Roughly halfway through yesterday’s Central Command briefing,
Gen. Tommy Franks departed from matters of military forces and
launched into a short criticism of “Bringing Down The House,” the
latest Steve Martin film. Gen. Franks attacked the movie as lacking
decent cinematography, being devoid of a quality soundtrack and
having no coherent moral message. Gen. Franks suggested that the
film could be made better with a few cruise missiles and apache
helicopters.

No, not really.

But reality produced an equally absurd situation Sunday evening
when filmmaker Michael Moore chose to dedicate his Academy Award
acceptance speech to criticizing Operation Iraqi Freedom:

“We like non-fiction and we live in fictitious times. We live in
a time where we have fictitious election results that elect a
fictitious president. We live in a time where we have a man sending
us to war for fictitious reasons, whether it’s the fictition (sic)
of duct tape or the fictition of orange alert. We are against this
war Mr. Bush! Shame on you Mr. Bush! Shame on you! And any time
you’ve got the Pope and Dixie Chicks against you, your time is
up.”

Just as Gen. Franks is yielded a strong international pulpit for
the understood purpose of discussing war, Mr. Moore was yielded a
strong international pulpit for the understood purpose of
discussing entertainment.

When it comes to evaluating cinema, Gen. Franks’ opinion is no
more valued than that of the average citizen. And so, when it comes
to international affairs, Mr. Moore’s opinion should receive
equally hollow attention.

And as for those bleeding-heart liberals who will shamefully cry
out in the name of freedom of speech, a gentle reminder is in
order: that freedom is a guarantee of being able to express one’s
opinion, not a guarantee of an audience. Mr. Moore failed to show
any comprehension of this constitutional check on the speech of
lunatics like himself and grossly abused his pulpit
accordingly.

Mr. Moore, however, did not produce the only political message
of the evening. The mere ceremony was, in and of itself, a message.
As many cried for the show to be canceled or delayed in recognition
of the war, the Oscars went on in defiance.

This was the proper decision.

Events were cancelled in the wake of Sept. 11, 2001 for two
reasons. First, competitions — whether they were football games or
awards shows — seemed far too petty and insignificant while people
were still mourning. Second, an actual security risk was thought to
exist as America adjusted to the new threat at home.

Neither of these situations existed Sunday evening. Rather,
troops are overseas fighting for a way of life that celebrates such
petty yet amusing television programs as a form of escapist
entertainment. In fact, these Oscars would not have ever been
broadcast had they been Iraqi.

You see, these Academy Awards celebrated the art of director
Roman Polanski, an American fugitive of justice. In Iraq,
state-censored television would not permit the honoring of a
convict’s work.

When Mr. Polanski won Best Director honors for his film, “The
Pianist,” a standing ovation ensued.

This was truly an “Only in America” moment; practically nowhere
else would someone wanted for statutory rape receive such an honor.
And although this was a very vocal exercise of that freedom of
expression that our soldiers are fighting for today, it was not
necessarily a tasteful one.

The award was bestowed upon Mr. Polanski despite his film’s not
winning Best Picture honors. This would indicate that the Academy
was perhaps giving credit to the director not just for “The
Pianist” but also for the totality of his career that includes
films like “Tess” and “Chinatown.”

However, Martin Scorsese, someone with an equally storied
directing history (“Raging Bull,” “Goodfellas,” “The Last
Temptation of Christ”) was also nominated in the category. Mr.
Scorsese has, to the public’s knowledge, never slept with a
thirteen-year-old girl. Mr. Scorsese is not a convict. If the
Academy were interested in bestowing lifetime achievement honors
via the directing award, Mr. Scorsese would have been a far more
wise and tasteful choice.

But the Academy instead chose to show a total disregard for
personal histories by bestowing the high honor upon the exiled Mr.
Polanski. Ironically, this move just serves to show how unwelcome
personal politics, like those of Mr. Moore, are on Oscar night.

Mac VerStandig ([email protected]) is a former
syndicated film critic and a freshman majoring in rhetoric.