OscarGuy wrote:If this one isn't a landslide victory, I don't know what year from here on out could be.
Well Schindler's List does have some detractors, so you never know.
I'm not one of them. This is my first of three Picture/Director votes for Spielberg. (Plus another Picture vote for a movie he produced.) I'll add some more thoughts on this lineup when I have more time, hopefully. It's a solid lineup--one of the best in my lifetime, no question.
To me, they not only got this one right, they picked the only decent nominees for both Best Picture and Director.
Spielberg's Holocaust epic, Schindler's List was far and away the best film of the year and the best film he ever directed.
Other strong nominees were James Ivory's compelling The Remains of the Day and Jane Campion's The Piano, which laid on the feminism with such a heavy hand that I found it just a wee bit uncomfortable to watch at times. Was the broken finger (fingers?) really necessary?
I liked Jim Sheridan's In the Name of the Father but, as with so many films, the most compelling scenes are the ones that bend the real life facts - the real life father and son did not share the same prison cell and were if memory serves not even incarcerated in the same prison.
The Fugitive was a good popcorn movie, but didn't come close to making my top ten for the year.
My fourth and fifth slots for both Best Picture and Director were Ang Lee's rib tickling comedy, The Wedding Banquet and Lasse Hallstrom's family drama, What's Eating Gilbert Grape. Rounding out my top ten behind In the Name of the Father are Jonathan Demme's Philadelphia; Alfonso Arau's Like Water for Chocolate; Wayne Wang's The Joy Luck Club and Robert Altman's Short Cuts.
