Clint Eastwood with his Oscars for Best Picture and Best Director for 1993’s Unforgiven. (Getty)
In Hollywood, there’s no greater prize than the Best Picture Oscar. Of the thousands of movies made, only 89 films since 1927 – from Wings to Moonlight – have won the top prize at the Academy Awards. Below is the complete list of all winners.
Today, the Best Picture nominee field can contain anywhere between five and 10 nominees, thanks to a preferential voting system put in place after the 2008 Oscars. Before that, there were strictly only five nominees.
This system was put in place after the Academy was widely criticized for not giving Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight a nomination for Best Picture. Although this system has allowed for more popular films like Toy Story 3, Avatar and Mad Max: Fury Road to get nominations, there still has never been a movie based on a comic book nominated for the top prize. In addition, the eventual winner typically turns out to be a smaller film like The Hurt Locker, The Artist and last year’s Spotlight.
The early Oscar ceremonies were also much different from today’s. Since the seventh ceremony in 1935, the Oscars have honored films released in a single calendar year. But during the first six, the films were chosen from a period spread over two years. For example, the sixth ceremony honored movies released between August 1, 1932 and December 31, 1933.
It’s also worth pointing out that during the First Academy Awards, there were technically two Best Picture winners. Wings, a popular world War I action drama, won Outstanding Picture. Sunrise, directed by F.W. Murnau, won a prize called Unique and Artistic Picture, an award meant to honor art films that might not have been hits with audiences. Wings‘ prize was retroactively chosen as the equivalent of today’s “Best Picture.”
The Best Picture prize goes to the producers of a film. This tradition only started in 1950. Before that, the award went to the studio that made the movie.
Mel Gibson with his Oscars for Braveheart. (Getty)
Here’s the complete list of all 88 Best Picture winners.
- Wings (1927/1928)
- The Broadway Melody (1928/1929) – first sound picture and musical to win
- All Quiet On The Western Front (1929/1930)
- Cimarron (1930/1931) – first Western to win
- Grand Hotel (1931/1932) – last movie to win Best Picture and no other award
- Cavalcade (1932/1933)
- It Happened One Night (1934) – first movie to win the “Big Five” (Best Picture, Best Original/Adapted Screenplay, Best Actor, Best Actress and Best Director)
- Mutiny on the Bounty (1935)
- The Great Ziegfeld (1936)
- The Life of Emile Zola (1937)
- You Can’t Take It With You (1938)
- Gone With The Wind (1939) – the first color film to win Best Picture
- Rebecca (1940)
- How Green Was My Valley (1941)
- Mrs. Miniver (1942)
- Casablanca (1943) – Casablanca was first premiered in November 1942, but not released to the public until 1943
- Going My Way (1944)
- The Lost Weekend (1945)
- The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)
- Gentleman’s Agreement (1947)
- Hamlet (1948) – Sir Laurence Olivier’s Hamlet was the first film produced outside the U.S. to win Best Picture. It was filmed in the U.K.
- All The King’s Men (1949)
- All About Eve (1950) – tied with Titanic and La La Land with 14 nominations, the most ever
- An American In Paris (1951)
- The Greatest Show On Earth (1952)
- From Here to Eternity (1953)
- On The Waterfront (1954)
- Marty (1955) – The only film to win the Cannes Film Festival’s Palme d’Or and the Best Picture Oscar
- Around The World in 80 Days (1956)
- The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
- Gigi (1958)
- Ben-Hur (1959) – tied with Titanic and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King with 11 Oscar wins, the most ever
- The Apartment (1960)
- West Side Story (1961)
- Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
- Tom Jones (1963)
- My Fair Lady (1964)
- The Sound of Music (1965)
- A Man for all Seasons (1966)
- In the Heat of the Night (1967)
- Oliver! (1968)
- Midnight Cowboy (1969) – only X-rated film to win Best Picture
- Patton (1970)
- The French Connection (1971)
- The Godfather (1972)
- The Sting (1973)
- The Godfather Part II (1974) – the first sequel to win Best Picture
- One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest (1975) – the second film to win the “Big Five”
- Rocky (1976)
- Annie Hall (1977)
- The Deer Hunter (1978)
- Kramer vs. Kramer (1979)
- Ordinary People (1980)
- Chariots of Fire (1981)
- Ghandi (1982)
- Terms of Endearment (1983)
- Amadeus (1984)
- Out of Africa (1985)
- Platoon (1986)
- The Last Emperor (1987)
- Rain Man (1988)
- Driving Miss Daisy (1989)
- Dances With Wolves (1990)
- The Silence of the Lambs (1991) – the third and last film to win the “Big Five”
- Unforgiven (1992) – the first Western to win since Cimarron
- Schindler’s List (1993)
- Forrest Gump (1994)
- Braveheart (1995)
- The English Patient (1996)
- Titanic (1997) – tied with Ben-Hur and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King with 11 Oscar wins, the most ever; also tied with All About Eve and La La Land for the most Oscar nominations ever with 14
- Shakespeare in Love (1998)
- American Beauty (1999)
- Gladiator (2000)
- A Beautiful Mind (2001)
- Chicago (2002) – most recent musical to win & first musical to win since Oliver!
- The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003) – tied with Ben-Hur and Titanic with 11 Oscar wins; only the second sequel to win and the only fantasy film ever to win
- Million Dollar Baby (2004)
- Crash (2005) – Crash was the first Best Picture winner to be shown at a film festival the year before its release. It premiered at the 2014 Toronto Film Festival, but wasn’t released in the U.S. until May 2005.
- The Departed (2006)
- No Country For Old Men (2007)
- Slumdog Millionaire (2008)
- The Hurt Locker (2009)
- The King’s Speech (2010)
- The Artist (2011) – the first silent movie to win since Wings and the first completely black & white movie to win since The Apartment
- Argo (2012)
- 12 Years A Slave (2013) – the first film written and directed by black artists to win Best Picture
- Birdman (or the Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) (2014)
- Spotlight (2015)
- Moonlight (2016) – the first film written and directed by the same black artist