More Oscar Fallout

I'm still getting over my shock over the Crash and burn of Brokeback Mountain last night. Mrs. F and I watched Crash, and we certainly enjoyed it. But I didn't love it. Despite great acting throughout, it felt overly manufactured to be deep and meaninful whereas Brokeback's languorous pace (which some complained about) gave it a much more natural feel for the characters.

Today's Studio Briefing (over at the IMDB) has a quick-and-dirty summation of the reaction:

The Boston Globe film critic Ty Burr called the decision "one of the most stunning upsets in Oscar history." His colleague, Wesley Morris, wrote: "The memo from Hollywood seems clear enough. Better to reward the movie about people who clean our closets than the one about the men who live in them." And in a blistering commentary, Los Angeles Times critic Kenneth Turan excoriated the motion picture industry for its choice, claiming that despite the box office success and favorable publicity Brokeback had achieved (he did not mention the numerous awards from critics' organizations) "you could not take the pulse of the industry without realizing that this film made a number of people distinctly uncomfortable. ... In the privacy of the voting booth, as many political candidates who've led in polls only to lose elections have found out, people are free to act out the unspoken fears and unconscious prejudices that they would never breathe to another soul, or, likely, acknowledge to themselves. And at least this year, that acting out doomed Brokeback Mountain." Finally, Turan concluded that Hollywood "likes to pat itself on the back for the good it does in the world, but as Sunday night's ceremony proved, it is easier to congratulate yourself for a job well done in the past than to actually do that job in the present."

Snarky movie/celebrity blog Defamer puts it thusly (tongue firmly in cheek):

They now realize that co-opting the cowboy, that indelible icon of Marloboro-puffing, rugged heterosexuality, was too bold a move, and will make sure that next year's epic, tragic same-sex love story will involve a FedEx delivery guy and a DMV clerk, occupations that won't immediately register as sinister attempts to destroy the breeder status quo.

But equally as puzzling as this award win for Crash is the bitch-slapping of John Stewart. Again, from Studio Briefing:

Critics seemed to agree: It was one of the safest, least political Oscar telecasts in recent years. Jon Stewart, who has earned his considerable reputation taking satirical swipes at Establishment conduct, appeared to some critics to be straight-jacketed in his tuxedo. Commented the A.P.'s Frazier Moore: "His usually impeccable blend of puckishness and self-effacement fell flat in the service of Oscar. But he wasn't alone. The rest of the broadcast was largely bland and by-the-numbers." Tom Shales in the Washington Post had a harsher verdict. "It's hard to believe that professional entertainers could have put together a show less entertaining than this year's Oscars, hosted with a smug humorlessness by comic Jon Stewart, a sad and pale shadow of great hosts gone by," he wrote.

There's also this commentary over at MSNBC by Andy Dehnart:

Exposing hypocrisy while being self-depreciating is what Stewart does best; in fact, it's basically all he does. Those who believe "The Daily Show" is actually "fake news" don't understand either satire or the exceptionally smart, informative humor that the show invokes on a daily basis. Stewart and "The Daily Show's" team emphasize and demonstrate the importance and gravity of the day's news by making fun of it.

But that sort of contradictory, somewhat nuanced humor didn't work well for the Oscars' audience. The theater audience's lack of laughter was judgmental and was at odds with viewers who were laughing because this was the funny Jon Stewart we know from cable.

[...]

As with many of Stewart's lines, the laughter for these jokes was mostly distant, perhaps coming from the high balconies, far away from the celebrities. When we saw the faces of the stars, they were blank, or awkwardly smiling, perhaps pretending to chuckle.

A few got it: the cameras kept returning to Jamie Foxx, probably because he was laughing along with viewers. By comparison, Joaquin Phoenix looked dreadfully constipated every time a camera found his face, completely unmoved.

As Jon Stewart closed the show, he said, "I hope you had a nice night," and the audience hesitated before clapping politely. His interaction with the theater's crowd was going so bad that at one point, he said, in his usual self-deprecating way, "I am a loser."

Again, count me in as a fan of last night's hosting. And while it did play a middle ground politically, that's not a bad thing--and that's actually a strength of Stewart and The Daily Show writers, being able to point out hubris on both sides.

Finally, before I take leave of the world of celebrity commentary, here's the biggest oddity of the night: Charlize Theron's hunchback bow: