The High Art of Low Theft
Before I continue with the countdown (I sound like Casey Kasem, "This week on The R Spot Top 40, rising three notches to number 4..."), a personal note--I was recently victimized by ATM fraud.
Here's how it was done: sometime in the last year I used my ATM card to make a purchase in the L.A. area. The perpetrators--probably at least two of them--simultaneously made a duplicate of my magnetic strip while checking to see if they could glean my PIN code on the security camera. They waited a while, then they made a duplicate ATM card. Then they went to Vegas and proceeded to remove over $900 from my account, including direct deposit payroll advances. All has been fixed now, but I'm thinking about this and wondering--this is a pretty elaborate scheme. Yes, you can get lots of people's money for free, but you have to go to the trouble of duplicating strips, manufacturing cards and studying videotape to perpetrate the fraud. Wouldn't it be easier just to find a decent job? You probably wouldn't have to work as hard at it. Ah, the criminal mind and the quest for "easy" money. I wish I could understand it.
Now, back to the movies...
My Top Five Movie Picks from the Last Year
This list isn't set in stone by the way. If, in three weeks or so I see The New World or Munich or Cache and I think it's pretty damn good, I'll change the list around. It will just be too late for you to use it to handicap the award season, although it will be in time for the Oscars, so keep checking The R Spot...
5. Walk the Line - Written by Gill Dennis & James Mangold. Directed by Mangold. Stars Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon. Biopic about Johnny Cash from childhood until his marriage to soulmate June Carter follows all the cliches but also hits all the right notes. Two terrific, convincing performances by Phoenix and Witherspoon are the reason to see this movie.
4. Batman Begins - Written by David Goyer and Christopher Nolan. Directed by Nolan. Stars Christian Bale, Cillian Murphy, Morgan Freeman, Michael Caine, Liam Neeson and Katie Holmes. As good or better than all of the Batman movies combined and maybe the best comic book movie ever. Bale IS Batman, the way he was meant to be in a movie that does not sacrifice character or plot to special effects excess. Even Holmes is okay enough that she doesn't distract. The one very minor flaw? Maybe one bad guy too many, but I forgive them.
3. Crash - Written by Paul Haggis and Bobby Moresco. Directed by Haggis. Stars (to name a few) Don Cheadle, Sandra Bullock, Matt Dillon, Michael Pena, Terence Howard and Thandie Newton. Some of my friends are like, "Crash is overrated. It was so contrived...the ending was unbelievable...the Sandra Bullock/Brendan Fraser storyline didn't really pay off..." etc. OK, no, yes, yes and yes. You know what. Who cares? What about what the movie did right? How honest it was about hidden racial attitudes. How it got exactly right the isolation and dystopia that is living in Los Angeles, circa 2005. Did the end remind a little too much of P.T. Anderson's superior Magnolia (1999)? Maybe. But this movie had not one, but three of the best, most searing dramatic moments in the movies from last year, it was honest, courageous and beautifully acted by all involved. Sounds like at least the third best movie from last year to me.
2. Match Point - Written and directed by Woody Allen. Stars Jonathan Rhys-Myers, Scarlett Johansen, Emily Mortimer, Matthew Goode. I was as shocked as anybody that Match Point was a Woody Allen film...until I remembered that it's really not, it just happens to have been written and directed by him. By penning a moral thriller that strips away most of the annoying "Woodyisms" that have wrecked his films over the last 15 years, by not giving himself a part in the movie opposite a too young female love interest, by getting out of his beloved Manhattan and properly using that country's class structure to slyly inform his material, Allen delivers with a taut, entertaining and surprising drama hopefully points a new direction for him in his final years. Hopefully...
1. The Constant Gardener - Written by Jeffrey Caine, based on John LeCarre's novel. Directed by Fernando Mireilles. Stars Ralph Fiennes, Rachel Weisz, Danny Huston, Pete Postlewaite, Bill Nighy. Set amongst the beauty of the east African landscape and the ugliness of that region's crushing poverty, The Constant Gardener is a thriller that manages to skirt formula, deliver the goods and still convey its message not with didacticism but instead a sad, slow shake of the head. Someone is conspiring to test pharmaceuticals on poor African women and children without their consent. The diplomat's wife (Weisz) is on to it. It ruins nothing to say she is murdered when she gets too close to the truth--her character is seen only in flashbacks from the second reel on. The rest of the movie is about how the diplomat--perfectly cast and played by Fiennes--awakes from his civilized, compromised slumber, opens his eyes and dedicates himself not only to finding and avenging his wife's killers but also slaying the guilt he feels at the role his nation plays in exploiting a whole continent. This is great, poetic, romatic, politically searing filmmaking. This was the best picture I saw in 2005.
Best Lead Actor: Heath Ledger, Brokeback Mountain. He narrowly gets the nod over Joaquin Phoenix, Terence Howard (Hustle & Flow) and Phillip Seymour Hoffman (Capote). His performance holds together an overrated movie, audiences mainline his character's pain and confusion because he's so good at drawing us into him, even though he's a man of few words.
Best Lead Actress: Joan Allen, The Upside of Anger. You won't find her in any year end awards ceremonies and that's too bad. She took what could have been a sitcom part and turned it into an indelible and memorable portrayal.
Best Supporting Actress: Rachel Weisz, The Constant Gardener. A shoo-in for the Oscar (I think), Weisz' character is arguably the most important character in the movie, but slips into this category because she dies in the first 45 minutes. But there's no movie without her and she manages to be playful, scornful, sexy, manipulative, nurturing and mysterious every time she appears on screen.
Best Supporting Actor: Matt Dillon, Crash. He does a great job in two of the year's most searing dramatic scenes--first, molesting an Black woman (Thandie Newton) in full view of her enraged, but powerless husband during a routing traffic stop and then later (warning: spoiler alert) rescuing that same woman from her burning car after a traffic accident. You won't see better work this year. Also a nod of much respect to Ian McDarmid as Emperor Palpatine in Star Wars--in a movie series known more for it's special effects then for it's generally wooden acting, McDarmid brought real menace, subtlety and gravitas to his role as the evil Emperor who winds up turning Anakin to the darkside.
Best Ensemble Cast: Syriana. Everyone does standout work, especially George Clooney, as a veteran CIA agent who suddenly finds himself out in the cold and Matt Damon, as a cynical, opportunistic financial advisor retained by an Arabian oil prince to remake his empire. Even small parts, like Tim Blake Nelson's oily lobbyist, delivers some of the best lines of the year with brio.
Whew! That's enough for now. Sometime next week: the year's best in music including five recommended downloads that you might not have heard on the radio.
Peace...let's get out of Iraq and soon.
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