The Academy Awards were predictably obsessed with “”Milk”” and “”Frost/Nixon,”” films on subjects that Oscar types love to fawn over. Yet the Hollywood enclave’s skewed worldview was displayed with magnum force as “”Gran Torino”” got kicked to the curb. Not only was this probably the last chance to give Clint Eastwood an acting Oscar for his gloriously gruff performance as Korean vet Walt Kowalski, but beneath the movie’s annihilation of political correctness were excellent messages of the dangers of vigilantism, immigrant assimilation, understanding the common principles among different cultures, and a great heroic story. The film also presented the America-friendly Hmong community for the first time in a popular film, yet the Fords, racial slurs, and Pabst Blue Ribbon cans were apparently too much for Hollywood’s refined tastes. “”Gran Torino”” received nary a nomination, and the academy continued in its effort to become more laughably absurd than Tom Cruise’s credits dance in “”Tropic Thunder.””

– Daniel Greenberg is a political science junior.