I normally do this year-end wrap-up right before the Academy Award nominations are announced so as to not be biased by those films that receive too much credit or none at all. So this article arrives much later than normal. The easy reason that it took me so long to do this list was that I didn't want to write it until I saw both DREAMGIRLS and LETTERS FROM IWO JIMA. I ultimately saw neither, making this the first year in probably ten that I haven't seen all five Best Picture nominees.
Why was it so difficult to finally write this article? I've been doing a wrap-up for ten years now. Some years are better than others. This year was the worst year for movies. At least for me. Only two movies this year deserved four stars. The other movies on my top ten list this year are either of the three-and-a-half or three star variety.
The question then is…have I lost interest in movies or have movies gotten worse? I sincerely hope that it's the latter but I'm fearful that it's the former. Has the sheer volume of movies I've seen over
the years destroyed my overall appreciation for the current crop of films? Is this merely a function of getting older? Honestly, I don't think I'm the only who thinks movies, I mean the "good movies", have dropped severely in quality. Where are the Insiders, the L.A. Confidentials, the Incredibles, the Rushmores, the Truman Shows? None of them arrived this year, right? Am I crazy or what? Or is it that movie studios either make movies for morons (e.g. NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM) or finance pretentious pap that features interesting filmmaking but are simply duds (e.g. BABEL)? It says something that the single most fulfilling entertainment I found this year was in the long-ignored TV series THE WIRE.
Anyways, only two movies blew me away this year. And as you will see, they're not exactly crowd-pleasers. Onto the list:
One of the movies that blew Sam away....
UNITED 93 – "I can't pull! I can't!"
I will never see this movie again. But there is no other movie this year that affected me more. Now, some would call it exploitation, I don't. This movie made me remember that even though 9/11 was a
severely tragic event, it started from the actions of only a few people. It made me reflect on the events that have transpired since. Made me angry about the Iraq war. And made me frustrated that all the good will that came from this event was wasted by a guy who wasn't even elected. Soapbox speech over. I also saw this movie with someone who almost puked on my lap, so there was an extra dose of suspense during my viewing experience.
SCENE TO REMEMBER: The final push to re-take the plane.
MORAL TO THE STORY: The actions of so few can affect so many. And don't depend on Sledge Hammer to fly your hijacked plane out of trouble (anyone else catch that strange casting choice?).
Mom's note: Maybe I dreamed it, but I remember Sam talking about this movie and saying that it was one of those movies where, even though you knew how it ended, you kept hoping that the good guys would save the day and the plane would land safely. Maybe it was when he tried to talk me into watching it. I did watch it eventually, but I didn't watch it until maybe 2010...
And the Sledge Hammer reference -- another Cassel family obsession. We have the DVDs, and guess who gave them to Bob?!
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