The Nighthawk Awards: 1927-28

You can read more about this year in film here.  The Best Picture race is discussed here, with reviews of all the nominees.  There are the categories, followed by all the films with their nominations, then the Globes, where I split the major awards by Drama and Comedy, followed by a few lists at the very end.  If there’s a film you expected to see and didn’t, check the very bottom.  Films in red won the Oscar in that category.  Films in blue were nominated.  But remember, there were only a handful of Oscar categories in this, the first year of the Oscars.

Nighthawk Awards:

• Best Picture

1. Sunrise
2. Metropolis
3. The Man Who Laughs
4. The Circus
5. 7th Heaven

Analysis:  Doesn’t have nearly the impact as the first year, because that had 15 years worth of films and this has a year and a half.  On the other hand, both Sunrise and Metropolis rank higher on my list than any film released before them – it’s a shame that I have to choose and you can consider this the first of a few virtual ties (1958 will also have one, as will 1977, 1984 and 1992).  This is also the second time already that I have switched my Best Picture and Director winners with the brilliant and innovative Sunrise, directed by the brilliant and innovate F.W. Murnau just beating out the similarly brilliant and innovative Metropolis and Fritz Lang.  There are also two more films I must mention here – the other two **** films that fall outside the top 5 – The Last Command and The Love of Jeanne Ney.  It will take until 1932-33 before we again have a **** film that doesn’t get nominated for Best Picture.

• Best Director

1. F.W. Murnau  (Sunrise)
2. Fritz Lang  (Metropolis)
3. Paul Leni  (The Man Who Laughs)
4. Charlie Chaplin  (The Circus)
5. Frank Borzage  (7th Heaven)

Analysis:  Though four of these films are made in Hollywood, only one of these directors was actually American – Borzage.  The list continues – my next several spots are G.W. Pabst (The Love of Jeanne Ney), Paul Leni (The Cat and the Canary), Alfred Hitchcock (The Lodger) and Josef von Sternberg (The Last Command).  Three of those films are in English and two of them are made in Hollywood, but again, no Americans.  You have get to William Wellman in the #10 spot with Wings to find another American.  Chaplin was originally nominated for Best Comedy Director before his nominations were pulled.

• Best Adapted Screenplay:

1. Sunrise
2. 7th Heaven
3. The Man Who Laughs
4. The Love of Jeanne Ney
5. The Cat and the Canary

• Best Original Screenplay:

1. Metropolis
2. The Circus
3. The Last Command
4. Cameraman
5. Two Arabian Knights

Analysis:  It’s a much better year for Adapted than Original scripts and that would stay the case for a long time.  Original Screenplays wouldn’t really start to come in great quantity and quality until the rise of Preston Sturges and Billy Wilder in the early 1940’s.  Note, that The Circus was originally an Oscar nominee until all of Chaplin’s nominations were revoked to give him the Special Award.

• Best Actor:

1. Emil Jannings  (The Last Command)
2. Conrad Veidt  (The Man Who Laughs)
3. Charlie Chaplin  (The Circus)
4. George O’Brien  (Sunrise)
5. Lon Chaney  (Laugh Clown Laugh)

Analysis:  Jannings also won the Oscar for The Way of All Flesh, which is a lost film.

• Best Actress

1. Janet Gaynor  (Sunrise)
2. Maria Falconetti  (The Passion of Joan of Arc)
3. Janet Gaynor  (7th Heaven)
4. Gloria Swanson  (Sadie Thompson)
5. Lilian Gish  (The Scarlet Letter)
6. Louise Dresser  (A Ship Comes In)

Analysis:  There are definitely those who will say I have Falconetti too low.  So imagine what they must think that I have the film rated at only ***.  Yet, I watched again before this post and hold to my rating.  I find the film too overwhelming, that the use of close-ups actually hurts the film rather than helps it.  And Falconetti is great, but I still have her edged out by Gaynor.  Gaynor actually won her Oscar for three performances, and the only reason that Street Angel is not also among the nominees is because since it was also nominated for 2 Oscars in 1928-29, I moved it there for eligibility purposes and Gaynor will be nominated again for that.  Dresser makes it because of the two nominations for Gaynor – I always nominate 5 different performers.  This category and Best Supporting Actress are the only two categories where, as a whole, this year is better than the first year.

