httpss://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7hMDO-7NZuM
As the final votes pour in ahead of the Academy Awards’ Tuesday afternoon deadline, Hollywood is drawing to a close an awards season that has, from Nate Parker to Mel Gibson, often been a confounding morality play.
Parker, hailed as an Oscar sure-thing at last year’s Sundance Film Festival, saw his “The Birth of a Nation” torpedoed by the fallout of a tragic 18-year-old rape allegation against him.
Just as Parker was disappearing, Mel Gibson, a pariah for the last decade, engineered an unexpected comeback that culminated with six nominations for his “Hacksaw Ridge,” including best picture.
Parker has steadily maintained his innocence, but his Facebook responses and his evasion of the topic at a press conference at the Toronto International Film Festival did little to stem the backlash against him.
Though it’s done little to upset his winning streak, Affleck has been trailed through awards season by sexual harassment allegations made against him in 2010 while directing the mockumentary “I’m Not T.” Producer Amanda White, in a civil suit, alleged Affleck made “Unwelcome sexual advances” during shooting.
“And yet even if he did what he was accused of, which was never proven in court, it is not in any way a direct parallel to what Nate Parker was accused of. Sexual harassment is not the same thing as rape.”