The Indypendent e-news
“Oscar” is getting older—this year marks the 82nd awards ceremony for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. But movie lovers will have to wait until March 7 to find out whether or not he has, in fact, become wiser.
For the first time since 1944, there will be ten nominees (instead of only five) for the coveted Best Picture Oscar. And, for the first time ever, two of the Best Picture nominees were directed by women (Kathryn Bigelow’s The Hurt Locker and Lone Scherfig’s An Education), and one by a Black man (Lee Daniels’ Precious).
Women, War, and Sex
No woman-directed movie has ever been named Best Picture; only three others have been nominated, out of some 450 nominees: Barbra Streisand’s Prince of Tides in 1992; Jane Campion’s The Piano in 1994; and Sofia Coppola’s Lost in Translation in 2004. Campion and Coppola were also nominated as Best Director—joining Lina Wertmüller, who in 1977 had become the first female Best Director nominee, for Seven Beauties. Streisand wasn’t nominated as Best Director, and no woman has won in that category, either.
On the other hand, 16 out of 81 Best Pictures have been war movies, one of which was actually an antiwar movie.
What makes a war movie an antiwar movie? Showing that war is horrible and never worth the price, as did 1930’s Best Picture, All Quiet on the Western Front. Opposing that vision are those that show war and slaughter as the ultimate test of manhood. But most have occupied a middle ground: War is a dirty job but somebody has to do it, they declare, which essentially supports the (pro-war) status quo by failing to challenge it.
The Hurt Locker is three times a rarity—a war movie made by a woman, a character-driven action movie, and a woman-directed movie with almost no women in it. Yet it fits into that large middle ground, with its story of three members of a bomb disposal unit in occupied Iraq, a story driven by the intense and moving portrayal by Jeremy Renner as the squad leader hooked on the adrenaline rush of his dangerous business. (“War is a drug,” declares an epigraph from the Chris Hedges book, War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning; the film’s title apparently refers to the protagonist’s collection of fuses and detonators he’s removed from live bombs.) With equally nuanced performances by Anthony Mackie and Brian Geraghty as the other squad members, its tight focus on the three soldiers’ shifting emotions make it one of the most intimate of the genre ever filmed. Yet by positing the three as heroic saviors of the Iraqi people who can’t protect themselves against the evil Iraqi bomb-setting insurgents, The Hurt Locker accepts and approves the occupation of Iraq. It is a strong film; it is a convincing film; but it is not an antiwar film (which could help its Oscar chances).
As the woman director of a young woman’s coming-of-age story, the Danish filmmaker Lone Scherfig hasn’t gotten a fraction of the attention Bigelow has for Hurt Locker. An Education is, after all, what women directors do (that is, when they get a chance to direct at all). Set in London and Paris as the stuffy Fifties begin to give way to the exuberant Sixties, it’s the story of a 17-year-old’s first affair, the chance at college she almost sacrifices to it, and the lessons she learns. Unlike both The Hurt Locker and Precious (see below), An Education is chock-full of sharply drawn characters, from the center of the story—the hungry-for-experience Jenny (Carey Mulligan) and David (Peter Sarsgaard), the twice-her-age seducer— radiating outward to her inadequately suspicious parents (Cara Seymour and Alfred Molina), David’s disreputable friends (Dominic Cooper and Rosamund Pike), and Jenny’s teachers (Olivia Williams and the always impressive Emma Thompson). An Education is a near-perfect film, despite the reluctance of most of the characters to think that a 30-something man who takes an intense interest in a 17-year-old is up to no good—but it’s a small film, about a woman at that, and they rarely win Oscars.
Less Likely Still
Precious is an even longer-than-long shot. No movie directed by a Black person has ever been nominated as Best Picture; only a handful of films primarily about Black lives (Sounder, A Soldier’s Story, The Color Purple, and Ray) have been nominated, all of them directed by white men. None of them won, nor did any of those nominees tell a tale as grim as does Precious, the story of an obese, illiterate Black teenager twice impregnated and (CAUTION: SPOILER FOLLOWS) infected with HIV by her own father.
