If you’d told me before the fact that a movie about male strippers starring Matthew McConaughey and Channing Tatum would have been amongst my top five films of 2012, I may not have believed you, except for one key fact — the movie was directed by Steven Soderbergh, who tends to elevate could-be lowbrow material above and beyond expectations.

The first Magic Mike was, seemingly, an anomaly — a relatively light-hearted summer crowd-pleaser with real substance beneath the surface. Shedding genre conventions like rip-away pants, underneath the fairly straightforward plot beats of your average frustrated dancer movie, you could find both hard bodies in thongs and a pretty astute treatise on American economics — a tragedy about the working class. (Yes, seriously.)

Magic Mike XXL jettisons the All About Eve-esque plot machinations of the first film (as well as “The Kid” character who set them in motion, thankfully). In fact, it essentially jettisons any semblance of a plot at all. It’s as frivolous as you’d expect a summer sequel to a movie about male strippers would be, but it’s hardly disposable. Like the original, it’s a rarity, but in a different way. Magic Mike XXL is less about this gang of hunks, and more about the people who drop singles to ogle them. (Women, mostly.) Watch Magic Mike XXL, and you’re not really watching a movie about male strippers — it’s the rare movie that’s true subject is its own audience. If you’ve seen Magic Mike XXL, chances are, you’re somewhere in this movie.

I can confirm this, because at the screening I went to, I was one of about four males in the theater, and it was a full house. The ladies were out in full force — mostly in their late 20s and early 30s, they were drinking wine and laughing and cat-calling the sexy guys on screen, clearly having a great time. In other words, it was a lot like most bachelorette parties, complete with exotic dancing.

Unlike almost any other movie put out by a major studio, Magic Mike XXL doesn’t care at all what straight males think of it — even less than the first Magic Mike did. (Despite the titillating strip sequences, Soderbergh’s original had a certain masculine bro vibe, largely sidelining the ladies.) There’s no gratuitous female nudity here to appease heterosexual men, and why would there be? They’re not at this movie.

Instead, Magic Mike XXL positions itself as a treat for the underserved — namely, gay men, African-American ladies, and women over forty, three audiences Hollywood almost never makes movies for. You could neatly divide the movie into sections titled “Something For The Gay Dudes” and “This Part’s For You, Sisters!” — it’s that obvious, and that goes a long way in making Magic Mike XXL as charming as it is. It makes no apologies for what it is, no concessions for what it isn’t. It is not only a movie about male strippers that will appeal to women and gay men, it is also a movie that gladly depicts women and gay men enjoying said male strippers — no angst or baggage, just pure pleasure. That probably shouldn’t be such a novelty, but it is. And that’s what a strip show like the one put on by the Kings of Tampa is meant to do — allow you to forget your worries for a night and just give in to the fun. In that sense, XXL definitely delivers.The plot, for what it is, has Channing Tatum’s Mike Lane returning to form, taking a holiday from his small but successful furniture business after being ditched by his love interest from the first movie. (I didn’t mind Cody Horn’s flat affect in the first film as much as some people did, but I’m also not sorry she’s absent from this sequel. Her replacement for this film, Amber Heard’s moody photographer Zoe, fares a tad better.) Mike rejoins his old bros on a road trip to a stripper convention where they plan to perform their old routines. Along the way, he convinces them to ditch their fireman and sailor costumes and instead, figure out how to express their own true selves through their “art.” Mike already learned to follow his dream in the first movie; the sequel has the rest of the gang following suit.

The film manages to work in echoes of the first film’s American economics theme in sly ways, as most of these guys have something else they’d rather do for a living than collecting singles for taking their clothes off. “Male entertainment” wasn’t anyone’s first career choice, but life often has us doing something we’d rather not do for money, while we wait on Plan B or C or X to work out. Magic Mike XXL is about embracing your day job (or night job, as it goes in this case), about putting something of yourself into it and making the best of whatever that may be. That theme may not resonate as well if these guys were all, say, accountants, but it works nicely here.

These very basic character arcs would be enough for a perfectly average sequel, but XXL is much less concerned about male angst than its predecessor was. More weight is given to how the audience feels — which is unusual in any movie, but especially unusual in one in which the major roles are still mostly populated by men. The stripping sequences focus less on the moves and machinations of guys taking their clothes off, more on how much the women are digging it. The audience in the big strip-off is filled with women of all colors and sizes — real women, not typical supermodel-y extras — and they look like they’re loving every minute of it. (Most of them probably were — if you’re going to be an extra, why wouldn’t you want to be an extra in Magic Mike? They provide the strippers and the singles!) It’s a fun reflection of what we all, in the actual audience, paid to see — what’s on screen is essentially exactly what’s happening in the movie theater, except with less money flying around, because we spent all our dollar bills on popcorn.

Yes, the extras are plenty well cast, and good for you on that, Magic Mike XXL. But what’s even more novel are the “set pieces.” Before the big strip-off in the finale, we visit a gay bar, a strip club for African-American “queens,” and a gathering of post-menopausal women guzzling wine. These are not locations you’ll find in any other summer sequel, it goes without saying. (Though I’d argue that any one of them would have vastly improved Jurassic World.) Writer Reid Carolin takes his sweet time in each sequence, to the extent that any forward momentum of the plot virtually stops to pay these demographics tribute.

First, Mike and the gang happily unleash their gayest dance moves at the gay bar presided over by a drag queen named Tory Snatch, and no one has to make any sort of “no homo” joke. These guys are straight — even Matt Bomer’s vain pretty boy Ken (though the actor who plays him is not). We get it, and we don’t need it spelled out for us, thank gawd. I doubt we’ve fully entered an era in which straight male characters don’t have to make gay jokes just to double-confirm their heterosexuality all the time, but Magic Mike XXL is a heartening sign of changing times. When was the last time you saw a bunch of straight guys hanging out in a gay bar in a movie, actually having a good time, and not even once reminding us that they don’t swing that way?

Next, the film introduces its Matthew McConaughey stand-in — Mike’s former mentor and paramour, Rome (played by a surprisingly up-to-the-task Jada Pinkett Smith, who’s pretty great). If this isn’t the film’s longest sequence, it certainly feels that way, as we take plenty of time away from our lead characters to observe various African-American hotties, including Michael Strahan and Donald Glover, strip down to their underthings. Technically, most of this is totally inconsequential the movie’s narrative, but it’s hard not to enjoy Rome’s confidence-boosting sermons as her “queens” get their laps danced. We see that Rome has built an entire business out of making women feel good about themselves, and that’s pretty cool, really.

Finally, in the very best of the three pit stops on the way to the big show, Andie MacDowell (!) of all people pops up as Nancy, a wealthy divorcee who is utterly delighted to have her home invaded by her daughter’s stripper buddies during a pinot noir-drenched girls’ night. Like the previous two sequences, XXL could easily have resorted to reducing these women of a certain age to cheap jokes, but there’s not a hungry cougar in the bunch. Instead, there’s a rather beautiful moment in which Ken tells a shy married woman that her husband needs to appreciate her for the gorgeous creature she is. We understand that Ken is, essentially, doing his job — making women who are not often fawned over feel desirable for a night — and so does she. But he’s also doing her a great kindness, the kind of kindness you wouldn’t expect in a summer comedy. Magic Mike XXL doesn’t punish its extras or supporting female characters for desiring our male leads, no matter how old or big or gay they might be.

(Also on the roster of women we might not expect to find in this movie: Elizabeth Banks, who, after The Hunger Games and Pitch Perfect movies, I fear is never not playing an emcee.)

Magic Mike XXL cuts “male entertainment” down to its essence. These guys truly enjoy giving women pleasure, whether it’s Mike trying to turn Zoe’s frown upside-down, or Big Dick Richie (Joe Manganiello) performing a ridiculous Backstreet Boys striptease in a convenience store trying to make a sourpuss clerk crack a smile. Yes, sure, the fact that all these hot male strippers are such nice, thoughtful, respectful guys underneath is totally a fantasy — in the same way that almost every action movie has a perfectly idealized female for its hero to smooch in the end. Fair’s fair — it’s long past time for the women to get their wish fulfillment, and that’s what this summer sequel is all about.

Magic Mike XXL probably has less male nudity (or near-nudity) than the first Magic Mike, and most of the dance scenes aren’t quite as inspired — that doesn’t seem to be director Gregory Jacobs’ specialty. (It wouldn’t have hurt to give us an extra few minutes of Channing Tatum doing his thing at any point. Who would complain?) The movie is clearly more concerned with giving us a good time than giving us a raunchy sexy time, and I’m fine with that. It may have been even more daring to deliver a similar story that really hammered home the sexuality, but ultimately, women aren’t going to strip shows for masturbatory material — they’re going to have fun. It’s not about getting off. (There’s a whole other genre of movie for that.) I’d argue that Magic Mike XXL delivers what any show at Chippendale’s aims to — a campy, slightly risque night of fun and laughter.

Will Magic Mike XXL end up on this year’s Top Ten list? For most critics, doubtful. For me? It’s definitely possible. Magic Mike and Magic Mike XXL are quite different, yet feel of a piece. The first one delves deeper, but I had a better time with the sequel. They’re both deceptively smart, and this one really knows its audience. We know it knows us, because we’re in the movie. It was made for us.

With that in mind, I’ll be saving up my singles in hopes of a Magic Mike XXX.*

These days, the state of the film industry can be disheartening. Studios are focused almost exclusively on franchises, reboots, and colossally expensive tentpole releases. Mid-budget movies have gone the way of the dodo, and even the “indies” aren’t as independent as they used to be — three out of the last five winners of the Independent Spirit Awards’ Best Film have also won Best Picture (Birdman, 12 Years A Slave, and The Artist), and the other two starred Natalie Portman and Jennifer Lawrence. Few of the more notable independent films in recent years stand for what independent cinema used to be — narratively original, formally daring, possessing a spirit that is totally unrestrained by the Hollywood hit-making machine.

They were once an alternative to what the studios offered, not just a cheaper version.

It’s not that honest-to-God independent films aren’t being made anymore — it’s just increasingly difficult for them to cut through the noise in the digital age, when making a film has never been easier or cheaper. Apps like Vine have turned every user into an amateur filmmaker. Sean Baker is not the first to attempt shooting high-quality entertainment on an iPhone, but with Tangerine, he’s done it exactly right, allowing the flexibility of the camera to capture the kinds of shots we don’t often get to see in a low-budget movie. In most moments, the movie looks absolutely incredible — but none of that would matter if he hadn’t found the right story to tell with his handy Apple product. Many of the characters in Tangerine can’t even afford an iPhone, but there’s something about their ultra low-budget lifestyles that totally gels with the energetic but inexpensive way the film is shot. If these ladies were to decide to document their misadventures on an iPhone, it’d look a lot like this. (That is, if they had some help with post-production.) Tangerine is the story of a friendship between two male-to-female transsexual prostitutes with very different temperaments. The first is fiery Sin-Dee (Kitana Kiki Rodriguez), who has just spent 28 days in prison and emerges with exactly two dollars to her name. The second is drama-eschewing Alexandra (Mya Taylor), who is currently turning tricks for cash to bribe the bouncer at Hamburger Mary’s to let her perform a small set of holiday tunes. The story starts and ends on a typically golden Christmas Eve in Hollywood — the sun-drenched cinematography aptly underlines the absence of wintery coziness we normally associate with the season.

The plot kicks into gear as Sin-Dee and Alexandra are reunited at the seedy real-world location Donut Time — which, if you’ve spent much time in Hollywood, you’ll know is exactly where these characters would hang out. Alexandra’s loose lips let Sin-Dee know that her pimp boyfriend Chester (James Ransone) has been unfaithful to her. That isn’t terribly surprising news to learn about a sleazy, meth-addicted pimp, but it sure doesn’t put Sin-Dee in the Christmas spirit. She goes on a frantic tear through Los Angeles to locate Dina (Mickey O’Hagan), the “real fish” (AKA, natural-born woman) Chester’s been kicking it with. Meanwhile, an Armenian cab driver named Razmik (Karren Karagulian) picks up assorted colorful characters — you know, the sort of folk who aren’t hip enough to Uber — before his life intersects with Sin-Dee’s mission to drastic effect. This is already more plot than you’ll find in a lot of indies, and that’s just for starters. Baker and his co-writer Chris Bergoch don’t skimp on story, which is just one of several elements that helps Tangerine stand out as a truly innovative indie. When Sin-Dee does find Dina, there’s some outrageous catfight comedy before the film briefly becomes something like a road trip movie, even if the “trip” in question is only a trek down Santa Monica Boulevard to see Alexandra perform at Mary’s. (It’s a beautifully sad sequence.) Razmik’s wife and mother-in-law also become significant characters in an unexpected way, pulling Tangerine into domestic drama territory. Baker moves so nimbly between tones and genres, the film can be uproariously funny and immensely depressed all at once.

Los Angeles is the most overexposed movie star in film history, but Baker’s vision of Hollywood is a world away from what we generally see. These are not the kinds of characters who usually get whole movies made about them, and when they do, they’re often portrayed as tragic figures. There’s a little Christmas misery in store for every character in Tangerine, but Baker doesn’t pity them. They are agents of their own free will, even if their options are limited. If there was ever another choice for Alexandra and Sin-Dee besides the working girl life, it seems to be long gone by the time we meet them here. Tangerine is matter-of-fact about who these people are. They don’t apologize for it, Baker doesn’t apologize for it, and we aren’t asked to feel sorry for anyone. We witness moments of truth and grace from each character (except low-life Chester), but also the kinds of behavior you’d likely find in most prostitutes, cheaters, and drug addicts. These are not hookers with hearts of gold — they’re just hookers with hearts. Much has been made of Tangerine being the first film to premiere at Sundance shot entirely on an iPhone. That’s impressive, but it’s the film itself that’s worth raving about. Mya Taylor turns in a just-about-perfect performance as Alexandra; as Sin-Dee, Kitana Kiki Rodriguez isn’t quite as expressive, but her feisty presence feels essential. Neither of these ladies is a polished performer, but that works just fine for a movie shot on something you might be reading this on right at this very moment. (Performance-wise, the first scene is the roughest — get past that, and you’ll have a good time.) Editing, cinematography, and soundtrack are all top-notch, not just “pretty good, for a movie shot on an iPhone,” but damn good for any movie. Happily, Tangerine doesn’t feel like a film that had to be shot on an iPhone, but one that wanted to be.

Baker previously made 2012’s terrific Starlet, the story of a pretty young porn star who befriends an elderly lady, and starred multiple members of the cast of Tangerine. Both films are nuanced portrayals of characters who would often be looked down on as sex workers, but feel quite different otherwise, especially aesthetically. Tangerine made me excited about the future of independent cinema for the first time in a long time. As indies seemingly get lighter and more studio-friendly, Tangerine dares to be different. Scroll through Vine, and most of what you’ll see is underwhelming, if not eyeroll-inducing; this is what you can really do with an iPhone.

Few artists reach the literary legend status David Foster Wallace did — and fewer still do it with, essentially, one work. Many who do die tragically young. Perhaps there are certain eras more likely to breed this kind of tortured artist — Wallace was five years older than Kurt Cobain, and didn’t commit suicide until 2008. He was in his forties when he died.

Yet, captured in the earliest moments of his celebrity in James Ponsoldt’s The End Of The Tour, Wallace might as well be the other poster boy for Gen X angst — the literary Nirvana. The film depicts him on the last stop of his book tour with Infinite Jest, the 1,000-page tome that became an instant, unlikely runaway success — hailed as a masterwork upon release, prompting comparisons of Wallace to once-a-generation luminaries like Hemingway.

Stories about such figures tend to be larger than life, featuring screaming fans and flashing lights and usually at least one lonely shot of said celebrity staring mournfully in the mirror. An anguished artist battling an addiction of some kind — pills or booze or sex or fame itself, or maybe all of these — succumbing to the monstrous pressures of success.

But it should come as no surprise to anyone who’s read his work: Wallace refused to adhere to such a conventional narrative, and the first movie to be made about him follows suit. In The End Of The Tour, it’s not being a preternaturally gifted artist that comes at a price — it’s being human.

The protagonist of The End Of The Tour is an ambitious novelist named David who is not David Foster Wallace. That would be David Lipsky, whose debut novel The Art Fair didn’t make nearly the splash that Infinite Jest did. Lipsky also has a gig writing for Rolling Stone, suggesting to his boss (Ron Livingston) that the magazine conduct its first author interview in a decade with the hot new commodity on the literary scene. This makes a lot of sense for the magazine, given the cult of personality that rose up around Wallace, building him up as one of the tortured gods of the 1990s — a young, prophetic rock star in the literary world.

Lipsky prepares to meet this rock star, as eager as anyone to buy into the myth of the untouchable genius. But the man he finds refuses to be the man Lipsky is expecting. Lipsky keeps trying to unlock an easy, central mystery, the Key to Being David Foster Wallace — the kind of thing that makes for an easily digestible celebrity profile. (Ironic, since Wallace’s work takes so much mental mastication to get through.) What Lipsky’s discovers is that there is no tidy narrative, no singular addiction, no buried breakdown, and no pithy quote that can account for the painful prudence of Wallace’s writing. David Foster Wallace is not an addict; he’s a person. He’s depressed, and there is no glamour in it, no meaning or rhyme or reason. It is what it is, and it isn’t pretty.

Jesse Eisenberg played a troubled wunderkind to Oscar-nominated effect in The Social Network. Here, he portrays David Lipsky on the other side of that fence — a man who would love to be a tortured genius, but is neither quite tortured nor quite genius enough to achieve what Wallace did. (In the years since this 1996 interview, Lipsky has gone on to become a notable writer in his own right, but it’s ironic to note that his most meaningful work may be the one that’s all about Wallace’s brilliance.) Eisenberg, as usual, doesn’t care to be terribly well-liked by the audience, allowing Lipsky to come off as self-serving and vaguely monstrous through most of the film (though he’s ultimately not a bad guy). Lipsky’s a hypocrite — unhesitant to poke through Wallace’s medicine cabinet and hit up his ex-girlfriend for the dirty deets, but flinching when Wallace wants to know anything about him, and flying off the rails when Wallace has a conversation with Lipsky’s girlfriend.

By contrast, The End Of The Tour has nothing but reverence for David Foster Wallace, though it’s a more grounded reverence than we’re used to from most biopics. Eisenberg and Lipsky both step aside to make room for Wallace’s greatness, which goes rather undisputed by Ponsoldt even if the subject himself is rather humble about his talents. At one point, Lipsky suggests that Wallace dumbs himself down in everyday conversation so as not to alienate the “common people”; Wallace denies this, believing (or at least professing to believe) that all inner lives are equally rich. Regardless, Jason Segel’s performance is so full of vulnerability and depth, it’s impossible to take Lipsky’s side in this or any other matter that poses their ideals against each other. Generously, Eisenberg doesn’t fight to give his character equal standing — The End Of The Tour is Wallace and Segel’s show, hands down. (And this gives us every reason to believe Segel will be a part of the Oscar conversation come winter.)

As portrayed by Jason Segel, Wallace is both tremendously sad and almost heroically good-natured. Having suffered serious bouts of depression, he now makes a concerted effort to show kindness to the people around him and set himself on the same playing field as everyone else, despite a cult of celebrity that could and has devoured similarly talented men. Wallace could have moved to New York City or Los Angeles and been the toast of the town. He could have received nothing but fawning praise from friends and strangers. Instead, he’s a bit of a recluse, spending most of his time with his two dogs in chilly Illinois suburbs. He dresses for a radio interview the way most of us wouldn’t even dress to run to the corner store for milk. Fame is what he fears — or, rather, the inauthentic bullshit that comes along with it. Wallace lived for 13 years after the (never published) Rolling Stone interview, but his death hangs like a heavy cloud over the proceedings. Everything Wallace says in 1996 we know, in some part, fueled his hanging himself in 2008.

Most of the film unfolds in conversation, with Lipsky trying to provoke certain responses from Wallace, who rarely takes the bait — instead, firing back with some insightful nugget of quiet wisdom that outdoes whatever pull-quotable sound bite Lipsky was hoping to get out of him. It is reminiscent of a slightly bigger two-hander between a pretentious wannabe and a complicatedly private public figure, one that also boiled down to a tete-a-tete made available to millions — that would be Ron Howard’s Frost vs. Nixon. That was a great film, thanks largely to Frank Langella’s dynamic portrayal of Richard Nixon, and The End Of The Tour similarly owes a lot to the affable, unaffected way Segel plays Wallace, aided by Donald Margulies’ deft script. There’s never exactly an antagonistic relationship between these two men the way there was between Frost and Nixon — the script doesn’t build to anything quite so climactic. The friction between these men is more about the sadness they feel about themselves, yearnings and longing brought to light through this interview.

The leads are the movie — The End Of The Tour features only brief appearances from very few supporting characters. Mamie Gummer and Mickey Sumner play college friends of Wallace; Anna Chlumsky appears as Lipsky’s Wallace-adoring girlfriend; Joan Cusack is the chipper Twin Cities driver who knows nothing about Wallace, though she is quickly won over by his radio appearance. In a movie dominated almost entirely by two charismatic males, it’s worth nothing that every other character, besides Lipsky’s little-seen boss, is female — even the young intern played by Maria Wasikowska (Mia’s sister). I’m not sure this means much, but at least the women here are more than just objects of longing and lust for the men at its center. Though their appearances are brief, all of these women are fully realized characters, which is more than you can say for a lot of movies that are largely concerned with the male ego.

Though much trimmer than Infinite Jest, The End Of The Tour provides an awful lot of thematic weight to chew on, which is probably inevitable for any good film about David Foster Wallace. It’s drenched in 1990s nostalgia — Alanis Morissette and the John Woo’s Broken Arrow are featured prominently — in that strange cultural moment that fell between grunge and bubblegum. Wallace gorges on candy and junk food. He loves popcorn movies and brainless television. He’s addicted to these empty pleasures — activities, like masturbation, that provide a temporary, numbing solace from his despairing mind. (Which is the reason he’s given up drinking.)The film isn’t cheap enough to reduce either Lipsky or Wallace to “one or the other” cliches, but there is a battle between art and commerce central to the narrative. Wallace rues the irony that the more fame he acquires, the more he’ll end up feeling like a fraud; Lipsky takes note of Wallace’s lonesome life and still can’t help but covet his success. And then, of course, there’s the fact that this conversation is only happening so it can be published and devoured by the readers of Rolling Stone — which has a fine reputation for journalism, sure, but also exists mainly to feature rock stars looking all sexy and badass on its glossy cover.

Wallace is the complicated novelist who lives for McDonald’s and John Travolta movies, while Lipsky is the rock-and-roll magazine writer who tries to prove how “serious” he is by reading, well, David Foster Wallace. In The End Of The Tour, the literary world, like everything else in America, is depicted as the serpent eating its own tail. An artist like Wallace can only be celebrated through the magic of mass consumption, but the more popular his work gets, the less value it has in the eyes of consumers — and Wallace himself. Lipsky visits Wallace’s home searching for juicy details that will sell Wallace as a certain kind of author — maybe a reason for readers to feel smugly superior to him, or maybe a reason to elevate their blind worship to even greater heights.

What he finds instead is just a lonely human being who feels sad a lot of the time. Yes, Wallace has channeled that sadness into a book that a lot of people like, but ultimately, that celebration doesn’t change his situation any, and in fact might just isolate him further. It certainly doesn’t cure his depression, either, and for a wannabe luminary like Lipsky, the revelation that fame isn’t a panacea for all life’s ills is very bad news indeed. We like our artists tortured, maybe because we want to believe that there’s a price to pay for stardom, or maybe because we hope there’s some dirty, terrible secret that separates them from us. Or else, why do they have it, and we don’t?Every generation has its superstars, tormented and otherwise, but there’s something particularly downbeat about Generation X’s icons. Kurt Cobain isn’t mentioned in the film, but it’s hard not think, too, about his suicide while watching it. Like Cobain, Wallace produced one work that rocketed him to star status and suddenly posed his talents as a commercialized product — essentially, everything he thought his work was railing against. Ponsoldt does a spectacular and rather depressing job of miring this movie in its era — the mid-1990s comedown from the excessive highs of the 80s feels very ingrained in who Wallace was, both as man and as artist. His melancholy feels less particular to his character, and more emblematic of Gen X itself. (Which might be what made Infinite Jest so resonant.)

