For Your Consideration: 25 Things The Academy Got Right In The 2000s
by Peter Knegt (November 19, 2009)
Daniel Day-Lewis, Tilda Swinton, Marion Cotillard and Javier Bardem after winning acting statuettes at the 80th Academy Awards. Photo courtesy of AMPAS.
With the first wave of awards season precursors less than two weeks away, I figured I would use the very last addition of this column before an onslaught of commentary on critics awards and Spirit and Globe nominations beckons to provide some optimism in the wake of last week’s list of the “most despicable Oscar snubs of the 2000s. Because as hard as it is for those prone to bitching about the Academy to admit, they don’t always get it wrong. In fact, it was surprisingly easy to find twenty-five examples of where they most certainly got it right (though mind you, it was even easier finding fifty things they got wrong). So for what it’s worth, here are my picks in descending order for your anticipatory pleasure. Unlike the 50 snubs, I opened to up to all categories, since, again, there wasn’t quite the plethora of options.
25. Pixar’s nods for best original screenplay
The collective best picture snubs of “Finding Nemo,” “The Incredibles,” “Ratatouille,” and “WALL-E” topped last week’s list, so I figured I might as well open this one with the take-what-we-can-get consolation prizes each film received in the best original screenplay category. There’s still something to be said for this, as along with 1995’s “Toy Story” and 2001’s “Shrek,” they represent the only times the Academy has taken animation screenwriting seriously. While none of the films won, the fact that all four received nominations in a six year span suggests a decently sized step for the Academy’s recognition of animation.
24. Steven Soderbergh’s win for best director
People assumed his impressive 2000 double nomination for “Traffic” and “Erin Brokovich” essentially meant he was doomed to cancel himself out come Oscar night. Most prognosticators saw “Gladiator”‘s Ridley Scott and “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”‘s Ang Lee as the likely winners, but somehow Soderbergh prevailed for his work in “Traffic.” I’m not sure whether voters decided amongst themselves not vote for “Brokovich” on purpose, and thus not letting Soderbergh’s double nomination mess up his chances for a win, but either way, this was one of the decades biggest and most welcome surprises in a major category.
23. 8 nominations and 2 wins for “Milk”
Three years after stunning everyone with their “Brokeback” best picture snub, the Academy gave Gus Van Sant’s Harvey Milk biopic just as many nominations as “Mountain” and two major wins: best actor for Sean Penn and best original screenplay for Dustin Lance Black. While some saw this a result of the film’s considerable mainstream appeal, it remains that “Milk” was written and directed by gay men and dealt explicitly with a pivotal moment in the gay rights movement. The fact that it received its nominations with little of the controversy that met “Brokeback” suggested maybe things truly had progressed, even just a little, in the three years since.
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 A “For Your Consideration” ad for Robert Downey Jr.‘s performance in Tropic Thunder.”22. Robert Downey Jr.‘s nod for best supporting actor
Recognizing comedic roles has never been the Academy’s strong suit. From Steve Martin in “All of Me” to Eddie Murphy in “The Nutty Professor” to a variety of Christopher Guest regulars, there’s dozens and dozens of notable snubs over the years. Which is what made last year’s recognition of Downey Jr.‘s work in “Tropic Thunder” - playing a blackfaced Academy Award winning actor and lampooning Hollywood along the way, no less - such a pleasant surprise.
21. “A Kiss at the End of the Rainbow”‘s nod for best original song
One of the most consistently irritating categories, the Oscars got a best original song nomination very right in 2003 when it honored this song from Christopher Guest’s “A Mighty Wind.” Written by Michael McKean and Annette O’Toole and memorably performed at the ceremony by Eugene Levy and Catherine O’Hara, the song sadly represented the sole recognition the Academy gave Guest’s work, which makes its inclusion bittersweet. It ended up losing to that Annie Lennox song from “Lord of the Rings.”
20. Catalina Sandino Moreno’s nod for best actress
19. Ryan Gosling’s nod for best actor
18. Melissa Leo’s nod for best actress
17. Laura Linney’s nods for best actress
Five performances - Moreno’s in “Maria Full of Grace,” Gosling’s in “Half Nelson,” Leo’s in “Frozen River,” and Linney’s in both “You Can Count On Me” and “The Savages” - marked a noble wave of the Sundance Film Festival into Oscar night, with Academy voters recognizing some of the best indie performances of the decade despite their historical tendency to ignore films with such miniscule budgets. Though none of them won, the fact that they even made it is sadly something we should be very grateful for. You can take solace in the fact that Moreno, Gosling and Leo each won Independent Spirit Awards (though Linney, a nominee for “You Can Count On Me,” was oddly left out for “The Savages”), and be hopeful for years to come.
16. 10 nominations and 4 awards for “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”
While it remains quite saddening that in the end, “Gladiator” ended up taking away the Academy’s first realistic opportunity at awarding a foreign film in it’s top category, never have we seen such a deserving foreign film break through with Oscar like “Dragon.” And it’s four wins - for cinematography (Peter Pau), art direction (Timmy Yip), original score (Tan Dun), and foreign language film - did make it one of the most honored foreign language films in Oscar history, which in large part helped the film gross over $128 million in the U.S. alone, bringing it to audiences that otherwise might never have noticed.
15. Pedro Almodovar’s nod for best director
14. Mike Leigh’s nod for best director
13. Paul Greengrass’s nod for best director
12. David Lynch’s nod for best director
Back in the days when there were only five best picture nominees, the Academy’s director’s branch tended to offer one of its best director slots to a film that was not honored in the top race. And four times they most definitely used this “lone director slot” wisely by deciding to reward four very challenging films - “Talk To Her,” “Vera Drake,” “United 93” and “Mulholland Drive” - from four very deserving directors. It’s curious to consider if it will ever be possible for a director to again manage a nod without a best picture contender, but then again I question whether “Mulholland Drive” or “Talk To Her” would have made even a top ten list.
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Funny that Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon did so well here but did not do well in China.