Film Faves: 1994
Welcome folks to another edition of Film Faves wherein I count down my favorite dozen of a film topic. For those who are new, Film Faves is not intended as an objective 'Best of' list. Instead, think of it as an unabashedly subjective expression of movie geek love. Many lists stop at 10 with some Honorable Mentions thrown in afterward. Film Faves is a list of 12 movies or related items - no Honorable Mentions.
I intend to explore many different film topics with Film Faves, but its primary focus for the time being is marching backward through time, taking a look at each year and counting down my favorite films of every year.
Let's get on with it, shall we? This edition of Film Faves looks at the year 1994.
The year 1994 was a great year for movies. It is the first year I've written about in a while with too many movies I loved than I can fit into the list. Movies like Outbreak, The Crow, Disclosure, Maverick, and other movies apparently with one-word titles I really enjoy, but just couldn't squeeze their way onto the list.
There are several things worth noting about the movies of 1994. In the foreign film market il Postino, Eat Drink Man Woman, and Kieslowski's Red and White garnered most of the critical and commercial attention.
The documentary of the year was Hoop Dreams, the three-hour chronicle of inner city high schoolers who dream of becoming the next Michael Jordan. No documentary would gain such popularity for nearly a decade, however Hoop Dreams was not nominated for Best Documentary in the Academy Awards.
There were a couple notable debuts in 1994: Cameron Diaz (The Mask), Natalie Portman (Léon), and Kate Winslet (Heavenly Creatures). Also, Dakota Fanning, Justin Beiber, and Saoirse Ronan were all born that year.
Several comedies reigned supreme at the box office, including The Mask, Dumb and Dumber, Four Weddings and a Funeral, and the dumb-as-a-rock The Flintstones. Other notable comedies include Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult, Bullets Over Broadway, The Santa Clause, and Clerks.
Other movies of note include The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert; Heavenly Creatures; The Last Seduction; Legends of the Fall; Natural Born Killers; The Paper; Quiz Show; Reality Bites; Serial Mom; Timecop; and Wes Craven's New Nightmare.
Then there was the cack, the worst of the year. Remember these screen gems? Bad Girls, Cabin Boy, Camp Nowhere, The Chase, City Slickers II: The Legend of Curly's Gold, Clean Slate, Clear and Present Danger, Exit to Eden, Getting Even with Dad, I Love Trouble, It's Pat, Lightning Jack, The Next Karate Kid, North, On Deadly Ground, The Pagemaster, Renaissance Man, Richie Rich, The Specialist, and Raul Julia's final film (sigh...), Street Fighter.
But here are my favorite films of
1994:
12. With Honors
Once in a while, my taste in ‘90s films will dip into what many consider to be sub-par melodrama just a notch above Lifetime TV-movie schmaltz. I believe this film, starring Brendan Fraser and Joe Pesci, would count among those films. But I still enjoy it quite a bit. I watched this film about a dozen times during my teen years. As an adult revisiting this film for the first time in a decade (I’ve let a VHS copy sit on my shelf untouched most of that time), I steeled myself for an overwrought, treacley experience. I was pleasantly surprised. The ensemble – which also includes Moira Kelly, Patrick Dempsey, and Josh Hamilton – simultaneously gelled together and stood apart. The story is adequately told and avoids ringing false. The third-act drama, which touches on mortality, regret, and the sum of one’s life, was adequately moving without feeling forced. For those who aren’t aware, With Honors is about a Harvard student (Fraser) who loses his senior thesis to a bum (Pesci). That bum makes a deal to return a page of the thesis per charitable gesture given to him. One thing leads to another, and the student and bum develop a friendship as they learn more about each other, each teaching the other lessons in life. I won’t go so far as to say these are the best performances by Fraser and Pesci, but they are very good and help carry the film. Also, Patrick Dempsey was rarely seen during the '90s and his performance in this film is a treat.
11. Nell
This film has remained one of my favorite Jodie Foster movies – and happens to also be one of her personal favorites, as well. Directed by Michael Apted, Nell criticizes the cynicism and noise of our society through a 30-something wild child who was raised in the woods by a stroke victim. She is discovered by a scientist (played by Liam Neeson) and introduced to contemporary society. The film could’ve been completely melodramatic and silly – and it does go there a bit during a climactic courtroom scene – but Foster sells the character and keeps the film's feet on the ground. Nell connects not by resorting to cheap fish-out-of-water gags or a subject/observer romance, but by being truthful about its situation and focusing on Nell’s relationship with her sister. A very moving film.
