Is this oversight wholly the fault of the Academy? Who else, unless we all agree it's somehow natural or fitting for great comedies to be treated like the second-class citizens of cinema.

All great movies -- and great movie endings -- stay in our memories as normal or indifferent ones never could. They're like great taglines -- their strength lies in the very fact that we can't forget them.

If I could get all those black and white haters out there to watch just ten titles -- movies that constituted absolutely essential viewing -- which would they be?

What if we only had a month in which to force our young adult offspring to see ten essential movies before they succumbed entirely to short-form digital content? My own personal picks.

2005 -- for Best Picture, give me Capote over Crash any ol' time. Another uninspiring year, I thought.