7 Best Picture Winners That Would Never Be Made Today

Here are seven Best Picture winners that would never be made today.

And if you think Hollywood will respond to Donald Trump’s re-election by being less sensitive, you probably didn’t live through the last Trump Administration.

But First, Caveats and Clarifications

We aren’t here to gripe about “cancel culture” or “wokeism,” or to hold the past accountable to the standards of the present. But we see movies as time capsules of their eras, and love learning more about the past — and present — by paying attention to how stories play differently at different times.

Lots of Best Picture winners are movies that would never be made today because their directors have come to be regarded as problematic, and we aren’t including those. And we aren’t including brilliant movies like Casablanca that include some dicey moments that could be easily ignored without derailing the message of the movie.

For this list we’re focusing on movies that have innate plot elements egregious enough to give risk-averse studio executives pause. (They’re a cautious lot, not fond of social media backlash.) These plot elements are integral enough that removing them would make for a totally different movie.

So with that, here are seven movies that would never be made today despite winning Best Picture Oscars in their time.

Gigi (1958)

Our modern culture, very conscious of the threat of groomers, would quickly reject the concept of Gigi, a film about a 16-year-old being literally groomed to become a courtesan. Its main song is “Thank Heaven for Little Girls,” which we can’t really imagine would get a big studio sign-off today.

Yes, Gigi is set at the turn of the 20th Century, when the behavior depicted onscreen wasn’t shocking, and it was released in the 1950s, when teenage weddings were far more common. But today? Non-starter.

Though it won Best Picture and eight other Oscars — and for many years held the record for the highest clean sweep of nominations — Gigi easily leads the list of movies that would never be made today, by today’s Hollywood executives.

Crash (2004)

Sometimes the movies that age the most poorly are those that pat themselves on the back for seemingly topical or progressive statements that quickly feel obvious — especially as common sense evolves. Among the most eye-rolling are those with a “racism is bad” message, because of course it is. No one wants to spend two hours hearing Hollywood types teach a lesson every human being should have learned as a small child.

Modern critics have it in for Crash — the AV Club and Film Comment are among those who have named it the worst best picture winner, and IndieWire ranked it dead last among the Best Picture winners of this century.

More on Crash

Why are modern critics so anti-Crash? It’s hard to generalize, but the main problem seems to be a ham-fisted redemption arc in which a white cop (Matt Dillon) saves the life of a Black driver (Thandiwe Newton) he has previously sexually assaulted during a traffic stop. That’s just one of the glaring issues in a movie full of cartoonish twists.

Modern executives would be wise enough to know that critics — both professional and self-appointed on social media — would have their knives out for a movie like Crash, and that it would doom the film’s dreams of awards show glory.

Another Caveat

Also, sure: Technically, any of these movies could be made today by some friends with an iPhone. But they wouldn’t be the same movies without the resources of a major studio.

And now, back to our list.

Gone With the Wind (1939)

Even if you can get past the broad, stereotypical Black characters (we can’t — parts of this movie play like a bad cartoon), Gone With the Wind asks us to spend nearly four hours lamenting the fortunes of Scarlett O’Hara, a woman who holds other people as property.

There’s just no way to make her sympathetic to modern audiences. Yes, she gets her comeuppance in the end.

But those are four very long hours to spend with someone so unpleasant.

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975)

Lots of things about One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest have aged well. It’s anti-authoritarian streak is universal.

But one thing about One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest would never fly in the post #MeToo era: Protagonist Randle McMurphy (Jack Nicholson) is the statutory rapist of a 15-year-old victim. (He pretends to be insane because he thinks it will be easier to serve his time in a mental hospital.)

When you consider McMurphy’s criminally bad judgment when it comes to sexual boundaries, the fact that the movie’s main antagonist is a strong woman — Nurse Ratched — takes on a strange subtext.

It’s notable that when Hollywood returned to the Cuckooverse a few years ago with the Netflix series Ratched, she was the protagonist (or at least antihero) rather than the villain.

