2006 Year End Wrap Up

Index
Top 10 Films of 2006
Honorable Mentions
Good Buzz List
Worst 10 Films of 2006

Top 10 Films of the Year 

What follows are Nathan's picks of the best films of 2006.

1. The Proposition 

Directed by: John Hillcoat

Premise: Set in the Australian outback, this Western tells the story of the Captain Stanley (Ray Winstone) and his attempts to bring justice to the Burns Brothers (Guy Pierce, Richard Wilson, and Danny Huston).

Why It Made the List: The best Western since Unforgiven, The Proposition succeeds in areas that so many films of 2006 explored: the picture investigates the relationship between the law and the lawless, the victim and the perpetrator, and the savage and the civilized as a convoluted mess. Although many other films this year, such as The Departed, Little Children, and The Hills Have Eyes remake also addressed this issue, The Proposition goes further. In this film the characterizations are rich and the violence is brutal, but the humanity of characters on all sides is both conceived and questioned in equal measure. Beyond any other film this year, The Proposition combines high cinematic craft, with masterfully designed drama and intelligent inquiry into the darkest parts of the human psyche. 

2. The Departed

Directed by: Martin Scorsese

Premise: Billy Costigan, a Massachusetts state police officer (Leonardo DiCaprio) goes undercover and infiltrates an organized crime syndicate run by Frank Costello (Jack Nicholson). At the same time, Costello has a mole inside of the police force (Matt Damon) attempt to flush Costigan out of his cover.

Why It Made the List: Scorsese’s return to the gangster film is a bit like watching Muhammad Ali return to boxing ring and win the championship by knock out, reminding everyone why he was the greatest at what he did. Likewise, The Departed is the collaboration of filmmakers and actors each doing what they do best. The film is perfectly cast with DiCaprio’s as a streetwise antihero, Damon as a respectable police detective with a secret, and Nicholson as a brilliant but mad criminal. The picture is a throw back to Scorsese films like Mean Streets and Taxi Driver, but Scorsese has learned a thing or two about filmmaking in the ensuing years and now a seasoned pro, he applies his accumulated experience to this film, revisiting familiar material with a wider array of skills and coming out with one of the best films of his career.

3. When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts

Directed by: Spike Lee

Premise: A documentary film on the flooding of New Orleans in the wake of Hurricane Katrina in the fall of 2005. The film interviews historians, activists, political commentators, public figures, and residents of New Orleans to catalogue the causes of the disaster, the drama of the flooding, and after effects on New Orleans, Louisiana, and American culture.

Why It Made the List: Spike Lee has created an amazing historical document that is a complete account of one of the most important historical events of the early 21^st century. The film places the flooding of New Orleans in a historical context for New Orleans and for the United States and addresses the many angles of this story including the history of race relations in America, socio-economic class conflict, and the culture of New Orleans. When the Levees Broke has been styled with the culture of New Orleans in mind in its music and in its look; it is clear when watching the film that this was not merely any flood but a flood in New Orleans and the documentary is particular to the area, adding the local texture to the story, allowing the documentary to penetrate further into New Orleans’ culture. The film has an interesting relationship to the citizens of the area; although it portrays them as victims of circumstance and governmental incompetence, the film does not rob the citizens of their dignity. On the contrary, many of the subjects are able to maintain their self-respect above and beyond many of the other interviewees in the film. When the Levee’s Broke is the definitive account of the Katrina disaster in New Orleans and it accomplishes its goals in ways that are both artistic and humane.

4. Little Miss Sunshine
Directed by: Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris

Premise: A middle class family takes a cross-country trip in their VW bus to get their young daughter (Abigail Breslin) into the finals of a beauty pageant.

Why It Made the List: Little Miss Sunshine is the Cinderella story of 2006. Coming out of nowhere with very little advertising, the film gained a wide enough audience to make it a bona fide hit. The film uses the road trip story structure to put the family’s inner tensions through a rising conflict and bring them to a resolution, a technique familiar to films like National Lampoon’s Vacation, but Little Miss Sunshine goes beyond the silliness and uses real drama rather than just gags to push its characters to the breaking point. This is best seen in Steve Carell’s role as the uncle who has recently attempted suicide. Carell gives the kind of funny but carefully restrained performance that we had to wait decades to get from Robin Williams. This sensibility permeates the rest of the picture. Little Miss Sunshine reaffirms that the best comedies have a strong dramatic center and that making comedy does not mean compromising the picture with cheep laughs. 

5. Thank You For Smoking 
Directed by: Jason Reitman

Premise: Tobacco lobbyist Nick Naylor (Aaron Eckhart) falls into an ethical crisis as he attempts to resolve conflicts between his responsibilities to his employer and his role modeling duties to his son.

