Timing, eh? I suppose that's one possibility:
LOS ANGELES, California (Reuters) -- Miramax Films co-chairman Harvey Weinstein was quoted Sunday as blaming the timing of the release of "Cold Mountain" for the film's failure to win an Oscar nomination in the best picture category.
In interviews with Time and Newsweek, Weinstein said he opened the highly acclaimed Civil War epic starring Nicole Kidman and Jude Law at Christmas time so that Oscar nominations would fuel box office sales.
"With the early (Oscar voting) this year, we fell short. There's a lot to do for Academy members and I don't know how many members we got to. We just plain ran out of people who had seen this movie," Weinstein told Time magazine, which hits newsstands on February 2.
Weinstein has his take, I have mine, which is that everybody had ample opportunity to see this movie and...you may want to sit down...didn't think it was worthy of Oscar consideration.
What's that? How could a film starring one Oscar winner (Nicole Kidman) , two former Oscar nominees (Jude Law and Renee Zellweger), and directed by another Oscar winner (Anthony Minghella) not automatically qualify for Best Picture consideration? Maybe because it isn't that great.
Reviews for Cold Mountain have been uniformly good, though few have sent the writers hunting through their thesauruses for new superlatives. Most have commended the film for being a well-made reworking of Homer's Odyssey and little else. That being the case, Miramax could've released it on July 4th and it wouldn't have made much difference.
Then there's the very real possibility that voters are engaging in a little retaliation for The English Patient. Whatever subliminal programming was contained on their screeners for that particular film has probably worn off by now, leaving behind a Academy that is likely more than a little pissed off at being duped into voting such a colossal snoozefest Best Picture of 1996.
Having taken great personal risks by subjecting myself to Patient without the benefit of anti-psychotic drugs, I think Minghella's penance should be to direct a series of Don Lapre infomercials. Starring Pauly Shore, Grace Jones, and Chilly - the elf who cannot love.
I agree. It was a good movie, but it was about 20 minutes longer than it should have been.