The 3rd Academy Awards Assessed (November 1930)

Host Conrad Nagel with Best Actress winner Norma Shearer

After the pared down 2nd Academy Awards, the 3rd Oscars, as the awards show would come to be known, expanded the categories from seven to a whopping eight. It was a slight acceleration after just seven months; 1930 was the only year in which two Academy Awards ceremonies were held, to keep up with the eligibility period that was now established. The 3rd Academy Awards honored the best in film released from August 1, 1929 to July 31, 1930, and as sound films quickly improved, so too did the slate of nominees on offer.

Matinee idol Conrad Nagel hosted the event at The Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, one that would see ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT and THE BIG HOUSE tied as the “big winners,” with two awards each. THE LOVE PARADE was the biggest nominee of the night, with six of the eight possible nominations, but it failed to win any. The only audio and/or visual record of the show that I’ve been able to find is a seven-minute promotional film highlighting the Outstanding Production, Best Actress, and Best Writing wins, and it’s an interesting artifact of stodgy presentation.

As for the evergreen discussion of snubs: if we’re just talking American films (which the Academy was at this time), LUCKY STAR (1929) is a big miss in my opinion. It’s my favorite film of 1929 and one of Frank Borzage’s best. F.W. Murnau’s penultimate film, CITY GIRL, also deserves special notice. Although both of these films had sound versions, only the silents survive; perhaps both were still considered old-fashioned at the time in spite of the sound versions. In hindsight, of course, they are more beautiful than most any other American film of the eligibility period.

But for now, I’ll rank the films in each category from top to bottom, bolding my “what should have won” choice and marking the actual winner with a * and lost films/films that are not easy to track down with a ~, removing the latter from consideration.

Outstanding Production

• ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT (1930)*
• THE BIG HOUSE (1930)
• THE LOVE PARADE (1929)
• DISRAELI (1929)
• THE DIVORCEE (1930)

While I don’t think ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT was the best film of the 3rd Academy Awards’ eligibility period, not even the best American one, there’s no denying it’s an impressive and compelling early talkie. Often praised as one of the earliest examples of pacifist cinema, ALL QUIET certainly contains a multitude of images that should dissuade one from violence. And yet its performances are not always the most believable, and its pacing a little slow; nevertheless, it handily stands as a remarkable piece of filmmaking, especially among its peers in this category. THE BIG HOUSE is also a fantastic teardown of masculinity, as a prison drama that values the strength of friendship more than the strength of domination. THE LOVE PARADE, Ernst Lubitsch’s first talkie, is the big Hollywood coming out party for Frenchman Maurice Chevalier, who certainly gives a lively performance here. But the fun of THE LOVE PARADE is in the details; the set design, the clever dialogue, and the attractiveness of Lillian Roth’s great supporting performance (Roth is somewhat of a favorite from this small era of early Pre-Code films). DISRAELI is a very stagey film starring stage veteran George Arliss as the title character, but even in its creakiness, it’s somewhat elegant. But THE DIVORCEE, as an admittedly competent execution of the “upper class love tri-/quadr-angle melodrama” that was quite common at the time, is certainly the least unique picture nominated for the big prize at the 3rd Oscars. ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT is an obvious choice.

Best Director

• King Vidor — HALLELUJAH (1929)
• Lewis Milestone — ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT*
• Ernst Lubitsch — THE LOVE PARADE
• Clarence Brown — ANNA CHRISTIE (1930)
• Clarence Brown — ROMANCE (1930)
• Robert Z. Leonard — THE DIVORCEE

With Lewis Milestone’s win as Best Director for ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT, the tradition of Best Picture and Best Director winners aligning was begun, even though there were deviations throughout the decades. One deviation is retroactively represented here, as I reconcile my unease with King Vidor’s HALLELUJAH to recognize it as a singular, ultimately beautiful film about race, religion, and community; I’ve written about it pretty extensively. However, I do of course see ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT’s great success as a function of Milestone’s direction, and it should be applauded. And Lubitsch, a most delicate and charming director, turned the skills he had developed during the silent years right on for the talkies and THE LOVE PARADE. The pair of Clarence Brown-directed films nominated here are alright. As much as ANNA CHRISTIE is praised, I found it pretty staid, while ROMANCE, another Greta Garbo-led melodrama, is semi-conventional. However, they get points for strong plotting and a weighty framing device, respectively. THE DIVORCEE, as mentioned, is too conventional for this upper echelon of films from these years.

