The Decade List: The Heart of the World (2000)

The Heart of the World – dir. Guy Maddin

The Heart of the World might just be the greatest thing Guy Maddin has ever done, which doesn’t speak poorly on any of his other work as it’s just that wonderful. In quick succession, we meet two brothers, a mortician (Caelum Vatnsdal) and an actor playing Jesus in a Passion play (Greg Klymkiw), in love with the same woman, scientist Anna (Leslie Bais) who’s studying the earth’s core only to discover the world is dying of congestive heart failure! I bet you won’t guess what’ll end up saving the world. It’s not love, but that’s the only clue I’ll give you. Love triangles, evil capitalism, phallic rockets, creationist debating, heart attacks and the apocalypse all add up to Maddin’s masterpiece. If you can’t find it somewhere online, it’s available as part of Zeitgeist’s Guy Maddin Collection.

With: Leslie Bais, Caelum Vatnsdal, Shaun Balbar, Greg Klymkiw
Screenplay: Guy Maddin
Cinematography: Guy Maddin
Music: Georgy Sviridov
Country of Origin: Canada
US Distributor: Zeitgeist

Premiere: September 2000 (Toronto International Film Festival)

Awards: Golden Gate Award, Short Narrative (San Francisco International Film Festival); FIPRESCI Prize, Short Subject (Miami Film Festival)

My Sort-Of Top 10 for 2000

Over at Counting Down the Zeroes, I was asked to list my Top 10 films of 2000. I'm not totally set on the ten I chose, but I thought I'd link to it anyway. I may create a more definitive one by the end of the year.

1. Presque rien (Come Undone) [d. Sébastien Lifshitz]
2. Songs from the Second Floor (Sånger från andra våningen) [d. Roy Andersson]
3. Dancer in the Dark [d. Lars von Trier]
4. Water Drops on Burning Rocks (Gouttes d'eau sur pierres brûlantes) [d. François Ozon]
5. Code Unknown (Code inconnu: Récit incomplet de divers voyages) [d. Michael Haneke]
6. In the Mood for Love [d. Wong Kar-wai]
7. George Washington [d. David Gordon Green]
8. Under the Sand (Sous le sable) [d. François Ozon]
9. La fidélité [d. Andrzej Żuławski]
10. Citizen Toxie: The Toxic Avenger IV [d. Lloyd Kaufman]

The Decade List: Maelström (2000)

Maelström - dir. Denis Villeneuve

Denis Villeneuve certainly has a memorable way for opening his sophomore film Maelström. Enter our narrator, a grotesque nightmarish talking fish, with an Alphaville voice, on a Hostel-like operating table. Enter the heroine, Bibi (Marie-Josée Croze), undergoing a fairly graphic abortion. This might lead you to expect a much different type of film than Villeneuve offers his audience, though perhaps not knowing what should logically follow such an opening is the most accurate approach to Maelström. With a dynamite performance from Croze, in her first leading role, Maelström succeeds in being smart and bratty at the same time, all while moving at a pace and direction that seems all its own. Every plot synopsis I've read of the film differs, so there's no point in trying to describe what happens beyond the introduction. The best moment of the entire film occurs near the hour-mark as Bibi runs toward the plane a man she's just met (Jean-Nicolas Verreault) is boarding, reaching her destination out of breath and telling the man, "I forgot to tell you... I want to have sex with you." That really should've be the end-all of last-minute airport parodies (and it works a lot better than me relaying the scene to you).

With: Marie-Josée Croze, Jean-Nicolas Verreault, Stephanie Morgenstern, Pierre Lebeau
Screenplay: Denis Villeneuve
Cinematography: André Turpin
Music: Pierre Desrochers
Country of Origin: Canada
US Distributor: Arrow Features

Premiere: 29 August 2000 (Montréal World Film Festival)
US Premiere: January 2001 (Sundance Film Festival)

Awards: Best Film, Best Director, Best Actress - Marie-Josée Croze, Best Screenplay, Best Cinematography (Genie Awards, Canada); Best Film, Best Director, Best Actress - Marie-Josée Croze, Best Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Art Direction, Best Editing, Best Sound (Jutra Awards, Québec Canada); Best Canadian Feature Film - Special Jury Citation (Tornoto International Film Festival); FIPRESCI Prize - Panorama (Berlin International Film Festival); Best Cinematography (Montréal World Film Festival)

The Decade List: Code inconnu: Récit incomplet de divers voyages (2000)

