5 Oscar Losses That Fans STILL Haven't Forgiven The Academy For

Glenn Close Was THE Frontrunner — Then Olivia Colman Just... Won

Glenn Close swept the Golden Globe, Critics' Choice, SAG, and Independent Spirit Awards for The Wife, making her the presumed lock for her long-overdue first Oscar on her seventh nomination. Then Olivia Colman's name got called for The Favourite instead, and even Colman looked stunned walking to the stage.

Denzel Washington Had The Golden Globe In Hand — Then Lost Best Actor Anyway

Coming off a Golden Globe win as Rubin Carter in The Hurricane, Denzel Washington entered the 2000 ceremony as the best actor frontrunner, only to watch Kevin Spacey take the Oscar for American Beauty. Washington later admitted the loss left him so bitter he stopped watching the ceremony and had his wife vote in his place for years afterward.

The Color Purple Got 11 Nominations And Somehow Lost Every Single One

Steven Spielberg's adaptation tied for the most Oscar nominations of the year but walked away with zero wins, including a Best Director snub for Spielberg himself despite a DGA nomination. The NAACP publicly accused the Academy of racial bias over the shutout, and decades later critics still argue the film has aged far better than Out of Africa, the film that beat it for Best Picture.

Amy Adams Has Six Oscar Nominations And Still Zero Wins

From Junebug in 2005 through Vice in 2018, Amy Adams has lost every single one of her six Oscar nominations, tying her with Deborah Kerr and Thelma Ritter for the most nominations without a win among actresses not named Glenn Close. The gap cuts deepest with Arrival, where she wasn't even nominated — director Denis Villeneuve later called the omission 'a big disappointment,' saying she 'had the whole weight of the movie on her shoulders.'

It Took Leonardo DiCaprio Five Losses (And A Raw Bison Liver) To Finally Win

DiCaprio racked up nominations for The Aviator, Blood Diamond, and The Wolf of Wall Street across more than a decade without a single win, famously losing Best Actor for Titanic without even being nominated. It wasn't until he endured a grueling, widely-publicized physical ordeal filming The Revenant — including eating raw bison liver — that critics say the Academy finally handed him the Oscar in 2016.