All the Oscars

A few years ago I was watching the Academy Awards program, and realized for the first time in many years, I realized that I'd seen over half of the films. That started a line of thinking -- how many of ALL the winners and nominees have I seen?

A couple years later, a spreadsheet with every major winner and nominee (Best Picture, Best Actor/Actress, Best supporting, and Best director) is fleshed out. Between Netflix and Tivo (thank you, Turner Classics) a vast majority of the films are available. A few more were released on VHS, a few more have disappeared, and, sadly, a dozen or so are lost forever.

My score so far? 625 out of 1171. Or about 53.4%. Right now, as I type this, the annoying (too much bouzouki music, too much pointless Dutch tilt) The Third Man is running on the DVD player.

God knows I probably would NEVER have rented some of these films, if they hadn't been nominated? Trader Horn? Topkapi? California Suite? Dreadful films, all. But, in weak years, they picked up nominations. So I gritted my teeth and worked through them, feeling a true sense of accomplishment after crossing them off the list. On the flip side, some are gems: Best Years of Our Lives, for instance. Amazingly good film, and well ahead of its time; The Deer Hunter and Coming Home owe much to this 1946 masterpiece.

My strategy is... none. I scan the TCM web site for upcoming films, and pretty much randomly keep the Netflix queue loaded with classics. Of course, in a couple months I'll have to add all the 2005 nominees. Fortunately I've seen many of the likely ones: Squid and the Whale, History of Violence, Crash, Weather Man, and even worked on Syriana...

Next up? 1999's Straight Story. Stay tuned.