Nominees: The Double Life of Veronique, Flirting, Let Him Have It, Only Yesterday, The Silence of the Lambs, The Rapture, Diksha, Center Stage
Oscars pick: The Silence of the Lambs
Nominees: Beauty and the Beast, Bugsy, JFK, Prince of Tides
It's disconcerting how many of my favorite movies from 91 have not aged well. Watching them again, they were too sappy or obvious or corny or preachy or simplistic or clichéd... titles such as The Doctor, Fried Green Tomatoes, Boyz n the Hood and Dogfight were still good, but not great. (Because Kafka isn't on DVD, I wasn't afforded the opportunity to ruin my memory of that one)
Even big guns like Oliver Stone's gripping if factually manipulative JFK showed some wear. It still earns a lot of style points and is a cleverly constructed piece. But it is overwrought and heavy-handed. When Costner gives his final summation and his voice cracks and he looks right into the camera as he delivers his final line, I had to roll my eyes. I felt like I was being browbeaten and scolded. Gee-wiz Oliver, why not have Costner wag his finger and go "Tsk, tsk, tsk" while you're at it.
What about Beauty and the Beast? While Belle is a well-rounded, strong female character -- the story felt rushed, and curiously, I wasn't mad for the music. Overall, it doesn't charm me as the Little Mermaid did. As for the other Oscar contenders - Bugsy was good, Prince of Tides was bad, and nothing was right for my Best Picture award.
I thought it was neat that Silence of the Lambs won Best Picture. It was a bold move for Oscar going for something so dark and nasty. Regardless, it was a film I enjoyed more for the performances and the character of Hannibal Lecter than anything. It's a solid nominee, but I feel it falters in its final reel, where it stretches credibility and the narrative voice got fuzzy.
I was cool towards La Belle Noiseuse, Thelma and Louise, Delicatessen and Cape Fear. I was warm about Impromptu (With Judy Davis' fun, broad performance as George Sand) The Man in the Moon (with a young Reese Witherspoon) and Albert Brooks' Defending Your Life -- but not as my best pictures.
I did manage to find a group of worthy nominees (I'm especially fond of the Australian coming of age romance, Flirting, Peter Medek's look at the life of Derek Bentley in Let Him Have It and Kieslowski's delicate metaphysical poem, The Double Life of Veronique), but as for the Felix, I guess I'll go with Zhang Yimou's Raise the Red Lantern, which is a sumptuous looking piece about 4 wives who vie for their master’s attention. Paul Brenner called it, "a moving exploration of power in a suffocating world of ossified tradition." While Roger Ebert noted... "RtRL is told so directly and beautifully, with such confidence, with so little evidence of compromise. It is the product of a time when the new Chinese film industry could support such work, but had not yet learned to meddle with it."
The film is cold and reserved and the camera doesn't move very much -- the blocking and composition almost seem like a cage, and David Parkinson from Empire suggests that "The consistent use of delimiting framing devices reinforced the overall sense of repression."
Honorable Mentions:
Anthony Hopkins, The Silence of the Lambs * Val Kilmer, The Doors * Viggo Mortensen & David Morse, The Indian Runner * Christopher Eccleston, Let Him Have It * Nana Patekar, Diksha * Albert Brooks, Defending Your Life * Stellan Skarsgård, The Ox * Graham Greene, Clearcut * Utpal Dutt, Agantuk (The Stranger)
Honorable Mentions:
Gong Li, Raise the Red Lantern * Irène Jacob, The Double Life of Veronique * Jodie Foster, The Silence of the Lambs * Judy Davis, Impromptu * Reese Witherspoon, The Man in the Moon * Maggie Cheung, Center Stage * Victoria Abril, High Heels * Juliette Binoche, The Lovers on the Bridge
