An American in Paris: 1951 Best Picture

“A Streetcar Named Desire” was the most nominated film (12) at the 24th Academy Awards but it did not win Best Picture.

“An American in Paris” (8 nominations), starring Gene Kelly and Leslie Caron, did. It won 5 other Oscars in writing, cinematography, art direction-set decoration, costume and music categories.

“Streetcar” cleaned up in the acting categories: Vivien Leigh won Best Actress. Karl Malden and Kim Hunter picked up the Best Supporting acting awards. Best Actor, however, went to Humphrey Bogart for “The African Queen.” This marked the last time that a male in a leading role who was born in the 19th century won an Oscar. Heh! Bogart (born Christmas Day 1899) was only alive for 7 days in the 19th century. Does anybody ever use that as a trivia item?

As for Best Director, that went to George Stevens for “A Place in the Sun,” one of its 6 Oscars. The 1950 Japanese now classic “Rashomon”, starring Toshiro Mifune, won an award for Best Foreign Film.

Here are some Jeopardy! clues on “An American in Paris”
FILL IN THE BEST PICTURE TITLE $800: 1951, Gene Kelly on the Seine: “A.A.I.P.”
FILMS OF THE ’50s $3,500 (Daily Double): Alan Jay Lerner won the Oscar for Best Screenplay for this 1951 musical about an expatriate
BEST PICTURE OSCAR WINNERS: Following “Gone with the Wind”, it would be another 12 years before a color film won again: this foreign-set musical
EUROPE ON FILM $3,100 (Daily Double): Two Vincente Minnelli musicals set in Paris which won Oscars for Best Picture of ’51 & ’58
ALL “AMERICAN” $400: The screenplay for this Gene Kelly – Leslie Caron musical was written by Alan Jay Lerner
ARTSY FILMS $1000: Gene Kelly is an expatriate singing & dancing painter in this Oscar winner

More Jeopardy! clues on 1951 films:
LINE $200: This 1951 movie includes the line “I have always depended on the kindness of strangers”
THE BELLS ARE RINGING $600: The Xmas song standard titled these “Bells” was introduced by Bob Hope in the 1951 movie “The Lemon Drop Kid”
1950s SCI-FI FILMS $2000: An alien named Klaatu gets people’s attention by briefly shutting down electricity the world over in this 1951 film
ROBOTS & CYBORGS $1000: Gort visited Cold War-era Earth in this 1951 film
SCIENCE FICTION FILMS $2000: Lock Martin, a 7’7″ doorman at Grauman’s Chinese Theater, was cast as the robot Gort in this 1951 sci-fi film
TCM WITH ROBERT OSBORNE $2000: (Turner Classic Movies’s Robert Osbourne gives the clue.) This 1951 Kurosawa film famously told the story of a crime from the viewpoints of a priest, a peasant & a woodcutter
NOT NOMINATED FOR BEST PICTURE $200: Bogie & Hepburn floated across the screen in this 1951 film that pleased audiences & critics, but not the Academy
THE NEW YORK TIMES MOVIE REVIEWS $2000: The spacemen in this 1951 film are so peaceful “you’d hardly expect them to split an infinitive, let alone an atom”
THE WGA’s TOP 101 SCREENPLAYS $800: James Agee & John Huston wrote the script for this 1951 film with a continent in its title
RONALD REAGAN WAS AN ACTOR $400: Monkey business abounds in this 1951 film in which Reagan co-stars with a chimp
SUPER MARIO $2000: Called “The Voice of the Century”, he played the title role in the 1951 film “The Great Caruso”
DO “TELL” $200: Give us your best Marlon Brando with this famous 1-word howl from a classic 1951 film
OSCAR! OSCAR! $800: This actress won her second Oscar for her role in the 1951 film version of “A Streetcar Named Desire”
MALTIN ON THE MOVIES $800: Maltin tells us this 1951 classic was “gorgeously filmed on location in the Belgian Congo”
BIG SCREEN BUNNIES $800: If you were in this 1951 Disney film you’d have had a chance to chase a rabbit along with a little girl
GOD SAVE THE “QUEEN” $100: Bogie starred in the 1951 film version of this soggy C.S. Forester novel
HEY, MARIO! $1000: In a 1951 film, he was “The Great Caruso”
THEIR FIRST FEATURE FILMS $400: Her first film was the 1951 drama “Fourteen Hours”; her second was another “timely” movie, “High Noon”
ACTORS & ACTRESSES $400: This “Fair Lady” of film starred on Broadway in a non-musical version of “Gigi” in 1951
MOVIE NOSTALGIA $400: This British PM’s daughter Sarah played Fred Astaire’s love interest in the 1951 film “Royal Wedding”
ALFRED HITCHCOCK $800: Hitchcock’s daughter was in this 1951 film in which Robert Walker wanted to swap murders with Farley Granger
HORATIO HORNBLOWER $600: He played Hornblower on film in 1951; 5 years later he was back afloat as Captain Ahab
MOVIE CO-STARS $1000: Montgomery Clift & Shelley Winters were nominated for Oscars for this 1951 film; Elizabeth Taylor was not
’50S FILM FACTS $100: This Disney film based on a book by Englishman Lewis Carroll had its world premiere in England in 1951
SOPHIA LOREN $500: Both Sophia & her mother were extras in this 1951 Robert Taylor film set during the reign of Nero
DANCE $800: In a 1951 film Rhonda Fleming portrayed this famous belly dancer of the 1890s
BASEBALL $200: 1951 film “Angels in the Outfield” wasn’t about a California team but this Pennsylvania one
FILM CLASSICS: This 1951 classic stars the AFI’s top picks for the greatest male & female film legends