2002 Film List - Page 5

Updated with Adaptation.

Updated with Dog Soldiers well done action scenes, sound designs, and the characterizations of the soldiers. But the non-action scenes are a chore to sit through as every hoary military and horror movie cliche is trotted out. The cinematography and production design make this seem more like a sci-fi channel or syndicated TV product rather than a feature film.

But feeling generous, I'll give a B- for effort.

Updated with Joe Carnahan's Narc.

~Edwin

John Q
2 of 10
The 2 is only for the acting by Washington and Woods. Everything else sucked, including the other acting. Horribly manipulative, hoaky most of the time, and terribly cliched writing. It seemed moderate early on, but in the third act it becomes downright awful. Characters flip-flopping, odd, unclear roles for some characters, and a requirement that the audience suspend all questions of reason most of the time.

A damn shame because with that cast and the basic idea you could have had the tension of a Dog Day Afternoon rather than sugar-coated crap.

A very, very late 2002 list.

8 Mile /
11"09'01 /
The 51st State /
About A Boy /
Adaptation /
Austin Powers in Goldmember /
Bend It Like Beckham /
Blade II /
The Bourne Identity /
Bowling For Columbine /
Brotherhood of the Wolf /
Changing Lanes /
City of God /
Collateral Damage /
Crossroads / ZERO STARS
Das Experiment /
Die Another Day /
Dogtown and Z-Boys /
Eight Legged Freaks /
Enigma /
E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial (ineligable for 2002 Best Of List)/
Frailty /
Gangs of New York /
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets /
Ice Age /
Insomnia /
Jin-Roh /
Kissing Jessica Stein /
The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers /
Men In Black II /
Metropolis /
Minority Report /
Monsoon Wedding /
My Big Fat Greek Wedding /
One Hour Photo /
Orange County /
Panic Room /
The Quiet American /
Red Dragon /
Resident Evil /
Road To Perdition /
Scooby Doo /
Scorpion King /
Sex & Lucia /
Signs /
Spider /
Spider-Man /
Spirited Away /
Spy Kids 2: The Island Of Lost Dreams /
Star Trek: Nemesis /
Star Wars: Episode II - Attack Of The Clones /
Storytelling /
The Time Machine /
Undisputed /
We Were Soldiers /
Windtalkers /
xXx /
Y Tu Mama Tambien /

Four stars:
City of God
Metropolis
Minority Report
Spirited Away
Y Tu Mama Tambien

Three and a half stars:
Blade II
Changing Lanes
Dogtown and Z-Boys
Frailty
The Quiet American
Sex & Lucia
Signs
Spy Kids 2: The Island Of Lost Dreams
Storytelling

Three stars:
The Bourne Identity
Brotherhood of the Wolf
Das Experiment
Gangs of New York
Ice Age
Insomnia
Jin-Roh
Kissing Jessica Stein
Monsoon Wedding
Orange County
Panic Room
Resident Evil
Spider
We Were Soldiers

Two and a half stars:
Die Another Day
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
One Hour Photo
Red Dragon
Road To Perdition
Scorpion King
Star Wars : Episode II - Attack of the Clones

Two stars:
Austin Powers in Goldmember
Collateral Damage
Enigma
My Big Fat Greek Wedding
xXx

One and a half stars:
11"09'01
Spider-Man
Star Trek: Nemesis
Undisputed
Windtalkers

One Star:
The 51st State
Bend It Like Beckham
Eight Legged Freaks
The Time Machine

Half a Star:
Men In Black II
Scooby Doo

Zero Stars - which has the dubious honour of being the worst film I've seen all year.
Crossroads

Updated with 2 heart-wrenchers, the very good Rabbit-Proof Fence and the fantastic Talk To Her

Updated with:

25th Hour (**** / ****)

Lovely and Amazing (***1/2 /****)

Narc (*** / ****)

The Good Girl (*** / ****)

K-19 The Widowmaker (**1/2 / ****)

Lowell

Updated with The Hours. Eh; I'm reminded of the time in tenth grade English when I was the only person in my class with a Y-chromosome to finish The Awakening. It's technically and artistically very well-done, but as much as I admired the performances and the adaptation and the editing (really masterful), I never managed to feel much emotional connection to these characters. , but a relatively hollow one.

The Hours
9.5 of 10
I probably feel a bit similar to what Jason felt. However, I was connected to the characters, especially Harris and Streep. But I was a little detached from the overall theme of the film, especially in how Woolf was being tied into the 50's and modern era stories. I guess it was just how her writing affected these people. To me that aspect, while generally interesting, didn't make a connection strongly enough to blow me away. It's a very solid film and I will check it out on DVD, but I'll skip the purchase.

Who knows, maybe it will win me over.


BTW, the theater was packed with old ladies fresh off the Globes win.

Updated with Stephen Daldry's The Hours.

