I think they made the right calls in the year when No Country won best picture and Day Lewis won best actor. But apart from that. . .yeah, crap shoot, mostly filled with people winning because it is "their time." The "Lifetime Achievement Award" seems redundant when you essentially hand one over to guys like Scorsese for Best Director after years of snubbing him when he really deserved it (because, I guess, they were giving lifetime achievement awards to others those years).They have been for about 30 years.
And I'm guessing this has gone on for over 30 years considering that Woody Allen couldn't be bothered to cancel his Dixieland Jazz concert to attend to pick up the Best Director prize for Annie Hall