Solitude and Hope: Y'all Come Visit!

And these further comments from Obliquity, Monday, March 6th, 2006:

I’m not entirely sure where to begin. Watching the sixteen hour telecast of this year’s Oscars was at once irritating, painful, boring, completely predictable–and about fifteen hours too long. If memory serves, I scored last year’s telecast at a D+. All things considered, I’d have to give the Jon Stewart helmed fiasco an F.

Random thoughts:

–The Stewart/Berry/Clooney bed gag was cute.
–The gay western montage was insulting. The old man leering at the young boy was reinforcement of a predatory stereotype.
–Jon Stewart’s opening monologue was painfully unfunny. What the hell was all the yelling about?
–Did Charlize Theron know that there was a gigantic tarantula on her shoulder?
–Best Line from an Acceptance Speech: Clooney’s ‘proud to be out of touch’.
–Ben Stiller deserves to be green-screened out of existence.
–It’s now twenty-six minutes into the telecast and I’m BORED.
–Biggest Men’s Trend: not shaving
–Biggest Women’s Trend: black
–Biggest Reason to Raise the Terror Threat Level to Orange: The Wilson Brother’s hair.
–Terrence Howard wears a man brooch.
–Salma Hayek is STUNNING in turquoise. Her hair is exquisite.
–Lauren Bacall. Embarrassing.
–Three 6 Mafia. Ha. Ha. Ha. This is ‘Punk’d’ right?
–Naomi Watts’ dress was apparently mauled by King Kong.
–If these people are paid to act, would it kill them to memorize their scripted monologue? Or at least learn to read from a TelePrompTer?
–’King Kong’, ‘Memoirs of a Geisha’, ‘Crash’ and ‘Brokeback Mountain’ all win three awards–which seems very wrong.
–I had some other stuff, but I’m bored with the whole affair.

I can only say that if Ang Lee had not won Best Director, it would have been a travesty. ‘Crash’ winning Best Picture was a cop-out in my opinion. The message and ideas behind the film were admirable. There were some great acting performances. But, the execution and flow of the film was flawed. The pat redemption found by every character was over simplistic.

I think Hollywood proved itself to be a bit two-faced by denying ‘Brokeback Mountain’ the top award. For as progressive as they are want to paint themselves, the truth is homophobia lives comfortably in the neighborhood. To some, this will sound like gay boy sour grapes. I can only say that every frame, performance and nuance of ‘Brokeback Mountain’ was pitch perfect. Gay or not, it was my favorite film of the year. It was technically and emotionally brilliant.


And More from Brokeback Mountain Co-writer Larry McMurtry:

BROKEBACK'S McMURTRY ACCUSES ACADEMY OF RURAL DISCRIMINATION

BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN co-writer Larry McMurtry believes urban drama "Crash" beat his film to the Best Picture Award, because Academy members discriminate against rural stories. The writer, who has been involved with four Oscar nominated films including "The Last Picture Show" and "Terms of Endearment," claims "Crash" won because it was set in Los Angeles - where most Academy voters live. He explains, "The three rural films (I was involved with) lost. The one urban film, "Terms of Endearment," won. "Members of the Academy are mostly urban people. 'Crash' was [their] hometown movie."

06/03/2006 21:41