They Shoot Horses Don't They: The Film vs The Book

Based on the fascinating sub-culture of dance marathons that popped up as a form of exploitative Depression-era entertainment, They Shoot Horses Don't They was written by Horace McCoy in 1935 based on his own experience as a bouncer at some of them in California. It took over three decades to adapt the film. By that time, it was more of a time capsule than period commentary.

Both the film and book feature an extremely depressed character who has to be put to death through assisted suicide (sorry about the spoiler but the title sort of gives it away in both case), but the book portrays the lead character as someone who can't see the hope in her lot in life whereas the film is more of a direct commentary on how capitalism has created a crapsack world for the people at the bottom. After all, they're forced to dance for their supper, what could be more metaphorical.

First some background:

The idea of a free dance contest with the last man standing winning a big prize seems like an easy idea to romanticize alongside Gatsbyesque parties. At the time, dancing was associated with the liberation of the jazz age and  a healthy rebellion against puritan mores. But with the desperation bought on by the depression, contestants became more and more adept at gaming the system. The contestants learned to sleep standing up and were increasingly ok with a small chance in hell of getting a prize because the guarantee of free meals, health care, and shelter was enough. The promoters made bank on offering these as cheap sideshow attractions where people could spectate and feel superior to the dancers.

Now back to the film:

In the world of dance marathons, we find Gloria (a young Jane Fonda) who is pretty much at the end of her rope in terms of hope for herself or the world around her. It's a novelty in and of itself that a character in such a state of depression was made the protagonist of a film in the first place. The book offers some more backstory about how she had to enter into a sexless marriage in Texas just to have a roof over her head. Gloria exists in a time and place where she doesn't have agency to earn a living. Her decision to go to Hollywood isn't driven by the kind of "42nd Street"-type dream of being a star. Rather she just thinks she might be able to make some cash as an extra.

Gloria is paired up with a down-on-his-luck actor named Robert (Michael Sarrazin, if you haven't heard of that name, don't worry) who has grander artistic ambitions (again, the book delves into this by mentioning that he'll use his prize money to finance a short film) but needs the immediate money of a good project.

The story features an eclectic cast of characters for the other dancers. In both the book and the film, experienced couple Ruby and James (a young Bruce Dern and Bonnie Bedelia) represent the true-to-life phenomenon of professional dancers entering the contests to provide fame recognition. There's also a temptress for Robert played by Susannah York and a chipper elderly sailor (who only exists in the film) played by Oscar-winner Red Buttons.

In the book, there's also a contestant who is forced to leave the contest because he's wanted for murder, a jealous Spanish dancer, Pedro, who shoots the organizer in frustration, and her partner who doubles James and Ruby in being experienced and providing exposition.

One might assume these characters were eliminated in the film adaptation because they have their own storylines that complicate the central theme of doom. Pedro, like Gloria, chooses to want to throw away his future which is contrasting to those who play by the rules of the contest. I originally assumed that Buttons' character was added into the cast as a way to add color and diversify the age range, but his demise (I won't spoil his fate completely) adds to the sense of doom.

And then there's the devious show promoter, Rocky, who riles up the audience on the mic. Character actor Gig Young won an Oscar for the role as a man who knew how to keep the crowds entertained. As York's character has a nervous breakdown, he shows a shred of humanity in getting her to safety, but for the most part, the film hinges on the slow reveal of just how villainous he and the contest are.

The book actually splits Rocky's role into two: Rocky is the announcer but the man behind the scenes is his boss Socks Donald takes over behind the scenes. For the most part, they're relatively moral people trying to make a buck.

Additionally, Gloria's negativity is countered with far more first-person narration talking about just how miserable Robert is because Gloria is his partner. It's possibly repeated so often because Robert is dealing with guilt for shooting Gloria.

Book vs Movie
The movie has the electric performances of Jane Fonda, Bruce Dern, Gig Young, and Red Buttons, but the book is more than just a cesspool of depression. A depressed character in a depressed world isn't as rich as a depressed character in a difficult world whose choice to give up is contrasted by various people with the same circumstances across the spectrum of hope.

New Oscar nominees I saw 1917, Parasite, Little Women plus Judy (and JoJo Rabbit)

I watched "1917" "Parasite" and "Little Woman" and felt they were excellent choices for the Oscar. Although it's not in the video, "JoJo Rabbit" also blew me away.

