This year’s Oscars, a.k.a. the Academy Awards, were on Sunday, and while the event wasn’t super controversial as a celebration, several mendacious and taboo films were in the running.

“Anora” went home with the most accolades. This film is about a stripper and sex worker who manipulates a Russian oligarch’s son into marriage but is then kidnapped by goons and forced to annul the marriage. It won five Oscars: best picture, best actress, achievements in directing and editing, and best original screenplay. Both the director, Sean Baker, and its lead actress, Mikey Madison, mentioned in their acceptance speeches that they were allies to sex workers everywhere. Their intent was to ply the old feminist adage that “sex work is work.” Ironically, though, the very premise of the movie is that the sex worker wanted to be married and not have to sell herself anymore.

The early front-runner, nominated for 13 Oscars, was “Emilia Pérez.” This film is a musical set in Mexico about a cartel boss who decides that he’s really a woman. Or, as The New York Times put it, “a musical fairy tale whose songs flout rhythm and melody, and whose Mexican cartel overlord mistakes her transness for sainthood.” Humph.

“Emilia Pérez” won best musical at the Golden Globes earlier this year over the clearly better musical “Wicked.” There is nothing good or beautiful about this film, but what downgraded its plight at the Oscars was the controversial social media activity of the film’s lead, Karla Sofía Gascón — a gender-confused man who was up for a “best actress” Oscar. One interesting observation brought to light by political pundit Brett Cooper is that the implosion of this woke film’s chances was likely caused by a competing film’s PR team. On top of that, the French director of the film had the audacity to insult Spanish-speaking people by calling their lingo the language of the poor. In the end, the film won best supporting actress and best original song.

It’s here I would like to interject the fact that Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande, the stars of “Wicked,” performed the Academy’s opening number with a tribute to all the antecedent “Wizard of Oz” musicals. Even the Oscars didn’t want to suffer through musical numbers from “Emilia Pérez.”

While most of the acceptance speeches weren’t particularly political, there were three that did venture into that territory to varying degrees. Adrian Brody, winner of the best actor Oscar and star of the three-hour epic film “The Brutalist,” condemned anti-Semitism — a main theme in his film — but also had to throw race bait in there as well for “a healthier and a happier and a more inclusive world.”

Daryl Hannah, while presenting an award, said “Slava Ukraine” before getting on with her presentation speech.

Finally, the activist filmmakers of the best documentary film “No Other Land” gave an entire screed against the war in Gaza and criticized the Trump administration for siding with Israel and ostensibly preventing a two-state solution. Israeli journalist Yuval Abraham stated:

We made this film, Palestinians and Israelis, because together, our voices are stronger. We see each other, the destruction of Gaza and its people, which must end, the Israeli hostages, brutally taken in the crime of October 7, which must be freed.

When I look at Basel [Adra, my co-director], I see my brother — but we are unequal.

We live in a regime where I am free under civilian law and Basel is under military laws that destroy his life and he cannot control, there is a different path. There is a political solution without ethnic supremacy, with national rights for both of our people. And I have to say, as I’m here, the foreign policy in this country is helping to block this path.

Why? Can’t you see that we are intertwined, that my people can be truly safe if Basil’s people are truly free and safe? It’s not too late for life for the living.“

The team behind #NoOtherLand accepts the #Oscar for best documentary and speaks about the Iraeli-Palestinian conflict pic.twitter.com/3ilRwmdkzf

— The Hollywood Reporter (@THR) March 3, 2025

The most wholesome moment of the night came later during Kieran Culkin’s acceptance speech. He won best supporting actor for his role in "A Real Pain.” He told a really sweet and funny story about how his wife jokingly promised him last year that they could have a third baby if he won an Emmy. He did end up winning that Emmy, and he told his wife that he’d also love a fourth kid. She said she’d entertain a fourth kid should he win an Oscar. He ended with this hilarious conclusion to his wife: “I just have this to say to you, Jazz, love of my life, ye of little faith: No pressure. I love you. I’m really sorry I did this again. And let’s get crackin’ on those kids. What do you say? I love you!”

Those who viewed this 97th Oscars felt that not only were the celebrities still stuck in their echo chambers, but the films were exceptionally poor offerings. Practically no one had seen most of these films, with the exceptions of “Wicked” and “Dune 2.” The rest of the movies were either expressly anti-American or anti-Western culture, which even warranted censure from New York Times critic Wesley Morris.

Morris lamented:

But maybe, more than any other year since the Oscars came into my life, this group [of movies] declares that the old American film industry is broken, possibly forever. And not only because people keep telling me how they don’t care about most of the nominees or that they haven’t seen most of them. When you ask them which movies they’d swap in, they really don’t have much. You can’t blame these movies for our diminished viewing habits or the industry’s evident allergy to a narrative diet of characters and ideas.

While we’d like to hope that film — this uniquely American art form — isn’t dead, it doesn’t stand a chance of reviving while woke, leftist Hollywood cannot connect with audiences. The Oscars were merely a symptom of the continuing problem.