The Gleaners and I (2000)
Agnes Varda’s beautiful film follows gleaners at work, from people who depend on the practice for survival to hobbyists. She exposes how connected we are and shines a light on our coldness to the needs of others as she pointedly interviews jurists about the seemingly arbitrary French laws which prohibit some forms of gleaning while encouraging others.
Along the way, she gleans a few things of her own: a heart-shaped potato, a sense of her own mortality, and footage of a fervently dancing lens cap.
This simple film is a profound demonstration of art’s power to glean the beautiful from the ordinary.
The Royal Tenenbaums (2001)
The quirky Tenenbaums are the quintessential dysfunctional twenty-first century American family.
Eli Cash, the Tennebaum family friend, is the most realized character of Owen Wilson’s career, and eccentric former tennis player, Richie Tennebaum, is easily Luke Wilson’s best performance.
Everyone assumes Anjelica Huston was given her spot because of her famous father and grandfather. She’s not a typical Hollywood beauty and doesn’t always come to mind when thinking of the great actors of her generation, but her spectacular resumé includes This is Spinal Tap (1984), Prizzi’s Honor (1985), The Dead (1987), Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989), The Grifters (1990), and Manhattan Murder Mystery (1993). Fortunately, since her performance as Etheline, the Tennebaum matriarch, she’s experienced a late career Renaissance.
Her work as Margot Tennenbaum reminds me there was a time when Gwyneth Paltrow was a great actress and not prima donna tabloid fodder, and Alec Baldwin’s narration makes the movie feel like a nightmarish bed time story.
Bill Murray was a popular middlebrow comedian whose career stalled as he aged like fellow SNL alumni Dan Ackroyd, Chevy Chase, and Steve Martin, but beginning with the Anderson directed Rushmore (1998), he transitioned into a laconic, super cool trend setter / Internet legend. His later work has been so good, it’s forced us to view his earlier work through a different prism. We see Peter Venkman and Phil Connors differently because of Herman Blume and Bob Harris.
This was the last great role for Gene Hackman who epitomized the 1970s in films like The French Connection (1971), The Poseidon Adventure (1972) The Conversation (1974), and Young Frankenstein (1974). Sadly, in 2003 he opted to spend his twilight years engaged in other pursuits, ending a fifty year Hollywood career. Luckily, enigmatic and selfish Royal Tennenbaum is a glorious farewell.
Despite the success of Moonrise Kingdom (2012) and The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014), this remains the quintessential Wes Anderson film.
Talk to Her (2002)
While visiting his comatose girlfriend Lydia, Marco develops a deep bond with Beningo, a male nurse, but when he learns Lydia had intended to break up with him, he stops his daily visitations and his friendship with Beningo suffers.
Benigno cares for another coma patient, Alicia Roncero. While caring for her, he talks openly about his many insecurities, using her as a sort of silent therapist. Mistaking this for intimacy, one night he makes love to her. When routine lab work reveals she’s pregnant, a hospital investigation identifies Benigno as the father. The physical shock of giving birth unexpectedly revives Alicia, but her child is stillborn. Arrested for his crime, Benigno commits suicide in jail.
Despite the appalling and reprehensible act Beningo perpetrates on Alicia, Almodovar casts him in a sympathetic light, implying his actions are a product of intellectual limitations and emotional issues stemming from his difficult relationship with his mother. His rape of Alicia is presented as a stylized parody of the silent films Benigno loves, further contextualizing his actions.
Benigno’s imprisonment and death are not the righteous punishment due a rapist, but the devastating demise of a misguided outcast.
A modern-day Douglas Sirk, Almodovar specializes in female centric melodramas filtered through the tropes of Spanish language soap operas and uses dark humor to expose cracks in the facade of normalcy.
This movie illuminates the fine distinction between love and obsession. Love leads us to elevate the needs of others above our own. Obsession leads us to subjugate the needs of our beloved. Love is a mutual agreement. Obsession is a one way street. The obsessed will talk to her, a lover will listen.
Mystic River (2003)
In 1975, Dave Boyle is kidnapped while playing with Jimmy Markum and Sean Devine. After four days of captivity and sexual assaults, Dave escapes and returns home.
Thirty years later, Jimmy (Sean Penn) is an ex-con who runs a store, Sean (Kevin Bacon) is a detective with the state police, and Dave (Tim Robbins) leads an anonymous blue-collar life.
Their lives intertwine once again when Jimmy’s daughter is murdered. Sean is assigned the investigation, and circumstantial evidence indicates Dave is the murderer.
The movie builds suspense until the heartbreaking, inevitable ending, with the dawning realization their lives were spent playing roles they were randomly assigned thirty years ago.
Sean Penn has never been better than as Jimmy, who turns to a life of crime because it’s the only life he knows.
