12th in a series of polls examining which, of the original Academy Award nominees, should have won. Up next: Best Picture, 1984. Comments encouraged.
TrekBBS Academy Awards: #12 - Best Picture, 1984
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I will say that Amadeus is one of my all-time-favorite films. As a music history major, I should be bothered by some inaccuracies, but I am not... it's one of the finest movies ever made and fully deserved the Oscar.
Pristine lead and supporting performances, amazing attention to period detail, great costumes and sets, magnificent music, a classic story, strong script... yeah, it's a good movie.
Pristine lead and supporting performances, amazing attention to period detail, great costumes and sets, magnificent music, a classic story, strong script... yeah, it's a good movie.
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Places in the Heart is such a powerful movie. Makes the Great Depression come alive. It gets my vote.
MeanJoePhaser
Admiral
The only one I ever saw was A Soldier's Story. And I didn't realize it was nominated for an Oscar.
I only saw Amadeus and Places in the Heart, and out of those two, I'd definitely choose Amadeus. Places in the Heart was more telemovie-ish (to me). Amadeus had some originality (especially in the context of when it was released).
For comparison, the top-rated English language feature films of 1984 on IMDB are:
Amadeus (8.4)
Once Upon a Time in America (8.4)
Love Streams (8.1)
The Terminator (8.1)
The Killing Fields (8.0)
This Is Spinal Tap (8.0)
Paris, Texas (7.9)
Blood Simple (7.8)
Ghostbusters (7.7)
Stranger Than Paradise (7.5)
Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (7.4)
The Natural (7.4)
A Nightmare on Elm Street (7.4)
A Passage to India (7.4)
Places in the Heart (7.4)
A Soldier's Story scores a 7.2.
I've seen all five nominated films, and all five were strong, worthy nominees (and Once Upon a Time in America would have been a worthy nominee, too, had it got the nod). It comes down to Amadeus and The Killing Fields for me. I'll give my vote to the latter for its sheer power.
Amadeus (8.4)
Once Upon a Time in America (8.4)
Love Streams (8.1)
The Terminator (8.1)
The Killing Fields (8.0)
This Is Spinal Tap (8.0)
Paris, Texas (7.9)
Blood Simple (7.8)
Ghostbusters (7.7)
Stranger Than Paradise (7.5)
Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (7.4)
The Natural (7.4)
A Nightmare on Elm Street (7.4)
A Passage to India (7.4)
Places in the Heart (7.4)
A Soldier's Story scores a 7.2.
I've seen all five nominated films, and all five were strong, worthy nominees (and Once Upon a Time in America would have been a worthy nominee, too, had it got the nod). It comes down to Amadeus and The Killing Fields for me. I'll give my vote to the latter for its sheer power.
I'm not totally enamored with Once Upon a Time in America like some. I thought it wasn't Leone's best film, dragged in places, and was frankly too exploitive in some scenes (although I haven't seen it in years, so the judgment could be off). Not disappointed to see it go without nominated for Best Picture.
Of the nominees, of which I haven't seen all, The Killing Fields is an exceptionally well made movie. It gets my vote.
Of the nominees, of which I haven't seen all, The Killing Fields is an exceptionally well made movie. It gets my vote.
Bit of trivia for the awards from this year: Laurence Olivier presented the award for Best Picture, and by this time he was quite elderly and still frail from a recent illness. When the time came for Olivier to do his bit he failed to read out the nominees and then scan down to the winner; instead he simply saw Amadeus as the first title on the card and announced it had won. Saul Saentz, who produced Amadeus, went up amidst slightly stifled, awkward applause, checked that his film had indeed won by reading the card, and then made his acceptance speech. So, a bit of luck there that the winner came first alphabetically.
This was also the year that Sally Field made her widely ridiculed "You really like me!" acceptance speech upon winning Best Actress for the second time.
This was also the year that Sally Field made her widely ridiculed "You really like me!" acceptance speech upon winning Best Actress for the second time.
Amadeus. Great performances (especially, of course, the defining performance of F. Murray Abraham as Salieri), great integration of Mozart's music into the score.
I've seen four of these. The two that stand out are Amadeus (historically absurd but of course the soundtrack is incomparable) and The Killing Fields, which is one of the most powerful movies I've seen. Much as I like Amadeus, The Killing Fields gets my vote.
Of the nominees, The Killing Fields is the only one I've seen, but it's a very powerful film that deals with some truly horrifying (and important) subject matter, so I think it probably would've been worthy of the Best Picture Oscar.
