It’s Oscar week! Every day this week, WTOP examines a different aspect of Oscar history and this year’s race.
After decades of cinephilia, the “Barbenheimer” phenomenon could steer the Oscars back toward the people.
If either Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer” (the unstoppable front-runner) or Greta Gerwig’s “Barbie” (the pop culture powerhouse) emerges victorious at the Oscars on Sunday, it will mark the first time that a Top 5 grossing blockbuster has won best picture since Peter Jackson’s “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King” (2003).
That’s right, it’s been exactly 20 years since a mainstream blockbuster has won Hollywood’s top prize.
“Barbie” was the year’s top grosser with $636 million domestically and $1.4 billion worldwide, while “Oppenheimer” ranked fifth domestically at $326 million and third worldwide with $957 million.
Not only did I love both movies, but I’m rooting for a “Barbenheimer” best picture because it would end two decades of a false narrative that popcorn favorites and acclaimed artistry can’t go hand-in-hand. It would also silence a constant complaint every award season: Why do the Oscars reward films that people haven’t seen?
How quickly we forget that blockbusters frequently used to win best picture throughout Hollywood history.
In the 1920s, a Top 10 grosser won 100% of the time with “Wings” (1927/1928) and “The Broadway Melody” (1928/1929) transitioning from black-and-white silents to early talkies with a dash of Technicolor.
In the 1930s, a Top 10 grosser won 80% of the time with “All Quiet on the Western Front” (1930), “Cimarron” (1931), “Grand Hotel” (1932), “It Happened One Night” (1934), “Mutiny on the Bounty” (1935), “The Great Ziegfeld” (1936), “You Can’t Take it with You” (1938) and “Gone With the Wind” (1939), still the all-time top grosser adjusted for inflation. The only exceptions were “Cavalcade” (1933) and “The Life of Emile Zola” (1937).
In the 1940s, a Top 10 grosser once again won 80% of the time with “Rebecca” (1940), “How Green Was My Valley” (1941), “Mrs. Miniver” (1942), “Casablanca” (1943), “Going My Way” (1944), “The Lost Weekend” (1945), “The Best Years of Our Lives” (1946) and “Gentleman’s Agreement” (1947). The only exceptions were “Hamlet” (1948) and “All the King’s Men” (1949).
In the 1950s, a Top 10 grosser won 90% of the time with “All About Eve” (1950), “An American in Paris” (1951), “The Greatest Show on Earth” (1952), “From Here to Eternity” (1953), “On the Waterfront” (1954), “Around the World in 80 Days” (1956), “Bridge on the River Kwai” (1957), “Gigi” (1958) and “Ben-Hur” (1959), which won a record 11 Oscars. The only exception was “Marty” (1955), an underrated gem of the Golden Age.
In the 1960s, a Top 10 grosser won 90% of the time with “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), “Oliver!” (1968) and “Midnight Cowboy” (1969), which remains the only X-rated best picture. The one exception was “In the Heat of the Night” (1967), which just missed the Top 10 but was still very much a culturally significant force.
During the Hollywood Renaissance of the 1970s, a Top 10 grosser won 100% of the time with “Patton” (1970), “The French Connection” (1971), “The Godfather” (1972), “The Sting” (1973), “The Godfather: Part II” (1974), “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” (1975), “Rocky” (1976), “Annie Hall” (1977), “The Deer Hunter” (1978) and “Kramer vs. Kramer” (1979) as audiences embraced edgier filmmaking inspired by the New Wave overseas.
Things began to dip in the 1980s when a Top 10 grosser won 70% of the time with “Ordinary People” (1980), “Chariots of Fire” (1981), “Terms of Endearment” (1983), “Out of Africa” (1985), “Platoon” (1986), “Rain Man” (1988) and “Driving Miss Daisy” (1989). Three non-blockbusters won: “Gandhi” (1982), “Amadeus” (1984) and “The Last Emperor” (1987) as audiences shifted from prestige biopics to a “Star Wars” franchise model.
It fell further in the 1990s as a Top 10 grosser only won 50% of the time with “Dances With Wolves” (1990), “The Silence of the Lambs” (1991), “Schindler’s List” (1993), “Forrest Gump” (1994) and “Titanic” (1997), which tied the record of 11 wins. The other half of ’90s winners missed the Top 10 box office: “Unforgiven” (1992), “Braveheart” (1995), “The English Patient” (1996), “Shakespeare in Love” (1998) and “American Beauty” (1999).
The new millennium of the 2000s plummeted further to 30% with “Gladiator” (2000), “Chicago” (2002) and “Lord of the Rings: Return of the King” (2003), which tied the record of 11 wins. “A Beautiful Mind” (2001), “The Departed” (2006) and “Slumdog Millionaire” (2008) cracked the Top 15, “Million Dollar Baby” (2004) fell to No. 24, “Crash” (2005) to No. 49, “No Country for Old Men” (2007) to No. 36 and “The Hurt Locker” (2009) to No. 116.
During the Marvel boom of the 2010s, it hit rock bottom at 0%. That’s right, zero of the Top 10 grossers last decade won, leaving “The King’s Speech” (2010) at No. 18, “The Artist” (2011) at No. 71, “Argo” (2012) at No. 22, “12 Years a Slave” (2013) at No. 62, “Birdman” (2014) at No. 78, “Spotlight” (2015) at No. 62, “Moonlight” (2016) at No. 135, “The Shape of Water” (2017) at No. 118, “Green Book” (2018) at No. 88 and “Parasite” (2019) at No. 98.
Finally, our current decade seemed like this divisive trend would continue with “Nomadland” (2020) at No. 115 in the outset of the pandemic and “CODA” (2021) not even charting as a streaming-only release. “Everything Everywhere All at Once” (2022) ranked No. 27, the closest to a blockbuster champ in 10 years, so I suppose that was progress toward bridging art vs. mainstream, though its wacky nature was generationally polarizing.
This is why “Oppenheimer” winning would be such a big deal. Not only has Nolan endeared himself to cinephiles with “Memento” (2000), “Inception” (2010) and “Dunkirk” (2017), he’s built up legions of fans since “The Dark Knight” (2008) with superhero fans rooting for Cillian Murphy (“Batman Begins”) and Robert Downey Jr. (“Iron Man”). Ironically, it was “The Dark Knight” not getting nominated that expanded the field to 10 nominees.
For all this, Nolan is the perfect director to break this streak — and the result is good for the movies. Cord-cutting trends and splintered viewing habits make it virtually impossible for the Oscars to ever again see the record 55.3 million viewers that watched “Titanic” win best picture, but last year’s Oscars were still the top-rated non-NFL telecast of 2023, according to Nielsen. That’s right, name your favorite TV show and the Oscars still beat it.
If Hollywood filmmakers continue to make movies as good as “Oppenheimer,” and the Academy continues to reward them with Oscars going forward, we could see a new era of common cultural touchstones where folks munch popcorn to artful cinema and a new generation learns that quality and quantity aren’t mutually exclusive.
Or, to paraphrase J. Robert Oppenheimer: Now, I am become best picture, destroyer of trends.
Tune in every day this week as WTOP’s Jason Fraley examines a different aspect of Oscar history and this year’s race.
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