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I love making lists of stuff. Films, TV shows, books, songs... anything. So, in anticipation to the 93rd Academy Awards ceremony, I thought it would be fun to make a list of my favourite Best Picture winners. I did a similar thing back in 2017, but I've watched a few more winnings films since then, so this is an updated version of my top 20 favourite Best Picture winners. Please bear in mind that I haven't seen every single film that has won Best Picture, so my choices are based on the ones that I have in fact seen so far.     20. Rain Man (1988) Directed by Barry Levinson, Rain Man is the story of a selfish young wheeler-dealer named Charlie Babbitt (Tom Cruise), who discovers that his estranged father has died and bequeathed all of his multimillion dollar estate to his other son, Raymond (Dustin Hoffman), an autistic savant, of whose existence Charlie was completely unaware.  Besides winning for Best Picture, Rain Man also received Oscars for Best Director, Best Orig...

In anticipation to the 93rd Academy Awards ceremony, which will be held on April 25, I have decided to write a series of articles related to the most prestigious awards in the movie industry. Two weeks ago I talked about the birth of the Academy Awards , and last week I wrote about Wings (1927), the first ever Best Picture winner. For this week, I bring you 10 interesting facts about the Oscars. (Well, at least I hope they're interesting.)     1. The least and most expensive winners Barry Jenkins' Moonlight (2017) stands as the lowest-budgeted film to win the Oscar for Best Picture, with a budget of $1.5 million. In contrast, James Cameron's Titanic (1997) is the most expensive winner, with a budget of $200 million. Bonus fact: Moonlight is also the first film with an all-black cast to win Best Picture.   2. Dual nominations for the same role  Barry Fitzgerald is the only person in history to be nominated for both Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor (which he...

Wings was the first ever film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture. Since then, it has become one of the most influential war dramas, noted for its technical realism and spectacular air-combat sequences. This is the story of how it came to be made.   A man and his story The concept for Wings originated from a writer trying to sell one of his stories. In September 1924, Byron Morgan approached Jesse L. Lasky, vice-president of Famous Players-Lasky, a component of Paramount Pictures, proposing that the studio do an aviation film. Morgan suggested an «incident and plot» focused on the failure of the American aerial effort in World War I and the effect that the country's «aviation unpreparedness» would have in upcoming conflicts. Lasky liked the idea, and approved the project under the working title «The Menace.»   LEFT: Byron Morgan (1889-1963). RIGHT: Jesse L. Lasky (1880-1958).   During his development of the scenario with William Shepherd, a former war correspond...