A.I. Artificial Intelligence: I watched this film so many times at one point. I was caught up in the story, the visuals, the journey, even though it was a depressing movie, there was something about it that touched my heart when I first saw it and did for several viewing. However, now that I've seen a handful of Stanley Kubrick films, I wonder what he would've done with this story. What aspects of it would he have explored? How would he handle the flesh fair, the journey into Man-Hattan? Spielberg's take keeps some of Kubrick's spirit, but now that I think about it, it feels very sentimental and somewhat safe. There are still things I love about this movie. Teddy is still an adorable character, I love Jude Law's performance, the world created around it, the visuals, Dr. Know (I still have a soft spot for Robin Williams), and Haley Joel Osment was one hell of a child actor. I just wonder how much more could've been explored with it.
Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone: Funny story, when I was younger, I didn't want to miss out on this film, but my parents told me they wouldn't take me unless I read the book, so I picked it up three weeks before the film was released, and finished it about five days later. From then on I became a die hard fan of Harry Potter, devoured the first four books in less than two months, and read the last three as they were released. I saw the film so many times when it came out on DVD, and I really enjoyed the adventure. It's so faithful to the book, and that's one thing I enjoyed about it, but now that I think back on it, I think the fact that this film was so faithful to the book worked to its disadvantage. It's a fun fantasy adventure, but I feel that they missed a golden opportunity to dig a little deeper into the characters, into the world, into some other possibilities just because they wanted to incorporate the entire plot and please fans with it. Of course, from the third movie onward, the films followed the books a little less religiously and that allowed for some exploring of themes, and I love how those movies have matured. I still very much enjoy this one, and there are certain scenes and performances that are just a joy to watch (Alan Rickman is my favorite actor in this series, tough that may be because Snape is my favorite character). Also, this along with another film that I'll get to later gave a re-birth to fantasy franchises that have plagued the cinema in the last decade.
Gosford Park: This is the first Robert Altman film I ever saw, and I may need to give it another viewing, because I remember how much his ensemble style of characters talking over one another bothered me (and it's bothered me in some of his other films), but I remember being very impressed by the story and the performances in this film. There's a humor present in the British traditions, the system of masters and servants, and I love how we see it all from the eyes of one servant girl (played by Kelly Macdonald, first time I'd ever seen her and I was very impressed). The film is worth watching. It's sort of an Agatha Christie murder mystery with the Robert Altman style of characters (without an actual detective).
I am Sam: I need to talk about this film because I loved it for a really long time. Yes, it's sappy, it's not really realistic, and it's pretty irritating at times, but when I first saw it I found it very moving. It was the first performance I'd seen from Sean Penn (I'm better educated on him now, don't worry), and I was very impressed. I saw it at a time when I was obsessed with stories about people with mental and neurological disorders, such as Rain Man, Forrest Gump, Shine, and another film I'm going to mention later, and this one stayed with me for a while. I still love the opening with Sam organizing the cream and sugar packets at Starbucks (my sister is particularly fond of that opening), I discovered a lot of Beatles songs because of this film (I tracked down the original recordings by the Beatles of course), and it was the first performance I'd seen from Dakota Fanning, and was very impressed (before her cute little girl who is smarter than all the adults act got tired). I still found flaws with pacing back then, but despite its flaws, this is a film I can't help loving. Maybe it was just lucky I was still young enough to enjoy it back then.
Now, onto the Top Ten:
#10. The Majestic: I think this film is criminally underrated. It's a throwback to the classic Frank Capra films, about ordinary men who do extraordinary things. This one gets a little too schmaltzy at the end with the courtroom scene, but everything before it is beautiful. The colorful 1950's setting of a small town outside of Los Angeles that looks sort of like a movie set, and the people who look like they belong in an episode of I Love Lucy. It's a film that was made to inspire nostalgia, and even though I wasn't around during those times, I've seen enough films of those times to realize what they evoke. It was also a film that made me further respect Jim Carrey as an actor. I'd seen The Truman Show earlier, the first film that made me see him as a serious actor, and this performance is another one where he controls his schtick and energy to just give us a character. Frank Darabont is very good at telling stories. With The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile as proof, I think this one should've gotten more credit.
