How did ‘Brokeback Mountain’ lose?

updated 9:35 p.m. ET March 6, 2006

NEW YORK - We chatted about it, joked about it, argued about it, spoofed it. “Brokeback Mountain” was everywhere in our popular culture — yet it lost the big Oscar it was supposed to win.

Was there a “Brokeback Backlash,” or was “Crash” just the worthy contender that came on strong in the final best picture stretch? There were as many theories being offered up Monday as there are “Brokeback” parodies on the Internet.

One theory was that, despite the hoopla, the endless late-night monologues and the clever imitations, people (Academy voters, that is) didn’t really love the soulful saga of two gay cowboys — and perhaps even felt uncomfortable with its themes.

“Sometimes people pretend to like movies more than they actually do,” said Richard Walter, who heads the screenwriting program at UCLA’s film school. “But this film wasn’t really THAT good. What it tried to do was great, sensational. But what it actually accomplished wasn’t so great. You can’t really buy the love story.”

Unspoken prejudices?
Film critic Kenneth Turan, writing in the Los Angeles Times, said the problem wasn’t with the film’s quality. Rather, he said, “you could not take the pulse of the industry without realizing that this film made people distinctly uncomfortable.”

“In the privacy of the voting booth ... people are free to act out the unspoken fears and 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.”’

Gay activists did not necessarily agree.

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“I don’t think it has anything to do with the subject matter,” said Joe Solmonese, president of the Human Rights Campaign, the largest national gay rights group. He noted that “Brokeback” and “Crash” both dealt with “tough issues like indifference and intolerance.”

“I was certainly disappointed,” Solmonese said. “But I would trade that Oscar for all the positive conversations that this movie spurred beteween parents and their gay children, or between employees and their gay co-workers. That impact transcends any accolades.”

Some people focused on the demographics of the typical Academy voter: older, and city-dwelling. Author and “Brokeback” co-screenwriter Larry McMurtry thought that was key to his film’s loss.

“Members of the Academy are mostly urban people,” McMurtry, who won the adapted screenplay prize with Diana Ossana, said backstage at Sunday night’s ceremony. “We are an urban nation. We are not a rural nation. It’s not easy even to get a rural story made.”

McMurtry could have added that not only are Academy voters urban, they are from Los Angeles — the city that is the heart of “Crash,” a racial drama depicting the intertwining experiences of an array of characters over 36 hours. The film, featuring a huge and accomplished cast (“Raise your hand if you’re NOT in “Crash,” host Jon Stewart quipped to the crowd) also won for original screenplay and film editing.

“Brokeback” director Ang Lee, who won the directing prize, said he hadn’t a clue why the film didn’t take the best-picture award. “They didn’t vote for it,” he said. “I don’t know. You asked me one question, and I don’t know the answer.”

But his brother had an opinion. Lee Kang, speaking in Tapei, suggested American bias was involved. “When the locals are voting, they will have this, whether you call it nationalism or something else,” he said.

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