I haven't been following the strike issue nearly as close as I'd like, but I'm starting to get increasingly interested as it looks like there's less and less chance of a deal being cut to spare the Golden Globes and Academy Awards from the wrath of the writers. David Poland's blog is the place for some entertaining commentary on this issue. Like everyone else, he doesn't care about whether or not the Globes goes on, but he's absolutely enraged at the thought of Oscar being put in the crosshairs next. "There is a world of difference between f*cking with 100 'foreigners' with the collective journalistic weight of a sitcom sidekick's blog and taking on 6,000 of the town's most powerful people," he writes. He goes on to explain how the Oscar ceremony is a critical income generator for the AMPAS and attempting to derail it is tantamount to a declaration of war. "If the union tries to shut down Oscar, they will be messing with something more than money. WGA would really be tapping into the mass ego of the industry," he writes, before blasting off into an extended hyperbole that ends with -- I'm not kidding -- a picture of Moe Green about to get shot in the eye.

And what does Nikki Finke think about this line of argument? Not much. Her position is that the WGA simply has them over a barrel, and it's their own fault, although she does confine most of her argument to the Globes issue -- she hasn't said very much about Oscar specifically yet, but you can see where she's headed. "For the AMPTP to expect a groundswell of Internet anger aimed at the WGA for threatening the Golden Globes or the Academy Awards is naive not to mention downright laughable. The ratings for these shows keep going down almost every year so the public doesn't much care."

Is it just me, or is this poster a tad quote heavy? Yes, this year the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (or AMPAS) is going with the quote theme -- stuffing tons and tons of quotes onto their promotional poster -- all of which (except for one -- but more on that later) are lines from films that were either nominated for Best Picture, Best Writing or both between the years 1936 and 2005. I'm not sure why Jerry Maguire (of all the fantastic films quoted) is on there more than once -- but, whatever. I guess it's just that quotable. "You had me at hello, Jerry. Hello!"

According to the Academy's official website (and in case you care about stuff like this), the poster "is printed on premium recycled paper in black and gold metallic ink." Oh, and you can buy one for $25 and stick it up on your dorm room wall if the mood should strike you. Ah, but the Academy is also playing a little game with us ... even if, technically, they haven't started playing yet. See, one of those quotes belongs to a movie that was not nominated for Best Picture or Best Writing. The answer isn't too hard to figure out (it took me all of about six minutes), but let's see which Cinematical reader can figure it out first. There will be no hints since you're all movie geeks and don't deserve any. Click on the poster to see a larger version.

The 79th Academy Awards will air live on ABC this February 25.

Folks like MPAA Chairman and CEO Dan Glickman, Joaquin Phoenix, Felicity Huffman, The Brokeback Boys (Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal) and little Dakota Fanning are among 120 filmmakers and executives who have been invited to join The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS). For those of you who have no idea what that means (Trust me, if you don't, you're not missing much), these are the folks who will be participating in the voting process for next year's Academy Awards.

Come Oscar time, the voting membership is normally up around the 6,000 range, with this past year clocking in around 5,798. Each yeah, as members pass away or retire, new slots then become available. For one reason or the other, the Academy decided to start going public with this list back in 2004, making it so you know exactly who to blame after losing a bet that Brokeback Mountain would win Best Picture. Bastards! After scrolling down the list, only 39 people were nominated for an Oscar in 2005, and eight of them won. One of the more puzzling moves finds 12-year-old Dakota Fanning landing an invite. Um, not for nothing, but the girl can't even watch a PG-13 film -- how in the world is she supposed to vote? I suppose her parents can let her watch an R rated film if necessary, but what would Dan Glickman think about that? This poses an interesting question: Should the Academy enforce a rule that states an invitee must be over the age of 18 before becoming a member?

James posted earlier today about Annie Proulx's scathing bitch-slapping of the Academy Awards. Say what you will about whether old Annie is full of sour grapes; she's always been full of what my grandmother would have admiringly called "piss and vinegar", and she is one of my personal heroes as a writer. James called her piece "scathing, coarse and wrathful" and I suppose it is all those things; more than that, however, Proulx is unflinchingly honest in revealing a side of the glittery, sparkling, Oscars that you won't see depicted on E! or anywhere else. She totally de-glamorizes Hollywood's most gratuitous event, rather like someone revealing that the elaborately decorated cake you can't wait to have a taste of is display-window dressing - nothing more than a cardboard box underneath.

The most revealing bit in Proulx's piece, however, was not her vitriolic attacks on Crash and the merit of Phillip Seymour Hoffman's acting skill - it was her description of protesters at the Oscars, "hordes of the righteous, some leaning forward like wind-bent grasses, the better to deliver their imprecations against gays and fags to the open windows of the limos". I read that line and my initial reaction was - huh?!? There were protesters at the Oscars - people yelling about "gays and fags", waving signs about? I watched every single moment of the Oscars, from red carpet to the E! after party coverage. The picture accompanying this piece is from the protests at the 2003 Oscars; I couldn't find any pictures of the protests this year. Nobody - nobody - reported on the presence of people protesting Brokeback Mountain.Which begs the question, why?

