So, you don't wanna talk about Spencer Tracy or James Brown? Okay, fine, be that way. I see now that the crew over at Time Out New York has posted its Top 50 Movies of the Aughts, so now's the time, as Charlie Parker would put it, when I might as well counter with my own list, and create what some call "added value" by citing 20 more than 50, because why the hell not.
I will try to be more aphoristic and less portentous than the TONY crew in my film assessment. I don't mean that as a slam against the TONY crew's summings-up. Believe me, I know what a drag it can be to write those 50-to-120 word capsules, particularly if you're trying to get across why the films "mattered" or were "important." It was, quite frankly, really tiresome to have to strike those poses back in the Premiere days. Now that I'm my own boss, my own capsules will be...well, whatever they will be. Another liberty I take is in not ranking—who am I tallying up ballots against, anyway?—but rather listing the films in possibly imperfect alphabetical order. Shine sweet freedom, etc...
A.I.: Artificial Intelligence (Steven Spielberg, 2001): A heartbreakingly fractured fairy tale. If you think its final 20 minutes constitute a happy ending, watch, and think, again.
Adaptation (Spike Jonze, 2002): The Charlie Kaufman-scripted upending of Hollywood convention isn't quite the coup-de-grace it's meant to be, but it still delivers a potent viral load of satirical venom.
The Aviator (Martin Scorsese, 2004): The maestro's sweeping Hughes biography is a much-misunderstood study in obsession, and how failure never stops haunting success. The color manipulation is brilliant too.
Burn After Reading (The Coen Brothers, 2008): A really superb live-action cartoon. Reviewed here.
Che (Steven Soderbergh, 2008): Pace, Steven, this was not a mistake. Not at all. Some thoughts on it here.
A Christmas Tale (Arnaud Desplechin, 2008, pictured): A superbly multi-faceted film that genuinely suggests where cinema can, and should, go in the next century.
The Circle (Jafar Panahi, 2000): Women's oppression in Iran. A beautiful new manifestation of the neo-realist ethos.
Colossal Youth (Pedro Costa, 2006): It took me a while to come around to this extraordinary film...and I'm glad I did. I walked out on it first...now I feel I could watch it three times a year, at least. The first key to appreciating it is to stop seeing Costa as some sort of, shall we say, "liberal." It's deeper, way deeper, than that...
The Darjeeling Limited (Wes Anderson, 2007): Well, yes, it is about the plaints of white people who are visiting India. And your point is? My initial thoughts here.
Demonlover (Olivier Assayas, 2002, pictured): A perhaps alarmist portrait of capital in the cyber age. But a swift, effective kick in the balls in any event.
Éloge de l’amour (Jean-Luc Godard, 2001): Profoundly problematic Godard, yes. And no less great for that.
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (Michel Gondry, 2004): Another magnificent Kaufman script given preternaturally empathetic life by director Gondry.
Fantastic Mr. Fox (Wes Anderson, 2009): Reviewed here.
Fat Girl (Catherine Breillat, 2001, pictured): An appropriately twisted vision about the catastrophe of erotic awakening.
The Fountain (Darren Aronofsky, 2006): "We rented that, and we saw they quoted you on the box cover," some friend of a friend told me at dinner recently, "and you said it was 'fascinating and amazing.' I'm amazed the stupid thing ever even got made!" I get this a lot. And still insist. Review here.
The Frontier of Dawn (Philippe Garrel, 2008): His ghost story, with effects straight out of Melies/Franju. An incomparable atmosphere.
Gangs of New York (Scorsese, 2002): Decidedly imperfect, with moments of epic greatness that is dares subsequent films to come near.
The Girlfriend Experience (Soderbergh, 2009): Yeah, The Girlfriend Experience. What about it?
Goodbye Dragon Inn (Tsai Ming-liang, 2003): I love all of this director's films, but really, this is his most haunted and haunting experience, a must-see for everyone.
The GoodTimes Kid (Azazel Jacobs, 2005): Another particularly sui generis thing, this from a genuinely adventurous American independent. Crazy, anguished, visually controlled and deft.
Good Morning, Night (Marco Bellocchio, 2003, pictured): A painfully nuanced film about the Red Army and Moro, from a politically and emotionally engaged director who's been in there pitching since well before the event depicted.
Gran Torino (Clint Eastwood, 2008): Reviewed here.