With "Little Woman", I admit I had a bit of bias against both period pieces of this era and
films that seemed to be targeted to females. I had to push through those biases in the first half hour to keep my mind on the movie but once the love triangles and tuberculosis and family problems mounted, I am glad I stuck it through. The film is emotionally there but has its own sense of joy about those lucky
enough to be born to a family of sisters. The film celebrates an earlier era of courtship where people didn’t meet grinding on the dance floor or on dating apps while also commenting on the distances it might create. On the whole, it's a very emotionally satisfying movie.


"1917", "Parasite", and "Jojo Rabbit" all blew me away.


"1917" is a technical marvel that makes you aware of the additive value of good cinematography in the best possible way. Roger Deakins is perhaps the only household name among cinematographers and he will be even more famed after this. Like "Little Woman" the film starts off slow and it builds and someone on home viewing might give up on it but that would be a massive shame because the film is an emotional ride. It's almost existential as a man has to find his purpose and then his purpose overtakes him to the point of exhaustion and everything else.


"JoJo Rabbit" I was concerned about because I'd just seen "Death of Stalin" and "Life is Beautiful" so I thought this has been done before but I don't know why I made this foolish mistake in retrospect: How many films have there really been in this genre?  The film makes the right movie at every juncture of the story and is supremely clever in its view of the war from a child's point of view. Sam Rockwell, once again, is great (he's on quite a roll), and Scarlet Johansson steals the show. She handles the arduous task of raising a difficult child as a single mother with such joy and resolve that I have no problem with her winning an Oscar this year. It handles World War II with a mix British absurdist humor (not unlike Monty Python which tackled the same subject matter), poetry and sentiment.


"Parasite" is the kind of deep dive into class that you don't see too often. It's extraordinarily layered in symbolism and visually dense. The film's biggest trick is introducing us to a tragedy (the class divide), but showing a larger tragedy lurking underneath the surface and building up the tension until these two tragedies collide. It plays with time and dramatic irony (what some characters know while others don't) perfectly well.

"Judy" is basically a TV movie with a good performance but what's the point of a movie if only to show off a good performance?





And here's my JoJo Rabbit review (with two strangers)

Definitive Top Ten List of 2002

This is again, taking a set of criteria and applying it to a certain year. Here's my take on 2002, discuss amongst yourselves

2002:

1. Chicago, Rob Marshall

-Won best picture

-Actors, directors considered locks and got a screenplay nom

-Won art direction awards

-Considered more successful mainstream improvement to Chicago

2. Pianist, Roman Polanski

-Won screenplay, actor and director awards despite Polanski’s PR problems

-Untouchable for critics to knock

-Won New York film critics award

3. Gangs of New York, Martin Scorsesee

-Hailed by Ebert as #1

-Had most nominations

-Had some supporters who felt it was Scorsesee’s return to form

-Oscar buzz for Sorsesee as best director

4. The Hours, Tom Daldry

-Won drama award but considered just a little bit too oscar-buzzy

-Won actress award and had 3 solid performances all oscar worthy

-Adaptation nomination

-NBR Review award

5. Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, Peter Jackson

-Nominated for best picture

6. Far From Heaven, Todd Haynes

-EW Predicted it in final 5

-Won snub poll of 6^th contender

-Named as #1 movie of the year by Lisa Schwarzbum

-Many top 10 accolades

-Positioned Julianne Moore for a win and best screenplay award for a win

7. About Schmidt, Alexander Payne

-Alexander Payne’s best performance of Nicholson which got him an academy award

-Runner-Up in NYC Film Critic Awards

8. Road to Perdition, Sam Mendes

-Received with great buzz and hailed by Washington Post’s Tom Shales as a must-see even if it didn’t live up to expections

-Buzz for against-type Tom Hanks role with Jude Law and Daniel Craig and Paul Newman in great supporting roles

-Big Production feel with cinematography and art direction awards going towards a lock

-One of approximately 7 or 8 films on the imdb 250 from the year

9. Adaptation, Spike Jonze

-Worthy followup to John Makovitch by Jonze/Kaufman team that was even more mainstream in some cases

-Nominations abound for acting parts

-Screenplau contender

10. Catch Me If You Can, Stephen Spielberg

-Held its own against many of the great December releases during Oscar season

-Considered for golden globe nominations for Spielberg and generated oscar buzz

-Box office success

10 biggest oscar injustices of the decade

Biggest Oscar Mistakes of the Decade so far:

