Today’s Newsreel

Alto on March 6, 2006 at 8:52 pm

Well, it was certainly a surprise to me and to everybody else who was watching it at our little “Oscar party”. Let’s face it, it was truly a handicapper from the start:
(1) its release date (May 8, 2005) – it barely made it in “under the wire” as an eligible candidate;
(2) by industry standards, this movie was already “old news” â€" when the nominees were announced, it had already been released on home video for several months (since September 6, 2005), whereas other nominees were just beginning wide theatrical release and are still in theaters today (and are only now being released on home video â€" a smart “post-Oscar” marketing move);
(3) a low-budget ($6.5M) and low-profile film, from a Hollywood production and publicity standpoint (and yet it did a respectable $55M box office when compared with Brokeback Mountain’s current $79M take, which will undoubtedly continue to go higher).

Looking at the nominees across all categories, you could say that the playing field was “loaded”. Three out of the biggest contenders focused on themes and characters that were either gay (“Brokeback Mountain”, “Capote”) or trans-gendered (Transamerica). Perhaps it was more gayness than even Hollywood could handle all at once.

Sorry to say, but in these “p.c.” times, it seems that excellence can also be a liability: “Brokeback Mountain” received SO much buzz, hype and critical acclaim (not to mention many other “best” awards – and deservedly so) that the Academy must have felt that a vote for it would have been perceived as an obvious “no-brainer” pressure bow to popular consensus. From an image standpoint, they must have felt it better to deliberately “go against the grain”, shock everyone, pick an underdog and err on the side of “political correctness” – the Academy at its “liberal” best: “edgy” and at the same time “safe”.

Ironic (and disappointing) actually, because so much of America still has a hard time accepting or acknowledging issues of sexual orientation or identity on ANY level, and being gay or trans-gendered is ANYTHING but popular or mainstream. If the Academy REALLY wanted to make a genuine statement about “tolerance” on awards night, they could have stepped up to the plate and voted the way so many others have. Besides, don’t they have ANY clue as to who Oscar’s most loyal audience is???

Ah, there’s nothing like Academy Awards night â€" the second biggest gay national holiday (after Halloween, of course!) :–)

stevenj on March 7, 2006 at 12:23 pm

I never received my agenda either and I’m thoroughly out of the closet and have been for 35 years. I think someone has got the gay agenda confused with the straight agenda. Brokeback was made by straight people for a straight audience. It’s theme (according to the straight author of the story) is homophobia in rural America. We see this form of psychological terrorism inflicted on Ennis at a young age and the repressed and fearful person that Ennis turns into. We see that it destroys his marriage— and the love of his life. Rural America (and the big cities for that matter) can still be a very dangerous place for gay people and this is not 1963. The high profile murder of Matthew Sheppard comes to mind. My own personal opinion is that I thought Brokeback was a far superior film to Crash although I liked it also. The fact that it didn’t really have an agenda is one of the reasons the film has done well in all it’s bookings nationwide and will probably have a huge dvd audience next month when it comes out again. Might not have won best picture but I think Brokeback, as a story and a film, will have a long life.

Alto on March 7, 2006 at 7:43 pm

Seriously though…

What I do believe is that these organizations are trying to advocate fair and equal treatment in housing, accommodations, and the workplace, and protection under the law from those that try to deny these rights (and in a modern democratic society, these are basic rights, not privileges). Acceptance is a pipe dream, because it is ultimately a personal choice that cannot be decided or regulated by someone else, and I’m not sure what a “normal” lifestyle is, because normalcy has no universal definition. However, if one’s daily lifestyle means living in fear of losing one’s job, being denied insurance benefits, or having the tar beaten out of them in public, then compared to the rest of society (i.e. the “majority”), I would have to say that it is definitely not “normal”.

All gay people should NOT expect or deserve special treatment, just fair treatment. All gay people should NOT expect everyone to like them, but should expect others to let them live without fear or harm.

But that was not your original point. You seemed to be saying that you are tired of the movies (and mass media) being used as a vehicle of sorts to push some specialized homosexual “agenda” (or dare I say “propaganda”) of “normalcy” to mainstream society, and that gay rights groups play an influential role in this. Actually, if one watches or reads the news regularly, one would probably conclude that it is the rest of society’s behavior that needs to be “normalized” first in order for ANYBODY to get along.

We all have choices, and you will find many more movies out there that do NOT make it a point of advocating tolerance towards gays or promoting “the gay lifestyle” ** anymore than they do so for blacks, Hispanics, Asians, Jews or women, and you are more than welcome to view those movies, regardless of whether you are gay, straight, or anything in-between. If you or I feel that we are being relentlessly “assaulted” by messages with the words “bigot, “racist” or “discrimination”, we have the right to say so, but we also have the right to ignore those messages by changing the channel, turning the page, ignoring the movie, or simply walking away. Democracy may not be perfect, but at least we have it.

** I’ve always found humor in people using this phrase, since those same people have yet to define “the straight lifestyle.”