The Academy Awards, or Oscars as it is also referred to, is one of the most prestigious
award ceremonies of the year. Hundreds of people attend the Oscars each year, between all
those who are nominated and those chosen from the public.

They come dressed head to toe in the most lavish designer outfits in hopes of winning that
24-karat plated gold award.

With The Oscars also being televised, it is watched by millions around the world in
anticipation of who will be coming out on top. The Oscars is the highest honour in the film industry to win.

For a film to be up for a chance to win, they have to first be nominated, and this has to come from members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Firstly, film companies submit their films for consideration. A committee votes to create a
shortlist of films then the committee votes again to select the final nominees. Finally, the
Academy members vote for the winners in most categories.

To be nominated for Best Picture, Academy members must vote for the nominee in each category.

Out of all those nominated films, you will rarely find one from the horror genre. Why is that? People may argue that horror can often be considered degrading, trashy or cliché and
therefore shouldn’t be considered for such prestigious awards.

Take the 2018 psychological horror Hereditary and the 2019 folk horror Midsommar for
example. Toni Collette gave a captivating performance in Hereditary for her role as the
mother, Annie, whilst Florence Pugh was sublime in her portrayal of a traumatised Dani.

Image Credit: Midsommar (2019)

Both of these films were beautifully written and directed by American film-maker, Ari Aster. Both had done exceptionally well at the Box Office but unbelievably were not nominated for an Oscar.

Toni Collette later commented on this by saying “It’s very sweet that people get so irate that I wasn’t nominated for an Oscar.”

Image Credit: Hereditary (2018)

It’s a known fact that horror films rarely win an Oscar, or get nominated at all. So, when it
does happen – and it has – it makes the ceremony that more special.

Let’s go way back to the first horror movie to be recognised, Alfred Hitchcock’s 1960 movie Psycho, which may not have won any awards but picked up an impressive four nominations, including Best Director for Hitchcock and Best Supporting Actor for Janet Leigh.

Would you believe since the first ever Oscar Awards back in 1929, it took 44 years for a
horror movie to even be nominated for Best Picture? 44 years.

Since then, a measly seven movies classed as horror have been nominated.

Image Credit: The Exorcist (1973)

The first horror film to ever be up for the nomination for Best Picture Oscar was 1973’s The Exorcist.

The Exorcist had already gained huge admiration from its release and the reviews around it, which helped the film receive ten total Academy Award nominations, of which it successfullywon two, Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Sound.

They unfortunately lost on winning Best Picture. Comedy Crime movie The Sting snagged that win.

Steven Spielberg’s 1975 horror movie Jaws, the story of a killer shark, was hugely
successful. The film was the first major motion picture to be shot on the ocean and the
highest-grossing film in history until the release of Star Wars in 1977.

Jaws was nominated for four Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Film Editing, Best Original Score, and Best Sound. The film came away with 3 wins but lost out on winning Best Picture. That win went to One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, A Drama Comedy starring Jack Nicholson.

Image Credit: Jaws (1975)

Sixteen years later, the psychological horror, Silence Of The Lambs, which was released in
1991 and starred Jodie Foster, Ted Levine and Sir Anthony Hopkins, made history at the
64th Academy Awards.

The film became the third in history to win for each of the five major categories: Best
Director, Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Adapted Screenplay, and at last, Best Picture.

This made Silence Of The Lambs the first ever horror movie to win the award.

In 1999, M. Night Shyamalan’s The Sixth Sense became the fourth horror movie to be
nominated for Best Picture. The Sixth Sense went up against four other films, battling it out for that all-important Best Picture. The other nominees included The Insider, The Green Mile, The Cider House Rules, and American Beauty.

Image Credit: The Sixth Sense (1999)

Unfortunately, The Sixth Sense could not make history and subsequently
lost out to rom-com American Beauty.

There was then an 11-year hiatus until the next horror nomination and the fifth horror movie to ever be nominated for Best Picture.

2010’s Black Swan was categorised as a psychological horror film that was praised upon its release. The film received five Oscar nominations, with lead actress Natalie Portman receiving a win for Best Actress.

It faced eight other movies and eventually lost out on the top award to the movie, The King’s Speech.

Before 2025, the most recent Best Picture nomination in the horror genre was Jordan
Peele’s Get Out. Peele is known primarily for his comedic work. Get Out gained a deep
respect from fans for its horror observation of racial subject matters.

The film received four nominations at the 90th Academy Awards, including Best Picture,
Best Director, Best Actor, and Best Original Screenplay, the latter of which was won.

Image Credit: Get Out (2017)

The fantasy romance movie The Shape Of Water took away Best Picture.

The seventh horror film in history to be nominated for the Best Picture Oscar, and the most recent, is The Substance. It is the first body horror film to be nominated.

The Substance is nominated for Best Picture, Director, Original Screenplay, Makeup and
Hairstyling and Actress with Demi Moore being nominated for her first Oscar.
The Substance is up against movies Anora, The Brutalist, A Complete Unknown, Emilia
Pérez, Dune: Part Two, I’m Still Here, Nickel Boys, and Wicked.

With the awards not until March, it will be a wait until we see what the movie can come away with.

We can only hope that The Substance will snap up all those awards and be the second horror movie in history to win Best Picture.

Featured Image Credit: The Mourning Paper