Fall 1990 was all about organized crime. Don't believe me? The films I capsule below run from September 14 to October 5, just shy of a month. There are seven films in all (though films I've defended before - Texasville and Henry & June - were released September 28th and October 5th, respectively). Four of those films deal with organized crime. And one film released around the same time - September 19th, to be exact - is considered by many to be the grand poobah of organized crime flicks.
GoodFellas is, perhaps, the most iconographic film in Martin Scorsese's career. Yeah, yeah, Taxi Driver, but I guarantee you know more people that have seen GoodFellas, that will quote GoodFellas without realizing they're quoting GoodFellas, than you will people who've seen Taxi Driver...or even The Departed. Think of the music video for Ashanti's "Foolish" or the multiple references on Family Guy or Animaniacs' "GoodFeathers" (an entire segment on a children's show based around imitations of the core three GoodFellas actors as pigeons). It's a movie that's permeated the culture, like Scarface or, hey, The Godfather. It's a movie significant enough to warrant its own making-of book, the indispensable Made Men by Glenn Kenny. Like the movie? Read the book, it only heightens the experience.
GoodFellas claimed the #1 spot its first weekend, taking over for Postcards from the Edge (more on that one below). That was it. Never hit the top spot of the box office again. By the end of its run, it made about $47M off a $25M budget. But that's just theaters: its life on video, DVD, and TV is...immeasurable. To see it is to love it: the Los Angeles Film Critics, the New York Film Critics, and the British Film Academy all named it the Best Picture of the Year in 1990! In national telecasts, the American Film Institute named it among the Top 100 American Films of All Time in both 1997 and 2007! Roger Ebert called it the best mob movie ever! The Sopranos creator David Chase credited that movie with the series' inception!
With many films, we look back at all their Oscar nominations and question the very meaning of the word "best." With GoodFellas, we see its one win (Best Supporting Actor - Joe Pesci) and four other nominations (Best Picture, Best Director, Best Supporting Actress - Lorraine Bracco, Best Adapted Screenplay) and question why it didn't get more?
Anyway. Here are the films it came out alongside:
Postcards from the Edge
release: September 14
nominations: Best Actress (Meryl Streep), Best Original Song ("I'm Checkin' Out" by Shel Silverstein)
dir: Mike Nichols
pr: John Calley / Mike Nichols
scr: Carrie Fisher
cin: Michael Ballhaus
An actress is forced to live with her mother to prove her commitment to overcoming addiction. It’s an honest story told well. Meryl Streep is terrific as a woman whose confidence and unhappiness are constantly in flux, maybe too ready with a disarming one-liner, and just…grounded. Sure she’s playing an actress but, (a) the emphasis seems to be on working actress, known but not exactly A-list and (b) there’s an honesty and lack of histrionics that ring true for someone getting clean for the umpteenth time. Shirley MacLaine channeling Debbie Reynolds is … look, the woman had an Oscar and was already a living legend at this point, but this is still, to me, an “oh my GOD” performance, the old pro still managing to surprise with her grace notes (by which I mean, the vibrato she deploys while bellowing, “It TWIRRRRRLED up!” And honestly, while we know Streep and MacLaine (and Dennis Quaid and Gene Hackman and, my God, Robin Bartlett, someone give her a movie!) are talented, the film is as effective as it is because Carrie Fisher’s writing and Mike Nichols’ direction flow from comedy to drama so fluidly, so effortlessly, so honestly, you almost feel like you’re part of the room - not just audience member, literally in the room watching an honest conversation take place between real people. Oh, I think I love this movie.
State of Grace
release: September 14
dir: Phil Joanou
pr: Ned Dowd / Randy Ostrow / Ron Rotholz
scr: Dennis McIntyre
cin: Jordan Cronenweth
Irish gangsters welcome home an old friend long absent...unaware he's undercover. Famously, this was a film that received pretty good notices but which many feel was overshadowed by GoodFellas. But that's fair: the elements for a good crime film are all there, but there's something a little too ... I don't want to say pat, because it isn't, but it just feels like we've got all the stock characters gathered together and we know where it's going before the opening credits end. No real surprises, no standout performances, everything click-click-click. Not bad, just not memorable. Except, my goodness, Robin Wright's hair in this movie is so lustrous, all the more so because she's lit to accentuate the gold in it, she's so beautiful.
