One Battle After Another. Sinners. Bugonia. Marty Supreme. This year’s Oscar nominations are surprisingly solid. Maybe as solid as you can hope for with a narrow field that will inevitably leave out some outstanding players.
Still, the 2026 nominations are not without a few misses:
Weapons, one of the most exciting and successful movies of the year, definitely deserved a spot in the Best Picture lineup.
Chase Infiniti probably should have got an acting nod for One Battle After Another (though pushing her in Best Actress was a tough sell).
There are few different categories where 28 Years Later could have been slotted.
But, all told, in the history of Academy Award nominations, these are relatively minor quibbles. There have been far more egregious snubs over the years—including a number of now-renowned movies that Oscar didn’t even deem worthy enough to give a passing glance.
I’m not talking about movies that were snubbed in a certain category (such as Do The Right Thing getting criminally ignored for both Best Picture and Best Director in 1989). I’m talking about movies that got zero Oscar nominations (Do The Right Thing at least got Best Original Screenplay and Best Supporting Actor nods); the ones that couldn’t even get in the room.
To that end, here are my picks for the most egregious Oscar overlooks of the past 50 years…
The Starting Five
These movies all shockingly scored a doughnut when it came to Oscar nominations:
1. The Shining (1980)
Apparently, this horror classic was so terrifying Oscar voters wouldn’t go near it.
Why it was overlooked: While it’s considered a masterpiece now, reaction to The Shining was mixed upon its initial release. Gene Siskel called the movie a “crashing disappointment” in his Chicago Tribune review, and the film was nominated for two Razzies.
Craziest snub: Best Director. With hindsight, this would probably be a 10-time Oscar nominee—easily racking up nominations for Cinematography, Art Direction, and Sound. But the biggest miss is not giving a nomination to Stanley Kubrick. One of our most distinct directors (nominated Best Director four times) crafting one of our greatest horror films and he doesn’t even get a nod? Madness. Especially when you consider something like Roman Polanski’s Tess, a little remembered or discussed film, scored six nominations including Best Director the same year.
2. Heat (1995)
The mother of all heist films got robbed of all nominations.
Why it was overlooked: For years leading up to Heat the idea of a Pacino-DeNiro pairing—considered by many at that point to be our best film actors—was a cinephile dream (the two both appeared in 1974’s The Godfather Part II but didn’t share any scenes). Unfortunately, the hype was so high there was no way this movie could live up to it. Heat did decent box office (making $67 million domestic), but it wasn’t a monster hit. And while critics were impressed, they weren’t quite over the moon (Entertainment Weekly gave it a B-). Some fans were also disappointed Pacino and DeNiro weren’t on screen together more.
Craziest snub: Best Picture. Personally, I kind of get the snubs here. Heat is an entertaining movie with a few transcendent moments that never quite makes it over the mountain. I don’t think this is either Pacino or DeNiro’s best work (though their scene together is great), so I’m alright with them being left out of the Best Actor race. And Michael Mann has made better movies. But Heat as a whole has grown so much in reputation, appreciation, and influence over the years, we are now in the phase where we’re regularly seeing the children of Heat like Den of Thieves and Crime 101. And, looking back, 1995 was not a super strong Oscar year. I think there’s a place for Heat in Best Picture and that would look right now.
3. Kill Bill: Vol. 1 (2003) / Kill Bill: Vol. 2 (2004)
The Academy kicked Quentin Tarantino’s kung-fu revenge tale in the face not just once, but twice.
Why it was overlooked: Despite the Tarantino pedigree, this (action/martial arts/grindhouse) is not the type of movie Oscar typically honors. But it’s the number that comes after the title that really doomed Kill Bill. While each movie was a box-office and critical success, Tarantino himself has stated the Academy would have been more likely to reward Uma Thurman if they would have seen the whole bloody affair.
Craziest snub: Best Editing. Given the separation of the movies into two, you can at least make sense of the snubs for Best Actress, Best Director, and Best Original Screenplay to some extent (the whole is more impressive than each individual half). But there’s no justifying not nominating Sally Menke for Best Editing on Vol. 1, especially when you consider this was originally one movie that had to be cut into two. Almost just as egregious (and insane) is Rza not getting a Best Score nod.
