The Alternate Oscars: Best Picture (1969-Present)

[colinr0380]

Where would you all stand on that Edward James Olmos-teaches-calculus movie Stand and Deliver?

[knives]

Huh, I had always dismissed Lean on Me as being sort of the granddaddy to the Dangerous Minds type of film. Also, yes, The Principal is a fun stupid movie.

It's a better film because it (rightly) suggests that no matter what's happening in the classroom, there's bigger institutional problems standing in the way for students that can only be overcome by breaking the "rules" and doing what needs to be done. This isn't the story of a man who devoted his life to his school. It's a story of a good person, frustrated by bureaucracy and a culture of displaced responsibility, doing what he must to achieve the results that will never come via the "right way." I don't know how inspirational it is to non-inner city school employees, but I thought fondly of him locking the fire doors &c all the time at my old job and certainly took a page from his book whenever possible

Fortunately I've only been on the other side of that divide (though rich kids are such entitled brats). Nowadays I think back to my teachers all the time literally getting brutalized by students and having to call the cops and wonder how anyone survived long enough to not quit.

[Gregory]

Far too many films set out to be "inspirational" when they'd be more interesting if they sought to examine really existing fucked-up relationships (for lack of better words) between imperfect human beings. I can't count how many people criticized Cantet's The Class/Entre les Murs simply because the teacher had some very apparent flaws.

That's probably the reason I liked Dead Poets better than its detractors did. It sometimes comes across to me as a cynical story of how individualist idealism is doomed because oppressive people have all the power. But if one views it not through the lens of an inspirational/heroic teacher film, which is what sets it up for mockery, but instead with the understanding that even the best teachers are really far from perfect—Keating's pedagogy really failing to teach his impressionable students to be strategic and practical—then it becomes a far more interesting film.

In most other "inspirational teacher films," it's almost always a lone crusader straining credibility, and identifying problem students and their parents as the challenge to be faced. Meanwhile, stories about groups of people banding together to change something are virtually never told. Where are the films about teachers' strikes and collective bargaining battles in Madison and Chicago, which captured widespread public attention and imagination in the news but are still apparently deemed inappropriate material for the screen? Apparently it's easier to go on lazily making films about individual protagonists year in and year out than try to show anything like what really happens when teachers take up a fight.

[movielocke]

I know that Keating is a central figure of Dead Poets Society but I always thought it was a rather sad story about how the dreams (rebellion) of youth are crushed by the boys' parents. At the end of the film, they all fall in line on the road to becoming their parents (except for the suicide, the only way out is death?), sure the kids will give a final, sad, relatively ineffectual and passive tribute to Keating at the end of the film, but he sort of deserves it, since the bad parent is punishing Keating for the bad parent being bad, rather than taking responsibility for their own terrible parenting. That's not to say that Keating is a good parent substitute, he's never coded as such, he's coded as more of a buddy, an older brother type, the film explicitly points out he's a former student. In a sense the boys are all trapped by the tracks they've been set on, and Keating is a way out, an alternative path none of them have seen before, a graduate who did not become the same thing his parents were, but none of them make it, the one who tries, dies, and status quo culture is once again victorious. In a way the film is about the individuality being consumed by the desires of larger society to promote conformity to accepted norms.

And I gotta say, I get such cathartic pleasure out of ripping out the 'graph the poems excellence' essay which seems as moronic as the concentric circles of artisticness-ess of the auteur theory essay.

[domino harvey]

1994
Forrest Gump I am increasingly aware that I'm the product of two baby boomer parents, each on the opposite side of the political spectrum, and these foundational elements influenced a great deal of what I was exposed to in terms of popular culture artifacts and attitudes growing up. I still remember what an event this film was, and my mom was never been more excited to share a film with me as she was the day she brought this home from Suncoast. And everywhere I turned, everyone agreed the film was a masterpiece: my classmates, my teachers, my family, the media (Siskel and Ebert even devoted an entire program to talking about how everyone loved Forrest Gump). Dissenting voices were no doubt around, but if I ever encountered one they were surely drowned out and washed away by the cacophony of praise.