Code inconnu: Récit incomplet de divers voyages [Code Unknown] - dir. Michael Haneke

I've run into this problem before, and I'm sure to run into it again. But what does one do when everything they have to say about a given film (or whatever you happen to be writing about) has been said before? Revisiting Wong Kar-wai's In the Mood for Love presented a similar challenge, one which I haven't even begun to tackle, as what benefit would it do to regurgitate the same adjectives ("stunning" and "beautiful" are the most common) in describing a film that's already so sealed in the canon of great cinema? Michael Haneke's Code Unknown may not be the first thing to come to mind when you think of films that have been fervently dissected to the point where it's difficult to have anything fresh to say about it, but Girish's blog-a-thon from February of 2006 covered the film extensively, in which I found most of my own thoughts being said by others.

Andrew Grant's proclamation of Code Unknown as the anti-Crash was one of my first thoughts about the film upon re-watching, and it's a more-than-fair claim. Code Unknown uses its Altman-y structure of multi-character exposition to its fullest potential, examining race, class, culture and more in its greatest attempt: a search for truth. All of the film's characters stem from the second scene in the film (another improvement upon these contrived films: typically they tie their stories together at the end), in which teenage Jean (Alexandre Hamidi) throws his trash on a Romanian beggar-woman (Luminiţa Gheorghiu) and is called out for being an asshole by Amadou (Ona Lu Yenke), after Jean's brother's girlfriend Anne (Juliette Binoche) tells him that his brother Georges (Thierry Neuvic) is out of town on business. Code Unknown branches from this moment, in mostly single-take scenes, cut off often mid-conversation, mid-scene.

So what is it about Code Unknown that places it above the middling garbage that utilizes the same narrative structure? It's not just Haneke's rawness and his formidable talent with actors (Binoche, as well as most of the others, are incredible), but the way in which he, and his subjects, approach the impossible truths of our and their world. In the policier film Anne auditions for, the killer wishes to her see "true face." Amadou's father (Djibril Kouyaté) tries to get the truth from his young son (or it grandson?) in regards to his teacher's claim that he had been smoking marijuana. Georges uses a not-so-hidden camera to photograph unwilling subjects on a subway train, after his friend Francine (Arsinée Khanjian) makes some critical remarks about his profession of photographing war. And, as nearly every entry on Girish' blog-a-thon mentioned, there's a striking resemblance to Haneke's later Caché when Anne receives a note under her door which may confirm her suspicions that a young girl is being abused in an adjacent apartment (and the girl may or may not be the deaf girl we see open the film).

What we're left with then is a singular understanding, that truth is what lies in between. This refers to what Haneke doesn't show us, between these récits incomplets de divers voyages, as well as in a broader narrative critique of expected cause-and-effect. Through clichéd narrative structure, reality becomes lost, and in a certain way, Haneke admits defeat in the similar searching his characters do but finds beauty in its endless pursuit. Forgive the images, as they were taken from Kino's subpar disc, with its burned-in subtitles and hideous PAL-to-NTSC transfer. (Also, does anyone know what the tagline, "Love Has a Language All Its Own," has to do with the film? I suspect nothing.)

With: Juliette Binoche, Luminiţa Gheorghiu, Thierry Neuvic, Ona Lu Yenke, Maimouna Hélène Diarra, Sepp Bierbichler, Alexandre Hamidi, Djibril Kouyaté, Crenguta Hariton Stoica, Bob Nicolescu, Bruno Todeschini, Arsinée Khanjian, Florence Loiret, Nathalie Richard, Andrée Tainsy, Carlo Brandt, Philippe Demarle, Maurice Bénichou, Walid Afkir
Screenplay: Michael Haneke
Cinematography: Jürgen Jürges
Music: Giba Gonçalves
Country of Origin: France/Germany/Romania
US Distributor: Kino

Premiere: 19 May 2000 (Cannes Film Festival)
US Premiere: 30 November 2001 (New York City)

Awards: Prize of the Ecumenical Jury (Cannes Film Festival)

The Decade List: 40ish Great Performances (2000-2001)

In no particular order.

