2006 BAFTA Awards

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Over in London across the Atlantic, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts has announced its awards for cinematic achievement in 2005. I in-correctly guessed three of the acting categories, but how was I to know that the Brits were going to favor Americans in the lead categories over compatriots in the widely-admired "The Constant Gardener", which headed into the evening with as many nominations (nine) as "Brokeback Mountain" and "Crash" and ten if you add its nomination for Best British Film. Thandie Newton was the only British performer to take home an acting prize (for playing an American in "Crash"). Meanwhile, Jake Gyllenhaal pulled an upset in the Supporting Actor category, though the "upset" shouldn´t be entirely surprising since two nominees for "Crash" and two nods for George Clooney meant that Gyllenhaal was the only person in his field not fighting for split votes. On the whole, the BAFTA results seem to confirm what everyone has been predicting for the Oscars in most of the categories.

The 2006 BAFTA winners:
Picture – "Brokeback Mountain"
Foreign Film – "The Beat That My Heart Skipped", France (which is ineligible for the Foreign Film Oscar because France submitted "Joyeux Noel" instead)
Best British Film – "Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit" (This is obviously not an AMPAS category, but wins for anything help cement this movie´s win in the Animated Feature category at the Oscars.)
Director – Ang Lee, "Brokeback Mountain"
Actor – Philip Seymour Hoffman, "Capote"
Actress – Reese Witherspoon, "Walk the Line"
Supporting Actor – Jake Gyllenhaal, "Brokeback Mountain"
Supporting Actress – Thandie Newton, "Crash"
Original Screenplay – Paul Haggis and Bobby Moresco, "Crash"
Adapted Screenplay - Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana, "Brokeback Mountain"
Cinematography – "Memoirs of a Geisha"
Editing - "The Constant Gardener"
Production Design – "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire"
Costume Design – "Memoirs of a Geisha"
Make-up – "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe"
Sound – "Walk the Line"
Music Score – John Williams, "Memoirs of a Geisha"
Visual Effects – "King Kong"

Multiple-winners:
"Brokeback Mountain", 4
"Crash", 2
"Memoirs of a Geisha", 2
"Walk the Line", 2

The evening´s biggest loser was "The Constant Gardener", which not only lost Best British Film to "Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit" but wound up with one award (for Editing). George Clooney struck out four times despite his rare achievement of being nominated for two movies in one calendar year. In fact, with so many movies headed into the evening with more than six nominations, none of the leading contenders had winning percentages.

The list of BAFTA winners looks like something that the Academy might be releasing on 5 March. There was so much love for American movies that I wonder if the BAFTAs should just close shop. At a time when world cinema should take a firm stand against the homogenization of international shared culture by American art, the evening´s multiple winners were all American-oriented in theme, outlook, and form. ("Memoirs of a Geisha" was based on a book written in English by an American. The movie was written in English, it was largely shot in the United States by American moviemakers, and the dialogue was in English. The movie was made--poorly--with classical Hollywood aesthetics. It is the sort of cultural hodge-podge travesty that Hollywood likes to make when it feels the need to show the world how "global" and "cultured" it is.)

In the past two weeks, there´s been a lot of talk about "Crash" winning Best Picture at the Oscar ceremony. I wouldn´t mind "Brokeback Mountain" and "Munich" losing to another good movie, but "Crash" is, as I wrote in my DVD review, a serving of haggis. "Crash" is a terrible movie, not necessarily because it is contrived and schematic but because only one actor (Matt Dillon) in a large cast managed to sell the material. A lot of the actors (Don Cheadle, Sandra Bullock, Ryan Phillippe, the aptly-named Ludacris, etc.) made me laugh at, and not with, the movie. What´s more, during its conclusion, we see a car thief unload a van of illegal immigrants into the streets. The movie presents someone doing something wrong (on so many levels and in so many ways) as his redemption. This movie´s supporters weren´t thinking when they saw it, and passive viewing is a crime against cinema.

Here´s to hoping that "Brokeback Mountain" can maintain its momentum all the way to the finish line.

My current Oscar predictions:
Picture – "Brokeback Mountain"
Foreign Film – "Tsotsi", South Africa
Animated Feature – "Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit"
Documentary Feature – "March of the Penguins"
Director – Ang Lee, "Brokeback Mountain"
Actor – Philip Seymour Hoffman, "Capote"
Actress – Reese Witherspoon, "Walk the Line"
Supporting Actor – George Clooney, "Syriana"
Supporting Actress – Rachel Weisz, "The Constant Gardener"
Original Screenplay – Paul Haggis and Bobby Moresco, "Crash"
Adapated Screenplay – Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana, "Brokeback Mountain"
Cinematography – "Memoirs of a Geisha"
Editing – "Crash"
Sound Mixing – "Walk the Line"
Sound Editing – "King Kong"
Music Score – John Williams, "Memoirs of a Geisha"
Original Song – "It´s Hard Out Here For A Pimp", "Hustle & Flow" (this is the AMPAS´s way of showing that it´s cool; foul-mouthed Eminem won in this category not too long ago)
Art Direction – "Memoirs of a Geisha"
Costume Design – "Memoirs of a Geisha"
Make-Up – "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, & the Wardrobe"
Visual Effects – "King Kong"

(It's possible that "Memoirs of a Geisha" will take home more Oscars than the movie that takes Best Picture.)

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