• Best Supporting Actor:

1. William Powell  (The Last Command)
2. Lionel Barrymore  (Sadie Thompson)
3. Adolf E. Licho  (The Love of Jeanne Ney)
4. Rudolf Klein-Rogge  (Metropolis)
5. Sig Arno  (The Love of Jeanne Ney)

Analysis:  This may be faulty memory, but I don’t really remember seeing Powell play the villain in any other film.  He could a charming cad, cynical, sardonic, but not a villain.  And here, as the villain, he wins my award for Best Supporting Actor (he would never end up winning an Oscar).  Don’t miss the performances, by the way, in The Love of Jeanne Ney, with her lecherous uncle as my #3 and his chief inspector at #5.

• Best Supporting Actress:

1. Brigitte Helm  (Metropolis)
2. Evelyn Brent  (The Last Command)
3. Olga Baclanova  (The Man Who Laughs)
4. Brigitte Helm  (The Love of Jeanne Ney)
5. Martha Mattox  (The Cat and the Canary)
6. Molly O’Day  (The Patent Leather Kid)

Analysis:  Brigitte Helm plays two very different roles in Metropolis and yet, neither is like her performance in The Love of Jeanne Ney.  There’s a big drop, by the way, in quality between #4 and 5 – but there’s not a whole lot of noteworthy supporting actress performances in this year.

• Best Editing:

1. Sunrise
2. The Circus
3. Metropolis
4. The Love of Jeanne Ney
5. 7th Heaven

• Best Cinematography:

1. Sunrise
2. Metropolis
3. 7th Heaven
4. The Man Who Laughs
5. The Circus

Analysis:  Between the visionary shots in Sunrise (whose Cinematography is possibly the best in film until Citizen Kane), the amazing shots in Metropolis and the great move up the staircase in 7th Heaven, this is a very strong year.

• Best Original Score:

1. The Circus

Analysis:  This may again be considered cheating, as Chaplin wrote the score for the 1969 re-release.  But it means that two years in a row, Chaplin earns 6 nominations from me (he also edited), though this time he doesn’t win any of them.

• Best Sound:

1. The Jazz Singer

• Best Art Direction:

1. Metropolis
2. The Man Who Laughs
3. Sunrise
4. Tartuffe
5. 7th Heaven

• Best Visual Effects:

1. Metropolis
2. Wings
3. Sunrise
4. 7th Heaven

Analysis:  This category was called Engineering Effects in this, the initial year of the Oscars.  It was dropped after that, only to be revived as Special Effects in 1939.

• Best Costume Design:

1. The Man Who Laughs
2. Tartuffe
3. The King of Kings
4. The Circus
5. Tempest

• Best Makeup:

1. London After Midnight
2. The Man Who Laughs
3. The Passion of Joan of Arc
4. Laugh Clown Laugh

Analysis:  Two more makeup jobs for Lon Chaney, with another win, bringing him up to 4 Nighthawk Awards and 9 nominations total so far.

• Best Foreign Film:

1. The Love of Jeanne Ney
2. October
3. Napoleon

Analysis:  As noted below, I have only seen 5 films that are eligible for this award in this year.  By this point, many of the best European directors had left for Hollywood and were making films in English.

By Film:

note:  They’re in points order.  You get twice as many points for a win as for a nomination.  Hopefully your math skills will let you figure out the system.

