After the Academy Awards.

Well, please, i hope that this puts to rest any pretense that the Academy Awards have anything to do with "excellence" because if "Crash" can win....

Let's not get into that.

But liberal guilt did play a part, and Ang took home his statuette. The only real surprise was Three 6 Mafia winning for Best Song for "It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp".

(And Ang did use the word "gay" in his acceptance speech; savvy guy, that Ang, since so many gay writers have become vocal about the avoidance of the word in terms of the way "Brokeback Mountain" has been marketed.)