Annual award for Best Film Editing
Thelma Schoonmaker (left) and Columba Powell (right) at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival . Schoonmaker is among the deans of film editing; Powell is the son of Michael Powell , a prominent film director to whom Schoonmaker was married until his death in 1990.
Conrad A. Nervig was the inaugural winner, winning for Eskimo (1933). He also won for King Solomon's Mines (1950).
The Academy Award for Best Film Editing is one of the annual awards of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS). Nominations for this award are closely correlated with the Academy Award for Best Picture . For 33 consecutive years, 1981 to 2013, every Best Picture winner had also been nominated for the Film Editing Oscar, and about two thirds of the Best Picture winners have also won for Film Editing.[ 1] [ 2] Only the principal, "above the line " editor(s) as listed in the film's credits are named on the award; additional editors, supervising editors, etc. are not currently eligible.[ 3]
The nominations for this Academy Award are determined by a ballot of the voting members of the Editing Branch of the academy; there were 220 members of the Editing Branch in 2012.[ 4] The members may vote for up to five of the eligible films in the order of their preference; the five films with the largest vote totals are selected as nominees.[ 3] The Academy Award itself is selected from the nominated films by a subsequent ballot of all active and life members of the academy. This process is essentially the reverse of that of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA); nominations for the BAFTA Award for Best Editing are done by a general ballot of academy voters, and the winner is selected by members of the editing chapter.[ 5]
This award was first given for films released in 1934. The name of this award is occasionally changed; in 2008, it was listed as the Academy Award for Achievement in Film Editing .
Four film editors have won this award three times in their career:
To date, two film directors have won this award, James Cameron and Alfonso Cuarón for the films Titanic and Gravity , respectively. Directors David Lean , Steve James , Joel Coen and Ethan Coen (under the alias "Roderick Jaynes"), Michel Hazanavicius , Jean-Marc Vallée (under the alias "John Mac McMurphy") and Chloé Zhao have been nominated for editing their own films, with Cameron, Cuarón, and the Coens each being nominated for the award twice. Additionally, Best Film Editing winner, Walter Murch , although known for film editing and sound, directed the Oscar nominated Return to Oz and is, to date, the only person with Oscars for both sound engineering and film editing, winning them in the same year for his work on The English Patient . Also, nominated editors Robert Wise , Francis D. Lyon , winner for Body and Soul and Hal Ashby , winner for In the Heat of the Night , became directors whose films were in turn nominated for Best Film Editing, namely Somebody Up There Likes Me , I Want to Live! , West Side Story , The Sound of Music , The Sand Pebbles and The Andromeda Strain for Wise, Crazylegs for Lyon and Bound for Glory and Coming Home for Ashby.
Superlatives taken from a document published by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences .[ 8]
Winners and nominees [ edit ]
These listings are based on the Awards Database maintained by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences .[ 9]
indicates the winner
Year
Film
Nominees
1960 (33rd)
The Apartment
Daniel Mandell
The Alamo
Stuart Gilmore
Inherit the Wind
Frederic Knudtson
Pepe
Viola Lawrence and Al Clark
Spartacus
Robert Lawrence
1961 (34th)
West Side Story
Thomas Stanford
Fanny
William H. Reynolds
The Guns of Navarone
Alan Osbiston
Judgment at Nuremberg
Frederic Knudtson
The Parent Trap
Philip W. Anderson
1962 (35th)
Lawrence of Arabia
Anne V. Coates
The Longest Day
Samuel E. Beetley
The Manchurian Candidate
Ferris Webster
The Music Man
William H. Ziegler
Mutiny on the Bounty
John McSweeney Jr.
1963 (36th)
How the West Was Won
Harold F. Kress
The Cardinal
Louis R. Loeffler
Cleopatra
Dorothy Spencer
The Great Escape
Ferris Webster
It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World
Frederic Knudtson (posthumously ) , Robert C. Jones and Gene Fowler Jr.
1964 (37th)
Mary Poppins
Cotton Warburton
Becket
Anne V. Coates
Father Goose
Ted J. Kent
Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte
Michael Luciano
My Fair Lady
William H. Ziegler
1965 (38th)
The Sound of Music
William H. Reynolds
Cat Ballou
Charles Nelson
Doctor Zhivago
Norman Savage
The Flight of the Phoenix
Michael Luciano
The Great Race
Ralph E. Winters
1966 (39th)
Grand Prix
Fredric Steinkamp , Henry Berman , Stewart Linder and Frank Santillo
Fantastic Voyage
William B. Murphy
The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming
Hal Ashby and J. Terry Williams
The Sand Pebbles
William H. Reynolds
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
Sam O'Steen
1967 (40th)
In the Heat of the Night
Hal Ashby
Beach Red
Frank P. Keller
The Dirty Dozen
Michael Luciano
Doctor Dolittle
Samuel E. Beetley and Marjorie Fowler
Guess Who's Coming to Dinner
Robert C. Jones
1968 (41st)
Bullitt
Frank P. Keller
Funny Girl
Robert Swink , Maury Winetrobe and William Sands
The Odd Couple
Frank Bracht
Oliver!
Ralph Kemplen
Wild in the Streets
Fred R. Feitshans Jr. and Eve Newman
1969 (42nd)
Z
Françoise Bonnot
Hello, Dolly!