Culturally, it is probably only about now, in 2015, that we are ready to delve into what the 1990s meant, the way we’ve already exhaustively deconstructed the 1970s and 1980s. I’m not sure Margulies or Ponsoldt consciously meant to take on such a lofty topic, but it’s a fitting task for the movie that explores the mind behind one of the essential pop cultural products of the decade. (Can it be a coincidence that Wallace’s work has “infinite” in the title, while Ponsoldt answers it with “the end” of the tour? I doubt it.) In 1996, America was hungry for an icon — to replace Cobain, perhaps — and Wallace happened to come along at the right time with the right book. But ultimately, even award-winning literary titans are have to be packaged a certain way to make an impact. It may not look it on the outside, but The End Of The Tour is one of the most insightful works about modern celebrity in ages.

It’s nice to think that the silver lining of sadness might be great art — which is why we have The Bell Jar and Nevermind, Starry Night and Aladdin‘s wisecracking Genie. The list goes on and on — writers and musicians and actors and artists are our modern-day Christs, dying for our sins. They create greatness and, in the process, destroy themselves, and we consume it, enjoying their soul-searching insight without having to look so deep within ourselves. At least, that’s the romantic version. But there’s no indication in The End Of The Tour that David Foster Wallace would be any happier a person if he never wrote a single word. He is neither bolstered nor undone by fame. His stories and his depression seem to be entirely separate entities. But then, we can’t ever be truly sure, can we?

For all that he opens up to Lipsky (and us), The End Of The Tour‘s David Foster Wallace remains elusive. We believe he’s being honest, but still, he never comes fully into view. We don’t get the little detail that clicks everything into place and allows us to nod our heads and say, Aha! Yes, I understand him perfectly now. And that’s the point. It’s easy to define a person, particularly a celebrity, by their untimely death, especially when it’s their own doing. But there was a whole life that came before that. David Foster Wallace may have committed suicide at one moment in 2008, but there were many moments up until then when he didn’t. Moments when he wanted to, thought about it, decided against. These are the moments The End Of The Tour decides to define Wallace by — not so much by what we see on screen, but by everything we don’t that’s implied.

We are not 2,000 words in a magazine. We are not a 106-minute movie. We are not even a 1,000+ novel hailed by everyone everywhere as a masterpiece. The End Of The Tour is about many things, but ironically, it is most about how no biopic, no biography, and certainly no celebrity profile interview in Rolling Stone can ever tell us who a person is, famous or otherwise. No matter how big a book we write, we are so much infinitely bigger.

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(A “Then & Now” perspective.)

Like my 2005 list, this Top Ten comes at you twenty strong, because that’s how I wrote it back in the day on my LiveJournal. And like last time, I’ll be adding my commentary about how the movies have held up 11 years later, because tastes change. Some of these movies have aged well in my mind, and others? Not so much.

I don’t think of 2004 as a particularly strong cinematic year in the abstract, mostly because the movies that dominated the Oscars fell, in my mind, in “good, but not great” territory. (They’re in my Top 20 here, but mostly not in the Top Ten.) A Clint Eastwood movie cleaned up in Best Picture, Best Director, and two of the acting categories, and three biopics of varying quality also made stronger showings than they probably deserved. (Those would be the biopics of Ray Charles, Howard Hughes, and J.M. Barrie.) Even the year’s critical darling, Sideways — which did manage to come away with several nominations, including Best Picture — felt too uneven for me to wholeheartedly embrace, despite some lovely moments. (More on that later.)

However, now that I’m looking at 2004 again, I realize how many incredibly strong films came out that year, several of which I’d count amongst my favorites. They just weren’t incredibly well-represented at the Oscars.

So here it is. Let’s revisit 2004.

*

THE TOP 20 FILMS OF 2004

20. RAY

Jamie Foxx had the Oscar for Ray before the film was even released; now that he’s won a Golden Globe, he’s almost a shoo-in to take home the golden guy. I’m happy to say it’ll be a well-deserved award, for Foxx not only captures Ray Charles in a way that few other actors could, but also makes him a dynamic character. Smartly, the film avoids using his blindness as too much of a foil, and allows the story to delve into some of the darker elements of Charles’ life (heavy drug use and lots of womanizing, though they’ve been toned down a bit). Supporting performances are solid and the film has a nifty structure, though I wish it didn’t devolve into Trainspotting territory toward the end. The best moments in Ray are far better than the picture as a whole; those moments are good enough for me. Congratulations in advance, Jamie.

(I haven’t revisted Ray. Of course, Foxx did win the Oscar, and that remains the primary reason the film is at all noteworthy. Like Walk The Line, released the next year, this one became the go-to example for a “typical” musician biopic, the sort mocked in Walk Hard. I’d be curious to see how it plays now, but not quite curious enough to seek it out.)19. MEAN GIRLS

There aren’t many comedies these days that actually get funnier every time you watch them; Tina Fey’s first screenplay (adeptly adapted from a nonfiction book) isn’t a triumph of storytelling, but its consistently wry humor makes repeat viewing enjoyable. No movie this year has spawned half as many worthy one-liners, and the performances are all tons of fun. Lindsay Lohan is a capable leading lady, but Rachel McAdams steals the show as Plastic Regina George, a complete bitch we’d still totally hang out with. Lots of stuff, like a running joke that compares teen girls to feral animals, is funny, but it’s the little things that make this movie stand out: Amy Poehler’s hilarious “Cool Mom,” for one. It’d be pretty lame to call this movie “so fetch,” so… I’m not going to try and make fetch happen. But it’s, y’know… fun.

(Oh, here we go. It’s almost funny to see a comedy staple like this on a Top 20 list. Mean Girls really has held up as one of the most consistent comedies of this century. It hasn’t aged a bit, and in fact, a lot of its more subtle jokes really do take a few viewings to catch on… but now, of course, you’ll hear them quoted often. Fey’s zany brand of humor plays a little better now that we’ve seen 30 Rock and gotten used to it. I still don’t know that this is Top 10 material, but I’m sure I’ve seen it more than any other movie from 2004, so maybe it deserves to be up there.)

18. SIDEWAYS

Critics have overpraised this simple comedy, stretching a small, low-key movie into “the best movie of the year!!” In its straightforwardness and lack of focus, Sideways can’t quite fulfill that hefty obligation, but let’s not forget the movie’s charms: a solid leading man in Paul Giamatti and a lovely supporting performance from Virginia Madsen; a setting and subject that allow for lush, wine-soaked set pieces; and some delicious dialogue in the film’s best scenes. Parts of the movie are superbly written and directed, others left me wanting more from the script. The best scenes center around two middle-aged men struggling with new relationships mid-life. (Have they aged as well as the wine they’re drinking? Not really.) The worst scenes depend partially upon Thomas Haden Church’s one-note, sitcom-level performance, which would be a complete bust if not for his character’s funny lines (as is, he brings nothing to the underwritten character or the movie itself). Still, there are enough funny and touching moments in the film to recommend it — though it’d be far more enjoyable if you imbibed some merlot beforehand.

(I had a bone to pick with Sideways in 2004. I simply didn’t enjoy it as much as most critics did, and I got tired of the heapings of praise I kept hearing. I stand by my assessment of Sideways as a flawed movie, though I’m probably not quite as bothered by it anymore. I’d still call it ever-so-slightly overrated.)

17. HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF AZKABAN

Harry Potter has hit puberty, and so has the series of films based on his adventures. Director Alfonso Cuaron infuses new life into the series, lifting the story off the page and creating a story that truly is as magical as it ought to be. The film isn’t afraid to go a little darker than the prior films in the series, no doubt setting up even further mayhem at Hogwarts. Almost universally agreed to be the best of the Potter films, Harry Potter and the Prisoner Azkaban has me eager for more.

(While all of the following Potter sequels were good enough, none were quite as daring as this. Cuaron was the only filmmaker to really put his own stamp on a Potter movie.)

16. FINDING NEVERLAND

A story can’t really be any cuter than one about the creator of beloved childhood hero Peter Pan and his make-believe games with the real-life boys who inspired it. Really, it just can’t. Unless that man is played by Johnny Depp, doing an accent. Hooray for Finding Neverland, then! It’s a bit somber for a family film, a bit light for an adult drama, but Finding Neverland tells an engaging story with a fine cast (Kate Winslet, Julie Christie, Freddie Highmore, Radha Mitchell, and Dustin Hoffman all do solid work). It touches on important, mature themes, but never strays far from childhood, much like its subject. Strangely enough, the figure who never quite comes into focus is J.M. Barrie himself, but the movie is so good-natured and well-executed we hardly notice. Seeing “Peter Pan” performed for the first time (and how people react to it) is especially fun.

(This review tells me I liked this movie a lot more in 2004 than I thought I did. I don’t recall any particular for it, maybe because Depp has overstayed his welcome as a movie star in his latest endeavors. On the other hand, Kate Winslet is worth watching, always. I still don’t see myself going out of my way to see this again.) 15. A VERY LONG ENGAGEMENT

Audrey Tautou more or less reprises the role of Amelie for Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s wartime love story about a woman determined to find her lost lover against all odds. The cinematography is beautiful, and the more serious subject matter lends itself to Jeunet’s talents for creating big moments out of small things. Tautou is winning, as always, and the supporting characters are just as well-drawn. A sweeping love story, an epic war, comedy, drama, suspense, Jodie Foster, and the French — A Very Long Engagement has it all.

(I’ll have to trust my 2004 opinion. This isn’t a movie I’ve thought much about, though I’m sure it’s perfectly fine, still. The problem with Top 20 lists is that they’re bound to be padded with some decent but unremarkable films.)

14. MILLION DOLLAR BABY

Okay, so Clint Eastwood looks like an exhumed corpse and the trailer made this movie look godawful. It’s actually pretty good. Hilary Swank deserves the Oscar she’s probably going to get for her portrayal of a driven boxer-wannabe who won’t give up because she’s got no other future. Morgan Freeman lends his graceful presence as the narrator and Eastwood’s longtime friend, and he too will be nominated for his efforts here. Eastwood’s gruff presence is sometimes right on target and sometimes a little awkward (I personally think it’d be a better film with someone else as the lead), but that’s the way he likes it. He takes his sweet time getting to where the story is going, but it thankfully deviates from the usual sports champion film formula and instead delves into some dark, somber themes. Eastwood should be praised for his originality in tackling the material, from his moody (lack of) lighting to his willingness to abandon the tried-and-true Hollywood champ-movie formula. Million Dollar Baby packs in a few surprises — one of them being that it’s not terrible.

(Ouch. Some harsh words from 2004 me. I think Eastwood’s movies are often more acclaimed than they should be — though many of his more recent efforts have earned dwindling praise for this very reason — but this one does feel like a bit of a classic. It’s easy to see why it won so many Oscars, including Best Picture, though I still wouldn’t count it amongst my favorite films. Leaving it off my Top 10 may have been a reaction against its frontrunner status — fair enough, though it’s possible I’d find room for it now. Then again, maybe not.)

13. HOTEL RWANDA

It’s hard to compare a movie about mass genocide to one about a few characters squabbling over adultery or enjoying a hootenanny in wine country. As far as big themes go, Hotel Rwanda is the most important film of the year. While the film is competently (but not super impressively) written and directed, the subject matter transcends any flaws that could be found in the storytelling. Hotel Rwanda tells the true story of a man who used his hotel-manager savvy to do an entirely different sort of negotiation, saving the lives of hundreds of Rwandans targeted for death. As that man, Don Cheadle gives an utterly convincing performance that should pave the way for his status as a leading man — and earn him an Oscar nomination. (Sophie Okonedo, as his wife, deserves props as well.)

Though absent of graphic violence, Hotel Rwanda can be difficult to watch — there is constant tension as we wonder how these people are going to stay alive. But the film’s refusal to wallow in unimaginable horror — criticized by some for treating genocide too lightly — and the protagonist’s modest heroism make it watchable and even, at times, uplifting. Director Terry George makes a subtle but clear point about international relations with Africa (basically, that the Western world is unwilling to concern itself with Africa’s troubles), but thankfully leaves unnecessary politics aside, focusing the story entirely on Rwandans. There’s no denying the power of a story like this one, one that many moviegoers will know nothing about. There are some haunting moments here, and while the film doesn’t leave the kind of imprint Schindler’s List does, it isn’t too far off.

(Through a twist of fate, I ended up sitting through this twice in week, which was not ideal. I haven’t watched it since, but I still have a high enough opinion of it. #13 seems like the right slot to me.)12. MEAN CREEK

It’s easy to dismiss or even forget Mean Creek as the subtle gem that it is, but writer-director Jacob Aaron Estes has made a tiny masterpiece that perfectly captures the ferocity and frailty of adolescent males. The film avoids cliches, making every character — even its meanest ones — a real person. Led by an unusually talented young cast (some familiar faces like Trevor Morgan, Scott Mechlowicz, and Kieran Culkin joined by newcomers Ryan Kelley, Josh Peck, and Carly Schroeder — all considerably talented and spot-on), the story is a straightforward, simplistic one, tackling big themes with its young characters. These kids don’t act like adults when faced with tragedy — they act like adolescents, making big, stupid mistakes, and they deal with the consequences. The film is layered with male-male relationships: between brothers, friends, a bully and his victims, all of which seem like natural, uncharted territory. I can’t think of a film that better understands the unspoken rules and hierarchies of adolescent males, the ways they interact with one another, their fears and insecurities. Truly one of the most underrated, underseen films of the year.

(Yep! And still not a movie most people know about. It probably deserved to be in my proper Top Ten, which made me want to cheat and sneak it in there, but instead I preserved the list as it was in 2004, so here it is at #12.)

11. THE BOURNE SUPREMACY

If Collateral was the 2004 film that showed that thrillers can be done in exciting new ways, The Bourne Supremacy is the one that proves there ain’t nothing wrong with tradition. That isn’t to say that Bourne is by-the-numbers in any way — everything here feels fresh, which is particularly impressive since this film is a sequel. This time, Jason Bourne is the hunter, under the false impression that Treadstone is still after him. He still struggles with his memory loss; he is still tortured by his dual-sides: sensitive Matt Damon guy versus calculating killing machine. Damon proves again that he’s a true movie star while Paul Greengrass directs with a fresh, almost documentary-like approach, so the action is all the more immediate and engrossing. It’s all pretty standard fare, but the superb cast (also including Julia Stiles and the always-outstanding Joan Allen) and stylish direction make this an action film that is truly, truly exciting. (Perhaps my favorite moment is the film’s last scene, reincorporating Moby’s “Extreme Ways” at just the right moment.) There are no frills here, just pure, unadulterated wham-bam action. And it’s so much fucking fun.

(This film is actually even more notable than it seemed at the time, one of the first to usher in the handheld camera in a blockbuster — which is now such an action staple, you’ll see almost zero movies that don’t use it. It remains the strongest of the Bourne movies.)

And now, for our main attraction… The Top 10!

10. THE AVIATOR

In a year where most of the would-be epics were anything but (Troy, Alexander, The Alamo), it’s refreshing to see one of those big-star, big-director, big-movie movies actually get it right. Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio make up for the misbegotten Gangs Of New York with the Howard Hughes biopic that deftly balances the man’s soaring career and dazzling public persona with his shadier private life (madness and womanizing and nudity, oh my!). As an added bonus, we are taken back to the glory days of Hollywood to fraternize with icons like Ava Gardner, Louis B. Mayer, Jean Harlow, Erroll Flynn, and Katharine Hepburn.

Like any Scorsese production these days, the film rounds up one of the most impressive casts imaginable — Alec Baldwin, Alan Alda, John C. Reilly, Jude Law, Kate Beckinsale, Willem Dafoe — plus, of course, Cate Blanchett’s very showy turn as the very showy Katherine Hepburn. DiCaprio’s performance is one of his very best and Scorsese’s filmmaking is exciting. You can call the movie bloated, but it’s bloated with so much good stuff it’s hard to complain. There’s something to be said for the big prestigious Hollywood drama that actually delivers.

(I know not every Scorsese fan ranks this amongst his best, and sure, it’s no GoodFellas or Taxi Driver. I have a fondness for Scorsese’s excesses, which is how I picked the similarly sprawling The Wolf Of Wall Street as my favorite film of 2013. I can understand anyone who feels like it’s all too much, but I’ll take this over Ray or Finding Neverland any day.)

9. THE INCREDIBLES

There’s no question that The Incredibles provides some of the most entertainment value you’ll get in any movie this year. What it also does is redefine our expectations of the computer-animated film: The Incredibles masquerades as a family movie, but most of it is pitched at an adult level — which isn’t to say the kids don’t love it too. (Pleasing the parents and the kidlets accounts for the boffo box office.)

Director Brad Bird has taken Pixar to a new level, doing away with the standard Disney formula “kiddie story + some jokes for the adults = all-around hit” and making a bona fide action movie that just happens to be animated. (It’s not hard to imagine a live-action version that plays out in almost exactly the same way.) Will Pixar ever fuck up? After watching The Incredibles, I’m compelled to say, “Probably not.”

(I’m not sure anything Pixar has put out counts as a “fuck up,” but a handful of their attempts since have not found the same level of unanimous praise — take Cars, Brave, or Monsters University. Still, with WALL-E, Toy Story 3, Up, and Inside Out under their belt post-Incredibles, they clearly still have the magic touch most of the time. I did recently see this again, and while many stories since have definitely played in this same superhero sandbox, this remains one of the strongest entries in the genre.)8. KINSEY

Biopics are tailor-made for Oscar season. A famous actor playing a famous persona, often with some sort of accent or disability (see Ray or The Aviator), is bound to get an Oscar nomination. Kinsey, at least, never seems like it’s actively going for the gold; written and directed by Bill Condon, Kinsey is content to tell a fascinating story without being flashy or grandiose.

Kinsey, as portrayed by Liam Neeson, is certainly a worthy subject for a movie, and his ambition to explain sexuality in scientific terms is not only an interesting story, it’s an interesting character study. Why does Kinsey do this? How does it affect his life? More than telling us what happened, Kinsey centers around the man at the heart of it all, and doesn’t try and make light of the fact that his actions, though monumental, might also have been damaging to the people around him.

Neeson and Laura Linney (as Mrs. Kinsey) both turn in great performances, and Condon’s script is tidy and effective. Condon shows us everything we want to see and nothing more; it’s a well-crafted story about an interesting man studying something that fascinates and baffles us all.

(I remember almost nothing about this movie.)

7. BAD EDUCATION

Oh, Pedro Almodovar. What a task you’ve given me, trying to explain why Bad Education is one of the 10 best films of the year. How could I ever summarize what this movie is about, or why it is so compelling? Suffice to say that Bad Education is about real life versus how films depict real-life, and is also an homage to Alfred Hitchcock, and is also a disturbing tale of molestation and abuse in the Catholic church, and also stars Gabriel Garcia Bernal as a cross-dressing prostitute (and that’s just one of his personas). If that doesn’t at least make you curious, I don’t know what will.

Bad Education isn’t a perfectly executed movie — at least, not by traditional Hollywood standards — but that’s part of it’s charm. It forgoes some character development and obscures what, exactly, is going on in order to keep an aura of mystery and suspense. And that’s all right with me. There are excellent performances all around, but Almodovar’s energetic direction is the glue that coheres the choppy individual pieces into a fresh, satisfying whole. The film’s final moment is a chilling stroke of genius — and this is bound to be the creepiest use of “Moon River” ever put to the screen.

(This is probably the film that first set me aflame with Almodovar love, though I saw Talk To Her before this. I’ve only come to appreciate him more since, though this probably remains my favorite. Definitely my cup of dark, fucked up tea.)6. COLLATERAL

Collateral was one of few films this year to give me that geeky film student thrill of excitement at its very coolness. Sure, it’s basically just a standard Hollywood thriller at its core, but it’s such a damn good one! Michael Mann gives us a kinetic jolt in every electrifying scene, even when it’s just a seemingly innocent conversation between a cabbie and his fare. Jamie Foxx and Tom Cruise are pitch-perfect in their respective roles: the daydreaming cab driver and the merciless hitman who holds him captive. The action scenes are plenty good, but what makes the film is the smart dialogue by Stuart Beattie — between Foxx and Cruise, between Foxx and Jada Pinkett Smith, between Cruise and whoever he’s planning to kill. (It’s fun to see Cruise’s usual stalwart hero persona subverted, allowing him to come off as a bloodthirsty asshole for a change.)

You might expect a story centered around a taxi to take place in Manhattan, but this one plays like a nasty love letter to the City of Angels. Mann makes after-hours Los Angeles a very sinister place indeed, and the film packs some smart surprises without getting too caught up in plot twists and turns. A smart thriller (I’d rather call it an “action drama”) is a rare thing, but Collateral has it all — an intelligent plot, compelling characters, plus an exciting visual style.  equals one of the best movies of the year. Not bad, for a Tom Cruise action flick.

(Like The Bourne Supremacy, Collateral looked and felt a lot more “different” than it does now. Its style has been aped, though it is still one of the most respectable thrillers of the past dozen years. Alongside a win for Ray, this was definitely the Year of the Foxx, though it marked an interesting departure for Cruise, whose career is robust as ever in 2015, while Foxx has had only a small handful of memorable parts since. Long story short, this is still a great movie.)

5. BEFORE SUNSET

It was a big year for high-quality sequels, with Shrek 2, The Bourne Supremacy, and Spider-Man 2 repeating themselves all the way to the bank. But the year’s best sequel is Richard Linklater’s Before Sunset, reuniting Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy as strangers whose one-night stand in Paris nine years ago left the question “What if?” imprinted in the back of their minds. Hawke and Delpy co-wrote their own stories and dialogue — the performances are fresh and genuine, but also as precise as anything you’ll see elsewhere. (They’re not as improvised as they may seem.)

Best of all, the film unfolds in 80 minutes of real time, following these two characters on a walk through Paris with the sinking sun reminding them that, again, they only have a short time together. Somehow, Linklater pulls all this off flawlessly, and although the film is essentially one long conversation, it’s never boring for a single second. I sincerely hope that this is only the second entry in a series of inspired films.

(And I got my wish! This was actually the first of these films I caught, and it took me several more years to catch Before Sunrise. I still find this the best of the trio, but each film makes the others stronger and more layered. There’s basically no limit to the praise I could heap on Linklater, so I’ll just stop.)

4. CLOSER

It’s unfortunate that many critics were turned off by the morally questionable actions and frank sexual dialogue in Mike Nichols’ Closer (I guess USA Today‘s Mike Clark and Entertainment Weekly‘s Lisa Schwarzbaum never raise their voices or speak of cum). To each their own, but for my money I identify more with Closer‘s fierce, angry lovers than the mopey loser Paul Giamatti portrays in critical darling Sideways. (Come on, guys — everybody gets a little nasty when it comes to sex and love.) Likable or not, the characters in Closer are vividly brought to life by four outstanding performers who, in a just world, would each get an Oscar nomination. (Why Julia Roberts’ delicious foray into bitchville hasn’t received more praise is a mystery to me. She’s fantastic.)

Patrick Marber, who adapted his own stage play, has crafted playful, biting dialogue that puts most Hollywood movies to shame, and Nichols has brought the production to life in a way that rarely betrays the film’s theatrical roots. The movie’s two best scenes occur back-to-back — the supercharged confrontation between Roberts and Clive Owen as they admit their infidelities (it has to be some of the best acting ever), and Natalie Portman’s coy striptease that simultaneously shows us how much and how little she’s willing to reveal. Closer is great fun to watch — how can you go wrong with four incomparable actors spouting off acidic dialogue in a film directed by one of Hollywood’s greatest?

(It surprises me to find this at #4, given that I have the poster in my living room and count it amongst my favorite films. I’ve seen it more than any of my other Top 10 films from 2004. It’s just one of those films that seems like it was made for me — four of my favorite actors screaming at, crying about, and fucking each other, plus some super gorgeous cinematography. It’s not really in the wrong spot on this list, but as I’ve found in other years, sometimes the movies you rank the best don’t necessarily become your favorites.)

3. MARIA FULL OF GRACE

Maria is full of heroin, full of fetus, or full of shit in any given scene in this movie; she is rarely full of grace. But the movie is. Joshua Marston’s documentary-like tale of a young, knocked-up Colombian girl who becomes a drug mule to escape her humdrum home life is both subtle and searing, an exercise in restraint that doesn’t shy away from the real dilemmas girls like Maria face.

At the center of it all, Catalina Sandino Moreno turns in a fantastic first performance. She’s neither a sinner nor a saint but rather your average teenage girl, one who takes a huge gamble that could cost her her life (in several ways). Marston’s movie is smart enough to avoid drug-movie cliches and the sense that you are watching A Very Special Film. It’s all utterly real, unfolding in front of you, neither melodramatic nor underwritten. Maria Full of Grace never makes a misstep — it truly is a graceful picture.

(Still holds up, though we haven’t heard as much from Marston as I would have expected since. Moreno pops up here and there, though she also hasn’t had a role quite as juicy as this. Maybe it’s time for a sequel?)

2. ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND

There’s no doubt that Charlie Kaufman is one of the most original screenwriters out there, but until Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, he hadn’t proven that he could write a story about real people. The ideas in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind are brilliant and intricate and unique and absurd, but they’re also rooted in the deepest of human emotions, and that’s what makes it work.

As Joel and Clementine, Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet give some of the most heartfelt performances of their careers. Like the gang from Closer, they’re real people — sometimes they’re cuddly, sometimes they’re assholes. They flirt, they fight, they fuck, they drink — they do all the things that real couples do. Since their relationship is essentially seen backwards, Kaufman shows us their uglier final fights and then slowly reveals the better times, the reasons they were together in the first place. By the end, we’re fighting for their memories to survive not because they’re perfect for each other, but because we know these are the moments that defined their lives, for better or worse.

Director Michel Gondry handles Kaufman’s script masterfully, the perfect visual accompaniment to such a kooky, bizarre screenplay. The supporting characters, too (portrayed by Elijah Wood, Kirsten Dunst, Tom Wilkinson, and Mark Ruffalo) round out the story. It’s a convoluted premise based around a very simple notion: that love is too painful to remember and too important to forget. Anyone who’s ever been in a relationship gone sour should relate. There are beautiful moments both visually and narratively — this is truly a landmark cinematic achievement.

(And has remained so ever since. This might very well be the most enduring film of 2004. If I had to pick one film from this year to preserve for a future civilization to remember us by, it’d probably be this.)

1. DOGVILLE

Lars von Trier’s Dogville is perhaps the year’s biggest anomaly; I moved it around everywhere between #2 and #11 before deciding that it belonged here. It’s difficult to place because it is such a challenging film to enjoy — in some ways, it’s hardly a film at all. What it is is a Dogma 95 study in bare bones moviemaking essentials: a compelling story and strong performances, that’s it. There’s nothing else in Dogville: no sets, no special effects, no locations save the stage itself. Even the titular dog is imaginary.

The ensemble cast is great, and Nicole Kidman proves exactly why she’s Hollywood’s hottest actress in a performance that would be unbearably sweet if not for the film’s tongue-in-cheek finale. It’s easy to see why one would claim that Dogville is a bad, or even terrible, film — with its purported anti-American sentiment, three-hour running time, and blatant disregard for the comforts we look for in today’s moviegoing experience, it’s a film that many (particularly those who are virgins to Von Trier’s always-unconventional storytelling) won’t understand or enjoy. For me, it was a groundbreaking cinematic achievement that went above and beyond its experimental mission statement. My favorite films are those that take risks, and Dogville does so in a major way. There’s simply no way to compare it to these other films. Dogville is in a league of its own, and for me is the year’s crowning cinematic achievement.

(I have soured on Von Trier since this film. I didn’t even bother to see Dogville’s Kidman-less “sequel” Manderlay. I try not to let his more recent efforts get in the way of what was so daring and brilliant about his first few films, which remain great — I just wish he’d move on and do something else for a change. I wrote more in my “#1 Club” revisitation of this film.)

*

BEST DIRECTOR

Michel Gondry — Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Mike Nichols — Closer
Michael Mann — Collateral
Martin Scorsese — The Aviator
Bill Condon — Kinsey

Honorable Mention: Joshua Marston — Maria Full of Grace

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY

Charlie Kaufman — Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Richard Linklater, Ethan Hawke, and Julie Delpy — Before Sunset
Joshua Marston — Maria Full of Grace
Stuart Beattie—Collateral
Bill Condon—Kinsey

Honorable Mention: John Logan — The Aviator

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY

Patrick Marber — Closer
Paul Haggis — Million Dollar Baby
Jean-Pierre Jeunet — A Very Long Engagement
David Magee — Finding Neverland
Tina Fey — Mean Girls

Honorable Mention: Larry Gross — We Don’t Live Here Anymore

BEST ACTOR

Jamie Foxx — Ray
Leonardo DiCaprio — The Aviator
Liam Neeson — Kinsey
Gabriel Garcia Bernal — Bad Education
Don Cheadle — Hotel Rwanda

Honorable Mention: Ethan Hawke — Before Sunset, Jim Carrey — Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

BEST ACTRESS

Catalina Sandino Moreno — Maria Full Of Grace
Hilary Swank — Million Dollar Baby
Julia Roberts — Closer
Julie Delpy — Before Sunset
Laura Dern — We Don’t Live Here Anymore

Honorable Mention: Nicole Kidman — Dogville; Kate Winslet — Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

Clive Owen — Closer
Morgan Freeman — Million Dollar Baby
Jude Law — Closer
Freddie Highmore — Finding Neverland
Peter Sarsgaard — Kinsey

Honorable Mention: Alan Alda — The Aviator

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Virginia Madsen—Sideways
Natalie Portman—Closer
Laura Linney—Kinsey
Cate Blanchett—The Aviator
Sophie Okonedo—Hotel Rwanda

Honorable Mention: Regina King — Ray

BEST ENSEMBLE CAST

Dogville
Closer
Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind
Mean Creek
Collateral

*

2004 FILM RANKINGS

1. Dogville
2. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
3. Maria Full of Grace
4. Closer
5. Before Sunset
6. Collateral
7. Bad Education
8. Kinsey
9. The Incredibles
10. The Aviator
11. The Bourne Supremacy
12. Mean Creek
13. Hotel Rwanda
14. Million Dollar Baby
15. A Very Long Engagement
16. Finding Neverland
17. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
18. Sideways
19. Mean Girls
20. Ray
21. Alfie
22. Shrek 2
23. Open Water
24. Garden State
25. Spider-Man 2
26. Saved!
27. Kill Bill Vol. 2
28. Born Into Brothels
29. Fahrenheit 9/11
30. We Don’t Live Here Anymore
31. I, Robot
32. I Heart Huckabee’s
33. In Good Company
34. Good-Bye, Lenin!
35. Little Black Book
36. The Passion of the Christ
37. The Phantom of the Opera
38. Coffee & Cigarettes
39. Hero
40. 13 Going on 30
41. The Terminal
42. Spanglish
43. Ocean’s Twelve
44. Meet the Fockers
45. Napoleon Dynamite
46. Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow
47. Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy
48. Alexander
49. Around the Bend
50. The Dreamers
51. Eurotrip
52. The Manchurian Candidate
53. Starsky & Hutch
54. Shark Tale
55. The Day After Tomorrow
56. Saw
57. Troy
58. The Village
59. The Stepford Wives
60. Tarnation
61. Van Helsing
62. The Forgotten
63. A Home at the End of the World
64. The Chronicles of Riddick
65. Catwoman

*

Here it is, straight from the mouth of a film student. The Top 10 movies of the year. However, I haven’t seen any of the following yet: The Hours, Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, Talk to Her, Bowling for Columbine, 8 Mile, 25th Hour, Frida, The Pianist, Antwone Fisher, The Good Girl, or Secretary. All of these movies could very well end up with some acting or writing awards, or perhaps crack into my Top 10, so a final list will be posted closer to Oscar time. I just wanted to get these out as my unbiased opinion before the nominations were announced.

TOP 10 MOVIES OF THE YEAR

1. Far From Heaven
2. About Schmidt
3. Chicago
4. Minority Report
5. Y Tu Mama Tambien
6. Adaptation
7. Insomnia
8. Punch-Drunk Love
9. Road To Perdition
10. The Two Towers

FAR FROM HEAVEN – Grounded by a perfect performance by Julianne Moore, the movie concerns what happens when the ideals of the “perfect” 50’s family are shattered by topics that the 1950’s weren’t ready for (homosexuality and interracial friendship). Far From Heaven is filmed in a 50’s style, as well, allowing the audience to feel that they are in 50’s along with Julianne Moore, right there with her as her cheerful suburban world falls apart. The use of color is brilliant and the film also contains my favorite line in a movie this year, because of its simplicity and importance to the story: “Here’s to being the only one.”

ABOUT SCHMIDT – I think this is maybe Jack Nicholson’s best performance ever. We all know he can scream and act like a madman, but he rarely does that here. This is a touching and honest portrayal of aging, hitting on topics such as retirement, the death of a spouse, and watching kids grow up and become independent. Nicholson is fearless in his portrayal of all of this, allowing his character to be vulnerable and pathetic. As good as he was in As Good As It Gets, he deserves an award for this movie much more because it is more about acting and less about performance. The movie as a whole is filled with great performances, and is alternately very funny and very sad, and just when it seems like it might get boring, the plot goes in a new direction and makes you laugh. Not the sort of thing I’d want to watch over and over, but definitely worth seeing.

CHICAGO – I had a hard time figuring out where, exactly, to put Chicago, because the songs and dance moves were more or less lifted from the stage musical, and were not created simply for the movie. I decided to judge it based on entertainment value alone, and in that respect, Chicago might have been the most entertaining movie I saw all year. Shockingly, Renee Zellweger can sing! And she’s great in the movie, playing a character who I was surprised to find isn’t very likeable at all. Balancing her out is Catherine Zeta-Jones as yet another murderess bitch, who plays off Zellweger very well. The film is all about fame vs. infamy, and watching the women compete for the public’s eye is amusing. The musical numbers are directed brilliantly and integrated into the film in a clever way that gets rid of that whole, “Why are people running around singing?” clause that invades most musicals. The movie builds a momentum that it can’t quite carry through the entire film, since the best musical numbers come at the beginning of the film (particularly “Cell Block Tango”).

MINORITY REPORT – Steven Spielberg proves once again he’s the master entertainer. Minority Report delivers in a way that Spielberg’s other chase movie this year, Catch Me If You Can, doesn’t quite pull off. (I find it strange that “Everybody runs” could be the tagline of either of his films). The effects are great and the plot twists good, although Spielberg once again blunders an ending to an otherwise great film (what is it with this guy?). Still, the vision of the future presented here is one of the most original I’ve seen in quite awhile, and Spielberg delivers several of his trademark Great Movie Moments—particularly the mall chase scene with Tom Cruise and Samantha Morton.

Y TU MAMA TAMBIEN – The only movie from my Top 10 I saw on DVD instead of in the theater, Y Tu Mama Tambien is a Spanish-language coming-of-age film. It centers around two teenage friends who hit on a woman by asking her to come with them to a made-up beach. After her husband cheats on her, she agrees, to their surprise. The film is all about the journey instead of the destination, and the most remarkable thing about the film is how natural it feels. Instead of watching a movie, you’ll usually feel like you’re eavesdropping on these people’s lives. Part of this is due to the raw, explicit sex scenes that leave nothing to the imagination. Diego Luna and Gael Garcia Bernal as the two leads are great, but it’s the performance by Maribel Verdu that really makes the film and tiesd. I’ve never seen a film more honest than this about being a teenage guy.

25TH HOUR

ADAPTATION – This movie is probably more enjoyable to screenwriters than anybody else. Nicolas Cage gives two good performances as the frustrated screenwriter of Being John Malkovich and his half-witted twin brother. The plot concerns Charlie Kaufman, assigned to adapt Susan Orlean’s The Orchid Thief into a screenplay. His solution to writer’s block has him write himself into the screenplay and stalking Orlean, who is played perfectly by Meryl Streep. There are plenty of in-jokes that people who are very familiar with the entertainment industry will eat up, but the film goes spinning off on a strange tangent in the third act that seems to embrace everything the movie is against. With a stronger, more honest ending, it would have been a much better film. As is, it’s funny, clever, and twisted, and features some great lines and performances.

INSOMNIA – Insomnia is a remake of a European film I haven’t seen, but it’s a damn good one. Al Pacino plays a tough cop from Los Angeles struggling with his own morals and police ethics while trying to solve a murder in Nightmute, Alaska. As his conscience eats away at him, so does the lack of sleep he gets in a town where the sun never sets. Al Pacino is awesome as always; Hilary Swank is perfect as the eager, younger cop trying to learn from Pacino, unaware that he is not quite the good cop she idolizes. Robin Williams is good, too, as the manipulative killer who thinks he and Pacino are the same. Christopher Nolan, better known for Memento, pulls off brilliant editing techniques that sell the insomniac idea, and the film’s morality plays are almost epic. This is one of the best thrillers in years.

PUNCH-DRUNK LOVE – It’s Paul Thomas Anderson! It’s excellent, right? Well… The story concerns Barry Egan, and his quest to buy a lot of pudding, and invade evil Mormon sex phone operators, and fall in love, and stuff. This movie proves Adam Sandler can be at least a halfway decent actor, and that Paul Thomas Anderson can be an only halfway decent writer. Like Magnolia, Anderson doesn’t follow any sort of filmmaking rules—he goes with his own drummer. That’s fine, except in this case the movie is too short and random and never quite comes together. If Anderson had developed the story and characters thoroughly this could have been an amazing movie, but the audience is left with way too much to wonder about to make this movie anything better than funny, clever, crazy, quick, and entertaining. I must admit that it’s much better seeing it the second time around, and Emily Watson lights up the screen.

ROAD TO PERDITION – The follow-up to Sam Mendes’ triumphant American Beauty didn’t, of course, live up to the reputation of that movie, but it is a solid gangster picture. Tom Hanks is very good as a father who must protect his surviving son from the criminals he works with, and Tyler Hoechlin matches his performance as the son. Jude Law shows up as a creepy photographer/killer and Paul Newman rounds out the cast, finding the right note for the villain in the movie. The cast is all first-class and the cinematography equally impressive, but the film never quite takes off the way it should. Oh well. It’s still solid entertainment.

THE TWO TOWERS – The second installment in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, for all it’s entertainment value, left a lot to be desired. By adding several new characters, many from the first movie were shoved into supporting roles far away from the main action in the story. The story doesn’t move—most of the characters are in the same situations at the end of the movie as they are in the beginning, and very little happens to affect the central plot of the destruction of the ring. Frodo’s slow corruption by the ring isn’t quite as convincing as it should be, and he is placed in the background of the story to allow the main plot of this one—the battle of Helm’s Deep—to be in central focus. Too bad it doesn’t really matter to the audience whether any of these characters survive, since we’re already more concerned with the dozen other characters we were introduced to in the first movie. As big and awesome as the climactic battle is, not much is at stake—if so many kingdoms are being destroyed, what is it about this one that’s so special? That being said, Viggo Mortensen does a great job of carrying the movie as this film’s hero, Aragorn, and Gollum, the computer-generated creature, is the best-developed character in the film. Technically impressive and certainly entertaining, but a bit unbalanced and out-of-focus, leaving too many characters stranded for too long and without much to do.

OTHER AWARDS

Best Director
Todd Haynes, Far From Heaven
Steven Spielberg, Minority Report
Rob Marshall, Chicago
Peter Jackson, The Two Towers
Sam Mendes, Road to Perdition

Best Actress
Julianne Moore, Far From Heaven
Renee Zellweger, Chicago
Meryl Streep, Adaptation
Maribel Verdu, Y Tu Mama Tambien
Diane Lane, Unfaithful

Best Actor
Jack Nicholson, About Schmidt
Daniel Day-Lewis, Gangs of New York
Nicolas Cage, Adaptation
Viggo Mortensen, The Two Towers
Leonardo DiCaprio, Catch Me If You Can

Best Supporting Actress
Catherine Zeta-Jones, Chicago
Kathy Bates, About Schmidt
Patricia Clarkson, Far From Heaven
Susan Sarandon, Igby Goes Down
Hilary Swank, Insomnia

Best Supporting Actor
Dennis Quaid, Far From Heaven
Paul Newman, Road to Perdition
Chris Cooper, Adaptation
Dennis Haysbert, Far From Heaven
Colin Farrell, Minority Report

Best Editing
Chicago
Insomnia
About Schmidt
The Two Towers
Punch-Drunk Love

Best Cinematography
Far From Heaven
Minority Report
Chicago
Punch-Drunk Love
Road to Perdition

Best Screenplay
For my best screenplay award, I am awarding only movies whose screenplay did not veer off in some wild and unplanned direction (i.e. went off the horse).
About Schmidt
Far From Heaven
Changing Lanes
Y Tu Mama Tambien
Insomnia

Best Movies With Faulted Screenplays:
They went off the horse, but the movies are enjoyable anyway.
Adaptation
Punch-Drunk Love
Minority Report
The Two Towers
Gangs of New York

Let me know what you agree/disagree with!

No, Academy Awards drinking games are nothing new or novel, and yes, every other more reputable pop culture website has already posted one.

But if I’m going to be watching the Oscars, and I’m going to be drinking, and I’m going to be playing a game, I may as well be playing my own Oscars drinking game, so here it is.

I tried to avoid some of the most obvious ones, because I know me some Oscars, and if I wanted to, I could seriously get you drunk before 6 PM.

Have fun, everyone!

*

DRINK EVERY TIME…

Neil Patrick Harris says or implies that we wish he was Tina Fey and Amy Poehler.

A joke spoils (or comes close to spoiling) Gone Girl.

A mention of Selma is followed by a cut to a “person of color.”

Neil Patrick Harris makes a gay joke about Alan Turing.

Someone jokes about how The Imitation Game and The Theory Of Everything are similar because they’re both British biopics.

Neil Patrick Harris insinuates that a Gone Girl-like sexual experience turned him gay.

Ellen’s selfie from last year’s Oscars is mentioned. (Take two drinks if it’s shown.)

Someone asks if the show is “rushing or dragging” or screams “NOT MY TEMPO!”

Anyone jokes about how many Oscars Meryl Streep has.

Anyone jokes about how many Oscars Julianne Moore doesn’t have (yet).

An award recipient says they could not have made the movie without their spouse who had nothing to do with making the movie.

You see (or someone mentions) Groot from Guardians Of The Galaxy.

Oprah looks surprised by a particularly edgy joke.

Meryl Streep shrugs.

Clint Eastwood gets that ol’ Dirty Harry murderous gleam in his eyes.

Tilda Swinton looks like she’d rather be participating in a bisexual threeway.

Lady Gaga gestures in a way that is obviously meant to show off her new engagement ring.

A previous Oscar winner that you forgot existed or thought was dead appears to present an award.

An affable celebrity that another celebrity takes a dig at smiles and shakes their head good-naturedly but you can tell they are secretly digging their fingernails into their skin under the table and plotting revenge. (Take two drinks if it’s George Clooney.)

Someone mentions that they had a really clever bit planned, but the producers cut it for time.

You see a clip from The King’s Speech, The Artist, or Argo.

SMILE KNOWINGLY AT…

Anything to do with hacking or North Korea.

Anything to do with a fake baby.

50 Shades Of Grey mockery.

References to how American Sniper is the only Oscar movie to make a significant amount of money.

Anyone singing any part of “Everything Is Awesome.”

Any mention of Harvey Weinstein in jest.

SMOKE SOME POT IF…

Anyone jokes about how watching Inherent Vice makes you feel like you’re stoned.

Someone dusts off an old Matthew McConaughey bongos reference.

A mention of Wes Anderson is followed by a cut to Wes Anderson and an abnormally enthusiastic amount of cheering.

James Franco’s ill-fated hosting duties from several years ago are mentioned.

TAKE A SHOT IF…

Someone gets seriously sentimental or patriotic about American Sniper.

Someone talks earnestly about how hard being an artist is in reference to Birdman.

Someone speaks earnestly about Alan Turing’s sexuality in reference to The Imitation Game, which neglected to show him being even a little bit gay.

Lyndon B. Johnson is mentioned.

Anyone likens Jake Gyllenhaal’s character in Nightcrawler to paparazzi or people in Los Angeles in general.

An actor actually manages to thank the screenwriter who wrote all their dialogue.

Jupiter Ascending is mentioned.

“12 Years” is mentioned either in the context of filming Boyhood or slavery. (Take two shots if they are mentioned together.)

Someone mentions Meryl Streep while accepting an award for a movie that in no way involves Meryl Streep.

The second recipient of an Oscar opens their mouth to say something just as the music strikes up and they are promptly whisked off stage by someone famous’s hot daughter.

Anyone says “…or The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance” in its entirety.

A winning actor or actress starts to talk about the other nominees in their category but stops before mentioning each of them by name.

The winning supporting actress mentions that it was an honor to be nominated alongside Meryl Streep, with the implied undertone of “fuck you, Meryl, I WAS BETTER THIS YEAR.”

A winner mentions watching the Oscars as a child and never imagining that they might someday be up there.

FINISH YOUR DRINK IF…

Woody Allen shows up.

You catch a glimpse of Lupita N’yongo’s brother.

There is a clips montage about heroes.

Neil Patrick Harris appears in a Birdman costume.

Jaws music plays someone offstage.

A presenter reflects soberly about how important the screenplay is but none of the nominated screenwriters have yet been thanked in a speech.

Anyone calls out the blatant fact that Birdman is exactly like Black Swan.

*

(A Then & Now perspective.)

The further back I go in time, the less secure I am in my Top Ten choices. That’s largely because I haven’t seen all these movies again since, and I have no idea how, say, House Of Sand And Fog measures up to The Last Samurai.

On the other hand, there are a few of these films I know very well, which always makes me feel they belong higher on the list. On some level, isn’t the movie I’ve watched the most times probably my favorite?

That’s what makes ranking films fun in the first place. There’s no need for a list that changes as you do — it wouldn’t tell us anything. Instead, we look back on where we were, where the movies were, and think about what’s changed in both cases. Sometimes, the path a filmmaker took after a given year makes me look upon his film less favorably. Other times, I see more of a director’s work and then appreciate a film they made more than when I first saw it. It goes without saying that creating a Top Ten list is not a perfect science.

Few of these films from 2003 are ones that I’ve revisited often or count amongst my favorites. But in 2003, I thought they were damn good, apparently — or at least better than everything else I saw — and so did many others. If I were to re-rank them now, I know exactly which one would be my favorite, and it’s not my #1 or #2 choice. But as much as it may pain me, I am keeping the list intact for historic accuracy. You’re welcome, Mystic River.

*

TOP TEN FILMS OF 2003  10. KILL BILL VOL. 1

Quentin Tarantino proves he’s still the king of violent, edgy, ain’t-it-cool postmodern entertainment. Over-the-top and in your face every step of the way, the film packs a mean punch despite its showiness. The B-movie plot is given grade-A Hollywood production value, making it a fun ride from start to finish. A blood-spattered action pic is the perfect forum to showcase Tarantino’s talents (and disguise his shortcomings).

(I probably appreciate Kill Bill now more than I did after viewing just this first half. I like but do not love most of Tarantino’s films, as there’s always a cool post-modern detachment that keeps me from fully investing in the story. That’s certainly true in Kill Bill. I found this one to be the better of the volumes by far, given that it has the most epic action sequences. The “two volume” gimmick might have worked better if they’d been rearranged a bit, but both the visuals and the storytelling work better for me in this first film.)

9. IN AMERICA

A genuinely heartfelt piece of filmmaking, made all the more poignant due to its close ties to the true story of writer/director Jim Sheridan. It’s increasingly rare to see a movie that so openly and straightforwardly deals with familial love, free of the usual contrivances. In America is sometimes melodramatic, but never manipulative. Solid performances all-around (especially from the kids) support a charming, funny script. A rare entry in a dying, oft-clichéd genre: the feel-good film.

(I haven’t seen this since and remember, mostly, the warm and loving tone of the film, as well as a surprisingly tense sequence set at some fairgrounds. Plus Samantha Morton’s short haircut. I would happily watch this again sometime.)

8. MONSTER

A complex character realized on screen with astonishing results. Charlize Theron goes beyond physical transformation to play serial killer Aileen Wurnos — she channels her. Theron doesn’t hold back, but unfortunately, the script does, at times — going too far for us to sympathize with her but not far enough to take us inside her head. Some aspects of her lesbian love affair with Christina Ricci’s Selby feel underexplored. Regardless, Aileen is always compelling to watch, even when we want to look away from her ugly misdeeds.

(A dozen years later, Theron’s performance is still just as riveting as ever. These “transformative” acting stunts don’t always age well, but Theron really went for it, and it shows. Her Oscar win came relatively early in her career, but all these years later I think she’s one of the most respectable leading ladies we’ve got. That’s pretty good, especially for someone who’s been starring primarily in big budget sci-fi/fantasy endeavors lately.)

7. MYSTIC RIVER

One of the best ensemble casts of the year comes together for the involving story about two crimes — one in the past, the other in the present, but both equally pervasive in the lives of the characters. The script is solid, in spite of a few awkward moments (typical of Eastwood), keeping up the suspense with some nifty twists and turns. But the top-notch performances are what really drive the story — it’s solid work all around from Tim Robbins, Marcia Gay Harden, Laura Linney, Thomas Guiry, and Sean Penn. If only Clint Eastwood hadn’t done the music.

