Top ten reasons to refrain from suicide.
I had to wait until the end of January to compile a Ten Best list, as I am usually at least a month behind the times. Note that:
A) A few of these films were released elsewhere previously, but had their first U.S. release in 2006.
B) I have not seen plenty of movies that are supposed to be good, like Babel, The Queen and Letters From Iwo Jima.
So here goes.
When the lights came up at the conclusion of Children Of Men, I was a jiggling heap of tension and sobs. OK, so I wasn't sobbing, but I did feel that anybody within reach was in danger of getting smacked in the face if they made any sudden moves.
Cuarón directs his childless dystopia with tremendous balls. It's bravado, "look at me" filmmaking, but somehow never distractingly desperate for attention. Rather, the film feels like the long awaited radical response to the here and now, a period of history that is defined by its extremes. Unapologetically prescient, Cuarón has crafted a terrifying endorsement of activism in the face of insurmountable human evil.
And though mired in all that bullshit, the film still feels deeply personal. What it nails so beautifully is the specifics of a life in which it's so easy to enjoy the fruits of inaction. The government isn't marching you off to a gas chamber, so life is pretty good. The film knows how significant it all is, but then, so do I. From its jarring first scene to its maddeningly unsatisfying ending, the film is as certain to be as simultaneously relevant and timeless as two films to which it is indebted, Brazil and The Battle of Algiers.
2) Block Party (Michel Gondry)
I was convinced that this movie would be huge. The trailer alone is enough to put a smile on your face ("Attention Huxtables..."), and when you combine that with Dave Chappelle's burgeoning superstardom and a director who has yet to do wrong (note that I haven't seen The Science of Sleep), how could it miss?
Well, artistically, it didn't. Shot in 2004, the film follows Dave as he recruits a few busloads of Midwesterners to come to Brooklyn and watch an amazing concert, including performances by Mos Def, Jill Scott, The Roots, Dead Prez, and a little band called The Fugees. Dave is laconic and hilarious, the music is incredible, and the film is beautifully photographed. I love 16mm film.
There is no particular drama to speak of, unless unexpected rain counts as drama (which it does). The film is sometimes political, but it's strongest at conveying a sense of celebration and, above all, inclusiveness. Is that a word?
Here is music that is skillfull and intelligent, that bears little to no resemblance to the jiggling booties and bling bling that you'd find on BET on any given afternoon. It's a shame that that BET crowd or the TRL crowd or the "Chappelle's Show" crowd (read: frat boys) or the AARP crowd didn't turn out in droves. Because this is really a movie for everyone.
Oh and and and people were bopping their heads and stomping their feet in the theater. Which was really lovely.
3) Shortbus (John Cameron Mitchell)
In a year that brought us Ted Haggard's platonic massages, Mark Foley's "overly friendly" instant messages, and Dustin Diamond's filthy latino pal, let's not underestimate the value of a healthy attitude towards sex. Though childlike in its wonder, Shortbus is a film of boundless maturity when it comes to the issues that surround the putting of dingles into hoo-has (and occasionally poop-chutes).
Shot on glorious 16mm (IMDb says 35mm, but I heard John Cameron Mitchell say otherwise on Elvis Mitchell's The Treatment), Shortbus has an actual indie feel to it (as opposed to a "Sundance Indie"), due in large part to the clunky performances by unknowns and the intermingling of their plot threads. But even the terrible acting is endearing in its earnestness, and the weaving in and out of particular stories works really well because of the skill with which it's all centered around the Shortbus club, a hangout/orgy space for sexually adventerous New Yorkers.
Mitchell has made a film that reclaims sex, not only from evangelicals who would have you deny its existence, but also from mindless pornography (and the children's entertainment that has come to resemble it). The sex here is very real. It is messy, confusing, juicy, and joyful. With the spunky attitude of a Saturday morning cartoon and the precision of a manifesto, Mitchell has created one of the most hopeful films of the year.
In fact, the film also has one of the best renditions of the "Star Spangled Banner" that I've heard, and when you couple that with the fact that the film serves as a response to the more pornographic elements of our culture, it almost sounds like a conservative's dream! Get Bill O'Reilly on the phone. This movie is on the front lines of the culture war with him.
