Today's Eye-Rolling Conspiracy Theory....

Film critic Kenneth Turan has an article in today's LA Times, in which he blames Brokeback Mountain's not winning Best Picture on homophobia by the voters.

Writes Turan, "In the privacy of the voting booth... people are free to act out the unspoken fears or 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."

Of course, some obvious flaws in this argument quickly emerge. Voters certainly weren't against the movie (or homosexuality) enough not to vote Ang Lee best director, or the film best screenplay, or Philip Seymour Hoffman best actor for playing a gay man in Capote.

But it's when you read deeper into the article that the reasons for Kenneth Turan's take become clear --

Kenneth Turan HATED Crash. HATED it.

And in Kenneth Turan's mind, the only possible way that Crash could have won, is because homophobic voters who didn't vote for Brokeback Mountain defaulted to Crash instead.

Writes Turan, "For people who were discomfited by Brokeback Mountain but wanted to look at themselves in the mirror, and feel as if they were good, productive liberals, "Crash" provided the perfect safe harbor. They could vote for it in good conscience, vote for it and feel they had made a progressive move, vote for it and not feel that there was any stain on their liberal credentials for shunning what "Brokeback" had to offer. And that's what they did."

Huh?

I have a real hard time believing that when the average Academy voter sits down to fill out their ballot, they aren't simply voting for something they liked.

And if one wants to credit the idea that voters would shift their votes away from Brokeback Mountain to another well-meaning movie, wouldn't the more logical choice have been "Goodnight and Good Luck"? Especially if you believe that Crash sucked? Goodnight and Good Luck is an almost universally-acclaimed movie that has none of that pesky LA racism; instead, it's filled with good people doing good, brave things. THAT would have been the safe harbor choice.

In fact, one could easily argue that more voters were uncomfortable with the portrayal of LA being rife with racism, and that many of them would have more logically shifted their vote to the safe, well-reviewed Brokeback Mountain.

(By the way, I don't have a horse in this race. Brokeback Mountain, Crash, Capote and Goodnight and Good Luck were all on my top ten list for the year.)

When you try to make sweeping generalizations about a group of people, you're just asking for trouble. Were there voters who didn't vote for Brokeback Mountain because they are homophobic? Probably. Was it a substantial amount? Probably not.

The amazing thing about Crash is that it won despite the fact that a lot of people totally hate it. It's one of the most divisive movies I can remember.

If you ask the people who have seen Brokeback Mountain to rate it from one to ten, even the people who don't think it is great will give it at least a 5 or a 6.

Crash pretty much splits people down the middle. It seems like either you think it was a 9 or a 10, or a 1. The people it didn't work for (and I can sort of see their side of it) see it as contrived and manipulative, or criticize it by claiming that it is trying to make you feel better about yourself because you aren't as bad as the people in the movie.

Still, even if only 30% of the Academy voters thought Crash was the best movie of the year, and 70% thought it sucked ass, that still would have been enough to easily win the vote. The count could well have been:

30% Crash
25% Brokeback Mountain
20% Goodnight and Good Luck
15% Capote
10% Munich

What this all points up is just how flawed the Oscars are. Winners don't need a clear majority, while criteria for victory is vague at best, particularly in the acting categories.

They are chosen by a group of people who can be easily derided as having conflicts of interest (though they probably don't), or can even be described as being massively homophobic -- despite the fact that Hollywood is one of the most gay-friendly businesses in the world.

They are the faceless mass known as "Hollywood", who are continually credited for giving people awards or not for particular reasons, when in reality they never do anything for any one reason.

My conspiracy theory? Maybe people were just choosing what they thought was the best movie of the year.

Oh well. At least Salma Hayek looked hot.