January 18, 2006	Wednesday	Zilhaj 17, 1426

BEVERLY HILLS, Jan 17: A heady mix of political drama and romance — both gay and straight — won major Golden Globe Awards on Monday with ‘Brokeback Mountain’ earning the best film drama prize and ‘Walk the Line’ best musical or comedy.

‘Brokeback’, which has wowed critics and found a sizable audience at box offices with its homosexual love story, walked off with four Golden Globes, more than any movie, including best director for Ang Lee, screenplay and song.

The movie entered the show a favourite among its rivals after having been nominated in a leading seven categories, and it now becomes a clear front-runner for Oscars, the US film industry’s top awards that will be given out in March.

But ‘Walk the Line’, about the long love affair between singers Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash, may be a close No 2. It earned three Golden Globes and won trophies for stars Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon as best actor and actress in musical or comedy, respectively.

Felicity Huffman was named best actress in a film drama playing a man on the verge of a sex change in ‘Transamerica’, and Philip Seymour Hoffman was named best film actor in a movie drama for his role as author Truman Capote in ‘Capote’.

The film awards capped a night in which gay movies and characters dominated the winners circle, and the movies’ makers and actors urged audiences to see beyond the gay stories and into deeper themes of love, family ties and fearmongering.

“You can never categorize or stereotype a region or a place. People fall in love, period,” Ang Lee said backstage. This is a universal story ... I just wanted to make a love story.”

OIL, POLITICS & PALESTINIANS: But politics played a major role at the Golden Globes, too, especially early in the evening when George Clooney was named best supporting actor in a film playing a veteran CIA agent in Middle East oil drama ‘Syriana’.

“This is early, I haven’t had a drink yet,” Clooney joked when he took the stage to accept his award, the first award of the night. But he turned serious when acknowledging the film’s writer/director Stephen Gaghan, as well as Warner Independent Pictures for releasing such a politically charged film.

“These are tough questions to ask, and I’m very proud that the studios are willing to ask these questions,” he said about ‘Syriana’s’ take on the Middle East and the politics of oil.

British actress Rachel Weisz was named best supporting actress in a film drama for her portrayal of a social activist in Africa in thriller ‘The Constant Gardener’.

Palestinian film ‘Paradise Now’, which looks at why suicide bombers take their own lives and kill others, was named best foreign language film. Its director, Hany Abu Assad, called the award ‘a recognition that the Palestinians deserve their liberty and equality unconditionally’.

Golden Globe winners are chosen annually by about 85 members of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association and are widely watched as a measure of which movies will later vie for Oscars, the top US film honours voted on by some 6,000 members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Golden Globe winners often go on to win Oscars, and the stars turned out for Monday’s show in tuxedos, gowns and fine jewellery to wow viewers in some 172 countries around the world.

TOPS IN TV: Unlike the Oscars, Golden Globes also are given out for television shows, and in that arena, the ABC network swept the top categories with its hit show ‘Lost’ earning the title of best drama series and another of its top-rated programs, ‘Desperate Housewives’, taking the prize for best comedy.

Among TV winners, Geena Davis, who was named best actress in a drama series for playing the first female US president in ‘Commander In Chief’, offered audiences one of the award show’s lighter moments in an evening that held few surprises.

When she collected her trophy onstage, Geena Davis noted a young girl had tugged at her dress before the program and told her that ‘Commander In Chief’ inspired her to be president.

As the crowed sighed, Davis smiled. “Well, that didn’t actually happen,” she said. “But it could have. ... And were that to be the case, then all of this would be worth it.” —Reuters