Best of 2002
Hi! It’s wrap-up time.
As you saw in the awards list I sent out yesterday, I didn’t see a lot of the winners at this year’s festival. No matter, I loved it like always!
With 345 films showing, someone who sees only 41 of them isn’t guaranteed of seeing all the “buzz” shows. It just means that I’ll be watching for the good ones I missed to appear at cinemas in the next year.
Below are general rankings for what I saw. (Fr w sub) means “French with subtitles”, and so-on. Films with “*Mtl” were ones I saw at the World Film Festival. I oughta write about those too I suppose…
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Craig’s Choice Award for best fiction film
MA VRAIE VIE A ROUEN - 16 yr old films a year of growing up (Fr w sub)
Most stunning technical achievement
RUSSIAN ARK - 96 minutes, one take, 1000 cast members, Wow! (Russian w sub)
Good fiction with subtitles (no particular order, I enjoyed all of these)
MEISJE *Mtl - Country girl runs to Brussels for new life (Flemish w sub)
THE WAY HOME - Young boy learns life lessons from grandmother (Korean w sub)
TAKE CARE OF MY CAT - 20 yr old girlfriends grow up and split apart (Kor w sub)
CORTO MALTESE *Mtl - animated adventure in Hong Kong, Siberia 1918 (Fr w sub)
MARRIAGE DERAILED *Mtl - railroad romantic dalliance (Swed w sub)
8 FEMMES - musical comedy murder mystery stocked with divas (Fr w sub)
LA TRILOGIE: CAVALE - engaging thriller with radical politics (Fr w sub)
MADAME SATA - drag artist fights opression in Rio 1930s (Portuguese w sub)
THE MAN WITHOUT A PAST - amnesiac finds a quirky new life (Finnish w sub)
Good fiction, partially subtitled
BOLLYWOOD/HOLLYWOOD - good silly fun Indian/Cdn courtship (Eng or Hindi w sub)
HEAVEN - good thriller, great acting, beautifully filmed (Eng or Ital w sub)
Good fiction, no reading
LAUREL CANYON - conflicting lifestyles seek harmony in la la land
THE QUIET AMERICAN - Michael Caine digs for trouble in Viet Nam, 1952
BUBBA HO-TEP - wacky b-movie about Elvis, JFK, and a Mummy
I’m Non-commital
FOOD OF LOVE *Mtl - uneven gay coming of age story
EXXXORCISMOS - guy deals with ghosts in his past (Spanish w sub)
YELLOWKNIFE - melancholy cross country search for better life (Eng or Fr w sub)
DIVINE INTERVENTION - absurdist middle eastern comedy (Arabic w sub)
RUB AND TUG - initially funny comedy about a massage parlour
BLISSFULLY YOURS - laaaaanguid picnic in the jungle (Thai w sub)
BIG SHOT’S FUNERAL - occasionally funny comedy about a tv funeral
AUTO FOCUS - mostly depressing docudrama about Bob Crane’s fall from grace
PAST PERFECT - mostly miserable, sometimes comic story of couple in trouble
Not my cup of tea
BELLISIMA - miserable mother pushes kid into modelling (Polish w sub)
THE BARONESS AND THE PIG - inept overly earnest costume drama (Eng or Fr w sub)
SUXXESS *Mtl - ideal company taken over by bottom line manager (Swedish w sub)
TEKNOLUST - futuristic drivel
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Best freakin’ documentary
BOWLING FOR COLUMBINE - guns in America, in a class by itself
Good documentaries
SPELLBOUND - terrific characters, clever dialogue, lots of tension, all true
THE TRUE MEANING OF PICTURES: SHELBY LEE ADAMS’ APPALACHIA - thought provoking
LOST IN LA MANCHA - funny, impressive
PROM FIGHT: THE MARC HALL STORY - well told underdog story
LES ROSSY - good short never-give-up story (English, some French w sub)
Okay documentaries
FOLK - unblinking home movie with eye on family caught in sorry circumstances
BLIND SPOT: HITLER’S SECRETARY - dull film, but compelling material (Ger w sub)
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That’s it - cheers!
Craig James White
Toronto - show me the movie!