Best Dramatic Presentation Hugo

The Best Dramatic Presentation Hugo category has a long and complicated history. Fittingly enough, it was first awarded in 1958 at the Solacon where it was called the **Outstanding Movie** category. In 1959, the Detention followed up by awarding a **Best SF or Fantasy Movie** Hugo. Starting in 1960 at Pittcon, it got its long-term title of Best Dramatic Presentation.

The "BDP" category has failed to appear on the final ballot three times due to insufficient nominations: 1964, 1966, and in the 1946 Retro Hugos. It has also had more No Awards than any other category.

In 2003, the Best Dramatic Presentation category was split into Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form and Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form with the dividing line being a running time of 90 minutes (+- 18 minutes, so things can be in both Long and Short categories, at the Administrators discretion). See Hugo category boundaries for a discussion of some of the finer points of defining Hugo categories.

Year	Winner
1939	The War of the Worlds by Orson Welles (short)
1941	Pinocchio by Disney (short)
1941	Fantasia by Disney (long)
1943	Bambi by Disney (short)
1944	Frankenstein Meets the Wolfman (short)
1944	Heaven Can Wait by Disney (long)
1944	The Canterville Ghost tied with The Curse of the Cat People (short)
1946	The Picture of Dorian Gray
1951	Destination Moon
1954	War of the Worlds (short)
1958	The Incredible Shrinking Man (the category was called "Outstanding Movie" this year)
1959	No Award (the category was called "SF or Fantasy Movie" on the nominations ballot this year and "Hollywood Movie" on the final ballot)
1960	The Twilight Zone by Rod Serling
1961	The Twilight Zone by Rod Serling
1962	The Twilight Zone by Rod Serling
1963	No Award
1964	No Award
1965	Dr. Strangelove
1966	No Award
1967	Star Trek - "The Menagerie"
1968	Star Trek - "The City on the Edge of Forever"
1969	2001: A Space Odyssey
1970	TV Coverage of Apollo XI
1971	No Award
1972	A Clockwork Orange
1973	Slaughterhouse-Five
1974	Sleeper
1975	Young Frankenstein
1976	A Boy and His Dog
1977	No Award
1978	Star Wars
1979	Superman
1980	Alien
1981	The Empire Strikes Back
1982	Raiders of the Lost Ark
1983	Blade Runner
1984	Return of the Jedi
1985	2010: Odyssey Two
1986	Back to the Future
1987	Aliens
1988	The Princess Bride
1989	Who Framed Roger Rabbit?
1990	Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
1991	Edward Scissorhands
1992	Terminator 2: Judgment Day
1993	Star Trek: The Next Generation - "The Inner Light"
1994	Jurassic Park
1995	Star Trek: The Next Generation - "All Good Things..."
1996	Babylon 5 - "The Coming of Shadows"
1997	Babylon 5 - "Severed Dreams"
1998	Contact
1999	The Truman Show
2000	Galaxy Quest
2001	Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
2002	The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
(starting here, the category becomes "Dramatic Presentation Long Form" with a separate Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form category)
2003	The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
2004	The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
2005	The Incredibles
2006	Serenity
2007	Pan's Labyrinth
2008	Stardust
2009	WALL-E
2010	Moon
2011	Inception
2012	Game of Thrones (Season 1)
2013	The Avengers
2014	Gravity
2015	Guardians of the Galaxy
2016	The Martian
2017	Arrival
2018	Wonder Woman
2019	Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse

---

Hugos

1939—

This is an award page. If you know something about it, such as who awarded it, who the winners were, what the criteria were, and when it was awarded, please add it! See Standards for Awards.