From the blockbusters that swept the board to the ones that scooped the five most important prizes – plus the one that won the most while missing out on Best Picture – these are the most successful Oscar-winning films of all time.
Films that have won the most Oscars
Three films jointly hold the record for the most Oscar wins (11).
Ben-Hur (1959)
Nominated in 12 out of 15 categories, the success of William Wyler’s sword and sandals epic quickly turned the ceremony into a suspense-free procession. Perhaps the voters were responding to the new challenges of TV in rewarding a movie that was so clearly cinematic. Perhaps they just loved Wyler: this was his third Best Director/Best Picture double after Mrs Miniver (1942) and The Best Years of Our Lives (1946). “I guess this is old hat to you,” said Heston, backstage. “Chuck, it never gets old,” Wyler responded.
Titanic (1997)
If Kim Basinger hadn’t beaten the pre-ceremony favourite, 87-year-old Gloria Stuart, to the Best Supporting Actress statuette for her role in LA Confidential, Titanic would have won a record number of Oscars, including Best Director and Best Picture. As it was, it took 11 out of its 14 nominations – Kate Winslet also missed out (to Helen Hunt in As Good As It Gets) in the Best Actress category, while Leonardo DiCaprio wasn’t even nominated as Best Actor (which Jack Nicholson took, also for As Good As It Gets) and make-up went to Men in Black. The ceremony contained the divisive moment when director James Cameron declared: “I’m king of the world” – a quotation from DiCaprio’s Jack in the bow of the ship. Critics thought it was arrogance; others felt it was fair enough given what a passion project Titanic had been and how widely it had been assumed that it would be a flop.
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
When voters rewarded the final part of Peter Jackson’s epic JRR Tolkien adaptation, they were really giving the Oscars to the genre-defining trilogy as a whole. The film won all 11 categories in which it was nominated; only its surprising omission from the cinematography line-up prevented it from becoming the most garlanded Oscar movie of all time. As it is, it remains the only film in Academy Award history to have been nominated in more than 10 categories and won all of them including Best Picture.