Ah, 2003. I still remember that awards ceremony like it was not too long ago. Which it wasn't I guess. But I'll be saying the same thing from now until the end of time, because it was the year that the fantasy movie with lots of special effects and a big fan following that made lots of money won Best Picture. In the words of Johnny Drama: "Victory!" And some other movies came out too. I actually do feel sincere regret that one of them came out when it did, because even though LOTR is overall better in my mind, if this movie had come out any other year it would've and should've won. But enough regret, this year is awesome! Except for freaking Bill Murray ruining my life of course.
Well the movies start mid-alphabet this year, which is good because I want to put this movie to rest before I get to the good stuff. The movie is Lost in Translation. And yes, I meant that as a pun. Because whatever good movie was inside of Sofia Coppola's brain didn't translate well to my brain. Some might say that they didn't enjoy it but probably missed something good about it by not being attentive enough. I'm a genius, I miss nothing. The movie is dumb. Although before I rip it up, I do feel bad for Sofia Coppola, because no matter how good a movie is that she makes the only response she can hear is: "yeah it's pretty good, but her dad made the greatest movie of all time." That kinda sucks. But so does her movie. Are there interesting scenes/ideas conveyed in it? Yes. Do the actors do a good job? Yes (especially Bill Murray). But since the movie is about an odd "kinda" romance between Bill Murray's 53-year-old washed up actor character and Scarlett Johansson (who was 19 at the time, gross) I really can't take it seriously for a few reasons. The first of which being that her character's husband is ignoring her. Umm, yeah. She's pretty much a goddess. I mean, seriously. If Heath Ledger was engaged to her instead then he and Jake Gyllenhaal would've herded their sheep and left the mountain, no double entendre need apply. There's no way that anybody married to her would ignore her. Or if they do, it wouldn't be when they're still newlyweds. And it would be by some equally good looking jerk, not Phoebe Buffay's crazy brother. And even if that was true, in order for me to believe that she fell for a way older guy he'd either have to be A) Sean Connery (best aged man alive) B) George Clooney (when he gets older he'll be the best aged man alive) or C) Benjamin Button. They should have cast her character as someone who was good-looking enough to make the viewer go, "why is her husband ignoring her?" but not to the point where the audience is drooling. As a friend of mine pointed out, "that's one of the many reasons I can't take Valentine's Day seriously. The movie asks you to believe that Jessica Biel would have trouble finding a date." So there you have it. It would've been a silly enough movie to be nominated in any year, but among the giants of 2003 I have to just laugh.
Well it's all uphill from here my loyal X-Men. The next film is Master and Commander: the Far Side of the World and though I haven't seen it in a while, I watched it several times on DVD and also saw it in theaters. Something about it just struck me, and it occurs to me now that I should go back and watch it again because I'm sure I'd pick up on even more stuff. When I saw it, I was at an age where I was almost purely interested in movies that contained at least a fair amount of fighting. It was, after all, the beginning of the age of superhero films, the year of the Matrix sequels, and the first Pirates movie. And there is definitely a pretty big battle at the end of this movie, but most of it is really just about being on the open water and both the danger and the majesty that the crew encounters. I can't even really put my finger on what it's about besides that, but I really enjoy it the whole way through (and it's fairly long considering not much really happens throughout it). The acting is top notch from Russell Crowe (as usual) and Paul Bettany (also as usual but he's sadly not in as much stuff as he should be) and the scenery is just stunning. The film also includes fairly minor roles from the future young Augustus Caesar of Rome and also Dominic Monaghan who was then famous for playing Merry in LOTR and is now also famous for his role as Charlie Pace on Lost. But anyway, the film certainly falls short of the year's two best but it is incredibly well done and worthy of a nomination (also, it came out in the summer and got nominated which is pretty cool).
Well, I'm going to break my own rule. And the rules of space/time. And decency itself. I'm doing this by not going alphabetically for this next one. I'll explain later. Instead let's talk about Seabiscuit. Yes, it's your classic sports movie. And although I wouldn't really call horse racing a sport, you could also call Slumdog Millionaire a sports movie in a lot of ways even though sport has nothing to do with it. Basically any story that involves beating the odds and being inspirational at some sort of contest qualifies a film as being a sports movie. And this one is much the same, but it has some added value to it on top of that. I'd actually compare it to Cinderella Man in a lot of ways. Because both films take place during the depression and explore the idea of how a sports or public figure can help to raise a country's morale. So there is an underlying theme of the mass media's effect on culture (although it was hardly "mass" media back then, but hopefully you see what I'm getting at). And the acting is certainly good, the movie makes you cry and cheer at all of the right points, and Elizabeth Banks is in it. She's ADORABLE. That's the only word for her, she's just so loveable in basically everything she's in. Because she's definitely pretty, but not hot per se. She just has this warmth that she brings with her on the screen that I'm not sure how to describe. So you'll have to watch it yourself (or her run on Scrubs). So on one hand you could say that it's too similar to other movies of that type and thus not worthy of a nomination. But in this instance, I'd say that since nothing but LOTR had a shot that year anyway, why not throw something uplifting in there?