• Sunrise  (515)
  • Picture, Director, Adapted Screenplay, Actor, Actress, Editing, Cinematography, Art Direction, Visual Effects
• Metropolis  (435)
  • Picture, Director, Original Screenplay, Supporting Actor, Supporting Actress, Editing, Cinematography, Art Direction, Visual Effects, Foreign Film  (02-26)
• The Man Who Laughs  (285)
  • Picture, Director, Adapted Screenplay, Actor, Supporting Actress, Cinematography, Art Direction, Costume Design, Makeup
• The Circus  (285)
  • Picture, Director, Original Screenplay, Actor, Editing, Cinematography, Original Score, Costume Design
• 7th Heaven  (260)
  • Picture, Director, Adapted Screenplay, Actress, Editing, Cinematography, Art Direction, Visual Effects
• The Last Command  (200)
  • Original Screenplay, Actor, Supporting Actor, Supporting Actress
• The Love of Jeanne Ney  (195)
  • Adapted Screenplay, Supporting Actor, Supporting Actor, Supporting Actress, Editing, Foreign Film
• The Cat and the Canary  (70)
  • Adapted Screenplay, Supporting Actress
• Sadie Thompson  (65)
  • Actress, Supporting Actor
• Laugh Clown Laugh  (45)
  • Actor, Makeup
• The Passion of Joan of Arc  (45)
  • Actress, Makeup
• Cameraman  (40)
  • Original Screenplay
• Two Arabian Knights  (40)
  • Original Screenplay
• The Jazz Singer  (40)
  • Sound
• Tartuffe  (35)
  • Art Direction, Costume Design
• The Scarlet Letter  (35)
  • Actress
• A Ship Comes In  (35)
  • Actress
• The Patent Leather Kid  (30)
  • Supporting Actress
• London After Midnight  (20)
  • Makeup
• Wings  (20)
  • Visual Effects
• The King of Kings  (15)
  • Costume Design
• Tempest  (15)
  • Costume Design

Best Film Not Nominated for Any Nighthawk Awards:

• The Lodger

Analysis:  I already discussed The Lodger in the Best Adapted Screenplay post.  It is a very good film, my #10 of the year, but never manages to get higher than 8th in any category.

Also Not Nominated but Don’t Miss:

• The Kid Brother  –  a very enjoyable collaboration between star Harold Lloyd and director Ted Wilde – much better than Speedy, which would earn Wilde a Best Comedy Director nomination in the only year of the category
• The Hands of Orlac  –  a very good German horror film from the director of Caligari, made in 1924, but just reaching the States here
• The Unknown  –  always watch the Chaney films, especially the ones directed by Tod Browning

Biggest Awards Film Not Nominated for Any Nighthawk Awards:

• The Crowd

Analysis:  Nominated for Best Artistic Production and Best Director, it would have won the former had Louis B. Mayer not wanted such a depressing film from his studio to win the award.  I find it to be massively over-rated (see below).

Nighthawk Golden Globes:

Drama:

• Best Picture

1. Sunrise
2. Metropolis
3. The Man Who Laughs
4. 7th Heaven
5. The Last Command

• Best Director

1. F.W. Murnau  (Sunrise)
2. Fritz Lang  (Metropolis)
3. Paul Leni  (The Man Who Laughs)
4. Frank Borzage  (7th Heaven)
5. G.W. Pabst  (The Love of Jeanne Ney)

• Best Adapted Screenplay:

1. Sunrise
2. 7th Heaven
3. The Man Who Laughs
4. The Love of Jeanne Ney
5. Tartuffe

• Best Original Screenplay:

1. Metropolis
2. The Last Command

• Best Actor:

1. Emil Jannings  (The Last Command)
2. Conrad Veidt  (The Man Who Laughs)
3. George O’Brien  (Sunrise)
4. Lon Chaney  (Laugh Clown Laugh)
5. Richard Barthelmess  (The Patent Leather Kid)

Analysis:  Barthelmess was nominated for Best Actor for The Patent Leather Kid and The Noose (which has a copy at MOMA which I haven’t seen).  I only recently got a chance to see Kid, and it’s maybe the best performance of his career.  It just missed out on the regular Best Actor category, but manages to slip in here with Chaplin in the Comedy category.

