LAFCA: Why we vote

Some awards groups — the Hollywood Foreign Press Assn. and HFPA wannabe Broadcast Film Critics Assn. (now there’s an oxymoron if ever there was) take some pleasure in proclaiming themselves Oscar barometers. As if that’s a good thing.

I’m not setting up the Los Angeles Film Critics Association as a pure-as-snow alternative, but I would say the group doesn’t give much thought whether Oscar voters are going to agree with us. (It should be noted that I’m a member of LAFCA, as is my colleague, Bob Strauss.)

The idea is to vote for the year’s best. And if some of our winners — say, best actress winner Vera Farmiga — don’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell in being nominated by the Academy … well, really, who cares? She gave a fearless performance in the addiction drama “Down to the Bone.” And maybe by recognizing her, the film — and the performance — will be seen by people outside of New York and Los Angeles.

Likewise, voting Werner Herzog’s masterful “Grizzly Man” as best documentary is a middle finger to the short-sighted nimrods who didn’t deign to include the film among the 15 finalists for the documentary Oscar. But that’s not why we gave “Grizzly Man” the award. It just happens to the best doc of the year, maybe even the best picture, even if dilligent family-values groups couldn’t find a way to love its unpredictable bears as they did the seasonally monogamous birds in “March of the Penguins.”

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