White Hunter, Black Heart
release: September 14
dir/pr: Clint Eastwood
scr: Peter Viertel & James Bridges and Burt Kennedy
cin: Jack N. Green
A film director leads a crew to Africa, more intent on bagging an elephant than he is on making a movie. It's an episodic little movie, I don't know as it's one with a real arc, at least not a noticeable one on first glance. Based, apparently, on screenwriter Peter Viertel's experiences with John Huston on The African Queen, Clint Eastwood does an interesting performance that isn't really but then again kind of is Huston: not the voice, of course, but a pattern of talking, little hand gestures, a fey masculinity: it's jarring at first, but by the end I was convinced that this is one of the greatest showcases of Eastwood The Actor - not to mention Eastwood The Director, as he gives co-lead Jeff Fahey enough room to shine, works with cinematographer Jack N. Green to execute ominously beautiful shots, and just...what do I say, he delivers a slow-burn study of a man who can be a great guy and good friend but is also a self-deifying manipulator. An odd movie but, my God, incredible.
Narrow Margin
release: September 21
dir/scr/cin: Peter Hyams
pr: Jonathan A. Zimbert
Remake of The Narrow Margin. If you're gonna update a perfect movie, might as well cast Gene Hackman. Solid movie.
King of New York
release: September 28
dir: Abel Ferrara
pr: Augusto Caminito / Mary Kane
scr: Nicholas St. John
cin: Bojan Bazelli
Crime boss comes out of the pen and almost immediately goes to war against his rivals. Nasty little movie, one of the violent ones that was originally tipped for an X before the producers opted for an unrated release. Damn is it good. Everything feels so empty, even the suite and the suits Christopher Walken's Frank White spends his time in are, like, nice, but once you realize how much time he's spending there you can't help but think, "Really? Is this all there is? Is this really what you're doing all this for? This impermanent gilded cage?" And it appears, yes, this is exactly what he's here for, this is what they're all here for: they talk about power but it looks empty, it is hollow; it is the dream of a person who can't imagine a life beyond their zip code. This and the unflinching violence make it perhaps one of the purest, truest gangster films I've ever watched. Larry Fishburne in this movie: Holy! Cow!
Miller's Crossing
release: October 5
dir: Joel Coen
pr: Ethan Coen
scr: Joel Coen & Ethan Coen
cin: Barry Sonnenfeld
A war between an Irish boss and an Italian boss sparked by a Jewish bookie, the flames fanned by a trusted Irish lieutenant having it off with the boss's mistress (who's the bookie's sister). Elements (by which I mean direct plot points from the novels) of Dashiell Hammett. Among the many elements I liked: Albert Finney's boss being so gullible you wonder how he made it this far until you see the way he handles himself when assassins break into his home; the neighborliness with which hoods greet each other the day after one has tried to kill the other; the casual acknowledgment of homosexuality; Jon Polito getting to flex his acting chops in a pivotal role as the Italian boss.
To Sleep with Anger
release: October 12
dir/scr: Charles Burnett
pr: Caldecot Chubb / Darin Scott
cin: Walt Lloyd
I nodded and admired what the film was doing and going for, I said, "Well, OK!" at its praise and critical and industry awards. But goddam, I was bored. I'm sorry, the pacing of this movie is deadly: I like a slow burn but this didn't even get the match lit. My God! And this is something I feel is in my wheelhouse: the personification of the devil, the conflict between folk tradition and religion, Danny Glover being bad, Mary Alice being, these are all things I want to see more of! But I just didn't gel with this one.
Tomorrow, an extended look at the Best Picture winner.
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