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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
From the eccentric, intimate "Lost in Translation" to the epic nobility of "Return of the King" to the rough-hewn affirmation of "In America," Salon critics Stephanie Zacharek, Charles Taylor and Andrew O'Hehir list 2003's best films.
Dec 27, 2003 | Stephanie Zacharek's 10 Best Films
"Lost in Translation" (directed by Sofia Coppola). A jet-lag romance not just for the modern age, but for the ages. Coppola meditates on the nature of intimacy and dislocation, sustaining a mood of rapturous melancholy that few older, more experienced filmmakers have matched. The characters played by Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson circle each other on currents of sleeplessness: Both suffering from travelers' insomnia, they repeatedly drift toward their accidental meeting spot, the bar in the Tokyo hotel where they're staying, as if they were tuned in to the same silent whistle. Johansson is luminous and touching; Murray, whose expressiveness radiates from within instead of just beaming off the surface, turns in the performance of a lifetime.
"In America" (directed by Jim Sheridan). A man moves his young family from Ireland to Hell's Kitchen, NYC, and figures out the difference between surviving and living. There's something emotionally rough-hewed about Sheridan's movie (which is based loosely on his own experience and that of his two daughters, who co-wrote the movie with him). Its edges aren't polished and smoothed under, which may be why the picture cuts so deep.
"A Mighty Wind" (directed by Christopher Guest). Satire made by a staunch humanist. Guest's mockumentary about '60s folk singers is improvisational comedy that feels immediate and spontaneous and jazzy, yet it has so much emotional heft -- particularly in the performances of Catherine O'Hara and Eugene Levy -- that it leaves an echo of melancholy in its wake.
"Spellbound" (directed by Jeffrey Blitz). This documentary about the National Spelling Bee is more suspenseful than most modern thrillers, and better made, too. But what really sets it apart is the way it makes a kind of straightforward poetry out of the loneliness, the diligence and, yes, the excitement of being a smart kid.
"American Splendor" (directed by Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini). Paul Giamatti is crotchety and wonderful as comic-book writer Harvey Pekar, an unrepentant crank who wouldn't know a good mood if it peed on his leg. But Pekar's dirty little not-quite-a-secret is that he's actually a closet idealist, and both Giamatti and the filmmakers understand that. Pekar is so open to the world around him, it's no wonder he's in a bad mood most of the time. Then again, the only way to take the measure of humanity in all its perplexed glory is to keep our receptors on at all times. How do you put that in a movie? I don't quite know, but Berman, Pulcini and their actors sure pulled it off.
"Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" (directed by Peter Jackson). I wonder if the massive popularity of the honor-sogged "The Last Samurai" in the first few weeks of its release wasn't at least partly because moviegoers were treating it as a stopover on the way to "The Return of the King." Of the two, "Return" is the movie that really scrutinizes the meaning of honor in battle, cutting straight to the spiritual underpinnings of warriorhood. (I'll take Aragorn's nightmares over Algren's, any day.) Or, at the very least, "Return" is a magnificent and purely satisfying -- and, yes, devastating -- cap-off to one of the greatest epic movie adventures of all time. Accept no substitutes, no matter how pseudo-spiritual or neo-historical they pretend to be.
"Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World" (directed by Peter Weir). Yet another movie about bravery, honor and duty. But as with "Return of the King," you don't walk away from it praising the worthiness of its themes -- instead, you're left with a true and deep sense of the rueful compromises that rousing victories often demand. Russell Crowe gives a performance that's heroic not just in the most obvious sense of the word, but also in the most subtle: His Jack Aubrey understands that every decision has a potentially devastating downside, and he carries that knowledge both in his heart and on his nobly squared shoulders. "Master and Commander" is a magnificent historical adventure with a throbbing heart. And there's mournful grandeur in cinematographer Russell Boyd's every shot.
"To Be and to Have" (directed by Nicolas Philibert). A delicately calibrated documentary about a one-room schoolhouse in the French countryside and the teacher who guides the students in attendance there, from tots to young teenagers. "To Be and To Have" illuminates both the vocation of teaching and the work of being a student, without sentimentalizing, or underestimating, either. It's a small-scale picture that does the same thing a great teacher does: It keeps you thinking long after you've left your seat.
"School of Rock" (directed by Richard Linklater). Forget makeover shows: The real transformative power lies in rock 'n' roll. Jack Black plays an unshaven lout who takes a bunch of square schoolkids and shows them how to channel their inner cool. This picture moves, driven by intelligence and craftsmanship and goofiness. Hollywood comedies have a bad reputation these days, for some very good reasons. But Linklater leads the way in showing that you can surf the mainstream without being dragged under by it.
"Masked and Anonymous" (directed by Larry Charles). The most picked-on movie of the year was also one of the weirdest and most provocative. In this parallel-universe parable, a troubadour masquerading as Bob Dylan (or is it the other way around?) reflects on American idealism, fame and the commodification of music. No, it's not linear -- but then, neither is Dylan.
Honorable Mentions: Robert Altman's "The Company," Lisa Cholodenko's "Laurel Canyon," Terry Zwigoff's "Bad Santa," Jacques Perrin's "Winged Migration," Claire Denis' "Friday Night," Tom McCarthy's "The Station Agent," Patty Jenkins' "Monster," Seijun Suzuki's "Pistol Opera" and John Malkovich's "The Dancer Upstairs." And last but not least, Mark Waters' highly entertaining "Freaky Friday," particularly because Jamie Lee Curtis is so damn good.
