You’re the Best (Picture and Earner) Around

In my never ending quest to resolve popular taste with critical concensus, I’ve decided to take a look at Oscar-winners vs. box office champs. One of the common explanations given for declining Oscar ratings is the idea that the Academy is out of touch with the common man. Regardless of whether or not that’s to blame for the fall in ratings (it’s not) let’s look at the statement itself. Do films that win Best Picture bear any relation to the popular taste?

To get a little bit of insight into this, I decided to ask a simple question: How many Best Pictures have also been the highest grosser for their particular year?

It happened more often than I expected. 19 out of 80 times, or almost 25%. It also happened more frequently in the past. Often three times a decade (minus the 40′s) peaking at four times in the 70′s and then dropping to an all time low of only once in the 80′s, then twice in the 90′s, then only once so far this decade.

So I can kind of see where people might get that impression.

Anyway, here’s the list. Where possible, I’ve tried to account for films that had multiple releases, only counting them as top-grossers if they made enough in their initial run to outperform the next highest contender. Also, the year mentioned is the year the movie came out, so it would have won the Oscar the following year.

{Note: The very first Oscar winner, The Broadway Melody (1929), may be the top earner for 1929, or it may not. See, there’s a lot of sources that say Gold Diggers of Broadway holds that title. Since the evidence weighs in favor of Gold Diggers, I’m going to leave Broadway Melody off the list.}

1. Mutiny on the Bounty (1935)
2. You Can’t Take It With You (1938)
3. Gone With the Wind (1939)
4. Mrs. Miniver (1942)
5. Going My Way (1944)
6. The Greatest Show on Earth (1952)
   
7. The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
8. Ben Hur (1959)
9. West Side Story (1961)
10. Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
11. The Sound of Music (1965)
12. The French Connection (1971)
13. The Godfather (1972)
14. Rocky (1976)
15. Kramer vs. Kramer (1979)
16. Rain Man (1988)
17. Forrest Gump (1994)
18. Titanic (1997)
19. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)