(Though it displays several of Eastwood’s recurring sins as a director, I found this held up well when I watched it again a couple years ago. Eastwood’s last seven films have not been stellar, but he had a good run with this, Million Dollar Baby, and Letters From Iwo Jima.)

6. AMERICAN SPLENDOR

It’s not a film for everyone, but it is a film about everyone — the average joe who tirelessly survives the mundanity of everyday life. It mirrors the attitude of its protagonist — content to be imperfect, irregular, and unremarkable — and in doing so, becomes something remarkable after all: a love letter to weird people. Harvey Pekar’s life is drab, in essence, but colorfully and richly portrayed by the film. American Splendor goes beyond truth by placing the real Harvey Pekar in it, defying genre and formula for a strikingly original approach.

(American Splendor is one of those movies I kind of forget about, but I feel like I would probably appreciate even more now than I did as a film student. It was pretty much the first signal of Giamatti as a serious leading man for a certain kind of movie… usually an offbeat movie about someone grumpy. Plus, it has Hope Davis, from back when Hope Davis was in a lot of things. Maybe she still is, but I don’t see her enough.)

5. FINDING NEMO

It can be hard to review Pixar movies without overusing the word “delightful.” Arguably the most purely enjoyable film of the year, there’s nothing not to like: beautiful animation, a clever script, hilarious voice work (especially from Ellen DeGeneres), and a charming story. It is certainly the best major animated film in years, but it also transcends the genre to become not only something that an entire family can enjoy together, but something that even the most sophisticated adult viewer can admit to loving without shame.

(Finding Nemo intentionally brought back happy flashbacks to Disney’s The Little Mermaid, one of their very best. Animated films can do “under the sea” like no one else, and in a lot of ways this is the quintessential Pixar movie… though it certainly has competition. It’s surprising that the sequel has been such a long time coming. I watch this when I’m in the mood for nothing but unadulterated joy, though they do make room for some brief, melancholy echoes of Bambi early on.)

4. LOST IN TRANSLATION

A delightful and distinct film with two solid leads playing superbly-written characters. Sophia Coppola proves that she has a unique, fresh point of view in both her writing and direction, and Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson are not only completely convincing as foreigners in a strange land, they also look like they’re having a hell of a lot of fun. Watching the film leaves the viewer with an indefinite emotion that is neither happy nor sad, a tell-tale sign of a talented filmmaker. A pleasure to watch.

(Well, this takes us back to a time when neither Sofia Coppola nor Scarlett Johansson was a proven commodity. Coppola was known only for The Virgin Suicides, while Johansson was still a rising starlet with her biggest roles ahead of her. Coppola is a polarizing auteur — people tend to either love her or hate her, and this film achieves similar results. I tend to like what she does more often than I don’t, and I still appreciate this movie, even if it does somewhat overdo it on ScarJo staring vacantly out of windows.)

3. COLD MOUNTAIN

A wartime epic told the old-fashioned way, which is not easy to do these days. The love story between Ada (Nicole Kidman) and Inman (Jude Law) is well-crafted without inducing any eye-rolls. What makes it fresh, however, is not the romance, but the separate journey each character makes — he tries to make his way back home, she struggles to take ownership of hers. They must find themselves before they find each other, encountering violence, horror, and hardship galore along the way, as well as a robust supporting cast featuring Natalie Portman, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Kathy Baker, Renee Zellweger, and plenty more. It’s a well-crafted, well-executed film in every way, thanks to Anthony Minghella’s superb talents as writer/director.

(I have a special fondness for this movie, since I met Minghella around its release and he died a few years later. This was, unfortunately, his last major release… if you don’t count the little-seen Breaking And Entering, an odd little romance starring Jude Law and Juliette Binoche. Cold Mountain was largely snubbed come Oscar time, which I find particularly unfortunate in a year where Seabiscuit was nominated for Best Picture. I think it has held up remarkably well and is one of my favorite romantic epics. It would probably be my #1 movie from 2003 if I was doing it over again, though I don’t know many who like it as much as I do.)

2. 21 GRAMS

Though the jumbled plot is a unique, bold choice, the film is really a showcase for some of the most talented actors of our time. A phenomenal Sean Penn (who made another big splash in Mystic River this year) gives the film its heart (no pun intended), while the fearless Naomi Watts gives it some bite. The film is wrenching and emotionally exhausting, but the performances put us right there every minute, unable to look away.

(Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu got a bad rap after this for essentially making the same movie again and again, and I have a particular grudge against him for robbing Richard Linklater and Boyhood with his Oscar wins for Birdman, which I will never not think is ridiculously overrated. This is the kind of story that feels overdone now, but was reasonably fresh at the time, and a good showcase for its actors.)

1. LORD OF THE RINGS: RETURN OF THE KING

A fitting finish to a truly remarkable achievement in filmmaking. Peter Jackson has literally brought magic to the screen with a masterful gift for fantasy storytelling unseen since Spielberg’s heyday. A true epic, filled with heroism and honor, mercifully free of postmodern cynicism. Though it could not be made without today’s technology, the film itself is a timeless story that will be beloved for years to come.

(I basically never have the time required to rewatch these movies — that’s what I get for buying the Extended Editions on DVD. I really appreciated several of these performances and the genuinely moving story at the time. For whatever reason, my feelings about Peter Jackson are less pure these days, as I’ve had no interest in any of his Hobbit movies, which may have retroactively turned me off of Middle Earth completely. Aside for the laughably bloated ending to this installment, I will go ahead and stand behind this choice as my #1 film, even though it seems highly unlikely I’d place it here if I were evaluating these films today. I can’t really imagine finding this more powerful than Cold Mountain, but maybe that’s only because I’ve had time to get over what a massive technical achievement this trilogy was, in addition to some solid storytelling.)

BEST ACTOR

Sean Penn, 21 Grams
Paul Giamatti, American Splendor
Ben Kingsley, House Of Sand And Fog
Tim Robbins, Mystic River
Bill Murray, Lost In Translation

Honorable Mention: Johnny Depp, Pirates Of The Caribbean: The Curse Of The Black Pearl; Jude Law, Cold Mountain

BEST ACTRESS

Charlize Theron, Monster
Naomi Watts, 21 Grams
Scarlett Johansson, Lost In Translation
Hope Davis, American Splendor
Jennifer Connelly, House Of Sand And Fog

Honorable Mention: Keisha Castle-Hughes, Whale Rider; Nicole Kidman, Cold Mountain

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

Dominic Monaghan, Lord Of The Rings: Return Of The King
Tom Guiry, Mystic River
Judah Friedlander, American Splendor
Albert Finney, Big Fish
Billy Boyd, Lord Of The Rings: Return Of The King

Honorable Mention: Djimon Hounsou, In America; Sean Astin, Lord Of The Rings: Return Of The King

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Shohreh Aghdashloo, House Of Sand And Fog
Renee Zellweger, Cold Mountain
Marcia Gay Harden, Mystic River
Samantha Morton, In America
Christina Ricci, Monster

Honorable Mention: Miranda Otto, Lord Of The Rings: Return Of The King; Patricia Clarkson, The Station Agent

BEST ENSEMBLE CAST

Cold Mountain
Mystic River
Lord of the Rings: Return of the King
21 Grams
American Splendor

BEST SCORE

Hans Zimmer, The Last Samurai
Gabriel Yared, Cold Mountain
Howard Shore, Lord of the Rings: Return of the King
Danny Elfman, Big Fish

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY

Cold Mountain
Lord Of The Rings: Return Of The King
Big Fish
American Splendor

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY

Lost In Translation
In America
21 Grams
Finding Nemo

BEST DIRECTION

Peter Jackson, Lord of the Rings: Return of the King
Anthony Minghella, Cold Mountain
Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, 21 Grams
Sofia Coppola, Lost in Translation
Edward Zwick, The Last Samurai

*

2004 MOVIE RANKINGS

1. Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
2. 21 Grams
3. Cold Mountain
4. Lost in Translation
5. Finding Nemo
6. American Splendor
7. Mystic River
8. Monster
9. In America
10. Kill Bill—Vol. 1
11. The Station Agent
12. The Last Samurai
13. Big Fish
14. School of Rock
15. Master & Commander: The Far Side of the World
16. A Mighty Wind
17. Whale Rider
18. House of Sand and Fog
19. Calendar Girls
20. Shattered Glass
21. Down With Love
22. The Matrix Reloaded
23. Love Actually
24. Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines
25. Bend It Like Beckham
26. X2: X-Men United
27. Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
28. Something’s Gotta Give
29. Sylvia
30. The Triplets of Belleville
31. How To Lose A Guy in 10 Days
32. The Matrix Revolutions
33. The Shape of Things
34. Elephant
35. Seabiscuit
36. The Hunted
37. Bruce Almighty
38. Hollywood Homicide
39. Legally Blonde 2: Red, White, & Blonde
40. The Hulk
41. Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle
42. Dreamcatcher
43. View From The Top

For anyone going through Looking withdrawals since HBO cancelled their low-rated gay series, the internet now has your methadone. Season Two of EastSiders just made its Vimeo debut.

Seeing as it takes place in Silver Lake (the Brooklyn of Los Angeles, for you outsiders), EastSiders is not quite but almost as hairy as the San Francisco-set Looking, which is quite possibly the single most important factor in depicting any hipster ‘hood. Unlike other hipster habitats like Brooklyn and Portland, Silver Lake has managed to maintain a relatively low profile without being savagely mocked by the media — possibly because Los Angeles is already so viciously ridiculed, what’s the point? Silver Lake is a great neighborhood, one I would visit more often if it wasn’t so terribly far. (It’s 7.6 miles from my apartment in West Hollywood, which in Los Angeles traffic takes about a day and a half.) I would wager that Silver Lake has managed to retain what is good about cool, hipsterish neighborhoods without quite succumbing to what makes them ripe for parody — but don’t take my word for it. Take a look for yourself in EastSiders.

For my money, at least, EastSiders centers on a more believable and relatable group of friends than Looking ever did, similarly navigating through sex and romance and questions of identity and finding oneself (but mostly sex and romance). And, as a bonus, the characters are endearing and easy to warm up to — yes, all of them! By which I mean, there’s no Augustin. (Okay, I’ll stop talking about Looking now.)

As in Season One, the focus of EastSiders’ second outing is on the strained relationship between exes Cal (played by writer, director, and series creator extraordinaire Kit Williamson) and Thom (Van Hansis), who, in the Season Two premiere “Weirder Than Normal,” find themselves in bed with a hunky third party, confronting questions about where their relationship is heading (or not heading). The other big development is the arrival of Cal’s flighty sister Hillary (Brianna Brown), who shares his fondness for alcohol in a memorable day-drinking sequence but has a host of other problems to contend with — or shrug off (such as being homeless).

“Sodom (And Gomorrah),” the season’s second episode, takes the gang to a party called Sodom hosted by the drag queen Gomorrah (Willam Belli) and Quincy (Stephan Guarino), where, despite the party’s racy moniker, they find more drama than debauchery. While Cal and Thom are still feeling things out, the episode’s centerpiece is Cal’s best friend Kathy (Constance Wu) coming to terms with the sharper edges of her heart, and her patient boyfriend Ian (John Halbach) trying to decide when enough is enough. The romantic ups and downs keep things interesting, but the episode’s real highlight is the glimpse at Los Angeles’ east side gay nightlife, bearded drag queen and all. Real-life L.A. eastsiders who are watching will feel right at home.

The third episode, “Sex Therapy,” is the steamiest as well as the most artistically ambitious, concerning Cal and Thom’s sexual misadventures as they discover that a couple seeking a third can be just as rigorous and awkward as traditional dating between just two guys. Things take a slightly surreal turn, but of course, that’s how things really feel sometimes when you’re caught up in such a situation. Meanwhile, Jeremy (Matthew McKelligon), who caused plenty of drama last season in flings with both Cal and Thom, is maintaining a lower profile as the semi-welcome houseguest of his sister Bri (Brea Grant), but his mooching can only go so far. He finds himself holding back from getting attached to the handsome older doctor who wants more than just a good time in the sack.

As the season unfolds, things get a little criss-crossed as surprising secret romances form between unlikely lovers. A major emerging theme is fidelity — both what that means when a relationship is opened up, as well as what happens when it goes on behind someone’s back and when the one you want won’t commit (possibly, because their heart already belongs to another).

In short, Season Two is off to a very promising start, and it’s still only just beginning to simmer…

*

Movies these days tend to be events. Even the smaller ones are often given the royal treatment, when it comes from a beloved, established filmmaker. Noam Baumbach is certainly one of those, yet he’s managed to avoid making capital-E Events out of his efforts, even when The Squid And The Whale had him hailed as one of the hottest auteurs of the new century.

In the past few years, Baumbach’s movies have been received as trifles instead. They come across as cinematic shrugs. “Maybe this works, and maybe it doesn’t!” each new film seems to say. In part, it might be because he’s been fairly prolific recently — 2015 saw him release both While We’re Young and Mistress America. Or maybe because it’s easy enough to compare his movies to those of Woody Allen — both in craft, content, and recent frequency of output.

Allen’s movies aren’t often that ambitious, either, and they come out so often, it’s easy to give the less inspired ones a pass — if one doesn’t quite ring our bell, there will soon be another. The same is true of Noah Baumbach. I know this sounds like a back-handed compliment, which is really not how I mean it at all. I don’t mean to say he’s not trying that hard, because making a movie of any kind or quality requires herculean effort, especially ones that are as enjoyable as While We’re Young and Frances Ha. It’s just that the effort doesn’t show. I hate to say that they feel “tossed off,” but they do, in a way. It’s just that they’re tossed off incredibly well that makes them feel so unique.

The latest is Mistress America, a spiritual sequel, of sorts, to 2013’s Frances Ha, which ended up unexpectedly sneaking onto my Top Ten list that year. I wasn’t sure I loved Frances Ha until I started remembering so many moments from it so fondly — like a spontaneous weekend trip to Paris that Frances accidentally sleeps through, or the way she merely squawks when a friend makes what might be a pass at her. Like its titular character, whose name is cut off on her mailbox the same way her life has fallen short of its full potential, it is a movie content with its quirks, effusive and engaging despite not necessarily amounting to much in the grand scheme of things. (Frances Halladay’s life looks rather puny when you stack her up against The Wolf Of Wall Street‘s Jordan Belfort in my #1 pick from 2013, just as Frances Ha is a much slighter movie. But in their own ways, they both have plenty to say about the power of money in New York.)

Frances Ha is deceptively simple, while at the same, revisiting a similar creative bohemia as the one found in Woody Allen’s Manhattan (and plenty of his other films) — writers, actors, and artists finding kinship in each other, spouting more ideas than credentials. Fittingly, Frances Ha updates Allen’s formula with a post-recession, millennial brokeness that is essential for any accurate account of present day twenty-something life in the big city. Yes, I know it sounds a lot like I’m re-reviewing Frances Ha, but you can’t examine Baumbach’s latest without at least a glance back at what he’s done with Gerwig previously. Mistress America is less of a throwback — its look and feel are more contemporary, and, by design, its vision of New York City has far less charm — but it’s also talking about “our generation” in a major way. Like Frances Ha, it is a half a throwback, while the other half is as immediate and relevant as a movie can be.

While Frances Halladay and Mistress America‘s Brooke Cardinas certainly have plenty in common — particularly that they’re both co-written and played to perfection by Greta Gerwig — the movies have a few key differences. For one, the wide-eyed protagonist of Mistress America is actually Tracy Fishko (Lola Kirke), a freshman at Barnard and aspiring writer who finds herself at odds with her classmates, gravitating instead toward her thirtyish stepsister-to-be. Like Frances, Brooke is passionate and charismatic, with big ideas and not so much follow-through or finesse, having a hard time paying the rent. (This isn’t Baumbach repeating himself — technically, almost any story set in New York City these days should revolve primarily around paying the rent.) But Brooke is also a bit of a self-involved monster, who seemingly only considers what other people have to say when it’s something she can poach for a tweet. (As Tracy eventually tells her, Brooke’s relationship with social media is awkward.) Brooke is a singular construction, more the butt of a joke than Frances Halladay was, and at least somewhat less sympathetic — but still, it’s hard not to root for her on some level.

I have a feeling I’ll have more to say about Mistress America‘s themes when I have a chance to watch it again, perhaps around the time my Top 10 list comes out? (Hint!) For now, I mustn’t forget to praise its more surface-level highlights, including an absolutely hilarious sequence set entirely in a Connecticut mansion that takes up most of the second half of this movie, but moves at such a clip it feels like the best (and possibly only) screwball comedy in decades.

Mistress America occasionally threatens to turn into one of those tired films where someone writes a story based on someone else, and that person gets mad at it — and that does happen, it’s just somehow fresh again as Baumbach and Gerwig present it. The movie zigs where other movies zag to keep us guessing. Baumbach’s While We’re Young was a perfectly enjoyable 2015 trifle, but it’s obvious where Mistress America is very subtle, while exploring some similar ideas. (Brooke is at least a decade younger than Ben Stiller and Naomi Watts’ characters in that movie, but she still manages to feel like a dinosaur when she’s hanging out with a bunch of college kids.) Baumbach has always managed to include vital female characters in his films, but this one is almost totally dominated by women, and in my opinion, it’s his best work. To be honest, I was too busy enjoying Mistress America‘s madcap pace to bother thinking about it much in the moment, but beneath the absurdity is a biting and relevant piece of work, one that will reward many multiple viewings. I can’t wait for it to so.For an even more contentious rivalry between a misguided older woman and an ingenue, consider The Diary Of A Teenage Girl, the controversial tale of a fifteen-year-old who begins a passionate affair with her mother’s boyfriend. (Ick!) Minnie (Bel Pawley) is a talented budding artist whose hormones go a-ragin’, as hormones tend to do at that age. However, most teenagers don’t have a single mother who regularly holds cocaine-fueled ragers and encourages the flaunting of pubescent T&A. (Or maybe they did in 1976, when this story takes place.) Minnie’s absentee mom Charlotte (Kristen Wiig) all but advocates for her daughter’s sexual experimentation, which unfortunately for Charlotte includes the 35-year-old Monroe (Alexander Skarsgard), simultaneously boning mother and daughter. (Ick!)

An affair between a teenager and a much older dude is slightly more taboo now than it was then (though equally illegal), but the film doesn’t make any particular judgments about the characters. While not exactly condoning the romance, writer/director Marielle Heller doesn’t demonize Monroe or depict him as a depraved pervert. He’s just a guy who gets involved with someone he obviously shouldn’t, for multiple reasons. Their love story is given as equal a consideration as any other — he’s not just a pervert, and she’s not just a victim. The two have a genuine bond and genuine feelings, however illegal those feelings may be. Minnie’s emotions aren’t dismissed just because she’s a teenage girl who only recently went through puberty.

Heller is remarkably competent as a first-time filmmaker, nailing the period details and guiding the cast’s uniformly strong performances. But it’s the subject matter itself that feels freshest. The Diary Of A Teenage Girl contains some fairly graphic sexuality and an even franker look at a young woman’s libido, without shying away from the more uncomfortable bits. By the end, Minnie will have engaged in some behavior we probably wouldn’t want our own daughters or sisters engaging in, but it’s hard to judge, given how honest Heller is in depicting the confusing tug-of-war between childhood and womanhood that hits every girl at one point or another.

Minnie makes choices many of us wouldn’t make, exploring her sexuality more freely than a lot of people would at that age (though, again, it is the 70s), but none of it is out of character. Heller knows we have a tendency to throw the book at a woman — particularly such a young woman — who shows such sexual agency. So do some of the characters — like one of Minnie’s teen peers (and sexual partners), who is intimidated by the mere fact that a teenage girl knows what she wants and expects sex to be mutually satisfying. (The nerve!) In this way, the film is practically daring us to judge it, or any of its characters. Ultimately, The Diary Of A Teenage Girl shows that growing up isn’t about being ashamed or dissuaded from sex, but merely learning how to navigate around fleeting desires to find what one truly wants.And finally, there’s Queen Of Earth, the new film by Alex Ross Perry that somewhat defies categorization by genre, because what happens in the storyline doesn’t necessarily match the murky mood it strikes. Queen Of Earth begins with a lengthy close-up of a very distraught Catherine (Elisabeth Moss) reacting to the very bad news that her boyfriend James (Kentucker Audley) has been seeing someone else and is leaving her. Catherine takes off for an indefinite stay at the family vacation home of her best friend Virginia (Katherine Waterston), kicking off a third notable arthouse flick this summer that relies heavily on conflict between its female leads.

Things are not exactly warm and fuzzy between Catherine and Virginia. Flashbacks reveal that the friendship was almost equally toxic a year ago, when Catherine and James visited this very lake house in somewhat happier times. (For Catherine.) Also of note: Catherine’s father, a famous artist, recently committed suicide, and Catherine, an artist herself, is having a hard time slipping out from underneath his shadow. Complicating matters is Virginia’s perpetual fling Rich (Patrick Fugit), who seems to enjoy subtly tormenting Catherine.

The less said about what truly happens in Queen Of Earth, the better, but suffice to say that the unsettling direction and agonizingly creepy score by Keegan DeWitt make everything feel entirely off-kilter, even when there’s nothing explicitly unnerving happening on screen. In ways, Queen Of Earth could be construed as a partial remake of Ingmar Bergman’s Persona, though it attacks some different ideas. The title refers to Catherine’s high opinion of herself — at least, before those twin tragedies befell her — which is pointed out by Virginia numerous times in the flashbacks. (We see less evidence of Catherine’s haughtiness than Virginia seems to.) Both  women come from wealthy and/or well-known families; Virginia does not ever work, it seems, and Catherine was a glorified assistant for her father. Their privilege may or may not have something to do with how things turn out.Queen Of Earth ultimately goes down a more traditional path than you might expect, given how unusual its aesthetic is. The color palette is reminiscent of a 70s film, and aspects like the film’s titles and poster are also throwbacks, while the tone itself is entirely in keeping with a post-modern indie. Individual haunting moments hang together better than the movie as a whole, and a nagging question or two may linger once it is over. Katherine Waterson is as captivating and elusive a figure as she was as Shasta in Paul Thomas Anderson’s Inherent Vice. In both films, we end up feeling like she’s hiding a lot of her character from us, and in Queen Of Earth, it might have helped to know her a little better, if only to explain some of her actions. But this is really Elisabeth Moss’ showcase, and she’s phenomenal from the first frame — even if the journey Catherine goes on is not a terribly original one for the plot of a psychological thriller. (The ending is fairly ambiguous, though at least it’s clear exactly what psychological state Catherine is in.)

If the story of Queen Of Earth lets us down somewhat, Perry’s direction keeps us guessing — unfolding largely in long takes, it’s the kind of film where watching someone listen tends to be more revealing than watching a person speak, and the flashbacks feel so immediate that it’s sometimes jarring to return to the present day story because we were so invested in what happened before. Without further examinations upon repeated viewings and a clearer grasp on what’s happened by the end, I cannot say with complete confidence that Queen Of Earth is about the narcissism of artists and rich people, but that’s the direction I’m leaning. A high-and-mighty, privileged woman like Catherine may get used to things turning out a certain way, and when they suddenly go wrong, the effect can be quite a wake-up call. This film is the sound of her thudding back down to Earth.

*

It seems exactly enough time has passed to allow for a film that prominently features New York City’s fallen World Trade Center without any explicit reference to September 11. Though Joseph Gordon-Levitt has top billing, The Walk really belongs to two much bigger stars — the Twin Towers themselves, brought back from the dead in all their steel majesty in Robert Zemeckis’ latest technological feat.

Though the shadow of 9/11 inevitably looms large, The Walk does an admirable job of leaving the past — or, in this case, the future — behind, telling a solid story that doesn’t really need to acknowledge the sad truth that we all already know anyway. Movies have had a shaky time confronting that horrific attack head on — Oliver Stone’s overwrought World Trade Center and the bewildering Best Picture nominee Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close being two notable examples, with United 93 as one masterful exception. It’s hard to believe that Zemeckis would have ended The Walk with the same loving, lingering shot of the towers had they not met such a cruel fate, but the film also acknowledges that we’ve mourned and grieved enough to do some celebrating of what was for a change.

The Walk is respectful of the towers’ legacy, but not overly cautious about it. Unlike its hero, it feels no need to tip-toe around the truth, and instead immerses us in a moment — 1974 — when the towers were just being built, met with mixed feelings by the people of New York City, but certainly a thing to behold. Zemeckis takes us back to to a time when we were not awed by what happened to them, but amazed by the towers themselves. He allows them to be a symbol of wonder and possibility, which is no small feat, given that we all know what came later. As a love letter to the enduring spirit of New York City in the wake of a tragedy, The Walk is a masterpiece.

As a movie? It’s alright.

