Oh, please

I came across the following musing in Slate's post-Oscar conversation between its movie critics.

I sense that the culture is in full Kate Winslet backlash: The Reader is dreadful, her dress looked matronly, she wanted it too much and too openly. But much as I loathe that the road to Oscarsville is paved with Holocaust victims (and, as of this year, perpetrators), I did love hearing Kate's dad give a proud taxi-whistle from whatever remote corner of the audience he'd been plonked in. And the part of her speech about having practiced for this since age 10 in the bathroom mirror, with a shampoo bottle standing in for the statue, captured what these awards are for most of us watching them, an excuse to fantasize for a moment about being recognized as the superstar that every child knows he or she is.

To which I reply: the "culture" can stick it in its eye. I know that celebrities are genetically programmed to be attuned to cool, and that anything smacking of the merely mortal is anathema. Yes, yes. Fine. Sure. Whatever.

Now, admittedly, I am biased. I love Kate Winslet, and think she's a fantastic actress. While I didn't love her dress, it wasn't that terrible, either. And I was much less down on The Reader than most. With all of that said, I would like to voice my unambiguous preference for a movie star acknowledging that she feels exactly like every other normal human being would feel. She wanted to win, especially since she'd been nominated and lost five times already.

In contrast, let's take Angelina Jolie. She shows up at these things wearing an expression normally associated with burying animals one's pet has killed. She doesn't deign to talk to the assembled press (which I can't really blame her for, all things considered) and generally just seems to have been forced to go. That doesn't stop her from wearing a designer dress and emeralds that doubtless cost more than the GDP of Bolivia, of course. Either do like George C. Scott and boycott the thing in its entirety, or smile, dammit!