9. Pulp Fiction Loses Best Picture and Best Director to Forrest Gump
1994 saw a few great choices in the Best Picture category, including Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction, Robert Zemeckis’ Forrest Gump, and Robert Redford’s Quiz Show. However, the one that most people look back on as the film that should have won the big prize is Tarantino’s influential masterpiece. Few movies end up shaping a generation of filmmakers, but that’s just what Tarantino did with Pulp Fiction, a film that plays with structure while featuring tons of unforgettable dialogue and plot elements.
That being said, it’s hard to fault the Academy for going with Forrest Gump and Zemeckis for Best Picture and Best Director, respectively. It too is a great film, but Tarantino broke new ground with Pulp Fiction, and in the process created one of the greatest, most quotable, movies ever made. The film garnered seven Oscar nominations and walked away with Best Original Screenplay, a fitting consolation prize. However, the film had already won the prestigious Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival for 1994, so you don’t need to feel too bad for it. Like many of the movies that the Academy nominates for Best Picture, they just didn’t appreciate it enough when it came out. Now though, it’s highly regarded as one of the best films ever made. People still appreciate Forrest Gump to this day as well, but it just hasn’t had the long-lasting love that Tarantino’s masterpiece has had.