William H. Reynolds
Midnight Cowboy
Hugh A. Robertson
The Secret of Santa Vittoria
William A. Lyon and Earle Herdan
They Shoot Horses, Don't They?
Fredric Steinkamp
Year
Film
Nominees
1990 (63rd)
Dances with Wolves
Neil Travis
Ghost
Walter Murch
The Godfather Part III
Barry Malkin , Lisa Fruchtman and Walter Murch
Goodfellas
Thelma Schoonmaker
The Hunt for Red October
Dennis Virkler and John Wright
1991 (64th)
JFK
Joe Hutshing and Pietro Scalia
The Commitments
Gerry Hambling
The Silence of the Lambs
Craig McKay
Terminator 2: Judgment Day
Conrad Buff , Mark Goldblatt and Richard A. Harris
Thelma & Louise
Thom Noble
1992 (65th)
Unforgiven
Joel Cox
Basic Instinct
Frank J. Urioste
The Crying Game
Kant Pan
A Few Good Men
Robert Leighton
The Player
Geraldine Peroni
1993 (66th)
Schindler's List
Michael Kahn
The Fugitive
Dennis Virkler , David Finfer , Dean Goodhill , Don Brochu , Richard Nord and Dov Hoenig
In the Line of Fire
Anne V. Coates
In the Name of the Father
Gerry Hambling
The Piano
Veronika Jenet
1994 (67th)
Forrest Gump
Arthur Schmidt
Hoop Dreams
Frederick Marx , Steve James and William Haugse
Pulp Fiction
Sally Menke
The Shawshank Redemption
Richard Francis-Bruce
Speed
John Wright
1995 (68th)
Apollo 13
Mike Hill and Daniel P. Hanley
Babe
Marcus D'Arcy and Jay Friedkin
Braveheart
Steven Rosenblum
Crimson Tide
Chris Lebenzon
Seven
Richard Francis-Bruce
1996 (69th)
The English Patient
Walter Murch
Evita
Gerry Hambling
Fargo
Roderick Jaynes
Jerry Maguire
Joe Hutshing
Shine
Pip Karmel
1997 (70th)
Titanic
Conrad Buff , James Cameron and Richard A. Harris
Air Force One
Richard Francis-Bruce
As Good as It Gets
Richard Marks
Good Will Hunting
Pietro Scalia
L.A. Confidential
Peter Honess
1998 (71st)
Saving Private Ryan
Michael Kahn
Life Is Beautiful
Simona Paggi
Out of Sight
Anne V. Coates
Shakespeare in Love
David Gamble
The Thin Red Line
Billy Weber , Leslie Jones and Saar Klein
1999 (72nd)
The Matrix
Zach Staenberg
American Beauty
Tariq Anwar and Christopher Greenbury
The Cider House Rules
Lisa Zeno Churgin
The Insider
William Goldenberg , Paul Rubell and David Rosenbloom
The Sixth Sense
Andrew Mondshein
Multiple wins and nominations [ edit ]
The following editors have received multiple nominations for the Academy Award for Best Film Editing. This list is sorted by the number of total awards won (with the number of total nominations listed in parentheses).
^ Harris, Mark (January 6, 2008). "Which Editing is a Cut Above?" . The New York Times . In 1980, Ordinary People won as Best Picture, but its editor Jeff Kanew was not nominated for Best Editing.
^ Dimond, Anna (December 13, 2013). "Why Editing Nominations Predict the Best Picture Oscar" . Variety . Interviews with prominent film editors exploring the correlation between the Academy Awards for Best Film Editing and for Best Film.
^ a b "Rule Thirteen—Special Rules for the Film Editing Award" . 79th Academy Awards Rules for Distinguished Achievements in 2006 . Archived from the original on 2010-07-18. Rules are published for each year's awards. In earlier years, different rules applied; thus Robert Parrish was nominated for All the King's Men (1949) with a credit as an "editorial consultant".
^ "Academy Branches" . Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences . February 2012. Archived from the original on 2012-02-24.
^ "Orange British Academy Film Awards: Rules and Guidelines 2008-2009" (PDF) . British Academy of Film and Television Arts. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-07-28.
^ a b "FILM EDITING FACTS: MOST NOMINATIONS AND AWARDS" (PDF) . Oscars.org. Retrieved 2020-01-27 .
^ Tibbs, Ros (2023-02-08). "The youngest Oscar winner in every Academy Award category" . Far Out . Retrieved 2023-02-23 .
^ "Film Editing Facts" (PDF) . Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences . March 2012. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2013-11-13. Retrieved 2012-03-01 .
^ "The Official Academy Awards Database" . Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Retrieved 2022-03-20 . Select all "film editing" awards.
^ "Academy Awards 2017: Complete list of Oscar winners and nominees" . Los Angeles Times . February 26, 2017. Retrieved January 8, 2018 .
^ Hipes, Patrick (January 23, 2018). "Oscar Nominations: 'The Shape Of Water' Leads Way With 13" . Deadline Hollywood . Retrieved January 23, 2018 .
^ Hipes, Patrick (January 22, 2019). "Oscar Nominations – The Complete List Of Noms" . Deadline Hollywood . Retrieved January 22, 2019 .
1934–1950 1951–1975 1976–2000 2001–present
Best Film Editing became Best Editing in 1999