THE MT VOID
Mt. Holz Science Fiction Society
01/25/02 -- Vol. 20, No. 30
El Presidente: Mark Leeper, mleeper@optonline.net
The Power Behind El Pres: Evelyn Leeper, eleeper@optonline.net
Back issues at http://www.geocities.com/evelynleeper
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Topics:
The Ten Best 2001 Films I Saw in General Release (film
comment by Mark R. Leeper)
===================================================================
TOPIC: The Ten Best 2001 Films I Saw in General Release (film
comment by Mark R. Leeper)
Every year I dread making out my list of the top ten films of the
previous year. It seems like it should be an easy matter to
choose since I rate most of the films I see. Except for ratings
ties for the last few places, the ratings should actually choose
most of the films. The truth is that my list is usually a bit of
an embarrassment. You would expect that there should be some
obscure films on the list.
The truth is I see mostly just the films that have made it to
Central New Jersey and what I see at film festivals. I do see
some very good films at the festivals, but people do not want to
read recommendations for films they never hear of and will have
little chance to see. If such a film gets a release, I will treat
it as if I had just seen it on that release. As remarkable as it
was that I had a +4 film on my list this year--I very rarely use
the +4 rating because so few films are that good--even it was not
the best film of this year. THE GREY ZONE was in my opinion the
better film but may not get much of a release.
So there are better films that I have seen but which are not
generally available. And there have been better films that are
generally available but which I have not seen. That compromises
this list somewhat. The films are listed best first (so much for
suspense). Each one has the ranking and what I would rate the
film on the 0 to 10 and the -4 to +4 scale.
My major hobbies include travel and film. Both can take me to
places I have not been to before in different ways. Sadly the
films that do that are films that may have been popular, but
perhaps not much public respect. But what impresses me the most
about THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING (#1, 10,
+4) is the effort that was required to being it to the screen.
Tolkien's Middle Earth has been portrayed on the screen before and
those representations only go to show how hard it is to do it
well. This I did think was done well and in a visualization that
repeatedly created a sense of awe. Peter Jackson has created the
definitive visualization of a modern classic story.
MEMENTO (#2, 9, +3) is a clever and intelligent idea for a film.
In telling its narrative in reverse order, it is a film in which
we all know how the story ends, but the mystery is how it began
and really who is who. The reverse structure also gives the
viewer a simulation of the actual mental dysfunction, a form of
amnesia, the character is suffering. This is a film that some
viewers have found very taxing, and perhaps it should be seen more
than once, but it is probably the most original film of 2001.
A BEAUTIFUL MIND did not get released in my area until 2002, but
it makes an interesting companion piece to 2001's THE LUZHIN
DEFENCE(#3, 9, +3). Both films are about geniuses who are social
misfits and gives the audience a window into how these people
think as well as the price each pays for his genius. John Turturro
stars as Alexandre Luzhin, a chess Grand Master who is nearly an
idiot savant. In this adaptation of a story by Vladimir Nabokov
the strange Luzhin falls in love at and important chess match.
John Turturo stars as the brilliant but extremely eccentric chess
master.
If MEMENTO was disorienting in its story told backward-style,
A.I.: ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE (#4, 9 +3) disoriented the viewer by
telling its story in tree parts of very different styles. In a
sense this is a sort of dual of Ridley Scott's BLADERUNNER. That
film suggested that we would be able to create feeling beings, but
their life span would not be long enough for their purposes. It
replicants are haunted by how short and transitory life is. The
film planned by Stanley Kubrick and completed by Steven Spielberg
looks at a created human with a life span far longer than his
purpose. Programmed to love and be loved by one human, the robot
goes on living pointlessly, his whole reason for living taken
away. Some almost magical future intelligence gives him one last
contact with his purpose in life and the film asks us, "Is he
better or worse for it?" Is it like giving a reformed alcoholic
one last drink? Many did not like the sentimentality of the last
part of the film, but I found the film to be rich in ideas
throughout.
Several times now I have included on my top ten list films that
have been made for cable. I have never seen that with anybody
else's published top ten list. I do not know if other reviewers
just do not consider them to be good enough or did not consider
them at all. In any case this year no less a critic than Roger
Ebert and I both agree WIT (#5, 8, low +3) is among the best of
the year. The film has Emma Thompson as a professor of 17th
century poetry who is dying of cancer. It is based on Margaret
Edson's Pulitzer-Prize-winning play. With wit and intelligence
she tells us about the dying experience. This is an extremely
moving film.
There was a time when the best art films were horror films.
German expressionism gave us THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI,
NOSFERATU, M, THE GOLEM, WAXWORKS, and METROPOLIS. Their legacy
gave us films like DRACULA, THE BLACK CAT, and THE BRIDE OF
FRANKENSTEIN. But since that time few horror films have had
substantial merit. The films produced by Val Lewton and some made
by David Cronenberg and perhaps one or two films like INVASION OF
THE BODY SNATCHERS were interesting artistically. The best modern
director of artistic horror films is Mexican director Guillermo
del Toro. This year he followed up CRONOS and MIMIC with THE
DEVIL'S BACKBONE (#6, 8, high +2) which combines generally non-
horror subgenre of the boys school story with a story featuring a
ghost and a stalking villain. As always, del Toro's visual
compositions are absolutely beautiful. In the final analysis this
is more of a murder film than a ghost story, but it nonetheless is
hypnotically told. Del Toro actually has done (three times out of
three) what Romero, Craven and Carpenter should be doing.
HARRY POTTER AND THE SORCERER'S STONE (#7, 8, high +2) is faithful
to the book and at the same time entertaining, not an easy
balance. Like THE LORD OF THE RINGS it is a marvelous
visualization of the book. There is some violence that may bother
some parents, but kids are turning out in legions to see the film.
And for many this will be one of the tamer films they are going to
see. If the film limits the imagination they need in reading the
modern classic Potter series, it will show them how it is done and
open their imaginations when reading other books. Most of the
weaknesses in the film, things like plot improbabilities, I found
track back to the book.
Two good crime stories come next on my list. THE MAN WHO WASN'T
THERE (#8, 8, high +2) is a crisp black-and-white murder tale with
a twisted plot that becomes clear in the end. The story is about
a personal failure, a second chair barber in a tiny barbershop.
When Ed enters a room with three other people in it, he makes it
approximately three people in the room. In desperation to change
his condition he tries blackmail and that makes things start to
happen. The stark black and white images actually are the result
of filming in color and then making black and white prints from
that. HEIST (#9, 8, high +2), written and directed by David
Mamet, this script boasts two very clever robberies and a fairly
good story of a brilliant criminal in the process of retiring.
The script is not perfect, but is intriguing and has fewer holes
than Mamet's THE SPANISH PRISONER. David Mamet's dialog may not
be realistic, but it is artistic, like Shakespeare's was.
Then there's SHREK (#10, 8, high +2). What can I say? It has
great animation and I laugh every time I see it. Robin Williams's
genie in ALADDIN leaves me cold. Rosie O'Donnell's Terk in TARZAN
went all the way to irritating. Eddie Murphy's donkey in SHREK
cracks me up every time. The film stands as a story on its own,
but it is also a merciless rank-out of every Disney convention in
reach. [-mrl]
===================================================================
Mark Leeper
mleeper@optonline.net
Heaven, as conventionally conceived, is a place
so inane, so dull, so useless, so miserable, that
no-body has ever ventured to describe a whole day
in heaven, though plenty of people have described
a day at the seaside.
- George Bernard Shaw
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