Little Oscar Love for Box Office Hits

Feb. 8, 2008 — -- They kept you on the edge of your seat. They had you laughing so hard, you clutched your stomach as tears streamed down your cheeks. They made you skip work so you could wait in line with hundreds of other fans, feverishly scanning the crowd, hoping you wouldn't have to crane your neck and squint up at the screen.

But none of them got nominated for Oscars.

"Spider-Man 3," "Knocked Up" and "Harry Potter and the "Order of the Phoenix" were among the most anticipated and highest-grossing films of 2007. They blew out the box office ("Spider-Man" made more money than any other '07 film), they impressed the industry (Judd Apatow, "Knocked Up's" director, is Hollywood's new king of comedy), and they dominated national discourse (who didn't catch Harry Potter fever last summer?).

So why does the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the elite organization that dispenses Hollywood's highest honors, refuse to recognize them?

It's no secret that the films that score the major Academy Awards aren't usually blood-soaked thrillers or pie-in-the-groin comedies. But this year, the discrepancy between movies nominated for awards and flicks that drove people to theaters is hard to ignore.

"That gap -- it has seemed to widen in recent years. In the last four years, you're looking at one movie, two at most, in the best picture category that has grossed $100 million or more," said Sean Smith, Entertainment Weekly's Los Angeles bureau chief. "On the one hand, it looks like the Academy's out of touch with the American people. On the other, it's kind of supposed to be."

That's because the Academy cares about the passion, the genius, the art of cinema. It can't be bothered with something as banal as money.

"The Academy doesn't go by what the public likes; they're under no obligation to reward the films that the public likes," said Gitesh Pandya, editor of box-office analysis Web site boxofficeguru.com. "They're looking more at what deserves to be considered the best films of the year and often those are tough sells at the box office."