Ep. 241: 72nd Oscars Retrospective and If We Replaced the Nominees and Winners

On episode 241 of The AwardsWatch Podcast, Executive Editor Ryan McQuade is joined by AwardsWatch Editor-In-Chief Erik Anderson, Associate Editor Sophia Ciminello and AwardsWatch contributors Josh Parham and Jay Ledbetter go back 25 years to take a look at the 72nd Academy Awards, celebrating the films of 1999.

Two and a half decades ago marked on of the richest years of cinema, showcasing some of the most influential films within popular culture that have lived on as classics that brought us into the 21st century. But with such a rich selection of cinema released by Hollywood, with innovated blockbusters, stellar comedies, groundbreaking international selections, and introspective, auteur driven projects that rank as some of the best films of the careers for filmmakers like Stanley Kubrick, The Wachowskis, David Fincher, Paul Thomas Anderson, Michael Mann, and more. But when it came to the Oscars for this year, the Academy went with a newcomer in director Sam Mendes and his suburban drama, American Beauty, a beloved film at the time that has become complicated and disliked by many, as well as most of the winners from this ceremony.

On this episode, the team talk about where they were in 1999, their thoughts on the overall film year as well as the Oscar ceremony, briefly discuss talk about American Beauty as a Best Picture winner, do a little Oscar trivia as it relates to this year, and then the new version of the AW Shoulda Woulda Coulda game, where instead of individual replacements, they must decide as a group who the nominees and winners should be in the top eight categories. The rules of the game state they can only replace two of the nominees that year from each category, except in Best Picture, where the group could replace up to three films to make up the final set of five nominated films. It made for a lively, fun show with spirited debate, alliances, vote swinging and more that we all hope you enjoy.

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This podcast runs 3h04m. We will be back next week to talk about the latest release, Twisters, and our favorite disaster movies. Till then, let’s get into it.

Music: “Modern Fashion” from AShamaleuvmusic (intro), “B-3” from BoxCat Games Nameless: The Hackers RPG Soundtrack (outro).