Best Actor

• George Arliss — DISRAELI*
• Ronald Colman — BULLDOG DRUMMOND (1929) and CONDEMNED (1929)~
• Wallace Beery — THE BIG HOUSE
• Maurice Chevalier — THE BIG POND (1930) and THE LOVE PARADE
• George Arliss — THE GREEN GODDESS (1930)
• Lawrence Tibbett — THE ROGUE SONG (1930)~

I must admit, it is interesting to agree that George Arliss is the Best Actor from this list, considering the film for which he is the title character is not the best one here. I mean, DISRAELI is kind of unextractable from Arliss’ role as the British Prime Minister! And yet (even though I’m not like an Arliss stan or something), I didn’t see the man. I saw a Conservative leader who I certainly don’t admire, insofar as I really know anything at all about Benjamin Disraeli, but that performance was compelling. It was slightly rhythmic, even as it creaked. By comparison: Ronald Colman’s titular detective in BULLDOG DRUMMOND is all guile too, just in a more handsome and forceful package (I wasn’t able to track down CONDEMNED not dubbed in Spanish). Wallace Beery is his rough-and-tumble self in THE BIG HOUSE, with those redeeming moments here and there that he was so good at producing from his thugs. Maurice Chevalier is certainly superior in THE LOVE PARADE to himself in THE BIG POND, but both smarmy characters don’t leave as long a lasting impression. Arliss, on the flip side of his win-worthy performance as Disraeli, puts on some brownface makeup to play a stereotypical, Orientalist villain in the adventure film THE GREEN GODDESS. Finally, THE ROGUE SONG is mostly missing, and so I didn’t view opera star Lawrence Tibbett’s performance in the film. But I must admit, Arliss’ potentially, unintentionally detestable performance is the strongest one here.

Best Actress

• Nancy Carroll — THE DEVIL’S HOLIDAY (1930)
• Gloria Swanson — THE TRESPASSER (1929)
• Ruth Chatterton — SARAH AND SON (1930)
• Greta Garbo — ANNA CHRISTIE and ROMANCE
• Norma Shearer — THE DIVORCEE*
• Norma Shearer — THEIR OWN DESIRE (1929)

The common thread through the characters played by these actresses is “fallen woman.” Seriously, nearly everyone these actresses play is either some kind of former, current, and/or future prostitute, gold-digger, and/or generally sexual woman, to their shame and the driving force of their films’ plots. The one exception is Norma Shearer’s Lally in THEIR OWN DESIRE, but her performance in that film is the weakest from the list. The strongest comes from Nancy Carroll, who delivers the most nuanced and sympathetic character amid her peers in THE DEVIL’S HOLIDAY, although I would say all of the characters here are at least sympathetic. Gloria Swanson plays a good, if tragic, mother in THE TRESPASSER, and the same goes for Ruth Chatterton in SARAH AND SON. I’ve already written about ANNA CHRISTIE and ROMANCE, and I feel that part of their relative tepidness comes from Garbo’s continuing equalization to sound, which had reached some stability by 1931’s MATA HARI. And finally, on the subject of THE DIVORCEE: I really did not actively dislike the film. But while Shearer gives a good performance, it is within a film that doesn’t bring out the best in her. Of these “fallen women,” Carroll was the most realistic.

Best Writing

• ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT — George Abbott, Maxwell Anderson, and Del Andrews
• THE BIG HOUSE — Frances Marion*
• DISRAELI — Julien Josephson
• THE DIVORCEE — John Meehan
• STREET OF CHANCE (1930) — Howard Estabrook

I feel I must place ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT at the top if only because of its everlasting moment: that of a hand, reaching for a butterfly, as it loses its life. OK, but also not only because of that: its depiction of the degradation of men’s spirits is a tremendous work of growing pain and tragedy. It slightly beats THE BIG HOUSE, as it did in Outstanding Picture, because its somewhat similar themes (in regards to masculinity and violence) are irrepressible when blown up to the highest stakes; that is, to the scale of World War I. But THE BIG HOUSE’s relationships are strong, and it ultimately finds the value and violence of brotherhood, in a similar vein to King Vidor’s BILLY THE KID, from later in the same year. Although I’ve praised DISRAELI to some extent, its dry theatricality is indeed given life by George Arliss, so its writing alone doesn’t hold as much weight. My apparent punching bag for this piece, THE DIVORCEE (it just was truly overrated by the Academy), weaves a more complicated romantic melodrama than others of its kind, and its characters marginally more interesting. But its surmounting of STREET OF CHANCE, a middling gambling drama with William Powell, is not a huge achievement.

