10 Horror Films That Beat Genre Prejudice To Win Oscars

Oct 31, 2018 Updated: October 31st, 2018

1. The Silence Of The Lambs (1991) - Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Adapted Screenplay

Finally, then, the big one... the only horror to win all the major prizes, and - indeed - the only Best Picture there has ever been to fall under the horror genre.

While all those prestigious 70s horrors had audience and critical acclaim, it was The Silence of the Lambs' story of a rookie FBI agent teaming up with an urbane cannibal killer to catch an even worse serial killer that stole the Academy's imagination in 1992, winning Best Picture, Best Director for Jonathan Demme, Best Actor for Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal Lecter, Best Actress for Jodie Foster as Clarice Starling and Best Adapted Screenplay for Ted Tally's take on Thomas Harris' novel.

Did It Deserve To Win?

For the most part, yes. Foster is superb as Starling, a mix of callow youth and undoubted smarts that appeal to the audience as much as to the cannibal who takes her under his wing. It is probably the best performance of her impressive career and was definitely the star turn in a Best Actress line-up that included both leads from Thelma & Louise. Hopkins' status as Best Actor in a Leading Role is more debatable, given he only manages 18 minutes of screen time, and would possibly have been better as a Supporting Actor winner.

However, his success in the bigger award is a reflection of the impression that he made on the audience. As the ups and downs of the collective efforts of Brian Cox, Gaspard Ulliel, Mads Mikkelsen and an older, paunchier Hopkins show, Lecter is a difficult character to get right and Hopkins in The Silence of the Lambs gets it perfectly, partly because he's often a supporting player with the story not necessarily revolving around him.

As for the biggest award of them all, The Silence of the Lambs was a worthy Best Picture, hugely popular at the time and retaining an iconic status over twenty years later. It might have been nice to see Beauty and the Beast, the first ever animated Best Picture nominee, take home the prize though.