Friday, July 29, 2011
Mock 'n' roll
By Edward Copeland
Near the beginning of David Holzman's Diary, the filmmaker of the title speaks directly to us as he explains his idea to find himself by making a documentary of his life. He repeats Godard's famous quote, "Film is truth 24 times a second," only he omits the ending of Godard's statement which says, "and every cut is a lie." Of course, if Holzman finished the quote, he might give away the game because when director Jim McBride's film began to screen in 1967, many thought it was an actual documentary. It wasn't until the end credits appeared and viewers learned that Holzman was played by an actor, L.M. Kit Carson, and the film had a screenplay that they realized they'd been had by a deadpan satire of the cinéma vérité-style of documentary prevalent at the time. More importantly, the mockumentary was born, inventing a practical cottage industry spanning from Woody Allen's Take the Money and Run in 1969 through the current Emmy-winning sitcom Modern Family with much in between.
I'd never seen David Holzman's Diary which isn't surprising since, despite its acclaim, including being added to the National Film Registry in 1991, the film never had a real release in the United States outside of film festivals, film schools and museums. It received more attention in Europe before gaining notice in the U.S. and
has never received a Region 1 DVD release, though that will soon be rectified. I only was able to see the film thanks to the good people at Fandor, who invited me to review ahead of it being the first of its new program of coordinated digital-theatrical releases. Unfortunately, at the time I was swamped with projects and my weekly Treme recaps. Fandor was kind enough to send me a screener anyway and I finally got a chance to watch it and this is the first chance I've had to write on it. Right now, the only place people in America without a region-free DVD player (or a still-working laserdisc player and the old Criterion laserdisc) can see David Holzman's Diary is on Fandor. However, Kino Lorber announced on its blog that it will release a special edition of the film on DVD and Blu-ray on Aug. 16 and it's available for pre-ordering now. Whether any other home rental services will acquire the film is another story.Now when I began watching David Holzman's Diary, I knew it was a joke, so it's interesting to consider how the reaction differs for someone going in knowing a spoof is at hand versus someone who doesn't. (To peer inside a time capsule, check out this 1971 review from The Harvard Crimson where the writer was "moved" by the film until the credits pulled the rug out from beneath him, revealing the joke, and starting an argument with a friend over whether or not to mention that it wasn't real in the review.) This isn't the type of laugh-out-loud mockumentary we've grown accustomed to as with the best of the Christopher Guest films, This Is Spinal Tap! or Woody Allen's Zelig. Diary will bemuse you more than it strains your stomach muscles from strenuous chuckling but that's because while the film has humor within it, its real targets reside outside the movie itself. If you see or re-watch some of those real cinéma vérité documentaries, that might be where you'll have delayed reactions to some of the setups that David Holzman's Diary provides.
That doesn't mean Holzman's Diary lacks funny moments all its own. It contains plenty, such as when David interviews Pepe (Lorenzo Mans) who suggests that Holzman's life just doesn't justify a movie, saying it's not an "interesting script." There is the priceless near-monologue that Sandra (Louise Levine) delivers from her car on a Manhattan street that
McBride said in an interview was mostly improvised and occurred by happenstance. Then, there are all the moments involving David and his love Penny (Eileen Dietz), who does her best to stay away from Holzman's camera, prompting her boyfriend to say that he just doesn't "get her sense of privacy," something that will send her heading for the door eventually and foretells the morphing of that documentary style he's spoofing into reality TV, such as covered in the HBO movie Cinéma Vérité earlier this year that told the story of the making of the landmark PBS series An American Family about the Loud family. In a way, it also predicts part of the outcome for the Louds as well as making the film nearly destroys David's life as An American Family did a number on the Loud family as well. Strikingly, while David Holzman's Diary might be a spoof of a very particular style of documentary filmmaking, when it's dealing with David coping with his flailing relationship with Penny, it reminded me of a real and great documentary that wouldn't come out until nearly 20 years later: Ross McElwee's Sherman's March, when McElwee's planned documentary about the path the legendary Civil War general took gets derailed by the breakup with his girlfriend.While David Holzman's Diary isn't a real documentary, it does display its own sense of truth in terms of time and place by showing in crisp black-and-white, a view of N.Y. neighborhoods on the Upper West Side at that time. In another sequence where David films himself flipping through TV channels, you catch quick glimpses of Batman and Star Trek, which would have been in first run. The movie was filmed by Michael Wadleigh (though his name is spelled Wadley in the credits) who would go on to direct one of the great music and cultural documentaries two years later, Woodstock.