~Edwin

Added three new ones:

Halloween: Resurrection - - Starts out awful and only gets worse. Poorly paced, non-scary, with obnoxious leads and a paint-by-numbers blueprint. Limp and terrible.

S1m0ne - - Beware of the film that promptly becomes precisely what it was originally trying to mock. Pacino apes and poor Keener struggles with a truly awful role. The few glimmers of cleverness only manage to make the failure that much more annoying.

Narc - - Not much more than a well-acted (and double-length) pilot for a profane cop series, this one benefits from superlative work by Patric and Liotta. Goes through its 'harass the witness / bad cop / stoolie partner' machinations with admirable confidence, so it gains in forcefulness what it lacks in originality. Solid pulp procedural, not much more.

Updated with George Clooney's Confessions Of A Dangerous Mind.

~Edwin

First, after looking at my 2001 list I found that I slightly overrated some films this year in comparison (to be consistent as a measure of quality between the years). In other words I looked a 9s or 8.5s from last year and saw that they were equal (IMO) to some of my 10-9s this year so I have adjusted many films downward by .5 to 1 all the way from the 10's to the 6's (not every film was downgraded though).


With that in mind I am also adding:

Confessions of a Dangerous Mind
10 of 10
I now have 7 10's on my list for the year. This film falls in at #3 on my 2002 top 10.

Like Adaptation Kaufman has delivered an amazing script from what would appear to be a rather quirky book. How the life of Chuck Barris could appear so interesting and poignent is beyond me, but it does. Lines of reality are blurred of course, and in the end the film reminded me most in themes of About Schmidt (reflection on a failed life) and A Beautiful Mind (is this guy simply living a delusion created by stress).

Clooney or whomever he had help him have done an outstanding bit of direction here, and the cinematography is also beautiful. I was interested in the film and had hopeful expectations, but this went well beyond them. Sam Rockwell delivers a top notch performance, though short of Oscar levels. Clooney, Roberts and Drew all bring in solid efforts in rather limited roles.

The film is a ton of laughs, yet also thoughtful, emotional, and even sweet. I got a lot more from the film than I ever dreamed I would.


About a Boy
9 of 10
Well, this film lived up to the hype. I'm not sure Grant is quite at Oscar level, but the film is maybe as good as something like 4 Weddings and a Funeral or last years excellent Brit import, Billy Elliot. It's a warm, funny film taking yet another look at the irresponsible single male (not unlike Vanilla Sky/Open Your Eyes for example), and while it plays only for feel-good it does it as well as such a film can be done.


CQ
8 of 10
This interesting piece explores the world of filmmaking from the editor's standpoint all while playing with the 70's hippy Sci-Fi genre that brought us films like Barbarella. I enjoyed how the reality and the film world blurred for our protagonist which was done in a very interesting and consistent manner. The only drawback to the film is that it doesn't quite go deep enough into the main character and ends up running rather short (just 88 minutes with credits)

A good piece of work that everyone interested in filmmaking should give a look.

Updated my list with Confessions Of A Dangerous Mind (10/10), which somewhat surprisingly is my favorite Charlie Kaufman-penned film of the year. This is a funny and unexpectedly moving film. George Clooney makes an assured directoral debut, and Sam Rockwell & Drew Barrymore turn in career-best performances.

I've hit the big time, up to 36 now so I can throw down!

updated with What Time Is It There? My new favorite Ming Tsai-Liang film and one of the best of the year. Liang continues his examination of people isolated by modern life, but this film is his most emotive yet; filled with heart, hope, pain, and sadness. It's also surprisingly funny and witty, showing the plight of the characters leavened in unexpected and surprising ways. A

Chicago - Starts well with the spectacle of "All That Jazz" and includes a couple more outstanding numbers, my favorite being the one with the marionettes, but as others have pointed out, it's empty spectacle. There's no heart to this show. I grew steadily less interested as it went past the half way point. Impressed by John C. Reilly, Catherine Zeta-Jones did well with what she had to work with, Zellweger brought too many mannerisms from previous movies to this part and looked rather ghastly compared to Bridget Jones' Diary. Richard Gere was worst of all, while he carried the dialogue well, his singing and dancing were inadequate. And yet again, the modernist cutting style spoils what should be the celebrated fluidity of Bob Fosse. B-

Updated with the French import, Time Out.

~Edwin

I also adjusted my list a little, downgrading Y Tu Mama Tambien to an A- after watching it again last night. Now that I know what happens, I found myself not quite as invested in the character's friendship and not as emotionally involved. Still an excellent film, just not quite as good as some others this year.

Also downgraded Two Towers, and I'm considering upgrading Chicago to a B since I can't get "All That Jazz" out of my head.