Note: I know that these clubs do exist. And I am sure that they are scary, scary places, with little of the gaiety and hilarity that the Shortbus club leads us to believe we'd find. But the fact that the film makes the place believable, and turns a carniverous three-way makeout session into one of the most touching moments I've seen on film this year, is to be commended.
4) Jackass Number Two (Jeff Tremaine)
Speaking of maturity and precision, there's Jackass Number Two. No... really...
In September, Greg Boardman, a theater owner in Hoopeston, Illinois closed his theater for a week rather than show Jackass Number Two, Beerfest, or The Covenant, saying that he was "pissed off" at the "lousy material" Hollywood was foisting upon him. What's worse, the jokey media coverage of the decision never called the man's taste into question. "Well, of course the movies are lousy," the stories seemed to say, "and here's a guy who's standing up for decent American values."
Now, I didn't see The Covenant. Or Beerfest. But I will say this. By denying the people of Hoopeston the unadulterated jubilation that is Jackass Number Two, Boardman did his community a disservice. Number Two contains some of the more revolting sequences ever committed to film I guess, but it's also got huge leaps of creativity. In a world glutted with CGI, where no images, however convincing, can be trusted, these guys are concerned only with what is real, what is actually happening in front of the camera at this moment.
OK, so maybe it's not mature. But that's the point, isn't it? Here are guys that are willing to do anything, anything, in the service of their reversion to a fetal state of pain and shit-eating. It's primal, and the audience with whom I saw it was roaring with disgust and incredible appreciation. It was the most fun I've had in a theater all year.
And what of Greg Boardman? Obviously, he has the right to show whatever films he wants to show. Wouldn't it be great if he had groown so sick of the Hollywood system that he chose to reopen as a repertory theater, showing restored Billy Wilder films and decent prints of Truffaut or Kurosawa? Maybe a little 70mm action? Or if he decided to seek out independent films by local talent, creating a bustling art house that would bring the avant garde to Hoopeston?
Boardman reopened the following week with Invincible and Open Season.
Note: I am not just being an asshole. I saw Invincible, and it was manipulative Disney sports porn (sporn?).
5) The Departed (Martin Scorsese)
The Departed is a display of such sheer goddamn competence (and I mean that in a good way) that it reminds you, in a year full of Inside Mans, Casino Royales, and Da Vinci Codes, that a thriller is best served thrilling. The performances are amazing ("Mark Whalberg stands out" is a sentence I never thought I'd say), the direction is fluid and dynamic, and the script is compelling. It's one of the only movies of the year that I felt like seeing twice.
6) L'Armée Des Ombres (Army of Shadows) (Jean-Pierre Melville)
I feel inadequate to the task of describing how this film has been stuck in my brain for six months. Melville's account of the French Resistance is maddeningly quiet (as are Melville's zany heist films), but the discipline with which it's all staged and photographed is a perfect vehicle to showcase the discipline required of the film's tragic characters.
7) Brick (Rian Johnson)
My initial reaction to Brick was a simple, "That was cool." On reflection (and second viewing), it's clear that the film captures so perfectly the key idea of film noir and, more importantly, the novels from which it was birthed.
And the idea is this: A man alone. In every sense of the word.
8) The Proposition (John Hillcoat)
Reviewed here.
9) Little Children (Todd Field)
It's official. I love Kate Winslet.
OK, now that that's out of the way. Little Children is Todd Field's poignant and focused observation of the lives of a few adulterous stay-at-home parents. The affair provides the foreground action for a portrait of a New England suburb living in fear of a recently released sexual deviant. Is that an OK word to use? Deviant? I'm not sure.
The film is melodramatic and the climax is deeply problematic, but in the end it earns its melodrama through an investment in character that is usually missing from these "blow the lid open on perfect suburban life" type things. They're not all on pills and they're not all sleeping with their teenage daughters (I'm looking at you, The Quiet).
Above all though, Field and Tom Perrotta, on whose book it's based, are deeply compassionate towards their subjects. There are no monsters here: not the sexual predator (?) or the meathead cop out to get him. There are no innocents either, as Winslet's Sarah and Wilson's Brad turn out to be enormously selfish, and recognizably human, characters.
Well maybe the little children are innocent. Wait... little children... Little Children... ooooooooooohhhhhhhhhh.