10. Forrest Gump
Forrest Gump is a really good film. That statement may come as common knowledge, but I think it may be a bit controversial. The AFI once named Forrest Gump among the 100 greatest films ever made. The Academy of Motion Picture Sciences named Forrest Gump the Best Picture of its year. I respectfully disagree with them both. Sure, Gump was one of the best films of 1994 and one could place it among the greatest films ever made. But it was not the best film of 1994 and it certainly would be in better company between the 200th and 500th best films ever made - not the top 100. Gump took top honors at the Oscars, proving once again that sometimes popularity beats out quality. That said, I bawl my eyes out when I watch this film (you’ll hear this sentiment more often in coming months). The cast is magnificent and the way in which Gump is weaved within the fabric of American history is far more poignant than in Winston Groom’s comedic novel. I remember how much of a phenomenon this film was; lines stretched to parking lots, in a way typically witnessed only with genre films like Star Wars. The only thing about Gump that hasn’t aged too well is what made it ‘revolutionary’: the archive footage looks completely fake now, especially where people’s mouths are manipulated. Cinephiles will note the appearance of a tiny Haley Joel Osmett during the third act.
9. Léon (aka The Professional)
I reviewed Léon as part of the Remember That Movie feature earlier this year. I'd never seen the film before, but immediately loved it for the performances of its leads, the action, and its characters. It is a film that has borne many cardboard copies. That this film's characters are not one-dimensional and its morality beyond one-note makes it the intriguing film it is. It's a shame Jean Reno's career afterward never quite afforded him the kind of quality Portman's or Oldman's, but at least he can say he starred in Luc Besson's best film.
8. Interview with the Vampire
This film came out a couple years after Bram Stoker’s Dracula (another favorite of mine) and may not have been possible if not for that film. During the '80s, vampires were depicted in movies as street toughs with fangs. Interview once again captured the oldness of vampires; these are creatures who have been around since the Victorian Age. Unlike many other vampire films, the cast of Interview took the material seriously and reined in the camp. This was also first film where I sat up and took Tom Cruise seriously as an actor (to be fair, I’d probably yet to see Born on the Fourth of July or Rain Man). Kirsten Dunst impressed many as the aging woman trapped in a little girl’s body. Brad Pitt amped-up his star power by double-billing the tortured hunk role in Interview and Legends of the Fall. And Antonio Banderas, whose career would explode in coming years, is also fantastic as Armand. It's a shame 'The Vampire Chronicles' couldn't be handled with this much respect again (a horrendous sequel, The Queen of the Damned, was released eight years later); it would've made quite a franchise.
7. Speed
A city bus loaded with a dozen civilians has a bomb that will explode if it drops below 50 miles per hour. What do you do? Action pitches don’t get much simpler than that. Thankfully, this action film kept things simple, fun, and exciting without treating the audience like idiots. Keanu Reeves works well as the determined hotshot bomb specialist and Dennis Hopper joins the love-to-hate villainy pantheon. Sandra Bullock, who appeared as a naïve cop a year before in Demolition Man, exploded with this movie, quickly becoming Julia Roberts’ competition for romantic leading roles. Unfortunately, director Jan de Bont and Bullock failed to yield and merged again for the ill-advised sequel, Speed 2: Cruise Control.
6. The Hudsucker Proxy
I have loved The Hudsucker Proxy ever since I saw it on cable when I was fourteen. It has remained my favorite Coen Brothers movie since (although True Grit is a close 2nd). It’s 1958. Just as Warren Hudsucker (Charles Durning), founder of Hudsucker Industries plummets from the top floor, Norville Barnes (Tim Robbins) wanders into the first floor. By chance, Barnes becomes the unwitting pawn of a corporate scheme of the stockholders (led by a gruff Paul Newman) to buy out the company and take total control. However, Barnes has an idea up his sleeve (Ya know… for kids!) that incidentally becomes a huge success, keeping Hudsucker stocks soaring. There are about a hundred things I love about this movie: the circular motif, Bill Cobbs’ narration, the score by Carter Burwell (he of the score to every Coen Bros. movie), the way the dialogue pops, and Jennifer Jason Leigh’s performance (swoon!) as a tough-talking Gal Friday who is skeptical about Barnes and later falls for him. The Hudsucker Proxy is one of the Coens’ most over-looked movies, which is a shame, because it’s also one of their most accessible. Check it out, if you’re unfamiliar with it.
