Getting close to the (initial) end of the Top 1000 list. The introduction is here and the rest of the list can be found by going here. Films through Inglourious Basterds (#174) are a 95 which is high ****. The rest are a 96. A 96 is, to me, worthy of a Best Picture win. That means any Oscar winners from that point on, even if they don’t win the Nighthawk, earn no complaints from me. Ironically, one of those films doesn’t even earn a Nighthawk nomination (The Hours) because 2002 is just that tough. There are also a few films that come 5th in their years while the only actual Nighthawk winners in this post are all 95 films. Things are so even across genres and major studios that only one film in this group of 50 is in the Top 5 all-time for its genre or major studio. (more…)
12 March, 2022
A Century of Film: The Top 1000 Films (#200-151)
Posted by nighthawk4486 under Erik, film, lists | Tags: academy awards, ang lee, bergman, bunuel, cameron crowe, Chaplin, coen brothers, david lynch, disney, dracula, F.W. Murnau, film, hitchcock, kurosawa, olivier, paul thomas anderson, renoir, ridley scott, shakespeare, sidney lumet, spielberg, star wars, tarantino, Top 1000, truffaut |1 Comment
18 March, 2017
The Nighthawk Awards: 2001
Posted by nighthawk4486 under Academy Awards, Erik, film, lists | Tags: 2001, academy awards, baz luhrmann, cameron crowe, christopher lee, christopher nolan, coen brothers, david lynch, golden globes, Harry Potter, lord of the rings, Nighthawk Awards, peter jackson, robert altman, spielberg, wes anderson, year in film |[13] Comments
You can read more about this year in film here. The Best Picture race is discussed here, with reviews of all the nominees. First 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 – it might be eligible in a different year. Films in red won the Oscar in that category (or Globe, in the Globes section). Films in blue were nominated. Films (or directors) in olive are links to earlier posts that I don’t want to have show up in blue and be mistaken for a nominee. Films with an asterisk (*) were Consensus nominees (a scale I put together based on the various awards) while those with a double asterisk (**) were the Consensus winners.
I’m listing the top 20 in the categories (because that’s how many **** films there are) but only the top 5 earn Nighthawk nominations.
Nighthawk Awards:
- Best Picture
- The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring *
- The Fabulous Destiny of Amélie Poulain
- Moulin Rouge *
- Mulholland Drive **
- Memento
- Gosford Park
- In the Bedroom *
- The Royal Tenenbaums
- Vanilla Sky
- Amores Perros
- The Man Who Wasn’t There
- The Others
- Ghost World
- Monster’s Ball
- A.I. Artificial Intelligence
- The Princess and the Warrior
- Black Hawk Down
- The Devil’s Backbone
- Monsters Inc.
- Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone
26 February, 2017
The Nighthawk Awards: 2000
Posted by nighthawk4486 under Academy Awards, Erik, film, lists | Tags: 2000, academy awards, ang lee, cameron crowe, coen brothers, film, golden globes, michael chabon, Nighthawk Awards, year in film |[19] Comments

One of cinema’s great love stories. Along with a whole lot of other things. One of cinema’s great films.
You can read more about this year in film here. The Best Picture race is discussed here, with reviews of all the nominees. First 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 – it might be eligible in a different year. Films in red won the Oscar in that category (or Globe, in the Globes section). Films in blue were nominated. Films (or directors) in olive are links to earlier posts that I don’t want to have show up in blue and be mistaken for a nominee. Films with an asterisk (*) were Consensus nominees (a scale I put together based on the various awards) while those with a double asterisk (**) were the Consensus winners.
I’m listing the top 10 in the categories but only the top 5 earn Nighthawk nominations.
Nighthawk Awards:
- Best Picture
- Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon *
- Traffic *
- Almost Famous *
- O Brother Where Art Thou
- Wonder Boys
- Thirteen Days
- High Fidelity
- The Virgin Suicides
- Billy Elliot
- Best in Show
Analysis: Gladiator wins the Consensus easily in spite of not winning any critics awards. It became just the fifth film to win the Oscar, Globe and BAFTA without having won any critics awards (one of which was Lawrence of Arabia, which was released in a year where there was no NYFC awards due to a strike). But, with addition of the PGA in 1989 and the BFCA in 1995, Gladiator becomes the first film to win all five awards groups without having won a single critics group, something that has only happened once since (Argo). It’s my #65 film of the year. Almost Famous comes in second at the Consensus without an Oscar nom which is a rarity, but nothing compared to what will happen the next year. Erin Brockovich, my #50, is the fifth Consensus nominee. It’s also the first film to ever go 0 for 5 with the Best Picture awards (nominations from all five awards groups and losing all five), something which 14 films have done since and which has become quite common since the Best Picture lineup at the Oscars was expanded.
There are only 11 **** films on the year (the other is Chicken Run), making this a much weaker year than many recent years. The Top 20 is the lowest in five years and there won’t be a lower one again until 2008. Nonetheless, this year has some of my absolute favorite films of all-time, including Crouching Tiger, Almost Famous, O Brother, Wonder Boys and High Fidelity.
The Oscar Score is 43.6, the lowest since 1968, which is a little deceptive. It’s because films below ***.5 don’t earn any points, so to have three *** nominees, even if they are mid ***, really hurts with the Oscar Score. (more…)