Why It Made the List: They say the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, and director Jason Reitman shows the influence of his father, Ivan (Stripes, Ghostbusters) Reitman in this fun and satirical look at a character most viewers would despise. The film is able to make us cheer for the Naylor as he weasels his way through one situation after the other. Eckhart’s performance works because he is able to find the empathetic elements of this despicable character and uses a Mephistopheles-like wit, charm, and intelligence to exploit that empathy. The dialogue is very sharp and the film uses lots of formalistic, non-digetic elements that add to the sense of fun in the film. In terms of story design, Thank You for Smoking follows a redemption plotline, but it takes unexpected turns and does something amazing: it refuses to let Naylor off the hook, does not allow him to be redeemed, and has us loving him for it.

6. Dreamgirls

Directed by: Bill Condon

Premise: A film adaptation of the stage musical. Under the guidance of a savvy producer (Jamie Foxx), a trio of women (Beyoncé Knowles, Anika Noni Rose, and Jennifer Hudson) rise to superstardom in the 1960s and 70s after they perform back up vocals for soul singer James “Thunder” Early (Eddie Murphy).

Why It Made the List: Musicals and films about musicians have been slowly coming back into style. Dreamgirls is a terrific addition to this new generation of musical cinema. Dreamgirls’ musical sequences have a lot of energy and showmanship to them, capturing the excitement of the stage presentation, but conveying it in cinematic terms. Rather than stopping to tell the audience how the characters feel in that moment, music is used to develop characters and set up themes. Something that sets Dreamgirls apart from many other contemporary musicals is its criticism of contemporary music and the music business. As the characters get frustrated with the limitations of pop music, they reveal the shallowness and narcissistic elements of the music industry that can destroy artistic integrity in the name of monetary success.

7. Notes on a Scandal

Directed by: Richard Eyre

Premise: Barbara, an old school history instructor (Judi Dench) becomes fast friends with Sheba, a free spirited art teacher (Cate Blanchett). When Sheba begins an affair with a fifteen-year-old student (Andrew Simpson), Barbara takes the opportunity to insert herself into Sheba’s life, blackmailing her and manipulating Sheba into abandoning her family. 

Why It Made the List: Stories involving children and sexuality were popular in 2006 but few were as well done as Notes on a Scandal, a Hitchcockian thriller that demonstrates a psychological complexity above and beyond other films of its kind. Judi Dench has a complicated role that requires her to take a fundamentally unlikable character and make her sympathetic. Blanchett brings a naiveté to her role that makes the seduction understandable in context but does not excuse her actions. Notes on a Scandal also breaks away from similar films by making Sheba’s husband (Bill Nighy) more than the boorish, unappreciative, or abusive husband that forces his wife into someone else’s arms, as seen in many of these kinds of stories. Instead, the film makes him a likeable and sympathetic figure who becomes a victim of Sheba’s actions. Notes on a Scandal is a successful thriller and a psychological drama that makes some frightening and penetrating observation about the extent to which people will go to relive their loneliness.

8. Children of Men 

Directed by: Alfonso Cuarón

Premise: Twenty years from now women have lost the ability to reproduce. Faced with the extinction of the human race, civilization is quickly descending into chaos. In the UK, Theodore (Clive Owen) must escort a pregnant woman (Claire-Hope Ashitey) across the violent countryside to safety while being pursued by the government and by rebels who want to use the baby for political purposes.

Why It Made the List: Stories of future societies descending into chaos are nothing new, but in Children of Men, the filmmakers have fully realized their environment and thought through their premise, delivering a great story. The scenes of violence and warfare have been shot in a hand held style used in films like Saving Private Ryan and Full Metal Jacket but here the focus is on civilians within the war zone. The film captures the chaos of urban warfare unlike anything seen recently and uses images that will be familiar to anyone who watches current affairs on the television news. As a story of an apocalypse and a rebirth, the film lets the moments speak for themselves without a lot of grandiose cinematic effects; the film does not cue up highly emotional music and use intrusive camera techniques to herald the new beginning. Instead, the world of Children of Men ends and begins with a whimper, but this quiet visual style gives the film its power.

9. The Fountain

Directed by: Darren Aronofsky

Premise: Tom (Hugh Jackman), a cancer researcher, struggles to find a cure for his wife’s (Rachel Weisz) condition. At the same time she writes a fantasy story about a conquistador searching for the fountain of youth to save his loved one. The film alternates between the story in the real world and the story in the fantasy world.

