Oscar season is a competitive and cutthroat time for filmmakers, actors and studios alike. Films are locked in a battle for recognition from the Academy, usually resulting in only one film coming out on top in each category. However, that doesn’t mean there aren’t other fantastic films that fell short of an Oscar win. Here are 7 of the best films that didn’t win an Oscar. Some of these films didn’t even get nominated which makes their exclusion all the more painful. These films have serious staying power as they have all gained cult followings over time, even if they didn’t win gold at the Oscars.
The Shawshank Redemption
The Shawshank Redemption is a story about hope and how the human spirit is able to persevere through even the most difficult of circumstances. It tells the story of an innocent man who is sent to prison for the murder of his wife and her lover and how he builds a new life for himself in prison. After being convicted and sent to Shawshank prison, he befriends a fellow inmate named Red, who helps him to adjust to life inside. Over the years, Andy comes to terms with his situation and makes a new life for himself as a captive. He is a natural leader and inspires hope in the other prisoners who eventually help him to break out of prison. The film explores themes of hope and friendship, as well as the resilience of the human spirit even in the darkest of surroundings.
Fight Club
Fight Club is a dark and twisted, yet wildly entertaining film about an insomniac narrator and a charismatic salesman named Tyler Durden. The narrator is an employee of an automobile company; he’s in a dead-end job and he hates his life. The narrator meets Tyler Durden at a support group for people who can’t sleep because of their boring and unfulfilling lives. He and Tyler Durden soon begin to form a friendship which turns into something more as Durden encourages the narrator to embrace his inherent anarchic and anti-consumerist nature and to start a fight club where men can beat each other bloody. It’s not long before the fight clubs become something more as the narrator and Tyler Durden form an anarchist militia called Project Mayhem that is determined to destroy modern society as we know it. Fight Club is a subversive and thought-provoking film with a very surprising twist at the end.
The Terminator
The Terminator is the story of the impending war between man and machine. It follows Sarah Connor, a young woman who unknowingly holds the future of the human race in her hands. She is pursued by a cyborg assassin named the Terminator who has been sent back in time from the year 2029 to kill her before she can give birth to the leader of the human resistance: John Connor. The Terminator is relentless in his pursuit of Sarah as he travels across the country and encounters many different people along the way.
Edward Scissorhands
Edward Scissorhands is a classic fairy tale story that just happens to be set in a modern-day suburban neighborhood. A young woman named Kim brings a strange and mysterious man named Edward home with her one day after finding him working in a local garden. Her neighbours are distrustful of Edward and it soon becomes obvious that he is not like other people; he has scissors for hands. Edward is a lonely being who has never known human contact and has no idea how to function in a society that is so unfamiliar to him. Unfortunately, he becomes the victim of an act of cruelty at the hands of neighbours who are jealous of his relationship with Kim.
Reservoir Dogs
The story of Reservoir Dogs is told out of chronological order, which is a bold and unusual approach to storytelling. It follows a group of criminals who plan a jewellery heist together and then proceed to go their separate ways after the robbery goes wrong. The film intersperses scenes of the planning with scenes from the aftermath of the botched heist and the aftermath of the characters’ lives. We follow the characters’ attempts to evade the police and their attempts to find out who ratted them out and caused the heist to go wrong. The characters are all named after types of dogs and their personalities and backgrounds are explored throughout the film. It is a story of betrayal, greed and crime, and it’s told in a very unusual way that is sure to keep you on the edge of your seat while trying to piece everything together.
The Wolf of Wall Street
The Wolf of Wall Street is based on a true story about an unscrupulous stockbroker named Jordan Belfort. It details his rise to power as a stockbroker on Wall Street and the massive fraud scheme that he orchestrated. The film shows a culture of greed, indulgence and excess. It goes far beyond the usual depiction of stockbrokers as driven and hardworking men and women who are committed to making the world a better place. There is no such thing as too much money or too much sex or too many drugs—the only thing that matters is having more of everything. The film details the massive fraud scheme that Belfort orchestrated, but it also focuses on his wild lifestyle.
The Shining
The Shining is a psychological horror film that will have you questioning what’s real and what’s not by the end. Jack Torrance is a struggling writer who has accepted a job as the caretaker of a secluded hotel in the Colorado mountains during the harsh winter months. The hotel is located in the middle of nowhere, which is precisely why Jack was offered the job in the first place. Jack brings his wife, Wendy, and their young son, Danny, to stay with him during the winter months at the hotel. Jack’s odd behaviour soon becomes clear when Danny starts having visions of a man who is covered in blood. Danny soon realises that the visions are real and that his father has been possessed by an evil force.
