Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Oscars Quiz - The Great Directors

This coming Sunday, February 24, marks the 80th Annual Academy Awards. Time, then, to celebrate some of Oscar's glorious history.

1. Between them, Ernst Lubitsch, Alfred Hitchcock, Ingmar Bergman, Federico Fellini, Akira Kurosawa, Stanley Kubrick, and Robert Altman were nominated 24 times for Best Direction. Which one of them won the most statues in this category?

2. Between them, Ingmar Bergman, Federico Fellini and Stanley Kubrick were nominated 17 times for Best Screenplay (Original or Adapted). Which one of them won the most statues in this category?

3. Not including honorary awards, Ernst Lubitsch, Alfred Hitchcock, Ingmar Bergman, Federico Fellini, Akira Kurosawa, Robert Altman and Stanley Kubrick were nominated 49 times for various Oscars. How many statues did they take home?

4. How many Academy Award nominations has Jean-Luc Godard received?
(A) 0 (B) 1 (C) 2 (D) 5

Jean-Luc Godard


5. How many has Godard won?
(A) 0 (B) 1 (C) 2 (D) 5

6. How many Academy Award nominations has Jim Jarmusch received?
(A) 0 (B) 1 (C) 2 (D) 5

7. How many has Jarmusch won?
(A) 0 (B) 1 (C) 2 (D) 5

8. Between Michelangelo Antonioni, John Cassavetes, Charles Chaplin, Mel Gibson, Howard Hawks, Akira Kurosawa, and Orson Welles, who has won the most Academy Awards for Best Direction?

9. Who has been nominated the most times for an Academy Award for Best Direction?
(A) Billy Wilder (B) John Ford (C) William Wyler (D) Robert Altman (E) Martin Scorsese

10. Who has won the most Academy Awards for Best Direction?
(A) Billy Wilder (B) John Ford (C) William Wyler (D) Robert Altman (E) Martin Scorsese

Federico Fellini



Ingmar Bergman on the cover of Time.







Ernst Lubitsch





William Wyler









ANSWERS:

1. None of them ever won an Oscar for Best Direction. Hitchcock and Altman were nominated five times each for the award; Fellini four times; Bergman, Lubitsch and Kubrick three times; and Kurosawa once.

2. None of them ever won an Oscar for Best Screenplay. Fellini was nominated seven times; Bergman and Kubrick five times each.

3. One. Stanley Kubrick won for "Best Effects, Special Visual Effects" for 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). His other 12 nominations didn't lead to any awards.

Fellini received 12 personal nominations without winning anything. Bergman received nine, Altman seven, Hitchcock five, Lubitsch three, and Kurosawa one.

Hitchcock's Rebecca (1940) won Best Picture, but the Oscar is given to the producer. Four Fellini films won Best Foreign Language Film (La Strada 1956; The Nights of Cabiria 1957; 1963; Amarcord 1974), as did three by Bergman (The Virgin Spring 1960; Through a Glass Darkly 1961; Fanny & Alexander 1983) and two by Kurosawa (Rashomon 1951; Dersu Uzala 1975), but, again, the statues are given to the producers.

4. Zero

5. Bigger zero.

6. Yeah, right.

7. He'll probably win an Oscar about the same time the Jets win the Super Bowl.

8. Mel Gibson. He won for Braveheart. The other directors in the list were each nominated once but did not win.

9. William Wyler. He was nominated 12 times for: Dodsworth (1936); Wuthering Heights (1939); The Letter (1940); The Little Foxes (1941); Mrs. Miniver (1942); The Best Years of Our Lives (1946); The Heiress (1949); Detective Story (1951); Roman Holiday (1953); Friendly Persuasion (1956); Ben-Hur (1959); and The Collector (1965).

He won for Mrs. Miniver (1942); The Best Years of Our Lives (1946); and Ben-Hur (1959).

Billy Wilder was nominated eight times, winning twice for and The Lost Weekend (1945) and The Apartment (1960).

David Lean and Fred Zinneman were each nominated seven times, both winning twice.

