Best Sound, 1941

Awards presented February 26, 1942

Conspicuously absent from the year's sound recording nominees were the team behind Walt Disney's Fantasia, which pioneered the use of stereophonic sound, but they received an honorary award.

The nominees were ... 

• Appointment for Love, Universal Studio Sound Department, Bernard B. Brown, sound director
• Ball of Fire, Samuel Goldwyn Studio Sound Department, Thomas T. Moulton, sound director
• The Chocolate Soldier, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studio Sound Department, Douglas Shearer, sound director
• Citizen Kane, RKO Radio Studio Sound Department, John Aalberg, sound director
• The Devil Pays Off, Republic Studio Sound Department, Charles Lootens, sound director
• How Green Was My Valley, 20th Century-Fox Studio Sound Department, E.H. Hansen, sound director
• The Men in Her Life, Columbia Studio Sound Department, John Livadary, sound director
• Sergeant York, Warner Bros. Studio Sound Department, Nathan Levinson, sound director
• Skylark, Paramount Studio Sound Department, Loren Ryder, sound director
• That Hamilton Woman, General Service Sound Department, Jack Whitney, sound director
• Topper Returns, Hal Roach Studio Sound Department, Elmer Raguse, sound director

And the Oscar went to ... 

That Hamilton Woman, General Service Sound Department, Jack Whitney, sound director.

Vivien Leigh is Emma, Lady Hamilton, a woman of common origins whose beauty earned her a position as trophy wife to the British ambassador to Naples. Unfortunately, Lord Hamilton (Alan Mowbray) loves his art collection more than his wife, so when the dashing young Admiral Horatio Nelson (Laurence Olivier) comes to Naples to ask its king and queen for support in the fight against Napoleon, Emma and Horatio fall in love. But he is also married, and even when Lord Hamilton dies, Lady Nelson (Gladys Cooper) refuses to divorce him. He sets up Emma and their child in the country, but when he's killed at Trafalgar she's left penniless. Possibly to appease the censors and emphasize the consequences of adultery, the story is told in flashback by a raddled, alcoholic Emma in debtor's prison. But for most of the movie Emma and Horatio are Leigh and Olivier at their most luscious, and their love story is told against the backdrop of English heroics -- Nelson has a big speech about how the British have always fought against tyrants -- appropriate to the contemporary battle against the Nazis. Small wonder that it is said to have been Winston Churchill's favorite movie. Rumor has it that Churchill not only had a financial interest in the film but also wrote Nelson's speech about destroying dictators. Producer and director Alexander Korda made the movie in Hollywood, again with Churchill's encouragement because filmmaking was an effective cover for British spies in pre-Pearl Harbor America. This was Whitney's second Oscar in a row. He won the previous year for the special sound effects for Korda's The Thief of Bagdad. 

Vivien Leigh and Laurence Olivier in That Hamilton Woman

Best Special Effects, 1940

Awards presented February 27, 1941

The Academy improved on its new(ish) category by singling out both visual technicians and sound technicians among the nominees.

The nominees were ... 

• The Blue Bird, photographic effects by Fred Sersen, sound effects by E.H. Hansen 
• Boom Town, photographic effects by A. Arnold Gillespie, sound effects by Douglas Shearer 
• The Boys From Syracuse, photographic effects by John P. Fulton, sound effects by Bernard B. Brown  Joseph Lapis 
• Dr. Cyclops, photographic effects by Gordon Jennings, Farciot Edouart 
• Foreign Correspondent, photographic effects by Paul Eagler, sound effects by Thomas T. Moulton 
• The Invisible Man Returns, photographic effects by John P. Fulton  sound effects by Bernard B. Brown, William Hedgecock 
• The Long Voyage Home, photographic effects by R.T. Layton, R.O. Binger, sound effects by Thomas T. Moulton 
• One Million B.C., photographic effects by Roy Seawright, sound effects by Elmer Raguse 
• Rebecca, photographic effects by Jack Cosgrove, sound effects by Arthur Johns 
• The Sea Hawk, photographic effects by Byron Haskin, sound effects by Nathan Levinson 
• Swiss Family Robinson, photographic effects by Vernon L. Walker, sound effects by John O. Aalberg  
• The Thief of Bagdad, photographic effects by Lawrence Butler, sound effects by Jack Whitney 
• Typhoon, photographic effects by Farciot Edouart, Gordon Jennings, sound effects by Loren Ryder 
• Women in War, photographic effects by Howard J. Lydecker, William Bradford, Ellis J. Thackery, sound effects by Herbert Norsch 

And the Oscar went to ... 

The Thief of Bagdad, photographic effects by Lawrence Butler, sound effects by Jack Whitney. 

Rex Ingram and Sabu in The Thief of Bagdad

Butler's great contribution to the special effects world is the pioneering use of chroma key compositing, the now-familiar bluescreen or greenscreen effect, in which figures perform against a blue or green backdrop, allowing them to be superimposed on another image. Butler used it to allow the genie, played by Rex Ingram, to become a giant in scenes with Abu, played by Sabu. Butler began his career with Alexander Korda, and after World War II became head of the special effects department at Columbia. Whitney, the chief sound engineer on The Thief of Bagdad, received most of his eight nominations in the sound recording category, and won a second Oscar for That Hamilton Woman.