Best actor winner Philip Seymour-Hoffman as openly gay author Truman
Capote.
In
times of struggle — be it economic, political, cultural or religious — some
of the world’s most impacting art has been created.
Example: The Names Project AIDS Memorial Quilt was conceived in November
of 1985 by long-time San Francisco gay rights activist Cleve Jones after
he learned that more than 1,000 people had died from AIDS-related causes.
Jones and those that worked with him, in an effort to memorialize individuals
that history may have otherwise forgotten, created and collected panels
for the quilt. Today the quilt contains more than 44,000 panels. At its
last display — in its entirety — it weighed more than 60 tons
and would cover more than 27 football fields.
This massive living artistic memorial was in response to the deaths of
tens of thousands and a homophobic, apathetic government. Anyone who’s
ever seen the complete display can tell you — the emotional experience
is overwhelming.
Now, more than 20 years after Jones came up with the idea for the AIDS
Memorial Quilt, homophobia is still with us as a powerful and vocal force
of conservatives continue to spew their hate-filled venom.
Reactions from the right over the Academy Awards’ Best Motion picture
nominees is predictably full of the rhetoric we’ve heard so much
of in recent years:
“It’s a sad day for America when a small group of very determined
activists are dominating the awards ceremony,” said Janice Crouse,
the senior fellow at the Beverly LaHaye Institute, a think tank associated
with the Concerned Women for America.
The movie advances Hollywood’s “radical agenda,” says
MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough. Syndicated conservative radio host Janet
Parshall calls it part of the “homosexualizing of America.” Fox
News Channel’s Bill O’Reilly, talking about the film’s
critical success, says the rapturous response is “about mainstreaming
certain conduct.”
Best actor nominee for “Brokeback Mountain’ Heath Ledger
at the Academy Awards.
Given the current level of debate in this country surrounding political
corruption, race relations, same-sex marriage, the invasion of Iraq, abortion
and the death penalty — and the fact we are living under one of the
most oppressive governments in modern times — the films nominated
for Best Picture Oscar should come as no surprise. There’s no question
it’s a case of art responding to life.
“Brokeback Mountain” examines the love relationship between
two men. “Crash” takes a look at racism in contemporary Los
Angeles. In “Good Night, and Good Luck” we travel back to a
fabled broadcaster’s stance against Communist witch-hunts. “Capote” shows
us a family’s murder and a gay writer who nearly destroys himself
in trying to capture the story. “Munich” is a fictional retelling
of events following the 1972 Olympics in Munich, which saw 11 Israeli athletes
murdered by Palestinian militants.
Since Republicans came to power in this country six years ago the entertainment
industry — largely a gay and liberal powerhouse — has constantly
been scapegoated as “out of touch” with mainstream America.
It is interesting that none of the films are classic big budget Hollywood
like some winners of the past — “Titanic” is the first
example that springs to mind — rather, they are mostly message films.
In earlier times when the cultural war wasn’t raging — it was
fine for Hollywood to rest on its creative laurels and turn out formulaic
mega-buck blockbusters.
But now, when the very livelihood of modern America is threatened by corrupt
politicians and religious zealots, it seems as though entertainment executives
and film producers really are in touch with America. If cultural change
can’t be achieved through political means — it’s time
to do it by sending a message to the country’s heart. What better
way to do it than by creating thought provoking and emotionally evocative
art? “Brokeback Mountain” winner of the best adapted screenplay,
best motion picture soundtrack and best director, and “Capote,” which
captured the award for best actor, are films that have changed worldview.
Thanks for getting in touch, Hollywood.
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