At that, Precious—its full title is Precious, Based on the Novel “Push” by Sapphire—omits from its catalog of horrors some of the grimmest aspects of Sapphire’s novel, which describes a young woman sexually abused since earliest childhood by both her parents. Unfortunately, the film version also fails to depict convincingly the ultimate victory that the novel’s Precious wins over her circumstances. In the novel, the horrors throw into dramatic relief her slow and patient struggle up from illiteracy; in the film, she suddenly and for no discernible reason “gets it” and can read.
Even more than in The Hurt Locker, the powerful and compelling lead performances—by Gabourey Sidibe as Claireece Precious Jones and standup comic/actor Mo’nique as her battering and rage-filled mother, Mary—carry the film. As in The Hurt Locker, other characters (including those played by Mariah Carey and Lenny Kravitz) seem to exist only as they interact with the central characters. In the end, the film Precious is neither as harrowing nor as uplifting as the book from which it’s derived.
The Odds
So on March 7, who will hear the magic words, “And the Oscar goes to—”? Will 2010 go down in Academy history as the Year of the Woman? Will it be the Year of the Black movie?
This critic says not yet. Kathryn Bigelow will be outshone by her ex-husband, James Cameron; the Black characters will lose to the blue ones. Alas, this will be yet another Year of White Guy Dances with Natives of Color and Saves Them: Avatar, all the way (except for acting awards, some of which will go to The Hurt Locker, An Education, and Precious as consolation prizes).
Prove me wrong, Academy. Please.
© 2010 Judith Mahoney Pasternak
An earlier version of this article that included some inaccuracies was published by mistake; this is the correct version.
Comments
What a dopey article. First off, as a Black man I found Precious to be highly racist and insulting. Who are the bad guys? All the Black men. Who saves Precious? Whites. I find it hilarious that you're ragging on Avatar for being "White Guy Dances with Natives of Color and Saves Them" when that's Precious -- and you obviously are not very well connected to the Black community because that is a common theme of the Black criticism of that film.
Avatar is an anti-war movie and so is The Hurt Locker. I'm really amazed at all the people who keep missing that point. At least with Avatar, WBAI's Arts Magazine grasped that it was a powerful anti-war statement.
I also think the director of The Hurt Locker's recent interview with Los Angeles Times made clear the film's point of view for even those who, like this critic slamming it, miss the it.
Ishmael Reed's critique of the racist Precious can be found at CounterPunch
http://www.counterpunch.org/reed12042009.html
I agree with Reed and the poster above, that movie is highly racist. I haven't seen Avatar. I found The Hurt Locker to be an important movie and did not see it as pro-war.
You know, I'm getting sick and tired of people slamming on "Avatar" because the main character is a white male. Well, fuck you. It's probably the most anti-war, pro-ecology, film ever made by Hollywood. What is more radical than a white man giving up the rather dubious privilege of being white? Especially when he's disabled?
I have to say, I agree with the commentary posted. I actually took a copy of the Indypendent home just so I could go to the site and reply to this article. Avatar is one of the most important films of our time. I am a woman, part Jew, part Irish Catholic, part Spanish. My religion is Afro-Brazilian. Yes, I truly am a mutt. As much as we want every minority group to have it's moment in the sun, one of the things us liberals are supposed to understand, and frequently forget, is that the argument is supposed to be based on merit and that there's room for everyone at the top. So, as much as I want women to be in charge, I voted for Obama - because it was his time. And as much as I respect and understand the need for this woman's story in Precious to be told and heard LOUDLY - the big spotlight may land on Avatar. For it's art and craft, Cameron dedicated a decade of his life to telling this story, which he has done impeccably well. For the timeliness of it's message, 2009 a year we watched the Indigenous people's of teh world including Peru and Colombia, defending their rights to exist and defending the forests against political greed and violence. If you were paying one iota of attention, you realize that Avatar is about saving our planet - by listening to the people who are taking care of it - and have been taking care of it for thousands of years. Do some rearch on the Kogi, for example. The transformation of Worthington's lead white male military 'jarhead' is sincere. And Cameron should be thanked for his willingness to show this example. Jake Sully is a hero, not because he blew stuff up, but because he woke up, along with Grace (Sigorney Weaver) to the truth that the intelligence greater than us, including the Great Mother - Eywa - is real and worth protecting. From my point of view it's very pro-woman and even pro-African (though I imagine that would take another page of commentary to explain why anything pro-Indigenous to me is pro-Africa, pro-homeland). This film succeeds beautifully at articulating for consumerists why we shouldn't be cutting down the rainforest - because we are killing the Earth, the plants which are our foods and medicines, the trees which provide clean air and oxygen, along with all of her inhabitants. And we are killing off the very people who can help us learn how to live here - to tap in to that energetic grid through the forest. Avatar shows the idiocy of destroying something so beautiful and, yes, sophisticated beyond the human mind, for the almighty dollar. That message is not man or woman, straight or gay, black, white, red, yellow or blue - it's green. And it stands for all of us who dont want to continue to destroy our home or send people to war over money and greed. Is that noble enough for you for it to deserve an Oscar for Best Picture?