Driving Miss Daisy (1989)

When rap group Public Enemy took aim at stereotypical, servile Black roles in 1990’s “Burn Hollywood Burn,” one of their main targets was Driving Miss Daisy, the 1989 Best Picture winner starring Jessica Tandy as a wealthy white woman and Morgan Freeman as her chauffeur, Hoke.

When he endures her surliness, they become best friends and she teaches him to read.

Alfred Uhry, who wrote the stage and screen versions of Driving Miss Daisy, based it on his own grandmother and her driver. But however well-intentioned the movie is, few Hollywood producers in this era are excited about yet another film about Black servants and the white people who help them. (Yes, Miss Daisy learns from Hoke, too, and Morgan Freeman brings dignity to the role, but modern-day social media that doesn’t have time for that kind of nuance.)

More on Driving Miss Daisy (1989)

As Big Daddy Kane explained in “Burn Hollywood Burn”:

“As I walk the streets of Hollywood Boulevard/
Thinking how hard it was to those that starred/In the movies portraying the roles/Of butlers and maids, slaves and h–s/Many intelligent Black men seemed/To look uncivilized when on the screen…And Black women in this profession/As for playing a lawyer, out of the question/For what they play Aunt Jemima is the perfect term/Even if now she got a perm.”

Thirty-four years later, Hollywood seems to at least understand the complaint.

Dances With Wolves (1990)

Look, we like Dances With Wolves. Kevin Costner’s film is a gorgeous, sweeping epic, and is a genuinely affecting story of transformation and coming to respect a different way of life. It was advanced for its time, flipping the old Hollywood Cowboys-and-Indians stereotypes. All good!

But it’s also a perfect example of the kind of movie modern-day Hollywood claims it doesn’t want to make any more: Films ostensibly about Native Americans that feature white people front and center. And it plays into white savior criticisms as well.

But: You have to crawl before you walk, and Dances With Wolves had its heart in the right place.

The Silence of the Lambs (1991)

Full disclosure: This is your humble correspondent’s favorite movie. It is often criticized today for allegedly featuring a transgender serial killer, Buffalo Bill. The realization that Buffalo Bill is “making a women’s suit” is a key and crucial reveal in the film. But Buffalo Bill is not transgender, as the movie clearly explains.

In fact, Buffalo Bill is a misogynist who wants to become a mockery of a woman — note his cruel impersonation of one of his victims, in which he tugs at his shirt to mimic breasts and screams in a grotesque voice.

Gender is a very important part of Silence of the Lambs — Clarice ultimately catches Bill by empathizing with one of his female victims in a way that none of her male colleagues can. But take out Bill — a man who hates women — and the movie loses much of this theme.

Still, just the accusation of transphobia would be enough to keep Silence of the Lambs out of the Best Picture race today, given the lack of nuance in many social media protests.

More on The Silence of the Lambs

How does The Silence of the Lambs make clear that Bill is not transgender? In a quick exchange between Clarice Starling and the criminal genius Hannibal Lecter. Both characters use the outdated (but not offensive at the time) phrase “transsexual” instead of the modern “transgender.”

“There’s no correlation in the literature between transsexualism and violence. Transsexuals are very passive,” Clarice explains.

Seconds later, Lecter comes right out and says: “Billy is not a real transsexual. But he thinks he is. He tries to be. He’s tried to be a lot of things, I expect.” Lecter also surmises that Buffalo Bill likely sought out sexual reassignment surgery — and was rejected.

Why would a transphobic movie bother to include such an exchange? It wouldn’t. It actually slows things down. But director Jonathan Demme was sensitive enough to take care to ensure that audience not see Buffalo Bill as representative of transgender people. And he obviously isn’t.

Liked This List of 7 Best Picture Winners That Would Never Be Made in Today’s Hollywood?

Let us know if you agree or disagreee in the comments — and if you think we missed any. You may also like this list of 13 Shameless Comedies That Just Don’t Care If You’re Offended. Some are movies that would never be made today, and none won Best Picture.

Main image: Gone With the Wind. Loew’s Inc.