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The Academy Awards Year 1978 was held at Los Angeles, California, USA on April 9 1979

BEST PICTURE 1979 WINNER

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THE DEER HUNTER (1978)

Director : Michael Cimino
Writer : Michael Cimino (story) & Deric Washburn (story)
Genre : Drama | War
Main Cast : Robert De Niro, John Cazale, John Savage, Christopher Walken, Meryl Streep

Plot : Michael, Steven and Nick are young factory workers from Pennsylvania who enlist into the Army to fight in Vietnam. Before they go, Steven marries the pregnant Angela and their wedding-party is also the men’s farewell party. After some time and many horrors the three friends fall in the hands of the Vietcong and are brought to a prison camp in which they are forced to play Russian roulette against each other. Michael makes it possible for them to escape, but they soon get separated again. —IMDb

 

 

 

 

 

OTHER NOMINEES

AN UNMARRIED WOMAN (1978)

Director : Paul Mazursky
Writer : Paul Mazursky (written by)
Genre : Comedy | Drama | Romance
Main Cast : Jill Clayburgh, Alan Bates, Michael Murphy, Cliff Gorman, Patricia Quinn

Plot : Erica is unmarried only temporarily in that her successful, wealthy husband of seventeen years has just left her for a girl he met while buying a shirt in Bloomingdale’s. The film shows Erica coming to terms with the break-up while revising her opinions of herself, redefining that self in its own right rather than as an extension of somebody else’s personality, and finally going out with another man. Erica refuses to drop everything for Saul, an abstract expressionist painter, simply out of love for him because he expects her to. It is not so much loneliness that is her problem, and the problems that men, flitting around this newly “available” woman like moths round a flame, bring to her sense of independence. —IMDb

 

COMING HOME (1978)

Director : Hal Ashby
Writer : Nancy Dowd (story), Robert C. Jones (writer)
Genre : Drama | War
Main Cast : Jane Fonda, Jon Voight, Bruce Dern, Penelope Milford, Robert Carradine

Plot : Sally Bender is the wife of a Captain in the United States Marine Corps. He is sent over to Vietnam, and Sally is alone. With nothing else to do, she decides to volunteer at a local veteran’s hospital, where she meets Luke, who went to high school with Sally. Luke was wounded and is paralyzed and confined to a wheelchair. When Sally begins to fall in love with Luke, she has to make a crucial decision about her life. —IMDb

 

 

 

HEAVEN CAN WAIT (1978)

Director : Warren Beatty, Buck Henry
Writer : Harry Segall (play), Elaine May (screenplay)
Genre : Comedy | Fantasy | Romance | Sport
Main Cast : Warren Beatty, Julie Christie, James Mason, Jack Warden, Charles Grodin

Plot : Joe Pendleton is a football quarterback, who hasn’t been playing a lot because of injuries. But now it appears he has fully recovered and the coach wants to make him the starting quarterback. But he goes out one day and an accident occurs and the next thing he knows he is on his way to heaven. But he convinces the man in charge, Mr. Jordan. that he isn’t suppose to be here and upon checking Mr. Jordan discovers that he is right and tries to get him back into his body but his body has been cremated. Mr. Jordan tells him that they can put him in another man’s body provided that the man’s death has not been discovered. Now Mr. Jordan shows him the body of Leo Farnsworth, who has just been killed by his wife and secretary. Joe doesn’t want to take Farnsworth’s body until a woman, Betty Logan who has a problem with what Farnsworth’s business is doing to her home, insists on meeting him. Now Joe’s taken with her and would like to help her but can only do it if he assumes Farnsworth’s identity. And he does but unfortunately still acts like himself which perplexes everyone who knows Farnsworth especially his wife and secretary who are sure that they killed him and are on the edge of their seats wondering what he is going to do. —IMDb

 

MIDNIGHT EXPRESS (1978)

Director : Alan Parker
Writer : Billy Hayes (book), William Hoffer (book)
Genre : Biography | Crime | Drama | Thriller
Main Cast : Brad Davis, Irene Miracle, Bo Hopkins, Paolo Bonacelli, Paul L. Smith

Plot : Midnight Express is a harrowing tale of a naïve American caught in a nightmare of his own making thousands of miles from his home. Billy Hayes (Brad Davis) is an American tourist visiting Turkey with his girlfriend Susan (Irene Miracle) when he’s caught by customs officials trying to smuggle a large amount of hashish out of the country. The crime would normally carry a sentence of four years, but officials decide to make an example of Billy, and he draws a 30-year sentence despite the promises of his Turkish legal counsel. While Susan and Billy’s father (Mike Kellin) pledge to do everything they can to speed Billy’s release, in fact there’s little than can be done. Billy quickly finds himself in a hellish prison that’s a nightmare of filth, violence, rape, inedible food, and unspeakable health conditions. However, Billy gains a few confidantes behind bars: Jimmy (Randy Quaid), an American in a constant state of emotional overdrive; Max (John Hurt), an intelligent, drug-addicted Englishman; and Erich (Norbert Weisser), a gay Scandinavian who is attracted to Billy but accepts his gentle refusals of sex. Before long, Billy is convinced that he can take no more, and he makes plans to take the “midnight express” — jailhouse slang for escape. While his friends are willing to help, they also make clear that almost no one who has tried to escape has lived to tell the tale. Based on a true story, Midnight Express was a box-office hit which won wide acclaim for the performances of Brad Davis and John Hurt; and the screenplay, by Oliver Stone, won an Academy Award. —Allmovie