Considering that David Holzman's Diary was made 44 years ago, Jim McBride actually has a rather slim directing resume. In the seven years after Diary, McBride made three short real documentaries and two features, but then he didn't helm another film until the 1983 remake of Breathless starring Richard Gere. (What would David Holzman think of McBride daring to remake Godard's French New Wave classic?) His next two films were much better: The Big Easy and Great Balls of Fire, both starring Dennis Quaid, but most of his directing work has been on television, including several episodes of The Wonder Years. I guess you can't take McBride out of that era.
Thankfully, he gave us David Holzman's Diary and even better it has finally returned where more film enthusiasts can have access to it. With all the upheaval with formats, Net Neutrality fights in Congress that could affect streaming and a shaky economy that might someday soon make it so only people of means will be able to afford entertainment, it's good to know we have this window to see David Holzman's Diary so it doesn't vanish as I fear so many film titles will (with book titles possibly not that far behind).
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Labels: 60s, D. Quaid, Documentary, Godard, HBO, Television, Treme, Woody
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Saturday, December 18, 2010
From the Vault: Callie Khouri
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED AUG. 4, 1995
Not all Hollywood stories are hard luck ones. Take Callie Khouri's, for instance. Though she struggled for years to become a writer-director, she hit a home run with her first screenplay when director Ridley Scott was interested in making it. The movie was Thelma & Louise and it won Khouri the Oscar for 1991's best original screenplay. Not bad for an idea that Khouri originally planned to direct herself for less than $5 million.
"It was my first script so I was very, very lucky. I had struggled doing other things for a very long time and wanted to direct it myself and was fortunate to get it into the hands of someone who wanted to make it. Had the movie not done what it did, I would be leading a very different kind of life right now."
Now with Something to Talk About, Khouri finds herself blessed again — with a producing team and director who welcomed her input and patiently waited the five years it took her to complete the script. Something to Talk About tells the story of Grace King Bichon (Julia Roberts). The daughter of a wealthy Southern horse-breeding family, she married her college sweetheart Eddie (Dennis Quaid) and has a young equestrian daughter (Haley Aull).
For some reason, all is not right in Grace's life. She has a tendency to drive off without her daughter and feels detached from her husband, something she finds an explanation for when she spots him passionately kissing another woman. Originally, Something to Talk About was going to be titled Grace Under Pressure, but legal complications arose because of another film registered with the same name and ABC's television series Grace Under Fire. While Khouri can live with Something to Talk About, which is taken from the hit Bonnie Raitt song, she would have preferred the original title or Saving Grace.
"The thing about it that's hard for me as the writer — and I have a problem with it that nobody else does — is that I would never presume to call a film of mine Something to Talk About because I want the audience to make that call. To say to the audience that this film is Something to Talk About feels pretentious."
The movie has been percolating for quite some time. Producers Paula Weinstein and Althea Sylbert originated the general theme of the movie about 12 years ago, and Khouri began working on it prior to the beginning of production on Thelma & Louise. When Thelma & Louise hit and the Oscar followed, it slowed down Khouri, who was already busy with a new husband and a new house.
"Things were just kind of rowdy for a couple of years. It took a while until things got quiet enough that I could hear these characters talking. I just decided that I would really take my time. I was very self-conscious writing this. I just decided I'd wait it out until I was happy with it."
Later, when director Lasse Hallstrom (Once Around, My Life as a Dog) came aboard, Khouri's luck continued and she found herself in a very unusual situation for a Hollywood screenwriter — active participation in the actual direction and course of the film. Khouri feels fortunate.
"A lot of times people say, 'We've got a really great script here. Who can we get to rewrite it?' (It's) a psychology that will always elude me."
People who go see Something to Talk About expecting to find a tone or theme similar to Thelma & Louise are going to be confused by its ambiguous ending and the way the character of the cheating husband develops. It's a situation that Khouri would have faced no matter what her follow-up film would have been.
