And the winner is . . . homophobia?
Hollywood is now buzzing with accusations that homophobia played a lead role in "Brokeback Mountain's" loss as best picture at the Oscars. Is it true?
Let's recall a report I made here recently about one voter barking: "Have you ever seen the audience at an official academy screening? There's no way that crowd's voting for 'Brokeback'!" What he meant was that they're mostly straight geezers who certainly can't be seduced by some too-pretty young gay cowboys.
One older academy member, an obviously disgusted Tony Curtis, told Fox News reporter Bill McCuddy that he had no intention of watching "Brokeback" and he knew lots of other academy members who felt the same way.
Looks like Curtis is still running away from what scared him in "Spartacus" when Crassus (Laurence Olivier) told his slave Antoninus (Curtis) with a sly smile that he likes both "snails and oysters." Antoninus, a somewhat effeminate poet, skeedattled out of there fast to sign up for Spartacus' manly rebel army.
Curtis' fury was the same thing I saw on lots of faces of academy voters when I asked them what film they chose for best pic. Most of the non-"Brokeback" respondees were obviously anti-"Brokeback" because, before they revealed that they opted for "Crash" or "Good Night, and Good Luck," they began their response huffily, saying, "Well, I'm not voting for 'Brokeback'!" No doubt some of them meant that they didn't feel the film was up to its hype, but it was obvious as heck that others had a problem with the whole gay thing.
Perhaps I've deluded myself so far thinking that those folks can't be homophobes. I just kept telling myself that they're probably thinking, "Oh, enough with all these gay persecution movies already!" But when you hear similar sentiment about a glut of Jewish persecution films, it doesn't seem to matter in the Oscar results. "Schindler's List," "Life is Beautiful" and "Chariots of Fire" still win. But, of course, many gay persecution films have claimed top Oscars too, like "Philadelphia" and "Boys Don't Cry," so maybe it's unfair to think the worst.
"Crash" is a worthy best pic champ, a truly great film that deserves the top Oscar and I'm happy it prevailed, as I always warned you it might. No doubt it has scads of passionate supporters within the academy who truly believe it was the best movie of 2005 and they were enthusiastically won over by the "Crash" cast, crew and studio execs who campaigned with more gusto than those shy cowboys.
But the "Brokeback" backlash, if real, is scary because it suggests something sinister going unsaid and, if it is true in liberal, normally gay-friendly Hollywood, then imagine what that implies about attitudes in less lavender-tolerant parts of America. If Paul Haggis had won best director for his best picture, this fear would be unfounded, but the illogical split vote must make us wonder.
Mar 6, 2006 2:41:17 PM