Buzz
Just because a film receives the prestigious Best Picture Oscar from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences doesn’t guarantee universal acclaim. In fact, there are several Best Picture winners that have left the general public somewhat indifferent.
The biggest culprit is 1929’s The Broadway Melody, which holds a dismal 20 percent audience score on Rotten Tomatoes. While critics gave it a slightly better score of 42 percent, it still remains far from favorable. Close behind are three films from the 1930s—Cimarron (1931), Cavalcade (1933), and The Great Ziegfeld (1936)—a trend that reflects the shifting tastes and expectations of viewers over the last century.
A quick glance at the audience reviews on Rotten Tomatoes sheds light on this shift. One critic labeled Cavalcade, a film that follows the life of an elite London family through the early 20th century, as “another cinematic Hallmark card,” while another described it as “a bizarre mix of sentimentality and melancholy.” As for Cimarron, a sweeping Western about the Oklahoma Land Rush of 1889, it was criticized for being “full of offensive stereotypes” and “as absurdly politically incorrect as you can get.”
The four films listed are the only Best Picture winners with audience ratings of 50 percent or lower; the remaining films in the top 10 received more balanced reactions. However, you might be surprised to learn that a couple of widely loved classics—one of which ranks among the highest-grossing films ever—didn’t exclusively receive positive feedback. These are Titanic (1997) and Rocky (1976), both of which earned a 69 percent rating. In contrast, critics were much more favorable: Titanic boasts an 88 percent critic score, while Rocky holds a 91 percent rating.
Take a look at the rest of the list below; again, the Rotten Tomatoes percentages reflect the audience scores. (You can check out all 95 Best Picture Oscar winners ranked by their critic scores here.)
