putting to some. It is cerebral, it doesn’t care about touching your heart. But it is one of the best films of the year. One of those rare five-star masterpieces from a great filmmaker who at least won Best Director (Jane Campion).
We look back and wonder why Best Picture went to CODA. With CODA being on Apple TV Plus and not available to purchase physically, it will be a likely forgotten winner.
Drive My Car, Dune, Licorice Pizza (PTA was robbed in screenplay), and West Side Story are at least some good films in the lineup.
2022 – The Ninety-Fifth Academy Awards
What Won Best Picture: Everything Everywhere All At Once
What Should Have Won Best Picture: TAR
Nominated for 11 Oscars and winning seven of them. A film had not been this dominant at the Oscars since Slumdog Millionaire in 2008 when it won eight. Everything Everywhere was completely dominant. Widely loved, something in the film spoke to audiences.
However, just like the year prior, as with most years, the Academy votes with its heart. What film moves them? TAR is not a moving film, it is a challenging film and one I knew was an instant five-star masterpiece as soon as I left the theater.
TAR going home empty-handed losing screenplay, director, and picture to Everything Everywhere will not age well in the future. Mainly TAR going home empty-handed will not age well.
Honestly, this is a great lineup. The worst film is Elvis and I still thought it was pretty good. I would recommend all ten films here.
In the words of Daniel Plainview “I’m finished!” We’ll see what tomorrow brings. Oppenheimer's winning seems inevitable, and a worthy winner. But should The Zone of Interest be getting the awards’ attention? Only time will tell.
I hope you enjoyed this journey through 95 years at the Oscars, at least as much as I enjoyed writing it! Look out for the 2024 Academy Awards tomorrow on ABC at 6 pm central time.
