British online voters at msn.com have allegedly decided that Shakespeare in Love is the most undeserving Oscar Best Picture winner of all time. (“Allegedly” because I can’t find the article that announces the tabulations — the news has been passed along by a BBC web page.)

The people who voted obviously aren’t very hip or knowledgable. Shakespeare in Love was a mostly tolerable, agreeably spunky period romance with a short-but-terrific Judi Dench performance. It wasn’t “right” that it won over Saving Private Ryan, but it wasn’t a rank embarassment. Mike Todd‘s Around the World in 80 Days winning the Best Picture Oscar iwas, however.

The respondents are correct in saying that the 2002 Best Picture going to Chicago was a joke, which it was. And they’re wrong in saying that Titanic winning in ’98 was undeserved. Any movie that ends as well as Titanic deserves accolades. Most of Titanic was okay, some of it was bad, some of it was genuinely engrossing and thrilling…but the last 20 to 25 minutes were spellbinding in a profoundly sad, inwardly-melting way. And that last dream/death sequence was transcendent.