Naomi Watts - Mulholland Drive
Isabelle Huppert - La pianiste [The Piano Teacher]
Nicole Kidman - The Others
Dover Koshashvili, Ronit Elkabetz - Late Marriage

John Cameron Mitchell - Hedwig and the Angry Inch
Piper Perabo - Lost & Delirious
Sissy Spacek, Tom Wilkinson, Marisa Tomei - In the Bedroom
Renée Zellweger - Nurse Betty, Bridget Jones's Diary

Stockard Channing - The Business of Strangers
Brian Cox - L.I.E.
Emmanuelle Devos, Vincent Cassel - Sur mes lèvres [Read My Lips]
Tilda Swinton - The Deep End

Javier Bardem - Before Night Falls
The entire cast - The Royal Tenenbaums
Juliette Binoche - Code inconnu [Code Unknown]
Charlotte Rampling - Sous le sable [Under the Sand]

Tony Leung, Maggie Cheung - In the Mood for Love
Jennifer Jason Leigh, Janet McTeer, Romane Bohringer, Lia Williams - The King Is Alive
Lauren Ambrose - Psycho Beach Party, Swimming
Björk - Dancer in the Dark

Eric Bana - Chopper
Eugene Levy, Catherine O'Hara, Parker Posey, Jane Lynch, Michael McKean, John Michael Higgins, Jennifer Coolidge - Best in Show
Christian Bale - American Psycho
Jamie Bell - Billy Elliot

Daryl Hannah, Jennifer Tilly, Sandra Oh - Dancing at the Blue Iguana
Reese Witherspoon - Legally Blonde
Helen Mirren, Maggie Smith - Gosford Park
Guy Pearce, Carrie-Anne Moss - Memento

John Goodman, Paul Giamatti, Robert Wisdom - Storytelling
Lupe Ontiveros - Chuck&Buck, Storytelling
Mike White - Chuck&Buck
Aurélien Recoing - L'emploi du temps [Time Out]

Maribel Verdú - Y tu mamá también
Mark Ruffalo, Laura Linney - You Can Count on Me
Willem Dafoe - Shadow of the Vampire
Ben Kingsley - Sexy Beast

Sergi López - Harry, un ami qui vous veut du bien [With a Friend Like Harry]
Albert Finney - Erin Brockovich
Anna Thomson - Gouttes d'eau sur pierres brûlantes [Water Drops on Burning Rocks]
Brooke Smith, Glenn Fitzgerald - Series 7: The Contenders

The Decade List: Some Honorable Mentions for 2000

As time is not on my side, I probably won't get the chance to write about (or even view) all of the films I'd like to for The Decade List. To make up for this, I've singled out a few other notable films from the year 2000, most of which aren't likely to show up on the big list down the road. Some of them are annotated, others not. Of the films below, only five have been revisited within the past year. You can still expect a bunch of other 2000 films throughout the year. I'll probably continue to do this with other good, if not amazing, films from the past 10 years. The films below are in no particular order, though the annotated ones are listed first.

Seom [The Isle] - dir. Kim Ki-duk

A rewatch of the film that introduced me to Kim Ki-duk proved less satisfactory than I had remembered. Outside of its grotesqueness, Ki-duk conducts a breathtaking landscape, a dream/nightmare world of floating houses on a Korean river with dialogue at an absolute minimum. This setting/tone of a cinematic poem works a lot better in Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... and Spring, but on a visual level, The Isle is still quite lovely.

With: Suh Jung, Kim Yoosuk, Park Sung-hee, Jo Jae-hyeon, Jang Hang-Seon
Screenplay: Kim Ki-duk
Cinematography: Hwang Seo-shik
Music: Jeon Sang-yun
Country of Origin: South Korea
US Distributor: First Run Features

Premiere: 22 April 2000 (South Korea)
US Premiere: 2002 August 23

The King Is Alive - dir. Kristian Levring

Of the notable Dogme 95 films of the 21st century (which, I believe, Lone Scherfig's Italian for Beginners, Susanne Bier's Open Hearts and Ole Christian Madsen's Kira's Reason: A Love Story may be the only others), Kristian Levring's The King Is Alive always stood as my favorite, despite the handful of problems that lie within. The premise, in which a group of tourists get stranded in the middle of an African desert when their bus veers off-course, isn't remarkable. It's a classic pre-reality TV boom exposé of the dark side of the human condition, in which a group of strangers resort to greed and treachery as their hope diminishes, and it doesn't break new ground there. However, when meta psychdrama takes precedence over bleak survival drama, The King Is Alive becomes a lot more intriguing. Of the uniformly excellent cast, Levring provides his actresses with the best material, with Romane Bohringer as an Iago-esque French woman, Jennifer Jason Leigh as a seemingly vapid party girl, Janet McTeer and Lia Williams as women unsatisfied by their husbands. Though certainly contrived, The King Is Alive is rather beautiful when it's hitting the right notes.