Why it made the list: Each year at least one film lends itself to the “love it or hate it” category and this year The Fountain is the clear winner in that regard. The Fountain uses formalistic techniques, creatively cross cutting between the narratives in ways that fill in the gaps between the two stories and create greater understanding how one relates to the other. The film is able to be more than just art for arts sake; The Fountain’s themes of love, creativity, and mortality have real substance and comment on how imagination and the act of storytelling provides our lives with meaning and can be a deeply therapeutic activity.  The Fountain is a challenging film because of its highly symbolic elements and its split narrative, but this is at the heart of what makes it such a great picture. For those who understand it, The Fountain is a great, romantic story in which love and creativity trump death.

10. Little Children 

Directed by: Todd Field

Premise: The film is a portrayal of a community and the families that live within it. Two married friends (Kate Winslet and Patrick Wilson) begin an affair and contemplate leaving their families. At the same time a sex offender (Jackie Earle Haley) moves into the neighborhood and causes uproar among the people who live there.

Why It Made the List: Little Children is the kind of film that that is able to successfully navigate between telling intimate stories and then contextualizing those interpersonal narratives within a larger environment. The affair between Sarah (Winslet) and Brad (Wilson) has an authenticity to it beyond what most of these kinds of stories accomplish and although the romance follows a fairly predictable plotline, it is very well done. If Sarah and Brad’s story were isolated, Little Children might remain be a fairly conventional romantic tragedy, but the context of the film gives it its richness. The supporting story of Ronny (Haley), a recently released sex offender, pulls and twists at our sympathies and adds an unstable element to the film that provides a sense of danger and foreboding. In contrast is the story of Larry (Noah Emmerich), a neighborhood watchman with a dark past, who pursues Ronny. Between the two of them the sense of morality and righteousness shifts back and forth, and the film does not take one side or the other, but makes the distinction blurred. Little Children is an intelligent film about romantic dreams versus the realities of suburban and married life.

Index

Honorable Mentions  

Here are some films that did not make the top 10 cut but were worth mentioning. 

Blood Diamond – A great action thriller that is able to be entertaining and socially conscious.

Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan – The most controversial film of the year and also the funniest. As a piece of subversive cinema, Borat comes up a little short, but it is still an audacious film.

Casino Royale - The best Bond film in years, Casino Royale smartly updates the character to the contemporary age and jettisons the cartoonish elements of more recent films.

Crank - An absurd, politically incorrect action film that indulges every guilty impulse.

The Devil Wears Prada – An intelligent film about corruption and the lengths to which people will go to succeed. Meryl Streep is excellent as the boss from hell.

Hard Candy – One of the best entries in the horror genre in a long time for its willlingness to indulge in taboo and yet do it tastefully. 

Hollywoodland – A fine dramatization of the life of George Reeves (Ben Affleck).

Idlewild – The combination of the music of Outkast with the culture of 1920’s urban culture works very well and captures the sensuality, danger, creativity, and fun of the speakeasy environment.

Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang – Although metatextual references have been hip in the past few years, Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang does a standout job of taking the right elements of action and detective genres to create a post-modern action comedy.

Marie Antoinette – A flawed but interesting dramatization that was a great metaphor for Hollywood and contemporary celebrity.

Monster House – Easily the best animated film of the year. The film will appeal to children and adults, and it bases that appeal on a solid story with some great visuals rather than tired pop culture references.

The Painted Veil – A gorgeous looking film that features a great performance by Edward Norton. 

The Prestige – A film about fame and fortune and the lengths to which people will go to attain it.

The Queen – A brilliant film about the merging of politics and pop culture, and how one affects the other.

Rocky Balboa - Easily the best of the Rocky sequels. This film jettisons the cartoonish qualities of some of the later sequels and rather than just recapitulate the formula, Rocky Balboa provides commentary on the original film.

Slither – Good, icky fun that will appeal to fans of the monster movie genre.

Stranger Than Fiction – Easily Will Ferrell’s best film to date.

Superman Returns – Despite some errors in the storytelling, it was nice to see the return of the Man of Steel and the way the film integrated with the films of the 1970s was very impressive.

Sweet Land - A smart and good-hearted picture that was very endearing.

United 93 – While it was not the first dramatization of the events of September 11^th, it is the best so far. The film manages to present the material in a way that does not exploit the subject matter but does acknowledge the drama and horror of the event. 

V for Vendetta – Although it had some serious faults, V for Vendetta works very well and shoots ahead of the curve with its visual savvy and political ideas.

Index

Good Buzz List

The following are films that Nathan did not get to see, usually because they did not open in this area but had a good critical reaction.

Curse of the Golden Flower – Another martial arts epic from Yimou Zhang, director of Hero.

