The following article, from the Associated Press, signals good news for independent productions, but it could mean the lowest ratings ever for tomorrow’s Academy Awards. How about you? Will you be tuning in tomorrow night?
By David Germain, Associated Press
The Oscars are as establishment as it gets in the entertainment world. So it’s a triumph of art over commerce that low-budget, fierce dramas such as the cowboy romance ”Brokeback Mountain,” the ensemble tale ”Crash,” the Truman Capote story ”Capote” and the Edward R. Murrow saga ”Good Night, and Good Luck” are the awards darlings this time over the escapist blockbusters that often rule.
”It doesn’t have anything to do with the budget of the film. It has to do with the scope and scale of ambition, and the skill that people brought to it to realize that ambition,” said James Schamus, a producer of best-picture front-runner ”Brokeback Mountain.”
”None of these films is small in what they’re trying to accomplish,” he said.
Those films — along with their fellow best-picture nominee, the assassination thriller ”Munich” — had rung up $230 million in domestic grosses as of a week before the Oscars. Last year’s best-picture nominees tallied $315 million and together drew the smallest audiences among key Oscar contenders in 20 years.
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