| Award | Category | Nominee(s) | Result |
|---|---|---|---|
| Academy Awards[49] | Best Motion Picture | Charles Brackett (for Paramount Pictures) | Nominated |
| Best Director | Billy Wilder | Nominated | |
| Best Actor | William Holden | Nominated | |
| Best Actress | Gloria Swanson | Nominated | |
| Best Supporting Actor | Erich von Stroheim | Nominated | |
| Best Supporting Actress | Nancy Olson | Nominated | |
| Best Story and Screenplay | Charles Brackett, Billy Wilder and D. M. Marshman Jr. | Won | |
| Best Art Direction-Set Decoration – Black-and-White | Hans Dreier, John Meehan, Samuel M. Comer and Ray Moyer | Won | |
| Best Cinematography – Black-and-White | John F. Seitz | Nominated | |
| Best Film Editing | Arthur P. Schmidt and Doane Harrison | Nominated | |
| Best Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture | Franz Waxman | Won | |
| Blue Ribbon Awards | Best Foreign Film | Billy Wilder | Won |
| Bodil Awards | Best American Film | Won | |
| Cahiers du Cinéma | Best Film | Nominated | |
| Directors Guild of America Awards | Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Motion Pictures | Nominated | |
| DVD Exclusive Awards | Best Overall New Extra Features – Library Release | John Barbour (for the "Special Collector's Edition") | Nominated |
| Golden Globe Awards | Best Motion Picture – Drama | Won | |
| Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama | Gloria Swanson | Won | |
| Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture | Erich von Stroheim | Nominated | |
| Best Director – Motion Picture | Billy Wilder | Won | |
| Best Screenplay – Motion Picture | Charles Brackett, Billy Wilder and D. M. Marshman Jr. | Nominated | |
| Best Original Score – Motion Picture | Franz Waxman | Won | |
| Best Cinematography – Black and White | John F. Seitz | Nominated | |
| Jussi Awards | Best Foreign Actress | Gloria Swanson | Won |
| Nastro d'Argento | Best Foreign Director | Billy Wilder | Won |
| Best Foreign Actress | Gloria Swanson | Won | |
| National Board of Review Awards | Best Film | Won | |
| Top Ten Films | 2nd Place | ||
| Best Actress | Gloria Swanson | Won | |
| National Film Preservation Board | National Film Registry | Inducted | |
| New York Film Critics Circle Awards | Best Film | Nominated | |
| Best Director | Billy Wilder | Nominated | |
| Best Actress | Gloria Swanson | Nominated | |
| Online Film & Television Association Awards | Hall of Fame – Motion Picture | Won | |
| Picturegoer Awards | Best Actor | William Holden | Nominated |
| Best Actress | Gloria Swanson | Nominated | |
| Writers Guild of America Awards | Best Written American Drama | Charles Brackett, Billy Wilder and D. M. Marshman Jr. | Won |
Of the various films that have attracted Academy Award nominations in all four acting categories, Sunset Boulevard is one of only three not to win in any category, the others being My Man Godfrey (1936) and American Hustle (2013). At the time its eleven Oscar nominations were exceeded only by the fourteen received by All About Eve, which won six awards, including Best Picture and Best Director. Many critics predicted that the Best Actress award would be given to Gloria Swanson or Bette Davis for All About Eve and were surprised that the recipient was newcomer Judy Holliday for Born Yesterday.[12] Bette Davis believed that her and Swanson's comparable characters effectively "cancelled each other out", allowing Holliday to win.[50] Swanson recalled the press's reaction following Holliday's win: "It slowly dawned on me that they were asking for a larger-than-life scene, or better still, a mad scene. More accurately, they were trying to flush out Norma Desmond."[40]
Sunset Boulevard was dramatized as an hour-long radio play on the September 17, 1951, broadcast of Lux Radio Theater with Gloria Swanson and William Holden in their original film roles.[51]
Recognition since 1989
In 1989, the film was among the first group of 25 deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry.[52] The Village Voice ranked the film at No. 43 in its Top 250 "Best Films of the Century" list in 1999, based on a poll of critics.[53] The film was included in "The New York Times Guide to the Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made" in 2002.[54] In January 2002, the film was voted at No. 87 on the list of the "Top 100 Essential Films of All Time" by the National Society of Film Critics.[55][56] Sunset Boulevard received 33 votes in the British Film Institute's 2012 Sight & Sound polls, making it the 63rd greatest film of all time in the critics' poll and 67th in the directors' poll.[57] In the earlier 2002 Sight & Sound polls the film ranked 12th among directors.[58] In 2022 edition of Sight & Sound's Greatest films of all time list the film ranked 62nd in the director's poll.[59] The Writers Guild of America ranked the film's screenplay (written by Charles Brackett & Billy Wilder and D.M. Marshman Jr.) the 7th greatest ever.[60] In a 2015 poll by BBC Culture, film critics ranked Sunset Boulevard the 54th greatest American film of all time.[61]
American Film Institute included the film on these lists:
- 1998 – AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movies – #12
- 2005 – AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movie Quotes:
- "All right, Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up." – #7
- "I am big, it's the pictures that got small!" – #24
- 2005 – AFI's 100 Years of Film Scores – #16
- 2007 – AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition) – #16
