Oscar loves a man in uniform

LOS ANGELES, Feb. 20 (UPI) -- A search for clues to help predict this year's Oscar winner for best picture turns up a long-running preference among academy voters for men -- and occasionally women -- in uniform.

Hollywood has had a long-running love affair with war stories, which have been part of the institution of storytelling's stock in trade since humans first started spinning yarns. After all, a really good story without conflict is an exceedingly rare commodity, and war furnishes storytellers with a virtually limitless supply of conflict.

War is a high-stakes proposition with a natural tendency to heighten and enhance not only the conflict at the center of a story but also the characteristics of the context in which a war is being waged. Idealism, antagonism, issues of faith and family -- the entire range of human experiences -- are on the table when people resort to desperate measures to resolve conflict.

Of course, it is not necessary for Hollywood to resort to war in the interest of compelling -- i.e. profitable -- storytelling. But even when a movie's subject is not military, per se, other kinds of uniforms often stand in.

In film, as in real life, uniforms frequently act as a symbol denoting authority. Authority typically plays an integral role in resolving conflict, and is frequently responsible for inflicting difficulty on sympathetic characters.

Take last year's best picture Oscar winner, "Gladiator."

The protagonist was the Roman General Maximus (Russell Crowe), the antagonist the illegitimate Emperor Commodus (Joaquin Phoenix). Director Ridley Scott and writer David Franzoni were kind enough to provide audiences with clear instructions as to which one was the good guy and which the villain, and that helped clarify the point of the story -- that earthly authority is a powerful force but not as powerful as moral authority.

In 1999, the Academy gave its top prize to "American Beauty" in what also amounted to a declaration of victory for moral authority. Only the antagonist -- Col. Frank Fitts, U.S.M.C (Chris Cooper) -- wore the uniform of his country.

The protagonist, Lester Burnham (Kevin Spacey) abandoned the suit-and-tie uniform of his dead-end job, trading it in -- for a time, at least -- for the uniform of a fast food restaurant worker.

As silly as Lester Burnham looked in that paper hat, he at least looked happier than he had been when he was still stuffed into a dress shirt. Col. Fitts seemed not to have enjoyed much of his life, let alone his military career.

The Oscar went to "Shakespeare in Love" in 1998, but a lot of people in Hollywood will still tell you that "Saving Private Ryan" got robbed. In any event, no less an authority figure than Queen Elizabeth herself provided the solution to everyone's problems in Marc Norman and Tom Stoppard's inventive, Oscar-winning screenplay.

"Titanic's" virtual Oscar sweep in 1997 featured a conflict between bohemian values and post-Victorian standards -- with bohemia taking a split decision. Plenty of uniforms on hand here -- worn almost exclusively by the ship's captain and crew.

In 1996, "The English Patient" provided romance, action and epic sweep in its account of a man badly burned in a plane crash and the woman who nursed him back to health. Most of the main characters were not in uniform, but their story was told against the backdrop of World War II -- possibly the most militarized period in all of human history.

"Braveheart" -- Mel Gibson's expansive take on 13th century Scottish rebel warrior William Wallace -- took the best picture Oscar in 1995.

In 1994's best picture winner, "Forrest Gump," Tom Hanks plays a slow-witted Southerner who wears a variety of uniforms -- as a University of Alabama football player, a soldier in the U.S. Army and a member of the American table tennis team in competition with the Chinese.

"Schindler's List," director Steven Spielberg's 1993 best picture winner, is set against the Nazi atrocities of World War II.

In 1992, the academy honored Clint Eastwood's "Unforgiven" with the top Oscar. Formal uniforms were scarcely in evidence, but the main antagonist, Little Bill Daggett (Gene Hackman), terrorized his community under color of law.

"The Silence of the Lambs," 1991's best picture, featured Jodie Foster as an FBI agent and "Dances with Wolves," the winner in 1990, had Kevin Costner as an idealistic Civil War-era officer who gives up his way of life to live as a Sioux Indian.

In the 1980s, the academy's preference for uniform pictures was not as pronounced. Except for "Platoon" (1986), "Gandhi" (1982) and "The Last Emperor" (1987), winners did not place much emphasis on military matters or affairs of state.

The other winners were "Ordinary People" (1980), "Chariots of Fire" (1981) "Terms of Endearment" (1983), "Amadeus" (1984), "Out of Africa" (1985), "Rain Man" (1988) and "Driving Miss Daisy" (1989).

If the academy's recent fascination with uniforms provides any clues as to this year's winner, that is probably good news for "The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring" -- since its central story has to do with an epic battle between a ragtag band of idealists and a gathering army of darkness.

"LOTR" -- as its fans have come to call the picture -- also has another bit of Oscar history on its side, the academy's tendency to give the best picture Oscar to the movie with the most nominations. This year, that would be director Peter Jackson's screen version of the first of J.R.R. Tolkien's classic literary trilogy -- the seventh movie in Oscar history to receive 13 nominations.