This film would make a great double feature companion to Shortbus. I'm just saying.
Oh, and there's a killer voice over narration, maybe the best since Alec Baldwin took the mic in The Royal Tenenbaums.
10) Temporada De Patos (Duck Season) (Fernando Eimbcke)
And we round out the list with a film that Cuarón produced. Way to go, you Mexican bastard. Keep importing nice little indies and lending credibility to our children's fantasy franchises, and maybe the Bush administration won't kick you out. Or at least you can be part of our "guest worker program".
Charming and well photographed, sure, but Duck Season is also really well observed. I mean, here are middle class kids (in Mexico, how novel) who are more concerned with Xbox and pizza than they are with girls and family. It's a really wrenching look at why these two kids are so disaffected, but it avoids being "ABOUT A GENERATION" in big letters and somehow remains (like Children Of Men) deeply personal. Recommended.
I am aware of the lack of diversity represented above. All of the directors are men, and for this I am sorry. To whom, I'm not really sure.
A) A few of these films were released elsewhere previously, but had their first U.S. release in 2006.
B) I have not seen plenty of movies that are supposed to be good, like Babel, The Queen and Letters From Iwo Jima.
So here goes.
**************************************
1) Children Of Men (Alfonso Cuarón)When the lights came up at the conclusion of Children Of Men, I was a jiggling heap of tension and sobs. OK, so I wasn't sobbing, but I did feel that anybody within reach was in danger of getting smacked in the face if they made any sudden moves.
Cuarón directs his childless dystopia with tremendous balls. It's bravado, "look at me" filmmaking, but somehow never distractingly desperate for attention. Rather, the film feels like the long awaited radical response to the here and now, a period of history that is defined by its extremes. Unapologetically prescient, Cuarón has crafted a terrifying endorsement of activism in the face of insurmountable human evil.
And though mired in all that bullshit, the film still feels deeply personal. What it nails so beautifully is the specifics of a life in which it's so easy to enjoy the fruits of inaction. The government isn't marching you off to a gas chamber, so life is pretty good. The film knows how significant it all is, but then, so do I. From its jarring first scene to its maddeningly unsatisfying ending, the film is as certain to be as simultaneously relevant and timeless as two films to which it is indebted, Brazil and The Battle of Algiers.
2) Block Party (Michel Gondry)
Well, artistically, it didn't. Shot in 2004, the film follows Dave as he recruits a few busloads of Midwesterners to come to Brooklyn and watch an amazing concert, including performances by Mos Def, Jill Scott, The Roots, Dead Prez, and a little band called The Fugees. Dave is laconic and hilarious, the music is incredible, and the film is beautifully photographed. I love 16mm film.
There is no particular drama to speak of, unless unexpected rain counts as drama (which it does). The film is sometimes political, but it's strongest at conveying a sense of celebration and, above all, inclusiveness. Is that a word?
Here is music that is skillfull and intelligent, that bears little to no resemblance to the jiggling booties and bling bling that you'd find on BET on any given afternoon. It's a shame that that BET crowd or the TRL crowd or the "Chappelle's Show" crowd (read: frat boys) or the AARP crowd didn't turn out in droves. Because this is really a movie for everyone.
Oh and and and people were bopping their heads and stomping their feet in the theater. Which was really lovely.
3) Shortbus (John Cameron Mitchell)
In a year that brought us Ted Haggard's platonic massages, Mark Foley's "overly friendly" instant messages, and Dustin Diamond's filthy latino pal, let's not underestimate the value of a healthy attitude towards sex. Though childlike in its wonder, Shortbus is a film of boundless maturity when it comes to the issues that surround the putting of dingles into hoo-has (and occasionally poop-chutes).
Shot on glorious 16mm (IMDb says 35mm, but I heard John Cameron Mitchell say otherwise on Elvis Mitchell's The Treatment), Shortbus has an actual indie feel to it (as opposed to a "Sundance Indie"), due in large part to the clunky performances by unknowns and the intermingling of their plot threads. But even the terrible acting is endearing in its earnestness, and the weaving in and out of particular stories works really well because of the skill with which it's all centered around the Shortbus club, a hangout/orgy space for sexually adventerous New Yorkers.