With: David Bradley, Romane Bohringer, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Janet McTeer, David Calder, Bruce Davison, Lia Williams, Chris Walker, Vusi Kunene, Miles Anderson, Brion James, Peter Khubeke
Screenplay: Kristian Levring, Anders Thomas Jensen, with inspiration from William Shakespeare's King Lear
Cinematography: Jens Schlosser
Music: Derek Thompson
Country of Origin: Denmark/Sweden/USA
US Distributor: IFC Films

Premiere: 11 May 2000 (Cannes)
US Premiere: 2001 May 11

Awards: Best Actress - Jennifer Jason Leigh (Tokyo International Film Festival)

Psycho Beach Party - dir. Robert Lee King

An amalgam of Frankie & Annette beach films, slasher pics and 60s Americana, Psycho Beach Party finds nothing new to say about its gender or sexual politics, but in such a rambunctious, vibrant package, it's hard to complain. The year 2000 was a strong one for Lauren Ambrose, whose hysterical performance as the spunky schizo Chicklet here and the lost teenager Frankie in Robert J. Siegel's somber Swimming would lead her to the amazing Six Feet Under the following year. Though Psycho Beach Party has a few casting missteps (Nicholas Brendan as Mr. Perfect?), Amy Adams, as the boycrazy Marvel Ann, is one of the bright spots.

With: Lauren Ambrose, Charles Busch, Thomas Gibson, Nicholas Brendon, Beth Broderick, Kimberley Davies, Matt Keeslar, Danni Wheeler, Amy Adams, Nick Cornish, Andrew Levitas, Kathleen Robertson, Nathan Bexton, Buddy Quaid
Screenplay: Charles Busch, based on his play Psycho Beach Party
Cinematography: Arturo Smith
Music: Ben Vaughn
Country of Origin: USA/Australia
US Distributor: Strand Releasing

Premiere: 23 January 2000 (Sundance)

Awards: Outstanding Actress - Lauren Ambrose (L.A. Outfest)

Trolösa [Faithless] - dir. Liv Ullmann

Ingmar Bergman screenplays directed by other people always lack the filmmaker's visual and emotional touch, but his frequent actress and former lover Liv Ullmann does an impressive job with Faithless, even if it does feel like something's missing. There's a strangeness about the unveiled disclosure of the screenplay, in which Erland Josephson, another regular in Bergman's troupe of actors, plays a character named Bergman, living on the island of Fårö, where many of the master's great works were filmed and where he'd later die. Ullmann keeps things ambiguous however, intertwining imagination and memory and keeping the narrative from feeling too confessional.

With: Lena Endre, Erland Josephson, Krister Henriksson, Thomas Hanzon, Michelle Gylemo
Screenplay: Ingmar Bergman
Cinematography: Jörgen Persson
Country of Origin: Sweden/Italy/Germany/Finland/Norway
US Distributor: Samuel Goldwyn Films

Premiere: 13 May 2000 (Cannes)
US Premiere: 2001 January 26 (Palm Springs International Film Festival)

Happy Times - dir. Zhang Yimou

Happy Times would be the turning point in Zhang Yimou's successful, if overpraised, career. His fascination with human drama ended on a high note with Happy Times before giving way to shit-fucking-awful martial arts epics Hero and House of Flying Daggers (as well Curse of the Golden Flower, which I never saw, and Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles, a "return to form").

With: Zhao Benshan, Dong Jie, Dong Lifan, Fu Biao, Li Xuejian
Screenplay: Zi Gai, based on the novel Shifu, You'll Do Anything for a Laugh by Mo Yan
Cinematography: Hou Yong
Music: San Bao
Country of Origin: China
US Distributor: Sony Pictures Classics

Premiere: 31 December 2000
US Premiere: 2002 July 26

Erin Brockovich - dir. Steven Soderbergh

As wildly diverse as Steven Soderbergh's career may be, he found one of his best films, Out of Sight, under the Hollywood umbrella. While not nearly as good as Out of Sight, Erin Brockovich was, for this writer, the better of Soderbergh's offerings in 2000. Erin Brockovich's "empowerment" and sense of humor made for a much more enjoyable filmgoing experience than Traffic's "grittiness." Both could be thrown together as "message movies" about giant social issues, and while their insincerity comes from divergent reasons, Erin Brockovich never strives for anything bigger than its real-life subject does, and thankfully a few of those things are a tight-top, big hair, high heels and plenty of sass. All snark aside, Julia Roberts' performance is quite good, and her Oscar for it is certainly justified from a Hollywood perspective (though, of course, plenty of other actresses were even better with more challenging roles).

