Top 120 Movies, Continued (69-60)

This next installment consists of great dramas, primarily with absurdly phenomenal singular performances either by one actor (e.g., Cool Hand Luke) or by two or more actors (A Few Good Men) that overshadowed the fact that the movies would suck in the hands of mere mortals (except for Clerks...will explain below). There is no question these movies have other intangibles beyond the individual actors amazing skill, but seriously...put Nicholas Cage in any one of these movies and it blows. 


69. Cool Hand Luke. Raise your hand if (a) you've never heard of this movie or (b) you've heard of it, but never watched it. "What we've got here is, failure to communicate." Paul Newman's best. You can have the Hustler and The Color of Money, I will take this movie. It epitomizes the cool, unflappable tough guy before the metrosexual revolution destroyed masculinity. Newman plays a vet who is deep in the throes of anomie. He ends up in prison; his choice. And, among the men in prison he feels whole again. From one total institution to the next. He becomes a symbol of hope, determination, and freedom to a bunch of people who have lost all three. He is Christ-like...the movie is so good, you will kick yourself for waiting this long.

68. A Few Good Men. Should be higher up, right? Absolute career-defining job by Tom Cruise; a Barry Bonds-like 2001 season by Jack Nicholson who returns from the dreaded late 80's/early 90's swinging for the fences; a nearly standable job by Demi Moore; underrated perforamances by Kevin Bacon and Kevin Pollack (one of my all-time favorite Robert Horry/Derek Fisher like actors); and a surprising good job by Keifer Sutherland (so good, but overshadowed by everyone else, you forgot he was there!). Most of you have seen it, so all I will say is watch it again...if only for the courtroom scenes. This movie may be a 10 out of 10 in the re-watchable category. TNT puts it on like 100 times a year, and I will watch it from start to finish, or any other time...it gets this rating, perhaps, only because Tom Cruise is in it.

66. The Truman Show. Another career defining/altering movie. A better version of Ed TV which also was prescient in anticipating the reality TV craze of the 2000s, The Truman Show is a almost believeable 'what if' that finds Jim Carrey being adopted by a television corporation, a studio set large enough to be seen from space being constructed to film Carrey's birth, first steps, acne years, marriage, etc., and a whole cast of extras hired to fill the spaces in this make believe world. An entire life created for TV; ironically, people feel attached to him because they know him better than he may know himself. Everything, though, is carefully crafted from the girl who was chosen to 'bump' into him and eventually marry him, to the beer his best friend drinks while sitting on the dock. Maniacal, yet fantastic; cynical, yet so much of a mirror reflecting our real lives and our inordinate obsession with gossip and now reality TV. A serious role for a funny guy, but not like the death of Robin Williams.

65. What's Eating Gilbert Grape? Johnny Depp and Juliette Lewis (so absurdly underrated) dominate a movie that could not exist without them (much like Depp's performance in Bennie and Joon). Lucky for us, DiCraprio couldn't ruin the movie because he plays a retarded younger brother; a role perfect for him. This movie is touching, soft, and a beautiful moment in film.

64. Clerks. The only other Kevin Smith movie to make the list, but not entirely fitting of the others in this grouping. Smith shot this film on the cheap in a convenience store he worked at. His friends are the actors. And while the dialogue is really the selling point of this movie as well as his unique Seinfeld-ian ability to see the irony in the ordinary aspects of everyday life, the acting doesn't detract from the movie. If anything, the New Jersey-ness of the main character Dante adds to the realism of the whole thing. For example, Dante makes mundane, inane questions such as "are the contractors the Empire hires to build the death star in Star Wars to blame for their own decisions or innocent parties simply making a buck" matter to the viewer. As a person who has worked as a clerk at a liquor store, the laughs take on double meanings. But, at the end of the day, the dialogue is witty and intelligent, and will stand up on its own. 

63. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Don't expect the Holy Grail Indiana Jones to make this list. I personally wasn't fooled by the addition of Sean Connery to beef up the sagging series. I am also not fooled by the detractors of the second installment, The Temple of Doom, who prefer the first and the third over the second. Nonsense I say. Let's think about the movie from a cinematographical perspective first: the opening scene...Indy is poisoned, shot at, attacked, chases the antidote across the floor of a club with patrons running for their lives, cuts a huge gong off the ceiling and runs with it to avoid getting shot, jumps out of a window into a car. Ten minutes later, he is on a crashing plane where he jumps out onto an inflatable raft and shoots down the Himalayas only to find himself in an India village. Awesome. The scene where they are eating bugs and eels is great; the scene where Bradshaw has to put her hands in the hole full of bugs is as intensely tactile as any scene in the others. And while the Nazis are good as evil doers, the slave driving evil Indians are just as good for the moral effect. Topping them is the pulling out of the heart and the temporary evil Indy. This movie has it all. Imagine Nicholas Cage as Indiana Jones...we basically have that in National Treasure (a shitty movie!)

62. Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark. Except it does not beat the first one. The opening scene made every kid want to be an archaeologist. The Egyptian bazaar; the tomb of the ark with the snakes; the bar in the crazy Nepalese mountains where we meet Karen Allen (Animal House; and who may be the single cutest-in-a-70s-sense actress who never went anywhere) and watch her beat a bunch of eskimos at a drinking game; the weird Nazi guy with the portable coathanger; the French rival archaeologist; the scene where the Ark is opened and their faces melt off; and fight scene with the bald German and the airplane out of control. Any action movie would kill for that much action without losing the talent that Harrison Ford delivers. This movie was so awesome, people forget how good it really was. But, no one...and I mean no one...could do it but Harrison Ford coming off of Hans Solo. Don't believe me? Go rent Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull...it blew.

61. The Pianist. Adrian Brody, the holocaust, and music. Three things that should tell you to have a box of tissues right next to you. I don't want to even ruin the plot or the movie, because if it wasn't for a series of unreal movies ahead of it, this movie would warrant a higher number. It isn't even the best holocaust movie on the list! But, Brody stands on an island in this movie, putting in a performance equal to or better than Hanks in Castaway. Both men are on an island; one literal, the other figurative. With Brody's performance ranking higher in my opinion.

60. American Beauty. Kevin Spacey; Annette Benning. Superstar performances. Throw in a compelling story with pretty good support acting and you have a good recipe. A dark drama about the meaning of American life, or more precisely, the loss of the meaning of life behind the trivalities we fill it with to hide the fact that we are alienated from the parts that make us human. If any movie captures Guatama Buddha's realization that all life is suffering, it would be American Beauty. Moreover, this movie captures the sociological significance of triads. Every plot twist, subplot, or character arc is immersed in a relationship, a third person brought in to either relieve the tension, to mediate, or to divide and conquer. The movie is fueled by the complexities born out of one-on-one relationships altered by the dynamics of third-parties. Spacey-Benning, and the King; Spacey's kid, her friend, and Spacy; his kid, the neighbor boy, and Spacey; the neighbor, his dad, and Spacy; hell both families are triads! Look for that when you watch it again, as it is a primer on social dynamics and organization.

Back to the premise of suffering. Every character is sad, looking for release from the cycle of rebirths. Spacey finds it in a buddhist sense: the world is illusory, so why continue to abide by the illusion. His daughter thinks she finds it in love, and perhaps if we could watch on, she would; he boyfriend finds it in love too...or so he thinks. The others are doomed. Mira Sorvino finds it in the attention that Spacey gives her, but it is narcissim and emptiness that fills her; Benning in her career aspirations, which turn out to lack all human qualities (which, incidentally, she lacks to); Chris Cooley, the neighbor, finds it in military discipline, conservative ideology, and patriarchal authority. All of which turn out to be fronts for his real identity. Thus, we have two options: world rejection (as exemplified by Spacey) or love...the movie seems to make a clear choice, or does it?