It's not hard to see why Forrest Gump was such an omnipresent film in the mid-90s-- here's a movie that's finally come to grips with the anxieties that informed the previous decade's the Big Chill and others and has now settled peacefully into explanatory behavior. It's a new narrative of a contentious couple of decades made possible by the uneasy identity issues that largely informed the decade in which this was produced-- if the 70s were the "Me" decade, the 90s were the "Who am I?" decade. If history is written by the victors, than Forrest Gump proves change lost and regressive whitewashing has won. Viewed politically, the film preaches a form of complicit simplicity, a Bobby McFaren approach to a contentious era that shaped our country in lots of ways, none as positively as those involved hoped. It's said that the older one gets, the more their experiences are defined by the "Ifs," and here's a film fantasy offering dreams of blissful success and adventure all gleaned by not rallying against the system but by being as free as the feather that bookends the film's narrative: go with the crowd, don't rock the boat, &c. I hadn't really thought of it much before but it occurred to me while rewatching this film, the 90s were really a second pass at the 50s in some regards: in a time of instability, we latched onto the past and onto the popular and the result is a decade that defies conventional appraisals of overarching status.

Something else occurred to me while watching Forrest Gump. Against all odds and in spite of my less than charitable appraisal of its function, the film's charms are as omnipresent as ever. The biggest reason the film was such a success is that it did all of the above within the larger and more basic function of being a good movie. I'd love nothing more than to dismiss the film as I've done in the past, but watching it again forced me to be honest: Robert Zemeckis is a talented director blessed with a charming beyond belief central performance by Tom Hanks, and neither lets the other down. Having seen this is close quarters with garbage like Rain Man also helps see Hanks' Gump in a better light: he is recognizably human, mildly retarded to be sure but not an animal doing parlor tricks as in Levinson's film. And I think it's a mistake to align Gump's ludicrous but comical collusions with half of the historical events occurring within his lifetime with a lack of agency: Gump chooses to go along, to be happy, to not over-think things, without it being an anti-intellectual screed against thought. That's a tough line to walk, but all due respect to Richard Widmark's hilarious takedown of the picture as a "hymn to stupidity," the film doesn't praise a lack of intelligence as much as the lack of cynicism. Jenny's parallel journey is often criticized for blaming liberal behavior for the unhappiness of the era, but I think that critique misses her more basic function, that of self-aware apologia. We tried to change the world and all we did is get more fucked up. It's cynical and at odds with the central narrative, but not dishonest.

The problem with a film as agenda-dependent as this is that by being co-opted by the public at large as a touchstone feature, a film everyone has seen and most view fondly, it's effectively reshaped the Baby Boomer era and rewritten the narrative for many. Forrest Gump is grand entertainment for every generation, a Disneyland ride through the 70s with all your classic rocks hits prominently featured on the soundtrack! But rather than seeing the film as depicted through a specific, context-reliant lens, the film is seen not as the fable it is but rather it inadvertently turns the 70s into a fable itself. The 70s were tumultuous and uneasy at best (Take it from me who lived through none of it, to paraphrase Rivette) and Forrest Gump inspired a whole new generation to fetishize the fashions and music without thinking of the ideas behind their fruition. This is a film that made real and hard impact and influence in a decade that needed a tipping point. What full effect this historical whitewashing did subsequent decades will have to wait for the definitive filmic work observing and commenting on the 90s and 00s with the same perfect storm of ingredients (ie never).

I was happier before I undertook this quest of viewing or re-viewing films with an open mind. I'll miss making fun of Forrest Gump, but at-odds with the central conceit, I'd prefer to Jenny this one and embrace the now-unpopular, non-uplifting truth of the matter: Forrest Gump is a good film. It's funny. It's well-acted. The set pieces are well-staged and the special effects have held up. Even the fucking cliche AM Gold music cues work. On a basic level, the film is cute and likable and that's just how it is. I'm sure I'm sorry.