"I'm in a no-win situation. People's expectations of what I should say or how I should say it — I'm never going to be able to overcome that. If people think that there's no such thing as forgiveness, I'm sure there are plenty of people out there who could tell them otherwise. For people who expect me to write a doctrine instead of a movie, they're always going to be disappointed. I'm interested in writing movies and the characters dictate the story; it's not arbitrary ... Somebody's always going to be let down no matter what, so they're just going to have to deal with it."
The complexity of the characters in Something to Talk About is something Khouri sought from the beginning.
"At the beginning of this movie, I wanted to start everybody out as a stereotype — have Eddie the cheating husband, Grace the charity league wife, Wyly the overbearing father, Georgia the submissive mother — and have you understand who everybody was by the end of the movie and see the human beings in every one of those stereotypes."
While there are certainly serious elements to the story, Khouri's main goal with her second script was to entertain.
"If I would have called it something, I would have called it Something to Laugh About because I really hope people do have a good time."
By the way, where has Khouri placed the Oscar she won? It's in her office, though you might not recognize it at first.
When the Academy sent it back after engraving, it was shipped in "those blue bags, like a Crown Royal bottle. So I put the thing on the shelf and looked at it for a while and then I put the blue bag over it. My husband came in and took one look at it and said, 'Ahh! Safe success.'"
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Labels: D. Quaid, Interview, Julia Roberts, Oscars, R. Scott
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Monday, July 13, 2009
A really great visit with old friends
By Edward Copeland
For some reason, in addition to not getting the credit it richly deserves as it turns 30 today, Breaking Away far too often gets lumped into the generic category of "sports movie" when nothing could be further from the truth. When I scanned some reviews of the film after finishing this piece, one writer accused it of being a "formula sports film" that ends with "the big game." Ignoring whether this person even watched Breaking Away, yes, a bike race does appear near the end of the film, but only one of the four young men at the center of the film is a cycling enthusiast and the race isn't where the entire film has been heading. His three friends essentially have no cycling skills and are only there because the race rules require a team of four. Breaking Away, directed by Peter Yates from Steve Tesich's Oscar-winning screenplay, tells a coming-of-age story, or rather trying to avoid it and the clash between blue collar and white collar types in a college town and, yes, it contains some cycling.
Dennis Christopher stars as Dave Stoller, born-and-bred in
Bloomington, Ind., where Indiana University residents. Dave and his three best buddies Mike (Dennis Quaid), Cyril (Daniel Stern) and Moocher (Jackie Earle Haley). All are the offspring of men that the fratboys for generations have referred to as "cutters" for their jobs working on the stone quarries in the area. The problem is that as quarries mostly have dried up, taking most of the jobs with them. If I've given you the impression that this setting makes for a downbeat movie, nothing could be further from the proof. Breaking Away is one of the most sweetly funny films I've ever seen. In fact, re-watching the film reminded that as much as the time period from whence it came is often lauded (to the point of exaggeration) as the "last golden age of movies," it also was the last great age of serious coming-of age movies. In addition to Breaking Away, they gave us My Bodyguard, Over the Edge. You could even count Saturday Night Fever. Since then, they have be silly, vulgar or have characters who are too cute by half. Back then, they spoke as they might actually have spoken if you’d come across them in real life. As Breaking Away opens, Dave's cycling obsession has focused on the Italian racing team, so much so that he's taken to speaking with an Italian accent, driving his father (the great Paul Dooley) mad. His friends indulge him, especially self-appointed leader Mike (Quaid) as long as he's not seen as doing something unforgivable to him such as getting a job or a wife. The former quarterback, in his first year after high school, seems satisfied with a life of ennui. Moocher (Haley) goes so far as to keep his impending marriage to his girlfriend a secret from his friends for as long as possible. When it is revealed, and Moocher remind Mike that he's no
