Over the past few months, we’ve been revisiting all the major Academy Awards from 5, 10, 15, 20 and 25 years ago in our Recall the Gold survey, asking the entertainment industry and EW.com readers to decide whether the winners in the top categories are still Oscar worthy after several years of percolating within popular culture. With just three more categories to go, we’ve finally reached the winner whose Oscar would seem by far the safest: The 1993 Best Picture, Schindler’s List. Director Steven Spielberg’s haunting and harrowing portrait of the Holocaust often felt as if it was a document rather than a narrative; it feels just as alive and terribly vital today as it did 15 years ago. Asking whether it still deserves its Oscar feels somehow a little wrong and a lot beside the point.
And yet there are those who contend, now and in 1993, that Schindler’s List is a flawed film, that Spielberg indulged in some overly sentimental tropes — the girl in the red coat; Oskar Schindler’s "I could have done more" speech — as if he couldn’t bear to fully face such an uncompromisingly brutal period in history. The other four Best Picture nominees from that year, meanwhile, were worthy films in their own right. The Fugitive may seem now like the One That Doesn’t Quite Belong, but in truth, it was really just a dying breed: A contemporary, audience-pleasing, near-perfectly executed Hollywood thriller that also happened to earn a Best Picture nod. In the Name of the Father was a blistering look at the true story of a group of working class Irishmen falsely imprisoned for an IRA bombing. The Piano, a tale about a mute Scotswoman (Holly Hunter) and her young daughter (Anna Paquin) who move to New Zealand for an arranged marriage, felt like a living novel, winning raves, and Oscars, for Hunter, Paquin, and writer-director Jane Campion. (Only the second-ever female Best Director nominee, Campion won for her original screenplay.) And The Remains of the Day, about the life of a buttoned-up butler (Anthony Hopkins) in post-WWI Britain, was yet another impeccable Merchant Ivory literary adaptation (Howards End, A Room With a View) that have since fallen out of favor with the Academy.
These four films lost for one reason: They weren’t Schindler’s List. The quibbles over Spielberg’s softer side were not nearly enough to keep the film from taking home seven Oscars (including Spielberg’s first as a director), including, of course, Best Picture. And now, PopWatchers, it’s your turn to decide whether, with the benefit of time, that Oscar is still as deserved today as it was in 1993, or should go instead to one of the other nominees. Vote in our poll below; if you need a reminder of the films, check out the clips after the jump. (Some are NSFW.) While you’re at it, if you haven’t already, vote in all the other polls from our ongoing walk down Oscar’s memory lane. Tomorrow, we’ll take a look at the 1988 Best Actress race; also, check out coverage of this year’s awards contenders in Dave Karger’s Oscar Watch blog.
The Fugitive
In the Name of the Father (language NSFW)
The Piano
The Remains of the Day
Schindler’s List
Comments (1-30) of 45 Add your comment
You have got to be kidding. Every movie has flaws, just as life does. These columns get dumber and dumber. The academy award is a made up award to boost ticket sales. Best is subjective, unlike say a batting average.
Um, how could you even think of redoing this category? Of course, Schindler’s List deserves it. If it came out today, it’d still deserve it over anything else that’s out. The end.
didnt we do this one already???
Yes I really want to take it away.
No I’m not anti-semetic.
I have never enjoyed this movie. I felt that it was trying to manipulate my feelings when it didn’t have too! I saw all the others when they first came out and was shocked that SL was considered superior to any other one of these movies. I just thought it was the academy once again “redeeming itself” for over looking Steven Spielberg in previous years.
It appears that Chanukah came twice this year. Not only does this over-developed sob story emanating from a money-and-power hungry, biased Jew (SpielBERG) deserve to lose its Oscars, it shouldn’t have been greenlit in the first place. I assure you that if back in 1992, an unknown indie filmmaker named Mark Rosenblatt approached a studio to say that he wants to make a 3-hour, black and white, mind-numbing juxtaposition about something that may have never happened, he would have been tossed out on his jarmukle. SpielBERG was able to make this “passion project” simply because he’s worth $2 billion, has the studio heads in back pocket, and thinks the Jews may have had it tough over the years (they haven’t). I find it abhorrent that such broadly drawn characters following a patchwork storyline, with barely any cohesive elements, would ever contribute to a Best Picture winning film. This is garbage, just like SpielBERG’s soul. This is a comedy, so it shouldn’t have been nominated at all.
“and thinks the Jews may have had it tough over the years (they haven’t).”
dude, you need to calm down sometimes. what the hell do you have against jews anyways?
it isn’t the BEST FILM EVER MADE OMG!!!11′, but have some respect once in a while. the holocaust is one of the darkest periods of human history (and certainly the darkest of the modern age) and doesn’t deserved to be torn apart and disrespected from a-holes like you.
To Otis Jefferson: I assume you were rooting for the Nazis. I hope your post is taken down asap.
No contest here. One of the best films of the last half-century.