#9. In the Bedroom: What got me about this film was its quiet intensity and the way these characters hit breaking points. It's a simple story about a college boy who has an affair with an older married woman, and then has to deal with the woman's husband, and the consequences fall on the boy's parents. Those roles belong to Tom Wilkinson and Sissy Spacek. Tom Wilkinson carries his portion of the movie on his shoulder, You don't take your eye off him, even when he's about to do something unspeakable, and even though Sissy Spacek has some screaming scenes that can make you cringe, it's those moments when she doesn't say anything, or says very little in which she really lets you into her character. She's unforgiving, she's passionate, she's strict, but she's loyal and loving. It's a tough film to watch, but one that is really worth your time. I only discovered it three years ago myself, and it was worth it.
#8. Ocean's Eleven: This is a film I can watch so many times and I'll always enjoy it. What really carries this movie is the cast. It includes some of the biggest names in Hollywood, and some character actors here and there, but this is not a films where these men try to display their acting talents. They're all having fun. They all play off each other beautifully, they create moments of comic genius, and as the heist unfolds they keep you guessing. I remember when I first saw it, I enjoyed from the get-go. And then I bought the DVD, saw it quite a few times, started memorizing the dialogue, and realized how witty and suave the script is. I love the little moments between character where they tease each other, or ask about their wives, or what they heard about other people. Even though we're dealing with criminals and gamblers, the environment is friendly and cool. I love that about this film.
#7. A Beautiful Mind: This is a film that has lost some value on me with repeat viewings, but it was a very important film for me. It's the other film about a person with a mental disorder, but this is a true story about a man who despite that managed to win the Nobel Prize. It's a film that inspired me to want to do something great in the field I'm going in. When I first saw it back then I saw it as that, a film about a man whom I considered an inspiration. Now that I look at it withing filmmaking qualities, I see that it's a film that doesn't take a lot of chances with its subject. Ron Howard is a director who likes to play things close to the chest, never having the audience feel like they're in too much danger, and that's okay, it's his choice, though it's hard to wonder whether there are any missed opportunities. Still, I think the film works as a thriller, because it plants the question of what is real and what is in his mind. I love how the audience comes to care about what we learn is in his head, and at one point it kind of backfired, because I was asking John Nash not to ignore his friend, because even if he didn't exist, he existed for him and had a personality. The film works because it creates an emotional response with the audience and it keeps the audience guessing. I loved this film when I first saw it back in 2001, and even though it doesn't hold the same value now, I still think it's a worthy film.
#6. Monsters Inc: Yes, I know, me and Pixar. What can I say? They're amazing. I saw this film at a VIP theater, and what I loved most about this film were the characters and the originality of the world. I loved the concept of a monster world living in our closets and having to scare little children to get their electricity. The various characters and many ways they scare is fun to watch, and I find the story itself to be adorable. It's a buddy comedy, but it's also a father-daughter love story between a monster and a human child, and I loved what that created for the Sully character (voiced by John Goodman). This film has so much heart, but what wowed me the most when I first saw it was the action sequence on the doors in which they were looking for Boo's door throughout a parade of doors. I think it is, to this day, the most original sequence I've seen in an animated film.
#5. Shrek: I cannot believe it's been eight years since I first saw this. I still remember the movie-going experience with my parents quite vividly. My parents saw it with me and my sister, expecting a nice little Disney-type animated film, with some sweet original songs, a sweet story, lovable characters, you know, the way Disney made them (not that they didn't love those movies) but they were not prepared for what they got, and come to think of it, neither was I. I grew up on Disney, and I was really impressed with how this film turned everything I grew up with on its head, making an ogre into a hero, and breaking quite a few fairy tale rules. I wonder what Walt Disney would've thought of Shrek. Anyway, my dad was sold as soon as the Dragon falls in love with Donkey. I was sold from the minute Donkey opened his mouth and Eddie Murphy made me laugh for an hour-and-a-half, but I was also taken in by the originality of the story and the characters. Yes, it spawned some horrible Dreamworks films that focus on pop culture references rather than story, but that takes no merit away from this gem of a movie, which made a big splash when it first came out in 2001, had me and nearly everyone I knew talking about it, and I enjoy it all the more to this day. It's also one of the few films in which I really like the Spanish dubbing (I love how Mexican Donkey is).
#4. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring: I actually hated this film when I first saw it in theater. I thought it was too long, too slow, and way too intense. I loved the opening, but I had felt it went downhill from there. After repeat viewing, it grew on me, and now that I've seen all three of the Lord of the Rings films together, I can say I truly love it. It's the beginning of the adventure and it took us three years to complete this adventure on the screen. That's another reason why I love 2001. With this, Shrek, Harry Potter and a few other films, fantasy came back to the movies after it had been somewhat absent for a while in favor of science fiction, and it brought us an adventure that most people didn't want t leave. Unlike Harry Potter, I haven't actually read these books (well, I started once, I couldn't get through it), but I was taken in by the rich detail in every character, every performance, every setting, the creation of this world, it's the reason why I watch movies and what I love most about going to the movies. Even though some of the over-emphasizing in exposition in certain scenes is overbearing, and some sequences go on for too long, it's a fantastic journey, and nowadays, every time I see this film, I have to put the other two right away, because it's an adventure I always want to see through to the end.
