Joey Magidson
Ladies and gentlemen, we’re back! Yes, it’s what I think is actually the most popular series on the site! Continuing a tradition I’ve been keen on for years, I’m ranking the new crop of Academy Award winners. For nearly all of the Oscar categories, you’ll see me list the top 25 recipients of that prize. Sometimes, our newest winner will appear. Other times, they’ll be relegated to the Honorable Mention category. Who knows, maybe one or two won’t even make the cut? It’s a list series that I’ll do each and every single year, in the weeks after the ceremony concludes. So, while this is a fun way to think about the Oscars in the aftermath of the latest telecast, it’s also a beginning for another column here on the site. Of course, definitely show us your own lists as well, in the comments section below. We’re definitely keen to know what you think!
This week, we kick off with a pretty big one…the Best Adapted Screenplay category. Often the spot for prestige fare to shine, it’s also a place where major Best Picture hopefuls (and winners) see their writers rewarded. The other screenplay category may seem “cooler” on the whole, but if you look at some of the scribes who have emerged victorious in Adapted Screenplay, they’re no slouches. This is also the spot where Spike Lee finally got his Academy Award, winning for BlacKkKlansman. For my money, Aaron Sorkin and The Social Network is tops here. Where does a recent winner like Sian Heder and CODA, rank? What about a new placement for three years ago’s winner in Sarah Polley and Women Talking? There’s also Cord Jefferson two years for American Fiction. Does his spot change? Or last year’s winner in Peter Straughan for Conclave? Of course, what of our newest winner, which happens to be Paul Thomas Anderson for One Battle After Another? Well, you’re in luck, as you can read on below to find out the answer…
Here now are what I consider to be the 25 best winners of the Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar, to date:
25. Moonlight (Tarell Alvin McCraney and Barry Jenkins)
24. Sideways (Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor)
23. Forrest Gump (Eric Roth)
22. BlacKkKlansman (Spike Lee, David Rabinowitz, Charlie Wachtel & Kevin Willmott)
21. Kramer vs. Kramer (Robert Benton)
20. No Country for Old Men (Joel Coen and Ethan Coen)
19. One Battle After Another (Paul Thomas Anderson)
18. Traffic (Stephen Gaghan)
17. The Exorcist (William Peter Blatty)
16. Conclave (Peter Straughan)
15. The Godfather (Francis Ford Coppola and Mario Puzo)
14. MASH (Ring Lardner Jr.)
13. The Godfather Part II (Francis Ford Coppola and Mario Puzo)
12. Marty (Paddy Chayefsky)
11. The Departed (William Monahan)
10. Judgment at Nuremberg (Abby Mann)
9. Midnight Cowboy (Waldo Salt)
8. Argo (Chris Terrio)
7. To Kill a Mockingbird (Horton Foote)
6. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (Bo Goldman and Lawrence Hauben)
5. The Silence of the Lambs (Ted Tally)
4. Schindler’s List (Steven Zaillian)
3. All the President’s Men (William Goldman)
2. Casablanca (Philip G. Epstein, Julius J. Epstein and Howard Koch)
1. The Social Network (Aaron Sorkin)
Honorable Mentions: 12 Years a Slave (John Ridley), American Fiction (Cord Jefferson), Brokeback Mountain (Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana), CODA (Sian Heder), Ordinary People (Alvin Sargent), and Women Talking (Sarah Polley)
Stay tuned for another category early next week!
The script for One Battle After Another is a paragon of adaptation. It preserves the “spirit” of the source material while making changes to its story, characters, and milieu that not only make it work better on the screen, but also making its themes more relevant to an entirely new generation of audiences during a time when seemingly every other Gen X and Boomer filmmaker is dead-set on preserving their formative entertainment in amber.
Such a deserving winner. Quibble with its other Oscar wins if you must, but when we get to this category, everyone needs to shut up and recognize.
Agreed. I think it’s worth studying, in fact.
Another year!
25. CODA
24.Blackkklansman
23. A Place in the Sun
22. Moonlight
21 .Amadeus
20. American Fiction
19.The Treasure of the Sierra Madre
The Exorcist
17. Conclave
16. No Country For Old Men
15. Miracle on 34 th Street
14. Brokeback Mountain
13. Ordinary People
12. One Battle After Another
11. All the President’s Men
10. Women Talking
9. The Philadelphia Story
8. It Happened One Night
7. The Silence of the Lambs
6. Schindler’s List
5. Sense and Sensibility
4. LA Confidential
3. Casablanca
2. The Best Years of Our Lives
1. To Kill A Mockingbird
HM
In the Heat of the Night
Precious
A Letter to Three Wives
Missing
The Big Short
From Here to Eternity
Yes! We’re back at it!