• Best Actress

1. Janet Gaynor  (Sunrise)
2. Maria Falconetti  (The Passion of Joan of Arc)
3. Janet Gaynor  (7th Heaven)
4. Gloria Swanson  (Sadie Thompson)
5. Lilian Gish  (The Scarlet Letter)

• Best Supporting Actor:

1. William Powell  (The Last Command)
2. Lionel Barrymore  (Sadie Thompson)
3. Adolf E. Licho  (The Love of Jeanne Ney)
4. Rudolf Klein-Rogge  (Metropolis)
5. Sig Arno  (The Love of Jeanne Ney)

Analysis:  For the Drama / Comedy split, I go by the film.  So, here, in the Drama category we have Sig Arno nominated for a performance that is comedic genius (he would play a similar role to similar effects in Pandora’s Box) because he gives it in a very dramatic film (the scenes with Arno provide really the only light moments in the film).

• Best Supporting Actress:

1. Brigitte Helm  (Metropolis)
2. Evelyn Brent  (The Last Command)
3. Olga Baclanova  (The Man Who Laughs)
4. Brigitte Helm  (The Love of Jeanne Ney)
5. Molly O’Day  (The Patent Leather Kid)

By Film:

• Sunrise  (375)
  • Picture, Director, Adapted Screenplay, Actor, Actress
• Metropolis  (265)
  • Picture, Director, Original Screenplay, Supporting Actor, Supporting Actress
• The Last Command  (250)
  • Picture, Original Screenplay, Actor, Supporting Actor, Supporting Actress
• The Love of Jeanne Ney  (175)
  • Director, Adapted Screenplay, Supporting Actor, Supporting Actor, Supporting Actress
• 7th Heaven  (170)
  • Picture, Director, Adapted Screenplay, Actress
• The Patent Leather Kid  (65)
  • Actor, Supporting Actress
• Sadie Thompson  (65)
  • Actress, Supporting Actor
• Tartuffe  (40)
  • Adapted Screenplay
• Laugh Clown Laugh  (35)
  • Actor
• The Passion of Joan of Arc  (35)
  • Actress
• The Scarlet Letter  (35)
  • Actress

Best Drama Not Nominated for Any Nighthawk Golden Globes:

• The Lodger

Analysis:  see above

Comedy:

• Best Picture:

1. The Circus
2. The Cat and the Canary
3. The Kid Brother
4. Cameraman

Analysis:  To be eligible for my Best Picture awards you have to be a ***.5 or **** film.  So, there are other films I have seen that are the Comedy or Musical category, like Running Wild or Two Arabian Knights or, of course, The Jazz Singer.  But none of them are better than *** and so they don’t make the cut here and I go with four nominees.  This will be a weak category (and all the overall Comedy awards will be a problem) until the advent of the Screwball comedies in the mid-30’s.  But this isn’t the weakest stretch – in the late 40’s, when Musicals were running dry and Comedies seemed to have run out of humor (Wilder was being dramatic or not at his best, Sturges was basically gone) there is a much worse dearth of films in the Comedy awards.

• Best Director:

1. Charlie Chaplin  (The Circus)
2. Paul Leni  (The Cat and the Canary)
3. Buster Keaton  (Cameraman)
4. Lewis Milestone  (Two Arabian Knights)
5. Ted Wilde  (The Kid Brother)

Analysis:  This is Chaplin’s second win here in a row.  Get used to it.  He’ll be back in the top spot in 1931, 1936, 1940 and 1947.  His career record for points in the Comedy Director category won’t be surpassed until 1994.

• Best Adapted Screenplay:

1. The Cat and the Canary

Analysis:  Like the first year, there isn’t much here.  Most of the good comedies from the era were original, in stark contrast to most of the other good films being made.