Best Sound Recording

• THE LOVE PARADE — Franklin Hansen
• THE BIG HOUSE — Douglas Shearer*
• RAFFLES (1930) — Oscar Lagerstrom
• THE CASE OF SERGEANT GRISCHA (1930) — John E. Tribby~
• SONG OF THE FLAME (1930) — George Groves~

The category of Best Sound Recording is made easier to suss out with the absence of THE CASE OF SERGEANT GRISCHA and SONG OF THE FLAME. However, it’s complicated somewhat by my interpretation of the award. Should it simply go to the film with the most audible dialogue? I mean, it is simply called Best Sound Recording. I jest, but I have to admit I am not an audiophile. Even my ears, though, can pick up on the difficulties some had in the earliest years of talkies. The surviving nominees are not among the films with those difficulties, I’m happy to report. Douglas Shearer, brother of Norma, won in reality, making them the first sibling winners in Oscars history. But THE LOVE PARADE, as a musical comedy, has more pleasing audio as a whole. Shearer deserves some recognition, however, for THE BIG HOUSE’s climactic gunfight. It’s loud and chaotic, audibly representing the violence. I’m not quite sure why RAFFLES, with Ronald Colman as a gentleman thief, was nominated, but sure, it sounds good. I’m just surprised there weren’t more musicals nominated for this category (besides THE LOVE PARADE and the missing SONG OF THE FLAME).

Best Art Direction

• KING OF JAZZ (1930) — Herman Rosse*
• THE LOVE PARADE — Hans Dreier
• BULLDOG DRUMMOND — William Cameron Menzies
• THE VAGABOND KING (1930) — Hans Dreier
• SALLY (1929) — Jack Okey

KING OF JAZZ, Universal’s contribution to the full-throated revue trend from each of the big movie studios, is far and away the best. It benefits from glorious early Technicolor, but it also benefits from Herman Rosse’s gorgeous, abstract, humongous set design. KING OF JAZZ’s acts are better, its pacing better, and it even features an Oswald the Lucky Rabbit cameo, but its beauty lies in the space it presents. So I think it heartily deserves the award among the nominees here, although none are truly slackers. The luxurious, small-country castle that much of THE LOVE PARADE takes place in perfectly complements the excess of its characters, while BULLDOG DRUMMOND ends up in a wonderful, villainous hideout after moving through art-deco apartments and moody inns. THE VAGABOND KING is a forgettable musical, but its massive sets are impressive, and SALLY is much the same. I come to Best Art Direction thinking, “Which one of these places would I want to visit?,” and gosh, I would love to walk onto the stages of KING OF JAZZ.

Best Cinematography

• ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT — Arthur Edeson
• WITH BYRD AT THE SOUTH POLE (1930) — Joseph T. Rucker and Willard Van der Veer*
• HELL’S ANGELS (1930) — Tony Gaudio and Harry Perry
• THE LOVE PARADE — Victor Milner
• ANNA CHRISTIE — William Daniels

Arthur Edeson is one of the greatest cinematographers of all time, and that is on display with ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT. I again point you to that butterfly shot. Edeson’s stark depiction of violence is balanced with the suffusion of warmth into the peaceful moments, even the death of Paul. That is why it takes the cake over WITH BYRD AT THE SOUTH POLE, which also displays the stark realities of Antarctica as a documentary about explorer Richard E. Byrd’s journey to the southernmost continent. Joseph T. Rucker and Willard Van der Veer do a tremendous job, but if the cinematographer brings visuals to the viewer in the service of an emotional truth, Edeson and ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT present humanity, and Rucker, Van der Veer, and WITH BYRD present spectacle. Somewhere in between is HELL’S ANGELS, which is impressive not only because of its much-publicized air battles, but also because of its quiet scenes. THE LOVE PARADE is a delight, but I must admit the cinematography is “invisible” (to the movie’s benefit), and William Daniels’ work on ANNA CHRISTIE also fits into the emerging Hollywood mould, but ultimately, it’s too static.

As I had found in exploring the 2nd Academy Awards, I felt the absence of foreign films very strongly, since my favorites from these years are overwhelmingly from abroad. Nevertheless, the crop of nominees for the 3rd Academy Awards was indeed an improvement over the previous year’s, just as the American film industry was finding its footing in a new paradigm. At the end of this assessment, I only “agreed” with the Academy three times out of the eight categories, but my big winner was ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT, breaking the tie in the historical record with three wins instead of just two. From what’s here, it’s deserving.