This image was lost some time after publication.

Robert Altman will join an illustrious list of movie history's greatest also-rans, when he is bestowed at this year's Academy Awards ceremony that greatest of consolation prizes for a lifetime's worth of unrecognized achievement, the honorary Oscar:

Director Robert Altman will be presented with an honorary Oscar at the 78th annual Academy Awards.


Altman, who's also worked as a writer and producer, has been nominated for the best directing Oscar — for "M*A*S*H," "Nashville," "The Player," Short Cuts" and "Gosford Park" — but has never won an Academy Award. [...]

The honorary award, voted by the board of governors of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, will be given to Altman to honor "a career that has repeatedly reinvented the art form and inspired filmmakers and audiences alike."

With a body of work as diverse and excellent as Altman's, the accompanying clip reel should be a telecast highlight. As for the actual award presentation, we predict no major misshaps; the director is already well-practiced in holding fragile, golden trophies by their tiny legs.