Over the past two decades, 13 PGA winners have gone on to win the Oscar for best picture.
The hotel's eighth-floor Stardust Room was featured in "Argo, " the Iran hostage drama that won this year's Oscar for best picture.
But this year the Oscar for best picture (and perhaps for best actor) may go to a movie that has no dialogue.
While Argo was nominated for an Oscar for Best Picture, Affleck was passed over in the directing category, something many see as a huge snub.
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Last year's winner Slumdog Millionaire went on to win the Oscar for best picture and the previous year, the Coen brother's No Country For Old Men did the same.
"It was the equivalent of an indie film winning the Oscar for best picture, " jokes Mr. Hautemont, 47, who was born in France but has lived in California since the late 1980s.
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The surprise success of Slumdog Millionaire, which could win the Oscar for Best Picture, not only draws attention to the rich film culture of India's Bollywood but also reflects a profound change in the way the world views the film's key supporting character: the slum itself.
Several commentators call it an Oscar frontrunner for Best Picture, pointing to the authenticity of the portrayal.
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Based on the book by Brian Selznick, the film is an Oscar contender for Best Picture, both marvel and masterpiece.
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It will definitely be on the list of Oscar nominees for Best Picture, and Bradley Cooper will surely get a nod for Best Actor.
In 1989, Cyrus Todd found himself nearly broke, so he reportedly decided to sell his grandfather's 1956 Best Picture Oscar for Around the World in 80 Days.
The trio proved to be box-office gold: They were two of the highest-grossing films of their time, winning a slew of awards -- including a best picture Oscar for the latter, a tale of con men in 1930s Chicago.
Several named producers, including actor Don Cheadle, were deemed ineligible for the Best Picture Oscar.
O'Neil claims that Hollywood has improved in its recognition of black actors, but the Academy's failure to nominate 2006's "Dreamgirls" for best picture, for example, is a sign that Oscar voters simply don't understand such films culturally.
His spaghetti western's Oscar nominations include nods for best film and best picture.
When Affleck was snubbed for a directing slot, awards analysts initially were counting "Argo" out for the best-picture Oscar, along with Kathryn Bigelow's "Zero Dark Thirty" and Tom Hooper's "Les Miserables, " which also missed out on directing nominations.
The Academy has been cracking down on the number of producers per film who can be eligible for an Oscar since Shakespeare in Love won Best Picture in 1999 and five producers walked away with Oscars.
The film has six other Oscar nominations, including best picture and best actor for star Adrien Brody.
The former would mean Argo has to overcome 80 years of Oscar history to take Best Picture without even a nomination for Best Director, and the latter means Lincoln has to overcome a softening status amid a race that became highly competitive with strong challengers in the home stretch.
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Since 2008, the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences has been playing with the formula for Best Picture in the hopes of getting more popular films nominated (and boosting viewership for the Oscar ceremony which last year was watched by fewer people than watched the Grammy Awards).
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In the 25 years since Rocky won the Academy Award for Best Picture, the top-grossing film has won the Oscar just five times.
Sure, schizophrenia isn't generally considered a crowd-pleaser, but as the year's Golden Globe award for Best Picture, this uniquely refreshing flick has all the prerequisites of an Oscar winner.
So good is this Batman film, that the Academy Awards had to change the way movies are nominated in order to make up for the perceived shortcomings in Oscar balloting that resulted in The Dark Knight failing to get a Best Picture nomination.
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The cast prize at SAG adds some weight to the Oscar prospects for "Argo, " though the guild honor has a spotty record at forecasting eventual best-picture winners.
And the U.S. Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is considering whether to nominate Nairobi Half Life for an Oscar in the Best Foreign Language Film category -- the first time a Kenyan movie has been considered.
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