Best Picture Academy Award Winners

As you may well know the best picture category in Academy Awards has been recognised only since 1951. Of all academy award winners, a best picture academy award winner is always looked upon with high esteem since that award is the highest recognition any particular movie can receive. It is the most predominant category of award where every member of the academy awards can nominate and vote for the movie that they feel should represent the overall outstanding achievement as the next best picture academy award winner.



Since 1951, there have been many movies that are recognised as the best picture of the year. The most noteworthy fact about this particular category is that over time, it has been addressed in various names. Since 1927 to 1929 this particular category was called the Outstanding Picture, between 1929 1940 it was called Outstanding Production. For the next two years this award was called Outstanding Motion Picture while the period of 1944 through 192 was when this category was best known as The Best Motion Picture award. Currently, Best Picture is the term that has stuck to this particular award.



Since 1927, there have been a total of 82 best picture winners. The latest and the 82nd best picture academy award winner for 2009 was The Hurt Locker. It was a stunning movie, that starred Jeremy Renner, Ralph Fiennes, Anthony Mackie and several other outstanding actors. Summit Entertainment was the studio that received the prestigious Oscar.



In 2008, the best picture academy award winner Was Fox Search Light, Warner Bros for the movie Slum Dog Millionaire - a gripping movie that had an all Indian cast and an original story line. Dev Patel played the lead role alongside Frieda Pinto while the negative lead was played by Anil Kapoor in this movie. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and Frost / Nixon were also nominated for this prestigious award for 2008.



An interesting note in Academy Awards history is that the 1928 nominee for best picture, "The Patriot" has been lost to us for all times! While pieces of it have been recovered, no complete copies remain to be found. The Patriot was nominated that year for Best Actor in a Leading Role (Lewis Stone), Best Director (Ernst Lubitsch), and Best Picture. It won the Award for Best Writing Achievement. It was also the the last silent film to receive a Best Picture nomination.



The number of nominations for this particular category has been constantly expanding and reducing. Initially when this award was decided upon, there were a total of 10 nominations from which one movie was to be made the best picture academy award winner. Over time, it was reduced to five, was later expanded to eight nominations, later to twelve nominations and then was reduced again to a total of ten nominations for each year. For 2010 the number has once more been brought up to 10 nominations.



Since 1938 only eight foreign movies have been nominated for the best picture category. For almost seven decades many movies that were partially made in English have also been nominated under this particular category and the recent best picture academy award winner, Slum Dog Millionaire is an example. This particular movie was done both in English and in Hindi.

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For information about the best movies of all time, check out this Classic Movies site and for even more historical information about classical entertainment visit this Academy Award Theater Radio Show page.

Survivor TV Show

Welcome the granddaddy of all reality shows; the one that started it all; the one that had everyone believing reality shows were really real: the Survivor TV show. Take a bunch of total strangers and drop them on a deserted island with nothing but a few simple tools, some rations, and a film crew and see how they handle it. Dangle a huge wad of cash in front of them and watch them go at each other like sharks in a frenzy. It was great entertainment and it spawned the next wave of television that is still crashing on the shores of home televisions worldwide. The reality series was here to stay. The Survivor TV show became part of our cultural and social fabric. The expression being voted off the island is not only used around the world in the office, but by other TV shows. No one can put out a tiki torch around their pool without making some sort of Survivor TV show reference. We all have that island sound in our heads when we joke that the tribe has spoken and someone must leave the donut table.



What gives this show a special spot in TV history is that it was the first to do this so well. It re-invented the formula for TV. You didnt have to have a new premise or plot every week or come up with new ideas for new shows. All you had to do is come up with new locations. The fact that you had almost no payroll for actors and thousands of replacements lining up to work for free didnt hurt either. The Survivor TV show presented a new business model that had producers and networks smiling. The people in the show were the same as the people on the show. The connection was amazing between audience and actor. The guy at home felt like he had just as much a chance to be there as anyone else. Add in the fact that the show was designed to bring out the darkest and most devious human behavior possible made the allure irresistible.



The Survivor TV show phenomenon has cooled off a bit from where it started in its first couple seasons. It was hurt by scandal and accusations of corruption. It was also hurt when the public found out that the islands they went to werent all that deserted and often served dessert at the end of a buffet line just off camera. But the show was strong enough to survive even that. The Survivor TV show made strong com backs a few season in a row, but now struggles to keep its head above water in a rough sea of reality shows. The joy that the originators can take is seeing their formula being replicated over and over again. The Survivor TV show changed TV forever. The way that shows are judged will never be the same. This show will never leave the island. The viewing tribe has spoken.

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Discover more facts and trivia by visiting Rick's Survivor TV Show Page or talk about the show with others at Rick's Survivor Forum.