March 1, 2004

I’m writing this at 1:40 am. So brief it shall be. There will be a Monday update, hopefully by 1pm pst. Included in that will be a look at the monumental start of The Passion of The Christ, which deserves a serious look. I’d try to write about it now, but I’m too tired to really nail it.

Oscar season came to a close in a way that seemed almost uncanny. A giant, record-making bang of a success that everyone kind of saw coming, thus turning the event of it all into a bit of a whisper. In other words, much like Return of The King itself. This is not meant to diminish the film or the awards success. But to paraphrase last year’s Oscar winner, they had it coming.

And it wasn’t just Lord of the Rings but the entire evening, where the only two surprises were not surprises at all… long-time front-runners Sean Penn and Renee Zellweger holding on to their status and taking home the gold.

For me, this whole season has been quite different than any other I’ve previously experienced. I have come to feel real affection for a number of nominees. And so the end of the awards season is a bit like ending a school year, knowing that you’ll be back next year, but not completely sure that those for whom you care will ever be in your life that way ever again.

The odd thing is that my nascent friendships with filmmakers of all stripes hasn’t really figured into my journalistic judgments. I’ve never felt a conflict, though I surely have considered the implications. Recently, a friend I speak to once a week or so and rarely see, and who may be in the Oscar race next year, questioned whether spending more time together was a good idea, in that there might be some perception that if I end up supporting the film during awards season, there might be an accusation of bias, which would diminish the value of my support. It’s an interesting problem.

So I must admit that when the Oscars were going along, while many of the people I was rooting for and who had a chance were passed by, every time Fran Walsh or Phillipa Boyens or Peter Jackson won something, I was terribly pleased for them. I’d had only minimal contact with the dynamic trio until this year’s Oscar season and when I first met Fran, her first reaction was that she never would have recognized me from my website photo. Fair (and funny) enough.

In the last three months, I’ve gotten a few opportunities to spend a little “quality” time with the trio. And what I have learned is that there is that they have a combined power that is greater than their individual powers. Not only are they a family of sorts, they are endlessly generous about making others feel a part of the family. They don’t have to… they aren’t calculating… they are just good people. And you just want to sit at them in the high school cafeteria every day and chat with Peter about movies or to talk to Phillipa about books or to catch a passing comment by Fran that is sharp enough to cut your food and funny enough to make you squirt milk through your nose.

People talk about the difficult tasks of filmmaking all the time. And Lord of the Rings was as tough as any. But when Peter accepts an award and talks about the team, it seems real. And when you meet these people, you can feel how real it is. The same seems to be true of Clint Eastwood and the team he’s worked with on movie after movie. Yet, there seems to be, at the core, the difference between command and demand.

In recent days, I’ve gotten a chance to spend a little time with Bob Pulcini (and he partner Shari Berman), Andrew Jarecki (and his hard-to-tell-she’s-pregnant-in-most-outfits wife), Sam Green from The Weather Underground doc. Each is so different, yet compelling in each their own way. Jim Sheridan (and Naomi and Kirsten and Fran) … Shohreh Agdashloo… Vadim Perelman… Meirelles… John August… Omar Sharif, even Minghella and Weir… it’s just been wonderful.

Surely, there are some who I am forgetting to include. But you get the idea. I really like these people… sometime, somehow, they became more than the sum of their resumes to me during this funny little season of ours.

More later... I have to get some sleep… Jackson, Walsh, Boyens and Company arrived at the New Line party after 1 a.m. Where were they? The One Ring fan party. I missed a chance to hang out with them because of their late arrival, but it was more than okay… it was them… it is them. What’s not to love?

More later…