Like the celebrated documentary Man On Wire, The Walk tells the story of Philippe Petit, who is, as his name suggest, very, very French. He is played by the very, very American Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who does an admirable job not only with a French accent, but with a certain… oh, how do you say?… je ne sais quoi. The casting of Gordon-Levitt tells you everything you need to know about Zemeckis’ approach — though he’s probably about as good as any American actor could be in the part, it’s impossible to see the character as anything but Joseph Gordon-Levitt “doing” French. The part doesn’t exactly leave room for a nuanced performance. It’s a stunt, and so is the whole movie.

Maybe that’s appropriate for a movie about one of the greatest stunts of all time, and maybe if you want the real story, you should watch the documentary. This version gives us schmaltz and spectacle in equal measure, a family-friendly sheen brushed with the broadest of strokes. Narrated from atop the Statue of Liberty, The Walk takes us back to Petit’s days as a street performer in Paris, shown first in black-and-white, followed by an unmotivated, unceremonious switch to full color. (It probably won’t bother anyone else, but I find it weird that the midpoint of what we see of Petit’s life is black-and-white, while his childhood and later years are in color.) Petit has a genuinely cute meet-cute with fellow street performer Annie (Charlotte Le Bon), who quickly becomes his girlfriend/cheerleader. (I wouldn’t say Annie is a terrific character, given that she’s the film’s sole femme, but Le Bon at least adds some welcome spunk to the typical “girlfriend” role — though it’s unfortunate that women are still limited to a few scenes of nagging, followed by lots of crying/smiling/clapping reaction shots, in such films.)It is clear early on that The Walk is not really interested in real human drama. Philippe’s rejection by his parents is shrugged off in a mini-scene and never mentioned again, and there’s no other indication of what might be driving him to perform an insane, illegal, death-defying stunt, except that he saw a picture in a magazine and just, you know, decided to. The film’s nimble, whimsical tone is able to pull this off for a while, until The Walk tries rather half-heartedly to become a heist film in its mid-section, collecting a team of perfectly adequate supporting characters like Jeff (Cesar Domboy), conveniently afraid of heights, and J.P. (James Badge Dale), conveniently fond of illegal activities. This section of the film reminded me of Argo, in the sense that it’s trying to ratchet up suspense about something I already know the outcome of — which certainly works in some films, but did not at all work for me in Argo, thanks to stale screenwriting. (The Academy clearly disagreed with me.) The Walk‘s screenplay tries even less than Argo‘s did — the heist business is shamelessly borrowed from other movies, and even Zemeckis doesn’t seem fully committed to it (though Alan Silvestri’s very heist-y score sure is). The only real suspense in this film is in the cable connected between the towers! (Yep. Went there. Deal with it.)

Which brings us to the walk section of The Walk, also known as the Reason You Paid Money For This. It more or less does the trick, without resorting to cheap tricks (such as, say, having Petit dangle from the wires, about to plummet to his death, which did not happen). Given how short it is on substance, would The Walk have been equally or more satisfying as a 30 or 40-minute experience, without the lengthy setup? Probably. Zemeckis’ most egregious error is the corny device of having Petit narrate the film from atop the Statue of Liberty. The location itself is a nice nod to that original gift to New York City from the French, which pays off in the film’s touching finale, which suggests that Petit’s walk may be what made the towers such an endearing landmark in the first place — another architectural gift from France, albeit a very indirect one.Perching Petit on the Statute of Liberty, talking directly to camera, immediately frames the movie as a fantasy, which is kind of an odd choice for a true story, but I could have forgiven it if the constant voice-over wasn’t so intrusive, interrupting moments that might be genuinely moving with dialogue from Petit telling me how genuinely moving this moment was. Petit narrates all kinds of moments for no reason, pointing out things we can already clearly see are happening. (This is the perfect movie for blind people. You won’t miss a thing.) Zemeckis co-wrote the script with Christopher Browne — this being Browne’s first feature credit on a screenplay — and writing has rarely been Zemeckis’ strong suit. The film’s best scenes are the ones where Petit the Narrator pipes down for a minute, but those are few and far between. The story is already as simple as can be, so the constant explaining grows maddening. Petit’s walk, in its first few blissful seconds, is chatter-free, but then Future Petit cuts in to tell us how he’s feeling, rather than just letting us feel it with him. Do we need to be told that crossing the Twin Towers on a wire 110 stories off the ground is super exhilarating? Apparently, we do. And for those of you thought Forrest Gump‘s CGI feather was bad? No joke — in The Walk, we get the whole bird.

Yes, The Walk is coated with a hefty helping of Hollywood cheese; by comparison, it makes Cast Away look like it was directed by Michael Haneke. More often than not, Zemeckis gets more excited about computer-generated wizardry than he does about storytelling. That pays off in the sense that this 3D is some of the best you’ll find (and I’m not generally a fan of 3D), and the CGI recreation of the Twin Towers is sometimes (but not always) astonishing. It’s impressive special effects work, though I couldn’t help but feel short-changed by the fact that it’s so much easier to cross the World Trade Center with computer graphics than it was on a steel cable for Philippe Petit. Now, I don’t expect them to actually string Joseph Gordon-Levitt 110 stories off the ground just for the sake of realistic stunt work, but when Philippe furiously refuses to wear a safety belt during the walk because it would be inauthentic, it rings a little false because this whole movie is a cheat.Yeah. I know, I know — all movies are, in a sense. But not all movies are about an act of high-wire athleticism like The Walk. And while a lot of what’s accomplished here looks reasonably impressive on a big screen in 3D — and will probably not hold up so well on smaller screens in 2D — there’s a disconnect between what the movie is and what it’s about, how Zemeckis asks us to applaud little CGI Joseph Gordon-Levitt for his high-stakes artistic “coup” when almost nothing we’re seeing has any real risk, art, or physicality to it. The real Gordon-Levitt was walking across the floor against a green screen. As good as the digital effects are, I never found them truly convincing, just as I was never convinced that Joseph Gordon-Levitt was actually French. You never for a moment forget that it’s all artifice, which is strange for a movie that purports to be all about artistic authenticity.

But I don’t think Robert Zemeckis cares about that, and much of his audience won’t, either. The Walk is really a ride, meant to provoke only the most surface-level responses. And that’s fine. I won’t say the film never pulled my heartstrings, though I was more moved by the Twin Towers than anything involving the character of Philippe Petit. Is there something wrong, when steel and concrete provoke more emotion than flesh and blood? Zemeckis doesn’t exploit 9/11 — this is a lovely tribute to the towers — but this film would be much more of a dud if it didn’t have the emotional weight of a real tragedy bolstering our emotions. Despite the artifice, it’s rather magical to see something that was so suddenly and ruthlessly taken away from us brought back by the movies. The Walk transports us to a time before tragedy, temporarily erasing the pain of the present and letting us relive a more innocent moment. (Okay, maybe 1974 wasn’t so innocent, but it is in this movie.)

The Twin Towers were already gone by the time I made it to New York. As much as I cringed at its chatterbox voice-over and paper-thin characterization, I can’t stay mad at The Walk, because it gave me one last chance to go up there and see what all the fuss was about. I’m glad I made the journey.*

The Martian shouldn’t feel like such a treasure, and maybe twenty years ago, it wouldn’t have. Its closest cousin, Apollo 13, was nominated for Best Picture in 1995, back when feel-good movies could still dominate both the box office and awards season — which is not to say that they always did, but feel-good guys like Ron Howard and Robert Zemeckis fared better then than they do now, critically speaking. Hollywood schmaltz is out of fashion — the occasional crowd-pleaser may sneak into the Oscar race now and again, but not that often.

We live in more cynical times now, and Ridley Scott is not a filmmaker you’d generally call “upbeat.” Chest-bursting aliens, brain-eating, a wire cutting through Brad Pitt’s neck, and two female BFFs driving over a cliff to meet their maker — these are just a few of the chipper cinematic scenarios Scott has graced us with.

So it’s surprising indeed that Scott is responsible for one of the most genuinely optimistic dramas to come along in ages. (Genuinely optimistic and genuinely good, that is.) The Martian has been released at the same moment as Zemeckis’ The Walk, which is interesting, since both are about men driven to achieve the impossible, isolating their protagonist from a crack team ensemble in the most crucial bits, with a hero who addresses the audience directly throughout the story, and a high likelihood that he will die (even if the audience is quite certain he won’t). The films share a common spirit and a light tone that may come as a surprise given their subject matter, but The Martian is the one with real gravity and emotional heft. Somehow, even with an upbeat outlook and some nimble comedy, Scott’s film stays firmly grounded in reality, so that we can genuinely feel those life-or-death stakes — and understand why its hero’s survival matters. One man’s life hangs in the balance, but it adds up to so much more.

The Martian is adapted from the popular novel by Andy Weir, telling the story of Mark Watney (Matt Damon), an astronaut accidentally left for dead on the Red Planet, who finds he has no choice but to be the first colonist on Mars. Fortunately, Watney is a botanist, so he “sciences the shit” out of problems such as how to grow food on a planet that hasn’t been known to sustain plant or animal life, and how to send word back home that he’s still hanging on millions of miles from home.

You might expect The Martian to follow the Cast Away approach, stranding us with Watney to exacerbate his isolation. Instead, The Martian is filled with a sizable chunk of supporting players, filled out by an impressive roster of talent: Jessica Chastain, Jeff Daniels, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Kristen Wiig, Donald Glover, Sean Bean, Kate Mara, Sebastian Stan, and Michael Pena. This is not the first time Ridley Scott has managed to pull together an all-star cast in a movie that might seem otherwise beneath them — would many other filmmakers have drawn Oscar winner Charlize Theron to her reasonably thankless role in Prometheus, or assembled such an A-list ensemble for the bonkers noir The Counselor? Doubtful.

At first, it seems like the constant cutting to Mark’s fellow astronauts and various NASA suits and scientists back on Earth is merely a narrative crutch meant to keep us from getting bored with Damon on Mars. As The Martian goes on, however, it becomes apparent that this is no interplanetary Robinson Crusoe — the real story is not so much Watney’s survival, but the collective spirit of the globe itself, as Watney’s colleagues work to rescue him while scores of strangers anxiously await news of his safe return. 

Why we explore. Why we fight to survive. Why we band together to save each other in a crisis. Plenty of films have examined the worst of human nature in precarious predicaments, but The Martian gives us the best — a lot of good people trying their damnedest to do the right thing. The smartest people in the world come together to work the problem; foreign nations lend a helping hand; brave people risk their lives to save one. Late in the film, there are reaction shots of people grouped together all over the world, watching giant TV screens to discover the fate of Mark Watney. These scenes are a little overdone, but it’s hard not to get swept up in the “Yes, we can!” spirit of the whole endeavor.

The Martian is reminiscent of plenty of movies set in space — from Ron Howard’s Apollo 13 to Robert Zemeckis’ Contact, and more recently, Gravity and Interstellar. (Matt Damon’s winning turn as Watney is somewhat undermined by the fact that he already played a marooned astronaut in Interstellar — which also co-starred Chastain. Less problematic, but worth noting: he played a lone survivor in need of similar rescue in Saving Private Ryan, too.)

But The Martian, surprisingly enough, has the lightest touch of them all — there’s not a lot of time to gawk at the wonders of space, nor contemplate man’s place in the universe, or anything along those lines. For a film that takes us to another planet, it is decidedly focused on earthly matters like community and human perseverance, plus lots of math and science. The heroes of The Martian are very, very smart people. It’s brains, not brawn, that allows Watney to survive for so long on Mars, and the minds of many scientists that bring him back home. (Here’s a theory: if you averaged the IQ of every speaking character in every movie, The Martian would have the highest.)The Martian is not a true story, obviously, but it does feel like one — Hollywood is fond of making true stories that end in hugs and cheers and happy tears, but it’s rarer to see a crowd-pleaser like this that’s wholly fiction. Though it shares plenty of DNA with other films set in outer space, The Martian fits more squarely in the “one man (or woman) up against the elements” genre, alongside Wild and 127 Hours. Like those films, The Martian‘s smart script by Drew Goddard comes up with an obvious but necessary device to allow Watney to speak to us — he frequently addresses the many cameras left behind on Mars, supposedly to log his thoughts and activities in case he dies, but really as a way of giving us the lowdown on what he’s up to. (At times, the device borders on cloying, as if we’re seeing confessionals from The Real World: Mars, but overall it isn’t a problem.)

The visuals are completely convincing, which is crucial if we’re to buy Watney’s predicament. Scott doesn’t overdo it with the special effects — everything that’s here is in service of the story, and despite the oversized cast, everyone gets a little something memorable to do. No one is expendable. The Martian also has the distinction of being perhaps the first blockbuster in which growing potatoes is a crucial and compelling plot point. Thankfully, the film has no need to complicate its story with anything but the difficulties of rescuing a guy from Mars — its drama is all in believable problem-solving, making no apologies for its inherent nerdiness. In an era when most studio films are being dumbed down to appeal to global audiences, it’s refreshing to find one that celebrates intelligence, both in its characters and in its smart storytelling.

Matt Damon brings the necessary charm and charisma to carry the film, which isn’t too surprising. It’s quite likely he’ll be rewarded with an Oscar nomination. (He’s never won for acting, and been nominated only twice, which feels like less than he should have been. The Academy loves an actor who’s overdue.) Ultimately, The Martian does so many things so well, and nothing much wrong. It’s hard to find much to fault it for, even when the end result is more “very, very good” than truly transcendent. It may or may not be an accurate how-to to survive when stranded on Mars, but it’s certainly a how-to for Hollywood to make big budget movies that appeal to and satisfy everyone. Who’d have guessed? They found signs of intelligent life in mainstream moviemaking.

*

Here it is, straight from the mouth of a film student.

(Sort of.)

I made this Top 10 list relatively early in awards season, before I’d seen a number of films that factored into the race that year — including The Hours, 8 Mile, Secretary, Frida, Talk To Her, and The Pianist, some of which came away with major wins (Best Actress and Best Actor included).

Reconsidering this list in 2015, I wouldn’t change a whole lot. There are a couple films I like better now than I did back then — like Steven Spielberg’s Catch Me If You Can, which didn’t quite do it for me the first time around. Others, like Talk To Her, Secretary, and 8 Mile, I know I did like quite a bit when I saw them, but now it’s been so long that I’d need to see them again to know if they’d find their way onto my list.

And, full disclosure: I did make one change to this list from back in 2002, adding a film I saw shortly after making this list that has since become one of my favorites of the year. It seemed a shame to leave it off, considering that it was one of my favorites both back then and still now.

Which film did I add, and which one got kicked off to make room for it? I’ll never tell…

10. THE TWO TOWERS

The second installment in the Lord Of The Rings trilogy suffers slightly at not being nearly as fresh and exciting as the first, and lacks the inevitable climactic pay-off of The Return Of The King, but it does bring one cinematic marvel to the screen — Gollum, performed by Andy Serkis but entirely rendered by CGI, to date probably the most impressive computer-generated creature we’ve seen. (And definitely the most preciousss.)

The Two Towers adds several new characters we didn’t meet in The Fellowship Of The Ring, and many favorites from the first movie are shoved into supporting roles far away from the main action. And sure, these guys are pretty much in the same predicament at the end of this movie as they were in the beginning, and not a whole lot closer to Mordor. The battle of Helm’s Deep is the central focus, and director Peter Jackson brings his expected flair for technical wizardly and large-scale spectacle. It’s big and awesome, even if it seems there’s less at stake than at other points in this series.

Viggo Mortensen does an excellent job of carrying the movie as this film’s hero, leaving Frodo in the backseat, and Gollum is somehow the best-developed and most captivating character in the film. The Two Towers‘ main purpose is keeping audiences invested long enough to make it to the series’ grand finale, but as big budget fantasy epics go, it certainly delivers the goods.9. PUNCH-DRUNK LOVE

It’s Paul Thomas Anderson! So, it’s excellent, right?

Well…

Punch-Drunk Love is a surprise on almost every level from the uber-acclaimed director of Magnolia, Boogie Nights, and Hard Eight. Anderson’s films up until now have mostly been sprawling epics that don’t shy away from sex, violence, and some very dark themes, so it takes some adjustment to prepare for this quirky, smaller-scoped love story about Barry Egan and his quest to buy a whole lot of pudding — with some evil Mormon sex phone operators thrown into the mix.

This movie proves Adam Sandler can be at least a halfway decent actor, aided by the always lovable Emily Watson as patient love interest Lena and a pretty crazy turn from Philip Seymour Hoffman as an ill-tempered Mormon. (We can assume he’s Mormon since he lives in Provo, although his foul mouth and sex phone operation may suggest otherwise.) As in Magnolia, Anderson doesn’t follow the typical three-act structure — he marches to the beat of his own drummer, and this one is willfully offbeat.

At a scant 95 minutes, Punch-Drunk Love seems to gloss over some story elements and instead spends its screen time on a fair amount of chaos and randomness, but you gotta give it credit for being unpredictable. It’s funny, clever, crazy, quick, and entertaining, and Emily Watson lights up the screen, though it falls well short of being a masterpiece like Magnolia and Boogie Nights. I guess they can’t all be instant classics… (but they can still be very good).

8. INSOMNIA

Insomnia is a remake of a Norwegian film I haven’t seen, so I’m sure some of the credit goes to the original — but this adaptation definitely does it some justice regardless. Al Pacino is a tough-guy cop from Los Angeles struggling with his own morals and police ethics   while trying to solve a murder in Nightmute, Alaska. (A real place, apparently — despite the noirish name.) As his conscience eats away at him, so does the titular lack of sleep he struggles with in a town where the sun never sets — a nice twist on the typical murky nighttime setting of such thrillers.

Al Pacino is awesome as always, if you like that sort of thing (and I very much do!). Hilary Swank is perfect as the eager young local cop trying to learn from Pacino, unaware that he is not quite the good detective she idolizes. The real revelation, though, is Robin Williams in icy-cold killer mode (previously shown in One Hour Photo, which somewhat undermines the surprise of the comedian’s malevolent turn here).

Christopher Nolan, best known for Memento, pulls off some brilliant editing that puts us in an insomniac state of mind, and the film’s morality plays are almost epic. Certainly one of the best American thrillers to come along in quite some time. (Even if it did come from Norway first.)7. ADAPTATION

This movie probably plays better to screenwriters than anybody else — sorry! The ultimate scribe’s wet dream has Charlie Kaufman literally writing himself into the movie he was supposed to be writing, an adaptation of Susan Orlean’s The Orchid Thief. Most writers who tried this would get a swift “no, thank you,” be fired, and never work in this town again. Somehow, Kaufman got a critically beloved film made — one that could easily win some Oscars. (It would be a sweet irony if a film called Adaptation won Best Adapted Screenplay, especially considering that it is basically an original story.)

Nicolas Cage gives two very solid performances as the frustrated screenwriter of Being John Malkovich and his half-witted twin brother. In addition to basically ruining the move version of her book, Kaufman also begins stalking Susan Orlean, who is played perfectly (of course) by Meryl Streep. Chris Cooper also provides a memorable turn as the kooky subject of Orlean’s book. But none of that orchid-thieving business is what ultimately makes Adaptation such a breath of fresh, weird air — it’s the bizarre mix of fact and fiction, with the real-life Kaufman and his made-up brother battling for screenwriting supremacy, tossing in plenty of industry in-jokes along the way.

The film goes spinning off on a strange tangent in the third act that embraces everything the movie is against. I get the point of it, thematically, but I didn’t love it. Adaptation is funny, clever, and twisted, and probably quite a bit more interesting than a straightforward Orchid Thief movie would have been — though let’s hope it doesn’t spark a dangerous trend of writers inserting themselves into their screenplays ever time they get writer’s block. This will only work once, people.6. MINORITY REPORT

Steven Spielberg proves once again he’s a peerless entertainer. In 2002, he delivered two very different chases movies, this one and Catch Me If You Can. (“Everybody runs” could be the tagline of either film.) While not as diverse as the films in other years when Spielberg has delivered a one-two punch (1993’s double-offering of Jurassic Park and Schindler’s List obviously takes that cake), I can’t help but be impressed that one man can craft a breathless piece of action-packed science fiction as well as a moving drama within a few months of each other, and have them both be so good. Let us never take Spielberg for granted.

Between the two, it’s Minority Report that gets my full-on Top 10 stamp of approval, with an utterly convincing (and somewhat terrifying) vision of the future despite a far-fetched premise — cops using prescient humans to predict crimes before they happen, but nevertheless arresting criminals for their murderous intent. Tom Cruise is at the top of his form as the detective who goes from hunter to hunted, grabbing an ethereally excellent Samantha Morton to prove his innocence along the way.

Spielberg once again blunders the ending to an otherwise great film — I had third-act issues with Catch Me If You Can and A.I. too — but it’s not an egregious error when so much that came before was so very good. The vision of the future presented here is the most original I’ve seen since, well, Spielberg’s last film (A.I.), and the maestro of wonder delivers several of his trademark Great Movie Moments — particularly the exhilarating mall chase scene. In a world that so often gets them wrong, this is a blockbuster done right.5. 25TH HOUR

Countless filmmakers have made movies in and about New York City, but few are as closely tied to it as Spike Lee. He’s as essential to the city as Woody Allen, depicting a very different, but equally vital slice of life in the city that never sleeps.

So it’s almost impossible to think that Lee wouldn’t somehow respond to the devastation faced on September 11 by New York (and all of America, of course) — and it’s entirely appropriate that he is, essentially, the first. Though it’s probably too soon for cinema to cover the attacks in their entirety, 25th Hour finds a perfectly subtle way to pay homage without letting that dark shadow loom over the film overall.

The story itself has nothing to do with the World Trade Center — it’s about a drug dealer named Monty (Edward Norton) who has just one last day of freedom before he heads to prison for dealing drugs. He spends that day with his best buddies Frank (Barry Pepper), a Wall Street hotshot, and Jacob (Philip Seymour Hoffman), a shy high school teacher with a crush on his student Mary (Anna Paquin). Another key figure is Monty’s girlfriend Naturelle (Rosario Dawson), whom he suspects might have been the one to give him up to the cops.

25th Hour spends more time on character development than on mystery or suspense, though, and that’s a very good thing. It takes its time and isn’t afraid of some random detours to explore its supporting characters or a slice of New York City life. (One incredibly memorable sequence features Monty’s foul-mouthed disparagement of virtually every person in New York, which somehow still comes across as a love letter to the place.)

Developed before 9/11 and shot afterward, the film’s only reference to the tragedy is a mournful look down at Ground Zero — and it’s all that’s needed. September 11 would be easy to exploit for some added emotional weight, but that’s now what Lee is doing here. Sure, it can be read as a metaphor for Monty’s life in ruins, but it would feel more conspicuous for a Spike Lee joint about these New Yorkers to pretend like it never happened. Monty’s angst is front and center, but 25th Hour is also very much about the rest of the people who inhabit his world. That single shot of Ground Zero hits just the right note, and then quickly moves on.
4. Y TU MAMA TAMBIEN

Hollywood loves a good coming-of-age story, but apparently it takes a Mexican to get it right. Y Tu Mama Tambien treads in waters you’ll rarely see in any American film about teenage boys, with graphic sex scenes that are both hetero- and homoerotic. (Something for everyone to enjoy!)

The film takes us on a road trip, as two teenage boys (Diego Luna and Gabriel Garcia Bernal) woo the same older woman (Maribel Verdu) who has just left her cheating husband — and is carrying an even more heartbreaking secret, too. They go in search of a beach and instead find all kinds of romantic and sexual complications that come with the territory of growing up.

Cowriter and director Alfonso Cuaron understands that sexuality is complicated, especially when we’re young. The fact that these teen boys explore their sexual curiosities with each other doesn’t mean that either is gay, necessarily, but that the lines between friendship and romance aren’t always explicitly defined. (To be fair, there is a female present when they’re making out, which makes it a little less queer.)

The film is all about the journey instead of the destination, and the journey is not so much the road trip but adolescence itself. The most remarkable thing about the film is how natural it feels — less like a movie, more like eavesdropping on these people’s lives. Part of this is due to the raw, explicit sex scenes that leave nothing to the imagination.

The performances by all three are stellar, though it’s Maribel Verdu that really brings the film to life. The final scene is a real heartbreaker, because of what we learn happens to one of the characters, but moreso because of what it says about what happens when friendships grow a little too intimate. For better or worse, I’ve never seen a more honest movie about being a teenage guy.

3. CHICAGO

I had a hard time figuring out where, exactly, to put Chicago on this list. It’s the songs and the spirit that make it so great, and that’s lifted pretty much verbatim from the musical. However, Rob Marshall finds a pretty nifty way to pull off a stage-to-screen adaptation, suggesting that the musical numbers take place in Roxie Hart’s warped mind. That could easily be cheesy, except that Roxie is so obsessed with being a star, it’s easy to see how she’d be deluded enough to imagine that everyone around her is starring in a musical that’s all about her.

