Mel Has No "Passion" for Oscar Ads

The Passion's not making too much of a play for Oscar.

Mel Gibson and his company, Icon Productions, have vowed not to spend a dime on advertisements hyping his religious blockbuster, The Passion of the Christ, for Academy Award consideration.

Gibson's publicist, Alan Nierob, says the ad abstention is an attempt to remove the ultra-competitive, high-stakes campaigns from the Oscar equation. Studios regularly pump millions into TV, radio and print ads trying to sway voters, and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences has been griping for years about how such campaigns tarnish the awards.

"Every studio has wanted to do this and none of them has had the guts to do it," Nierob tells E! Online. "It's basically about bringing it back to what the Academy's been talking about for many years now--taking out the competitive nature of the Oscar campaigns and getting back to. . .that camaraderie feeling that the Academy envisioned initially."

Or, as Gibson's partner at Icon, Bruce Davey, tells the Los Angeles Times, "As far as joining in a contest to see who can spend the most dollars campaigning for a film, we do not propose to enter into that game...[The Oscars] were conceived to acknowledge artistic merit and performance, not to acknowledge the ability to buy numerous ads and try to swing it one way or another."

Although Icon won't bankroll any ads, the company will host several screenings for voters and will also send out between 7,000 and 8,000 DVD copies of The Passion to members of the Academy and other Industry guilds that determine award nominees.

Not that The Passion suffers from lack of exposure.

Using a grassroots marketing strategy that targeted church groups, The Passion became one of the 10 highest grossing films of all time with more than $625 million in worldwide ticket sales. Not bad for a picture that Gibson financed by himself for $25 million and then shot entirely in the ancient languages Latin and Aramaic.

And it's not like Gibson need the hardware, either. He already owns golden guys for directing and producing 1995's Braveheart.

Nierob also played down speculation that Gibson's no-ads stance is actual a stealthy attempt to raise The Passion's profile.

"There's no other motivation here," says Nierob. "Do they think the film should be considered in all categories? Absolutely and it will be. It's not like they need the money."

Despite mixed reviews and charges of anti-Semitism, The Passion's monster box office could put it in contention in for several major prizes, including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actor for star Jim Caviezel. Nominations are due out Jan. 25.

There are also conspiracy theories floating around Hollywood suggesting that the Academy wants The Passion to score nominations to counteract any nods for Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11, thus giving both red and blue states a vested interest in the outcome.

In any case, Gibson's decision to ditch the decade-long Tinseltown trend to pour millions of dollars into "For Your Consideration" ads and sometimes hostile campaigns (see: Miramax's Shakespeare in Love vs. DreamWorks' Saving Private Ryan) has earned props from the folks behind the Oscars.

Frank Pierson, the president of the Motion Picture Academy, has frowned upon such promotional tactics and overseen rule changes seeking to limit such overblown, win-at-all-costs campaigns.

"This kind of aggressive, competitive campaigning is really destructive, and it's destructive in every sense," Pierson tells the Times. "It puts the less well-heeled at a disadvantage the same way a political campaign does for less well-heeled candidates. But I also think it wearies the public and it cheapens the whole process."

So will Mel's Passion play make any real substantive changes in the way Hollywood conducts its Oscar campaigns?

"Only time will tell," says Nierob.

In related award news, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association has deemed The Passion of the Christ ineligible for the Best Drama category because it is a non-English film. The Passion will be eligible for the Best Foreign-Language Film, as well as categories like Best Director, Best Actor and Best Screenplay. Globe nominations will be announced Dec. 16.