1. Denzel Washington winning over Russell Crowe in Training Day for best actor, 2001
Crowe gave an amazing performance as mathematician John Nash and was considered one of the two front-runners for the best actor award along with Washington . To some extent, Russell was hurting himself. He apparently got really angry and barked at the orchestra conductor for cutting him off at the BAFTA awards when he was giving his Oscar Award Acceptance Speech and his reputation as a jerk was starting to catch up to him. What was truly ridiculous, though, was that Queen-of-Hollywood Julia Roberts said she couldn’t imagine a world in which Denzel Washington didn’t have an oscar. Uh, did she forget about his best supporting actor oscar for Glory? If best supporting doesn’t count in Julia’s mind, I’d like to see her break the news to Sean Connery, Anjelica Huston, Shelley Winters, Joe Pesci, Michael Caine, Judi Dench and the like. Plus, the Oscars had Sidney Poitier as the Honorary Award Winner, so the votes were transparently an effort to make it African-American appreciation night. If the academy was a little more patient in crowning a worthy successor to Sidney Poitier as lead actor winner, it could have waited 3 more years for Jamie Foxx or another possibly another 2 after that when Forest Whitaker takes the lead oscar award this February.

2. Cold Mountain losing best songs and score to Lord of the Rings, 2003
I can’t imagine an Annie Lennox song would ever beat a song written by Sting in a music competition, EXCEPT when a song written by Annie Lennox appears on the end credits of a steamrolling juggernaut like Lord of the Rings while Sting’s beautifully haunting song appears in the film A Cold Mountain which didn’t have as good of a run at the Oscars. In addition, Lennox’s song was just a bland ballot while Sting and Krauss’ song You Will be my Ain True Love as well as the song The Scarlett Tide cowritten by Krauss and T-Bone Burnett, both organically blended into Civil War North Carolina ’s bluegrass setting, which is what a good movie song should do. The artists who contributed music to the film went on a hit national tour that summer “The Cold Mountain Music Tour.” Was there a “Lord of the Rings” soundtrack tour?
My problem with this win was twofold. First, Lord of the Rings’ steamrolling through ever oscar category made for the most boring ceremony I’ve ever seen and nowhere more than the best song (and best score category) was it evident that voters were just penciling in Lord of the Rings for everything rather than thinking about it on a category-by-category basis. Second, movie songs have the potential to be the next biggest category after picture, acting, and directing due to their crossover appeal but not when their credibility is ruined with wins like this. I’m not a rap fan, but even I admit that Eminem’s win in 2002 for 8 Mile and Three Six Mafia’s win for Hustle and Flow were necessary to keep the category relevant for contemporary times.

3. Bennett Miller’s best director nomination and Capote’s best picture nomination, 2005
I have to admit that I am in the extreme minority of film critics (the exact figure from rottentomatoes.com is an incredibly low 9%) in disliking Capote, but I disliked the film for resting too heavily on Philip Seymour Hoffman’s performance (which failed in my eyes, because it didn’t convince us that he was as exciting of a figure to be around as much as his biographer and the movie needed us to believe). Although Two Towers is a close second, Capote would have to be the least worthy picture of the decade so far. If you take Hoffman’s performance out of the equation, it’s slow and circuitous.
This is made all the worse by considering the competition that year. 2005 seemed to me to be the deepest year of oscar contending films I’ve ever witnessed. Normally, there are about 10 or 11 pictures that have lofty enough ambitions, excellent enough critical praise and sufficient public enthusiasm to vie for nomination honors (i.e roughly 11 for 2003: Lord of the Rings, Big Fish, Lost in Translation, In America, House of Sand and Fog, Seabiscuit, 21 Grams, Last Samurai, Master and Commander, Mystic River, Cold Mountain and 11 for 2004: Hotel Rwanda, Aviator, Closer, Kinsey, Eternal Sunshine, Phantom of the Opera, The Incredibles, Finding Neverland, Ray, Sideways), but 2005 had over 15: Brokeback Mountain, Munich, Crash, Good Night and Good Luck, Capote, Walk the Line, The Constant Gardener, A History of Violence, Match Point, New World, King Kong, Syrianna, Cinderella Man, Cache, Squid and the Whale, Rent and Pride and Prejudice.
Even worse than a failure to get the best picture nod is that for the first time in 24 years, this just happened to be the year when all five pictures aligned with all 5 directing nominations. If there was a better time to spread the wealth around, I can’t think of a better year. Peter Jackson proved he could do more than nerdy stories about middle-earth and took King Kong and transcended the blockbuster by getting many 4-star reviews and taking it up to 5th on critical top ten appearances for the year. Fernando Meirelles crossed over to the English language and explored a new continent with career-best performances for Ralph Feinnes and Rachel Weicz and a solid adaptation of a John La Carrerre novel in The Constant Gardener. Woody Allen turned in his best work in decades and changed his tone completely in Matchpoint. Terrence Malick had a brilliant return-to-form in The New World and David Cronenberg pleased audiences and critics alike with A History of Violence. Even if you liked the movie Capote, you’d have to be a little worried about the integrity of your category if you’re going to invite someone who’s only previous credit was the ’98 documentary The Cruise and probably just lucked out with a good slate of actors, into that prestigious group of Oscar-nomination directors.

