In Memoriam: The Oscar Death Montage 2013

The last two years I made predictions about who would feature among the 40 or so film personalities to make the In Memoriam montage at the Oscars. This year I started to make a list in early January and then just plum forgot about it until a few hours before the show, at which point I thought it was a bit late.

Here's the final list as presented on the show. The inclusion of Andrew Sarris is significant. Critics don't often make these lists. Surely the people working in the industry don't always like us, but you can't deny the influence certain critics have had on the medium. Sarris is one.

No big omissions, although there are always some people griping about this or that person not given their due. Ann Rutherford was left off this year, for example. Look, she was never a big star, never a big award winner. She was an Academy member, but her last credit was nearly 40 years ago and she spent the end of her career in television. Talk of snubs of Andy Griffith, Phyllis Diller, and Larry Hagman is just silly. They were clearly TV stars who get their In Memoriam tribute at the Emmys. The Oscars is for feature film and people primarily associated with films. But then there's Adam Yauch...

Ernest Borgnine - actor, Oscar winner for Marty (1955)

Eiko Ishioka – costume designer, posthumously nominated this year for Mirror Mirror

Ralph McQuarrie - conceptual artist who worked on Star Wars and Raiders of the Lost Ark

Jack Klugman - actor

Celeste Holm - actor, Oscar winner for Gentleman's Agreement (1947)

Adam Yauch - Beastie Boy

Michael Clarke Duncan - actor, Oscar nominee for The Green Mile (1999)

Charles Durning - actor, Oscar nominee for The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas (1982) and To Be or Not to Be (1983)

Carlo Rambaldi - visual effects artist for Alien and E.T.

Erland Josephson - Swedish actor

Richard Robbins - composer

Stephen Frankfurt - title designer

Harris Savides - cinematographer

Tonino Guerra - writer

J. Michael Riva - art director

Ulu Grosbard - director

Herbert Lom - actor

Bruce Surtees - cinematographer

Andrew Sarris - film critic

George A. Bowers - film editor

Tony Scott - director of Top Gun

Theodore Soderberg - sound

Lois W. Smith - publicist

Geoffrey G. Ammer - public relations

Neil Travis - film editor

Mike Hopkins - sound editor

John D. Lowry - image restoration pioneer

Hal David - song writer

Nora Ephron - writer

Charles Rosen - production designer

Jake Eberts - executive

Mike Kohut - sound

Frank Pierson - writer, former Academy president

Chris Marker - writer

Charles C. Washburn - assistant director

Ray Bradbury - writer

Richard Rodney Bennett - composer

Robert B. Sherman - song writer

Richard D. Zanuck - producer

Matthew Yuricich - visual effects

Marvin Hamlisch - song writer