With: Julia Roberts, Albert Finney, Aaron Eckhart, Marg Helgenberger
Screenplay: Susannah Grant
Cinematography: Ed Lachman
Music: Thomas Newman
Country of Origin: USA
US Distributor: Universal Studios

Premiere: 14 March 2000 (USA)

Awards: Best Actress - Julia Roberts (Academy Awards); Best Actress - Julia Roberts (BAFTAs); Best Actress, Drama - Julia Roberts (Golden Globes); Best Actress - Julia Roberts, Best Director [also for Traffic] (National Board of Review)

Dancing at the Blue Iguana - dir. Michael Radford

As a film, Dancing at the Blue Iguana isn't much, but as an acting experiment, which was how the film became what it is, it's fantastic. Surrounding the personal and professional lives of five strippers at the Blue Iguana, Daryl Hannah, Jennifer Tilly and Sandra Oh deliver some of the best performances of their careers. All three tool around with their own expected cinematic personas (Hannah as the ditzy blonde, Oh as the introverted nice girl and Tilly as the fiesty vixen) with remarkable results. As one might expect from a film based around improvisation, Dancing at the Blue Iguana works better in individual scenes than as a whole. The most memorable occurs when Tilly, after finding out that she's pregnant, tries to smoke in the waiting room of the doctor's office and goes off on the irritating mom-to-bed next to her. Though neither Hannah nor Oh are physically believable as strippers (I always assume chest size is a pre-requisite for such a job), they make up for it in other areas. Dancing at the Blue Iguana is one of the few examples of a film that overcomes the fact that the sum of its parts greatly out-weight the whole.

With: Daryl Hannah, Jennifer Tilly, Charlotta Ayanna, Sandra Oh, Sheila Kelley, Elias Koteas, Robert Wisdom, Vladimir Mashkov, Kristin Bauer, W. Earl Brown, Chris Hogan, Rodney Rowland, Jesse Bradford, Christina Cabot
Screenplay: Michael Radford, David Linter
Cinematography: Ericson Core
Music: Tal Bergman, Renato Neto
Country of Origin: USA
US Distributor: Lions Gate

Premiere: 14 September 2000 (Toronto Film Festival)
US Premiere: 21 April 2001 (Los Angeles Film Festival)

Trasgredire [Cheeky!] - dir. Tinto Brass

Taken from my earlier review: Tinto Brass still makes films as if it were the 1970s. We open Cheeky! with our heroine, Carla (Yuliya Mayarchuk), strolling through a London park like Jayne Mansfield in The Girl Can’t Help It to an amusingly high-cheese score, where it just so happens everyone around her is engaging in lusty sex. Everywhere she turns, there’s a woman uncrossing her legs to reveal she forgot to put her panties in the laundry that morning. Or there’s a couple in heat, appeasing one another’s sexual urges. Of course, Carla, looking like an Eastern-European streetwalker dressed up as Brigitte Bardot, joins in on the fun, wearing a see-through skirt and exposing her buttocks to passer-byers. There’s a story that follows involving Carla’s tight-ass boyfriend and her search for an apartment, but really this is only an excuse to introduce Carla to as many sexual partners as possible or place her in a situation where others are about to bang. The playfulness of Cheeky!’s sexuality is admirable and refreshing, even if the film is simply pretext for close-ups of Mayarchuk’s ass and sexual experimentation.

With: Yuliya Mayarchuk, Jarno Berardi, Francesca Nunzi, Max Parodi, Mauro Lorenz, Leila Carli, Vittorio Attene
Screenplay: Tinto Brass, Carla Cipriani, Nicolaj Pennestri, Silvia Rossi, Massimiliano Zanin
Cinematography: Massimo Di Venanzo
Music: Pino Donaggio
Country of Origin: Italy
US Distributor: Cult Epics

Premiere: 28 January 2000 (Italy)
US Premiere: 30 May 2006 (DVD Premiere)