4. Big Fish’s snub in pretty much everything, 2003
Big Fish was the first victim in what perhaps could be a very long line of victims from the movement of the Oscar ceremony back a month early. It was a rare Oscar contender that scored big numbers in the box office and nearly beat out Lord of the Rings: Return of the King during its January opening (initial box office reports deemed it 1st for the weekend) aside from being considered a high-water mark in Tim Burton’s career. But with Oscar season ballots being due a month or two sooner, it had little chance to be viewed by anyone and only earned one nomination: best score. The same thing happened to Terrence Malick’s brilliant The New World (only shown in an uncut version in 2 theaters nationwide on December 29th and 30th before opening in wide release in mid-January and similarly only earned a single nomination in the cinametography category) a month later and it could easily happen this year with late entries this year such as Letters of Iwo Jima or Pan’s Labrynth, although the extreme build-up of films in the last two weeks of the year isn’t a good thing.

5. Lord of the Ring: Two Towers ’ Nomination for best picture over Far From Heaven, 2002
Even though I liked A Beautiful Mind and felt it worthy of the best picture award, I kind of wish that Lord of the Rings won, or at least it won a few awards that year, just so it wouldn’t dominate the Oscars the next two years and take so many worthy awards away from other films. Considering this was the second in a trilogy and voters could’ve easily waited for Return of the King to atone for Fellowship’s loss, which they were planning on doing anyway, this was a complete waste of a perfectly useful best picture nomination on another worthy film. Far From Heaven, widely considered to have been sixth in line for the nomination, was a well-crafted homage to the Douglas Sirk movies of the 1950s and would have been far more widely remembered today if it had a best picture nomination to give it a longer shelf life.

6. The Aviator’s supporting acting snubs: Alan Alda over Alec Baldwin and Cate Blanchett over Kate Beckinsdale in the Aviator, 2004
Alec Baldwin’s part was a meatier one than fellow nominee Alan Alda and required far more range. He displayed a little bit of a different tone as the standard tough guy role that he usually plays and that he was nominated for the previous year in The Cooler. An astute observer might have seen that it was an equally worthy performance as The Cooler and possibly more worthy. His character in The Aviator wasn’t completely ruthless, it was more shades of gray. He was ruthless underneath a veneer of diplomacy.
In chosing between the love interests of Leo DiCaprio’s Howard Hughes for an oscar nomination, the academy also got it wrong. Kate Beckinsdale was more deserving of a nomination than Cate Blanchett, in my opinion. Blanchett probably got the nomination because of her higher profile and because she played perennial Oscar winner Katherine Hepburn, while Beckinsdale played Ava Gardner, who had never won one. If you take out the factor of who the two were portraying, you’ll find that Beckinsdale played the more interesting character and had more meaningful moments in her scenes with DiCaprio. Blanchett’s win in a crowded category that included National Board of Review winner Virginia Madsen for “Sideways” and Laura Linney for “Kinsey” was an even greater injustice.

7. Catherine Zeta-Jones’ win over Meryl Streep in the best supporting actress category in 2002
Aside from the fact that Streep had the best performance in the category and one of her best in years, Zeta-Jones’ win was flat-out illogical for the fact that she didn’t really resonate past the singing and dancing of the performance. It was clear the Oscar committee felt the need to reward the ensemble effort of Chicago with an acting oscar of some sort. Aside from creating an ensemble category which would really make sense in these situations, if they felt a need to award an oscar to someone, I would have gone for Rene Zellweger, who, for my money, was deserving of an oscar in her category anyway. While Kidman in “The Hours” and Moore in “Far From Heaven” were both carefully studied portraits that were deserving as well, Zellweger was the heart and soul of Chicago and infused a surface that was all about glitz and glamour with emotional vulnerability.