Based on entertainment value alone, Chicago might have be the most enjoyable entertaining movie I saw all year. Shockingly, Renee Zellweger can sing! She’s great in Chicago, playing a character anyone who hasn’t seen this on Broadway may be surprised to learn isn’t very likable at all. (It’s a nice way to subvert the actress’ usual cutesy charms.) Balancing her out is Catherine Zeta-Jones as another murderess bitch, one who plays off Zellweger very well. Zeta-Jones’ Velma Kelly is more upfront about her killer instincts, though not necessarily the more ruthless — she may look darker, but both of these women are devious vamps.

Chicago is all about fame versus infamy, and Marshall nails every musical number, giving each one its own distinct flair. (Not always the case in movie musicals.) “Cell Block Tango” in particular is a real knockout. And though much of the film is a cynical look at criminal celebrity — witness Richard Gere’s turn as a sharky defense attorney — the film also has a tiny bit of heart in John C. Reilly’s poor schlub of a husband, who sells the melancholy “Mr. Cellophane.” Chicago feels perfectly poised to sweep the Academy Awards, and for all its gloss, it’s hard to fault a film that’s so much fun for painting the Oscars red.2. ABOUT SCHMIDT

Jack Nicholson is an icon — he’s won three Oscars and been nominated for many more, turning in essential performances in classic films like Chinatown, The Shining, and One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest. And while I haven’t seen his entire body of work, I’m prepared to say that this might be his best performance ever.

We all know Nicholson can rant and rave like a madman. It’s become a bit of a shtick, which doesn’t mean it doesn’t still work when used effectively. (Call it the Al Pacino Syndrome.) But Nicholson rarely does that here, instead delivering a subdued and understated turn as a man grappling with aging, retirement, and the death of a spouse — and that’s just the first act.

Nicholson is fearless in his touching and honest portrayal of the perils of being a senior citizen, an underexplored topic in cinema to be sure. He allows his Schmidt to be vulnerable and pathetic, weak and petty. As good as he was in As Good As It Gets, that was not as good as Nicholson gets — it’s this performance that deserves an award. It’s the rare turn from Nicholson that’s more about acting than performance.

The movie as a whole is filled with solid work from a cast including Kathy Bates, Hope Davis, and Dermot Mulroney, reveling at times in the mundane cultural squalor of Middle America. Alexander Payne’s film is alternately very funny and very sad, and just when it seems like it might get boring, the plot goes in a new direction and makes us laugh all over again. About Schmidt proves that Election was no fluke, trading some of that film’s biting comedy for genuine pathos instead.1. FAR FROM HEAVEN

This is both the best movie of 2002 and the best movie of 1955 — or at least it feels that way. Todd Haynes presents a pitch perfect pastiche of Douglas Sirk’s 1950s melodramas, though here the ideals of the “perfect” 50s family are shattered by topics that the world wasn’t ready to tackle back then. (Namely, homosexuality and interracial relationships.)

Julianne Moore plays Cathy Whitaker, a seemingly happy housewife whose cheerful suburban bubble is about to pop. When Cathy finds her husband engaging in unspeakable acts with a fellow gentleman, she discovers her marriage, her friendships, and basically her entire white hetero Connecticut world are nothing but surface — and longs to find something deeper. That causes her to fire up a flirtation with her black gardener, which is almost as taboo as her hubby’s same-sex hanky-panky in this era.

Anchored by Moore’s immaculate performance, Far From Heaven looks and sounds like it was made 50 years ago — with no sex or profanity, it’s certainly tame in comparison to today’s films, though it probably would have been the raciest, most controversial movie of 1955. The period details are simply flawless, with a Technicolor-like sheen that makes this by far 2002’s most beautiful picture to look at. The supporting cast — Dennis Quaid, Patricia Clarkson, and Dennis Haysbert — does plenty of good work too, but this is Moore’s movie, and she shines. If there’s any justice, she’ll win the Oscar this year.

Far From Heaven also contains my favorite line in a movie this year, because of its simplicity and importance to the story: “Here’s to being the only one.” Though it isn’t the only great film of the year, it is certainly one of the most strikingly original, in that it inhabits the tropes and mores of a 1950s melodrama while simultaneously critiquing them. That’s not an easy maneuver, but Haynes pulls it off in spades. And as good as Julianne Moore is in absolutely everything, this may endure as her most essential performance.

BEST DIRECTOR

Todd Haynes, Far From Heaven
Spike Lee, 25th Hour
Steven Spielberg, Minority Report
Rob Marshall, Chicago
Peter Jackson, The Two Towers

BEST ACTRESS

Julianne Moore, Far From Heaven
Renee Zellweger, Chicago
Maribel Verdu, Y Tu Mama Tambien
Diane Lane, Unfaithful
Emily Watson, Punch-Drunk Love

BEST ACTOR

Jack Nicholson, About Schmidt
Daniel Day-Lewis, Gangs Of New York
Nicolas Cage, Adaptation
Edward Norton, 25th Hour
Leonardo DiCaprio, Catch Me If You Can

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Catherine Zeta-Jones, Chicago
Kathy Bates, About Schmidt
Patricia Clarkson, Far From Heaven
Susan Sarandon, Igby Goes Down
Meryl Streep, Adaptation

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

Dennis Quaid, Far From Heaven
Paul Newman, Road To Perdition
Chris Cooper, Adaptation
Dennis Haysbert, Far From Heaven
Colin Farrell, Minority Report

BEST EDITING

Chicago
Insomnia
About Schmidt
The Two Towers
Punch-Drunk Love

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY

Far From Heaven
Minority Report
Chicago
Punch-Drunk Love
Road to Perdition

BEST SCREENPLAY

About Schmidt
Far From Heaven
Changing Lanes
Y Tu Mama Tambien
Insomnia

Many of us have had the experience of returning to a place we know from childhood. A place that once served as the stage for everything we knew, and suddenly, looks very small. Room stars Brie Larson as a woman we know only as “Ma” in the first act of this movie, because that’s the only context a five-year-old boy has of his mother. She is not a person with her own name, and her own history, and her thoughts and moods. We begin our lives as inherently selfish, and only gradually to we come to realize that everyone else’s inner lives are as rich as our own. They don’t just revolve around us.

Jack and Ma live in “Room,” which need not be classified as a room because it’s the only room Jack has ever been in, and the only one he knows about. Unlike most of us, who early on learn to distinguish between the bedroom and the bathroom and the living room, for Jack, there is just room. When Room begins, he believes that this room is all their is of the world, and everything else is “just TV.”

While the circumstances that put Jack and Ma in this predicament are far from universal, the film serves as a metaphor for feelings and relationships we’ve all experienced. Even if we’re not literally trapped in one room for the first five years of our lives, the world as we experience it in childhood is very, very small. Most of our time is spent at home with a caregiver — probably a parent — eating and learning and playing games. Parents create fictions for their kids in order to soften the harsher blows of reality, and gradually reveal the truth as they get older. Then, suddenly, there are moments when we realize the world is much bigger than we previously believed. Often, we wish we could go back to when it felt safe and simple and small. Room occasionally injects itself with a shot of menace through the presence of Old Nick, Ma’s captor (and Jack’s biological father, though he’s far from paternal toward the boy). On the whole, however, writer Emma Donoghue (adapting her own novel very faithfully) and director Lenny Abrahamson are more interested in what makes Jack and Ma’s lives similar to most mothers and sons, rather than the horrifying details that set them apart from those of us who haven’t been locked in a shed for seven years.

Room is intentionally claustrophobic, both because its first act is set entirely within the confines of Room, and also because the film locks us into Jack’s juvenile point of view. The bulk of the film is not about Jack and Ma’s time together in captivity, but what happens following their hasty exit strategy. In the moment many films would use as a happy ending, this one is just beginning. We learn that Ma is actually Joy Newsome, daughter of Robert (William H. Macy) and Nancy (Joan Allen), abducted as a teenage girl by a man who baited her with an invented sick dog.

Room makes room for a lot of the elements you’d expect from a story about a kidnap victim’s homecoming — fear, anger, depression, and of course, thorough hounding from the media — but only in its periphery, because we experience it through Jack, who may get the gist of what’s going on but doesn’t really understand what any of this means. All he knows is that the world is suddenly colossal and terrifying, and now he’s competing with a lot of new factors for Ma’s attention.In a sense, this is a brave choice on the part of the filmmakers — one that clearly follows the example of its source material, which was written entirely in Jack’s voice from his point of view. But it also somewhat limits the dramatic impact of this movie, as we get only glimpses of the juicy stuff we can’t help but want to know about, like what happens to Old Nick after he’s caught by the police, and how Joy is going to reacclimate to being a young woman of the real world. (I wouldn’t want this to become an episode of Law & Order: SVU, but there might have been a clever way to satisfy both requirements.) We get little bits of information here and there, but not enough to flesh out all the intricacies Joy must be facing upon her return. Room focuses primarily on Jack’s journey, which, between the two, is a lot less complicated.

Despite its subject matter, Room is not ultimately a story that tackles grand ideas or big moments. In scenes that might be tense if handled by another director, Room goes for a more lighthearted touch. (The score, by Stephen Rennicks, is a little more upbeat than I’d like.) Its best scenes are the quieter moments, like the one in which Jack first learns to trust Nancy’s new beau Leo (Tom McCamus), or the growing relationship between the grandmother who only just learned she was a grandmother and the grandson she never knew about. There are a handful of dark moments, but Room dwells more on love and hope. Children have an astounding resilience when it comes to accepting hard truths and adapting to new challenges. They’re the reason we push aside past tragedies and carry on, when we might rather just give up. I might have preferred the film to keep us more in the dark about certain elements, like Ma’s backstory, until after their great escape. In several moments, Joy’s emotions feel understated, in part because we’re meant to focus on Jack. But since we’re missing key moments of her experience, we miss out on what feels like essential character development. Whether Room intends to or not, it’s telling a much bigger story than the one we ultimately get; even if showing it from Jack’s perspective is a novel approach, we can’t help but feel a little cheated when so many other characters have more complicated and nuanced perspectives. Both the script and Abrahamson’s direction ultimately split the difference between keeping us in a five-year-old mindset and letting us in on the real world of the adults. Had the film been stylized more subjectively from a child’s perspective, we might not miss what’s left out quite so much. But the camera is more often neutral, shooting the action the way a straightforward adult drama would be, but then pulling us away from that when Jack leaves the scene. Jack doesn’t know or care about these things, but we do. We’re watching his story, but we identify more with Ma. It doesn’t sink the movie, but it’s bound to leave many viewers slightly frustrated.

Across the board, the performances are phenomenal. The film has a serious chance at a Best Picture nomination, and it’s practically a shoo-in for a Best Actress nod for Larson. Joan Allen is typically stellar as Nancy, a role that reminded me of Laura Dern’s turn in Wild last year — which did eke out a Best Supporting Actress nod, but was a bit too light on screen time to be a fighting contender. The same could be true here. As Jack, Jacob Tremblay is tasked with carrying the film on his small shoulders, and he’s simply tremendous.

Room is dark enough to feel important but not so dark that it’ll turn off mainstream audiences. That’s basically the Academy’s sweet spot, though the way this film tackles its subject still somehow feels both too heavy and too light to compete out of the performance races. Some of us like our dramas to be a shade darker and more daring; others prefer them without any rape or attempted suicide at all. You can probably guess which camp I’m in.

*

We’ve heard many times that the so-called “War on Drugs” really is an actual war. Traffic, a Best Picture nominee from way back in 2000, remains the cinematic authority on the topic, and probably had more influence on the aesthetic of modern movies than almost any other film. Nowadays, plenty of dramas and thriller look like Traffic. Back then, only Traffic did.

Sicario, the latest film to take us south of the border to the war zone, shares a lot of DNA with its predecessor in terms of its look and feel — not to mention one of its stars, Benicio Del Toro — and a focus on of good cops feeling powerless against the forces of evil, weighing the pros and cons of compromising their values. Sicario might be the first of the films to tackle this subject, however, that actually feel like a war movie.

The film’s unsettling percussive score by Johann Johannsson is our first clue. There are drums beating constantly underneath the action in this thriller from Denis Villeneuve, who takes the bleak dread of Prisoners and Enemy to a new height (or is that a new low?) in Sicario. It’s rare to mention a film’s score before its plot, stars, or director, but it’s as major a player in Sicario as anyone else. The music raises our pulses during several ultra-tense action scenes, as a good thriller score should do, but I also think we’re meant to hear these war drums as a call to arms the same way these characters do. Thousands of people are being senselessly murdered by unseen, seemingly unstoppable forces. The various law enforcement officers in Sicario know they stand little chance of defeating this enemy in total, but also know that if they don’t fight back, no one else will. And it can only get worse. In their hearts and heads, the drums of war beat constantly, just as they do on the soundtrack.

Emily Blunt stars as FBI agent Kate Macer, who is persuaded to “volunteer” for a mysterious mission that aims to cripple the Mexican drug cartel. The film’s opening scene sees Kate and her task force raiding a home in Arizona, where it is suspected that hostages are being held, only to discover something much, much worse inside.

Kate must answer to Matt Graves (Josh Brolin), supposedly of the Department of Defense, though she suspects he’s actually CIA, along with his “partner” Alejandro (Del Toro), whose origins are even more shrouded in secrecy. Graves won’t tell Kate what their true objective is, and the film doesn’t let us in on their secrets for a long while either. We know what Kate knows, which is not much. She’s just a soldier.

Eventually, Kate’s superiors take her to ground zero — Juarez, Mexico, the kind of place where seeing naked, decapitated bodies hanging under overpasses is routine. Kate and her team enter the country in swiftly moving snack of black vehicles, not stopping to present their passports or for any other formalities, because their task exists outside the law. It’s similar to a scene like “Ride of the Valkyries” in Apocalypse Now, or any depiction of troops heading into battle. Rules don’t exist here, except the rules set by the cartel. There’s a very real danger that Kate and her teammates could be killed at any moment, just as in combat. It’s easy to see why Kate feels the urge to fight — everything the Juarez cartel touches turns into Hell on Earth.

Watching Sicario the first time around is an almost unbearably tense experience. As in the rest of Villeneuve’s body of work, oppressive dread hangs over every frame. We witness a few highly unpleasant moments; what happens in this film’s denouement could be troublesome in a slicker Hollywood product, but Sicario earns its misery by establishing the stakes of this war. As long as people continue using drugs, there will be someone to sell drugs to them. These drugs will come from places like Colombia and Mexico, and the price paid by the people who live there will be steep. According to Graves, intervention by the United States is mandatory, or more and more bodies will keep piling up on both sides of the border — what they’re doing circumnavigates much of the law, but again: this is war.Kate is our eyes and ears as we enter this world and witness the many horrors even she is stunned by. It’s not crucial that the lead of Sicario be a woman, but it does create an interesting dynamic. Matt and Alejandro have no respect for Kate’s role on their team, which may or may not be because she’s a woman. Kate is out of her depth in dealing with the horrors of Juarez, but not because she’s a woman — because that’s not her field, and because Juarez is fucking terrifying.

Kate’s morals butt up against Matt and Alejandro’s elusive interests, and she is visibly terrified through most of the movie. (Who wouldn’t be?) In some senses, this is behavior we’d think of as “typical” for a female character. Matt is almost disturbingly cavalier about his mission, seemingly shrugging at the fact that he could die at any moment. Without giving too much away, Alejandro reveals himself to be a force to be reckoned with, to say the least. In some movies, it would be problematic that the lone female is relegated to the weak “good cop” role, but this film also takes the time to fully develop her as a character. Sicario is well aware of its own gender politics, without drawing too much attention to them. Kate’s gender surely has something to do with her role as the pawn in this mission, but not everything. Ultimately, Sicario has its female protagonist wrestle with morality in a way that is probably somewhat different than, but not less equal to, the way a male protagonist would. At this moment in time, that’s probably more interesting than presenting her as a badass “tough girl” who’s just one of the boys.

Beyond Traffic, Sicario reminded me of two other films — Silence Of The Lambs and Zero Dark Thirty. The former has been pored over in gender studies in cinema classes, with Clarice Starling emerging as something of an icon for capable women in a male-dominated workplace, while the latter drops its female protagonist into a war zone she’s not quite ready for, just like Sicario. These films all feature women in the FBI or CIA struggling to prove their competence against men who’d prefer them to play nice and pipe down, though thanks to the work of its predecessors, Sicario is less concerned with having Kate “prove herself” and be the one who saves the day. It’s not a “take that, boys!” kind of movie. (All three films also have memorable and significant night vision sequences. I don’t know what to make of that connection.) The cinematography is courtesy of the legendary Roger Deakins, and it shows.At the opposite end of the spectrum is the new Steven Spielberg movie, Bridge Of Spies, which gives its few female characters absolutely nothing to do, in large part because when it comes to high-stakes international politics, women weren’t given a whole lot to do back in 1960 either. Amy Ryan, a powerhouse actress capable of great things, is totally sidelined in the “supportive wife” role. Bridge Of Spies is definitely a boys’ club, but again, so was 1960.

Bridge Of Spies is comparable to Sicario only in the sense that both explore U.S. intervention in global affairs, and it’s kind of interesting to think about how our role in such matters has changed (or not changed) from 1960 to 2015. Tom Hanks is a lawyer who begrudgingly represents a British man, living in Brooklyn, accused of being a spy. (And he is a spy, as the movie lets us know in a quietly masterful opening sequence.) James B. Donovan’s defense of Rudolf Abel takes up the first third or so of this film, which has a knowingly Capra-esque, Mr. Smith Goes To Washington feel to it (and who better to cast as a Jimmy Stewart type than Tom Hanks?). It’s really just an extended prologue for the real story, though, when Donovan is asked to covertly travel to Berlin to facilitate the exchange of an American spy captured in Russia for Abel. The governments themselves can’t be involved, so Donovan agrees to perform this very dangerous task on behalf of his country.

Bridge Of Spies is the ultimate 21st century Spielberg movie, nestling right up alongside titles like Munich, War Horse, and Lincoln. Janusz Kamiński shoots it as beautifully as he shoots every Spielberg movie, and the maestro is (still) at the top of his form as a director, composing shots and sequences like no one else. As with so many of his films, this one features a family man on a moral mission — if Hanks’ character were anymore decent, he’d be playing Jesus Christ himself. The climactic sequence scrapes up some tension, just in time for a slightly too long, slightly too sentimental ending (a Spielberg staple), but mostly this is a talky film with grand political ideas like Lincoln, though the script also contains plenty of wry humor to offset the earnestness (perhaps because it was co-written by the Coen brothers). It’s all pretty great, but somehow the flawlessly executed pieces don’t add up to a totally gripping whole — perhaps because the story’s scope is so massive. Bridge Of Spies gives us a grand total of three spies (or suspected spies) to care about, with about half the movie set in Germany just as the Berlin Wall is going up, plus all those Cold War shenanigans. Aside from the tense scene in which American student Frederic Pryor is harassed and imprisoned by German soldiers, Bridge Of Spies doesn’t generate a palpable sense of danger for its characters. (In that sense, it reminded me of the very similar Argo.) It’s not a fatal flaw, but spending more time with the Americans imprisoned in Germany and Russia might have raised the stakes and gotten us more invested in the outcome of Donovan’s dealings. Donovan continually states that he “just wants to go home,” and after a while, it starts to feel like that really is the extent of the stakes of this movie.

Both Sicario and Bridge Of Spies are beautiful to behold, thanks to their unparalleled directors of photography, and masterfully directed by one incredibly promising filmmaker, relatively new on the scene, and one of the all time greats. In their own ways, both speak volumes about current events. I’m not about to surmise how Sicario should be interpreted regarding the Mexican-American border’s role in recent political debates; nor does Bridge Of Spies‘ sentiment about how foreign prisoners should be treated feel like a topic that needs exploring in a review of the film. One is shockingly violent and bleak as hell, the other a throwback to more optimistic times, and you can probably guess which one ends much more happily than the other. *

Whether you’re a fan of former president George W. Bush or not, you have to admit his term contained some profound low points, kicking off with 9/11 and ending in a nasty recession. You may or may not blame Bush himself for these and other pieces of unfortunate Americana in the 21st century, but let’s face it: as a nation, we’ve had better.

Several of the big blights the nation grappled with during the (second) Bush regime are reflected in films from the past 15 years, dealt with explicitly in Farenheit 9/11, Recount, United 93 and Oliver Stone’s W., and more subtextually in Munich or 25th Hour (or any number of others). It’s only about now, though, that we’re able to step back and see things in context, which is why we’re getting movies that deal with these themes at a smaller, more intimate level. We’ve seen a lot of movies about the forest. Now we’re seeing the ones that are about the trees.

99 Homes centers on the financial debacle Bush dropped in Obama’s lap on his way out of the Oval Office. The 2008 recession has been the subject of a few films already, of course — we saw it from a Wall Street’s point of view in Margin Call, way up high at skyscraper level. Now 99 Homes gives us a ground’s eye view: the perspective of the families forced to relinquish their homes to the very banks who effed up in lending to them in the first place. Andrew Garfield plays Dennis Nash, a construction worker facing hard times because in 2008, there isn’t a whole lot of new construction going on. Nash has a mortgage on the home he grew up in and still lives in with his mom Lynn (Laura Dern) and son Connor (Noah Lomax). Then, one day, they’re out on the street, with only a few dollars in their pockets. Theirs is not an uncommon plight.

Nash is resourceful enough to find a (literally) shitty job cleaning up a house its owners left riddled with feces as a “fuck you” to the bank. Real estate mogul Rick Carver (Michael Shannon) takes a shine to Dennis’ plucky attitude and recruits him for some shady but lucrative dealings. Dennis is a good guy at heart, but he ultimately doesn’t have a lot of qualms about screwing the system that screwed him first. Soon, Nash has the cash to buy his family home back — or buy a dreamy mansion, as he is tempted and seduced by the very factors that got him in trouble in the first place. Carver advises him to not get sentimental about real estate, but that doesn’t end up being very good advice. Despite the way it may look on paper, homes are not just the boxes we reside in. They contain our whole lives.Carver is a bastard and he knows it, but as the film unfolds, the twisted logic he uses to justify his riches starts making a lot of sense, both to Dennis and to us in the audience. Michael Shannon takes pleasure in this dirty, greasy rich prick role, the way Shannon manages to sink his teeth into despicable villain roles that many actors would be afraid to take. Dern is unfortunately underused, beginning in “worried mom” mode and never permitted to go beyond it. Buying Garfield as a low-income construction worker takes a moment to get used to, but he ably carries the film once we settle into the story.

Directed by Ramin Bahrani, 99 Homes has  moments of life-and-death suspense, but the real tension comes from scenes in which we see everyday Americans fight the powers that be — the bankers, the government, the police — to save their homes… and lose, over and over. These people did nothing wrong, except believe in the myth of the American dream, listen to the “authorities,” and follow the road map every middle class American is handed, telling us we’re supposed to buy houses, and cars, and whatever else we can get our hands on. It’s practically a birthright — or it seemed that way, before it became painfully obvious that no one in this scheme knew exactly what they were doing. It’s a horrible injustice.

Unfortunately, Bahrani’s plot takes a slightly more conventional and melodramatic turn toward the end of 99 Homes than it really needed to, as if it didn’t trust that the stakes were high enough when it was just ordinary people faced with greed and corruption and a very broken system. This is a horror most of us already lived through, at some level — if we didn’t lose a home, perhaps we lost a job or our sense of security. Its setting in the very recent past injects 99 Homes with more urgency than you’d usually get from this sort of drama. A couple of Michael Shannon’s juicier monologues spell out this movie’s themes, but we didn’t really need them to. We’ve been living those themes since 2008.A similar but much higher profile injustice is explored in Truth, the dramatization of news producer Mary Mapes’ eventual firing by CBS following a 60 Minutes segment that questioned George W. Bush’s military service. The issues raised by Mapes and Dan Rather have a lot of legitimacy and are worthy of investigation, but instead the public gets hung up on whether or not CBS got fooled by forged documents. The point of the piece gets completely lost amidst all the nitpicking, and Mapes, Rather, and a handful of others lose their jobs due to bureaucracy and implied pressures from the Bush administration.