By constitutional determination regarding the educational system, the aforementioned legislation still applies as long as it does not go against the Constitution. This ambiguity is a consequence of the absence of a new Bases and Guidelines Law and characterizes a transition phase until the new law is finally elaborated and enacted. The bill has already been submitted to congress.
jimmy
info@ibowtech.com
http://www.sangambayard-c-m.com
As for whom saved who in Avatar, one could make a much better argument that the Na’vi “saved” Jake Sulley (and the others who came to better understand the Na’vi’). It is as much a story of personal salvation and redemption as it is a story of humanity's inhumanity to the environment. Through the Na’vi, the humans who fought on the Na'vi's side were better able to understand the losses their high tech culture had sustained in their greed for resources and, in the end, they reached a kind of environmental satori as well as personal salvation. That they also aided in halting the destruction of the planet is just gravy and it feels good when they win (we do want to win this thing right?). The movie also points out very effectively that technological "advancement" does not equate to wisdom or intelligence and that many cultures can offer a great deal to western civilization. Also, like it or not, many times “natives” are not really understood or “seen” by western culture until some “white guy” (or woman for that matter) goes and lives with them, gets to know them and then acts as an interpreter for the rest of us lazy couch potatoes who don't have the time, money, skills or inclination to drop everything and spend years trying to gain in depth knowledge and understanding about other cultures. Individuals like Bruno Manser, Margaret Meade, Wade Davis or Richard Schultes all come to mind. These are the people who leave the cave, eat the fruit of knowledge and then return to tell the rest of us what the real world looks like. In many ways the story of the earthlings, particularly Jake Sulley, becoming integrated with and taking up the cause of the native community was a necessary part of the story as it offered a western “observer” or narrative point of view as well as a point - counter point that allows us to examine both cultures. Otherwise it would be so many blue people doing weird things in the forest and without this basic contrasting of the two cultures, it would probably would not make a very good movie. Avatar also offers a realistic view of the fact that if we are to save this planet it will be a joint effort of many, many cultures regardless of all our warts. prejudices and petty ignorances of each other.
I notice that the article says Black man, Black person, Black lives, Black teenager, Black character, with the "B' in Black capitalized every time, but says white men, with the "w" lower case. Is there a reason for that?
And what's with this crap about blacks--excuse me, Blacks--and women getting shafted by the Oscars? Are we supposed to give out awards because of a person's skin color and sex? If we did that for white men because they were white and men, would we hear the end of it by the day before Amageddon?
I am SO fed up with this liberal crap. Liberals keep telling us not to see race or sex in our dealings with people, but that's all they see when they look around themselves. And they never let us forget it.
I'm sorry I ever picked up this stupid newspaper, Just to piss off the ecoliberals, I'm not going to recycle it--I'm just going to throw it out.
buddy, america doesn't have liberals, they are a fantasy, and no one on the left either, just a bunch of mindless automatons who actually believe what they see on TV has something to do with reality.
SX, you're absolutely right.
Meanwhile, storm clouds are gathering on the horizon and nobody gives a damn.
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