And on that note of being uplifting, I will now mention what is probably one of the most depressing movies I've ever seen. But it's also (no joke) one of the best movies I've ever seen. And the reason I went outside of my pattern to mention it is because when I was watching it I truly felt regret over the fact that it didn't come out in a different year. If it had been up against pretty much any other movie it would've won. The movie is a masterpiece called Mystic River. And it is not for the faint of heart (it's mostly for the desensitized like myself). In fact, I distinctly remember my parents picking me up from a friend's house after having seen the movie, and they were both in this emotional stupor. I can expect that from my mom (no offense mom, but we all know you really feel the emotions in movies) but my dad? Nothing phases that guy! And he said, "it was too intense for me." Well I don't know what it says about me that I watched the movie without really being affected in that way, but I was certainly affected by how good it was. It was modern day Greek tragedy at its best. Everything about it is top notch: writing, directing, and especially the acting, for which two Oscars were given (Sean Penn and Tim Robbins). Let me reiterate that I enjoyed both of their deaths in Team America but you have to give credit to them for their performances. The basic plot is this: the film begins with three friends playing street hockey and one of them (Tim Robbins' character) is abducted and molested. See what I mean? Right off the bat it's pretty intense. He ends up escaping, and the film switches to modern day when they're all grown up and the daughter of Sean Penn's character is murdered. To say anything else would ruin it, but what follows is an intense study in the human soul. I literally don't want to say much more, but suffice it to say that only one character has any sort of redemption for his storyline at the end. But it's so powerfully done that I didn't really care about that, because to me it's about the delivery and not so much where the characters end up on paper. I can't decide whether I like Clint Eastwood's work here more than Million Dollar Baby or not, I think aspects of it are better. For instance, there's a nice little touch where all three boys' names are inscribed in the cement from when they were children. But the one who was abducted has his name unfinished because he was writing it when he was taken. It was a profound way of showing that his childhood was incomplete, part of it was stolen from him. Touches like that are what make Clint the artist that he is. And since he got his due the following year with the Academy, the year placement of this movie isn't quite as tragic I suppose.
Because it had no shot against The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King. I love this whole trilogy so much that it's actually going to be difficult for me to condense my thoughts on it. All three movies are deserving of the Best Picture award, but it would've been tacky to give it to all three (kind of like how John Williams deserves an Oscar every time he writes music but then he'd have like 40 Oscars and no one else would have any). And it didn't just get Picture. It's tied for the most Oscars of all time with Ben-Hur and Titanic (and although I really like Titanic, putting it up there with the other two is pretty insulting. I'll explain why when I get to 1997). And it's for good reason. You quite literally can't come up with something that a movie can do well that these films don't have, especially this final installment. The ensemble cast is incredible, the battles/effects/makeup/production design is breathtaking. And although I've mentioned that John Williams is my favorite composer, the fact that Howard Shore took like three years to write the score for the three movies really shows. It may well be the best musical score of all time, and I'm being serious when I say that. It's so complex and beautiful, and he devoted so much time to it. That's what puts these films on basically an entirely different level from other movies. The people making them truly lived and breathed their roles every day for several years. And I know that I'll get hate mail from Tolkien lovers (of which I am one, but I won't hate mail myself, I'll just put a stickie on the fridge) for saying this, but I truly think that all of the changes they made from the books are good ones. I'll mention more for the other films as I get to them, but in the ROTK book, there's a whole separate 50 pages at the end with an entirely new adventure after they've defeated the big bad guy. That's just silly. Well I've already gone on long enough, because I won't give a rundown of the plot and all of these other things. Because honestly, if you haven't seen them: shame on you. Go watch them like right now. All three of them. You will thank me. They're long, to be certain, but they fill every second with something incredible. Peter Jackson did something truly immortal within filmmaking when he put together these 3 films. His attention to detail is astounding, and he has the unusual ability to both get great performances from his actors and still have summer-action-movie level of awesome when it comes to the battle scenes (George Lucas has great action, can't get in touch with his actors for crap. Coppola gets great performances, but I've never seen him do a battle. Have you?). I could literally go on forever, so I'll leave it at that.
Well in case you couldn't tell, I was pretty happy with the outcome for this year. Stupid Rolling Stone magazine made the trilogy number 10 on its top ten list of the decade,and while that's more than I'd expect from a bunch of hippies, it should be number 1. But aside from Sofia Coppola (who I was not referencing in my last paragraph, I was obviously talking about her father, the real director) wasting an hour and forty five minutes of my life, 2003 was a pretty great year overall. So great, in fact, that I'd already seen almost all of the movies before I started my escapade. And speaking of my escapade, my next installment will include: cellophane John C. Reilly, gang member John C. Reilly, and unintentional-member-of-evil-patriarchal-50s-society John C. Reilly.
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