I usually wait until my birthday(3/12) to compile my best lists so I can catch up with films released in NYC and L.A. at the end of the year. These usually make the bulk of my english language list. For instance, all the films in your 2002 lists are good, but tell me, isn't your foreign list significantly stronger? Besides THE BELIEVER, I mean.[i]Originally posted by Chris Knipp [ Some of the best year's end releases don’t make it to northern California where I live till early the next year. The only one of your Ten Best I have any reservations about is ROYAL TENNENBAUMS, which seemed too cute and contrived to me, but of course many discerning individuals liked it. I have still missed CODE UNKNOWN. After seeing LA PIANISTE I definitely want to see it. I have to say I hated THE CIRCLE. Too relentlessly bleak;
ROYAL TENNENBAUMS snuck into my top 10 after a second viewing. It seems to me more ambitious and original than runner ups like Monster's Ball and The Deep End. Your complaints about it are warranted though.
THE CIRCLE is bleak. I just react differently to bleakness: There are people trapped in bleak situations, suffering from all kinds of injustices. I am glad there are filmakers documenting their plight with grace and wit. And I'm sure they appreciate it. I also like how intensely moved I am by many "sad" films. Now, I don't think that bleakness makes a film great. The usually great Todd Solondz released a very bleak, and pretty bad, film this year:Storytelling.I also have great admiration for purely escapist fare such as Lord of the Rings and Amelie.
CODE UNKNOWN has a performance by J. Binoche as strong as I. Huppert's in La Pianiste. Besides, its scope is wider and its themes are more relevant to the average person. I love its novel use of film-within-a-film devices and how the narrative explodes in three directions before coming together again at the end. I think you would like it.
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