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Bio picks (continued)


Oscar nominations

The 2004 Oscar nominations have been announced! Click here to see how Peter Keough's predictions panned out.

But leave it to the only Republican in the bunch, Clint Eastwood, to make a film taking an unambiguous stand on one of the issues dear to the liberal agenda. (To reveal what would give away too much about the movie.) Million Dollar Baby has cleaned up awards from all of Hollywood’s guilds and the Golden Globes and even got top spot from the National Society of Film Critics (traditionally a sign that a picture is doomed with the Academy). Hilary Swank is terrific as the boxer, Eastwood is sly but powerful as her crusty manager, and Morgan Freeman is as subtle and humane as he was in Unforgiven. The picture and all the above should be nominated, including Clint for Best Director.

Timid though it might be, the Academy won’t escape castigation from those scolds who see it as the sinkhole of depravity. For not only has this been the year of the bio-pic in movies, it’s also been the year of the pedophile — alleged, suspected, or imagined. Could this weird trend be some kind of retort to the priest-abuse scandal in the Catholic Church? I scratch my head, but the evidence is there: The Woodsman, Finding Neverland, and Kinsey. All have gotten kudos from critics’ organizations, the guilds, and the Globes. Which will the Oscars embrace and why?

At first glance, Kinsey would seem the favorite. Here’s the guy who pretty much gave Hollywood the go-ahead to merchandize the nasty with his groundbreaking volumes on male and female sexual behavior in 1948 and 1953. Plus, he was a little kinky himself — though accusations that he committed or abetted child molestation, most coming from right-wing groups, have been discredited by every reliable source. But he was bi-sexual, and I think Hollywood is as skittish as the Democrats about what those exit polls from the election seemed to say. Hollywood doesn’t want people exiting from its movies as well. So I think that Kinsey and Liam Neeson’s great performance will be passed over. Not so Laura Linney as Best Supporting Actress: there’s always room in that category for another long-suffering wife.

Perhaps the least likely pedophile movie to get any recognition is the only one about a bona fide, if fictitious, pedophile. Despite Kevin Bacon’s admirable performance as the convicted child molester trying to adjust to society after being released to society in Nicole Kassell’s debut feature, The Woodsman, and even though his character tries to beat his habit, the film will be taken to the woodshed come Oscar night.

Which leaves Finding Neverland — if it doesn’t get a Best Picture nomination, it should at any rate win the Karl Rove Award for concealing and ignoring blatant truths. James Barrie, author of Peter Pan, was a five-foot-tall homunculus who never developed beyond the age of 13 and who spent his life playing with little boys. Who should you cast in the role? Why, Johnny Depp, of course: give him a Best Actor nomination. And give a Best Director nod to Marc Forster: he got Halle Berry an Oscar for gratuitous sex in Monster’s Ball, and here he shows he’s equally adept at gratuitous non-sex. Neither should we forget Freddie Highmore, who plays the little boy who inspired Peter Pan, for Best Supporting Actor. Far from evoking the sinister Neverland of Michael Jackson’s dementia, this film conjures the even more fanciful Neverland of America today, where, as Peter Pan and George Bush insist, you just gotta believe.

But wait — doesn’t everybody love Ray? Doesn’t that bio-pic belong in the Best Picture category too? Probably, but my cynical feeling is that with Hotel Rwanda, the black Best Picture quota will be filled. Jamie Foxx, however, will get a Best Actor nomination, if only because he deserves it. (He’ll get a Best Supporting Actor nod for Collateral for good measure.)

So what remains? Oh: Best Actress. Have you noticed in recent years how few Best Picture nominations have nominees for Best Actress? What does that tell you? Anyway, joining Swank and Staunton in this category will be Kate Winslet for Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind (which should be a Best Picture nomination), Catalina Sandino Moreno for María, llena eres de gracia/María Full of Grace (which could be a Best Picture nominee) and Annette Bening for Being Julia (which shouldn’t).

Then, of course, there is sex. After the absurdities of the Janet Jackson imbroglio and all its censorious fallout, shouldn’t the Oscars pay some lip service to freedom of expression? So let’s give the last two supporting spots to two actors from Mike Nichols’s talky, creaky Closer: Clive Owen for almost making a movie out of pretentious piffle and Natalie Portman for talking dirty and, to the ecstasy of Star Wars fan boys everywhere, showing a little skin.

One nomination, for Best Director, remains. I know I should give it to Nichols for Closer or to Taylor Hackford for Ray. But I’ll give it instead to Zhang Yimou for the best movie of the year, House of Flying Daggers. It makes you believe in the future of movies even when the future of everything else appears in doubt.

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Issue Date: January 21 - 27, 2005
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