longer the quarterback and they can't go on wasting their lives, Cyril (Stern) responds, "I thought that was our plan — to waste our lives together." Despite the great chemistry of the four young actors, for me the real stars of the film were the pair that played Dave’s parents. Barbara Barrie earned an Oscar nomination for supporting actress for her work. Being a well-known Oscar obsessive, I’ve been frequently asked over the years what I thought was the most egregious example of the Academy not nomination something they should have. There are countless answers to that question, but almost inevitably what comes from my lips first are the words “Paul Dooley for Breaking Away.” He won some critics' awards and the Academy recognized the film in many key categories, including best picture, so his exclusion boggles the mind. He deserved a nomination over all five of the men who did get in and certainly the win over Melvyn Douglas for Being There. As Dave’s father, he is funny, but he’s also concerned and touching, as when he takes his son on a tour of the IU campus and explains to him that he is a cutter, Dave will never be one because that job barely exists. As he admires the university’s buildings, he tells his sons, “I was proud of my work. And the buildings went up. When they were finished the damnedest thing happened. It was like the buildings were too good for us. Nobody told us that. It just felt uncomfortable, that's all.” As for that "big race" at the end, even it defies the formula of the big game moment. Vindication doesn't really change the status of the friends' lives. In fact, there is even a small, sad moment that's almost so brief as to be missed. After the victory (sorry if you think that's a spoiler), Dave's parents congratulate him, Moocher's wife gives him a big hug and Mike's cop older brother (John Ashton) cheers his little bro. Then there is Cyril, Cyril who always has joked about how his father is so understanding about his failures, looking around with a sheepish grin and seeing that there is no one there for him at all. Revisiting Breaking Away again for the first time in many years, it felt as fresh as it did when I first saw it. More people should remember it.Tweet
Labels: 70s, D. Quaid, Movie Tributes
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Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Let them write the history, let the pilot fly the plane
By Edward Copeland
After some fellow fliers mocked Gus Grissom (Fred Ward) following his landing mishap, test pilot extraordinaire Chuck Yeager (Sam Shepard) silences them by saying, "It takes a special kind of man to volunteer for a suicide mission, especially when it's on TV." It takes a special kind of filmmaker to make a film as great as The Right Stuff, even if Philip Kaufman never has come close to equaling it again 25 years later.
It seems as if too many films these days are too long which makes it all the more amazing to re-watch The Right Stuff and feel how fleetly its 3-hour-plus running time flies by. It's a remarkable feat that its pacing holds up so well for someone pushing 40 and watching it on DVD from a bed as it did when he was 14 and saw it in a theater.
Part of this can be attributed to Kaufman's approach to the material. In an extra on the DVD, Kaufman says he attempted to adapt Tom Wolfe's stylized nonfiction book with a similarly stylized film (going so far as to hire an acrobatic comedy troupe as the slapsticky press corps). It's easy to forget what a cast the movie has, especially if it's been awhile since you've seen it. Fans of Robert Altman's Tanner '88 will enjoy seeing Pamela Reed and Veronica Cartwright interact as astronauts' wives years before their work in the great HBO series. Harry Shearer and Jeff Goldblum provisws fun comic relief as NASA recruiters. It's difficult to forget Donald Moffat's LBJ, shaking his limo in anger because John Glenn's wife won't cave to his PR desires. "Isn't there anyone that can deal with a housewife?" LBJ shouts in frustration. Of course, there are the movie's version of the Mercury astronauts and pilots themselves. I'd forgotten Lance Henriksen played Wally Schirra, though he has few lines. Ed Harris works wonders as John Glenn, seemingly imbued with a light and decency seldom seen in Harris' subsequent roles. Dennis Quaid oozes charm as Gordo Cooper and Scott Glenn lends a solid presence as Alan Shepard.
Watching The Right Stuff now, you can't help but compare it to Apollo 13. Ron Howard's fine film thatlacks so much depth when compared to Kaufman's movie. The astronauts of The Right Stuff ccertainly come off as heroic, but they're also multidimensional — human and flawed, prone to hard drinking and hard living. You also get a sense of the manipulation and politics surrounding the Mercury program that's completely absent from Howard's film. One thing both films do have in common is the amazing ability to create suspense out of real-life events whose resolution the viewer already knows. Both films also amaze when you think that we were ever able to get into space with the technology available at the time.