Updated with Confessions Of A Dangerous Mind. I liked it quite a bit. George Clooney didn't quite hit the homerun that Denzel Washington did with his directorial debut, but his quirky sensibilities serve him well.

better late than never

2002 Film List
Oscar release (75? total)

About a Boy ***
About Schmidt **1/2
Adaptation ***1/2
Antwone Fisher **
Ararat ***
Austin Powers : Goldmember **1/2
Bad Company
Barbershop **1/2
The Bourne Identity **
Bowling for Columbine ***
Catch Me If You Can ***
City by the Sea *
Changing Lanes **
Chicago **1/2
Confessions of a Dangerous Mind ***
Death to Smoochy
Divine Secrets of The Ya-Ya Sisterhood
The Emperor's Club **1/2
Far From Heaven ***
Femme Fatale *
Frailty ***
Full Frontal *
Gangs of New York **1/2
The Good Girl **1/2
Heaven ***
High Crimes 1/2
The Hours **1/2
Igby Goes Down ***1/2
Insomnia ***
Juwanna Mann *
Kung Pow:Enter The Fist 1/2
The Lord of The Rings : The Two Towers ***
Lovely and Amazing ***
Maid in Manhattan *
Metropolis **1/2
Minority Report ****
Moonlight Mile *1/2
Narc ***1/2
One Hour Photo **1/2
The Quiet American **1/2
Panic Room **1/2
The Pianist ***1/2
Pinocchio *
Possession **1/2
Punch-Drunk Love ***
Rabbit Proof Fence **1/2
Red Dragon ***
The Ring **1/2
Road to Perdition ***
The Rookie **1/2
The Salton Sea ***
The Scorpion King *
Serving Sara *1/2
Signs **1/2
S1m0ne 1/2
Solaris ***1/2
Spider **1/2
Spiderman **
Star Wars: Episode II : Attack of the Clones *1/2
Stolen Summer **
The Sum of All Fears 1/2
Tadpole ***
The Transporter *1/2
Trapped 1/2
The Tuxedo 1/2
25th Hour ***
Undercover Brother ***
Unfaithful **1/2
A Walk To Remember **
We Were Solders **
Welcome to Collinwood **
What Time is it There? ***
White Oleander **
Windtalkers *
Zu Warriors 1/2

.

Updated with the very funny and personal About Schmidt. I've been to several of the Midwest tourist traps Schmidt visits, like Fort Kearney, on family vacations.

B+

Brook, this is "We both went for the gun" sung by Gere. It's also the fav around our house. I bought the album and have been burning the bits of it with playtime.


Sum of All Fears
5 of 10
First half is pretty solid Ryan stuff. Second half is the worst sort of Hollywood crap you can imagine. It felt like they fired the director and brought in Bay/Bruckheimer to "give the film an ending", not unlike the gag in Adaptation. Too bad it was for real in this case. I blame the script at this point unless the editing/direction/ad libbing took things in a drastically new direction on the set. Much of the dialog and scenes were dreadful down the stretch, wasting what could have been on par with the first three films in the series based on the opening and the basic story.

I hate seeing films like this, films with real potential that you see just being wasted in execution. I guess it's time for me to pick up a Clancy novel if I want any more "good" Jack Ryan fixes.

Well, I looked it up and it seems that Paul Attanasio was also the guy who gave us 2 lousy Crichton adaptations. No more "Quiz Show" scripts from him I guess. Reflecting on it I would say that Sum of All Fears does have a very Disclosure/Sphere feel to it in how the story skips along in all the wrong places and seems to focus on the corniest aspects rather than the ideas/methods that were essential to the interest of the original story.

Oh great, I just watched...
Jason X
1 of 10
Hmmm, okay, sounded like a lame concept but you never can tell. Bright colors in contrast to standard darkness. Interesting, though should a Friday the 13th film really look like Star Trek the Next Generation. Why not, the CGI stuff does, might as well be consistent. So we have TV show SF, we have scenes that remind me of Xena (yet another TV comparison, why did this go to the theater anyway), and we have a plot that reminds me a WHOLE lot of Alien(s), both of them.

But there are some over-the-top moments, so maybe it's playing for camp. Sure, some of the time, but other times it's not. This film has no idea what it wants to be and it struck me that perhaps every person on the set had their own vision of what it was supposed to be, and none of them were the same.

Should I discuss the plot that can't even stay consistent with it's own SF devices? No, just assume the worst and you just about have it. (okay, I really wondered how Jason would have any memories of Crystal Lake have the nano-spiders had to build him a new brain based off his DNA using pieces of metal and plastic...sure, okay, they can rebuild a brain from DNA, but the MEMORIES...those are gone when your brain is blown off with a shotgun).

The scariest thing of the film is the script. Just dreadful in every way. Donald Kaufman has outdone himself this time.


It did get a huge laugh from me when Jason X is reborn as Robocop. I mean serious laughter in that unexpected, "WTF is that!?!" sort of way. It has to be one of the stupidest images I've ever seen on film.

Just think, next up for me is 8 Legged Freaks. I'm in rental hell this week.

Updated with Michael Winterbottom's 24 Hour Party People.

~Edwin