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The English Patient

(Best Picture, 1996)

What Should Have Won: Fargo

"The Official Story":  "Everyone loves the Oscar Sweep"...when it makes any sense. This not-so-terminal "Patient" would win in 9 of the 12 categories it was nominated for, as ---the camera doesn't lie--- everyone sat in total surprise. At least Billy Crystal was hosting that year...and he riotously places himself in a clip from The English Patient, telling Kristin Scott Thomas' character that sorry, he's hosting the Oscars this year, and frankly, she "picked a pretty bad night to die"...!

What We Think Happened:  To be candid: I really didn't like The English Patient. I just never got what all the fuss was about. By all accounts, it's a story whose lead performers did not leave you with the feeling of unconditional love that the film was allegedly telling. Seeing as an "epic love story" was the whole point of this story, what was the point of this?

Yet the film swept the Oscars. So sweeping was its win, that Juliette Binoche won as Best Supporting Actress, when everyone (including fans of The English Patient, I am sure) was rooting for Lauren Bacall to finally get her due. Here's the weird part: although The Academy voted for Fargo's Frances MacDormand as Best Actress instead of Kristin Scott Thomas, and while they chose Shine's Geoffrey Rush over Ralph Fiennes,  they decided that Juliette's supporting role deserved an Oscar over Lauren Bacall, who had already swept every other major award show, in the exact same category.

In the end, the reason this film won was because for most of the 1990's, you just "had to give Best Picture to the nominee with English accents. I have nothing against that, as log as the film in question is deserving of the honor, like some modern Shakespearean tale. Fanboys of English Patient would say it had such Shakespearean grandeur, and they would be highly exaggerating. This was hardly Shakespearean. It was a simple story about some guy who really liked this girl and also liked flying in his rickety old biplane, but, wouldn't you know, his flying skills suck. That's just not Best Picture material to me.

What Makes It So Embarrassing "Today":  Love or hate Rosie O'Donnel, this anecdote is very telling. You'd probably think the audience of a woman's talk show would be the most "into" a chick flick winning Best Picture. Yet Rosie says on her talk show the Monday after Oscar Night, that she really didn't like The English Patient. The applause she got in response was surprising...yet very telling.

Next...! : Run, Woody! Run!

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