8. Chocolat’s best picture nomination, 2000
I read the book Inside Oscar 2 which had the backstory on the oscar race and apparently it did test very well with audiences and critics nationwide. I saw about a third of this picture so I’m not really in a position to comment on it but it seemed incredibly lightweight and its incredibly transparent theme of chocolate as a metaphor for joy and freedom from class-mandate oppression almost seemed like a parody of the heavier themes that Oscar films usually contain.

9. Phillip Seymour Hoffman’s extreme front-runner status for Capote, 2005
I don’t think Phillip Seymour Hoffman’s win for Capote was a ridiculous choice, so much as I thought it was ridiculous how much of a leg up Hoffman had over the competition. Hoffman did a spot-on impression of iconic author Truman Capote, but so did co-nominees Joaquin Pheonix and David Strathain. Pheonix’s channeling of Cash’s repressed anger in “Walk the Line” was downright disturbing and should have given him serious consideration for an oscar in any given year, and Strathain’s ice-cold subtleties as Edward R. Murrow in “Good Night and Good Luck” was very affecting. While Strathain didn’t have the opportunities for the intense moments that Hoffman or Pheonix’s parts came with, you appreciate the magnitude of Murrow’s presence when he’s debating the real-life Senator McCarthy (taken through archival footage) and looks convincing doing it. It seemed throughout the oscar race, that Hoffman was a certain winner from the start, and I just found it disappointing that not even a few of the critics’ awards went Strathain or Pheonix’s way and that there wasn’t much debate about it.
As opposed to Joaquin Pheonix who managed to find his place in top billing roles pretty early in his career, Hoffman has gotten a lot of love from his peers and hard-core fans for doing good work in small roles in films such as Scent of a Woman, Talented Mr. Ripley, Big Lebowski and Boogie Nights which might be part of the love that Hoffman is always receiving.

10. Paul Newman’s loss to Chris Cooper for best supporting actor, 2002
It was a hard decision with five worthy candidates, simply put, so I don’t think it was a great Oscar injustice. In this case, I just disagreed with who was best, although Chris Cooper’s win could have been compensation for co-stars Meryl Streep and Nicholas Cage not being able to win their respective categories. Newman was sublimely delightful and out of his element in the film. Like Denzel Washington in Training Day, it was a riveting transformation to the dark side for Newman, whose screen persona has never stretched that far over to the evil side yet.

Da Vinci Code

Critics so far are giving Da Vinci code mixed reviews but when you're making a film based on a book that apparently has sold more copies than any book since the Bible (as Roger Ebert notes: "good thing it had a different ending") the expectations are going to be hard to live up to. The other mistake critics are making is that they're judging the film along the lines of how controversial it is, and are lampooning the usually middle-of-the-road Ron Howard for once again playing it too safe. That makes no sense to me: a movie has to have picketers at its premiere to be considered successful? The fact is that Howard is in a damned-if-you-do damned-if-you-don't situation with the material and he skirted the controversy smartly by just focusing on making a good movie and even if by sticking to the book he won't get the credit for the great story, that's still exactly what he did.

For those of you that didn't read the book, The Da Vinci Code is an intelligent thriller that starts out with a murder at an art museum in France, and a Harvard professor of symbology, Robert Langdon (Hanks) is called upon to help decipher the victim's dying message. Making their way into the story at intersecting points and building up the suspense level are a French cryptologist and granddaughter of the victim, a police chief with a vendetta (Reno), a bishop who heads a controversial sect of Christianity (Molina), a murderous albino monk (Bettany) and an obsessive British aristocrat (McKellan). The story is filled with cliffhangers and surprises at every turn and the film pretty much follows that same pace, being careful not to cut out too much of the interesting tidbits that made the book so interesting in the first place. The story's genius, after all, comes from playing with familiar historical events suggesting they didn't happen exactly the way we thought they did.

