Questions for...

Manohla Dargis...
A chief film critic for The Times answered readers' questions about the Oscars.

Q. Why do you care about the Oscars?— G. D. Avazrahani, New York City
A. Well, for starters I love Old Hollywood, so anything even remotely connected to the golden age of studio filmmaking interests me. New Hollywood pales by comparison, of course – though the specialty divisions are helping to ease the pain – but even its simulacrum of old-school glamour and sex is hard to resist. Then there’s the fact that while the Oscars are reliably irritating and often just plain stupid – and boring and silly and wrong – sometimes they draw attention to worthy films and give a boost to equally worthy filmmakers, like the 1997 multiple-nominee Curtis Hanson. (I also like the dresses.)
Q. My question is, how does one differentiate between the performance of a Terrence Howard and an Eric Bana or a Philip Seymour Hoffman? Each is brilliant. What does a film critic do to create a legitimate pecking order? What separates “gold from silver from bronze”? Incidentally, while I enjoyed "Brokeback Mountain," I can't put Heath Ledger in the same category this year as the aforementioned performers. — Ernest, Denver
A. There are a few variables that determine how I respond to an actor’s performance, some admittedly irrational. There are some actors, for instance, that I just don’t like – I don’t like the way they look, the way they talk, the way they take up space. And there are other actors who I like but who I can’t make any claims for; I just like watching them. I’ve almost always liked Heath Ledger, but I didn’t think he had anything going on as an actor until “Monster’s Ball.” But while he was amazing for the 10 seconds he was in that film, I wasn’t prepared for “Brokeback,” where he creates a world of pain with a tight mouth and a body so terribly self-contained it’s a wonder he can wrap his arms around another person. But here’s the thing – and this is the part that’s hard to explain – I don’t just admire the performance on the level of craft, I am also deeply moved by it, just as I am by the film. By contrast, while I think Philip Seymour Hoffman is really good in “Capote,” both the performance and the film leave me cold. I don’t care about either. And while I greatly enjoy watching the beautiful Terrence Howard (check him out in “Lackawanna Blues”), both his character in “Hustle & Flow” and the film itself are too laughable for me to take into consideration.
Q. In your review of “Something New” you commented on the pathetic lineup of Academy Award nominees for best actress. I'm curious to know your opinion on the lineup - is it the acting of the nominees, the failure to nominate actresses for finer performances, the lack of roles for women, or something else? — Kim Wittchow, San Francisco, CA
A. Have you seen “Junebug,” “Mrs. Henderson Presents” and “Transamerica”? All three are bad in degree, with the last being the worst, and their lead female performances pale next to those of Sibel Kekilli in “Head-On,” Ziyi Zhang in “2046” and Juliette Binoche in “Caché.” Amy Adams is certainly cute in "Junebug," and I like it when her dim bulb of a character feverishly declares that she loves Embeth Davidz's encroacher. That said I like Ms. Davidtz better in that film, partly because her big-city career woman is so mistreated both by the other characters and the director. As to “Mrs. Henderson Presents” – yeah, well, I like British accents, too. But isn’t it time Dame Judi started working for a living? And only in a year so profoundly devoid of juicy female performances (in English-language films that is) could Felicity Huffman’s graceless, unpersuasive turn in “Transamerica” be in contention. As to the other two nominees let’s just say that Reese Witherspoon should have won for “Election” and, man, can that Jane Austen chick write.
As to the Why and the How: I sound like a broken record, a broken record, a broken record…but American movies are now, overwhelmingly, made by men for men, which means that they are also primarily vehicles for male acting talent. There are still great female roles and performances, mind you, but you may need to travel through world cinema to find them.
Q. My friends and I seem to be asking each other the following two questions:
1. How did Reese Witherspoon become such a shoo-in when, as a lead actress, she doesn't have that much screen time, and worse, she seems to be playing Reese Witherspoon the whole time?
2. How did “Crash,” a somewhat obvious, over-the-top, contrived drama, score so many nominations and now come to be considered as a possible dark horse for best picture?—Danny, Austin, TX
A. Reese Witherspoon was nominated for “Walk the Line” because she’s beautiful, talented, has paid her dues (and I don’t mean by marrying Ryan Phillippe) and did a credible job in a big studio movie that made money and won kudos, if not across the board. (My pal A. O. Scott wasn’t wild about the movie, but he called her performance "lively" and "smart." Her performance seems more supporting than not, true, but given the paucity of good female lead performances (see above) the Academy’s choice of Ms. Witherspoon this year was a no-brainer.
