A Good Year

“We may be through with the past, but the past ain’t through with us.”

~ Jimmy Gator, Magnolia

This is not at all what I had planned, but then, so goes life.

I had so much fun yesterday talking about movies, it’s all I wanted to do today.  Every other email brought to my mind another happy memory; two hours of cinema followed by three of conversation (I’m an exhausting date).

1999 was so full of cinematic awesome, it busted the seams of the entire millennium.  I can’t list every great movie from that year.  Well, I could, but I’m pretty sure you’re hoping I won’t.

Because I like to stay right at the bleeding edge of what everybody’s talking about, here’s my list for some of the best films of 1999.  Movies are like tickle spots.  These are mine.  I’ll keep them short and start shorter.

Star Wars: Episode One (this wasn’t nearly as bad as everyone said), The Green Mile, American Beauty, The Talented Mr. Ripley, Eyes Wide Shut (half each, stunning and terrible), The Limey (elegantly savage), South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut, and Election (Reese Witherspoon at her best).

Toy Story 2:  How many sequels improve on the original?  The Godfather II, The Dark Knight, Terminator 2, Empire Strikes Back….. crickets chirping….  Toy Story redefined animation.  Toy Story 2 took everything that worked in the first one and made it like a perfect second date.  It was Pixar’s third home run, and the ball flew further than ever before.

The Matrix:  I don’t have enough superlatives for the Matrix.  Even if I did, they’d be tired by now.  The Matrix took Japanese Anime and twisted it into seamless live action, designing camera tricks that have had a half life and a half.  It was a perfectly articulated, spiritually confident action movie.  Redefining.

Three Kings:  I haven’t seen this one in several years, but I’d be surprised if I didn’t love it as much now as I did then.  The color palette was like looking on sky I’d never seen.  This movie is cool.

The Cider House Rules:  This movie feels like a poem, but in a good way.  I loved the book, but it’s nowhere near as good as the movie.

Run Lola Run:  If you haven’t seen this, do.  You have to be in to super frenetic German movies, with a lot of people yelling “Shaizer, Lola!”  You also have to be okay with thumping techno, and the same story told three times in a row.  If you like all that, and won’t feel ripped off at eighty minutes long, this movie’s rad.

Abre Sus Ojos (Open Your Eyes):  I also enjoyed the Cameron Crowe remake, Vanilla Sky, but this one was first.  It’s less Rock N’ Roll, more like a lingering trumpet solo.

The Iron Giant:  Before Brad Bird went on to blow my mind with the Incredibles and Ratatouille, he made this masterpiece.  It’s a love letter to a bygone era, with an intrepid kid, a groovy beatnik, and a giant robot.  It was also an abject failure.  The fact that Norbit made ten million dollars more on its opening weekend than The Iron Giant did in its entire theatrical run… shame on us.

Being John Malkovich:  This introduced me to one of my favorite writers.  Charlie Kaufman went on to pen Adaptation and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.  All three scripts are so unapologetically, idiosyncratically original, they make me want to weep.  I haven’t, but the intention’s there.  No one writes like this guy.

Fight Club:  I did smell the end of this one, but it so didn’t matter.  This movie is one of the flat out best directed movies ever.  You can’t see the seams.  Brad Pitt and Ed Norton; both perfect.  This movie takes beautiful metaphor and punches it in the teeth.

Magnolia:  I saved this one for last, because… well, golly; it’s just so good.  I know this one’s not for everyone, but neither is being an astronaut.  This movie is nirvana.  Totally drunk on its own ambition, yes, but it exists fully in the world it created.  You can hear it breathing.  I will watch anything PT Anderson directs, forever.  Even if he starts doing direct to DVD mini series’ featuring stick figure versions of the Muppet Babies.  I’ll wait in line.

Writer Dad

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