5. The Shawshank Redemption
The Shawshank Redemption may not only be the best Stephen King movie ever, but also the best prison movie ever. So rich is it with theme and pathos, it’s the kind of film that would make you sympathetic toward anyone doing hard time for murder. Tim Robbins and Morgan Freeman are two guys with the choice to get busy living or get busy dying in prison. Robbins is Andy Dufresne, an accountant convicted of killing his adulterous wife. He proves himself wily enough to hold his own in prison despite a few scrapes with some sociopaths. He befriends Red (Freeman), a man who keeps getting denied parole. What follows may be one of cinema's greatest bromances.
4. True Lies
Arnold Schwarzenegger reunites with director James Cameron for this spy action comedy about the need to inject a little excitement in a marriage. Arnold stars as Harry Tasker, a spy on the trail of a terrorist and discovers his wife may be cheating on him. It turns out she’s just craving some excitement of her own and gets swept up in her husband’s secret life (Helen, played by Jamie Lee Curtis, thought Harry was a software developer). True Lies is one of Schwarzenegger’s more substantial action flicks, balancing effectively the home life with the set-piece action scenes. A dose of humor is provided by all involved, especially Tom Arnold, who plays Harry’s best bud and carpool partner. Cameron is usually remembered for his sci-fi epics (and Titanic), but shows a lighter side to the notoriously strong-willed filmmaker.
3. Ed Wood
Ed Wood is widely regarded as America’s worst filmmaker ever. Often, his films are derided, ridiculed, and looked at as the crown jewels of so-bad-it’s-good cinema. How incredible then that director Tim Burton made this man's story one of the most beautiful and endearing biopics ever to hit the screen. We are shown how Wood was a man who just wanted to be accepted for who he was and had a passion for motion pictures. Wood grew up reading pulp magazines and watching genre films. He idolized Bela Lugosi and dreamed of creating something as great as Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane. He had a predilection toward ‘realism’, yet could never earn a big enough budget to buy anything better than cardboard sets and cheap props. He was blinded by his visions, unwilling to accept many notes, yet deeply cut by negative reviews. He was the complete opposite end of the spectrum from Lugosi and Welles. Yet these are the things that make the film Ed Wood deeply fascinating. Johnny Depp may have earned Academy nods for playing Captain Jack Sparrow, but his best work is as Ed Wood. Depp disappears into the role and brings us Wood’s passion, frustration, fears, determination, and desperation. Likewise, as forgotten screen legend Bela Lugosi, Martin Landau transforms himself into a dope-addicted, animated old cuss whose career ended with his indebted friendship and collaboration with Ed Wood. Often, this is probably perceived as pathetic given that Lugosi was once the iconic Dracula, that most powerful and enduring of Universal’s classic monsters. Burton shows us the trust and faith behind that collaboration; Wood was Lugosi’s only friend in the end. I’ve seen the films depicted here – and they’re truly awful (although I find Plan 9 from Outer Space way more tolerable than Glen or Glenda). But Ed Wood is probably the best film of Burton’s career.
2. The Lion King
During the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, Disney went through a creative explosion, a new Golden Age, and The Lion King was the culmination of that great period. I’ll go so far as to say it was the best film from that era. The opening teaser alone is a perfect example of how much beauty traditional animation can behold. Combined with the opening number ‘The Circle of Life’ and the title card appearing with a silencing BOOM!, those three minutes are enough to give me chills. The rest of the film, modeled after Hamlet, thankfully lives up to that moment, grappling with daddy issues, responsibility, and friendship. The Lion King may have its cutesy sidekick characters, but it is the closest since Pinocchio that Disney Studios ever got to transcending the animation genre beyond kids stuff.
1. Pulp Fiction
Quentin Tarantino's sophomore effort not only has some of the best characters, dialogue, and structure ever put to film, but (like The Lion King) it also has one of the greatest opening title sequences. A couple in a diner have a pseudo-intellectual discussion about crime, which crescendos to a stick-up with Amanda Plummer’s threatening growl. Then that bass line kicks in and the title slowly crawls into view. A fantastic start to one of the decade’s most influential films. Pulp Fiction helped the careers of everyone involved: John Travolta’s career got a kick in the butt, Samuel L. Jackson became everyone’s favorite bad-ass, Uma Thurman became the cinephile’s IT girl, etc. It also started a trend of talky-violent crime films and, together with Kevin Smith's Clerks, revolutionized the indie film scene and made Miramax (and the Weinsteins) a force to be reckoned with.