Grizzly Man (Werner Herzog, 2005): Reviewed here.
The Headless Woman (Lucrecia Martel, 2008) Reconsidered here.
A History of Violence (David Cronenberg, 2006): One of Cronenberg's slyest not-quite-pastiches. FULL of unnerving acting.
I Heart Huckabees (David O. Russell, 2004): Improbably enough, my original review is still preserved here.
I’m Not There (Todd Haynes, 2007): I didn't entirely get this picture at first. And then, I got it much better. It's that kind of movie. I've seen it three times. Gets more interesting.
The Incredibles (Brad Bird, 2004): Is The Incredibles.
Inglourious Basterds (Quentin Tarantino, 2009): Reviewed here. Tub-thumped further here.
L’Intrus (Claire Denis, 2004): One of the great Denis' most daring and transportive (in more ways than one) films.
Invictus (Clint Eastwood, 2009): I can't really talk about it yet, but yes, I think it's that good.
In The Mood For Love (Wong Kar-Wai, 2001): An apotheosis. Reviewed here.
The Lady and the Duke (Eric Rohmer, 2001, pictured): Rohmer's experiment with digitally-created backdrops adds a daringly beautiful dimension to his mise-en-scene. The writing and acting are unusually sensitive.
The Limits of Control (Jim Jarmusch, 2009): Too hip? Gotta go? Not by my lights. 100% beguiling.
Looney Tunes Back In Action (Joe Dante, 2003): A meta-movie that really knows its business. Reviewed here.
Lorna’s Silence (The Dardenne Brothers, 2008): A lot of critics thought this was more, and less, of the same from the filmmaking team, but its concentration, and discovery of the iconic Arta Dobroshi, make it my favorite Dardennes. First considered by me here. And again here.
Marie Antoinette (Sofia Coppola, 2006): A splendid cinematic intoxicant, and not stupid. Reviewed here.
Million Dollar Baby (Clint Eastwood, 2004): A lot of people still enjoy trashing this picture, and truth to tell, a lot of its imperfections are legitimate chum for the breed of moviegoer Hitchcock called "the Plausibles." And for all that it still wrenches your gut when you actually watch it. Reviewed here.
Morvern Callar (Lynne Ramsay, 2002): A truly visionary work from a truly visionary director...who hasn't made a feature since. What the hell is wrong with the world? Reviewed here.
Mulholland Drive (David Lynch, 2001): Ah, I'll never forget David Lynch at Premiere's party at Prego in Toronto, chomping on a Sicilian slice with Watts and Harring flanking him, and booming across the floor, "Thanks for the four-star review, Glenn! Great pizza!" From said review: "Roberto Rossellini once remarked of Chaplin's A King in New York, 'It is the film of a free man.' Mulholland Drive is the film of a slave — a slave to his own, undying obsessions. But that's not necessarily a bad thing."
Ne touchez pas le hache (Jacques Rivette, 2007): I prefer the evocative French title to the plainer The Duchess of Langeaise. A wonder, first reviewed here.
Night and Day (Hong Sang-soo, 2008): For my money the Korean director's funniest, most audacious work. Reviewed here.
Notre Musique (Jean-Luc Godard, pictured): War and provisional peace, enraged and enigmatic.
No Country For Old Men (The Coen Brothers, 2007): A lot of folks are already pissed that this was entirely snubbed by the Time Out New York panel. As in, didn't get a single vote. I reserve comment on the matter. I have written about the film here and here.
Ponyo (Hayao Miyazaki, 2009): Simplicity and wonder. Considered here.
Red Cliff Parts 1 & 2 (John Woo, 2008): Epic moviemaking like you thought they didn't/couldn't do anymore. Considered here.
Regular Lovers (Philippe Garrel, 2005): You say you wanna revolution...Garrel's uncanny evocation of May '68 melds the political with the personal until the political becomes...something else.
The Royal Tenenbaums (Wes Anderson, 2001): Anderson really let fly with his baroque side here, to dazzling and heartbreaking result.
Russian Ark (Aleksandr Sokurov, 2002): This one-take wonder is more than an amazing technical achievement, and more than an arty promo for The Hermitage. It's a restless treatise on art and intimations of immortality.
A Serious Man (The Coen Brothers, 2009): Reviewed here. Sorry about the critic-baiting therein, but what am I gonna do, pretend it never happened?
