ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, February 16, 1996 TAG: 9602160081
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: TERRY LAWSON KNIGHT-RIDDER/TRIBUNE
In a pig's eye.
That would have been the general reaction had anyone been foolhardy enough to suggest last year that ``Babe,'' a movie about a talking pig's quest to avoid becoming dinner, would bring home the big bacon come Oscar nomination time.
Even Universal, the studio that released and carefully promoted ``Babe,'' spent most of its Oscar-campaign energy on ``Apollo 13,'' which won nine nominations, second only to ``Braveheart's'' 10. But ``Babe,'' produced for maybe a 10th of what it cost to make ``Apollo 13'' or ``Braveheart,'' tied with ``Sense and Sensibility'' to earn seven nominations, which proves something.
But what?
Well, it could prove that pigs have more sympathizers than previously imagined, or it could prove that academy voters and audiences alike are tired of both conventional movies and conventional wisdom. Along with ``Babe'' - now destined to sell a ton of videos when it is released this Easter and a likely candidate for re-release - the biggest beneficiaries of the announcements are most certainly ``Leaving Las Vegas,'' and ``Dead Man Walking,'' films that would have never even been made under the old Hollywood rules, much less released widely enough to reach the large audiences both have.
The true impact of this year's Oscar nominations is to clue the public to Hollywood's carefully guarded little secret: The big studios matter less every year. Witness the recent successes of Miramax, owned by Disney but allowed to operate like its formerly independent self, at the Oscar nomination game. This year, Miramax put all its resources behind the sweetly romantic ``Il Postino'' (``The Postman''), which was filmed in Italy, but not submitted in the foreign language competition because it had an English director and was made with French money.
Miramax knows how to promote little movies into big movies - it turned ``The Crying Game'' and ``Pulp Fiction'' into must-see sensations, and its publicists shamelessly worked every angle for ``Il Postino,'' especially the fact that its star and motivating spirit, Massimo Troisi, died soon after it was finished. Their efforts on behalf of ``Il Postino'' were repaid with five nominations, including a surprise Best Actor nomination for Troisi, who filled the slot most people assumed was being held for last year's best loser, John Travolta.
But ``Il Postino's'' Best Picture nomination was even more startling, because it is only the fourth time a foreign language film has been so acknowledged. None of the previous three - ``Cries and Whispers,'' ``The Emigrants'' and ``Z'' - went on to win the Oscar, but ``Il Postino'' has a serious chance.
This year's nominations also served notice once and for all that the Best Picture and Best Director categories are not meant to correlate. Although Mike Figgis and Tim Robbins were both nominated for Best Director, the films they made, ``Leaving Las Vegas'' and ``Dead Man Walking'' respectively, were not nominated for best picture.
Since the male and female leads of both pictures were all nominated, the academy could be seen as rewarding the directors for the uniformly excellent performances they elicited. So how does that explain the passing over of Ron Howard, who guided Ed Harris and Kathleen Quinlan to supporting acting nominations for ``Apollo 13,'' and Ang Lee, who did the same for nominees Kate Winslet and Emma Thompson in ``Sense and Sensibility,'' both of which also got Best Picture nods? This could be explained by the academy's voting rules, in which actors vote for actors, directors vote for directors, etc. But it could also indicate a new attitude held by academy voters, whose average age is younger and younger every year, and who vote by instinct instead of in studio-influenced blocs.
It's probably too early to declare independence, in either of the above forms, but there is one dramatic sea change that can be instantly detected by a look at this year's Oscar nominees.
It seems like only yesterday that the shortage of good roles for women had Oscar voters scrambling to find five worthy candidates. Last year, Jessica Lange was awarded the Oscar for her performance in ``Blue Sky,'' a film that had sat on a shelf for more than three years and which no one went to see after it had been dusted off.
This year, by contrast, the competition in the actress category was so intense that many of the year's most acclaimed performances, including Jennifer Jason Leigh in ``Georgia,'' Nicole Kidman in ``To Die For'' and Annette Bening in ``The American President'' were passed over. This may be bad news for those particular actresses, but it certainly bodes well for women - and movies.
LENGTH: Medium: 86 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: Babe.by CNB