Please remove the Otis Jefferson Comment
I found it an emotionally moving and intelligent film. However, the girl in the red dress was an unnecessary cue from the director.
This one’s a no contest -’Schindler’s List’ is one of the best films of the 90’s and one of the best American films ever. It’s a shame it didn’t win any acting awards.
Could everyone back off of EW for the specifics? They’re doing ALL of the major awards from 5, 10, 15, 20, and 25 years ago. They are in no way suggesting that ANY of them should be taken away! Schindler’s List happens to be the Best Picture winner from one of those years.
Also, please ignore the Holocaust-denier down there, he’s just trying to get people riled up.
SL is excellent, but The Piano is a masterpiece of such stunning originality that I feel it should have won Best Picture. I respect the importance of Schindler’s, but I only felt the need to see it once, while I’ve seen the Piano about five times and was mesmerized each time.
I love all of those films, but c’mon. There is NO WAY that Schindler’s List doesn’t deserve to win that award. One of the best movies of the past 20 years, even if one wants to quibble with a few choices.
I sincerely apologize to anyone that my earlier post offended. This started as a joke with my friends when I trashed “Lost in Translation,” and it got seriously out of hand today. I went off the deep end cause my Jewish friends always rip on me for being black, and so I’m used to joking around about the Holocaust and Jewish stereotypes. That doesn’t justify anything, but it should explain why I was so glib about such a serious subject. It wouldn’t hurt my Jewish friends because they know me and we go back and forth like that, but I’m sure it really touched a chord with many of you and I’m sorry for that.
No contest. Schindler’s List. The Piano is an excellent film as are the others, but the Academy got it right this year. The film has also aged very well.
To Otis: “juxtaposition about something that may have never happened” What?!?! See, this is why movies like this (and maybe even the boring, but accurate Valkyrie) SHOULD get made, if only to remember or document the horrors of the past so we will not commit them again.
it’s pretty obvious from his ridiculous posts. sad really.
This is one of the surest locks in Oscar history, one that a recount, revote will not undo. Schindler’s List is great and deserves its Oscar for best picture. If it weren’t in the running for the award, then surely The Piano would have gotten the award. I actually like the Piano more, with its beautiful cinematography, sincere performances and exotic feel.
Schindlers List was one of the first films that made me cry. However, I must concur that if it had not been in the running, The Piano would have taken first prize.
I’ve always thought that Schindler’s List is overrated. Sacrilege to some but do we really need someone to show us that Nazis were bad? The film is black and white in more ways than one. The characters are all either unfailingly good or unredeemably bad. There is no nuance. The Pianist is a far superior holocaust film. For 1993, I would have picked The Piano.
Ralph Fiennes was totally hot in Schindler’s List, even with the pudge he gained for the film and even though he starred as an evil Nazi. So, yes, it deserved the Oscar.
Funny you should say that Schindler’s List contains “characters are all either unfailingly good or unredeemably bad”, when the main character was far from unfailingly good. what he did was good but that dont make him a good man, look at his relationship with his wife… and as for ralph fiennes character, i wouldnt call him unreemably bad per se. sure he’s an evil f***er but he did fall in love with his jewish maid and knew she was going to be saved, therefore allowing her to go with schindler’s jews…
it should be noted that i normally find your posts both hilarious and sarcastic. i guess i just didn’t find this one that funny.
Sorry Otis has inside jokes and issues he feels he needs to air out on a website where clearly we’re not in on the “joke.” If any film deserves the Oscar, it is SL. The Piano had the misfortune of being released that same year. While I don’t agree with Al’s comment about The Pianist, I do think both films have their audience(s) and they are of equal importance in the world of cinema.
Look guys, Otis said that he was sorry. Let it go. There are plenty of other a-holes out there that do not believe that such barberism ever existed. Next time Otis you will know to choose your words wisely.
Of the nominees, yes Schindler’s List is the deserving winner. The Fugitive was fabulous, but not sure if Oscar winning. Piano was ok (a bit boring for my taste but ok). I have yet to finish Remains of the Day. I cannot stay awake through it.
I don’t mind Schindler’s List but Can someone look into revoking the Best Picture Oscar for Gladitor? It’s an over glorified Spartacus/Braveheart rip off.
I don’t know how you could really say Spielberg went soft with Schindler’s List. I thought it was a bore the first time I watched it, but when I watched it in proper context (in high school history class), it was powerful and still remains a powerful experience just to watch. I find that it’s a harrowing, uncompromising look at one of the most shameful chapters in human history and to say that Spielberg went soft means that there are some Spielberg haters out there who think that every one of his films has to have a softer side to it. So what do they do? They look for it constantly. When they find it, they try to exploit it. Schindler’s List, as far as I’m concerned, has none of that. Watch the liquidation of the Krakow ghetto scene or the scenes in Auschwitz (the gas chamber scene still freaks me out) and tell me he’s gone soft.