You MUST give back that Oscar! (Part 3)

Okay, I already tipped my #3 choice in part 1 of this story.  My God, what was going on in the late 1990's, anyway?  There were SO many poor choices made by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences!  I'd always considered the year 1956 to be the benchmark year for terrible movies that were taken terribly seriously (The Ten Commandments, The Bad Seed, The Conqueror, etc.).  And Around the World in 80 Days was selected "Best Picture".  But looking more closely now, with a bit more distance of time, it's clear that the latter-half of the 1990's will go down in history as a time when the Academy lost their collective minds.

In 1997, the front-runner in the "Best Actress" category was really anyone's guess.  The nominees were:

• Kate Winslet – Titanic
• Julie Christie – Afterglow
• Helen Hunt – As Good as It Gets
• Helena Bonham Carter – The Wings of the Dove
• Judi Dench – Mrs. Brown

It was not an epic year for actresses.  Titanic and As Good As It Gets were the only two films featuring Best Actress nominees that voters might have seen....the other three were small, "art house" films with very limited release.  Still, Julie Christie was a sentimental favorite  for her memorable performance in Afterglow-- (with her third nomination - coming 32 years after her Oscar win in 1965 for Darling and 26 years after her previous Oscar nomination in 1971).  Titanic was, of course, an enormous success--in fact, it remained the top-earning film of all time until Avatar was released in 2009.  As often is the case of mega-blockbuster films, the actors are considered incidental to the overall picture and rarely are they given the top acting awards, which didn't necessarily bode well for Kate Winslet's possible win.  Judy Dench remained a perennial nominee/winner.  Helena Bonham-Carter was nominated for a film that no one had heard of, let alone seen.  Which left Helen Hunt.

I had high hopes for As Good As It Gets, as Terms of Endearment and Broadcast News-two other films written and directed by James L. Brooks--were (and are) two of my very favorite films.  And at that time, Jack Nicholson was still attached mostly to "prestige" films.  But after just about 15 minutes into this film, I got that sinking feeling that a stink-bomb had been let loose in the theatre.  There was a stilted, phony patina to the film that seemed to get more and more oppressive as the film spun on.  Nicholson's portrayal of a..er..total, hateful asshole (sorry...can't think of a better way to put it...), who's supposed to be a "loveable curmudgeon" is anything but loveable.  And his would-be love interest in the film is a bedraggled, whiny, unpleasant single-mother/ waitress who is played in a one-note, simpering manner by the oddly detached and unlikable actress, Helen Hunt (PAGING:  MISS PALTROW, STAGE LEFT).  Her faux-sincere bag of tricks is transparent and disingenuous (as always, to this viewer). 

The film rings false on just about every important level and rarely has a "love story" been handed over to such an unbelievable pair as her and Nicholson--whose on-screen chemistry is about as potent as a day-old glass of Alka Seltzer.  And Helen Hunt's charisma-free emotings left one looking at one's watch every 4 minutes or so (people wore those things way back then).

Just after the tragic, erroneous announcement was made....check out Helena Bonham-Carter!

So, it's Oscar night, March 23, 1998.  "And the Oscar goes to....," Geoffrey Rush announced, "Helen Hunt!".  If you watch the video of the awards ceremony today, the applause seemed very tepid, sort of like a mass, "WHO the hell did we just pick??" 

Helen Hunt:  NO SHE DI INT!

Not that it's necessarily an indicator of ability or merit, really, but since that win, she's only made a handful of films, none of them with her in a consequential lead role, and only two of them (Cast Away and What Women Want) had any showing at the box office.  So, it is plain, with the passing of a decade and a half, that this win was clearly a giant aberration...a miscount...a "hanging chad," maybe?  Something went terribly wrong.  HELEN HUNT:  YOU MUST GIVE BACK THAT OSCAR!

And the Oscar REALLY goes to:  Julie Christie for Afterglow.


See also:

You must GIVE BACK THAT OSCAR! (Part...  and

You Must Give Back That Oscar! (Part 2)