Oscar History: Academy Award Winning Movies and Actors of 1929-1930

A look at Oscar winners and nominees, behind the scenes on the decisions for best picture, actor, etc for 1929-1930, Alls Quiet on the Western Front gets top honors.

1929-1930

Best Picture

NOMINEES: All Quiet on the Western Front, The Big House, Disraeli, The Divorcee, The Love Parade

THE WINNER: ALL Quiet on the Western Front (Universal)

DIRECTOR: Lewis Milestone

PLAYERS: Lew Ayres, William Bakewell, Slim Summerville, John Wray, Louis Wolheim

Best Actor

NOMINEES: George Arliss ( Disraeli, The Green Goddess); Wallace Berry (The Big House); Maurice Chevalier (The Love Parade, The Big Pond); Ronald Colman (Bulldog Drummond, Condemned); Lawrence Tibbett (The Rogue Song)

THE WINNER: George Arliss (Disraeli)

Best Actress

NOMINEES: Norma Shearer (The Divorcee, Their Own Desire); Nancy Carroll (The Devil's Holiday); Ruth Chatteton (Sarah and Son); Greta Garbo (Anna Christie, Romance); Gloria Swanson (The Trespasser)

THE WINNER: Norma Shearer (The Divorcee)

Behind the Oscar

Garbo Talks! But not loud enough to be heard by the full Academy membership, which had taken over voting powers form a small clique of judges in a bloodless coup. Norma Shearer, bridge of Irving Thalberg, who brought her to MGM and started her on the road to stardom, got the vote. Monocled George Arliss, age 70, did not attend the sell-out ceremony. Carl Laemmle, Jr's grimly realistic antiwar film, All Quiet on the Western Front, based on the Erich Maria Remarque novel, was banned in France and Germany.