• Best Original Screenplay:

1. The Circus
2. Cameraman
3. Two Arabian Knights

• Best Actor:

1. Charlie Chaplin  (The Circus)

• Best Actress:

Analysis:  This is, again, partially a function of the comedies I have seen.  Some have no lead female.  Some have a lead female who isn’t all that good.  But none had a lead actress performance I thought was worthy of a nomination.

• Best Supporting Actor:

1. Tully Marshall  (The Cat and the Canary)

• Best Supporting Actress

1. Martha Mattox  (The Cat and the Canary)

By Film:

• The Circus  (340)
  • Picture, Director, Original Screenplay, Actor
• The Cat and the Canary  (295)
  • Picture, Director, Adapted Screenplay, Supporting Actor, Supporting Actress
• Cameraman  (135)
  • Picture, Director, Original Screenplay
• The Kid Brother  (95)
  • Picture, Director
• Two Arabian Knights  (85)
  • Director, Original Screenplay

Best Comedy Not Nominated for any Nighthawk Golden Globes:

• Running Wild

Analysis:  Running Wild is a good film from Gregory La Cava (one of his best, actually) that almost, but doesn’t quite make it into the ***.5 range.  But, as you can see, only one film ranked below ***.5 earns nominations – Two Arabian Knights, which had some good direction (Lewis Milestone actually won the initial Best Comedy Director category) and a good script, but doesn’t hold together enough to get up into the ***.5 range.

Roundup for the Year in Film:

Eligible Films I Have Seen:  60

Top 5 Films of the Year:

1  –  Sunrise  (see review here)

2  –  Metropolis  (dir. Fritz Lang)

I first discovered this by accident before I was seriously interested in films.  As such, it might have been the first Silent film I ever saw.  It was the Spring of 1986, and the new issue of All-Star Squadron, the comic book about the Golden Age heroes of DC was out.  In it, was a robot who had come from the future, back in time.  Over the course of the next couple of issues, this robot explained about her future, about her creator Rotwang and the girl Maria who would overthrow her masters.  There was clearly more here than I understood and it was soon explained in a note about how these were all references to the film Metropolis, the title of which, of course, was also the name of Superman’s city.  So, at age 12, I went looking for the film and I found it at a video store.  And I watched it.  And I was thunderstruck.

Of course, I didn’t know much about film back then.  I had no idea who Fritz Lang was, didn’t know anything about German expressionism, certainly didn’t know that the film I was watching was truncated and that it would be 25 years before I would be able to see the most complete version of the film (in the theaters no less – I have seen Metropolis in the theaters 3 times, the only Silent film I have seen in the theaters more than once).  But I could tell how amazing it was – the architectural highs of the city above (complete with titles designed to express that), the incredible detail of the workers lives below.

And so it kills me to knock Metropolis off the top of the list for the year.  As I said above, consider it really a co-winner of Best Picture and Director, because I don’t really want to be choosing between Sunrise and Metropolis, between Murnau and Lang.  It does not diminish this film in the slightest that each time I see Sunrise it goes up in my estimation.  This film had been way high in my estimation since that initial time I saw it.

And it wasn’t just the look of the film that did it.  It wasn’t just the very ideas behind it – the crazy machines that have to be spun around, the robot that transforms into a woman (that part didn’t make it into the comic).  It wasn’t just the brilliant direction that very clearly had a vision.  There were other things – the way the titles, like in Sunrise, reflected parts of the film itself, or the two key performances – that of Rudolf Klein-Rogge as the crazed Rotwangs, delightfully over the top, and the brilliant Brigitte Helm in the harder role of both Madonna and whore all at once.

If you have never seen a Silent film, there are two places that are great to start, that allow you to see them in the majesty of a movie theater as they should be seen (if you can) and yet never feel that anything is slowed down or distracting.  You can start with Chaplin, with any of his great features, that will keep you laughing from start to finish and keep you stunned in amazement at his myriad of talents (see below).  Or you can watch Metropolis, one of the most visionary films ever made and a film that, even though it has been knocked to #2 here, I am not prepared to say isn’t the great Silent film ever made.

