21st January 2013

Geek movies just can’t win: The Oscars

Today, I get my geek rant on over at The Mary Sue.

It’s all about the Academy Awards and there general dislike of or refusal to award any geek-centric movies with the big golden statues in recognizable categories.

Here’s a snippet, but be sure to go read the rest and let me know if you agree:

History shows us that the Academy has little to no appreciation for geek-centric films. Here’s a list of notable Academy Award snubs for context:

1969: Stanley Kubrick loses best director for 2001: A Space Odyssey to Carol Reed, who won for Oliver!.
1979: Alien takes home one Oscar for Visual Effects, but Sigourney Weaver is left off the nominations list for best Actress.
1980: Star Wars: Empire Strikes Back wins only one Academy Award for a technical category.
1982: E.T. loses Best Picture to Richard Attenborough’s Gandhi.
1982: Steven Spielberg loses best director for Raiders of the Lost Ark to Warren Beatty for Reds.
1986: Jeff Goldblum isn’t even nominated for his killer performance in The Fly.
1993: Jurassic Park wins Oscars for Sound, Sound Effects and Visual Effects, but receives no other category nominations.
1999: The Matrix wins all four technical categories it was nominated in, but doesn’t receive any acting or directing nominations.
1999: The Iron Giant receives zero nominations.
2005: The Incredibles keeps Pixar on top of the animation category with a win, but the film received zero visual effects nominations.
2009: Gary Oldman gets his first nomination for Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, after being passed over for his performances in 1992’s Dracula and 2009’s The Dark Knight.
2009: The Dark Knight is left off the Best Picture list.
2012: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 takes home zero Oscars, going on to make the Harry Potter the most commercially successful film to have never won an Oscar.