However, of all the great aspects of The Right Stuff, to me the real star remains cinematographer Caleb Deschanel. Deschanel belongs on the short list of great directors of photography, yet amazingly he doesn't have an Oscar despite five nominations (in addition to The Right Stuff, he earned nods for The Natural, Fly Away Home, The Patriot and The Passion of the Christ. Other credits include Being There, The Black Stallion and the forthcoming Abraham Lincoln Vampire Killer as well as directing the films The Escape Artist, Crusoe and several episodes of Twin Peaks). Deschanel should have won here, though it's hard to argue with Sven Nykvist's win for Ingmar Bergman's Fanny and Alexander.
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Labels: 80s, Altman, Books, D. Quaid, HBO, Ingmar Bergman, Jeff Goldblum, Movie Tributes, Nonfiction, Shepard, Twin Peaks
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Monday, November 19, 2007
Oscar's rules for GLBT characters
By Edward Copeland
This post was for the Queer Blog-a-Thon hosted at Queering the Apprentice, which apparently no longer exists. Be warned: the words below will contain spoilers for a lot of films, too many to mention, so don't read it and whine later.
The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences has been fairly generous in the past 20 or so years in nominating (and sometimes rewarding) actors and actresses who play gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgendered characters on screen. However, this does come with a price. Not to their careers, but in deciding whether or not the role gets nominated in the first place.
There seems to be only two types of gay roles that get deemed worthy of Oscar recognition: ones that are comicly broad or one where the gay character in question either ends up dead or alone. Look at just a couple of highly praised roles that got snubbed come Oscar time. Everyone thought Dennis Quaid was a lock for a nomination with his tortured married gay man in the 1950s in Far From Heaven, but he didn't make the cut. In the end of the film, his character has accepted his sexuality and found a boyfriend: no nomination for him.
Rupert Everett was a lot of fun as Julia Roberts' best gay friend in My Best Friend's Wedding, but his character was out, proud and presumably in a relationship. Strike him from your nominating ballot.
Now, here come the spoilers, as I look at all the performers who did get nominated or won an Oscar for playing a gay character. I'm only counting characters that are explicitly gay, not implied ones such as Clifton Webb in Laura For sake of simplicity, I'm going chronologically.
Peter Finch in Sunday Bloody Sunday (1971)
The first openly gay character that I can find with a nomination set one of the patterns: He's alone at the end.
Al Pacino and Chris Sarandon in Dog Day Afternoon (1975)
Sarandon's character of Leon is already institutionalized (and wants nothing to do with Sonny) when we meet him. Sonny (Pacino) ends up alone and in prison.
James Coco in Only When I Laugh (1981)
The first instance (post Dog Day Afternoon) of Oscar nominating an openly gay character was for Coco's broad comic turn in this lesser Neil Simon outing.
John Lithgow in The World According to Garp
Robert Preston in Victor, Victoria (both 1982)
Preston's great turn definitely belongs more in the broad comic category, though he might also be an exception since he is allowed to have a boyfriend by film's end. Lithgow, as the NFL player turned transsexual in Garp, might be an exception. He's alive at the end, but his role is mostly played for laughs and the film never provides him with a significant other.
Cher in Silkwood (1983)
Another possible exception, though the film makes it unclear if she's alone at the end, though she certainly looks guilt-stricken over possible involvement in her friend Karen's death.
William Hurt in Kiss of the Spider Woman (1985)
Ding ding ding. We have a winner. While the movie was certainly a drama, Hurt does a lot of histrionic flouncing AND he ends up dead in the end, even after his straight cellmate (Raul Julia) gives him a mercy fuck.
Bruce Davison in Longtime Companion (1990)
It was five years before another gay character earned a nomination and Davison's character got the double whammy. First, he has to watch his lover die of AIDS, leaving him alone, and then he dies as well (and not even on screen).
Tommy Lee Jones in JFK (1991)
Here's another example of a broad performance in a drama and while Jones' character lives in the end, it is complicated by the fact that he is portrayed as a villain (and with some over-the-top gay orgy scenes that only Oliver Stone could dream up). In contrast, Joe Pesci playing the less showy gay character who does get killed, didn't earn Academy notice.
