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Worst Best Picture Snubs in Oscar History

Warner Bros. / IMDb

The Academy Awards represent the pinnacle of what a movie can be. Since 1929, they’ve awarded statuettes to the best moviemaking every year. But in that time, they’ve made some mistakes.

None of those mistakes are more visible than when there’s a big miss on the final award of the night: Best Picture. Whether it’s politics or bias or whatever excuse you want to make for Academy Award voters, these are the worst Best Picture snubs in the history of the Oscars — several of which had incredible box office numbers that only drive the point home.

30. All the President’s Men (1976)

All the President's Men
FlimstoFilms_ / Twitter

Warning: Content contains spoilers.

Oscar year: 1977

Best Picture winner: Rocky

Best Picture nominees: All the President’s Men, Rocky, Bound for Glory, Network, Taxi Driver

Best Director winner: John G. Avildsen, Rocky

Budget: $8.5 million

Box office: $70.6 million

Bottom line: Don’t get it twisted. We love “Rocky” and want to acknowledge 1977 (honoring movies released in 1976) as one of the most stacked Best Picture fields of all time. 

The problem is, if we’re looking at things in a historical context, we have to understand that “Rocky” needs to take a backseat to two other movies that received nominations — Martin Scorsese’s brilliant “Taxi Driver” and “All the President’s Men” starring Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman.

Out of those two, “President’s Men” is still the one you can just hit “play” on today and watch from start to finish and get much of the same experience you had the first time you ever saw it. Thrilling, exhilarating, empowering. 

29. Mystic River (2003)

Mystic River
JuanFerrerVila / Twitter

Oscar year: 2004

Best Picture winner: The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King 

Best Picture nominees: Mystic River, The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King, Lost in Translation, Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, Seabiscuit

Best Director winner: Peter Jackson, The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King 

Budget: $25-30 million

Box office: $156.6 million

Bottom line: This may have been a makeup move by the Oscars. They screwed up in 2002 when they honored “Chicago” as best picture over “The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers,” which was the best of Peter Jackson’s film trilogy based on the books by J.R.R. Tolkien. 

Instead, in typical Oscars fashion, they chose to award Jackson the next year, when the obvious Best Picture choice was Clint Eastwood’s brilliant “Mystic River” based on the Dennis LeHane novel. Stars Sean Penn and Tim Robbins became the first duo to bring home Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor honors since “Ben-Hur” in 1959. 

28. High Noon (1952)

High Noon
cjubarrington / Twitter

Oscar year: 1953

Best Picture winner: The Greatest Show on Earth

Best Picture nominees: High Noon, The Greatest Show on Earth, Ivanhoe, Moulin Rouge, The Quiet Man

Best Director winner: John Ford, The Quiet Man

Budget: $730,000

Box office: $12 million

Bottom line: “High Noon” isn’t just one of the best Western films of its era. It is one of the best movies of its era. 

While it lost to the sappy “The Greatest Show on Earth,” the thrilling Western came away with four Academy Awards out of its seven nominations, including Best Actor for the great Cary Cooper. 

We like to think audiences at the time didn’t know what to make of “High Noon” as it flipped the tried-and-true plot at the end, with the heroine saving the hero instead of vice versa. Which is just awesome that it came out in 1952. 

27. Funny Girl (1968)

Funny Girl
BarbaraStreisand / Twitter

Oscar year: 1969

Best Picture winner: Oliver! 

Best Picture nominees: Funny Girl, Oliver!, The Lion in Winter, Rachel, Rachel, Romeo and Juliet

Best Director winner: Carol Reed, Oliver! 

Budget: $14.1 million

Box office: $58.5 million

Bottom line: “Funny Girl” was the movie that made Barbara Streisand a huge star and should have been the Best Picture winner over the incredibly corny “Oliver!” which brought home the statue in 1968. 

Streisand was a revelation in reprising her role of Fanny Brice from the hit Broadway musical, and the performance won her the Academy Award for Best Actress in a tie with Katharine Hepburn for “The Lion in Winter,” another movie that’s better than “Oliver!”