The good, bad and very ugly movies of 2006
Published 9:00 pm Thursday, December 28, 2006
When a maladroit journalist from Kazakhstan is the biggest story of the film year, you know it is a bizarre time for the movies. But that was 2006, when Borat – the clueless creation of British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen – came into our lives with a rude, hilarious, “Is nice!”
It’s the end of December, and thus time to look back at what was nice in the movies this year. In its own crazy way, “Borat” exemplified the movies today: On the one hand it indulged in juvenile silliness, but on the other it sneaked in a blistering commentary on the state of things.
Similarly, 2006 brought us a boatload of dumb movies (which we’ll get to), but also a storm of documentaries that provided bracing news about the war in Iraq, global warming and religion in America. And there were grown-up films – “United 93,” “Flags of Our Fathers,” “Little Children,” “Babel” – that challenged our ideas and even the way we watch movies.
We lost a great American director, Robert Altman, but could be consoled by the fact that he contributed the most sheerly pleasurable movie of the year, “A Prairie Home Companion.”
There were too many bland, sanitized big movies, and the pipeline of foreign films seemed to slow down. The best foreign film (maybe the best film, period) to open locally was made in 1969: Jean-Pierre Melville’s tale of the French Resistance in World War II, “Army of Shadows,” which had never had a proper run in the United States until a few months ago.
At the box office, the “Pirates of the Caribbean” sequel joined the list of top 10 money-makers of all time – and isn’t there something depressing about that? There was something obligatory about the big grossers this year. Or perhaps you know someone who actually loved “The Da Vinci Code.” The kiddie blockbusters (“Ice Age: The Meltdown,” “Happy Feet,” “Over the Hedge”) proved that there will be an animation industry for the foreseeable future.
But forget money. It is supposed to be the movie reviewer’s job to separate the hype from the real deal. Movie studios use various dodges to try to get around that, and more films opened this year without advance screenings for the press. But don’t worry, we’ll track down “The Wicker Man” and “Saw III” eventually.
So let us anoint the best movies of 2006 (these are the best movies that opened locally in 2006, so a couple of 2005-vintage pictures are here, whereas some delayed goodies – such as “Pan’s Labyrinth” and “Letters from Iwo Jima” – won’t arrive hereabouts until ‘07).
A hearty rendition of the Kazakh National Anthem for the following:
1. “A Prairie Home Companion.” This might seem a sentimental choice, given Altman’s recent death, but really, this movie was at the top of my list since I saw it in May. It chronicles the fictional finale of Garrison Keillor’s radio program, but somehow it’s also about life and death and the way people are.
2. “The Death of Mr. Lazarescu.” This long, slow Romanian film is tough to sell – it’s about the last night in the life of a man shuffled from hospital to hospital in Bucharest – yet it almost becomes a real-life experience as you live through it. And director Cristi Puiu gets every detail right, from medical ego to neighborly kindness.
3. “United 93.” A non-melodramatic approach to Sept. 11, 2001, leaving aside the usual conventions in favor of a near-documentary feel. Director Paul Greengrass demonstrates that real heroism comes from ordinary people pushed into a corner, not from supermen.
4. “The Departed.” Martin Scorsese’s brilliant re-working of the Hong Kong thriller “Infernal Affairs,” with Matt Damon and Leonardo DiCaprio as cops with secrets, was the best multiplex picture of the year. The suspense structure is ingenious, the editing is a diabolical puzzle, and the dialogue is a torrent of masculine patter.
5. “Half Nelson.” A cool surprise from new director Ryan Fleck, this movie took an old formula – the white teacher in an inner-city school – and bent it backwards. Ryan Gosling and Shareeka Epps were terrific as a heroin-addled teacher and his 13-year-old charge.
6. “Flags of Our Fathers.” Clint Eastwood’s film about the true story behind the Iwo Jima flag-raising is a fascinating film: It deliberately rejects the usual appeal of a war movie (identifying with characters, building suspense) in favor of a thoughtful examination of a single, important image. Parallels with the present made this essential viewing. (“Letters from Iwo Jima,” Eastwood’s film from the Japanese side, will open in January.)
7. “Cache.” A superb 2005 French film that could stand alongside the great paranoid thrillers of the 1970s. Daniel Autueil and Juliette Binoche were excellent in Michael Haneke’s story about “being watched”; this one forced you to pay attention to every speck of the screen.
8. “Mountain Patrol: Kekexili.” This “Chinese Western” came and went, but it deserves a look- even (or especially) if you like action movies; director Lu Chuan has clearly studied his Spielberg. It’s about some grizzled Tibetans who band together as a vigilante group to protect local antelope.
9. “The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada.” And here’s an American Western, courtesy of director/star Tommy Lee Jones, about a man intent on giving his old (and rapidly decomposing friend) a proper burial in Mexico.
10. “The Puffy Chair.” A fine example of the do-it-yourself, extreme low budget movie, a very funny but ruthlessly perceptive comedy about relationships. Brothers Jay and Mark Duplass wrote the film, with Jay directing and Mark starring.
The runners-up would include a pair of flawed but evocative Florida films, “Miami Vice” and “Coastlines,” the horror pic “The Descent,” “Children of Men,” “The Queen,” the low-budget comedy “Adam &Steve,” the Neil Young concert film “Heart of Gold,” the horrifying documentary about priests and pedophilia “Deliver Us from Evil,” James Bond’s return in “Casino Royale,” the three-part “Three Times,” and the clever hard-boiled high-school flick, “Brick.”
And, absolutely, “Borat.”
If you’re going to check out some of these on DVD, make sure you punch a few documentaries into your Netflix queue, too. The Iraq war dominated the scene, and among the best films on the subject were local filmmaker James Longley’s “Iraq in Fragments,” a visually stunning look at life for Iraqis; “The War Tapes,” which handed cameras to three U.S. soldiers on the ground, and “The Ground Truth,” which looks at life for returning vets.
There were stinkers, of course. A serving of Borat’s homemade cheese to the following:
“The Pink Panther.” A remake of the Peter Sellers classic, with Steve Martin getting off a few good sight gags in a comedy void.
“Basic Instinct 2.” Sharon Stone’s killer is still tormenting men after all these years, but she might’ve used the icepick on her screenwriters instead.
“A Good Year.” Russell Crowe and his “Gladiator” director, Ridley Scott, try out comedy. Somebody get them back to togas and sandals.
“Failure to Launch.” It was painful enough that Matthew McConaughey and Sarah Jessica Parker had bad chemistry, but the Terry Bradshaw nude scene added insult to injury.
“Deck the Halls.” A Christmas black comedy that made one nostalgic for the glory days of “Christmas with the Kranks.”
“Nearing Grace.” The subgenre of the British feel-good comedy is one of the most grating movements in film; this comedy about a homicidal granny took badness honors away from “Kinky Boots.”
“Employee of the Month.” In a just world, this vehicle for comic Dane Cook and Jessica Simpson would be exiled to the sale rack, along with “10 Items or Less.”
“You, Me and Dupree.” Owen Wilson running on fumes in a comedy without laughs; however, this movie did spark a letter of protest from the band Steely Dan, which was funnier than the film.
“Freedomland.” This pretentious, overblown social-issue movie gives a bad name to pretentious, overblown social-issue movies, and it made talented actors (Julianne Moore, Samuel L. Jackson) look awful.
“The Shaggy Dog.” Tim Allen as a D.A. who turns into a sheepdog … I’m sorry, I think I just ran out of energy. Or patience. Here’s hoping for better in 2007.