#3. Ghost World: This film never came to Mexico. I discovered it last year when I went on a renting spree, and I had heard about this film, so I decided to give it a go. I don't know what it is about this film that makes me care for two girls who do nothing but torture and play pranks. Maybe what I had learned about character archs and individual journeys, as well as the humor in so many of the scenes, made me root for Enid, a girl who was so lost in the world she inhabited that she spent all her time mocking the people in it, until she comes to care for one of those people, more than she ever had before. Character actor Steve Buscemi gives the best performance Í've ever seen out of him. It's a much more subdued performance than the ones we usually see from him and he nails it. I can't believe he didn't get an Oscar for this (or at least a nomination), and Thora Birch is amazing in the lead role. She manages to find layers to this little bitch that were just not present in the graphic novel it is based on (which I just read for an adaptation class). There's also a scene-stealing performance by Illeana Douglas as a pretentious High School art teacher who mentors Enid into the possibility of art school. Also, the film is very quotable, which is something I love in movies.
#2. Memento: I discovered this film about a year before I went into college, and I was very impressed by the structure and the complexities of the film. I loved the backward narrative and the alientaing sense of not knowing what the hell is going on, and the added frustration of following a character whom we can't trust because he doesn't know what the hell is going on, and if he does, he forgets it before he can make any sense out of it. After a few more viewings, I found myself noticing more details in the film, finding intriguing character traits and making sense out of the story of Sammy Jankis and of Leonard himself. By the time I saw this film, I had already seen Insomnia and Batman Begins, so I already knew what Christopher Nolan could do with suspense in a narrative such as this. He creates such an obscure world where characters try to take control of something much larger than themselves, and in this case, with a handicap. Leonard Shelby tattoos himself with information, takes photos, writes things down, he does whatever it takes to keep his world in order, but he doesn't remember where the information came from or what exactly it meant. He only has his system to trust, and we learn his system isn't very reliable. Guy Pearce takes us into the mind of this character, as far as he can take us, because we know more than he does about what happens next, and we have the rest of the characters filling in some blanks, with incredible performances by Joe Pantoliano and Carrie-Ann Moss. This would probably be my favorite film of 2001, if I didn't have a long history with the following film.
#1. Moulin Rouge!: This film is visual ecstasy. It's got so much style and so much flare that it's often hard not to be taken in by the music, the colors, the dancing, the characters, even in a paper-thin plot such as this one. I had mixed feelings about this film when I first saw it, loving the first half and hating the second half, but then I saw it many times, and the entire film grew on me. Baz Luhrman's manic style of directing and his love of this colorful world, it became something I couldn't get enough of. I remember this cruise I went to with my grandmother and cousin where they played this film so many times on the TV, in a different language every day (though never English) and since they kept the songs in the original language, we watched the films so many times in French, Spanish, Italian and German, and I never got tired of it. I don't think Nicole Kidman has ever looked more beautiful with that stunning red hair and her movements, it was hard not to fall in love with her. And Ewan McGregor's singing is truly amazing. His pipes, his charsma, his ability to play the straight man amongst this cast of lunatics is part of what kept me invested in his story. Outstanding work also from the hilarious John Leguizamo, the larger-than-life Jim Broadbent, and the mousy but no less threatening Duke, played by Richard Roxborough. This film may be spectacle, but it's a dazzling film, one that you can almost become addicted to. You laugh, you cry, you're dazzled, and you never forget it (at least I haven't).
Other films from this year that I saw in later years were The Royal Tennenbaums (which I thought was funny and moving with great performances, but really slow and at times pretentious), The Man Who Wasn't There (which I really need to see again, though I remember really liking it), Black Hawk Down (not that big a fan, but it's an achievement in action sequences), and I still need to finish Amelie and Mulholland Drive (two films I couldn't see all the way through for unusual circumstances). There are probably still many more films from the year I have yet to see, and I long to discover them. Any reccomendations from the rest of you? Any thoughts? Are there any other years you'd like me to evaluate in terms of the movies? Any years you'd like to talk about? I'll do more of these, and I may evaluate some films I've seen from decades before I was born. It's a great road to travel, discovering movies and remembering them.
