Did you actually see Brokeback? You’re not describing the movie that I saw. It had no dialogue about homosexuality or social mores, nor did it pretend to any “significance.” The principle characters were hardly gay rights crusaders. They could scarcely even acknowledge their sexuality to themselves much less wax political about it.
This complaint makes no sense. That’s like saying All the President’s Men is just a movie about a break-in if it wasn’t for the “signifcance”. While I don’t think BB deserved the Oscar, it’s “significance” is a vital part of the movie and makes it not just another love story.
I dunno, BROKEBACK just didn’t do it for me like the rest, although I was haunted by it for a while. And no, I didn’t think it was preachy, not like GN&GL (which I nevertheless had the best time at overall–the clothes! the grayscale! the eloquence)
CRASH, while ostensibly preachy as hell, worked for me because the characters knew they were preaching to each other, and they were deliberately making speeches and then acting one way or another to refute or confirm them. I loved the Latino locksmith and the Iranian family, the two witty black crooks, and esp. Don Cheadle’s cop (why wasn’t he nominated??) It just worked for me as a movie better than all the rest except MUNICH, which I think is a fine feat of moviemaking, skipping over continents, being skillfully suspenseful and having the best anti-hero besides CAPOTE.
If BROKEBACK had won, I wouldn’t have stormed the Bastille about it or anything. It’s a fine, fine movie. But to me it would have been like when I was a kid and GANDHI won over E.T. Yes, Gandhi’s story was inspiring and worthwhile and all that, and Ben Kingsley was terrific; but which story worked better as a movie? To me, the tapestry of CRASH was the most skillfully woven of all of them.
I had heard about the BROKEBACK backlash, but I’m surprised it actually happened. Congrats to Ang Lee, though, for your courage and vision.
Agreed.
Well, I suppose I should go rent Crash now, if only because I saw most of the other nominated films and want to have a sense of “completion.” (I will also go and see Transamerica, come to think of it.) But I’m still bummed that BBM lost the top honor.
At least it won in some other categories.
Sigh.
I can only think that this is a James K. Polk Award. It won Best Picture because the rest of the vote was so divided between the three best pictures in the category (Brokeback, Capote, G’night) that it managed to sail into harbor by dead of night. (I thought Munich was a good movie but never once thought it was Oscar worthy.)
Yes, you need to rent it so that you can have closure. 
I didn’t see BBM, but I did see Crash, and I thought it was very powerful. Actually, I saw it twice (once in the theater and once on video) and thought it was as powerful, if not moreso, the second time.
For me, the highlights were Tom Hanks being beaten by the orchestra and “Judi Dench poked my eye out in a bar fight.” Jon seemed nervous - I feel like hosting the show is almost a no-win, since the jokes can’t even be as barbed as what you’d hear on a late night talk show (much less The Daily Show), and the failures are remembered more than the successes - but he was funny. I laughed, and I was happy to see TDS’s cast and alumns getting some face and/or voice time.
I thought he did a good job. The host shouldn’t overshadow the awards, IMO.
I think you misread my opinion, or that I stated it poorly. I’m not saying that the movie was being preachy or that it’s dialgue intended to be significant or political. I’m saying that all the buzz around it is because people want it to be significant. I do not believe in rewarding movies that have a supposed “impact” as a result of their being made. Oscar movies should be supremely well made and compelling, and rewarded for that. BM was just another cloying, manipulative love story. Were it not about 2 men it’d have been quickly forgotten.
Crash isn’t a particularly great movie either and it was nominated due to it’s “importance”, which I’m equally suspect of. In a way I think it’s better because it’s at least about the political gravity that gets it discussed unlike BM.
All politics aside, Munich is the best movie of the lot and it should have won. Crash is anything but subtle about it’s message and that’s OK, having a message is fine, but you have to be a superlative movie while sending a message. It wasn’t, it was even clumsy at times. Brokeback was a retread, the worn out forbidden love story. The fact that it’s about gay men make it’s very fashionable. Fashionable movies aren’t the ones who should win unless they are supremely well done, this wasn’t. It didn’t suck, but it wasn’t transendant.
I thought Jon Stewart did the best he could with the audience he had. Everyone forgets that he is used to dealing with a rather homogeneous audience on The Daily Show. Listening to the responses to some of his jokes it seemed as if people did not really get what he was saying in some cases.
Sampiro, I am intrigued by your theory and want to subscribe to your newsletter.
Jon was extremely funny but he seemed so nervous that he stepped on a few of the jokes. I also loved the Colbert-narrated commercials, especially the other Dames putting down Dame Judi.
Agreed. Additionally all the films seem to be very distinct in style and theme leaving no room for overlap. There aren’t two competing love stories, or two period pieces, or two epic blockbusters to pick from. It’s 5 very different films in every meaning of the word.
You’re entitled to your aesthetic opinion of the film, but I think you’re wrong that the reason it appeals to people is because they perceive it as a “message film.” It’s been my observation that a huge fan base for the film has been straight women who just like seeing a love story between two good looking, Hollywood A-list leading men. That’s a novelty in itself regardless of any social significance. A lot of people really do just like it as a story and couldn’t care less about any political or social message it might have. It’s a chick flick, not a message film.
I also think that it’s virtually impossible for Hollywood to make any gay-themed film at all without being accused of pushing an “agenda.” Hell, Capote barely mentions the title character’s homosexuality at all and it’s been accused of that.
<grabs **DtC’s ** newsletter too> I must say I was one of the straight women who went partly to see the pretty, pretty men in love. In fact, I could have done with many MORE sex scenes between the guys. </shallow>
I don’t know a single Academy voter, but I do know a few people who refused to see BROKEBACK on principle–they had heard somewhere that it was subtle as the average Leatherman on Gay Pride Parade float, and they just had no interest in seeing it.
FWIW, I know plenty of Jews and others who are pro-Israel who refused to see MUNICH because they had heard it somehow gave moral equivalence to the terrorist side. IMO it didn’t; the murder of the athletes was quite cruel and harrowing, and while the terrorists as they were tracked down seemed usually nice enough, the Israeli team was obviously supposed to be the heroes–conflicted, self-doubting, haunted heroes, but basically righteous.
Oh my, it’s almost one and it’s a work night! Good Night and Good Luck and thanks for the thread!
Je. Sus. Would some passing mod make that the smallest font, not the largest? Sheesh, I’ll never live this down.
Freudian coding?
That’s definitely the funniest thing I’ve seen all night.
I think it was “River’s dead isn’t he? Boo. I wonder if there’s a dachshund in my fridge. I’m cuckoo for coacoa puffs… Hoo hoo! Hoo hoo! Woo woo hoo woo hoo hoo! When are we leaving for the Oscars?”
I’m not sure of that though.
Why can’t they just say they will end at 11:30? If they know that they will fall behind schedule every freaking time then stop kidding yourselves and say you will end in three and a half hours instead of just three.
I wonder what it must be like for Crash fans, happy at its win, to know that they’re celebrating right along with homophobes, bigots and $cientologists?
well, this sounds like the unpopular doper opinion right now, but as I said on page 1 of this thread, Crash was my favorite movie of 2005 and I’m glad it won, although I had a feeling people were going to go apeshit left and right over the favored movie not winning.
Just one question - is there some rule that they MUST show Jack Nicolson every 90 seconds throughout the entire show?