Four Weddings and a Funeral The film that spawned a thousand TV episode title puns. 1994 was an unusually strong year for nominees and while all five films nominated are worthwhile to some degree, this one's inclusion is a head-scratcher, especially since it only merited one other nom for its script. Clearly Bullets Over Broadway, which netted seven noms including director, script, and three for the actors, belonged here instead. But one can only play "What if?" for so long before admitting we're stuck with this one and, all things considered, it's a slight but enjoyable piece of romantic comedy fluff tied to a charming, star-making turn by Hugh Grant (who faded just as quickly, it seems) and a deadwood one by Andie MacDowell as the love (un)interest(ing) who is so dull that I spent most of the film trying to figure out if the film was mocking her character. Spoiler Alert: Nope.

Pulp Fiction If Forrest Gump was one of the most culturally influential films of the 90s, Pulp Fiction had the undisputed biggest impact of film itself. One is tempted to grade Quentin Tarantino's film on a sliding scale in relation to how many awful ripoffs were foisted on an unsuspecting public in its wake. I mean, someone's got to pay for 2 Days in the Valley, we can't let crimes against film just go unpunished! But let's not kid ourselves: Tarantino's film, in spite of all the imitators it spawned in its wake, remains an entertaining, adventurous, fun filmic ride, with several clever central conceits that have long since been taken for granted. This film will outlive us all, regardless of how you side on its specific merits. Me? I can hardly be accused of being a Tarantino fanboy, but this is one I'll defend, strongly and with great ease-- even if there's seemingly little left to say about it!

Quiz Show Smart, streamlined take on the Twenty-One quiz show scandal of the late 50s. Robert Redford's film presents the story in clear, workmanlike fashion, and the best thing here, other than that the film doesn't attempt to draw conclusions about the loss of innocence &c (leave that to the reviewers, the film is presentational in the extreme), are the performances. I particularly enjoyed Rob Morrow's increasingly slacken eager beaver and David Paymer's comically terse producer, but there's no bad turns here (as you'd expect from an actor directing other actors). There's not a lot of bite or residual effect, but it's a small and well-observed film.

the Shawshank Redemption IMDB's ~*~ FaVoRiTe MOIVE OFF ALL TiME~*~ This future TNT staple benefits from stellar source material and two fine central performances by Morgan Freeman and Tim Robbins. That a film about the furtherance of hope within the grueling setting of prison became such a bread-breaking shared phenom says something too about the way society felt in the mid to late 90s-- and by that I mean we all never looked at a man's shoes. This film has become so prominent in the collective cultural consciousness despite not being a big hit at the Box Office at the time, so you really do have to give the Academy some credit for somehow nominating yet another film that remained relevant-- this year's gotta be some kind of record on that account!

My Vote Pulp Fiction

[swo17]

I was happier before I undertook this quest of viewing or re-viewing films with an open mind.

The fundamental problem with going into everything with an open mind is that you risk shaking up your core belief system to the point that nothing means anything anymore. Like, maybe the movie that I watched yesterday that I thought I really liked...I didn't? Maybe every political movement I've ever fought against was actually right? Maybe It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World is actually a good movie? Maybe committing murder isn't really as bad as everyone says--how can I know for sure unless I try it out for myself?

[movielocke]

That's a totally fair take on Forrest Gump, a film that is often unfairly treated online. I'd say another point of why boomers love the film so much is because it is sort of a Cavalcade of the 1960s, it sort of shows them all the media-sponsored emotional high points of the decades they lived through and offers a sort of catharsis along the lines of, "look where we came from, look how far we've come, look at what we saw and experienced..." The emotional pace of the film is masterful in how the edit and storytelling manages a series of payoffs throughout the runtime and ultimately refuses to culminate in a really large crescendo, the ending isn't really all that different in scope or scale from the smaller climaxes from earlier in the film, it's not so much 'feel good' as it is 'feel bunches'.