Tim Robbins is masterful as the pitiful Dave, who will never be anything but a scared, broken boy.
Kevin Bacon is not in the same league as Penn and Robbins, but he’s good as Sean Devine, torn between his duty as a policeman and guilt about not protecting his childhood friend.
Marcia Gay Harden and Laura Linney do yeoman’s work as the wives of Jimmy and Dave. Linney has become one of my favorite actresses; when she’s in a movie, I’ll have strong feelings about it.
Laurence Fishburne has had a fascinating career. After debuting in Apocalypse Now (1979), he’s been Cowboy Curtis and Morpheus, starred in CSI, played Perry White, and fought Hannibal Lecter. He’s decent as Sean’s partner, Whitey Powers, but the role is just background.
Despite succeeding John Wayne as a symbol of masculinity in the 1970s, Clint Eastwood is a better director than actor. Unbelievably versatile, he can handle westerns, war pictures, foreign language films, and musicals. He won his second Best Director Oscar the following year, but this is his best movie.
Dennis Lehane’s novel is a hypnotic story about coincidence, fate, jumping to conclusions, and inadvertent consequences. This is a near perfect adaptation of a near perfect novel.
Before Sunset (2004)
In Before Sunrise (1995), Jesse, an idealistic American fresh out of college, meets Celine, an opinionated French girl, while traveling through Europe. After spending the night talking about their worldviews and personal philosophies, they make love and promise to meet again in six months.
This sequel takes place nine years later. Jesse returned to Vienna as agreed; Celine did not. Married with a son, he’s written a novel based on their encounter and is at a Parisian bookstore to promote it. Celine comes to explain why she didn’t meet him as planned: her grandmother died.
As they talk about their lives, their feelings are rekindled, but the movie ends ambiguously as Celine sings to Jesse and reminds him he has to catch a plane.
Despite his Texas roots, Linklater’s dialogue and idea driven films are closer to European cinema.
Ethan Hawke rarely makes a bad movie, but his work with fellow Texan Linklater is the best stuff he’s done.
Julie Delpy’s great as Celine, but as a similar character in 2 Days in Paris (2007), and its sequel 2 Days in New York (2012), she is much more annoying without Ethan Hawke to support her. Adam Goldberg and Chris Rock are funny, but they’re incapable of elevating her performance.
This is a great film about the petty squabbles, quiet moments of intimacy, and meandering conversations which are the hallmark of a good relationship.
Everything is Illuminated (2005)
Writer Jonathan Foer (Elijah Wood) travels to Eastern Europe to find Augustine, the woman who saved his Jewish grandfather during the Holocaust. He’s guided on his journey to Trachimbrod by an eccentric, anti-semitic grandfather, his English-speaking grandson, Alex (Eugene Hutz), and their bizarre dog, Sammy Davis Jr.
As Jonathan uncovers the truth of his grandfather’s past, he inadvertently unearths long buried family secrets for Alex and his grandfather.
Adapted from the semi-autobiographical novel by Jonathan Safran Foer, this is a powerful film about the echoes of our ancestors. We are the sum of the actions of an incredibly complex and long line of people, a link in a chain which stretches before and after. Understanding the past, and our connection to it, illuminates the future.
The first half is a frenetic farce, but midway through the film turns into a poignant tale of identity, and first time director Liev Schreiber does a great job of switching gears without stripping gears. It’s not obvious the film has undergone such a one hundred and eighty degree turn until the final act, when you realize the early energy has been absent for at least fifteen minutes. The history of Augustine and Jonathan’s grandfather is so compelling, I forgot the early fun of Sammy Davis Jr., the inappropriate, curmudgeonly grandfather, and lovable, slightly clueless Alex.
Ostensibly, Elijah Wood is the star of the film, but Eugene Hutz, leader of a gypsy rock band, Gogol Bordello, is the highlight, and his outstanding work is the soul of the film. His performance is most affected by the tonal change; he has to grow from a goofy, American-obsessed Ukrainian (oddly reminiscent of The Festrunk Brothers) to a thoughtful young man who understands and accepts the burdens life has placed on him. It’s a phenomenal and illuminating transformation.
The Lives of Others (2006)
Gerd Wiesler is tasked to spy on playwright Georg Dreyman, who the Minister of Culture is convinced is a security threat despite his communist sympathies. However, the Minister has a hidden agenda: he fancies Dreyman’s girlfriend, actress Christa-Marie Sieland, and uses the information supplied by Wiesler to blackmail her into a sexual relationship.
During his surveillance, Wiesler grows sympathetic to Dreyman and must choose between the country he loves and the friends who are unaware he exists.
The final, beautiful scenes illustrate how powerful the actions of an individual can be, even against the full apparatus of the state.
