Ernst Lubitsch (1892-1947)
Directing Nominations: “The Patriot” (1928), “The Love Parade” (1929) and “Heaven Can Wait” (1943)
Other Oscar History: Lubitsch won an Honorary Award in 1947, a few months before his death. All three of the films he received directing nods for picked up Best Picture nominations, as did 1931’s “The Smiling Lieutenant,” 1932’s “One Hour With You” and 1939’s “Ninotchka”
What Should They Have Won For? Lubitsch had a remarkable 40-year career, and shaped the Hollywood comedy for years to come, so it’s a bit depressing that he was overlooked to this extent (especially given that one of the films for which he was nominated, “The Patriot,” is lost, which seems wildly unfair). But if we had to pick one, it’d be a film that, like several of Lubitsch’s best, was almost entirely ignored by the Academy, receiving only a single nomination, for Best Original Score—1942’s “To Be Or Not To Be.” A rare flop for the director, attacked by critics who misunderstood it as irresponsible for making fun of the Nazis, and tainted by the death of star Carole Lombard in a plane crash two months before release, the tale of actors taking on the Nazis is a total delight from the first frame, deliriously funny but darker and more substantial than even the director’s most joyous other comedies. And if you need to know where to start with Lubitsch, be sure to check out our list of his essential films.
Cecil B. DeMille (1881-1959)
Directing Nominations: “The Greatest Show On Earth” (1953)
Other Oscar History: DeMille won not just one, but two honorary awards: the first in 1950, the second, the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award, in ’53. The same year also saw him win a Best Picture Oscar for “The Greatest Show On Earth,” and he was nominated for the same prize for 1956’s “The Ten Commandments.” 1934’s “Cleopatra” also picked up a nod there.
What Should They Have Won For? Well, given that we just called it the worst-ever Best Picture winner, we probably aren’t going to say “The Greatest Show On Earth.” In general, DeMille was more of a populist showman than a critical favorite, respected for his ability to create spectacle, but attacked for the crude nature of his work—the Michael Bay of his day, as it were. So our heart isn’t especially broken that DeMille was never given the Oscar, but at the same time, he’s such a key Hollywood figure that it does feel like a notable absence. So if we had to pick one, we’d probably go for “The Ten Commandments.” Not only was it his final film, but the nearly-four-hour Biblical epic still remains a glorious piece of spectacle, enough so that Ridley Scott‘s upcoming “Exodus” will have quite a task topping it, even with all the modern CGI effects it’ll undoubtedly use.
Akira Kurosawa (1936-1993)
Directing Nominations: “Ran” (1985)
Other Oscar History: While this is a trickier area, as the Academy is not known for embracing foreign-language films or filmmakers in categories other than Best Foreign Language Film, (Michael Haneke’s Director nomination for “Amour” being a recent, rare exception), there is technically no reason why they are not just as eligible. And in some cases, the quality of the output is simply impossible to ignore. This was certainly the case with Akira Kurosawa, with the Academy eventually nominating him as director for the “King Lear” riff “Ran,” and also giving him an Lifetime Achievement Oscar in 1990, while back in 1951 “Rashomon” had been awarded another discretionary Oscar for Outstanding Foreign Film in the days before the modern Foreign Language Film Oscar had been established.
What Should They Have Won For: Oh, man. Everyone has their favorite, and “Seven Samurai” is probably his most famous and influential, but since we can’t please everyone we’re just going to please ourselves and go for outsider “Ikiru.” Notionally one of the least immediate of his films, it is the tiny, immaculate tale (based on a Tolstoy short story) of a minor bureaucrat’s attempts to build a playground. And that is it, but just writing that gave us chills and if we think about it too much we’ll cry. So yes, “Ikiru.”
Stanley Kramer (1913-2001)
Directing Nominations: “The Defiant Ones” (1958), “Judgment at Nuremberg” (1961) and “Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner” (1967)
Other Oscar History: The same year he was nominated for ‘Nuremberg,’ Kramer was awarded the Irving G. Thalberg honorary Oscar (he had been a producer for more than a decade, on films including “High Noon,” prior to turning to directing.) His three Directing noms also were up for Best Picture, though none won. “The Defiant Ones,” however, snagged 8 nominations in total, winning Cinematography and Screenplay.
What Should They Have Won For: Perhaps not as instantly recognizable or forehead-slapping a name here as some others, Kramer was nonetheless a major player—a director who made his name in the kind of social issues dramas the Academy often favors (for their “serious” import) while also dipping briefly into comedy with the gonzo folly that is “It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.” But while he can seem over-earnest and self-important in some of the topics he tackled (Nazism, racism, nuclear war in “On the Beach,” the teaching of evolution in “Inherit the Wind”), he often coaxed excellent performances, which bettered the material in the case of ‘Dinner,’ and which, in “The Defiant Ones,” gave rise to his best film. Sidney Poitier and Tony Curtis (jointly nominated) are both terrific as the shackled-together convicts escaping a chain gang, and Kramer should have won that year. Especially over, of all things, Vincente Minnelli for the gossamer-thin “Gigi.”
Fritz Lang (1890-1976)
Directing Nominations: None. Boo, Academy, boo!
Other Oscar History: Lang, despite being a preternatural genius in the medium who turned in more than a handful of absolute classics, was probably overlooked because his films, aside from a couple of popular westerns, were largely in the hard-boiled, film noir genre which the Academy traditionally had little time for. However, this relative neglect of his oeuvre, along with the distinctly authorial imprint of his dark, pessimistic sensibility made him prime reclamation fodder for the Cahiers du Cinema crowd. So along with Hitchcock, Lang is now held up as a prime, founding example of a Hollywood auteur.
What Should They Have Won For: While Lang’s “M” is a masterpiece of disquiet, and the silent “Metropolis” is a beautiful, prescient science fiction film whose poster still adorns a million dormitory walls, both were made in Germany prior to Lang fleeing the Nazi regime, and as such would not have really been at the Oscar races. However, along with a clutch of strong films like “Fury,” “You Only Live Once” “While the City Sleeps” and “Scarlet Street” it’s probably “The Big Heat” that is the Hollywood pic he should have won for—an absolute classic of the film noir genre, featuring Gloria Grahame, Glenn Ford and a deeply menacing, coffee-throwing Lee Marvin, it writhes and revels in its seedy moral ambiguity.