A certain consensus seems to get agreed upon about movies before they recede into the past. A combination of popularity and critical response are the primary ingredients, and it’s usually more-or-less right. Movies like The Last Emperor or Crash may capture the zeitgeist enough to walk off with a Best Picture Oscar, but they tend to disappear as time goes on. Whether this is because they are beautiful but somewhat ephemeral (The Last Emperor) or thuggishly manipulative and self-important (Crash), time takes care of what we could not see in the moment.
The opposite, however, happens as well. Really wonderful films get disregarded and slip away largely unseen. It’s a shame, so I’ve decided to do my small part to undo the process and pick out five films that I think have been unfairly maligned. I’m sure everybody has some version of this list in their mind (I could probably get to 20 without breaking a sweat), but here’s mine:
Lust, Caution (2007)
This movie, if it is remembered at all, is remembered for one thing: sex. And you can believe the hype – the movie is HOT. The sex scenes are lengthy and very explicit. Without being too Pollyanna about it, however, the reason the sex is so hot goes well beyond the amount of skin shown.
The movie is hot because the sex feels like real sex. It is not airbrushed and romantic, or porny and disembodied. The power shifts, the vulnerability, the shocking moments of intimacy that real sex provides are all there. It’s shockingly vivid.
That sense of reality pervades the entire film. There is an agonizing scene when a group of student activists kill a collaborationist. The awkwardness of a group of people who have never killed trying to do so puts the artificiality of most cinematic deaths to shame. This whole film embraces the awkward and the messy while still remaining lushly beautiful. My favorite Ang Lee movie, and that is saying something.
The Human Stain (2003)
I wrote about this on Extra Criticum a couple of years ago, so I won’t go into too much detail. Suffice it to say when I saw The Human Stain at a Writer’s Guild preview I thought it would be the movie of the year. The fact that it wasn’t, despite Oscar winners at both leads (Anthony Hopkins and Nicole Kidman) and director (Robert Benton), I think says more about our culture’s discomfort with its subject* than the quality of the film itself.
I went into this film with my arms crossed and an attitude of “Prove it.” A huge Philip Roth fan, it is very difficult for me to love a movie when I have loved the book first. But prove it they did. Totally different from the book yet true to its spirit, it is a model of literary adaptation. Gorgeously shot, featuring great performances in the leads and the supporting roles (Ed Harris, Gary Sinise), it is a near-Great film. It shows up on TV from time to time, which may mean it will avoid the dustbin of history.
*subject cannot be revealed without giving away key plot point
Wonder Boys (2000)
Contradictory Fact #1 - I hate Michael Douglas. His presence onscreen makes me want to run screaming for the nearest exit.
Contradictory Fact #2 – I don’t love the movie Wonder Boys in spite of Michael Douglas. I love it because of Michael Douglas.
Truth be told, Wonder Boys is such a marvelous movie I would probably love it anyway. Literate and kind, warm and knowing, light-hearted but with the reach and range of great drama, Wonder Boys is that rarity in modern American movies – a deeply serious comedy. The fact that it is serious only means that it’s humor doesn’t come from jokes or parody. It comes from the stuff that makes up our very lives.
And then, well, there’s Michael Douglas. What can I say? Perhaps it is the Kevin Costner/Bull Durham rule, where each annoying male star gets to be perfect and brilliant in one movie. He is magnificent. It is an overstatement to call the neglect of a single film “tragic”, but this nearly qualifies.
Shopgirl (2005)
This movie was almost universally panned when it came out, so I vowed to stay away. I had loved the book and didn’t want that wonderful reading experience diluted by a crappy movie adaptation. Imagine my surprise then when my wife and I watched Shopgirl one bored night years later and discovered this sweet, gently philosophical little comedy that was both touching and sad.
I remember one of my favorite critics, Stephanie Zacharek of Salon, mocking what she thought was the vapidity of one of the movie’s last lines, “Well, that’s just the way life goes.” When that same moment happened onscreen, I almost gasped at its beauty and wisdom. Context is everything, I suppose.
The Matrix (1999)
Wait a minute. The Matrix? Underrated? Well yes, though in a very different way than the other four films on this list. The Matrix is not in any danger of being forgotten, but I would venture to say it is not taken very seriously. Most critics view it as a phenomenon rather than a film. I think that is a serious misjudgment. In fact, I think The Matrix is the greatest science fiction movie ever made.
I can feel the hackles of sci-fi geeks everywhere rise as I write that, but to my mind The Matrix leaves every other sci fi movie I have ever seen choking on its dust. One of the most exciting moviegoing experiences of my life, I also think The Matrix contains the greatest allegory of spiritual awakening I have ever seen on film. Not only is it on the very short list of movies I could basically watch anytime anywhere, images and lines from it come to my mind almost weekly. There a few movies I could say that about.
Some would argue for the greatness of Star Wars, which I love but ultimately consider a great B movie. Others would put forth Andrei Tarkovsky’s unwatchable “masterpieces” Solaris and Stalker (I’m looking at you, David Licata!). Me, I would rather eat glass than watch those again. I’ll take The Matrix every time.
Anybody got any others for this list?
