Ultimately it was defeated in all four categories, with all four awards going to William Friedkin’s outstanding The French Connection. This is the one “Kubrick year” where I don’t blame the Academy as much for their decision as in the other years he was nominated. The French Connection is a great film, featuring marvellous direction from Friedkin. It’s not as good as A Clockwork Orange (#75 on the Sight & Sound Directors’ poll, #235 on the Critics’ poll), but it was still a fine choice to represent the year.
The fourth and final time Stanley Kubrick was nominated for the Best Director Oscar came in 1976, where his next masterpiece, Barry Lyndon, was nominated for seven Academy Awards (Best Picture, Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Costumes, Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, and Best Original Song Score and/or Adapted Score), the most of any Kubrick film. Ultimately, it walked away with four of these, but strangely none of them for Kubrick. In fact, taking a look at the three it didn’t get, we find a disappointing commonality: Best Adapted Screenplay (Stanley Kubrick), Best Director (Stanley Kubrick), and Best Picture (Producer: Stanley Kubrick).
It was these three that would go to Milos Forman’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, a film that I have found rather overrated. It’s a decent film, but it’s only really memorable for Jack Nicholson’s great, Oscar-winning performance. Forman’s direction doesn’t leave a mark (not like the brilliant direction he would do several years later for his masterpiece Amadeus), nor does the script really have anything memorable about it. Looking at Barry Lyndon, we find one of the most beautiful films ever made, which the Academy acknowledged with Oscars for its Costumes, Art Direction-Set Decoration, and Cinematography, but as to how they left Kubrick in the dust for his gorgeous direction is beyond comprehension. This is a film so expertly crafted, so minutely detailed in Kubrick’s framing of every shot, that any Academy member could rightly be called a fool for not casting their vote in Kubrick’s direction.
As for the film itself, it has become Kubrick’s forgotten masterpiece, one that is usually only briefly mentioned (if mentioned at all), normally tossed aside in favor of discussion of 2001, Dr. Strangelove or A Clockwork Orange. In fact, if I were to ask how many of you had actually seen it, I would probably be thoroughly depressed at the result. It is a stunning epic that sweeps you into the adventures of a young Irish lad who is forced to leave home after defeating a rival in a duel. His journey has him joining the army, fighting a few battles in the Seven Years War, and eventually winning the hand of the beautiful (and rich) Lady Lyndon, but that’s where the story takes a somewhat dark turn.
There have been those that describe the film as a painting come to life, but aside from its look, there is so much more to admire: an unpredictable story, a great performance from Ryan O’Neal, an elegant screenplay and of course, Kubrick’s skilled direction. Turning back one last time to the Sight & Sound poll, we find the film tied at #59 on the Critics’ poll and tied for #19 on the Directors’ poll. It should be noted that Cuckoo’s Nest also makes an appearance on the Directors’ poll, but much further down where it’s tied at #48. However, it does not make an appearance on the Critics’ poll, even with 250 films on the list.
So why did the Academy go with Cuckoo’s Nest instead of Barry Lyndon? It’s a good question. Another good question would be why they went with Cuckoo’s Nest over Dog Day Afternoon and Jaws as well, two other superior films. As for why they passed on Lyndon, it could be because the film has a purposeful detached feeling to it. At first, Kubrick wants to take you along on Barry’s adventure, making you feel bad for him as he is forced into one situation after another, but as the film goes on, he gradually distances you from the character, for when we come to the second half of the film, we discover just what kind of a person he really is. But again, this really only seems to explain Best Picture. How Kubrick didn’t receive the Best Director Oscar in an easy victory is a mystery left to the ages and another embarrassment that the Academy will have to live with on its record forever.
This one entry on this list may have been cheating a bit, but it seemed a lot easier to encompass the vast number of errors the Academy made in regards to the great Stanley Kubrick in one spot as opposed to spreading them all out. It really could have been its own list, but that would’ve been somewhat monotonous. Suffice it to say that it’s unclear as to why the Academy spurned Kubrick so much, awarding him only one Oscar for the Visual Effects on 2001: A Space Odyssey. We can only speculate as to why he was shot down all four times for director, even when it was clear he was the best nominee. Whatever the reason, he, like Hitchcock, was never truly honored by the Academy for his incredible artistic vision, and yet, you’ll scarcely see a list of the greatest directors of all time without his name mentioned. All we can do at this point is look back at their history and shake our heads in shame and sadness at their terrible oversight.