Sordid Lives - dir. Del Shores

With: Beth Grant, Delta Burke, Ann Walker, Leslie Jordan, Bonnie Bedelia, Beau Bridges, Kirk Geiger, Olivia Newton-John, Newell Alexander, Rosemary Alexander
Screenplay: Del Shores, based on his play
Cinematography: Max Civon
Music: George S. Clinton
Country of Origin: USA
US Distributor: here! Films

Premiere: 2000 May 25 (Toronto InsideOut Lesbian and Gay Film Festival)
US Premiere: 31 May 2000 (Seattle International Film Festival)

Awards: Outstanding Soundtrack (L.A. Outfest); Best Feature Film, Best Actor - Leslie Jordan (New York International Independent Film & Video Festival); Best Feature (Philadelphia International Gay & Lesbian Film Festival)

Faites comme si je n'étais pas là [Pretend I'm Not Here] - dir. Olivier Jahan

With: Jérémie Renier, Aurore Clément, Sami Bouajila, Alexia Stresi, Nathalie Richard, Emma de Caunes, Johan Leysen, Ouassini Embarek, Bouli Lanners
Screenplay: Olivier Jahan, Michael C. Pouzol
Cinematography: Gilles Porte
Music: Cyril Moisson
Country of Origin: France
US Distributor: N/A

Premiere: 2000 June (Avignon Film Festival)
US Premiere: N/A

101 Reykjavík - dir. Baltasar Kormákur

With: Hilmir Snær Guðnason, Victoria Abril, Hanna María Karlsdóttir, Þrúður Vilhjálmsdóttir, Baltasar Kormákur
Screenplay: Baltasar Kormákur, based on the novel by Hallgrímur Helgason
Cinematography: Peter Steuger
Music: Damon Albarn, Einar Örn Benediktsson
Country of Origin: Iceland/Denmark/France/Norway/Germany
US Distributor: Wellspring

Premiere: 1 June 2000 (Iceland)
US Premiere: 25 July 2001 (New York City)

Awards: Discovery Award (Toronto International Film Festival); Best Screenplay, Best Sound - Kjartan Kjartansson (Edda Awards, Iceland)

Mysterious Object at Noon - dir. Apichatpong Weerasethakul

Cinematography: Prasong Klimborron, Sayombhu Mukdeeprom
Country of Origin: Thailand
US Distributor: Plexifilm

Premiere: 2000 October 2 (Vancouver International Film Festival)
US Premiere: 2001 June 23 (New York City)

Dayereh [The Circle] - dir. Jafar Panahi

With: Nargess Mamizadeh, Maryiam Palvin Almani, Mojgan Faramarzi, Elham Saboktakin, Solmaz Panahi, Fereshteh Sadre Orafaiy, Fatemeh Naghavi, Monir Arab
Screenplay: Kambuzia Partovi
Cinematography: Bahram Badakshani
Country of Origin: Iran/Switzerland/Italy
US Distributor: Fox Lorber

Premiere: 6 September 2000 (Venice FIlm Festival)
US Premiere: 1 March 2000 (International Film Series)

Awards: Golden Lion (Venice); Freedom of Expression Award (National Board of Review)

O Fantasma - dir. João Pedro Rodrigues

With: Ricardo Meneses, Beatriz Torcato, Andre Barbosa, Eurico Vieria, Joaquim Oliveira, Florindo Lourenço
Screenplay: Alexandre Melo, José Neves, Paulo Rebelo, João Pedro Rodrigues
Cinematography: Rui Poças
Country of Origin: Portugal
US Distributor: Picture This!

Premiere: 8 September 2000 (Venice Film Festival)
US Premiere: 2001 June 2 (Seattle International Film Festival)

Awards: Best Feature (New York Lesbian and Gay Film Festival)

The Decade List: Awards (2000)

Here's what I've got so far:

Citizen Toxie: The Toxic Avenger IV - dir. Lloyd Kaufman
Dancer in the Dark - dir. Lars von Trier
George Washington - dir. David Gordon Green
Gouttes d'eau sur pierres brûlantes [Water Drops on Burning Rocks] - dir. François Ozon
Presque rien [Come Undone / Almost Nothing] - dir. Sébastien Lifshitz
Sånger från andra våningen [Songs from the Second Floor] - dir. Roy Andersson
Sous le sable [Under the Sand] - dir. François Ozon

And, as I've stated many times before, I'm going to continue to revisit/watch/write about more films from the year 2000 throughout the year. The ones I'm working on now: Andrzej Żuławski's La fidélité, Wong Kar-wai's In the Mood for Love, Michael Haneke's Code Unknown [Code inconnu]. The ones I still have yet to see (which means they may, or may not, be written about in the future): Edward Yang's Yiyi, Im Kwon-taek's Chunhyang, Jia Zhang-ke's Platform, Terence Davies' House of Mirth, Olivier Assayas' Les destinées sentimentales, Volker Schlöndorff's Die Stille nach dem Schuß [The Legend of Rita] and Béla Tarr's Werckmeister harmóniák [Werckmeister Harmonies], among a few others.