Sideways (Alexander Payne, 2004): You don't have to be an alcoholic to love this picture...but it helps! But seriously. I compared it to Renoir when it first came out and I stand by that.
Spirited Away (Hayao Miyazaki, 2001): One of the master's most complex, enigmatic, and haunting works.
Star Spangled To Death (Ken Jacobs, 1957-2004): Jacobs' epic assembly, a jitter-and-laughter inducing anti-ode to the notion of American exceptionalism. Just because you're paranoid, etc. etc...
Still Life (Jia Zhangke, 2008): The most visually spectacular and mesmerizing work from the Chinese maverick yet.
The Story of Marie and Julian (Jacques Rivette, 2003): In a weird way, I feel as if I am somehow always writing about this film. See here. I consider it in an upcoming Salon mini-feature also.
Summer Hours (Olivier Assayas, 2008): Never trust a film critic who tells you he or she doesn't care for pictures about "rich" people.
Sympathy for Lady Vengeance (Park Chan-wook, 2005): Weirder and less on-the-nose than Oldboy. I didn't review, but I got into this online fracas about it, one of the most memorable in the genre.
Syndromes and a Century (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, 2008): Beautiful, droll, difficult to summarize, one of the most specifically poetic films ever made.
Synecdoche, New York (Charlie Kaufman, 2008): I liked it so much, I was a DVD extra on it! More thoughts here.
Talk to Her (Pedro Almodóvar, 2002): A peak moment, a summation and an expansion of everything the filmmaker has stood for.
There Will Be Blood (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2007): Damn. Further thoughts here and here. And here. This sure was a fun film to argue about.
Three Times (Hou Hsiao-Hsien, 2005): A remarkably delicate, ages-spanning anthology film. Every shot a beauty.
Tokyo Sonata (Kiroshi Kurosawa, 2008):A beautifully calibrated vision of dread. Reviewed here.
Trouble Every Day (Claire Denis, 2001): A sui generis splatter/art film. Harrowing, merciless, strangely tender.
25th Hour (Spike Lee, 2002, pictured): A beautiful sprawl.
Up (Pete Docter and Bob Peterson, 2009): Reviewed here.
The White Ribbon (Michael Haneke, 2009): Funny; I'm still kind of on the fence about the content of this picture, but I'm so impressed by its formal excellence in every respect that it dogs me, and strikes me as a genuinely major work.
The World (Jia Zhangke, 2004): Life as a theme park. Not as funny as it sounds. But wonderful
Yi yi (Edward Yang, 2000): The Taiwanese pioneer's last film, alas, a snappy, beautifully detailed family saga, each scene as vivid and true as the last or the next.
Zodiac (David Fincher, 2007): Head-spinningly masterful, a redefinition of the policier, an obsessive film worth obsessing over. See here.
And there you have it. You?
The two films that I would put high up for the decade that haven't been mentioned yet: "OldBoy" and "Children of Men". If I had a list that went to 70, I'm pretty sure I would include every Park Chan-Wook film this decade except for "I'm A Cyborg".
Posted by: Steven Santos | November 25, 2009 at 01:21 PM
Glenn, the problem with A.I.'s coda isn't that it's a "happy" ending (it's happy only for David, albeit in a very twisted way), but in how Spielberg chooses to portray it. You basically have a robot sit down on his bed and blurt out a bunch of exposition, after we've already had the Blue Fairy do the same in the previous scene. If Kubrick actually had ended the film this way plot-wise, there's no way he would have done it in such a ham-fisted way that drains the mystery and energy out of the film right before it ends.
Having said that, the film is amazing anyway, and certainly deserves inclusion on your list, and I'm glad you also included Scorsese's messy, reach-for-the-sun masterpieces from this decade as well.
And of course, The Story of Marie and Julien can never get too much praise.
Posted by: lazarus | November 25, 2009 at 01:27 PM
Of the ones I've seen, I can't agree enough with "The Fountain" and "Looney Tunes" (in fact I 90% agree with you on the ones I've seen, and I'm glad to hear "Invictus" is good), but this is the Internet, and dissent drives traffic. So let's argue about two of your selections.
"I Heart Huckabees": Not that it's a bad picture, but the message of the movie is deeply crippled by Russell's failure to develop Jude Law and Naomi Watts into anything other than strawmen. Russell wants to say something profound and instead he says something you can hear in any dorm room in America on a Saturday night, and he's annoyingly fucking smug about it while doing it. The only thing that saves it is that occasionally there are some truly inspired comedic bits.