George W. Bush ends up being the villain in this movie without even being seen in it; he’s probably not directly responsible for any of this, but we never actually see the minions do their bidding. By the time it gets down to Mapes, the ill will has been funneled through a number of levels, which only adds to the feeling of helplessness she (and we) feel against The System. In the third act, Mapes is scrutinized and demonized by a committee of conservative lawyers who are hell-bent on uncovering Mapes’ “radical liberal” agenda, standing in for a large segment of the population who holds the same beliefs. (And whom we can thank for voting for Bush. Twice.) As its in-your-face title may suggest, Truth is not terribly subtle about the issues it’s exploring. Like 99 Homes, it feels the urge to monologue its Big Ideas, with plenty of grandstanding about journalistic integrity and corporate corruption along the way.

This is Zodiac writer James Vanderbilt’s first foray into directing. The result is that a few scenes work like gangbusters, while others come off as a bit stagey. A key component of Truth‘s more successful moments, of course, is Cate Blanchett as Mary Mapes, who proves that she can deliver a near-Oscar caliber performance in just about anything. Any time Blanchett and Robert Redford, who plays Rather, are on screen together, the film gets an electric charge from its high-wattage stars. The film contains a host of other recognizable faces in smaller roles — Dennis Quaid, Elisabeth Moss, Dermot Mulroney, Stacy Keach, Topher Grace — but they don’t all fare as well as Blanchett and Redford, since they’re mostly saddled with exposition and monologues. It’s impossible not to compare Truth to another tale of 60 Minutes segments gone haywire, Michael Mann’s The Insider, one of the all-time great films about journalism. Blanchett is every bit as good here as Al Pacino was there, but Truth spends so much time examining the Big Issues that it never quite gets around to developing its characters as individual human beings. Ultimately, the ideas on Vanderbilt’s mind end up being more compelling than the execution.A third film delving into fairly recent Americana is Danny Boyle’s Steve Jobs. This one is set closer to George H.W. Bush’s reign than his son’s, however. (It takes place in 1984, 1988, and 1998, thereby avoiding the first Bush presidency altogether, despite its proximity.) There’s nothing terribly political about Steve Jobs, of course, except that it leaves us on the eve of the tech revolution that introduced the iMac to consumers, kicking off a whole wave of innovation that would bring us the iPod, iPhone, and iPad — all of which changed modern life as we know it. Technically set in the past, Steve Jobs is very much about the now. It’s the kind of movie that wouldn’t work at all unless we all knew what happened after.

Predictably, Steve Jobs feels like a spiritual sequel to The Social Network — or technically, a prequel, since without Steve Jobs there is no Mark Zuckerberg. Both films were written by Aaron Sorkin. Both play fast and loose with facts. Both portray their subjects as ego-maniacal assholes who push away the people they love (or the people they should love) in favor of unbridled genius. This is a particularly dicey position to take with Jobs, a man who is essentially worshipped, perhaps the closest we’ve come to a modern deity. You can write Mark Zuckerberg off as a spoiled whippersnapper who got lucky, if you wish, but with Steve Jobs, it’s more complicated. Jobs really worked before he was able to change the world.

As concocted by Sorkin, Steve Jobs unfolds in three theatrical acts, each revolving around the same handful of characters buzzing in and out of Jobs’ orbit just before he embarks on one of his now-infamous product launches. It’s a nifty gimmick, one that’s obviously meant to be taken with a grain of salt, given that there’s not a chance in hell any of these events actually unfolded as depicted here. This is an excuse for Sorkin to do what he does best, which is to portray very smart, very articulate professionals in their workplace, spouting ideas that say more about the macro state of the world than they do about any of them as individuals.

Steve Jobs isn’t all that much about Steve Jobs, the same way The Social Network wasn’t exactly about Mark Zuckerburg or Sean Parker, and Citizen Kane isn’t really about William Randolph Hearst. The Social Network‘s main takeaway was about loneliness in the digital age, and the central irony that no amount of virtual “friendship” can truly replace person-to-person intimacy. It depicted a shift in the power balance between the old guard of moneyed upper-crusters to pajamaed freshmen who could make millions without leaving their dorm rooms — a shift that would never have been possible without Steve Jobs. Most of us would agree that Jobs was ahead of the curve, but Steve Jobs depicts him as so ahead of the curve, he’s all but clairvoyant.

In its first act, Jobs is frustrated with the limits of the Macintosh computer, which refuses to say “Hello” as it’s programmed to do; this is crucial because the computer needs to appear friendly and appealing to consumers, and not like the emotionless killer people have in mind thanks largely to HAL9000 of 2001: A Space Odyssey. Ironically, the second act has Jobs unveiling the NeXT computer, a charmless black cube reminiscent of 2001’s mysterious Monolith. Ultimately, neither the Macintosh nor NeXT is a sustainable venture, which leads to the fun and frisky iMac launch of 1998, which we all know turned out just dandy.

But Steve Jobs suggests that it wasn’t just that the iMac had the right look and feel to appeal to the mass market, but that Jobs was essentially just waiting all along for technology to catch up to him. Ultimately, computers couldn’t be a staple in every home until there was a reason for them to be, and that reason was, of course, the internet. Steve Jobs didn’t explicitly know how the internet would start shaping our lives in the 90s, but intuitively he was aware that something like this would create a demand for his products. He was just a little too early with his ideas, and had to wait for the rest of the world to catch up.

Boyle gives us only hints of glimpses at the tech obsessives who made Jobs a god for the 21st century — stamping their feet and hollering for their deity, though the film focuses exclusively on Jobs’ closest confidantes and family. Despite posing Jobs as a prickly mogul who sacrificed personal relationships for his status as one of the most influential innovators of all time, the film is ultimately optimistic about all the wonderful toys Jobs left us with, treating technology not as a harbinger of doom the way it’s portrayed in most movies, but as something that is ultimately poised to bring human beings closer together.

Steve Jobs spends a lot of time on Jobs’ non-relationship with his daughter Lisa, who he refuses to acknowledge is his daughter in the film’s earliest segment. This is obviously tied to his complicated feelings about his own biological parents, who gave him up for adoption. It’s an echo of the way Zuckerberg isolates his friends in The Social Network, but in Steve Jobs, technology is the link that allows Jobs to connect with his daughter, rather than what comes between them. Jobs cherishes Lisa’s childhood drawing on a rudimentary paint program more than any time actually spent with her; a teenage Lisa’s Walkman inspires him to create a device that will allow her to carry  a thousand songs instead of just one album. As wondrous as technology is, in Steve Jobs, it is ultimately only as magnificent as what people can do with it. A computer is just a machine until we turn it on and use it for something incredible. Jobs’ Macs evolve in a way that mirrors Lisa’s own development, but Steve Jobs‘ third act in particular spends a lot more time on the people than the product.Steve Jobs is basically a mash-up of the themes explored in The Social Network and Moneyball, which occasionally make it play more like Aaron Sorkin’s Greatest Hits than a brand new movie standing on its own two feet. There’s sparkling banter and a constant flurry of activity from characters who never sit still but also never go anywhere; the same effect could be achieved for a fraction of the budget if Sorkin just put everyone on a treadmill. Aaron Sorkin has never not been Aaron Sorkin and Steve Jobs is no exception, but the crackling dialogue still contains as much genuine insight into the human condition as it does nifty zingers. As in 99 Homes and Truth, there are on-the-nose monologues that essentially spell out the themes Boyle and Sorkin are dealing with — but nobody does a monologue like Aaron Sorkin, so Steve Jobs can get away with it in a way that those others don’t quite pull off.

In the end, social networks may be slightly juicier cinematic material than the machines that deliver them to us, and so The Social Network will be the more enduring masterpiece. David Fincher had just the right sensibility to mitigate some of Sorkin’s most Sorkinian qualities, and while Daniel Pemberton’s score is plenty good, it’s not going to change the cinematic soundscape the way that Trent Reznor and Atticus Roth did. Boyle does good work here, but also adds a few stylistic flourishes that feel like overkill in a film that’s already so heightened. (Hello, rocket ship! Where did you come from?) The third act focuses too heavily on wrapping up the Lisa story, and the film’s final moments are possibly more upbeat than they needed to be, ending on a Jobs-as-rock-star moment the movie has up until this point wisely avoided.

Steve Jobs has disappointed in wide release, which somewhat mars its chances for major awards consideration — though it’s definitely still in the running. The sterling cast — mainly, Kate Winslet, Jeff Daniels, and Michael Fassbender — all have shots at Oscar nods, and Sorkin’s screenplay seems like a shoo-in. Steve Jobs is ultimately a fascinating look at the dawning of the modern age, its subject matter coming across as both ancient and current simultaneously. It sure is quaint that a computer saying “Hello” used to be a big deal, isn’t it? But at the same time, most of us have witnessed this revolution with our own eyes. And it’s still happening. There’s something almost spooky about seeing the birth of our era brought to life in this way, by a man both out of touch with basic human emotion and eerily prescient about what humans would want and need in the near future. Steve Jobs tells us only a little about who Steve Jobs was. It says a lot more about who we are.

*

It’s late November now… and, shocker of shockers, the Oscar race is still wide open.

As usual, awards season is officially underway with hopeful contenders stacked one on top of the other. But less usual is the reasonably quiet race we’ve had thus far. There are not thunderously moving, high-impact prestige dramas like 12 Years A Slave or Lincoln, or ambitious cinematic achievements like Boyhood, or industry-pandering fare like Argo or Birdman or The Artist, or actors turning in solid performances who are clearly overdue, like Julianne Moore in Still Alice. There’s no crowd-pleasing blockbuster that could take the cake like Life Of Pi or Gravity. There’s not even as much of the usual middling Oscar bait like The Imitation Game or Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close to contend with.

That doesn’t mean there won’t be. A few notable titles are still under wraps, and their quality could be game changers — most notably, Joy, The Revenant, and The Hateful Eight — but as of now, there’s no true frontrunner in any one race, as there often is by this time most years. The last three Best Picture winners had already been released by mid-November in their respective years, so if 2015 follows suit, then we’ve already seen this year’s Best Picture.

Is it Spotlight?

Tom McCarthy’s journalism drama is the most buzzed about awards contender of the moment, and probably the only film that is all but guaranteed a Best Picture nomination. It’s not impossible to imagine it heading for a win, especially if none of the above-mentioned titles turns out to be Oscar-worthy.

Spotlight continues the recent trend of films telling intimate stories about major events in the 21st century, though the scandals depicted here are very much of the century prior. It may take place in 2001, but in many ways, it feels like a 70s movie. The quartet of reporters it focuses on use landlines and books rather than smart phones and search engines, as fits the times, which makes the central action feel more antiquated than it is. It also makes following their journalistic journey more entertaining, since it’s never too exciting to watch movie characters Google something that would have taken a movie character from the 90s a few days to find. Spotlight is aptly being compared to All The President’s Men, as this is another movie about a team of newspaper reporters uncovering a major scandal committed by some very powerful, very revered men. Think of it as All The Church’s Men. (Or, okay, Six Percent Of The Church’s Men, since that’s the estimated number of priests who have molested children, according to one expert in the movie.)

Spotlight takes a workmanlike approach to its topic, with little time for sentimentality or subplots. It tells its story straightforwardly, without delving into the personal baggage of the reporters unless it’s relevant to their work. There isn’t a single moment in Spotlight that is not about these four reporters’ quest to bring the Catholic church’s crimes to light. When we see these people at home, which is rare, they’re working. The team consists of Robby (Michael Keaton), Mike (Mark Ruffalo), Sacha (Rachel McAdams), and Matt (Brian d’Arcy James), and the film spends roughly equal time on all of them. (There is no real lead in this movie.) There is only one scene with heightened emotion, delivered by Ruffalo. Otherwise, everything here is incredibly understated and unfolds as naturally as is possible in a narrative film. There’s a lot of walking and talking, knocking on doors, talking on phones, and telling secretaries that they’re here to see whoever they’re here to see. There are very few overtly cinematic flourishes. The screenplay, by McCarthy and Josh Singer, takes none of the artificial and obvious detours we’re afraid it will. The drama inherent to this story is enough, without the bells and whistles of a three-act structure. Joe Friday would love this movie — it’s just the facts.

This could be boring, if the subject matter didn’t bring so much to the table already. Instead, Spotlight is rather riveting. The Boston Globe reporters are initially lukewarm on investigating a court case about a Catholic priest accused of molesting children, until some digging reveals that many priests have molested an unthinkable number of children — and the Catholic church has been swiftly sweeping it under the rug for years. This is not news now, of course, but it was back in 2001. One of the most fascinating angles in McCarthy’s movie is the way “the system” in the city of Boston conspires, either willfully or unknowingly, to let these crimes continue in silence. The Catholic church isn’t made out to be a sinister force, exactly — there’s no mustache-twirling villain here, though it’s easy to imagine other screenwriters being tempted to create one. Thousands of people had to look the other way in order to allow this sexual abuse to continue undetected, but Spotlight makes it clear why they did so. It’s not because they’re bad people. They believe in God, and so they believe in the church. How could anything done in the name of God be that wrong?

What Spotlight does very well is make the stakes real and tangible, even without the typical ticking clock or a hackneyed conflict thrown in just in time for the climax. The film’s biggest dramatic turns are about things like unsealing court records or getting data over the phone from a psychologist. But Spotlight also manages to put faces on both the victims and the perpetrators — we briefly meet one priest who happily confesses that he is guilty of molesting children, and then admits to also being a victim of sexual abuse by a priest. Most films would demonize the character, but Spotlight does just the opposite — portraying him as a good-natured but misguided fool.

Even better are the scenes in which we meet the victims, all grown up — most prominently, a straight man who has developed a drug problem, and a gay man who sheds light on his sexual and spiritual confusion when the first person who acknowledged that it was okay to be homosexual was thirty years his senior, supposedly celibate, and appointed by God. With impressive economy, McCarthy shows us exactly who has been hurt by the church’s misdirection, and how. And then he quickly moves on. Each of the four reporters has a personal stake in the outcome — Sacha’s grandmother is a passionate churchgoers, Mike finds himself reexamining his lapsed faith, Matt discovers that he lives just down the street from a molesters “rehab,” and Robby discovers that his esteemed, well-established “friends” have known a lot more than they’ve ever let on. But none of this feels forced. We get exactly enough information about each character without ever stopping the forward momentum of the journalistic investigation. It’s the most efficient storytelling imaginative.

Spotlight is also immaculately cast — with supporting turns from Liev Schreiber, Billy Crudup, Stanley Tucci, and John Slattery (making this the second movie of the season that features a Mad Men alum as a journalist, following Elisabeth Moss’ underwritten appearance in Truth — it seems that cast is still the go-to for office settings). The film takes place in the latter half of 2001, which means these characters at one point have to reckon with September 11 — and even that feels subtle. It takes a hell of a storyteller to drop 9/11 into the plot, and then nimbly move on.

Spotlight doesn’t really make any wrong moves. At all. It comes together seemingly effortlessly, without calling much attention to just how good it is, until the film’s masterful final scene, which takes place on the Sunday morning that the Globe‘s story made its rounds in the city of Boston. (The fact that the story was so ironically printed on a Sunday morning is a detail so perfect you’d think it couldn’t be true. But of course it is.) The conclusion says everything without a single word of significant dialogue. You couldn’t ask for a better final scene.

Does Spotlight have what it takes to win Best Picture? Maybe. It’s likely a tad too understated for many viewers to feel passionately about. Best Picture winners tend to be bigger and splashier than this, though Spotlight‘s overall quality is difficult to refute. I would place my bets on another film winning Best Picture at this point, though Spotlight will definitely be in the spotlight throughout awards season, and definitely deserves to be.

*

This is neither the first nor the last time I’ll discuss awards season in relation to a movie that has maybe a 5% chance of nabbing an Oscar nomination. Every year, there are those surefire heavyweights — this year, films like Spotlight, The Revenant, and Room (to name a few) — and then there are the also-rans that enter the conversation, sometimes just for a fleeting moment, for one solitary standout element. Remember that time we thought Jennifer Aniston could get nominated for Cake? Or when Saving Mr. Banks felt like surefire Oscar bait, until it was entirely snubbed aside from Thomas Newman’s score?

For those of us who like such things, this is a fun (if somewhat overwhelming) time of year, as we check out as much as we can of what the studios and the indie scene have to offer, all of them vying for just five or so slots in the big races. There will inevitably be an outcry at performances in smaller films — those that gain recognition from critics’ groups and guilds, but not the Academy — and could have gone much further if they’d only been seen by more people. Most of the fringe films that bubble up in the awards season conversation will never actually get that sweet, sweet Oscar lovin’, but of course, that’s not all that matters. It doesn’t mean they’re undeserving.

James White is such a movie.

James White has already picked up a few festival wins, is nominated for three Independent Spirits Awards, and was named one of the National Board of Review’s ten best indie films for 2015. Most of the awards season chatter is based mainly on the strength of its supporting performance by Cynthia Nixon, playing a former schoolteacher who is losing a nasty bout with cancer. But as the title of the film may suggest, the story really belongs to her son, James (Christopher Abbott).

James is not a bad guy, but he’s not a terribly endearing individual either. Like many twentysomething males we meet in independent cinema, he’s a mess. He doesn’t have a job, and probably has never had one. He spends his nights (and sometimes his days) drinking excessively and doing drugs, occasionally picking a fight with a stranger for added entertainment. He has one loyal friend in Nick (Scott Mescudi, AKA Kid Cudi), but he’s testing even the limits of that brotherly bond with his recent behavior. He’s got a new girlfriend, Jayne (Mackenzie Leigh), who is still in high school, which says a lot about his maturity level. He spends most nights on his mother’s couch. James has led a privileged life, and mostly wasted the opportunities he was given. He thinks he’ll get his shit together soon enough, but those odds are looking slimmer by the day. James thinks of himself as a writer, when he thinks of himself as anything at all, but it’s clear that he’s going nowhere. He has no story to tell, because he hasn’t lived life so much as he’s avoided it. We meet James at the precise moment when things are beginning to get unfortunately interesting.

When we meet James, his estranged father has just died. He encounters his half-sister and stepmother for the first time at his father’s wake. James insists he isn’t that bothered by his dad’s death, probably because he’s more bothered by an earlier abandonment. Instead of dealing with his grief and anger, James runs away — both literally, to Mexico, and figuratively, with plenty of substance abuse — and his life of leisure is more or less uninterrupted. Until his mother Gail calls him, beckoning him home, because her cancer is back with a vengeance.

After a lot of meandering through James’ mostly meaningless existence, this is where the film kicks into high gear. Gail rapidly grows more and more feeble — it’s pretty clear early on that she won’t survive this time. A mere matter of weeks after losing his father, James is now faced with losing his mother, too, and it’s difficult not to feel sorry for him. This young man,  already so lost in so many ways, is about to become an orphan.

Most of this we must intuit through the action — James doesn’t often say how he really feels; he’s more likely to claim that he’s fine. He’s in denial. But as Gail grows weaker, James is tasked with getting her water in the middle of the night, carrying her to the bathroom, and dealing with the occasional dementia that steals her away as mind and body deteriorate. He rises to the challenge, though none of this comes naturally. He’s just doing the best he can.

Watching James White can be a frustrating experience, especially in its first half, because James is such a shallow, spoiled, mostly unremarkable person. He’s not a good guy, nor is he a bad guy, and it’s easy to see why just about everyone but his mother and his best buddy have given up on him. (Even they come close to doing so, in moments.) He’s like a lot of people — living for himself, day by day, without an eye on the big picture. For the first half of James White, you might easily hate this character — but the more we see what he’s facing, the more we’re likely to feel for him anyway. That’s how it is with people. We don’t have the capacity to care for strangers — but then, as we learn more about them, we do.

Several characters call James out as a spoiled brat throughout the movie, and it’s earned. But when his mother needs him, James is finally capable of doing what is right, of caring for the person who once cared for him in such a manner. James White makes the point that even the most overprivileged, underappreciative Upper West Side brat is capable of love and goodness in the right circumstances. We should not write anybody off. We should have compassion for everyone, because everyone, at one time or another, is going through something like this.

Nixon is utterly compelling and convincing in a role that’s a far cry from Miranda on Sex & The City (a role I can’t ever not associate her with, since I’m a fan of the show). It’s a heartbreaking turn, not just a supporting performance, but the essential soul of this movie — her love for James is one of few things he’s got going for him. We need to see him through her eyes to care about him at all.

Christopher Abbott is also an actor who is hard to separate from his role on a New York City-set TV show. As Charlie, he was one of the least sympathetic of the Girls gang (and that’s saying something). He’s similarly off-putting here, a choice I’m not sure was intentional. I spent much of this movie actively disliking this character, but that ends up being the point. (I’m not sure if an actor who more easily earned our sympathy would have helped or hurt the movie overall.)

James White is the directorial debut of Josh Mond, and partially autobiographical. (Mond also lost his mother to cancer.) It’s unclear if Mond knows exactly how unlikable James White is in the first act of this film, or if he wants us to like James more than I did, but the movie works regardless as a tale of the way people — even the worst people — deal with grief. He would probably say that it’s intentional, though I’m not sure it was intentional to this extent.

The Oscar race is a crowded place, and Cynthia Nixon has only a slim chance of ending up as one of the five nominees, as good as she is. (Especially since lead performances by Rooney Mara in Carol and Alicia Vikander in The Danish Girl are currently vying for Supporting Actress status, where they can stand out more.) But that sweet, sweet Oscar lovin’ isn’t the only reason to check out a film with a performance as solid as Nixon’s.

James White makes no concession to make its protagonist likable, and in the end, maybe he isn’t. What’s so compelling about the film is that we end up feeling for him anyway.

*

Now that Mad Men is over, we’re seeing its star players pop up as supporting players all over the place — mostly (surprise, surprise) in the workplace. Elisabeth Moss was part of the team of duped journalists in Truth, John Slattery helped highlight the Catholic church’s crimes in Spotlight, and Jessica Pare showed Saorise Ronan some tough love as a department store manager in Brooklyn. These all feel, more or less, like extensions of these characters’ Mad Men personas — while Spike Lee, on the other hand, shows us a side of mild-mannered secretary Dawn Chambers we never expected to see.

Yep, that’s Teyonah Parris as Chi-Raq‘s Lysistrata, who practically oozes confidence and sex appeal throughout the film. She’s so sexually persuasive, in fact, that she convinces her Chicago sisters to join her in withholding sex from men until peace between warring gangs can be negotiated — triggering a movement that spans the globe.

If you’re thinking that sounds like an outlandish plot for a movie that takes place in the 21st century, you’re right, and Spike Lee is right there with you. Chi-Raq veers wildly between comedy and tragedy. It wants to be taken seriously, but never asks to be taken literally. It’s an adaptation of the Greek comedy Lysistrata, originally performed in 411 BC. Much of the dialogue is spoken in rhymed couplets, though I’m guessing that the words and phrases such as “fleek,” “crib,” and “no peace, no pussy” were not a part of the original mix. Chi-Raq is a hell of a movie, one that few filmmakers besides Spike Lee would attempt to make, and one that few besides Lee could make at all coherently.

Chi-Raq is nothing if not uneven, with scenes of absurd comedy smooshed up against heartbreak and senseless bloodshed. None of this would work at all, except that the message Lee is attempting to get across is so urgent, and earnest, and sorely needed. (And, whether you like the film or not, you will receive the message. In its rapped overture featuring a graphic of the United States made up of firearms, followed by some chilling statistics on recent gun deaths, Chi-Raq makes sure of that.) It would seem fortuitously timed that this movie was released the week of the San Bernardino shootings, which once again stirred conversation over gun rights, except these days it feels like there’s always a shooting in the headlines. And that’s the point of the movie. Spike Lee is fed up with such headlines, as many of us are — but unlike us, Spike Lee has made a movie about it.Lee has never been accused of being too subtle, and Chi-Raq is maybe the least subtle movie imaginable. In another era, that might be to the film’s detriment. But when you look at the horrific number of shootings taking place in America on a daily basis, it seems perfectly fair for Lee to take subtlety off the menu. “This Is An Emergency,” a bold red title card informs us at the beginning of the film. And he’s right.

