When Awards Season began, everyone said the race was wide open. The Los Angeles Film Critics chose Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon as Best Film, the New York Film Critics Circle chose Traffic as Best Film, the National Board of Review named Quills the Best Film of 2000, and the Golden Globes gave Almost Famous its award for Best Picture - Musical/Comedy. As always, the race narrowed as the year continued. Gladiator won the BAFTA for Best Film, the Golden Globe for Best Picture - Drama, and the PGA Award for Outstanding Producers of Theatrical Motion Pictures.
The final group of nominees came down to: Chocolat, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Erin Brockovich, Gladiator, and Traffic. And the film that kept winning, did so again:
As I fully reviewed all the other films of the year in order of their release, I shall do the same here, before ranking them:
Erin Brockovich
produced by Danny DeVito / Michael Shamberg / Stacey Sher
DeVito's first nomination, Shamberg's second of two nominations, Sher's first of two nominations; BAFTA Award nominee for Best Film, Golden Globe nominee for Best Picture - Drama, PGA Awards nominee for Outstanding Producers of Theatrical Motion Pictures
The first to be released, it managed to stay fresh with voters for a full year. It stayed fresh with me, too, and I watched all these movies in release order within four months.
As a true story about a small town poisoned by an apathetic, full-coffered powerhouse, and the dogged lawyers who pursue justice for the little guy, comparisons to 1998's A Civil Action are inevitable (as are comparisons to 2019's Dark Waters - just how many true stories about powerful companies knowingly killing generations of Americans are there?). What makes this one unique is Erin Brockovich herself: not a lawyer, not someone who has her shit together, just as much of an underdog as the people she's fighting for. In their victory is her salvation, to an extent. Erin's tenacity is just as much desperation for her to do something right as it is about basic humanity, but the basic humanity is the foundation of everything that works about this movie. Not just our own fury at what's happening to these people, but the no-saints/no-villains depiction of heroes, victims, and antagonists: messy, distracted, sometimes inappropriately funny, angry, suspicious, afraid to fully open up because every time they do, they get burned. How do we live with each other, how do we provide for each other, how do we accept help - if we cannot even trust each other? That is the betrayal at the heart of the Hinkley case, that is the conflict Erin herself faces with her boss, her boyfriend, and her kids, and trust is what will eventually save her and the town. Oh, I love this movie.
Gladiator
produced by David Franzoni / Branko Lustig / Douglas Wick
Franzoni's only Picture nomination, Lustig's second of two wins and nominations, Wick's second of two nominations; BAFTA Award winner for Best Film, Golden Globes winner for Best Picture - Drama, PGA Awards winner for Outstanding Producers of Theatrical Motion Pictures; National Board of Review's Top Ten Films of 2000
An early summer hit that managed to become the frontrunner and eventual winner, due, it was said, to a heavily financed campaign by DreamWorks. Here's the thing: you can pump as much money into a campaign as you want, but in the end, the voters still have to like what they're watching, and clearly, enough did, audience and Academy both.
Why do people like it? Why wouldn't they? Here is an old-fashioned tale of loyalty, honor, betrayal, and crowd-pleasing bloody violence. Yes, maybe it has us as thirsty for bloodshed as the heartless rulers and plebes in the arena stands, maybe that could be a misstep, but maybe it's a fully aware demand for self-reflection - who else could Maximus be addressing, if not us, when he bellows, "Are you not entertained?" And yet, he's right: we can cheer on his acts of mercy, but we'd be disappointed if credits rolled without the villain's blood being spilled. Somehow, though, that's not the image we are left reflecting on weeks later: we're thinking of Oliver Reed whispering, "Dust and ashes," as the blades come down; we're thinking of Maximus dreaming of his wife and child in a wheaty idyll; we're thinking of Commodus weeping impotently, pathetically, refusing to realize that it's not blood that tells, but the soul; we're thinking of Marcus Aurelius teasing about the People and Democracy even as he acknowledges his own refusal to deliver in his lifetime. On spectacle, on politics, on people, it nails everything an epic should.
