I would normally mark the end of one run of films with a ranking, but I’m breaking up the whole Best Picture thing over time. I’m just not interested in only watching Best Picture winners for the next 3 months.
So, I will not be reviewing The Life of Emile Zola tomorrow. We’re taking a break, and tomorrow I will begin with work of Ralph Bakshi.
Just an FYI.
David Vining, Author 
Pretty slim pickings in that first group. Emile Zola is a good one.
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I am so absurdly far ahead in the schedule right now, so can say with certainty, yes, Emile Zola is a good one.
But yeah, that first ten is…slim. There’s real good stuff like It Happened One Night and Grand Hotel, but the rest is solidly good to mediocre with one particularly awful entry (Cimarron).
I don’t think the Academy voters really knew what they were voting for when they filled out their ballots for Best Production. It was definitely an award for producers first and foremost, and they seemed to be rewarding successful large bets before anything else.
The marriage of artistic merit always feels somewhat accidental with the sole exception of It Happened One Night, which was a modest production that became very big.
Still, it’ll be interesting to watch the dynamic change over the decades.
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Oh thank God, I bailed on The Life of Emile Zola in the first scene. This gives more more time to further ignore it.
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