The Best of the Nighthawk Awards: The 1940′s

the dancing mushrooms in Fantasia - the best animated film of the 1940's

Well, before I go into 1949, I’ll cover the decade as a whole.  Bear in mind the decade awards cover films by their original release date, so you might find films that haven’t shown up in individual years yet.

1940  -  1949

Total Films I’ve Seen:  617

Films That Make the Top 5 in a Category:  42

Best Film Not to Make the Top 5 in any Category:  The Best Years of Our Lives

Film of the Decade:  Children of Paradise

Worst Film of the Decade:  King of the Zombies

Worst Best Picture Nominee of the Decade:  All This and Heaven Too

Worst Film of the Decade Made by a Top 100 Director:  Under Capricorn

 

The History of the Academy Awards: Best Picture – 1940

David O. Selznick triumphs again with Joan Fontaine and Laurence Olivier in Alfred Hitchcock's Rebecca (1940)

The 13th Academy Awards, for the film year 1940.  The nominations were announced on February 10, 1941 and the awards were held on February 27, 1941.

Best Picture:  Rebecca

• The Grapes of Wrath
• The Philadelphia Story
• The Great Dictator
• The Letter
• The Long Voyage Home
• Foreign Correspondent
• Our Town
• Kitty Foyle
• All This and Heaven Too

Most Surprising Omission:  Arise My Love

Best Film Not Nominated:  His Girl Friday

Rank (out of 82) Among Best Picture Years:  #50

 

The Year in Film: 1940

My Top 10:

Henry Fonda as Tom Joad during his final speech in The Grapes of Wrath (1940)

1. The Grapes of Wrath
2. The Great Dictator
3. The Philadelphia Story
4. Rebecca
5. His Girl Friday
6. Pinocchio
7. The Great McGinty
8. The Shop Around the Corner
9. La Bete Humaine
10. Pride and Prejudice

 

The Myth of 1939

Kirk Douglas in Kubrick's Paths of Glory, one of the best films from 1957

A little note before my article: I have a new article appearing on CinCity2000.com on Tuesday. It’s a response to a New York Times article about the lack of decent women’s roles in summer movies.

The Myth of 1939

We are so fond of anniversaries. Just look at everything we celebrated last year. The 80th anniversary of the Academy Awards. The 40th anniversary of the Summer of Love and Sgt Pepper’s. The 30th anniversary of Star Wars and the Summer of Sam. But did we forget the best anniversary from last year? Isn’t the big number supposed to be 50 (“not to fifty” Christopher Guest shouts as that classic turned 20)? Shouldn’t we have been looking back to 1957? For movies, after all, it might have been the peak of artistic creation, both on the national and international front.