Jaye Davidson in The Crying Game (1992)
First, Dil's lover gets killed during an IRA kidnapping and then when he/she falls for his captor, Fergus (Stephen Rea) gets sent to prison and Dil waits patiently, even though Fergus shows no intention of abandoning his heterosexuality.
Tom Hanks in Philadelphia (1993)
Gay and dead takes home the prize again, though at least Hanks' portrayal wasn't a broad one, even if Denzel Washington gave the better lead role in the film.
Greg Kinnear in As Good As It Gets (1997)
I don't think Kinnear's character had a significant other by film's end, but I do remember he took a bad beating.
Ian McKellen in Gods and Monsters (1998)
Here is an openly gay actor nominated for portraying a true-life openly gay director. Alas, James Whale dies in the end (as he did in real life) but the real travesty was that McKellen (and Nick Nolte and Edward Norton) lost to Roberto Benigni (Life Is Beautiful).
Kathy Bates in Primary Colors (1998)
Bates was great as a take-no-prisoners political operative working on the campaign of a Bill Clinton-like candidate. Alas, her lesbian character had principles and ended up firing a gun into her head.
Hilary Swank in Boys Don't Cry (1999)
Swank won the first of her two Oscars for lead actress by playing the gender-confused Brandon Teena. It also was the first of two times that Swank made it to the winner's circle by getting beaten to death.
Javier Bardem in Before Night Falls (2000)
Based on a real person, Bardem's character has to fight problems in Cuba before getting to N.Y. for one of the longest death scenes (from AIDS) I've ever seen.
Ed Harris in The Hours (2002)
The same year that the Academy snubbed Dennis Quaid for his fine work in Far From Heaven, they nominated this awful performance by the usually fine Harris as an artist dying of AIDS.
Nicole Kidman in The Hours (2002)
If Virginia Woolf hadn't walked herself into the river, this nomination and win probably would have never happened.
Julianne Moore in The Hours (2002)
In a way, her character here is similar to the one Quaid plays in Moore's other 2002 film. She's married, but unable to accept her sexuality. By the film's end, she appears to be alone, so she gets a pass while Quaid got snubbed. It may also explain one of the rare occasions where Meryl Streep didn't get an Oscar nomination since her lesbian character in The Hours had a lover in the end and doesn't die.
Charlize Theron in Monster (2003)
Another win based on a true story. Theron took the executed lesbian serial killer right up to the winner's circle.
Philip Seymour Hoffman in Capote (2005)
This may be the true exception to the rule. Based on a real life character, the story didn't follow Truman Capote to his death and he did have a longtime companion. The closest this comes is denying him his crush on the executed killer.
Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhaal in Brokeback Mountain (2005)
Two nominated performances of gay character, so the Academy got to take one of each: Gyllenhaal's character ends up dead, Ledger's ends up alone.
Felicity Huffman in Transamerica (2005)
I'm not sure where to place this performance of an in-process transsexual. She doesn't die in the end.
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This post was for the Queer Blog-a-Thon hosted at Queering the Apprentice, which apparently no longer exists. Be warned: the words below will contain spoilers for a lot of films, too many to mention, so don't read it and whine later.
The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences has been fairly generous in the past 20 or so years in nominating (and sometimes rewarding) actors and actresses who play gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgendered characters on screen. However, this does come with a price. Not to their careers, but in deciding whether or not the role gets nominated in the first place.
There seems to be only two types of gay roles that get deemed worthy of Oscar recognition: ones that are comicly broad or one where the gay character in question either ends up dead or alone. Look at just a couple of highly praised roles that got snubbed come Oscar time. Everyone thought Dennis Quaid was a lock for a nomination with his tortured married gay man in the 1950s in Far From Heaven, but he didn't make the cut. In the end of the film, his character has accepted his sexuality and found a boyfriend: no nomination for him.
Rupert Everett was a lot of fun as Julia Roberts' best gay friend in My Best Friend's Wedding, but his character was out, proud and presumably in a relationship. Strike him from your nominating ballot.
Now, here come the spoilers, as I look at all the performers who did get nominated or won an Oscar for playing a gay character. I'm only counting characters that are explicitly gay, not implied ones such as Clifton Webb in Laura For sake of simplicity, I'm going chronologically.