For those of you who have read the book, don't worry, it's not by any means an exact copy of the book. Things are cut and moved around and at least a couple of key elements are changed for the better. For example, Bezu Fache, the policeman, is a member of Opus Dei in the film, which makes for more sensible character motives, and Robert Langdon is a religious man which makes for a slightly more open-ended approach to the religious controvoursey. What really makes the movie work, however, is the casting. Audrey Tatou, Paul Bettany, and Ian McKellan are all vastly underrated actors who give Tom Hanks great support and enhance the movie. McKellan's devious scholar seems to comes straight out of an Indiana Jones movie, and Paul Bettany makes Silas the albino monk sufficiently scary but surprisingly human at the same time.

My friend has a review at:
http://zerogrizzly.blogspot.com/

Best Ensemble Award from the past few years

Here's what my picks would've been for the last 5 years if the oscars had a best ensemble category. I think they should have an ensemble award because
1. It's a great award to debate
2. Obviously the acting awards are popular
3. It promotes teamwork
4. The actors don't have to get the oscars, they can go to the casting director




Nonetheless, here's what i would've picked, actually not what i personally would have picked but a relatively objective take i'd have been happy with. For instance, i hated PS Hoffman's performance in Capote and that would disqualify it out of the top 5 for me, but i acknowledge that a lot of people did like Phillip Seymour's performance, and so therefore i have to credit him for moving a lot of people with his performance.

2005: Brokeback Mountain OR Crash (wasn't a fan of either movie but as a concession to the fact that everyone loved them and they vied for top awards in most categories, i'll let my naysayers take their pick of one, i'd pick Brokeback, i think)
Syrianna (and i do strongly feel it should have been included)
Good Night and Good Luck
Batman Begins (wouldn't be considered for an oscar in any other non-technical category, but as casts for summer blockbusters go, i'd give it to this)
Capote

2004:
Sideways
Closer-Small but effective ensemble
Million Dollar Baby (hmmm, actually didn't see it yet, but who am i to argue with a best picture oscar winner)
Aviator-Jude Law and Wilhem DeFoe were filling out bit parts in this? That's how deep the talent level was
Ray-Did anyone even notice that guys like Terrence Howard were in this?
Runner-Up: Troy-With Orlando Bloom, Eric Bana, Peter O'Toole, Sean Bean, Brandon Gleason, and Brian Cox in supporting roles, this had the potential to win

2003:
*Note, i don't believe in awarding sequels unless they're better than the original or change it in some way, so i'll just award LOTR for 2001
1. House of Sand and Fog
2. 21 Grams-3 Good Leads
3. Cold Mountain-Everyone was great, especially Law at the helm, and Brandon Gleason, Ethan Suplee and Jack White as the gang of musical vagabonds were actually pretty good. Don't forget Giovanni Ribisi and PS Hoffman in bit roles
4. Mystic River-Although I think when you think about it, Tim Robbins and Sean Penn were both a little overdramatic, but there was a definite professional caliber of actors in that film
5. Seabiscuit

2002:
1. Road to Perdition-Daniel Craig and Jude Law could have been awarded best supporting actors right there, if they had stronger oscar campaigns and I think it was one of Tom Hanks' better roles
2. Adaptation-Cage, Strep, Cooper plus a lot of other goodies: Judy Greer, Tilda Swenson, Ron Livingston
3. The Hours
4. Chicago
5. 25th Hour-Ed Norton, Brian Cox, Rosario Dawson, Barry Pepper, Anna Paquin, and Phillip Seymour Hoffman in case anyone forgot

2001:
1. A Beautiful Mind-Once again, i didn't even realize that Anthony Rapp from Rent, Adam Goldberg from the Street and Josh Lucas who would later become a star were in this film
2. Royal Tannenbaums-Best Wes Anderson cast ever assembles, quietly strong performances by Paltrow, Glover and Huston were there best in years, and good use of Kumar Pullada. A great use of Gene Hackman as well and show of his comedic side.
3. Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Rings: Interestingly enough Christopher Lee has by now been in Lord of the Rings, James Bond, and Star Wars
4. In the Bedroom: Interesting that Marissa Thomei could get nominated for an oscar after people felt she absolutely didn't deserve her first to the point that they called foul on it (for My Cousin Vinny)
5. Godsford Park: Without a doubt

2000:
1. Traffic
2. The Contender-What insightful uses for guys like Christain Slater and Gary Oldman
3. You Can Count on Me-The executive producer had to fight for Mark Ruffallo since he was an unknown quantity back then
4. Almost Famous
5. Wonderboys