FOREST GUMP Wins ABC News 'Best Oscar Movie from Past 64 Years'

This month, ABC News Digital introduced "The Best Oscar Movie from the Past 64 Years," a new interactive bracket challenge available on ABCNews.com, sponsored at launch by JC Penney. In the final countdown to the 86th annual Academy Awards, ABC News invited participants to select their favorite Oscar-winning films from the past 64 years online to move their Best Picture pick to the #1 bracket spot. Users could vote for their top picks via Facebook and Twitter and share their votes with social followers using #bracketchallenge. Nearly half of the votes were cast on mobile devices throughout six rounds of voting.

From "Lord of the Rings" to "The Sound of Music" and "The Departed," the Best Picture winners were slowly narrowed down to four bracket contenders: "Ben-Hur," "The Godfather," "The Lord of the Rings" and "Forrest Gump." ESPN's resident bracketologists Seth Greenberg and Jay Williams even weighed in to offer their own predictions on the Final Four - with some surprisingly accurate results. WATCH: http://abcn.ws/1elIRJE

This week, the final showdown came down to two of the most celebrated Oscar-winning films of all-time, "The Godfather" (1972) and "Forrest Gump" (1994). After six rounds of voting and nearly 529,000 votes, "Forrest Gump" snuffed out "The Godfather" and was crowned the Best Oscar movie from the past 64 years.

READ: "Find Out Who Won the Best Oscar Movie Bracket Challenge"
WATCH: "The 64 Most Memorable Oscar Films"

For a complete list of this year's Oscar winners, exclusive behind-the-scenes interviews and live coverage from the red carpet, tune-in to ABCNews.com's Oscars coverage all week long here: http://abcnews.go.com/entertainment/oscars. The 86th annual Academy Awards airs this SUNDAY, MARCH 2 at 7:00 p.m., ET on the ABC Television Network.

About ABC News Digital:
ABC News Digital properties include Goodmorningamerica.com on Yahoo! along with ABC News' iPad, iPhone, Android & Windows 8 apps, offering a dynamic, around the clock look at the news as it breaks. It's the online destination for newsmaker access, investigative coverage, and exclusive footage from every big story. As part of the Yahoo!-ABC News network ABC News Digital content reaches over 82 million people a month and nearly 50% of all news and information videos streamed online are from the #1 online news network. In addition, ABC News Digital content serves a 24-hour news and information network currently available to 44 million users across cable, broadband, and mobile platforms.

About JC Penney:
J. C. Penney Company, Inc. (NYSE: JCP), one of the nation's largest apparel and home furnishing retailers, is dedicated to becoming America's preferred retail destination for unmatched style, quality and value. Across approximately 1,100 stores and at HYPERLINK "http://jcp.com" jcp.com, customers will discover an inspiring shopping environment that features the most sought after collection of private, national and exclusive brands and attractions. For more information, please visit jcp.com.