"Zodiac": I've aired my opinion of this elsewhere, but I may as well just state that I got nothing out of this movie. It was a technically accomplished, utterly handsome A&E reenactment; I felt no insight, and most damningly no curiosity. Any feeling and emotion comes from the actors, and you can Robert Downey Jr. flipping Fincher the bird and doing his own thing (and God bless).
What would I propose for replacements? Well, far be it from me not to give anybody who disagrees with me plenty of ammo to work with:
Ang Lee's "Hulk" and "Anti-Christ", the latter if for no other reason than Lars Von Trier failed right into making the kind of dramatic horror film I've been wanting to see for years.
Posted by: Dan | November 25, 2009 at 01:29 PM
@ James Keepnews - A second on Y TU MAMA, and we might as well throw in CHILDREN OF MEN, as long as Cauron is getting some love.
As far as an Unforgiven debate - the ball's in your court. What's wrong with it? I've never doubted Eastwood's technical mastery - the man knows how to tell a story, but his films usually rise or fall on the strength of his collaborators, and there aren't many better living screenwriters than David Webb Peoples - and Unforgiven has to be one of the best American screenplays of the past half-century, never mind the nineties. It would be overstating the case to say that with that script and those actors (Eastwood included) a monkey could have directed it, but, well, I'd give the monkey a shot.
Posted by: Zach | November 25, 2009 at 01:34 PM
Dan - How can you say there's no curiosity in ZODIAC? The film's practically brimming with it, to the point that curiosity becomes obsession. I'd try to make my argument stronger if I had any idea where you were coming from.
However...I'm actually with you on Lee's HULK. The only reason I didn't mention it myself is because I experienced a moment of cowardice.
Posted by: bill | November 25, 2009 at 01:41 PM
Ooo, Zach, many balls now tossed into my court! I haven't seen Unforgiven since I talked myself into not walking out of the theater now almost two decades ago, but my memory of the screenplay is, to put it extremely mildly, far less convinced of its half-century-towering status. About the most I can say is the mess that the will to violent vengenance wreaks in the lives of the characters is a notable break with Hollywood tradition -- and thus Clint's oeuvre -- but what of it when it's otherwise surrounded by cliches everywhere else? Overlong set-pieces, unconvincing characters/comeuppances portrayed by Jaimz Whomever and Richard Harris, and I also found the ending (spoiler alert!) intimating Munny's success post-climax to be anticlimactic at best and emerging from nothing more than your sainted Mr. Peoples' (not many better living screenwriters? Ummmm, Richard Price? Robert Towne? Rudolph Wurlitzer? Tarr/Krasnahorkai? Do you, pace The Roots, want more?) will to forced irony?
You've certainly explained your opinion where Mr. Peoples, monkeys, and some aspects of the last half-century or so are concerned -- now flip your first question around and tell me what's right with Unforgiven?
& quickly: Yay Werckmeister, Yi Yi, Éloge, Eternal Sunshine, Synecdoche ("Die"!!!!), the obscenely underappreciated Limits of Control, Tenenbaums (yay, moreover, Gene Hackman's greatest/funniest late-period performance), Che, Demonlover, Children of Men, Zodiac, doubtless many others!
Posted by: James Keepnews | November 25, 2009 at 01:53 PM
Great list -- the only one missing that I really wanted to see here was MEMENTO, as devastating a depiction of the nature of memory as ETERNAL SUNSHINE. Please tell me you're not one of those people who think the backwards-moving plot is just a gimmick. I don't think I could handle that.
Posted by: Tim | November 25, 2009 at 01:57 PM
I've always found MEMENTO to be a textbook case of the law of diminishing returns. Which, not coincidentally, I think is true of all of Nolan's movies to date.
Posted by: Matt Miller | November 25, 2009 at 01:59 PM
I largely agree with your choices, GK! However, not unlike a few others, I prefer Punch-Drunk Love over There Will Be Blood and INLAND EMPIRE to Mulholland Dr.
I'd just add the strangely unloved When Strangers Appear and The Good Girl as a couple of my own faves.
Perhaps, maybe, potentially, In America.
Posted by: bemo | November 25, 2009 at 02:06 PM
Lee's HULK was the first date me and the missus went on. I think it really would have been a good film without the stupid action sequences, which, to my mind, interrupted an actually compelling plot. And the Uber-Nolte finale is unforgivable.
