Lifetime Films: 2001

No, not that film..it's 2001 like for real and it was 9 years ago now. Looking at this year's films I see some that I caught in the theater and more and more films I find on DVD after the fact or on cable. Let's get down to my 3 top choices and then the winner shall we

Fellowship of the Ring

The Royal Tannenbaums

Mulholland Drive

Fellowship of the Ring: I knew nothing of the books, I barely knew what the story was about...and went to see these films with my buddy Jeff, who knew the stories and helped me along with what would happen. I loved these...I can only say that knowing we would get 1 film a year and the story continued was a great experience that has not yet been duplicated...I can also say that of the 3 films they did get better, as did the CGI and the story got tenser and the battles better...so for me this film is my least favorite of the 3 films...but still one of my favorites of the year...also I cant watch the theatrical version...for me its the extended cut or nothing.

The Royal Tannenbaums: This film just feels a lot older then 2001...with the success of Bottle Rocket and Rushmore I looked forward to this film...especially with a bigger cast and all the great set design and quirky lines and great characters...this is a quintessential Wes Anderson Film...

WINNER:

Mulholland Drive

OK...so it's Lynch again...This film is like his others...as we get into the plot...the plot becomes irrelevant and the dream takes over...we see this done for the masses in Inception...but here it balances the line between reality and dream so well...I think Lynch went into total dream with Inland Empire...but here the story of a hopefully naive starlet struck with obsession by another woman becomes a nightmare. This film introduced us to Naomi Watts who is brilliant and the sex scene is intense...the color is great...the score is awesome by Angelo Baldamenti...easily my favorite...and to think this was supposed to be a made for TV series...what a joke...this was the best film of 2001.

Others:

A Beautiful Mind: I liked it...glad that Jen Connelly won...but I cant help but thinking that Ron Howard just makes the same film over and over again...by toying with our emotions so blatantly...see Cinderella Man and Far and Away

AI- Stanley Kubrick's story done by Spielberg...I liked it and maybe most of my like is that we will never see a new Kubrick film again

Donnie Darko: Richard Kelly has good ideas...too bad they are convoluted and hard to figure out...the look of this film and soundtrack is great...but so did he time travel?..or it was a worm hole?

Black Hawk Down: Love a good gritty war film

Monsters Ball: Found this one years later...Heath Ledger is great and so is that Sling Blade feller...Billy Bob Thornton is very good as well as Halle Berry...great story set during a weird time in America

So as 2010 is closing I reflect on 2002...an easy one for me to love...but you know what they say, so happy together (hint for 2002 best film)

Playlist: My Son My Son What Have Ye Done

I have a lot of time off this week...I should be "getting work done"...or "spending time with the family"...or "reading a book"..or "controlling my diet"...but it always comes down to me wanting to revisit some old films or watch extras on dvd's that I never have gotten to...here is a list that always pops up around this time of year:

Schenecdoche NY
Twin Peaks (the whole series to rewatch)
Homicide (I am up to season 3 of 7...the first 2 were amazing...but now?)
The Lord of the Rings ( all three in a row in one day...extended cut only)
The Brown Bunny
Letters from Iwo Jima (until I heard Paul Haggis wrote it)
Thunderbolt and Light Foot
The Sicilian
The Sunchaser (last 3 to complete my Micheal Cimino collection)
Various Commentary tracks:
Youth without Youth with Coppola
The Fog with John Carpenter

But why?...why go through this...why not just watch some new films for a change rather then the old ones or the ones I feel I must watch to be a completest. So why not watch this film:

"My Son My Son What Have Ye Done"
reasons that struck my interest:
1. Directed by Werner Herzog
2. Produced by David Lynch
3. Actor Micheal Shannon
also...Chloe Sevigny, Willelm DeFoe, Micheal Pena, Udo Kier, Grace Zabriske..and based on a true story...according to Herzog 70 % of the story is made up.

Micheal Shannon is incredible as this mad man...obsessed with a sword, prescription glasses, Muslims, ostriches, and God...all the actors are pretty good...Micheal Pena is intentionally unintentionally funny, Willem DeFoe is solid, Chloe is good, and Udo Keir and Brad Dourif as Uncle Ben is a mad man...but the best of the best is my favorite actor of late and that's Shannon...this man seems to play crazy very well..I would like to see him in something other then crazy..so far I have seen him in Boardwalk Empire, parts of Bug, Revolution Road...which I only fast forwarded till I got to his part...