That about wraps things up for the year 1994. Were there any of your favorites or notable trends that I overlooked? Feel free to leave a comment below or 'like' the new Facebook Fan Page to the right and leave a comment there. You can also email your thoughts to thegibsonreview@gmail.com Be sure to also vote on your favorite films of 1994 on the poll to the right.
Next time on Film Faves, a creepy and kooky family, Chaos Theory, a one-armed man, and Tom Hanks gets sleepless in one city and on the streets of another. It's 1993!
I intend to explore many different film topics with Film Faves, but its primary focus for the time being is marching backward through time, taking a look at each year and counting down my favorite films of every year.
Let's get on with it, shall we? This edition of Film Faves looks at the year 1994.
The year 1994 was a great year for movies. It is the first year I've written about in a while with too many movies I loved than I can fit into the list. Movies like Outbreak, The Crow, Disclosure, Maverick, and other movies apparently with one-word titles I really enjoy, but just couldn't squeeze their way onto the list.
There are several things worth noting about the movies of 1994. In the foreign film market il Postino, Eat Drink Man Woman, and Kieslowski's Red and White garnered most of the critical and commercial attention.
The documentary of the year was Hoop Dreams, the three-hour chronicle of inner city high schoolers who dream of becoming the next Michael Jordan. No documentary would gain such popularity for nearly a decade, however Hoop Dreams was not nominated for Best Documentary in the Academy Awards.
There were a couple notable debuts in 1994: Cameron Diaz (The Mask), Natalie Portman (Léon), and Kate Winslet (Heavenly Creatures). Also, Dakota Fanning, Justin Beiber, and Saoirse Ronan were all born that year.
Several comedies reigned supreme at the box office, including The Mask, Dumb and Dumber, Four Weddings and a Funeral, and the dumb-as-a-rock The Flintstones. Other notable comedies include Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult, Bullets Over Broadway, The Santa Clause, and Clerks.
Other movies of note include The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert; Heavenly Creatures; The Last Seduction; Legends of the Fall; Natural Born Killers; The Paper; Quiz Show; Reality Bites; Serial Mom; Timecop; and Wes Craven's New Nightmare.
Then there was the cack, the worst of the year. Remember these screen gems? Bad Girls, Cabin Boy, Camp Nowhere, The Chase, City Slickers II: The Legend of Curly's Gold, Clean Slate, Clear and Present Danger, Exit to Eden, Getting Even with Dad, I Love Trouble, It's Pat, Lightning Jack, The Next Karate Kid, North, On Deadly Ground, The Pagemaster, Renaissance Man, Richie Rich, The Specialist, and Raul Julia's final film (sigh...), Street Fighter.
But here are my favorite films of
1994:
Once in a while, my taste in ‘90s films will dip into what many consider to be sub-par melodrama just a notch above Lifetime TV-movie schmaltz. I believe this film, starring Brendan Fraser and Joe Pesci, would count among those films. But I still enjoy it quite a bit. I watched this film about a dozen times during my teen years. As an adult revisiting this film for the first time in a decade (I’ve let a VHS copy sit on my shelf untouched most of that time), I steeled myself for an overwrought, treacley experience. I was pleasantly surprised. The ensemble – which also includes Moira Kelly, Patrick Dempsey, and Josh Hamilton – simultaneously gelled together and stood apart. The story is adequately told and avoids ringing false. The third-act drama, which touches on mortality, regret, and the sum of one’s life, was adequately moving without feeling forced. For those who aren’t aware, With Honors is about a Harvard student (Fraser) who loses his senior thesis to a bum (Pesci). That bum makes a deal to return a page of the thesis per charitable gesture given to him. One thing leads to another, and the student and bum develop a friendship as they learn more about each other, each teaching the other lessons in life. I won’t go so far as to say these are the best performances by Fraser and Pesci, but they are very good and help carry the film. Also, Patrick Dempsey was rarely seen during the '90s and his performance in this film is a treat.
This film has remained one of my favorite Jodie Foster movies – and happens to also be one of her personal favorites, as well. Directed by Michael Apted, Nell criticizes the cynicism and noise of our society through a 30-something wild child who was raised in the woods by a stroke victim. She is discovered by a scientist (played by Liam Neeson) and introduced to contemporary society. The film could’ve been completely melodramatic and silly – and it does go there a bit during a climactic courtroom scene – but Foster sells the character and keeps the film's feet on the ground. Nell connects not by resorting to cheap fish-out-of-water gags or a subject/observer romance, but by being truthful about its situation and focusing on Nell’s relationship with her sister. A very moving film.
