Brokeback Mountain and 2006 Oscars’ Other Losers
Fans of Brokeback Mountain are very, very wrong.
First, they believe rather incorrectly that they are in love with this film. The truth for many of them, but not all, is that they are only in love with its choice of subject matter.
Those fans in question have often been caught purporting Brokeback should win because it is ‘ground-breaking’ or ‘broke taboo’, et cetera. It is, and it did – but the Oscar Best Picture rewards an achievement in filmmaking, not in sociocultural awareness and significance.
Wrong award, people. Take your case up to maybe the Nobel Peace Prize.
Most telling that such a love is misguided is that now the fans are simply, crassly being sore losers. Since Brokeback lost the coveted 2006 Oscar to Crash, they have claimed the American movie industry pretended to be open to gay themes but isn’t really.
(Puhleeze. There are more gays in the Academy than we care to know; it is highly unlikely the industry is anti-gay.)
To be sure, sociocultural significance is an achievement in filmmaking. In this regard, it’s not like Crash is a romantic comedy, for crying out loud. Or the other nominated films. Who’s to say a gay theme is necessarily greater or lesser than those other films’ issues?
Hollywood has not lost the fight it professes to be having against prejudice and apathy just because Brokeback lost. These ill-arguing fans ought to come down from their hillbilly high horse and accept defeat.
On a chirpier note, proof is overwhelming that Memoirs of a Geisha is an arrogant, overproduced piece of Hollywood (instead of period Japan). It garners Oscars for art direction, costume design, and other aesthetic awards. Look what it doesn’t win… Any award for director Rob Marshall, thank God.
Brokeback fans will be better off channeling their anguish to that culturally insensitive fellow, who bestowed all three of his movie’s most vital Japanese women roles to, of all people, three Chinese stars. (Yeah, Rob, start another war.)
Speaking of overdone productions, understated acting must really be all the rage if even Jon Stewart’s hosting was. He was right about one thing, though. Three Six Mafia gave the night’s most excited award acceptance. (Well, alright, so did the Penguin guys.)
2006 Oscar night’s other losers: overly tanned actresses Jennifer Lopez, Jessica Alba, and Charlize Theron. You go, girls, tell your fans it’s okay to catch some sun and some skin cancer.
NBA Guide
March 7th, 2006 at 2:58 am
Of course that’s a fake tan JLo. it’s sooo overdone. And despite some critics bad reviews i enjoyed Jon Stewart’s hosting. People who don’t get him are simply stupid.
March 7th, 2006 at 4:02 am
Brokeback ain’t no loser even if it did not get the Oscar – the highly politicized brokeback fans are the losers – btw, what’s wrong with my girls Jen, Charlize and Jessica?
March 7th, 2006 at 6:11 am
Get over urslef mate. If u have been following the oscar race throug the past months particular the last month or so,ud understand why Brokeback never won. If people in the acadamy start saying that they wont watch a movie for its content in this case Brokeback Mountain, it makes u wonder. Crash did not deserve the award, better movies like Munich did a better job and unimosely Brokeback has been voted the Best Pic. Ur blog entry was cheap!Ultimatley Crash will be remembered as the movie that bit BM, while BM will remembered as a groundbreaking,modern classic. Then again JLo, was a bit much!! Wonder how much she paid for ticket to the oscars. What is up with people who have nothing to do with film be showing up aka Supermodel Karolina Kurkov (love her tho.
Kisses bastardo
March 13th, 2006 at 6:51 am
Brokeback Mountain will be remembered, alright. it will be remembered (1) as a well-made film, and (2) as a movie that spawned followers fanatical enough to think mistakenly that Crash, Munich, and other nominated films are ‘the enemy’ and ‘fighting for the other side of the fence’. there’s nothing wrong with the film, but there is something wrong with its so-called fans. anyhoo, Ang Lee and Paul Haggis have moved on, so let us.
March 19th, 2006 at 9:22 pm
In a way, Brokeback had won. During the award season, Brokeback won practically every Best Pic award. I like Crash, and enjoyed the film, but it really is not in the same league as Brokeback. In fact, I think that Crash is more “political” than Brokeback which has very little overt message. I had to drag my boyfriend and other straight male friends to see Brokeback. All of them refused to see the film in the beginning when we first saw Brokeback’s trailer at “Constant Gardener”, some of them even made homophobic remarks or laughed uncomfortably. Now, if you ask them, they all rank Brokeback Mountain as one of the best films they have seen in their lives. This is an achievement that cannot be measure by the Oscar. And just like Citizen Kane, both of them will be remembered as one of the best films ever made. No one will remember that the Oscar Best pic did not go to them. I cannot say the same for Crash.
March 22nd, 2006 at 12:24 am
OR… Brokeback will be remembered as the movie when Heath got Michelle preggers not long after Naomi Watts dumped him. So yeah a whle lotta sex went on there that we never got to see!
March 28th, 2006 at 9:02 am
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