Ebert's Best Picture Butterfly Ballot Conspiracy Theory.

Cafe Society
1

Ebert’s blog says that some voters mistakenly chose Crash instead of Brokeback Mountain for Best Picture because of a repeat of the infamous Butterfly Ballot.

I was partially taken in for a good five minutes until a simple Google search revealed the truth, and I could be sure it’s just a joke. But even before I confirmed the joke, I was realizing it myself:

  1. Who in their right minds would ever use a Butterfly layout ever again?
  2. There doesn’t seem to be any reason behind the order of the entries (Read left column then right column, it’s Capote, Brokeback Mountain, Good Night…, Crash, Munich. Read alternating from top to bottom: Capote, Crash, Brokeback Mountain, Munich, Good Night… Neither way is in order of release or alphabetically).
  3. The layout, font, and fact that it is once again the second one on the left (aka third dot) being mistaken for the second dot just all scream parody of the infamous Palm Beach ballot.

Shame on Roger Ebert for not labelling this in his blog as a joke. A nickel to every time this gets repeated in the upcoming weeks as truth.

2

I think it was quite obvious that it was a parody of the 2000 election.

And speaking of parodies, here’s a good one: The History of Brokeback Mountain jokes