11 Directors Who Won Oscars For Completely The Wrong Movie

6. Martin Scorsese

Won For... The Departed

Should Have Won For... Raging Bull OR Goodfellas

The Departed is a wonderfully entertaining film with a great performance by Jack Nicholson and with good performances from Matt Damon, Leonardo DiCaprio and Mark Wahlberg, but what it isn't is Martin Scorsese's best directed work. Not by some distance.

Goodfellas deserves directing acclaim for that one extended shot through the restaurant alone, never mind for the infinite little touches that bring its characters and tensions together. The choice to open with a voice-over, the framing of the scenes around Henry Hill's paranoia, the editing in almost every high-impact scene... It's a movie with directing touches visible all over it.

But Raging Bull is arguably even more impressive as a director's work, because of the way it plays around with tone and framing as the material requires: it is brutal and balletic, sentimental and stunningly raw, and the fight scenes are some of the best that have ever been captured on film. It makes The Departed look like a student film.