Stephen King has a great line in Hearts in Atlantis speaking of the boomer generation that always makes me think of Forrest Gump, "We had an opportunity to change the world, and we settled for the home shopping network."

I have to say, growing up in the midwest in the 90s, where this was perhaps one of my parents favorite movies, I never encountered one single person who did not like Forrest Gump, I never encountered a negative opinion of Forrest Gump. When I came out to the west coast for film school I finally met a person who didn't like the film, a sad and bitter grad assistant. In arguing over the film with him I had a sensation of 'otherness' wash over me like I'd never encountered before, I was sort of wondering to myself, "are you a real person? how can you have such an insane and invalid opinion? did you even watch the film? because what you're saying doesn't apply except to a strawman-forrest-gump."

Those sort of mind-opening experiences of encountering opinions and ideas I'd never considered before are part of what made university such a valuable experience for me, I recall similar eye opening perspectival changes from studying race in film or gender and sexuality in literature.

[matrixschmatrix]

Gump is one of those movies where the essential conservativism (small c, mostly) of it irritates me so much that the surface qualities that make it watchable- Hanks absolutely is charming as heck throughout, and it moves quickly without standing on any particular point too much- bother me that much more, as it feels like a nice winning presentation of intolerable ideology. I probably wouldn't like it much anyway- apart from Roger Rabbit, I'm generally pretty immune to Zemeckis's charms- but I am almost certainly unfair as a critic in that particular case.

[knives]

If we're talking irritants the politics doesn't bother me, but Gump himself and the awful performance Hanks gives does. It takes Chance the Gardener and removes the qualities that made him human just leaving him as this 'cute' freakshow we're supposed to nod at for being so simple. I really hate that portrayal.

[colinr0380]

I've always said that the most worrying thing about Zemeckis's films are that they are so well made, slick entertainments. I love Back To The Future (a paen to the 50s if ever there was one, with the sequels both making the 80s even worse than it already was and the 1880s fun but slightly boringly tech-less) and Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (a paen to the past, the 40s, itself before the land got developed) and Forrest Gump plays very slickly, calculated at every moment to tug the heartstrings. Consistent with the character himself, the whole film is based on uncritical thinking, which if considered ends up unravelling the spell.

Luckily, or sadly, he got sidetracked into making those creepy motion capture films for a few years, which I don't think anyone could fall under the spell of.

And I agree with knives - in a world in which Being There exists, who needs Forrest Gump?

[domino harvey]

If we're talking irritants the politics doesn't bother me, but Gump himself and the awful performance Hanks gives does. It takes Chance the Gardener and removes the qualities that made him human just leaving him as this 'cute' freakshow we're supposed to nod at for being so simple. I really hate that portrayal.

I'm sorry but this just isn't accurate-- maybe you're misremembering? Gump is given the full range of emotional response, even if it is tinged with optimism, and the evidence doesn't support that claim. He is not Rain Man, as I mentioned earlier

[knives]

Which is why I didn't bring up the portrayal of him being developmentally disabled which I also have problems with. As this sort of higher through simplicity observer of the cultural movements it seems to have taken the wrong lessons from Being There. I will give it another chance whenever I go over this year, but I am dreading it.

[mfunk9786]

I don't know how people remember Gump's portrayal as one-note and emotionlessly happy. There is a lot going on there. He feels like a very real man, even during the more hokey (read: running) sequences.

[domino harvey]

1996
the English Patient Because it had been over ten years since Out of Africa won and the Academy needed another wallpaper peeling epic. Contrary to the Seinfeld episode, I actually have never met anyone who liked this, and I lived in the heart of Middlebrow, USA. I remember catching this on TV as a kid and being perplexed then at why it garnered all the awards and rewatching it as an adult reveals that some things will always remain a mystery. As with Out of Africa, I can't even formulate who the audience is that voted for this. Browbeaten Academy voters who felt the Miramax crew were due a top win? It's like feeding a stray puppy: you only have yourself to blame for encouraging the scrappy ones that keep coming back! This thing just goes on and on and slowly and without artistry in mise-en-scene or story or, I don't know, anything-- make a list of things that don't suck beforehand and this film won't cause any revisions. While she didn't do anything in the film to merit such attention, I'm okay with Juliette Binoche winning here because it's not like the Academy was ever gonna reward her for one of her many impressive performances this decade. Proof that Medicine Cinema is alive and well past the studio-era.