3  –  The Man Who Laughs  (see review here)

Beware of monkeys on the high wire.

4  –  The Circus  (dir. Charlie Chaplin)

I used to have The Circus as a ***.5 film.  I knew, when comparing it to The Gold Rush, City Lights, Modern Times and The Great Dictator, that it couldn’t equal the sheer brilliance of those four masterpieces from Charlie Chaplin.  Watching it again, for the first time since I taped it a decade ago (I have all five of those films on one tape), I was reminded that while it isn’t up to the same level, that’s a different thing from saying that it’s not a **** film.  This is a **** film, a film of wit, intelligence, great deals of humor, both sharp and warm, and talent.

The plot is simple, as the plots always are with Chaplin.  The tramp ends up at a circus, at first just looking around, then in the midst of everything, chased by the police, in a misconception over whether or not he is a thief.  Then, astounded at the laughs that the tramp is getting when chased as opposed to his clowns who were resoundingly booed, the ringmaster hires the tramp.  The tramp kind of falls in love with the high-wire girl, but in the end, makes sure that she gets the man she really loves and all ends well, with the tramp again on his own, heading off into another adventure.

But of course, all of this is just a set-up for Chaplin to work his magic.  We get scenes like where the tramp has to go up on the high-wire (he has a wire holding him up) and things get screwy and he ends up with monkeys climbing on him and a tail in his mouth, inches from death.  Or the brilliant chase scene that gets so much applause from the crowd (here Chaplin illustrates a key rule of humor – that trying to be funny often isn’t funny, while trying to be serious and failing is often hilarious – this is why Chaplin films are still funny and most modern comedies will never be funny).  This film even has what might be my favorite Chaplin moment.  Not the hall of mirrors, which is brilliant, and I used as this picture up above because I couldn’t find the picture I wanted.  But the part where he pretends he is part of the exhibit, and then, confronted with the man who has gotten him into all this trouble, who is also forced to fake being part of the exhibit, he is able to continually beat him about the head, and then, after turning, roar with laughter.  I have a feeling that’s Chaplin’s true self shining through – the desire to beat someone about the head who deserves it and then laugh hysterically, without the world ever realizing what he is really laughing at.

The film moves well, edited by Chaplin, with a very good musical score added by Chaplin in 1969 for a re-release.  It of course, is written with great warmth and humor by Chaplin and was directed by him as well.  It is a reminder of his myriad of talents.  He never made a lot of films, but he poured his heart into each of them and they often gave the rewards worth the wait.  The Circus is not a high-level **** film, not one of the greatest films of all-time like Modern Times.  But it is a great film, a great comedy, and a great time to be had, even now, 85 years later.

5  –  7th Heaven  (see review here)

5 Weakest Films  (#1 being the weakest):

1. The Crowd
2. Noah’s Ark
3. A Girl in Every Port
4. The Racket
5. The Love Trap

Weakest Film of the Year:

The Crowd

I have already discussed before here how my opinion on this film goes against the grain of critical consensus.  So be it.  I have seen the film three times.  No matter how many times I am told or read it is brilliant, I hold to my ranking of **.5 and therefore the weakest film of the year that I have seen.  The other four films are all low-level *** films from directors I saw for the Best Director project (Curtiz, Hawks, Milestone, Wyler).  In fact, you have to go all the way up to #48 on the year to find a film not directed by a future Oscar nominee (The Gosta Berlings Saga).  By the way, I used the term “weakest” here as opposed to “worst” which I used the year before.  That’s because, at **.5, I don’t think The Crowd is a bad film, just a mediocre one.  So, if the weakest film I have seen for a year is **.5 or better, it is weakest.  If it is ** or worse, then it’s a bad film and it gets the description “worst”.