So I take Frank's inspiration and just watch new movies now...say goodbye to those old fossil DVD's

Meta: Before Meta was Meta

The idea of a "Meta" experience in film is usually one where the film either on purpose or by accident resembles real life or the real life events in the film. A quick recent example would be where Charlie Kaufman wrote himself into the script of Adaptation...it then creates a film that can be seen as a comment on books, film, making books, making film, etc. Sunset Blvd is a great film, it also is one of those films that as it tells a simple story of a crazy Hollywood past her prime actress, comments on the fact that it is played by a "past her prime Hollywood actress"...it also stars Cecil B. DeMille as "Cecil B. DeMille"...etc...

I was turned onto this film by an interview with David Lynch. Lynch was asked to name his most influential films. Lynch being a bit older and a clearly surrealist filmmaker chose some eclectic films, but also older classic films. These films are listed below:

Rear Window
8 1/2
M Hulots Holiday and
Sunset Blvd

I had not seen any of these films, but then added them to my Netflix Queue....I have a problem with old films that everyone else does...they are old...and in most cases film ideas repeat themselves and nothing is really original. When the first AFI top 100 films came out about 12 years ago I started to watch as many of those films I had not seen as possible. There were gems like Lawrence of Arabia and North by Northwest, and then there were trials on my patience and my soul like Casablanca and The Wild Bunch. I mean a film like The Wild Bunch is important because the level of violence is amped for the first time in American films and it's gritty...ok but in the days of The Matrix and post 80's action films, this movie is a slog of a watch.

So back to Lynch...I liked Rear Window, but had that feeling of "here we go again"...this film was the first to do what?...have a twist ending?...I mean come on we have all already been blown away by The Usual Suspects....

But then I saw Sunset Blvd...This is a must see...it features old has-beens playing old has-beens, it has a director playing a director...Cecil B DeMille has a great voice...and his films may be over the top and old style Big Hollywood spectacles...but his acting was awesome...at one point he accepts the old washed up silent film starlet named Norma Desmond into his set "where at the time Director Billy Wilder actually shot DeMille on the set of his current film at Paramount studios directing Samson and Deliliah...DeMille talks with Desmond and just pays her no real attention, he really wants to use her car in a film...but she thinks they will work together and she will make a great come back...DeMille then gets on his PA system and while the light man in the studio has shown the light on Desmond, DeMille insists that "place the light where it REALLY belongs"..on the real actors...

This is a sad story told in a sad way...but is thrilling like a car crash to watch...Buster Keaton is old and plays himself..the Butler of Desmond plays her first husband and first Director...and in real life was one of the first directors of the actress playing Norma Desmond..that film was called Queen Kelly, which was a disaster and ruined both their careers in real life and in this film.

Norma Desmond is played by Gloria Swanson...she is amazing...even 60 years later this performance is scary and weird and awesome. Swanson plays Norma and at the same time she plays a version of herself...sure she wasn't crazy but the film uses clips from her real old movies and Billy Wilder uses hundreds of her old silent film photos to adorn her old mansion. She has all those great lines you know, but you never saw this film "I am big, it's the pictures that got small"..and the classic "I am ready for my close-up, Mr. DeMille"...but in the context of the film...it's even greater.

William Holden plays a broken down screenwriter, and the object of Norma's sick love. He is ok...just ok...his performance is the one that seems old and you have seen it a million times in these old films...the rest is greatness

I saw this and thought of connections with many of David Lynch's films...the mood, the idea of odd characters, odd emotional moments, Hollywood, stardom, a surrealist look at film and filmmaking and his films such as Inland Empire, Mullholland Drive, and Lost Highway are easily recognizable within the confines of Sunset Boulevard. Even one character named Gordon Cole in Sunset Blvd who speaks on a phone, is used by Lynch for a character he plays in Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me, named Gordon Cole...who speaks in a phone. I think Lynch even has a story where he realized that driving on the real Sunset Blvd in California, he saw where Billy Wilder got the idea for the character named Cole...there is a street on the way to Paramount studios named "Cole"...

Lifetime Movies: 1986

When I think of the 80's...for some reason 1986 seems like a great year...Frank and I turned 12 this year...the prime of our childhood. 86..just like the great 86th street in Brooklyn New York...86 like the Challenger explosion...86 like the great Watchmen Graphic Novel...and Platoon won the Oscar...here are my Nominee's

At Close Range , Blue Velvet, Big Trouble In Little China , Wise Guys

I gotta say this is a tough one. Do I pick the artsy film and be called a snob again like with Eraserhead?...do I pick the little Gem that is At Close Range with both Penn boys, Chris Walken and my favorite Madonna song of all time, do I choose the crazy go nuts Big Trouble which perfectly balances action, kung fu, comedy, and sci-fi horror?...or do I go with a film I could watch a thousand times and always laugh knowing its glorious and no one has seen it in Wiseguys (picking this will make it the second Brian DePalma film...what?...me pick DePalma twice over Scorsese?..What a Disgrace I would be.

