Collectors

Here’s an Oscar-worthy collection of ‘Best Picture’ films spanning decades of movie magic

There is nothing like having an interesting hobby to put your energy into and enjoying the excitement it generates in return. I can’t recall the exact date, but it was sometime during 1995 that I took up a special hobby—collecting each year’s Oscar-winning Best Picture movie. I found a list of the winning movies on the Internet and used it as my guide. At first, I bought the VHS movies from Blockbuster or HMV a few months after they’d won the award. By so doing, I paid less than the original price. After all, I would have to purchase dozens of movies to get caught up. The first Oscar Best Picture, Wings, was awarded in 1927!

By 2000, DVDS had become popular, so I joined the Columbia House DVD Club and purchased many movies from them. They provided magazines with lists of winning movies with images of the movies’ posters. Some of the movies from the 1930s—cimarron and The Great Ziegfeld—were difficult to find at that time and even the major video stores did not stock them. But I persevered and eventually obtained them.

Since there is a new Best Picture every year, it is obvious that the collection will continue to grow. It is infinite. Where would I display the precious videos? I commissioned a client who was a carpenter to build a wooden cabinet specifically for the videos. The shelves had to be narrow, just the width of the videos; that way, they could stand like books on a bookshelf. As the collection expanded, I discovered that the long, three-hour movies with double cassettes, such as The Great Ziegfeld and Gandhi, occupied the space of four DVDS. These movies were also more expensive.

As time progressed, I challenged myself to obtain all the movies up to 2015. In the early days when I started the collection, my teenage son had embarked on a movie collection of his own; however, his interest was entirely different. He collected macho-man movies, such as Rambo and Terminator.

I struck a deal with him.

For every Christmas and Mother’s Day, he would buy nothing but Oscar’s Best Picture movies for me. I gave him a list of the movies I did not own, and to this day, movies are the only gifts that I desire and receive from my son. Now that he has two sons of his own, I receive an additional movie from the grandsons. I am delighted with the gifts, and he is pleased that he need not wonder about what to purchase for me.

The beauty of this hobby is that most of the movies are great stories. I can watch them alone, over and over, or I can have movie parties with friends at any time.

It has been 24 years since I began the collection. My cabinet (shown below) became packed to the brim several years ago, and I began replacing the movies in VHS format with DVDS. This freed up some space, yet space is still at a premium. I will not obtain another cabinet, therefore, the end date for collecting Oscar’s Best Pictures is coming soon.