Independents Get Their Day

Over at the L.A. Times, Kenneth Turan looks at this year’s Oscar nominees, and is thrilled to find so many independent features, like Brokeback Mountain, Good Night and Good Luck, Crash, and Capote. In addition, notes Turan, the Academy seemed to embrace rather than shun controversy, picking Steven Spielberg’s Munich for one of the Best Picture slots. And, he adds:

As to the commentators who hyperventilated over “Munich,” they are likely to have full-blown coronary attacks once they get a look at “Paradise Now,” the exceptional Palestinian film that is one of five nominees for best foreign-language film.

Though the category is a real tossup (all five Oscar nominees are strong enough to have U.S. distribution deals already in place), this powerful and provocative drama about the nightmare of terrorism is as involving and relevant a film as the year has produced.

Seriously, go see Paradise Now.