When in the course of Hollywood events it becomes necessary for one people to bestow awards upon another, politics apparently is the last thing on the people’s minds.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that after a year of passionate ideology on screen, building up to an election that threatened to turn the Oscars into a debating hall, voters rejected realism and rewarded emotions instead.
The slate of big movies honored tonight reflects an electorate – both Academy voters and the general public – that seeks from Hollywood the old-time religion of simply being entertained.
So the final big envelope tonight will reward the winsome “Finding Neverland” or the tear-gusher of “Million Dollar Baby” or the dizzying heights of “The Aviator.” “Ray” seems to win more fans each week, with the late Ray Charles sweeping eight of the recent Grammy awards. (A recent Harris Poll found average moviegoing Americans favoring “Ray” over “The Aviator” for best picture.) “Sideways” is all heartfelt humor and heady vintage.
But the in-your-face ideology of Michael Moore’s divisive “Fahrenheit 9/11” is nowhere to be found. And the muscular theological argument that is “The Passion of the Christ” will have its drama settled early in the evening, in relatively minor technical categories.
For the millions of arguments they inspired and the $833 million they took in worldwide, a wave of post-election fatigue swamped their award hopes. And then a real-life tidal wave handed the public an alternate, unifying cause.
“People want to move on to the next thing. In our age, that doesn’t take very long, does it?” said Michael Cornfield, a senior researcher with the Pew Internet & American Life Project. The project’s polling found 31 percent of the public saw a political documentary before the election. But Cornfield was not surprised when those high numbers failed to generate Oscar nominations come January.
“There’s an old quote about this,” Cornfield said. “Satire is what closes on Saturday night.”
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2005 ACADEMY AWARDS
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Only Mike Leigh’s devastating “Vera Drake” managed to win major nominations while tackling a socially volatile subject: abortion. Still, the best-director, best-actress and best-screenplay nods for “Vera Drake” arrived well after Leigh officially declared his movie’s abortion stance to be neutral.
“Those films that make the biggest splash and cause the biggest controversy don’t necessarily make the best art,” said Pete Snyder, a former political pollster and now chief executive of the online marketing firm New Media Strategies. Snyder’s company monitors bloggers and other online forums for word-of-mouth trends. “After election day, there weren’t a whole lot of people in Hollywood who wanted to talk politics.”
It’s also important to remember that both “Fahrenheit” and “Passion” began their movie lives already boasting fervent constituencies.
For those supporters, the mere fact their ideologically sympathetic movie was made at all is more important than “the actual art substance of the film,” Snyder said.
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The Oscar nominations did such a thorough job avoiding contemporary controversy that disappointed culture warriors had to manufacture a tempest. “Million Dollar Baby” is the ultimate silver-screen story, a melodramatic tale that could thrive only on the deep commitment of its creators and cast. As far as politics goes, it’s not as deep as “Pooh’s Heffalump Movie.”
Yet a few conservative commentators bashed “Million Dollar Baby” for the life-and-death choices the troubled characters must make. They widely gave away the surprise plot twists of a movie that relies on misdirection.
True to form this year, the controversy didn’t stick. Director and star Clint Eastwood largely achieved the slow word-of-mouth build he sought for his “Baby,” and the taut drama quickly became the favorite in every category it contests tonight.
One message, then, is that deliberate moviemaking paid off this season in an old-fashioned, tell-me-a-story sense. Films like “Million Dollar Baby” and “The Aviator” are “made to win awards, in a way,” said Doug Thomas, managing editor of Amazon.com’s DVD store. They weave a fable, tighten it to perfection, and then wrap it up and go home.
The temporarily dismissed “issue” movies have plenty of consolation beyond Oscar night, Thomas said. Michael Moore’s now legendary “Roger & Me” was never nominated for best documentary. Neither was the brilliant cautionary tale of “Hoop Dreams,” one of the great documentaries and also one of the greatest-ever Oscar slights.
As for Mel Gibson, Thomas said, the staunch Catholic can take pride in the flowing curves of Amazon’s DVD sales, which prove that “The Passion of the Christ” will be “a perennial during all the religious holidays.”
Oscar may have gone secular this time, but an endless succession of decidedly nonsecular elections and holy battles rumbles on the near horizon.
Staff writer Michael Booth can be reached at 303-820-1686 or mbooth@denverpost.com.