Mitchell has made a film that reclaims sex, not only from evangelicals who would have you deny its existence, but also from mindless pornography (and the children's entertainment that has come to resemble it). The sex here is very real. It is messy, confusing, juicy, and joyful. With the spunky attitude of a Saturday morning cartoon and the precision of a manifesto, Mitchell has created one of the most hopeful films of the year.
In fact, the film also has one of the best renditions of the "Star Spangled Banner" that I've heard, and when you couple that with the fact that the film serves as a response to the more pornographic elements of our culture, it almost sounds like a conservative's dream! Get Bill O'Reilly on the phone. This movie is on the front lines of the culture war with him.
Note: I know that these clubs do exist. And I am sure that they are scary, scary places, with little of the gaiety and hilarity that the Shortbus club leads us to believe we'd find. But the fact that the film makes the place believable, and turns a carniverous three-way makeout session into one of the most touching moments I've seen on film this year, is to be commended.
4) Jackass Number Two (Jeff Tremaine)
Speaking of maturity and precision, there's Jackass Number Two. No... really...
In September, Greg Boardman, a theater owner in Hoopeston, Illinois closed his theater for a week rather than show Jackass Number Two, Beerfest, or The Covenant, saying that he was "pissed off" at the "lousy material" Hollywood was foisting upon him. What's worse, the jokey media coverage of the decision never called the man's taste into question. "Well, of course the movies are lousy," the stories seemed to say, "and here's a guy who's standing up for decent American values."
Now, I didn't see The Covenant. Or Beerfest. But I will say this. By denying the people of Hoopeston the unadulterated jubilation that is Jackass Number Two, Boardman did his community a disservice. Number Two contains some of the more revolting sequences ever committed to film I guess, but it's also got huge leaps of creativity. In a world glutted with CGI, where no images, however convincing, can be trusted, these guys are concerned only with what is real, what is actually happening in front of the camera at this moment.
OK, so maybe it's not mature. But that's the point, isn't it? Here are guys that are willing to do anything, anything, in the service of their reversion to a fetal state of pain and shit-eating. It's primal, and the audience with whom I saw it was roaring with disgust and incredible appreciation. It was the most fun I've had in a theater all year.
And what of Greg Boardman? Obviously, he has the right to show whatever films he wants to show. Wouldn't it be great if he had groown so sick of the Hollywood system that he chose to reopen as a repertory theater, showing restored Billy Wilder films and decent prints of Truffaut or Kurosawa? Maybe a little 70mm action? Or if he decided to seek out independent films by local talent, creating a bustling art house that would bring the avant garde to Hoopeston?
Boardman reopened the following week with Invincible and Open Season.
Note: I am not just being an asshole. I saw Invincible, and it was manipulative Disney sports porn (sporn?).
5) The Departed (Martin Scorsese)
The Departed is a display of such sheer goddamn competence (and I mean that in a good way) that it reminds you, in a year full of Inside Mans, Casino Royales, and Da Vinci Codes, that a thriller is best served thrilling. The performances are amazing ("Mark Whalberg stands out" is a sentence I never thought I'd say), the direction is fluid and dynamic, and the script is compelling. It's one of the only movies of the year that I felt like seeing twice.
6) L'Armée Des Ombres (Army of Shadows) (Jean-Pierre Melville)
I feel inadequate to the task of describing how this film has been stuck in my brain for six months. Melville's account of the French Resistance is maddeningly quiet (as are Melville's zany heist films), but the discipline with which it's all staged and photographed is a perfect vehicle to showcase the discipline required of the film's tragic characters.
7) Brick (Rian Johnson)
My initial reaction to Brick was a simple, "That was cool." On reflection (and second viewing), it's clear that the film captures so perfectly the key idea of film noir and, more importantly, the novels from which it was birthed.
And the idea is this: A man alone. In every sense of the word.
8) The Proposition (John Hillcoat)
Reviewed here.
9) Little Children (Todd Field)
It's official. I love Kate Winslet.
OK, now that that's out of the way. Little Children is Todd Field's poignant and focused observation of the lives of a few adulterous stay-at-home parents. The affair provides the foreground action for a portrait of a New England suburb living in fear of a recently released sexual deviant. Is that an OK word to use? Deviant? I'm not sure.