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
produced by Li-Kong Hsu / William Kong / Ang Lee
Hsu's only nomination, Kong's only nomination, Lee's first of two Picture nominations; Golden Globe winner for Best Foreign Language Film, LAFCA Awards winner for Best Film, National Board of Review's Best Foreign Film; BAFTA Awards nominee for Best Film, NYFCC Awards runner-up for Best Film and Best Foreign Language Film, PGA Awards nominee for Outstanding Producers of Theatrical Motion Pictures
Rare is the film that can transcend an airplane viewing, but there I was, leaning forward, gasping at twists and turns, holding my breath at aerial feats and near-miss swordplay, crying as I mourned two romances that Could Not Be.
So many genres all at once: famously, it's a wuxia martial arts film, hand-to-hand and blade-to-blade combat, the fighters defying gravity as they leap across roofs, up walls, even through treetops; it's a romantic epic, two lovers separated by class coming together during a sojourn in desert caves, while another couple, two long-serving colleagues, can only express their devotion to each other through their entertwined commitments to their duty, their country; and it's a taut mystery of the old school, where clues are cleverly combed through over teatime conversation, as well as a political thriller, where old grudges lead to stunning new loyalties, and a feminist drama about three women navigating the corridors of power and expressing their individuality in their own ways. Many films have trouble committing to their own identity in a single genre (The Contender); this film fits all its narratives and genres snugly together into a single divine narrative.
Chocolat
produced by David Brown / Kit Golden / Leslie Holleran
Brown's fourth and final nomination, Golden's only nomination, Holleran's only nomination; Golden Globe nominee for Best Picture - Musical/Comedy
The only nominee I'd seen before, and more than once, at that. Why wouldn't I?
The movie is a warm blanket, it even glows with warm autumnal tones, despite taking place during Lent and Easter. Ah, well. I am here for the sensuality of South American chocolate, that surprising tang that you can feel spilling over your tongue and down your throat just by watching Judi Dench's eyes close in bliss...chocolate so effective that it brings estranged family together, saves a woman from an abusive marriage, and puts the sex back into another marriage that is loving but stale. It is renewal, it is pleasure, it is allowing oneself to enjoy the many flavors God, in His wisdom, put upon His earth. It is a lack of shame, not in a way that would have orgiastic displays of depravity in the streets, but in a way that allows you to look another human in the eye and say, "I am happy, this is good, won't you share in this joy?" But there is also the lesson in wayfaring spirits: do you wander because you are free, or because you fear true human connection and all the mess that comes with it? It is easy to make your mark on a town and then traipse off when the wind changes, but do you dare nurture the growth within and without yourself? And that score!
Traffic
produced by Laura Bickford / Marshall Herskovitz / Edward Zwick
Bickford's only nomination, Herskovitz's only nomination, past winner Zwick's second of two nominations; NYFCC Awards winner for Best Film; Golden Globe nominee for Best Picture - Drama, National Board of Review's Top Ten Films of 2000
The last to come out and the most typical, I think, of a Critics' Choice in the Oscar race. It deals with a contemporary subject that is heavy but Important - in this case, drug trafficking, and its effects on every level of society throughout...well, I would say the world, but in this case, strictly North America. And it gets into the realities: the good cops who wind up compromised, the politicians who mean well but don't understand the issue beyond talking points, the addicts who are not just track-marked transients in the slums but the upper echelons of power, the politics of race and class that come into play when it comes time to prosecute, the long arm of the cartels, the facade of philanthropy and Law&Order that the deadliest players hide behind. It's a lot to cover, and this film manages all of it without ever getting confusing, without ever straying from its mission.
It is, oddly, the most tidily resolved of the films here, though it feigns otherwise: Don Cheadle's smile at the end, Michael Douglas and Erika Christensen at the meeting, I just don't...buy any of it. Some of the narrative turns, its showcase scenes, just feel so stretched out: the filmmakers know that we know someone's about to die from a car bomb, but who and how is contrived and unnecessary - and, ultimately, predictable, and not because it's inevitable, but because we see someone make a decision completely at odds with the character established in the previous 90 minutes. Meanwhile, Christensen's descent into sex for drugs is subtly conveyed, until the point when we must, we have to see the Big Black Thug upon her to truly appreciate the degradation of our American Youth. Frankly, it is the most Dishonest movie here.
Had I a ballot, here's how I would rank them:
5. Traffic
4. Gladiator
3. Chocolat
2. Erin Brockovich
1. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Sunday, my personal Top Ten of 2000.
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