4. Us (2019)
Are Academy members still haunted by visions of themselves not voting for this movie? Let’s hope.
Why it was overlooked: Genre bias, plain and simple. The movie was a hit, critically well received, and Lupita Nyong’o was praised to high heavens. Which just leaves the fact that the Academy looks down on horror. And the movie wasn’t viewed as socially important enough (like Get Out was, which received four nominations) to help push it over the horror hump.
Craziest snub: Best Actress. While Us may not be held in as high regard as Get Out (though it may actually be better), Lupita gives one (or two) of the best performances of the decade, hands down. Pouring salt on the wound of her non-nomination is the fact that the Best Actress category was kind of a shit show (Renee Zelweger ended up winning for Judy, a performance I’m sure is good in a movie absolutely no one cares about). I would have easily popped the movie into Best Director and Best Original Screenplay too.
5. Uncut Gems (2019)
If you bet your life that the breakthrough hit from the Safdie brothers scored at least one nomination, you’d be dead.
Why it was overlooked: Unclear. Bias against Adam Sandler as a serious actor (maybe Academy members still haven’t gotten over Little Nicky)? A24 wasn’t quite the force that it is today, so that could be a factor too. But it was a big indie hit ($50 million+ domestic off a reported $19 million budget) with a great critical reception (91% on Rotten Tomatoes). Maybe it was just too ahead of its time?
Craziest snub: Best Actor. The influence of this movie and the “Safdie style” it popularized cannot be overstated. With the expanded 10 Best Picture nominees, the fact that Uncut Gems is not in the category looks real bad now. But let’s push that aside and talk about the Sandman, a mainstream movie fixture for the last 30 years giving his very best performance (not just a great-for-Sandler performance but a certifiably great performance). While there were some good Best Actor nominees this year, a couple don’t even come close to Sandler in Uncut Gems. Honestly, I wouldn’t have just handed him a nomination, I would have handed him the trophy.
The Bench Players
Two more Oscar-overlooked movies that landed just outside the starting lineup…
Tombstone (1993)
One of the great performances of the 90s was shot in the back by the Oscars.
Why it was overlooked: While Tombstone was a modest hit and fairly well reviewed (it ultimately won the battle of Wyatt Earp movies versus Kevin Costner), it was viewed as a popcorn movie with a troubled production history. The category where the movie had the best shot at a nomination was also particularly strong this year (more on this below), leaving Tombstone in the dust.
Craziest snub: Best Supporting Actor. There’s no denying Val Kilmer’s performance as Doc Holiday. He turns every line into melted butter. This oversight is particularly egregious because Kilmer was similarly overlooked two years earlier for The Doors, where he gives a performance far better than other rock biopic actors who actually won Oscars (ahem, Bohemian Rhapsody). While the Best Supporting Actor field was cut-throat at the 66th Academy Awards (Ben Kingsley was left out for Schindler’s List!), Kilmer’s performance can stand up to (and even potentially shoot down) any nominee.
Zodiac (2007)
The scariest thing is we’ll never know why the Academy is out to murder David Fincher’s chances of winning a gold man.
Why it was overlooked: Delayed from its original release date in the awards bread basket of December 2006, Zodiac was pushed back to March and forgotten by end of the year. The movie also didn’t get an over-enthusiastic reaction from audiences and critics (largely due to its unresolved third act, considered a key asset now). Finally, Zodiac had the misfortune of coming out in a loaded Oscar year—with the likes of No Country for Old Men, There Will Be Blood, and Michael Clayton.
Craziest snub: Best Director. Not only has Zodiac’s reputation grown over the years, it’s now talked about as one of director David Fincher’s best movies—and potentially his masterpiece. Worse still, Fincher had his in-the-bag Oscar stolen from him a few years later for The Social Network (losing out to The King’s Speech), making this slight feel even more egregious. It would also have been a fantastic slate to have Paul Thomas Anderson, Joel and Ethan Coen, and David Fincher (easily three of the top five directors of the past 30 years) competing for Best Director.
Speaking of Adam Sandler...Punch Drunk Love!
Even more egregious when you realize all of PTA's other films have received nominations except for his debut.
Heat is overrated. They wanted a Pacino-DeNiro scene so bad, they had to put Pacino in a helicopter to make it happen. It was no Usual Suspects.