Enough pick I know: I just feel this is so important I must go with my gut:

BLUE VELVET by David Lynch

Its just THE best film of 1986...it is the best filmed and most beautiful of the films listed, it is a true American Nightmare, Dreamscape, Fim Noir, Scary film....not in the horror sense but in the David Lynch sense...this is the film I would recommend to someone who wanted to see their first David Lynch Film. Maybe I'm feeling nostalgic but the late Dennis Hopper was amazing and scary and fun fun fun to watch. On a personal note the film was filmed in North Carolina...it is set in the fictional town of Lumberton...but in North Carolina there really is a Lumberton...and I ate at a Cracker Barrel in Lumberton...

Others of note that need to be recognized:

WiseGuys:...this film is great...probably in a toss up with Blue Velvet...but I HAD to pick one which are the rules...Wise guys has the best Captain Lou Albano ever and the first "Italo-Judeo Deli"

Cobra : What a crazy film...watch this one with some friends now and realize how stupid the 80's was...the product placement is great and Director Sylvester Stallone lets us all know he is the star.

of course : Stand By Me, Top Gun and Ferris Bueller..all equally wonderful to watch on the USA network during July 4th or some shit.

BOOM BITCHES (for Brattsley...our late great reader)

Lifetime Movies: 1976

I can't seem to get these out of my head (hint), this lifetime movie idea has consumed me, it scares me, will there be a Scorsese film on here? Will my favoritism toward a director, or my need to pick something obscure, cloud the truly "best" film from my list, or will I move toward what's popular?...I think you have to go with your gut and not look back...don't pick a film because it "needs" to be picked or what it means to history, either your own history or the film's history...I am clearly putting to much thought into it, or not enough. Anyway, today I came across an issue, "When is a film released"...today's 1976 film was released in '76 but was not released in the US first, according to IMDB, although it was shown to a small group of friends of the directors in 1976, and probably 1975 as well.

The Nominees

Rocky
Logan's Run
Eraserhead
Taxi Driver

This has got to be the closest and most back and forth I have done and I only have done 3 years so far...looking ahead to years to come, this one is easy compared to the choices soon to be,...its like Sophie's Choice...by not picking Taxi Driver do I lose credibility with the Scorsese Fan Club?

The winner is Eraserhead

I am not sure how many times David Lynch will be on this list, this may be the only one, even though I love all his films, but this film is special, and I will admit had it not been for all the "Extras" (Frank hates them I love them) on the DVD special edition of Eraserhead this spot would have been Rocky's probably. Eraserhead was a student film gone ballistic, It was Lynch's first feature while he was at AFI in 1971. It took him 5 years to complete it at an abandoned garage loft in the back of the school. Lynch and wife and only a handful of friends, including the great Jack Nance, worked on the film with little to no money, with no help, eating stolen sandwiches from Hamburger Hamlet for years...all lighting, costumes and effects were handmade, garbage, taken or found. The vision of the artist was never compromised, never edited and is a walk into the abstract. If you don't "get" Eraserhead as a film...who can blame you, but if you are not able to give it a chance and try to make your own sense out of it, you have no soul, at least no film soul. This starts the "almost" uncompromising, dream like career of one of America's greatest creative directors. Compared with the other films on the list it may not have the plot or storyline of Rocky or the acting of Taxi Driver or the fun of Logan's Run, but it has the seeds of brilliance that comes very rare, it is always something new found when I watch it, I try and imagine myself watching the filming..on set...I see Henry's Room in the film and know that for years that was actually a built room for David Lynch, he slept there, he cared for it, he decorated it...and you know he has done the very same thing in almost all his films, with care and excellence, a boyscout work ethic with an abstract expressionistic view of film.

Thoughts on the others:
Rocky: the best story of the year, I watch it about once a year, may be Stallone's best...but didn't he steal the story from some guy who got beat by Ali?

Logan's Run: I was always fascinated by this film as a kid, I could hardly wait when I heard that Bryan Singer might make it...it never happened, but seeing Logan get out of his home and go back to earths surface was great...also see The Island and 12 Monkeys

Taxi Driver: Sacrilegious not to be picked I know...Travis Bickle is the Anti-Batman..so is he retarded, is he Jesus, is he Naive?...Paul Shrader and Martin Scorsese had original thoughts that this should be shot in black and white on straight video...talk of a sequel have been around for a while...it should stay put, no sequel please.

Till 1977: may the force speak shellfish on devils tower while playing old school hockey:...BOOM