The Perpetual Three-Dot Column
The Perpetual Three-Dot Column
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by Jesse Walker

Tuesday, December 22, 2015
NOW TWENTY: On Sunday I listed my favorite films of 2005. Today we'll jump another decade into the past.

When the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences looked back at 1995, it gave its Best Picture award to Braveheart. That has some good bits, but these are better:

1. Safe
Written and directed by Todd Haynes

A parable about an egoless person who consumes her life rather than living it, even—or especially—when she turns her back on "consumerism."

2. Smoke
Directed by Wayne Wang
Written by Paul Auster

An ode to connections and coincidence.

3. Twelve Monkeys
Directed by Terry Gilliam
Written by David and Janet Peoples, from a story by Chris Marker

The shot of a giraffe galloping through a city is one of my favorite moments in any movie.

4. Mabarosi
Directed by Hirokazu Kore-eda
Written by Yoshihisa Ogita, from a novel by Teru Miyamoto

Tricks of the light.

5. Toy Story
Directed by John Lasseter
Written by Joss Whedon, Andrew Stanton, Joel Cohen, and Alec Sokolow, from a story by Lasseter, Stanton, Pete Docter, and Joe Ranft

"This isn't flying. This is falling with style."

6. The City of Lost Children
Directed by Marc Caro and Jean-Pierre Jeunet
Written by Caro, Jeunet, Gilles Adrien, and Guillaume Laurant

If Twelve Monkeys was 1995's best semi-surrealist science-fiction saga, this is the movie for viewers who prefer their surrealism without a "semi" prefixed.

7. Shanghai Triad
Directed by Zhang Yimou
Written by Bi Feiyu, from a novel by Li Xiao

A gangster movie in an opium haze.

8. Funny Bones
Directed by Peter Chelsom
Written by Chelsom and Peter Flannery

This is Jerry Lewis' best performance—and no, I'm not the sort of person who thinks the phrase "Jerry Lewis' best performance" is a punchline.

9. Get Shorty
Directed by Barry Sonnenfeld
Written by Scott Frank, from a novel by Elmore Leonard

It's easy to mock so many of the movies that tried to copy Pulp Fiction. But this one's good.

10. Welcome to the Dollhouse
Written and directed by Todd Solondz

"All of junior high school sucks. High school's better....They'll call you names, but not as much to your face."

Honorable mentions:

11. La Cérémonie (Claude Chabrol)
12. Tierra (Julio Medem)
13. Electronic Superhighway (Nam June Paik)
14. The Drivetime (Antero Alli)
15. Clueless (Amy Heckerling)
16. Whisper of the Heart (Yoshifumi Kondō)
17. A Close Shave (Nick Park)
18. Underground (Emir Kusturica)
19. The Wife (Tom Noonan)
20. Casino (Martin Scorsese)

A bonus Best Documentary prize goes to Nick Broomfield for Heidi Fleiss: Hollywood Madam. And a bonus Best Mockumentary prize goes to Peter Jackson and Costa Botes for Forgotten Silver.

Of the films of 1995 that I haven't seen, I'm most interested in The Flower of My Secret.


posted by Jesse 7:32 PM
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