The film is melodramatic and the climax is deeply problematic, but in the end it earns its melodrama through an investment in character that is usually missing from these "blow the lid open on perfect suburban life" type things. They're not all on pills and they're not all sleeping with their teenage daughters (I'm looking at you, The Quiet).
Above all though, Field and Tom Perrotta, on whose book it's based, are deeply compassionate towards their subjects. There are no monsters here: not the sexual predator (?) or the meathead cop out to get him. There are no innocents either, as Winslet's Sarah and Wilson's Brad turn out to be enormously selfish, and recognizably human, characters.
Well maybe the little children are innocent. Wait... little children... Little Children... ooooooooooohhhhhhhhhh.
This film would make a great double feature companion to Shortbus. I'm just saying.
Oh, and there's a killer voice over narration, maybe the best since Alec Baldwin took the mic in The Royal Tenenbaums.
10) Temporada De Patos (Duck Season) (Fernando Eimbcke)
And we round out the list with a film that Cuarón produced. Way to go, you Mexican bastard. Keep importing nice little indies and lending credibility to our children's fantasy franchises, and maybe the Bush administration won't kick you out. Or at least you can be part of our "guest worker program".
Charming and well photographed, sure, but Duck Season is also really well observed. I mean, here are middle class kids (in Mexico, how novel) who are more concerned with Xbox and pizza than they are with girls and family. It's a really wrenching look at why these two kids are so disaffected, but it avoids being "ABOUT A GENERATION" in big letters and somehow remains (like Children Of Men) deeply personal. Recommended.
**************************************
Honorable mention goes to some other really enjoyable 2006 films, including Idiocracy (Mike Judge), A Prairie Home Companion (Robert Altman), The Prestige (Christopher Nolan), Strangers With Candy (Paul Dinello), A Scanner Darkly (Richard Linklater), and Scoop (Woody Allen).I am aware of the lack of diversity represented above. All of the directors are men, and for this I am sorry. To whom, I'm not really sure.
**************************************
Other prizes!
Most Overrated (tie)
Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan
Little Miss Sunshine
I am sure that both of these will walk away with Oscars this year.
Most Insane Self Reverence
Lady In The Water
Shyamalan casts himself as a messianic writer who must die to save humanity. It also contains one of the most pathetic swipes at film critics I've seen since Mayor Ebert (haha get it?) was eaten by Godzilla in 1998. Oh Bob Balaban, why?
Most Egregious Waste of Alec Baldwin
Running With Scissors
Though I am told that the memoir on which the film is based is high quality, I doubt that I'll ever read it. Because of this film.
Most Distracted By Its Own Importance/Star Power
Bobby
It may be well intentioned, but Jesus Christ. The archive footage of Robert Kennedy provides the only moments of any emotional weight.
Most Disappointing (from a personal standpoint)
Superman Returns
As expounded upon here.
Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan
Little Miss Sunshine
I am sure that both of these will walk away with Oscars this year.
Most Insane Self Reverence
Lady In The Water
Shyamalan casts himself as a messianic writer who must die to save humanity. It also contains one of the most pathetic swipes at film critics I've seen since Mayor Ebert (haha get it?) was eaten by Godzilla in 1998. Oh Bob Balaban, why?
Most Egregious Waste of Alec Baldwin
Running With Scissors
Though I am told that the memoir on which the film is based is high quality, I doubt that I'll ever read it. Because of this film.
Most Distracted By Its Own Importance/Star Power
Bobby
It may be well intentioned, but Jesus Christ. The archive footage of Robert Kennedy provides the only moments of any emotional weight.
Most Disappointing (from a personal standpoint)
Superman Returns
As expounded upon here.
**************************************
So. All in all, quite a year. Thanks for reading this far. I can't believe you're still here.
Comments
First of all lay off the AARP crowd, will ya. Your mother is a member.
I was going to post something about Little Miss Sunshine but I'll do it here. The movie was perfectly adequate (if overhyped) until the whole 'Super Freak' thing at the end. I don't know why, but it was just so WRONG.
Maybe because I respected Alan Arkin's character more than to think that he would actually do that to the girl. I dunno. It literally made me sick.
Casino Royale
Thank You For Smoking
Inside Man
Cars
Over the Hedge
MI3