10. John Ford. He won four times for: The Informer (1935); The Grapes of Wrath (1940); How Green Was My Valley (1941) and The Quiet Man (1952). He was also nominated but did not win for Stagecoach (1939).




5 comments:

Liam said...

It's not about quality film, it's about red carpet glamor.

And you know... I don't have a problem with that. I've never taken the Oscars seriously.

cowboyangel said...

I've never taken the Oscars seriously.

The problem, for me, is that the Oscars are taken seriously by many people, even within the industry. They're not the Grammys, which are truly a joke. The Academy aspires to be the most important form of recognition within the world of cinema. If they were content with simple glamour and popularity, like the Golden Globes, it wouldn't be so bad. But they think they represent Film, and millions of people around the world think that as well.

And the Oscars have major repercussions, economically and artistically, on people's careers. Imagine if Orson Welles had won Best Director, Best Actor and Best Picture for Citizen Kane, which were among his nominations that year. And they never nominated him again for anything. Don't you think his financing problems wouldn't have been as bad as they were throughout his life, and that he might've produced more or finished some of his troubled projects?

Imagine if Hal Hartley or Jim Jarmusch or Jean-Luc Godard just received a bloody nomination. How many more people might see their films?

No, instead, they give a zillion awards to Titanic, legitimizing a number of dysfunctional Hollywood trends.

And how can you not give Hitchcock an award for Best Direction?! 5 nominations! No, they give one to Mel Gibson instead! Arrrrrggghhhh.

Liam said...

Yeah, but isn't EVERYTHING like that?

Obviously the fact that you and I never got an Oscar for our screenplay (their paltry excuse would be "you never finished it and made it into a movie") proves that the whole thing is meaningless.

cowboyangel said...

EVERYTHING?!?! What does that mean?!

We need to finish our screenplay. I think about it from time to time - it still feels alive. Buried in an avalanche. I dug up the tape I made as a possible soundtrack. It's pretty damn good. We've been listening to it in the car.

Apart from the "how seriously should one take the Oscars" debate, don't you find it amazing that Ernst Lubitsch, Alfred Hitchcock, Ingmar Bergman, Federico Fellini, Akira Kurosawa, Robert Altman and Stanley Kubrick could get 49 nominations that turned into one measly statue for Best Special Effects?

Perhaps the most shocking discovery for me was that Howard Hawks only received ONE nomination during his entire career. Here's a man who was in the center of Hollywood from 1917 to 1970. A producer, a screenwriter and a major director. And he only received ONE nomination in all that time? [Best Direction for Sergeant York (1941).]

Look at some of his films:
Rio Lobo (1970)
Hatari! (1962)
Rio Bravo (1959)
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953)
A Song Is Born (1948)
Red River (1948)
The Big Sleep (1946)
To Have and Have Not (1944)
Ball of Fire (1941)
Sergeant York (1941)
His Girl Friday (1940)
Only Angels Have Wings (1939)
Bringing Up Baby (1938)
Twentieth Century (1934)
Scarface (1932)

How do you make films like that and only get one nomination? It's really hard to figure out the Academy at times.

Liam said...

Oscar logic is very strange. They do things like give Al Pacino an Oscar for "Scent of a Woman" because he never got one for the Godfather. Also, Scorsese would have won last year even if he had directed "Waterworld."

EVERYTHING? I mean in our absurd consumer culture, s**t rises to the top. Besides, you have to remember that it's all run by the Man:

Undercover Brother: Are you telling me there really is a Man'?
Conspiracy Brother: What do you think? Things don't just happen by accident! Sometimes people - mostly *white* people - make things happen!
Undercover Brother: So the conspiracies we've believed for all these years are true? The NBA really did institute the three point shot to give white boys a chance?
Conspiracy Brother: Of course!
Undercover Brother: Then the entertainment industry really *is* out to get Spike Lee?
Conspiracy Brother: Come on man! Even Cher's won an Oscar! Cher!
Undercover Brother: Then O.J. really didn't do it?
[Everyone looks away and mumbles]