Additionally, here is a run-down of the major award shows/festivals from the year (or at least the ones corresponding to the films released during that year). Keep in mind though that a number of the films below were "officially" released in 1999.

Cannes

Palme d'Or: Dancer in the Dark - dir. Lars von Trier
Grand Prix: Devils on the Doorstep - dir. Jiang Wen
Jury Prize: (tie) Sånger från andra våningen [Songs from the Second Floor] - dir. Roy Andersson; Blackboards - dir. Samira Makhmalbaf
Director: Edward Yang - Yiyi
Actor: Tony Leung - In the Mood for Love
Actress: Björk - Dancer in the Dark
Screenplay: James Flamberg, John C. Richards - Nurse Betty
Camera d'Or: (tie) Djomeh - dir. Hassan Yektapanah; Time for Drunken Horses - dir. Bahman Ghobadi

Venice

Golden Lion: The Circle - dir. Jafar Panahi
Grand Special Jury Prize: Before Night Falls - dir. Julian Schnabel
Actor: Javier Bardem - Before Night Falls
Actress: Rose Byrne - The Goddess of 1967

Toronto

People's Choice Award: Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon - dir. Ang Lee
Discovery Award: 101 Reykjavík - dir. Baltasar Kormákur; George Washington - dir. David Gordon Green; The Day I Became a Woman - dir. Marzieh Makhmalbaf; The Iron Ladies - dir. Youngyooth Thongkonthun
Best Canadian Feature: Waydowntown - dir. Gary Burns

Berlin

Golden Bear: Magnolia - dir. Paul Thomas Anderson
Director: Miloš Forman - Man on the Moon
Actor: Denzel Washington - The Hurricane
Actress: Bibiana Beglau, Nadja Uhl - Die Stille nach dem Schuß [The Legend of Rita]
Jury Grand Prix: The Road Home - dir. Zhang Yimou
Jury Prize: The Million Dollar Hotel - dir. Wim Wenders

Sundance

Grand Jury Prize (Dramatic): (tie) Girlfight - dir. Karyn Kusama; You Can Count on Me - dir. Kenneth Lonergan
Grand Jury Prize (Documentary): Long Night's Journey Into Day - dir. Frances Reid, Deborah Hoffmann
Director (Dramatic): Karyn Kusama - Girlfight
Director (Documentary): Rob Epstein, Jeffrey Friedman - Paragraph 175
Special Jury Prize (Dramatic): Songcatcher, for outstanding ensemble performance; The Tao of Steve, for Donal Logue's outstanding performance
Special Jury Prize (Documentary): Aiyana Elliott - The Ballad of Ramblin' Jack, for artistic achievement; Daniel McCabe, Paul Stekler, Steve Fayer - George Wallace: Settin' the Woods on Fire, for writing a documentary
Cinematography (Dramatic): Tom Krueger - Committed
Cinematography (Documentary): (tie) Andrew Young - Americanos: Latino Life in the United States; Marc Singer - Dark Days
Audience Award (Dramatic): Two Family House - dir. Raymond De Felitta
Audience Award (Documentary): Dark Days - dir. Marc Singer
Audience Award (World Cinema): Saving Grace - dir. Nigel Cole

Oscars

Picture: Gladiator - dir. Ridley Scott
Director: Steven Soderbergh - Traffic
Actor: Russell Crowe - Gladiator
Actress: Julia Roberts - Erin Brockovich
Supporting Actor: Benicio del Toro - Traffic
Supporting Actress: Marcia Gay Harden - Pollock
Original Screenplay: Cameron Crowe - Almost Famous
Adapted Screenplay: Stephen Gaghan - Traffic
Cinematography: Peter Pau - Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Documentary: Into the Arms of Strangers: Stories of the Kindertransport - dir. Mark Jonathan Harris, Deborah Oppenheimer
Foreign Film: Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon - dir. Ang Lee

