It was also a huge box office success.

So how was it completely overlooked at the Oscars that year?

Even better: it’s 100 percent Yul Brynner-free!

The Searchers, John Wayne | Why It Wasn’t Nominated: The Searchers was an epic example of a movie in a beloved Hollywood genre (the Western), created by a bigger-than-life Hollywood

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Still, you would have thoughtGroundhog Day’s intricate screenplay would have earned some love.

(The decidedly more classifiableSleepless in SeattleandIn the Line of Firewere both nominated that year.

(In a sense, David Lynch has been brilliantly remakingPersonathroughout his career.)

Bill Murray, Groundhog Day | Why It Wasn’t Nominated: The Academy famously ignores comedies in most major categories. Still, you would have thought Groundhog Day ’s intricate screenplay would have

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In hindsight,Kongpractically invented the entire notion of a visual-effects movie.

But sure, whatever,Shakespeare in Lovewas cute, too.

The Shining (1980)

Why It Wasn’t Nominated:You think comedies have it hard?

Why It Wasn’t Nominated: Swedish filmmaker Ingmar Bergman had already won Foreign Film Oscars (for The Virgin Spring and Through a Glass Darkly ) and

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But it’s remarkable to think that the movie was snubbed for a Visual Effects award.

The Academy chose to honorE.T.

(Is it popular yet?)

Why It Wasn’t Nominated: Putting aside its infamous aversion to comedy, the Academy has three major blind spots: films about youth culture; films starring morally

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The award went to the cutesyMarch of the Penguins.

You could say he got the last laugh.

Although it remains unclear if Werner Herzog has ever laughed.

Hoop Dreams, Arthur Agee | Why It Wasn’t Nominated: In a crowded year for great movies — the Best Picture field included Pulp Fiction , The Shawshank Redemption , Forrest

It’s also scary as hell.

King Kong (Movie - 1933) | Why It Wasn’t Nominated: The Oscars were only six years old and didn’t have awards for either special effects or musical score — categories that

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Touch of Evil | Why It Wasn’t Nominated: Former boy-wonder auteur Orson Welles was nobody’s favorite person by the time he made this gritty border-noir thriller. Recut by the

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Chevy Chase, Caddyshack | Why It Wasn’t Nominated: Remember when we said that the Academy didn’t nominate Groundhog Day because it was a comedy about existentialism? Right, well replace

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The Big Lebowski, Jeff Bridges | Why it Wasn’t Nominated: The Coen Brothers' follow-up to their Oscar-winning Fargo was a purposefully ambling sorta-mystery about a pothead and a militant conservative bumbling

Merrick Morton

The Shining, Danny Lloyd, … | Why It Wasn’t Nominated: You think comedies have it hard? Only three horror movies have ever been nominated for Best Picture, and that’s if you

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The Thing, Kurt Russell | Why It Wasn’t Nominated: Another victim of the Academy’s general disinterest in the horror genre, The Thing was never in the running for a major

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Bend It Like Beckham, Keira Knightley | Why It Wasn’t Nominated: The Academy almost never honors sports movies — with the striking exception of boxing, a subject which has won the top

Christine Parry

Charlie Chaplin | Why It Wasn’t Nominated: A critical and box office success, Modern Times may have been overlooked simply because it was a film out of its

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Sweet Smell of Success | Why It Wasn’t Nominated: A nasty little noir about uniformly nasty people doing unequivocally nasty things, Success actually came out in a good year for

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Airplane!, Peter Graves | Why It Wasn’t Nominated: The joyless, crusty old deans who apparently run the Academy would’ve never considered this blazing disaster-film spoof — despite the film’s

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Grizzly Man | Why It Wasn’t Nominated: If Werner Herzog cared about Oscars half as much as he cared about the chaotic madness of nature, he’d probably have

Timothy Treadwell

Once Upon a Time in the West, Charles Bronson, … | Why It Wasn’t Nominated: A critical and box office flop made by an Italian director who seemed hell-bent on destroying a sainted Hollywood genre, Once

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Zodiac, Jake Gyllenhaal, … | Why It Wasn’t Nominated: The 2007 Best Picture slate was one of the darkest in Oscar history, between There Will Be Blood , Michael Clayton

Merrick Morton

Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, … | Why It Wasn’t Nominated: It’s not that the Academy doesn’t like action movies; it’s just that it prefers action movies that come with a thin

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American Psycho, Christian Bale | Why It Wasn’t Nominated: Well, it’s a movie about a handsome dude who has sex with random women and then tears them apart with a

Kerry Hayes