Fargo Likewise I hadn't seen this since its premium cable premiere shortly after being exposed to every critic in the world writing the 500 word equivalent of "OMGZ BEST MOVIE EVAR," and revisiting it hasn't revealed any new depths I missed the first time 'round. There are some good performances here-- William H Macy is given impossible, overwritten lines and makes them work (probably due to his proficiency in dealing with affectated dialog in Mamet et al) and his weasel-y sadsack is a great counter to Frances McDormand's non-flashy cheerful workhorse of a policewoman. The best aspect here seems to be how casually Marge takes her job. She's good at it, but she's still home in time to snuggle with her duck painting husband and isn't eaten away with obsessive crime solving impetuses. Unfortunately no one else on-screen registers, and the supporting players don't pull their weight behind those two running circles around 'em. I still don't find anything about Fargo profound, exceptionally clever, or all that interesting, really, beyond the strong pair of performances.

Jerry Maguire Oscar's usual bone thrown to the popular crowdpleaser once again ends up being the best of the lot. This is hardly a great film but it is an easy film to like, in large part due to the warm and welcoming performances-- Cuba Gooding Jr is the Mira Sorvino of the 90s in walking away with a deserved Supporting Oscar and then getting himself cast in movie after movie that makes everyone doubt his skills in the first place, but he is electric in the film, and the win was for far more than his infamous catchphrase. Cruise is good and can sleepwalk through parts like this, but the real joy here is Renée Zellweger, who steals the movie and is just the cutest thing in the world. It's not hard to see why she became a star after this film, and the only real head-scratcher is how the Academy missed the opportunity to nominate the ingenue here, especially since that's their specialty! This is a fine, resonating film about loyalty, and I smiled and cried and enjoyed it a great deal. If nothing else, the film had a remarkable influence on public discourse in catchphrases alone-- it spawned by my count at least four well-known and culturally-penetrating quotes, which means its only real competition for the decade were the Austin Powers movies, so at least we all had a fair and true warrior representing good taste in that battle!

Secrets & Lies Slow-moving but involving character study of members of a dysfunctional family who grow with the surprise discovery that eldest sister Brenda Blethyn gave her black daughter up for adoption years ago. I've read some reviews that praised the film for ignoring or sidestepping the race issue, which Mike Leigh's movie does not-- I'm not sure if this was rose colored mid-90s glasses at work or what, but just because Leigh shows the characters involved eventually find a peace and happiness with each other doesn't mean the immediate objection is only confused greater by the race of the daughter. But the interactions are interesting and strongly acted, particularly by the mother and daughter duo of Blethyn and Marianne Jean-Baptiste. I don't think the overall effect is quite as ground-shaking in terms of quality or import as the overly hyperbolic notices suggest, but I did enjoy the film, even if it still doesn't get my vote in a weak year of noms like this.

Shine This swept so many awards shows and then just as quickly swept out of view, probably forever. Shine must have had the mother of all press campaigns, because while entertaining and well-acted, it is so unexceptional that its inclusion makes buying all those more recent Oscar gossip books worth it if just to hopefully have explained the lingering questions this inspires! Geoffrey Rush gives yet another performance that requires some degree of mental or personal impairment playacting to merit the Best Actor statue. While watching, I kept thinking of that Kids in the Hall sketch where nearly all of the Best Actor nominees are characters overcoming handicaps-- and that was before Forrest Gump and this and I Am Sam, &c! Rush is one of our most reliable actors and his win here enabled him to be cast in a great deal of other, more interesting pictures, but I can't quite see what set this part and performance apart so drastically for voters at the time.