 

BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM WINNER 1979

PRÉPARES VOS MOUCHOIRS (1978)

Also Known As : Get Out Your Handkerchiefs
Country : France | Belgium
Director : Bertrand Blier
Writer : Bertrand Blier (writer)
Genre : Comedy | Drama | Romance
Main Cast : Gérard Depardieu, Carole Laure, Patrick Dewaere, Michel Serrault, Eléonore Hirt

Plot : Solange is depressed: she’s stopped smiling, she eats little, she says less. She has fainting fits. Her husband Raoul seeks to save her by enlisting Stephane, a stranger, to be her lover. Although he listens to Mozart and has every Pocket Book arranged in alphabetical order, Stephane fails to cheer Solange. She knits. She does housework. Everyone, including their neighbor a vegetable vendor, agrees that she needs a child, yet she fails to get pregnant by either lover. The three take a job running a kids’ summer camp where they meet Christian, the precocious 13-year-old son of the local factory manager. It is Christian who restores Solange to laughter. —IMDb

 

 

OTHER NOMINEES

BELYY BIM – CHYORNOE UKHO (1977)

Also Known As : White Bim Black Ear
Country : Russian
Director : Stanislav Rostotsky
Writer : Stanislav Rostotsky (writer), Gavriil Troyepolsky (book)
Genre : Drama
Main Cast : Vyacheslav Tikhonov, Valentina Vladimirova, Mikhail Dadyko, Ivan Ryzhov, Irina Shevchuk

Plot : Russia’s popular actor Vyacheslav Tikhonov plays Ivan Ivanovich, an ill and aging World War II veteran, who comes into possession of an eager and lovable puppy, whom he calls Bim. Because Bim has a black ear, which is not part of his breed’s accepted physical conformation, Ivan is unable to obtain a pedigree certificate for him, a fact which causes him endless trouble. Though most of his neighbors are too feeble to be concerned, a few of them hypocritically criticize any deviation from “correctness,” including Ivan’s dog, his boon companion. Bim is, in fact, Ivan’s only close friend. Bim wins friends in Ivan’s housing project when the dog alerts neighbors to illegal activities by those same obnoxious hypocrites. This touching drama won the very important Lenin Prize of the Soviet Union in 1980, the Grand Prize of the Karlovy Vary Film Festival, and was nominated for an Oscar as “Best Foreign Film” in 1978. Tikhonov, who plays the old man here, may be best known in the West for his performance as Prince Bolkonsky in Sergei Bondarchuk’s epic film of War and Peace. —Allmovie

 

DIE GLÄSERNE ZELLE (1978)

Also Known As : The Glass Cell
Country : West Germany
Director : Hans W. Geissendörfer
Writer : Klaus Bädekerl (writer), Hans W. Geissendörfer (writer)
Genre : Crime | Drama
Main Cast : Brigitte Fossey, Helmut Griem, Dieter Laser, Walter Kohut, Claudius Kracht

Plot : When a school crashes down around the children inside for no apparent reason, architect Phillip Braun (Helmut Griem) is quickly apprehended and tried for having condoned inferior design and construction of the building. He is sentenced to prison. After he has already served his sentence, his lawyer (who in the meantime has become the lover of Phillip’s wife) discovers that the real blame for the incident may lie elsewhere. However, overwhelmed by his passions, Phillip is easy prey for the villain. This psychological crime thriller was based on The Glass Cell by Patricia Highsmith. —Allmovie

 

MAGYAROK (1978)

Also Known As : Hungarians
Country : Hungary
Director : Zoltán Fábri
Writer : József Balázs (novel), Zoltán Fábri (writer)
Genre : Drama
Main Cast : Gábor Koncz, Bertalan Solti, Noemi Apor, Gellert Raksanyi, Éva Pap

Plot : A group of landless Hungarian peasants accept work as migrant-laborers on a farm in northern Germany where the wages are good, and the wives and family are allowed to accompany them. Though it is in the midst of World War II, they are relatively well-off. However, they glimpse the treatment accorded to POWs and others who are not so gently treated, and at the conclusion of the year’s harvest, they choose to return to Hungary and are quickly swept up in the tides of war. This film is part of a series of films by award-winning, well-respected director Zoltan Fabri who devoted much time and effort chronicling the struggle against fascism. —Allmovie

 

I NOUVI MOSTRI (1978)

Also Known As : Viva Italia!
Country : Italy
Director : Mario Monicelli, Dino Risi, Ettore Scola
Writer : Agenore Incrocci
Genre : Comedy
Main Cast : Vittorio Gassman, Ornella Muti, Alberto Sordi, Ugo Tognazzi, Alfredo Adami

Plot : This Italian black comedy is comprised of nine short stories all related to the theme that most men are selfish cads. At the 1978 Oscars, the film was nominated for Best Foreign film.