Points:

• Most Nighthawk Nominations:  Metropolis  (10)  *
• Most Nighthawk Awards:  Sunrise  (6) *
• Most Nighthawk Points:  Sunrise  (515) *
• Worst Film Nominated for a Nighthawk Award:  The Jazz Singer
• 2nd Place Award:  Metropolis  (Picture, Director, Cinematography)
• 6th Place Award:  The Love of Jeanne Ney  (Director, Supporting Actor)
• Most Nighthawk Drama Nominations:  Sunrise  /  Metropolis  /  The Last Command  /  The Man Who Laughs  /  The Love of Jeanne Ney  (5)
• Most Nighthawk Drama Awards:  Sunrise  (4)
• Most Nighthawk Drama Points:  Sunrise  (375)  *
• Worst Film Nominated for a Nighthawk Drama Award:  The Passion of Joan of Arc
• Most Nighthawk Comedy Nominations:  The Cat and the Canary  (5)
• Most Nighthawk Comedy Awards:  The Circus  (4)
• Most Nighthawk Comedy Points:  The Circus  (340)
• Worst Film Nominated for a Nighthawk Comedy Award:  Two Arabian Knights

Note 1:  * means a Nighthawk record up to this point

Note 2:  I will get crap for listing The Passion of Joan of Arc.  I still rank it at ***.  It’s just that all the other films that earn Drama nominations I have ranked higher.

Progressive Leaders:

• Most Nighthawk Nominations:  Metropolis  (10)
• Most Nighthawk Awards:  Sunrise  (6)
• Most Nighthawk Points:  Sunrise  (515)
• Most Nighthawk Awards without winning Best Picture:  Metropolis  (5)
• Most Nighthawk Nominations without a Best Picture Nomination:  Faust  (8)
• Most Nighthawk Nominations without a Nighthawk Award:  Faust  /  7th Heaven  (8)
• Actor:  Lon Chaney  (205)
• Actress:  Lilian Gish  (140)
• Director:  Erich von Stroheim  /  F.W. Murnau  /  Charlie Chaplin  (90)

Breakdown by Genre  (Foreign in parenthesis, best film in genre following):

• Drama:  41  (4)  –  Sunrise
• Comedy:  8  –  The Circus
• Foreign:  6  –  Metropolis
• Suspense:  2  –  The Cat and the Canary
• War:  2  –  Wings
• Crime:  2  –  Underworld
• Sci-Fi:  1  (1)  –  Metropolis
• Mystery:  1  –  The Lodger
• Horror:  1  (1)  –  The Hands of Orlac
• Musical:  1  –  The Jazz Singer
• Adventure:  1  –  Trail of 98
• Action:  0
• Fantasy:  0
• Kids:  0
• Western:  0

5 Films Eligible for Best Foreign Film (alphabetical, with director in parenthesis – red are ****, blue are ***.5 – both those colors qualify for my Best Foreign Film Award):

• The End of St Petersburg  (Pudovkin)
• The Love of Jeanne Ney  (Pabst)
• Napoleon  (Gance)
• October  (Eisenstein)
• The Passion of Joan of Arc  (Dreyer)

Films Eligible in This Year But Originally Released in a Different Calendar Year:

• The Gosta Berlings Saga  (1924)
• The Hands of Orlac  (1924)
• Metropolis  (1926)
• The Scarlet Letter  (1926)
• Tartuffe  (1926)

Films Released This Year Originally But Eligible in a Different Year:

• Easy Virtue  (1928-29)
• Napoleon  (1928-29)
• October  (1928-29)

Note:  Because of the way the Academy’s “years” were drawn prior to 1934, years fell into two different Oscar years.  So this is not a list of all the 1928 films that fall into the 1928-29 category.  This list, until 1932-33, will include films from the earlier year that have later eligibility (such as Easy Virtue, which was released in Britain in 1927) or Foreign Films eligible for my Best Foreign Film award in the present year but eligible for the rest of the categories in a different year.  After 1933, this will get considerably less complicated.