For Your Consideration – Satire of the Hollywood awards circuit.

Idiocracy - The new film by Mike Judge about a future in which everyone is stupid was purportedly dumped by a major studio when test audiences didn't get it. Make of that what you will. 

The Illusionist - The film was marketed and released at the same time as The Prestige and got lost in the other film's hype. 

Jesus Camp – A controversial documentary about a camp for Evangelical Christian children.

The Last King of Scotland – A portrayal of Ugandan dictator Idi Amin as seen by his personal physician. The film has gotten major praise for Forest Whitaker’s performance as Amin.

Letters from Iwo Jima – Clint Eastwood’s companion piece to Flags of Our Fathers is supposedly a much better film.

Perfume: The Story of a Murderer – A story of a man’s descent into madness as he searches for the perfect scent.

Pan’s Labyrinth – Guillermo del Toro’s newest film is receiving wide acclaim for its visual style and storytelling.

This Film is Not Yet Rated – A documentary about the Motion Picture Association of America that exposes the nature of the rating process.

Index

Bottom 10 Films of the Year

What follows represents the very bottom of the cinematic heap of 2006.

1. The Black Dahlia 

Directed by: Brian De Palma

Premise: An adaptation of James Ellroy's novel.  Aaron Eckhart and Josh Hartnett play a pair of detectives tracking a killer in 1940s Los Angeles.

Why It Made the List: Some pictures make the bottom ten because they are made by inexperienced filmmakers or studio executives have produced the stories into sludge. The Black Dahlia is a mess on so many levels that it is surprising this was made by some of Hollywood’s major talent. The film is largely miscast and the acting is very poor, particularly in Josh Hartnett who has all the charisma of a fire hydrant. Despite being directed by veteran filmmaker Brian DePalma, The Black Dahlia looks very amateurish in its execution. The cinematography and editing are sloppy, scenes plod along without any sense of direction, and De Palma’s characteristic split-diopter shots are used frequently but without any apparent storytelling function. While some other films this year might have been a little worse, the talents involved in The Black Dahlia ought to have known better.

2. The Wicker Man

Directed by: Neil LaBute

Premise: A remake of the 1973 film. A troubled police officer (Nicolas Cage) travels to a private island on the East Cost when his former fiancé needs his help to find her missing daughter. On the island, Cage’s character attempts to unravel the mystery of the missing child amid a neo-pagan community.

Why It Made the List: It is no exaggeration to say The Wicker Man is a disaster of a film. On a storytelling level, it meanders and scenes go by with no advancement of the mystery. Despite having a dramatic and workable McGuffin with the missing child, The Wicker Man is completely unable to create any dramatic tension or sense of urgency. Cage appears to know he is in a loser and it shows through in his phoned-in his performance. The pagan community in the film comes off as a bunch of silly tree huggers rather than a threatening cult. The ending of the picture caps this debacle with a twist that comes from nowhere, unintentionally funny dialogue from Cage, a bear suit, and a denouement that is just tagged on. This remake of The Wicker Man is so bad that may actually be worth viewing on late night cable, if only to see Nicolas Cage running around the woods in a bear costume.

3. Basic Instinct 2

Directed by: Michael Caton-Jones

Premise: A sequel to the 1992 original. Writer Catherine Tramell (Sharon Stone) is again in trouble with the law and gets involved with the psychiatrist (David Morrissey), leading him to believe she might be a serial killer.

Why It Made the List: Basic Instinct 2 is an utter disaster. While there is plenty wrong with the film—the editing is shoddy, the screenplay is full of holes, the lack of any sexual tension or sense of danger—the most egregious move in this film is the treatment of Stone’s character. The original Basic Instinct established Catherine Tramell as one of the great villains of American cinema in large part because of the character’s ambiguity and her ability to manipulate the environment around her. This film has Stone sneering and posturing for camera like a parody of herself. Basic Instinct 2 was hailed as Stone’s come back picture, but her vain attempt to remind everyone how sexy she is just comes off like a drunk aunt at a wedding who flirts with all the younger groomsmen. All the rest of us can do is blush and pretend not to notice.

4. Underworld: Evolution

Directed by: Len Wiseman

Premise: Picking up where the original film left off, vampire Selene (Kate Beckinsale) and vampire-werewolf crossbreed Michael (Scott Speedman) uncover more twists in the history of their species while being pursued by Marcus (Tony Curran), a vampire elder.

Why It Made the List: Despite such a promising predecessor, Underworld: Evolution is a disappointment. The biggest strength of the original film was the theme of interracial war and the way the narrative explored the structures that create and sustain racial prejudice; Evolution discards all of this for repeated gunfights and chase scenes that have no meaning. The love story between Selene and Michael goes too far, too fast with no romantic build up. While the film further explores the twisted relationship between the two sides, the exposition--and everything else in the story--is given a backseat to close ups of Kate Bechkinsale in latex. 