“Chi-Raq” is the nickname that likens Chicago to Iraq, given that more Americans have been killed in the Windy City in recent years than in our involvements in the Middle East. It’s a problem that extends beyond the rash of mass shootings that entered public consciousness in 1999 with Columbine and hasn’t dissipated since. Black Americans in urban areas have been dealing with fear and anguish over gun violence a lot longer than the rest of us have, and to a much greater magnitude. That’s the issue Chi-Raq aims to explore, though Lee’s film doesn’t segregate the problem according to class or race. Gun violence is everybody’s problem these days. And yes, he’s angry that it took headlines such as those in San Bernardino for most Americans to wake up and smell the bloodshed, when people in poorer neighborhoods of Chicago — and Philadelphia, and Los Angeles, and so on — have suffered in media silence for years. It’s a fair complaint. Chi-Raq might have been a perfectly potent film a few years back, but it wouldn’t have resonated with most of us. Now, though, it’s hard not to feel solidarity with the characters from Chi-Raq who live in constant terror, for whom a child struck down by a bullet is a common occurrence, who are desperate to put a stop to the steady stream of bad news. Chi-Raq couldn’t be more timely. As much as it is about a very particular place, and a very particular community, it’s impossible not to view it through the blood-spattered lens of recent headlines. We’re all getting closer and closer to know what it’s like to live in a gangland.Chi-Raq is a call to arms — well, technically, a call away from arms — that wears its heart on its sleeve and borrows even more heart to wear on the other sleeve. The plot involves two warring Chicago gangs, the Trojans and the Spartans — again, not subtle — whose feud claims the life of a little girl named Patti. Patti’s grieving mother is played by Jennifer Hudson, whose performance is plenty moving in its own right, but is even more moving when you recall that Hudson hails from Chicago and lost three family members to gun violence. The Spike Lee joint also stars Angela Bassett as another mother who lost a daughter to crossfire, Nick Cannon as a cocky rapper who doesn’t want to give up his piece, and John Cusack as a priest striving to make changes in the neighborhood.

But Chi-Raq also features Wesley Snipes in a sequined orange eye patch, and Samuel L. Jackson in assorted colorful suits, spouting ancient Greek-like rhymes about baby-making. There’s a blindfolded military general wearing Confederate flag underpants riding a canon called “Whistling Dick.” There’s a lot of raunchiness, and the film’s climax involves a public sex showdown in a large brass bed. Chi-Raq also boasts a few musical numbers, and much of the dialogue is spoken in rhymed couplets. The opening of the film is a lyric video. Some parts hew closely to the Greek play that is nearly 2,500 years old, while other pieces feature booty call sexting. Does this all fit together seamlessly? Not really. Portions of the film are a little too cartoonish and over-the-top, watering down the necessary tension. The script isn’t quite sure where to take itself in the third act, and portions of its plot would have been better set in more realistic settings than in the giant military space that houses most of the film’s latter half, where all characters save one are wearing white.

But Lee’s passion for the subject matter practically bleeds through the movie. Chi-Raq is an important film more than it is an exceptional one, filled with dialogue that addresses the many-headed beast that is gun control in America head on. Lee isn’t too polite to blame politicians, the media, and the NRA for their parts in perpetuating the bloodbath, while still holding gang members responsible for their crimes. Pretty much everyone gets name-checked for their role in this epidemic, but Lee is never unfair, and never too quick to point the finger elsewhere without first looking within. That’s not easy to do, especially in a film that is also slickly entertaining and sometimes laugh-out-loud hilarious. Chi-Raq is a strange movie, and I imagine many in the audience will find its erratic tone and the poetic delivery of the dialogue insurmountable. (It reminded me of Richard Kelly’s Southland Tales, which similarly blended political satire, somber themes, and absurd comedy into a unique cinematic concoction that did not sit well with many.)

While there are a few scenes that thud more than they bang, when Chi-Raq works, it’s really cooking. Gun violence — whether it’s happening in South Chicago or San Bernardino, whether the triggers are pulled by black people, white people, or ISIS extremists — is something that needs to be addressed by films as fearless as Chi-Raq, by filmmakers like Spike Lee who speak their minds.

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This is it. This is my final retroactive Top 10 list, because it is my first.

This was the first year I was in film school, and the first time I saw nearly enough films in any given year to feel qualified to weigh in. I was a teenager at the time, so maybe my taste wasn’t quite so refined — but hey, it was a lot more refined than most 18-year-olds, I’d wager.

These lists are a time capsule. Some of these films have aged better than others. Others that I’ve seen since — Mulholland Drive, Donnie Darko, Before Night Falls, to name a few — might have been in contention, but aren’t found here. Because you can’t see everything.

I wrote this list without ordering my picks, so I’ve ordered them as seems appropriate now. Another caveat: I didn’t do any write-ups then, so these are my current thoughts about these films. Some of these movies I love even more now than I did then, and others I’d probably happily leave off this list were I to go back and start over. But you can’t do that, because it defeats the whole purpose of encapsulating your favorites in a Top Ten!

(For other Top Tens from other years, click here.)

10. MONSTER’S BALL

There’s a lot of misery going on in Monster’s Ball. Hank is a son of a bitch whose wife killed herself, and early in the story, his son kills himself, too. Then there’s Leticia, whose husband is executed on death row early in the film, and whose son is later killed in a car accident. But hey, at least there’s ice cream!

Yes, this film lays on the “chocolate versus vanilla” symbolism thicker than hot fudge, because Hank is white and Leticia is blank, and Hank is also pretty much a racist. It’s basically tragedy porn, and is mostly notable for winning Halle Berry her Oscar for Best Actress, which was also the first (and, to date, only) Best Actress Oscar to go to a black actress. Unfortunately, Berry’s career since 2001 has been, shall we say, less than optimal, with duds like Gothika and Catwoman following her win and somewhat sullying her appeal. She hasn’t been great in a great movie since. Director Marc Forster’s career has been spotty, too.

But Berry is really good in Monster’s Ball, and despite its retroactive inclusion under the Lee Daniels Meloadrama Umbrella, it’s not a bad film, if a tad overcooked. Billy Bob Thornton, Heath Ledger, and even Sean “Puff Daddy” Combs turn out fine performances. This isn’t a film from 2001 I’ve revisited often (I may be a masochist when it comes to bleak movies, but I’m not that much of a masochist), but it’s not a cinematic blight, either, even though Monster’s Ball doesn’t have the greatest of reputations anymore. (Funny how consensus on certain films just sours sometimes, largely when its key players turn out subpar work in subsequent ventures.)

9. IRIS

I suppose it’s fitting that my most forgettable movie of 2001 happens to be about Alzheimer’s. I certainly don’t want to dismiss the film — I liked it enough to rank it among my favorites of the year, of course, and it was nominated for three Oscars, all for its performances. Not too shabby.

Jim Broadbent won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, even though I’d say his role is more of a lead (as you’ll see in my acting awards below). No matter. As Bayley, the mild-mannered hubby of the titular Iris, played to perfection as usual by Dame Judi Dench, Broadbent is heartbreaking. Broadbent is the kind of stalwart character actor who isn’t often recognized by the Academy, or at least rarely wins against more formidable (and famous) opponents. For this role, he was up against Ben Kinglsey, Ian McKellan, Ethan Hawke, and Jon Voight, all of whom are more recognizable to audiences. And Iris also has a supporting turn from Kate Winslet, which is never a bad thing.

Dench and Winslet have had plenty of other memorable roles, and Broadbent has proven his worth in many roles since, but it’s nice that this movie earned him his due… even if I’m feeling a bit Iris-like, in that I remember very little about the story of the film itself…8. THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING

Speaking of Ian McKellan! This was the film that started it all, for better or worse. It’s actually rather unfortunate that Peter Jackson went on to direct his bloated Hobbit trilogy — which (to be fair) I haven’t seen — because the original trilogy was held in such high regard by both audiences and critics, back in the day. The third installment managed to sweep the Oscars in 2004.

These films still have their place in the hearts of many fans (and I suppose the Hobbit films do too, of a much smaller group), but since 2001 we’ve seen a lot of imitators — not so much in terms of fantasy stories, but definitely in terms of spectacle. Few of these are anywhere as good as Fellowship Of The Ring.

Give Jackson his due for adapting a difficult book series into something that fans old and new cherished, something of high enough quality to be nominated for Best Picture all three times, and utilizing such magnificent actors in these iconic roles. There is so much to praise in these movies, and yet… and yet… I find it hard to muster much enthusiasm for them now, because I’m exhausted by what they left in their wake.

Sorry, Mr. Jackson.7. GOSFORD PARK

Before there was Downton Abbey, there was Gosford Park. The cast features more or less every British thespian who was noteworthy in 2001 (many who would become even more noteworthy later), including Helen Mirren, Kristin Scott Thomas, Jeremy Northam, Emily Watson, Clive Owen, Charles Dance… I’m getting tired of listing them, but there are lots more. Enough to compete with Hogwarts. Also… Ryan Phillippe!

Gosford Park is like an Agatha Christie novel come to life, paired with Christopher Guest-ian humor. (Or maybe that’s just the presence of Bob Balaban leading me to think so.) Directed by the legendary Robert Altman, this takes the auteur’s trademark comfort with colossal casts and loose narrative and puts it to work, in the pitch perfect setting of a posh English manor, where there’s been — dun dun dun — a murder!

The story is a classic “upstairs downstairs” type, where we see things unfold both with the upper crust and the servants. The film is wryly funny and the mystery is satisfying, and — no surprise here — the cast is superb all around. I haven’t seen Gosford Park in a while, but I should correct that. It’s Altman at his best (or close to it, at least).6. BLACK HAWK DOWN

We’ve seen a lot of movies that resemble Black Hawk Down since 2001, but they may never have been made if Black Hawk Down didn’t get there first. Ridley Scott was hot off the Best Picture-winning Gladiator, with the hot lineup of Josh Hartnett, Ewan McGregor, Orlando Bloom, and Eric Bana, amongst others. (You remember when Josh Hartnett was a thing, don’t you?)

Black Hawk Down was the most intense war film since Saving Private Ryan, set in a much more recent era (Somalia, 1993). Up until this year, it was probably also the best regarded film by Ridley Scott since Black Hawk Down, as his output has been hit or miss otherwise. (A Good Year, Kingdom Of Heaven, Body Of Lies, Prometheus, Robin Hood, Exodus: Gods And Kings, American Gangster, The Counselor… definitely a mixed bag there.) Hans Zimmer pulled out a pretty fantastic score, and the film won two out of the four Oscars it was nominated for. Black Hawk Down also feels like a necessary precursor to films like The Hurt Locker and American Sniper that depict more recent war zones than the usual WWII varietal.   5. THE ROYAL TENENBAUMS

Wes Anderson has been assembling casts of weirdo “families” (biological or otherwise) since 2001, many times using the same actors. (I know Bottle Rocket and Rushmore did this to an extent earlier, but I’d say it was The Royal Tenenbaums that really cemented the full Wes Anderson formula.) I am sometimes charmed by Anderson’s sensibilities, and sometimes not. Occasionally, I get a sense of quirk overload, to the extent that I’ve had to skip a few of his films.

It helped that back in 2001, we hadn’t really seen this sort of thing before. Gene Hackman is a hoot as the gruff patriarch of a fractured family whose only method of getting back in his loved ones’ good graces is to pretend that he’s dying. Anjelica Huston, Ben Stiller, Luke Wilson, Gwyneth Paltrow, Danny Glover, and Bill Murray are basically an immaculate lineup for Anderson (the dour, secretly smoking Margo is Paltrow’s best-ever performance). Like all of Anderson’s films, there’s an underlying sadness beneath the mega-stylized surface, but in this one, it feels earned.

4. MEMENTO

I mentioned having forgotten a lot about the Alzheimer’s drama Iris above, but Memento is far less forgettable — even though it is similarly all about memory loss, albeit in a much more mysterious fashion. While not technically Christopher Nolan’s first film, it is the film that put him on the mainstream map. While still best known for his Batman films, the unique vision Nolan put forth in Memento carried on in bigger original films like Inception and Interstellar, which are mainly notable because hardly anyone gets to make big budget original stories anymore.

In Memento, we have a story that is nothing new — a man trying to hunt down the man who wrong his wife. The twist, of course, is that this man has anterograde amnesia, so he forgets everything he does and everything that happens, making him vulnerable to certain predators. Taking place in alternating scenes of chronological and reverse-chronological order, one in color and one in black-and-white, Memento is a post-Pulp Fiction pushing of the limits of narrative storytelling, one that — like Pulp Fiction — has prompted plenty of copycats in the years since.

3. IN THE BEDROOM

This film is a lot less kinky than it sounds. In fact, it’s not kinky at all! The titular bedroom shenanigans refer primarily to grief, loss, estrangement, and other such unsexy things.

Tom Wilkinson and Sissy Spacek are Matt and Ruth Fowler, living an idyllic life in Maine with their son Frank (Nick Stahl)… until he begins dating an older woman, Natalie (Marisa Tomei), who has two children and a hot-headed ex husband. That ex ends up killing their son in a domestic dispute, and because there are no witnesses, he ends up going free. Matt and Ruth cope in different ways, the absence of Frank palpable between them. Eventually, Matt comes to believe that the only way they can move on is to take eye-for-an-eye vengeance, leading to a tense finale.

In The Bedroom was the first official Sundance selection nominated for Best Picture, and certainly not the last. A number of independent films with similar stories and moods have been released in the years since, but In The Bedroom remains one of the most sparsely elegant of all, powered by powerhouse performances from Spacek and Wilkinson. The fact that it lost Best Picture to the lighter-weight A Beautiful Mind is a predictable shame in the Academy Awards record books, but this one holds up far better.

2. GHOST WORLD

Of all my 2001 favorites, this is probably the film I’ve re-watched the most, and it only gets better with age. Following their high school graduation, BFFs Enid (Thora Birch) and Rebecca (Scarlett Johansson) hang out and fill their last summer of freedom in that idle, aimless manner you can only get away with as a teenager. Their primary preoccupation becomes with Seymour (Steve Buscemi), a lonesome sad sack, whom they prank by setting him up on a fake date. Then Enid starts to feel sorry for Seymour and begins spending time with him, and the longer she’s around Seymour, the more she realizes they have in common. Being a snarky outsider is fine and dandy in high school, but that’s the sort of attitude that could see Enid growing up to be as lonely as Seymour.

Adapted from a comic book, Terry Zwigoff’s offbeat comedy is plenty clever and contains a number of indelible comic moments, but like The Royal Tenenbaums, the comedy bubbles up in a sea of melancholy and human truth. The relationships between these characters are flawless and fascinating — Enid and Rebecca, as their friendship falls apart post-high school, as teen friendships tend to do, and Enid and Seymour, whose relationship is tender with some underlying romantic tension that’s never as creepy as it easily could be. Ghost World captures the tender age between childhood and adulthood perfectly, with a level of stark, sobering truth that’s rare in a “teen movie.” (This is one of those only in the most technical sense.) It’s one of the best comedies of the past 15 years… or maybe ever.

1. A.I. ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

This might be one of Steven Spielberg’s more divisive movies — in more ways than one. In it, you can feel Spielberg’s sentimental instincts grappling to stay buoyant while tangling with Stanley Kubrick’s more nihilistic worldview.

It is the story of David, an artificial intelligence in the form of a sweet-faced boy. (You didn’t get more sweet-faced in 2001 than Haley Joel Osment, hot off his iconic turn in 1999’s The Sixth Sense.) David is programmed to love his adoptive family, but these humans, of course, are not programmed to love him back. When their own child awakens from a coma, their fear of David’s synthetic origins overwhelms the complex feelings they’ve grown for him, and he is abandoned. That’s where the family drama ends, and an entirely different sort of adventure begins.

Based on the short story “Super-Toys Last All Summer Long,” A.I. is like a fairy tale, but not the sweet Disney-fied rewrites we remember. We’re talking original Brothers Grimm style stuff. Its depiction of the future is both awesome and hellish, and absolutely one of my favorite cinematic imaginings of the future. And how can you not love a story about a lost little boy and his talking teddy bear that has them meet up with a gigolo for the rest of their adventures? Though there are blatant echoes of Pinocchio in the text, A.I. also feels like a fucked up version of The Wizard Of Oz, as a child meets up with an array of unusual friends on his quest toward the big city.

It comes as no shocker that Jude Law makes a pitch perfect male prostitute, because in 2001, who didn’t want to sleep with him? But this is also one of his best and unheralded performances. The whole movie, in fact, is underrated despite coming from one of the highest profile filmmakers out there — it earned only two Oscar nods in a year where more people were focused on the first of Peter Jackson’s Lord Of The Rings movies. (Though as you can tell by these ranking, I find Spielberg’s vision of A.I. a lot more compelling.)

It may take a few viewings to fully appreciate the brilliant and beautiful strangeness of this story, but it ranks amongst Spielberg’s best work. Even coming from such a blockbuster auteur, it’s one of the most creative and memorable pieces of cinema from this era, and I’m not alone in holding it in even higher esteem now than I did upon its release in the summer of 2001.

BEST ACTRESS

Sissy Spacek, In The Bedroom
Halle Berry, Monster’s Ball
Judi Dench, Iris
Jennifer Connolly, A Beautiful Mind
Thora Birch, Ghost World

BEST ACTOR

Jim Broadbent, Iris
Gene Hackman, The Royal Tenenbaums
Tom Wilkinson, In The Bedroom
Billy Bob Thornton, Monster’s Ball
Denzel Washington, Training Day

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Marisa Tomei, In The Bedroom
Maggie Smith, Gosford Park
Kate Winslet, Iris
Gwyneth Paltrow, The Royal Tenenbaums
Cameron Diaz, Vanilla Sky

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

Jude Law, A.I. Artificial Intelligence
Steve Buscemi, Ghost World
Ben Kingsley, Sexy Beast
Ian McKellen, The Fellowship Of The Ring
Peter Boyle, Monster’s Ball

BEST SCREENPLAY

Gosford Park
Memento
The Royal Tenenbaums
Ghost World
In The Bedroom

BEST DIRECTOR

Peter Jackson
Ridley Scott
Robert Altman
Steven Spielberg
Christopher Nolan

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY

A.I. Artificial Intelligence
Fellowship Of The Ring
Black Hawk Down
Moulin Rouge
Vanilla Sky

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Recently, in this galaxy, I saw a film called Star Wars: The Force Awakens, and I bet you did too.

The film has already grossed a predictably record-shattering $240(ish) million in the United States, and more than twice that worldwide. The internet and all media and every single human person on the planet are abuzz with all things Star Wars. And here’s some more.

My childhood was consumed mostly by Batman and Jurassic Park. I saw the original Star Wars trilogy, first on VHS and then in the theaters when they were re-released with new “cutting edge” digital effects. And I somehow managed to see all the prequels, which I started out liking well enough. (Contrary to popular belief, I think Revenge Of The Sith was the woooorst. So much squandered potential!)

Truth be told, I was never a huge Star Wars person. I admired the original trilogy, and like all sane people, believe that The Empire Strikes Back is the strongest entry in the series. But 2015 already saw the reawakening of my favorite franchise in Jurassic World, so the Star Wars mania is largely lost on me. (I’m also not as big of a fan of the most recent Star Trek films as many are.) I was coming into The Force Awakens with reasonable expectations and moderate excitement.

It met those expectations.At this point, anticipation for a new Star Wars movie is such that Kathleen Kennedy and Disney could have turned the reigns over to Lars Von Trier and it still would have broken box office records. They could have done anything. They played it safe. Abrams has proven his skill at jumping into existing franchises (Mission: Impossible), rebooting dormant franchises (Star Trek), and flat-out aping the style of a legendary auteur (Super 8). There was probably no safer bet than J.J. Abrams to make a crowd-pleasing, down-the-middle Star Wars movie. And that would have been enough.

But the movie gods were smiling upon us, because Abrams, Kennedy, Michael Arndt, and Lawrence Kasdan did something they really didn’t need to do — they made it good. At a Q&A following my screening, Abrams and his co-writers explained that, before they broke the story, they sat down and thought about what the audience wanted from this movie. They came up with some concepts: “mythic,” “fun,” “caring about characters.” This is a sensible thing to do, of course — but it’s not the way movies like this are generally made. Can you imagine what might happen if every director and producer of a blockbuster took the time to consider what the audience actually wants? Not what toys they’d buy, or how they’ll be affected by marketing. Just what they want. What a concept!

They thought about what the audience would like to see, and then they put a girl and a black dude at the center of the action in what could very well become the biggest grossing movie of all time. They could just as easily have not. Would anyone be terribly surprised if the new Star Wars starred a beefy white dude? That’s what we’ve come to expect from this kind of thing. But Kennedy, Abrams, and Disney elected to use their very secure position as helmers of the most anticipated film of all time to give us a film that checks off both the “race” and “gender” boxes. (Now where’s our gay Wookie?)Of course, there’s already been plenty of praise for the team in giving us something besides the usual white male protagonist we find at the center of every other blockbuster. What The Force Awakens manages to do so expertly is make that choice organic to the story, without having it feel, um… forced. Despite the welcome return of the original trilogy’s core cast — Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, and Mark Hamill — the latest Star Wars introduces us to new characters who are so immediately compelling, the older cast is hardly needed at all. (But hey, it’s great to see them!)

After one movie, Rey, Finn, Poe Dameron, and Kylo Ren manage to feel instantly iconic and just as essential to this universe as Han, Luke, Darth Vader, and Leia — no small feat, considering these are the most beloved cinematic characters of all time. Daisy Ridley and John Boyega are the MVPs of The Force Awakens, though Adam Driver and Oscar Isaac aren’t far behind. (Meanwhile, folks like Lupita N’yongo, Simon Pegg, and Gwendoline Christie appear also, though less directly.) The Force Awakens gets its characters exactly right, which is not something you can say for every reboot. The script is spry and amusing, hitting all the major beats a true Star Wars picture needs.The story, on the other hand, is lifted directly from the original trilogy — which, along with the look of the film, makes The Force Awakens feel as much like we’re watching it on VHS in 1983 as a new theatrical experience. (Thankfully, Abrams uses more practical effects than George Lucas did in his misbegotten prequels, having learned well from Lucas’ failures.) This, perhaps, causes The Force Awakens to fall a wee bit short of being truly mind-blowing entertainment. (I’m hoping for the more daring, more visionary Rian Johnson to remedy that in the next installment.) The Force Awakens is basically A Not-So-New Hope, which might have been disappointing if the new cast didn’t come in feeling so fresh and invigorating, and so ready to carry more Star Wars movies.

Abrams’ aptitude for mimicry is at its peak in The Force Awakens. He’s not the guy you go to for a breathtaking original vision, so you won’t find that here. The story beats are simple. Some work quite well. Others, you can ignore and move past. The emotions are as big and broad as they were in the 70s and 80s, but thankfully without the overwrought, melodramatic earnestness the prequels strived for. Somewhat surprisingly, The Force Awakens makes virtually zero updates for a 21st century audience. Everything looks the same, feels the same, is the same — except for the excitement of having characters like Finn and Rey at the heart of the action. Abrams doesn’t even create any new set pieces — every setting is borrowed from the original trilogy. Desert planet? Check. Snowy place? Check. Forest? Check. Incredibly dangerous-looking thin walkway on a Death Star over a gaping chasm? Check!There are literally dozens of callbacks to tropes from the originals. Meanwhile, the humor is of the brand Joss Whedon brought to The Avengers — as well as Serenity, his space opera that borrowed heavily from Star Wars, which Abrams may be aping here. (Serenity was basically really good Star Wars fan fiction, but it beat The Force Awakens to the punch with its kickass heroine.) The Force Awakens also has a fairly lame, Marvel-y supervillain named Snoke (Andy Serkis) who is this story’s weakest link, and through Domnhall Gleeson’s General Hux, the Nazi symbolism is laid on about ten times thicker than it really needed to be.

It’s hard to say what a new Star Wars would have looked like if episodes I, II, and III hadn’t been so dismaying. Would dipping back in that original well have worked if fans didn’t need so desperately for a new film to reclaim that old magic? It’s only because Lucas went so astray that it works for Abrams to take us right back to the original Lucas, giving us new versions of old scenes from A New Hope. (And a few homages to Empire Strikes Back and Return Of The Jedi, too.) Star Wars is never not going to be successful, but from a creative standpoint, the series flatlined with the arc told between The Phantom Menace and Revenge Of The Sith. From a conceptual level, a Darth Vader origin stories could be great, but not a single beat of it was satisfying or resonant in execution.

There’s never any financial risk in making new Star Wars. Sure, people could hate it, but a lot of people hated the prequels and they still made gobs of money. Lots of movies people generally hate manage to make gobs of money. Allowing Daisy Ridley to be the new Luke Skywalker — a true epic hero — was never going to cause Star Wars fans to riot and refuse to see the new movie, but it’s an admirable choice all the same. And more than that — it made for a better movie.

It takes a man with Abrams’ strengths — and even his weaknesses — to get a franchise like this back on track, and now that it’s been reawakened, I hope to see it do more. This is the Force’s awakening — but once it’s had its morning coffee, then maybe we’ll really see something bold. Abrams needed to get back to basics to earn the audience’s trust back, but from here, Star Wars can go just about anywhere. So let’s hope it doesn’t just stay stuck in the past. I hope that the nostalgia ends here, with this movie, and Johnson feels free to take more creative and stylistic risks in the next one.

For the time being, I’m optimistic that that’s exactly what can happen, while being content with what we got. Looks like this Star Wars thing may have some staying power…

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