 

 

The most shocking moment of Sunday night's Oscar ceremony came early in the evening, long before Three 6 Mafia or Crash scored their twin victories for mediocrity. An hour or so after losing the night's first award to George Clooney, Jake Gyllenhaal trotted out on stage to ostensibly announce one of the night's many disposable montages. "They're called epics," he near-monotoned. "Extravaganzas. Spectacles." With that last one, Jake's voice took an unexpected up-turn. He went on to list a few (oddly amalgamated for mass cross-generational appeal) examples of the genre in question – "West Side Story. Star Wars. Ben-Hur." – before delivering the kicker: "You can't properly watch these on a television set, and good luck trying to enjoy them on a portable DVD." Gyllenhaal punctuated that embarrassingly over-scripted slice of Academy propaganda with a desperate, self-referential giggle – a composure break that lasted long enough for an insert shot of Heath Ledger and Michelle Williams, Gyllenhaal's Brokeback Mountain co-stars, just two members of what sounded like a large chunk of the audience laughing along with him. It was rather amazing, a pure, bumbling moment of transparency that neatly struck down whatever was left of Sid Gannis' sad house of cards. The new takeaway for the evening: If Hollywood can't take its own last-ditch propaganda seriously, how can we?

Thankfully, the Oscars are done for another year. We have some very interesting and astute comments from Cinematical readers on our Oscar posts:

Nobody commented on Tom Hank's really bad hairdo, but plenty of you noticed that he seemed to be saying "f***ing moron" or "f***ing idiot" as he stormed on stage to present the Best Director award. Many of our readers have speculated that his apparent anger was in response to host Jon Stewart's comment about the Brokeback Mountain screenwriters wearing jeans; others thought perhaps he was being rushed. Whatever the cause, people were rather shocked at Mr. Nice Guy Hanks using such language at the Oscars.

Over at Moviefone (part of our AOL-sugardaddy), they gave cameras to a bunch of  "Hollywood's Biggest Stars" including Charlize Theron, Queen Latifah, Sir Elton John, Jessica Alba, Zooey Deschanel, Ang Lee and...Donatella Versace. Okay, that last one is about as good as giving one to Paris Hilton - I mean, I know Dontella dresses a lot of stars, but that doesn't really make her a star, does it?

Anyhow. As you might expect, Oscar-winning director Ang Lee got some interesting shots (although whoever he had actually taking the photos needs some lessons in framing from Lee, because the tops of the heads are chopped off in most of them), including the fab one of Jake Gyllenhaal, above, getting a little "Brokeback" on his director at an after party.

Charlize Theron's shots get personal - including a playfully un-glam shot of her brushing her teeth, her toenails getting painted (hey, she has a tattoo on her foot!), and a gaggle of people doing her hair and makeup - hey, we'd all look that good too if we had all that help, right? Unfortunately, no one told her her dress was really not attractive.

 

Well, the Oscars are over. It's been a long and often mind-numbingly boring Oscar night (especially the acceptance speeches), but we, like Jon Stewart, stuck it out until the bittersweet end. What did everyone think of Stewart as the Oscar host? I was really impressed with Stewart, myself.  I was worried the audience wouldn't be real responsive to his jokes. His brand of humor is political, highbrow and snarky, and I wondered how he would go over with a theater full of insecure movie stars. I loved the Daily Show-style bits they did in-between too, although I think the humor went over the heads of some of the stars. Reese Witherspoon got it, though - she's a smart cookie, don't let the cutesy looks fool you for a second.

Here, for your perusing pleasure, is the list of all the winners and nominees from the major categories (winners are in bold and marked with an asterisk). Give us your thoughts on Oscar night -  the winners, the losers, whose outfits you loved and hated, what you thought of Stewart as the host - whatever your thoughts are, we want to hear them.

 

Dustin Hoffman cruises up to present the award for Best Adapted Screenplay, looking cool. He hasn't changed at all. He must have gotten into Dick Clark's secret youth potion. He gives some props to the losers, which probably doesn't really help make them feel better. But thanks anyhow. If Brokeback wins this it probably won't win Best Picture. The nominees are:

Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana, Brokeback Mountain
Dan Futterman, Capote
Jeffrey Caine, The Constant Gardener
Josh Olson, A History of Violence
Tony Kushner and Eric Roth, Munich

Let's see who the winner is...

Yup, it's Brokeback Mountain. This is the second minor award for Brokeback Mountain. Annie Proulx is there, but the stupid cameraman pans to Ang Lee instead of her. Okay, so either Brokeback is going to pull a Return of the King and sweep everything -- or it's gonna get shut out on Best Picture and Best Director.  If Crash wins Best Original Screenplay it could still be a toss-up. Munich is getting totally shut out so far - not a good night for Spielberg.

Will Smith presents Best Foreign, because of course foreign language films comprise the greater part of his body of work. What country is Paradise Now going to officially be from? -- Palestinian Territories, nice compromise. Here are the nominees:

Don't Tell (Italy)
Joyeux Noël (France)
Paradise Now (Palestinian Authority)
Sophie Scholl -- The Final Days (Germany)
Tsotsi (South Africa)

 

And the winner is....Tsotsi! Woot!

Director Gavin Hood gives the most impassioned and heartfelt speech of the evening. He graciously insists the camera people show the kids who starred in the film, too. Why is it that the non-Hollywood types give the most realistically emotional speeches, while the  people who are supposed to be able to act often give boring ones?