I sheepishly see that a couple of the films I added that weren't on your list were on your list after all, Glenn; please chalk that up to my bad memory, as I am, after all, an old man of 27.
Posted by: Tom Russell | November 25, 2009 at 02:15 PM
Loving Jia and Claire Denis, I am with you, cheering, that far on this list. But along with the petitions above for MASTER & COMMANDER, NEW WORLD and at least four Romanian films I can think of, I want appreciation for ASSASSINATION OF JESSE JAMES... and Martel's THE HOLY GIRL-- can't think of a list constricted-enough for them not to be included. That's not a bad decade you got there, buddy.
Posted by: jwarthen | November 25, 2009 at 02:22 PM
@bill
" How can you say there's no curiosity in ZODIAC? "
I meant on the part of Fincher. He shows us the events but he has no interest in telling us why he bothered showing us these events, at least to my mind. Mileage, obviously, varies. Fincher is a pretty cold director to begin with, but in this movie he practically becomes Arctic. It doesn't help that his message about obsession is obvious and tiresome to me, but Fincher isn't one in the Deep Thoughts department.
@Tom Russell
"Unforgiveable?" Are you kidding me? It's an action sequence that has actual dramatic weight and meaning. It's not just a plot climax: it's a CHARACTER climax. That alone puts it in a class by itself. Part of the reason I love "Hulk" is that it's not afraid to be both an action movie and an art movie.
Although it is extremely interesting, the cult that's formed around this movie. It makes me wonder if a reappreciation of it will happen at some point. I hope so.
Posted by: Dan | November 25, 2009 at 02:34 PM
A great list. But am I really only the second person in this thread to question the exclusion of The New World?
Posted by: DUH | November 25, 2009 at 02:38 PM
I'm not kidding; I think the Nolte-turns-into-electric-storm-man-thing was kinda ridiculous. Granted, I haven't seen the film since it came out, but my experience with it was-- wow, this is really interesting, oh, here comes the Hulk to punch something. Oh, it's interesting again, I want to find out what's behind that door-- oh, let's turn into the Hulk for twenty more minutes.
I greatly appreciate the film's ambition, but I don't think it quite pulls it off.
Posted by: Tom Russell | November 25, 2009 at 02:38 PM
You almost lost me with A.I., Looney Tunes and The Fountain...but then you cite Lady and the Duke (!), The Incredibles, and the only Wes Anderson flick I've been able to sit through without fidgeting, The Darjeeling Express. Nicely done.
Posted by: Johnny Bacardi | November 25, 2009 at 02:38 PM
Glenn,
So happy to see A CHRISTMAS TALE and WHITE RIBBON on your list. But I echo Zach's incredulity earlier, no NEW WORLD?
Bill, great movies all (especially MASTER AND COMMANDER), but you lost me on GOMORRAH. Good, yes, but great? As I stated in my own review earlier this week, I'm not even sure it's Criterion worthy.
Posted by: Tony Dayoub | November 25, 2009 at 02:48 PM
@Dan - How exactly should Fincher have portrayed his own, personal curiosity, as opposed to the curiosity of his characters, which I think he gets across beautifully? At its core, ZODIAC is a procedural, which calls for a certain cold remove on the part of the filmmaker.
@Tony - Well I thought so. It's possible I'm overstating things, but in general I'm a sucker for multi-narrative films, and GOMORRAH was an insidiously bleak and haunting crime film version of that, so I was pretty much in the bag for it before it even started.
Posted by: bill | November 25, 2009 at 02:55 PM
Niceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
Posted by: OMAR | November 25, 2009 at 02:56 PM
@ James Keepnews: My advice is, see Unforgiven again. If you still think there's a cliched scene (that doesn't add layers of irony and revision) or character, then I don't know what else to tell you. If you don't care for Harris or "Whomever" (Woolvett) - and I'm not sure if you mean the acting or the characters or both - then you and I have very different ideas about what constitutes good acting and screenwriting. What UNFORGIVEN does right is fuse (with amazing facility) the story conventions of the Western revenge tale with the revisionist leanings of modern history. It's about the soul-eating effect of violence, yes, but it's also about the instability of narrative - the stories we tell about ourselves, whether personal or historical, and how contingent they are. Overall, it's a hell of a good yarn, and one that engages expertly with issues of morality, politics and psychology.