My Vote Jerry Maguire

[matrixschmatrix]

What are the Jerry Macguire catchphrases besides "Show me the money!" and "You had me at hello."?

[domino harvey]

"You complete me" and "Help me help you"

[bamwc2]

Contrary to the Seinfeld episode, I actually have never met anyone who liked this, and I lived in the heart of Middlebrow, USA.

Me. I like it a lot. Admittedly though, I haven't seen it since I was 16 and it first hit VHS. I think of this as a very strong year of nominees with Jerry Maguire being the weakest among them. I generally dislike Renée Zellweger's performances, and her reported off screen antics on the set only make me loath her cloying work here even more.

[domino harvey]

To be fair, I haven't met you. Or have I... *cue organ music*

[Red Screamer]

I think Fargo is pretty entertaining but I am also puzzled by the copious praise surrounding the film. Not even close to one of the Coen's best.

[knives]

I'm more surprised by Dom's comment regarding the supporting characters all of whom I find memorable and the key to what raises the movie above similar films (certainly the dialogue isn't the Coen's best often being too on the nose). Even the smallest roles like the jerk guy help elevate the movie for me.

[matrixschmatrix]

Yeah, I think everyone from Steve Buscemi to the prostitutes McDormand interviews seemed delightful and fully realized even for a Coen movie. Though McDormand's performance stands out nonetheless.

[movielocke]

I've watched Fargo four times in vain trying to figure out why it is the universally beloved Coen Bros film. And extra viewings help detail out the beautifully managed minutia of the plot intricacies, but that doesn't make it the most amazeballs filmz evah, as virtually every review describes it. I've always felt it was their version of a ground rule double, they somehow hit something that for whatever bizarre alignment of the ephemeral zeitgeist of the moment connected to everyone involved in film and it was a home run, but really it's not a home run, it's a double. Nothing to sneeze at, but it's not a homer, sorry.

I--and the rest of my family--will be forever mystified as to why my conservative, mid-western father claims the English Patient is his favorite movie, "well The English Patient and Blues Brothers," as he always phrases it. My best guess is that he heard something on talk radio at the time of its release and has been repeating it ever since, like most of his other talking points.

I fully cop to being under the spell of the Shine publicity campaign at the time. Both my mom and I fell for it. the film was everywhere, and it was one of the first "Art" films I got interested in, and decided after enjoying it that maybe artsy fartsy cinema wasn't all the terribleness of mono-toned-schweddy-balls voices and cardigans and blue-toned colors that I thought it would be. and then a few years later Wes Anderson came along with his particular house style being a serious extrapolation and exploration of SNL's schweddy balls. I was very irritated, even more irritated when I found out I actually liked his films.

[thirtyframesasecond]

The sexual politics of Jerry Maguire really bother me. He's a complete jerk, who doesn't even really re-evaluate his life when it goes down the toilet. Plus he uproots Zellweger's life, messes her around, yet he still overcomes the odds and gets what he wants yadda yadda yadda. 96 isn't a good year though, agreed.

[domino harvey]

I think Zellweger's attraction to Cruise mirrors Cruise's relationship with Cuba Gooding Jr-- there's untapped potential that blossoms into greatness and both see it, either by choice or by having no other choice, but there's some nice symmetry there and I buy into Zellweger's inclinations

[colinr0380]

Here are the soft toy spoofs of Shine and The English Patient

I really liked the Tunisian section of The English Patient, all of the Italian stuff fell really flat, whether it was the best friend hilariously ragdolling out of her exploding car in the opening, or the presence of the actor more famous for playing Inspector Morses' righthand man getting drunk (and paying the price for it) in the town square, none of it felt particularly subtle. But then this film proved long before The Hurt Locker that the Academy loves bomb disposal plots! The Tunisian stuff did not feel particularly realistic either, but that felt much more properly played in a high tragedy, romantic style that was appropriate.

Nerdy note: apparently the location used for the Tunisian hotel Katharine Clifton is staying in is the Grand Hotel des Bains in Venice, which is the central location of Death In Venice!