BAFTAs

Film: Gladiator - dir. Ridley Scott
Director: Ang Lee - Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Film Not in the English Language: In the Mood for Love - dir. Wong Kar-wai
British Film: Billy Elliot - dir. Stephen Daldry
Actor: Jamie Bell - Billy Elliot
Actress: Julia Roberts - Erin Brockovich
Supporting Actor: Benicio del Toro - Traffic
Supporting Actress: Julie Walters - Billy Elliot
Original Screenplay: Cameron Crowe - Almost Famous
Adapted Screenplay: Stephen Gaghan - Traffic
Cinematography: John Mathieson - Gladiator

European Film Awards

Film: Dancer in the Dark - dir. Lars von Trier
Actor: Sergi López - Harry un ami qui vous veut du bien [With a Friend Like Harry]
Actress: Björk - Dancer in the Dark
Cinematography: Vittorio Storaro - Goya en Burdeos [Goya in Bordeaux]
Screenplay: Agnès Jaoui, Jean-Pierre Bacri - Le goût des autres [The Taste of Others]
Documentary: Les glaneurs et la glaneuse [The Gleaners & I] - dir. Agnès Varda
Discovery: Laurent Cantet - Ressources humaines [Human Resources]
Screen International: Wong Kar-wai - In the Mood for Love
Audience Award (Actor): Ingvar Eggert Sigurðsson - Englar alheimsins [Angels of the Universe]
Audience Award (Actress): Björk - Dancer in the Dark
Audience Award (Director): Lars von Trier - Dancer in the Dark

Independent Spirit

Feature: Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon - dir. Ang Lee
First Feature: You Can Count on Me - dir. Kenneth Lonergan
Feature Under $500,000: Chuck & Buck - dir. Miguel Arteta
Director: Ang Lee - Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Male Lead: Javier Bardem - Before Night Falls
Female Lead: Ellen Burstyn - Requiem for a Dream
Supporting Male: Willem Dafoe - Shadow of the Vampire
Supporting Female: Zhang Ziyi - Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Debut Performance: Michelle Rodriguez - Girlfight
Screenplay: Kenneth Lonergan - You Can Count on Me
First Screenplay: Gina Prince-Bythewood - Love and Basketball
Cinematography: Matthew Libatique - Requiem for a Dream
Documentary: Dark Days - dir. Marc Singer
Foreign Film: Dancer in the Dark - dir. Lars von Trier

Golden Globes

Picture (Drama): Gladiator - dir. Ridley Scott
Picture (Comedy/Musical): Almost Famous - dir. Cameron Crowe
Director: Ang Lee - Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Actor (D): Tom Hanks - Cast Away
Actress (D): Julia Roberts - Erin Brockovich
Actor (M/C): George Clooney - O Brother, Where Art Thou?
Actress (M/C): Renée Zellweger - Nurse Betty
Supporting Actor: Benicio del Toro - Traffic
Supporting Actress: Kate Hudson - Almost Famous
Screenplay: Stephen Gaghan - Traffic
Foreign Film: Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon - dir. Ang Lee

Césars

Best French Film: Le goût des autres [The Taste of Others] - dir. Agnès Jaoui
Director: Dominik Moll - Harry un ami qui vous veut du bien [With a Friend Like Harry]
Actor: Sergi López - Harry un ami qui vous veut du bien
Actress: Dominique Blanc - Stand-by
Supporting Actor: Gérard Lanvin - Le goût des autres
Supporting Actress: Anna Alvaro - Le goût des autres
Promising Actor: Jalil Lespert - Resources humaines [Human Resources]
Promising Actress: Sylvie Testud - Les blessures assassines [Murderous Maids]
Screenplay: Agnès Jaoui, Jean-Pierre Bacri - Le goût des autres
Cinematography: Agnès Godard - Beau travail
Foreign Film: In the Mood for Love - dir. Wong Kar-wai
Best First Film: Ressources humaines - dir. Laurent Cantet

Razzies

Worst Film: Battlefield Earth - dir. Roger Christian
Worst Director: Roger Christian - Battlefield Earth
Worst Actor: John Travolta - Battlefield Earth, Lucky Numbers
Worst Actress: Madonna - The Next Best Thing
Worst Supporting Actor: Barry Pepper - Battlefield Earth
Worst Supporting Actress: Kelly Preston - Battlefield Earth
Worst Screenplay: Corey Mandell, J.D. Shapiro - Battlefield Earth
Worst Remake/Sequel: Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2 - dir. Bill Carraro