I'd love to see Amadeus sometime though, especially if it's as good as I hear it is. As for the other three... to be honest, I barely know anything about them.
I'd love to see Amadeus sometime though, especially if it's as good as I hear it is. As for the other three... to be honest, I barely know anything about them.
For me, the two best movies of that year were Amadeus and The Killing Fields.
Both are excellent...but I have to go for Amadeus. As good as The Killing Fields is, Platoon and Apocalypse Now are better Vietnam War era films. And yeah...I know The Killing Fields is about Cambodia...but being an American and all, I lump all 3 of those films in the same 'Vietnam War Era' pot.
Anyhoo....Amadeus was simply breathtaking. I'm a huge Mozart fan anyway...but this movie is just wonderful....if not entirely historically accurate. Both lead actors were excellent - both were up for Best Actor, IIRC and F. Murray Abraham actually won!
One of my favorite scenes in Amadeus is when Mozart is so sick...but writing music on that pool table and rolling the ball between measures....it's incredible that Mozart wrote music like that - right out of his head...HEARING it in his head, if you will.
Incredible.
Although the history isn't entirely accurate, I think that they captured the fundamental character of Mozart very well. And what a dichotomy he was...quite possibly the most brilliant composer who ever lived...and yet he died pretty much penniless due to his appetite for excess of all kinds.
I LOVED the way they integrated Mozart's music into the story too. Especially the Requiem...and the use of that one scene from Don Giovanni which is so....terrifying, in a way.
The story was great, the acting was out-of-this-world great, the score was (of course) great, the costumes and period sets were first rate.
Not a single bad thing to say about this movie.
Oh...and I LOVED the way they framed the film with Salieri and the priest hearing his confession in the insane asylum. PERFECTLY done.
Both are excellent...but I have to go for Amadeus. As good as The Killing Fields is, Platoon and Apocalypse Now are better Vietnam War era films. And yeah...I know The Killing Fields is about Cambodia...but being an American and all, I lump all 3 of those films in the same 'Vietnam War Era' pot.
Anyhoo....Amadeus was simply breathtaking. I'm a huge Mozart fan anyway...but this movie is just wonderful....if not entirely historically accurate. Both lead actors were excellent - both were up for Best Actor, IIRC and F. Murray Abraham actually won!
One of my favorite scenes in Amadeus is when Mozart is so sick...but writing music on that pool table and rolling the ball between measures....it's incredible that Mozart wrote music like that - right out of his head...HEARING it in his head, if you will.
Incredible.
Although the history isn't entirely accurate, I think that they captured the fundamental character of Mozart very well. And what a dichotomy he was...quite possibly the most brilliant composer who ever lived...and yet he died pretty much penniless due to his appetite for excess of all kinds.
I LOVED the way they integrated Mozart's music into the story too. Especially the Requiem...and the use of that one scene from Don Giovanni which is so....terrifying, in a way.
The story was great, the acting was out-of-this-world great, the score was (of course) great, the costumes and period sets were first rate.
Not a single bad thing to say about this movie.
Oh...and I LOVED the way they framed the film with Salieri and the priest hearing his confession in the insane asylum. PERFECTLY done.
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Amadeus isn't history, but it's part of a literary tradition of depictions and Mozart and Salieri that dates to Pushkin.
One of my problems with criticism of the plot of Amadeus (there isn't really evidence that Salieri poisoned Mozart) is that it is based on a fictional stage play, and there never has been an assertion that this is a historically accurate depiction; it's a sort of imagining, an "alternate universe" kind of scenario. It's like any number of other films that take real figures from history and imagine a sort of possible story involving them. So I have no problems with Amadeus story-wise.
Same with me. If it makes a good story, I'm generally okay with it (though in instances where I think the original would have made a better story, or else am attached to some particular historical personage, I reserve the right to be a hypocrite). It's like with people who complain that Titanic should have been about the historical passengers, apparently the whole genre of using historical backdrops for fictional personal dramas have passed them by.
Amadeus. Such a great film. When I first saw it a few years ago (I wasn't alive yet in 1984), I was absolutely shocked to learn that it was an 80s movie. The quality, film-wise and on all other accounts, was amazing, and seemed like it had just come out in the theaters. It stands the test of time very well.
QFT on everything in this post! Amadeus is also one of my all time favorites.
Killing Fields is a close second for me.
