17 Lowest-Grossing Best Picture Winners in Oscars History

Domestic Total Gross: $27,854,932

Oh, last year's Oscars... messing up the Best Picture winner live on TV. This powerful and emotionally resonate indie deserved better. Thankfully, it has the award for its trouble.

Original Gross: $78,676,425
Adjusted Gross: $121,024,800

This adaptation of the epic romantic drama grossed double overseas what it made in the U.S. It was a hit with critics and the Academy -- winning nine Oscars. 

Original Gross: $43,984,000
Adjusted Gross: $91,660,178

The Bernardo Bertulocci film, which earned nine Oscars, never got a release wider than 877 theaters, making its per-screen average a rather impressive $50,153.

Original Gross: $74,273,505
Adjusted Gross: $84,802,946

This was the Coen Bros.'  highest grossing film until "True Grit" (2010), which racked up $171 million. "No Country" out-earned three of its Best Picture competitors: "Atonement," "Michael Clayton," and "There Will Be Blood."

Original Gross: $54,557,348
Adjusted Gross: $66,132,556

"Crash" may have gone home with the Oscar (and the title of "Most Overrated Best Picture Winner Ever"), but "Brokeback Mountain" beat it at the box office with $83 million. And if Academy members were voting today, they'd go with "Brokeback," a poll by The Hollywood Reporter found.

Original Gross: $7,321,000
Adjusted Gross: $59,970,389

The musical, starring Leslie Caron and the late Louis Jourdan, won a then-record-breaking nine Oscars. It's considered the last great MGM musical, but earned less than half of "South Pacific's" box office that year.

Original Gross: $56,671,993
Adjusted Gross: $57,591,319

A harrowing tale of slavery wasn't an easy sell to the American public. It never expanded beyond 1,474 screens, giving it a $38,447 per screen average, but it clearly found an audience.

Original Gross: $3,000,000
Adjusted Gross: $51,094,100

This biopic of entertainer Florenz Ziegfeld, Jr. stars "Thin Man" leads William Powell and Myrna Loy. It earned more than some of its Best Picture competition, including "A Tale of Two Cities" and "Mr. Deeds Goes to Town." 

Original Gross: $44,671,682
Adjusted Gross: $47,014,503

While critics loved it, audiences weren't sold on a modern-day silent film. "The Artist" was the 71st highest-grossing film of 2011.

Original Gross: $45,055,776
Adjusted Gross: $45,880,028

This engrossing Best Picture winner is one of two to star Michael Keaton back-to-back -- and this slow-burn, old-school journalism drama outgrossed the other film, "Birdman."

Original Gross: $2,500,000
Adjusted Gross: $44,167,164

It was the first film to win Best Picture, Actor (Clark Cable), Actress (Claudette Colbert), Director (Frank Capra), and Screenplay. But at the box office, it couldn't compete with Colbert as "Cleopatra."

Original Gross: $42,340,598
Adjusted Gross: $43,166,355

We're still reeling over Michael Keaton losing the Best Actor award here. And what the film lacks is robust grosses it makes up for with four Oscar wins, including Best Original Screenplay and Best Director. 

Original Gross: $4,531,000
Adjusted Gross: $41,255,800

The musical, starring Gene Kelly, won Best Picture over the higher-grossing "A Streetcar Named Desire," which swept the acting awards that year. 

Original Gross: $4,000,000
Adjusted Gross: $35,330,000

With a reported budget of just $350,000, this drama about a lonely butcher (Best Actor winner Ernest Borgnine) also had small returns at the box office, which went nuts that year for "Mister Roberts" and big-budget musicals like "Oklahoma!" 

Original Gross: $3,500,000
Adjusted Gross: $34,814,117

This political drama was the lowest-grossing film in the 1949 Best Picture race.

Original Gross: $3,075,000
Adjusted Gross: $30,205,942

Fifty years later, audiences (and the Academy) fell for Best Picture winner "Shakespeare in Love," but the great Laurence Olivier (won also won Best Actor) as Hamlet failed to do big box office. 

Original Gross: $17,017,811
Adjusted Gross: $19,415,300

After taking home six Oscars -- including Best Director for Kathryn Bigelow -- that less-than-$20 million gross is a non-issue. It is currently the lowest-grossing winner ever.