After a slow start in the initial Oscar contests, Hollywood’s Jewsreaffirmed their tribe’s historic resilience with a credible finish atSunday’s Academy Awards.
Host Ellen DeGeneres set the stage by noting the diversity of this year’snominees, concluding that without “blacks, Jews and gays, there would be noOscar .. or anyone named Oscar, when you think about that.”
Alan Arkin beat out the likes of Eddie Murphy and Mark Wahlberg to win thebest supporting actor award for his role as the heroin-addicted, womanizinggrandfather in “Little Miss Sunshine.”
The 72-year-old actor, director, author and musician had waited a long timefor the honor. He was first nominated for his 1966 screen debut, “TheRussians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming,” and again in 1968 for hisrole in “The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter,” but lost both times.
“An Inconvenient Truth,” Al Gore’s wake-up call on the threat of globalwarming, captured the documentary feature Oscar. Sharing the stage and theplaudits with the former vice president were the film’s exuberant directorDavis Guggenheim and producer Laurie David, wife of TV personality andwriter Larry David.
Perhaps the most surprised winner of the evening was Ari Sandel, whose “WestBank Story” made off with the Academy Award for best live action short film.
Created as a student project at USC, the 21-minute musical comedy depictsthe rivalry between the Israeli and Palestinian owners of adjoining falafelstands on the West Bank.
Their conflict is resolved with singing, dancing and a lot of hummus when anIsraeli soldier on one side falls in love with a Palestinian girl on theother side. In his acceptance speech, Sandel pointed to the more seriousaspect of his little allegory,
“This film is about hope and peace between Israelis and Palestinians,” saidthe 32-year-old director, whose father is Israeli. “So many other peoplesupport this notion, so perhaps hope is not hopeless.”
Later in a backstage interview, Sandel said, “My intention was to make amovie that Israelis and Jews would watch and find themselves liking the Arabcharacters, and that Arabs would watch and like the Israeli characters.”
“[Is the film] going to change the world or do anything else? Probably not.But you know, if you can change just a few minds…. I get e-mails from allover the world, from Israelis and Arabs, talking about how much the moviemeant to them. That’s hopeful, because otherwise there is such a sea ofnegativity out there,” Sandel said.
Israeli composer Yuval Ron wrote the songs and score for “West Bank Story.”
In the audience was British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen, but the worldwideaudience was deprived of one of his patented shticks as a faux Kazakhjournalist, since his nominated adapted screenplay for “Borat” was trumpedby the script for “The Departed,” which went on to snag the Best PictureOscar.
The Academy’s Humanitarian Award was presented to Sherry Lansing, formerhead of Paramount Studios and long active in civic and Jewish charities.
–Tom Tugend, Contributing Editor