Whereas, say, Mystic River is a solemnified B Movie about why child abuse is bad.
As far as screenwriters go: you'll notice I didn't say Peoples was the Best, only that he is one of the best - I agree that Towne certainly is up there, along (maybe) with Price, although Price's best stuff, in my opinion, is on the Wire. As far as the other guys - well, I've seen one Bela Tarr, and it wasn't the script that stood out. Wurlitzer - I'd have to see more. If he can match "I even thought I was dead myself - but it turned out I was only in Nebraska" then maybe we can talk about him.
Posted by: Zach | November 25, 2009 at 02:58 PM
Loved the list (it's the short comments that make a list interesting, as opposed to just egotistical). I loved to chart the course of my cinephelia through it. Great, great, great variety, quality in all different shapes and sizes.
Posted by: S. Porath | November 25, 2009 at 03:00 PM
The Fountain?! A tribute to the colossal shininess of Yul Brynner's space age head. Wow. I knew that Aronofsky was obsessed with wanting to pulverise the human body to the point of abstraction. Even 'The Wrestler' is fascinated with bodies. I do think that Soderbergh surpassed both Mann and Fincher as the best American film maker at work today.
Posted by: OMAR | November 25, 2009 at 03:02 PM
How can you make this list when you haven't seen PRECIOUS yet?!?!? (I am only 60% joking)
Posted by: Peter | November 25, 2009 at 03:05 PM
Actually, I've spent much of the decade catching up on all the great films of the previous nine decades. Still was I the only person who liked "A Very Long Engagement"? (Oh wait, there's Charles Taylor.)
Long live "Russian Ark".
Posted by: partisan | November 25, 2009 at 03:12 PM
Richard Price is a much (much much MUCH) better novelist than he is a screenwriter. He freely admits that he doesn't even really care about writing screenplays. They're a paycheck, for which he will do the best professional work he can, but he cares about his novels. And his novels are magnificent.
Posted by: bill | November 25, 2009 at 03:12 PM
Zach: "Whereas, say, Mystic River is a solemnified B Movie about why child abuse is bad."
Cute as punchlines go, but I'd suggest inaccurate as criticism. Since I'm leaving work now and can't expand too far in this wise, let me suggest: the look on Laura Linney's face on the parade sidelines at the end? That was coming from a solemnified B movie appreciation of child abuse? Or, as I might suggest, that there's more at work in this drama than the single readily identifiable theme in this not-exactly-B movie?
I'll re-watch Unforgiven if you'll re-view Mystic River. Regardless,
we likely have different opinions about great acting and unquestionably about great writing -- e.g., I'm reasonably confident even Joe Ezsterhas (sp?) could come up with a more trenchant line than "I even thought I was dead myself - but it turned out I was only in Nebraska". Wurlitzer, better? Repeatedly (and, candidly, not always) -- I'd recommend his rarely discussed collab with Robert Frank, Candy Mountain, as a good place to hear mo', + betta...
Posted by: James Keepnews | November 25, 2009 at 03:37 PM
How is the ending of A.I. ham-fisted if nobody got the ending? I'm even thinking you didn't get the ending, Lazarus...
Posted by: The Chevalier | November 25, 2009 at 03:57 PM
Nice list. Thanks for enriching my Netflix queue in the process.
Posted by: Nictate | November 25, 2009 at 03:59 PM
This list could use some cheer. So, two especially joyous films that match nicely: LINDA LINDA LINDA and HAPPY FEET.
And someone needs to mention the one-of-kind TROUBLE THE WATER.
Posted by: jwarthen | November 25, 2009 at 04:01 PM
Chavalier, it's ham-fisted because you have two characters giving monologues of exposition at the end of the film. I thought I was pretty clear. I "got" it, though I can't speak for all the morons who thought they were going to see something like E.T. At least when Kubrick does exposition-heavy scenes (like the pool table one between Pollack and Cruise in Eyes Wide Shut), he does something interesting with it.
Posted by: lazarus | November 25, 2009 at 04:20 PM
Zach: "If he can match "I even thought I was dead myself - but it turned out I was only in Nebraska" then maybe we can talk about him."
If I'm not grounded pretty soon, I'm going into orbit.
A personal favorite.
Posted by: Bruce Reid | November 25, 2009 at 04:29 PM