There are a few obvious reasons why “Crash” connected with the Academy. First, Los Angeles, where most of Academy members live, is a profoundly segregated city, so any movie that makes it seem like its white, black, Asian and Latino inhabitants are constantly tripping over one another has appeal. If nothing else it makes Los Angeles seem as cosmopolitan as, well, New York or at least the Upper West Side. Second, no matter how many times the camera picks out Oprah Winfrey on Oscar night, the Academy is super white. Third, the Academy is, at least in general terms, socially liberal. You see where I’m going, right? What could better soothe the troubled brow of the Academy’s collective white conscious than a movie that says sometimes black men really are muggers (so don’t worry if you engage in racial profiling); your Latina maid really, really loves you (so don’t worry about paying her less than minimum wage); even white racists (even white racist cops) can love their black brothers or at least their hot black sisters; and all answers are basically simple, so don’t even think about politics, policy, the lingering effects of Proposition 13 and Governor Arnold. This is a consummate Hollywood fantasy, no matter how nominally independent the financing and release. I also think it helped the film’s cause that its distributor sent out more than 130,000 DVD's to the industry, insuring easy viewing.
Q. Does the Academy use any technical process for distinguishing between best supporting and best actor performances – celebrity level of actor, deservedness of award, romantic lead, screen time? Seems kind of arbitrary – how is Jake Gyllenhaal a supporting actor in “Brokeback Mountain”? — Rachel Weidenfeld, Cambridge, Mass.
A. As far as I can tell, the Academy doesn’t actually have any rules about what constitutes a lead or a supporting performance; it leaves it to the voters to make that decision at the time of balloting. Even so, while the approximately 1,300 actors and actresses who choose the acting nominees decide whether a role is a lead or a support, film companies generally position actors for one or the other slot – hence those “for your consideration” (FYC) advertisements that fatten newspaper coffers this time of year. As far back as October 2005, Focus Features, the Universal Pictures specialty films unit that is releasing “Brokeback,” was running FYC advertisements that placed Mr. Gyllenhaal in the supporting role. Focus obviously did not want one great male performance canceling out the other. (Check out Oscarwatch.com for a gallery of such advertisements.)
Q. Why do you think Bill Murray's performance in “Broken Flowers” was overlooked this award season? — James, Berkeley, Calif.
Maybe because the various organizations realized that it wasn’t any good. Listen, I usually love Bill Murray (I even suffered through “Garfield” because of him) and I think he should have received an Oscar and every other possible prize in creation for his performances in “Groundhog Day” and “Rushmore.” In preparation for reviewing Harold Ramis’s latest film, “The Ice Harvest” (sigh), I recently watched “Caddyshack,” “Stripes” and “Groundhog Day” back-to-back for the umpteenth time. Ivan Reitman’s “Stripes” is slapdash if a lot of fun – the other two, meanwhile, both directed by Mr. Ramis, are genius – but what struck me this time around was how much more present and engaged Mr. Murray seemed in these earlier films than he did in either “Broken Flowers” or “The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou.” He was wonderful in Mr. Jarmusch’s “Coffee and Cigarettes,” but since "Lost in Translation" he sometimes seems content to coast on his cool, which, while very considerable indeed does not a fine performance make. His cause this year was not helped by the fact that “Broken Flowers” is a “small” movie that made relatively little money (always a consideration at Oscar time) and was directed by a filmmaker more beloved by critics than the industry.
Q. Why wasn't Andy Serkis nominated for best actor for his portrayal of King Kong? — Stephen Santangelo, South Plainfield, N.J.
A. There are no rules in the Academy guidelines that bar an animated or CGI character being nominated for best actor or actress, as either a lead or support; in fact, a few years ago DreamWorks even tried (and failed) to snare a nomination for Eddie Murphy’s voice work in “Shrek.” My guess – and given how the process is swathed in secrecy, a guess is all you’re going to get – is that both the hard-working and barely working actors and actresses of the Academy do not like what Mr. Serkis’s supple characterization may portend: namely, the end of human screen actors as we know and sometimes love them. (By the way, “King Kong” was nominated for “achievement in visual effects,” which indicates that the Visual Effects Award Nominating Committee is not nearly as nervous about the future as the Actors Branch.)
Q. I know you loved “The New World” and so did I. I've seen it twice in the past two weeks, with the second viewing even better than the first. I think it's an unqualified masterpiece. Why do you think it's being left out of the field of Oscar nominations? — Kay Flaminio Durham, N.C.
A. The film’s brilliant cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki was nominated, so it wasn’t completely ignored. Mr. Lubezki was previously nominated for “The Little Princess” (he lost to John Toll for, bleech, “Braveheart”) and “Sleepy Hollow” (that time he lost to Conrad L. Hall for "American Beauty"). Here’s hoping that this time around talent outweighs popularity. In any event, there is only one possible explanation for why Terrence Malick’s glorious film, one of the most aesthetically and intellectually ambitious, emotionally devastating and politically resonant works of American art in recent memory, was overlooked by the Academy: with the exception of my few dear friends in that august body, they are idiots.