The first openly gay character that I can find with a nomination set one of the patterns: He's alone at the end.
Sarandon's character of Leon is already institutionalized (and wants nothing to do with Sonny) when we meet him. Sonny (Pacino) ends up alone and in prison.
The first instance (post Dog Day Afternoon) of Oscar nominating an openly gay character was for Coco's broad comic turn in this lesser Neil Simon outing.
Robert Preston in Victor, Victoria (both 1982)
Preston's great turn definitely belongs more in the broad comic category, though he might also be an exception since he is allowed to have a boyfriend by film's end. Lithgow, as the NFL player turned transsexual in Garp, might be an exception. He's alive at the end, but his role is mostly played for laughs and the film never provides him with a significant other.
Another possible exception, though the film makes it unclear if she's alone at the end, though she certainly looks guilt-stricken over possible involvement in her friend Karen's death.
Ding ding ding. We have a winner. While the movie was certainly a drama, Hurt does a lot of histrionic flouncing AND he ends up dead in the end, even after his straight cellmate (Raul Julia) gives him a mercy fuck.
It was five years before another gay character earned a nomination and Davison's character got the double whammy. First, he has to watch his lover die of AIDS, leaving him alone, and then he dies as well (and not even on screen).
Here's another example of a broad performance in a drama and while Jones' character lives in the end, it is complicated by the fact that he is portrayed as a villain (and with some over-the-top gay orgy scenes that only Oliver Stone could dream up). In contrast, Joe Pesci playing the less showy gay character who does get killed, didn't earn Academy notice.
First, Dil's lover gets killed during an IRA kidnapping and then when he/she falls for his captor, Fergus (Stephen Rea) gets sent to prison and Dil waits patiently, even though Fergus shows no intention of abandoning his heterosexuality.
Gay and dead takes home the prize again, though at least Hanks' portrayal wasn't a broad one, even if Denzel Washington gave the better lead role in the film.
I don't think Kinnear's character had a significant other by film's end, but I do remember he took a bad beating.
Here is an openly gay actor nominated for portraying a true-life openly gay director. Alas, James Whale dies in the end (as he did in real life) but the real travesty was that McKellen (and Nick Nolte and Edward Norton) lost to Roberto Benigni (Life Is Beautiful).
Bates was great as a take-no-prisoners political operative working on the campaign of a Bill Clinton-like candidate. Alas, her lesbian character had principles and ended up firing a gun into her head.
Swank won the first of her two Oscars for lead actress by playing the gender-confused Brandon Teena. It also was the first of two times that Swank made it to the winner's circle by getting beaten to death.
Based on a real person, Bardem's character has to fight problems in Cuba before getting to N.Y. for one of the longest death scenes (from AIDS) I've ever seen.
The same year that the Academy snubbed Dennis Quaid for his fine work in Far From Heaven, they nominated this awful performance by the usually fine Harris as an artist dying of AIDS.
If Virginia Woolf hadn't walked herself into the river, this nomination and win probably would have never happened.
In a way, her character here is similar to the one Quaid plays in Moore's other 2002 film. She's married, but unable to accept her sexuality. By the film's end, she appears to be alone, so she gets a pass while Quaid got snubbed. It may also explain one of the rare occasions where Meryl Streep didn't get an Oscar nomination since her lesbian character in The Hours had a lover in the end and doesn't die.
Another win based on a true story. Theron took the executed lesbian serial killer right up to the winner's circle.
This may be the true exception to the rule. Based on a real life character, the story didn't follow Truman Capote to his death and he did have a longtime companion. The closest this comes is denying him his crush on the executed killer.
Two nominated performances of gay character, so the Academy got to take one of each: Gyllenhaal's character ends up dead, Ledger's ends up alone.
I'm not sure where to place this performance of an in-process transsexual. She doesn't die in the end.
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Labels: Bardem, Capote, D. Quaid, Denzel, Hanks, J. Gyllenhaal, Julia Roberts, Julianne Moore, K. Bates, Lithgow, Neil Simon, Nicole Kidman, Oliver Stone, P.S. Hoffman, Pacino, Pesci, R. Preston, Tommy Lee Jones, Whale, William Hurt
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