In a sublime scene, after Stasi workers assigned to intercept mail learn the Berlin Wall has fallen, they silently stop their work and leave their cramped office. We think of history as a slow march towards progress, but it often leaps forward. One day you’re spying for the East German communists, the next you’re living in a democratic, unified Germany.
The debut film by Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck has been hailed as a conservative masterpiece, but the movie transcends politics. Ideologies only become evil when corrupted by an insatiable desire for power.
A German language film about the oppressive tactics of East German intelligence during the Cold War doesn’t sound like a celebratory movie, but this hopeful film not only explores mankind’s capacity for evil, it shows how it can be defeated.
Gerd Wiesler was a part of the apparatus of evil, but in the film’s final act, he transcends and atones for his mistakes. If the last ten minutes don’t stir something inside you, there’s little chance any film will.
Gone Baby Gone (2007)
Smelling a profit, private investigators Patrick Kenzie (Casey Affleck) and Angie Gennaro (Michelle Monaghan) reach out to Helene McCready (Amy Ryan) to help find her abducted daughter.
It appears Amanda was abducted because Helen and her boyfriend, “Skinny Ray,” stole money from a drug lord, but uncovering the truth of her abduction reveals a complicated web of deception.
Casey Affleck is mesmerizing, beginning as a cynical private detective, but ending with a resolute idea of right and wrong. Sadly, Casey’s career has been overshadowed by his brother’s, but his work here and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007) prove he’s a more than capable actor.
Amy Ryan’s an incredibly versatile performer: believable as Holly Flax, Michael Scott’s nerdy love interest, and as the competent, world-weary Beadie Russell, but her performance as Helene McCready is a career highlight. She’s a feral animal, trapped by her limited education, her family, her child, and her drug addiction. She sees the attention from her daughter’s kidnapping as a way out of her miserable life. We recognize Helene has no business being a mother, but because of Ryan’s amazing work we still empathize with her. Affleck is the moral center of film, but Ryan is its emotional core.
Morgan Freeman deftly uses his public image and credibility as misdirection in his performance as Captain Jack Doyle. We believe Doyle more than we should because we believe Freeman.
Ben Affleck’s directorial debut is a triumphant achievement. His directorial style is similar to another actor turned director: Clint Eastwood. Both are technically proficient directors who stay out of the way of the story and use their experience as actors to get the most from their cast.
This great movie, based on Dennis Lehane’s novel, asks if a bad thing can save a girl’s future, how wrong can it be?
Departures (2008)
When Daigo Kobayahsi loses his job, he moves back into his childhood home with his wife. Looking for work, he sees an advertisement to “assist with departures.” He assumes the job is with a travel agency, but soon learns it’s a mortuary.
In Japan, dealing with the deceased is “unclean“and Kobayashi is ashamed of his accidental career. His wife leaves him and his friend, Yamashita, abandons him.
When Yamashita’s mother dies, Kobayashi performs the encoffinment, and during the ceremony, his wife and friend realize the importance of his work.
Despite the numerous masterpieces from Kuroswa and Ozu, this was the first Japanese winner of the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film.
Inevitable in a film about the rituals of death, it’s a tad too sentimental in places, but demonstrates the common humanity we discover when we realize all paths lead to the same end.
Mr. Nobody (2009)
In 2092, science has evolved to render death obsolete and 118 year old Nemo Nobody (Jared Leto) is the last mortal on earth. A reporter attempts to document Nemo’s life before he dies, but his life story is a series of seemingly impossible contradictions.
Nemo, like Billy Pilgrim, exists outside of time. However, while Pilgrim could only move backwards and forwards in his own timeline, Nemo has lived several lives and has memories of each. In one, he lived with his father and married Elsie (Sarah Polley), who’s in love with someone else. In another, he grew up with his mother and fell in love with Anna (Diane Kruger), his step-sister from his mother’s second marriage. In a third, he married Jeanne and had a family.
This film asks us to ponder the importance of the decisions in our lives and argues “there are no good or bad choices. It’s simply that each choice will create another life for you.”
Via a series of educational interludes, the films explains scientific concepts such as the Big Bang, the Big Crunch, chaos theory, the butterfly effect, and pigeon superstition, then explores the real world ramifications.
From Requiem for a Dream (2000) to Dallas Buyers Club (2013), Jared Leto is always riveting, but it’s difficult to believe he’ll ever be better.
Sarah Polley is great as Nemo’s emotionally disturbed wife, Elsie. A fine actress, she’s an even better director: Away from Her (2006) is a devastating portrait of Alzheimer’s; Take this Waltz (2011) is a bittersweet movie about a dying relationship; Stories We Tell (2012) is a searing look at the lies families tell to function and survive.
Part Slaughterhouse Five, part Run, Lola Run (1998), part Amelie (2001), part The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008), part Cloud Atlas (2012), part advanced science lesson, part love story, part philosophical discussion. This a great movie I hope to watch many more times.