5. Nacho Libre

Directed by: Jared Hess

Premise: Nacho, a lonely monk (Jack Black), fulfills his dream of becoming a professional wrestler to win money for the orphans sheltered by his monastery.

Why It Made the List: Combining the lead actor of School of Rock with the director of Napoleon Dynamite sounded like a match made in comedy heaven. Apparently this was just too much talent for one picture, as Nacho Libre quickly reveals itself as one of the worst comedies of the year. None of the relationships in the picture have the appropriate characterization or development to be dramatically interesting or to set up comedic results. Ana de la Reguera’s role as a nun is reduced to standing around looking pretty and the children, who quite obviously adore Nacho, are dropped from the duration of the story. Most of the film’s structure is episodic with little connection between scenes. The film attempts to mine slapstick humor in the wrestling scenes, but none of it is very funny. Nacho Libre is reminiscent of a Saturday Night Live skit adapted to film; it would have worked in a five minute skit, but stretched out to ninety minutes, the concept wears out its welcome in a hurry.

6. The Pink Panther

Directed by: Shawn Levy

Premise: A remake of the 1963 Peter Sellers film. Steve Martin plays Inspector Jacques Clouseau, a French detective who is charged with solving a high profile murder case.

Why It Made the List: The Pink Panther manages to take one of the greatest comedies of all time featuring one of the greatest comic characters in all of cinema and completely destroys it. It’s not entirely the fault of Martin, who still has comedic talent, but his Clouseau shtick wears thin very quickly. Between lame gags and the lack of any dramatic center, the film just isn’t funny.

7. Beerfest

Directed by: Jay Chandrasekhar

Premise: A group of American drinkers train to represent their country at an international drinking competition.

Why It Made the List: Beerfest is another poor effort from Broken Lizard, a “comedy team” that has a really tough time making anyone laugh. The jokes are too labored and do not deliver very much bang for their buck. When the film attempts to be dirty or risqué, it just comes off as lame. Instead of playing on the novelty of the idea of an international drinking competition, the film spends most of its time in the team’s training process, which is very unimaginative.

8. See No Evil

Directed by: Gregory Dark

Premise: A group of juvenile convicts is sent to an abandoned hotel and are soon stalked by a large killer (Kane). 

What Doesn’t: See No Evil is like the retarded cousin of Hitchcock’s Psycho. The premise of the story borrows a lot of Norman Bate’s psychology but it is completely unbelievable. The teen victims look more like they just got out of a Banana Republic photo shoot instead of a corrections facility and the dynamics between the characters are stock teen angst. See No Evil feels as though someone took an outline of a script and shot it without ever actually finishing the screenplay.

9. Annapolis

Directed by: Justin Lin

Premise: James Franco play Jake Huard, a first year recruit in the Annapolis Navy Academy. He comes into conflict with his commanding officer (Tyrese Gibson) and the two end up settling their differences in a boxing tournament.

Why It Made the List: If Annapolis sounds like An Officer and a Gentleman, that is precisely what it aspires to, but Annapolis does not even come close. The film bills itself as a military film but it is really a sports film; the academy seems more like an extreme gym or a prep school than the top officer academy in the US military. At some point in the second act, Annapolis gives up on the military content and becomes a boxing movie with all of the clichés. It abandons nearly all of the themes established in the first act and when it gets to the end there is little sense that our protagonist has matured at all as a leader. If James Franco keeps making films like this, he is going to end up as the next Christian Slater.

10. The DaVinci Code

Directed by: Ron Howard

Premise: An adaptation of Dan Brown’s best selling novel. Tom Hanks plays Robert Langdon, a symbologist who gets involved in a murder mystery that reveals a conspiracy involving the background of Jesus Christ and the Catholic Church.

Why It Made the List: There may have been films released this year that were worse, but The DaVinci Code was such an enormous let down that it was an obligatory addition to this list. The story is full of holes as characters erratically change allegiances and appear in places for no particular reason. The ending is very problematic, as it concludes the threats to the protagonists, but then has them to run around Europe for another twenty minutes of screen time with no urgency or dramatic necessity. The film’s handling of Sophie (Audrey Tautou) is awful, as she is pushed into a supporting role and never really participates in the action so much as she tags along with it. Despite a few interesting ideas, The DaVinci Code seems more interested in its exposition than in the murder mystery. The film was protested by members of the Religious Right, but they needn’t worry. No one will be talking about this film in ten years.

Index