Forrest Gump is a really good film. That statement may come as common knowledge, but I think it may be a bit controversial. The AFI once named Forrest Gump among the 100 greatest films ever made. The Academy of Motion Picture Sciences named Forrest Gump the Best Picture of its year. I respectfully disagree with them both. Sure, Gump was one of the best films of 1994 and one could place it among the greatest films ever made. But it was not the best film of 1994 and it certainly would be in better company between the 200th and 500th best films ever made - not the top 100. Gump took top honors at the Oscars, proving once again that sometimes popularity beats out quality. That said, I bawl my eyes out when I watch this film (you’ll hear this sentiment more often in coming months). The cast is magnificent and the way in which Gump is weaved within the fabric of American history is far more poignant than in Winston Groom’s comedic novel. I remember how much of a phenomenon this film was; lines stretched to parking lots, in a way typically witnessed only with genre films like Star Wars. The only thing about Gump that hasn’t aged too well is what made it ‘revolutionary’: the archive footage looks completely fake now, especially where people’s mouths are manipulated. Cinephiles will note the appearance of a tiny Haley Joel Osmett during the third act.
9. Léon (aka The Professional)
I reviewed Léon as part of the Remember That Movie feature earlier this year. I'd never seen the film before, but immediately loved it for the performances of its leads, the action, and its characters. It is a film that has borne many cardboard copies. That this film's characters are not one-dimensional and its morality beyond one-note makes it the intriguing film it is. It's a shame Jean Reno's career afterward never quite afforded him the kind of quality Portman's or Oldman's, but at least he can say he starred in Luc Besson's best film.
This film came out a couple years after Bram Stoker’s Dracula (another favorite of mine) and may not have been possible if not for that film. During the '80s, vampires were depicted in movies as street toughs with fangs. Interview once again captured the oldness of vampires; these are creatures who have been around since the Victorian Age. Unlike many other vampire films, the cast of Interview took the material seriously and reined in the camp. This was also first film where I sat up and took Tom Cruise seriously as an actor (to be fair, I’d probably yet to see Born on the Fourth of July or Rain Man). Kirsten Dunst impressed many as the aging woman trapped in a little girl’s body. Brad Pitt amped-up his star power by double-billing the tortured hunk role in Interview and Legends of the Fall. And Antonio Banderas, whose career would explode in coming years, is also fantastic as Armand. It's a shame 'The Vampire Chronicles' couldn't be handled with this much respect again (a horrendous sequel, The Queen of the Damned, was released eight years later); it would've made quite a franchise.
7. Speed
A city bus loaded with a dozen civilians has a bomb that will explode if it drops below 50 miles per hour. What do you do? Action pitches don’t get much simpler than that. Thankfully, this action film kept things simple, fun, and exciting without treating the audience like idiots. Keanu Reeves works well as the determined hotshot bomb specialist and Dennis Hopper joins the love-to-hate villainy pantheon. Sandra Bullock, who appeared as a naïve cop a year before in Demolition Man, exploded with this movie, quickly becoming Julia Roberts’ competition for romantic leading roles. Unfortunately, director Jan de Bont and Bullock failed to yield and merged again for the ill-advised sequel, Speed 2: Cruise Control.
I have loved The Hudsucker Proxy ever since I saw it on cable when I was fourteen. It has remained my favorite Coen Brothers movie since (although True Grit is a close 2nd). It’s 1958. Just as Warren Hudsucker (Charles Durning), founder of Hudsucker Industries plummets from the top floor, Norville Barnes (Tim Robbins) wanders into the first floor. By chance, Barnes becomes the unwitting pawn of a corporate scheme of the stockholders (led by a gruff Paul Newman) to buy out the company and take total control. However, Barnes has an idea up his sleeve (Ya know… for kids!) that incidentally becomes a huge success, keeping Hudsucker stocks soaring. There are about a hundred things I love about this movie: the circular motif, Bill Cobbs’ narration, the score by Carter Burwell (he of the score to every Coen Bros. movie), the way the dialogue pops, and Jennifer Jason Leigh’s performance (swoon!) as a tough-talking Gal Friday who is skeptical about Barnes and later falls for him. The Hudsucker Proxy is one of the Coens’ most over-looked movies, which is a shame, because it’s also one of their most accessible. Check it out, if you’re unfamiliar with it.
The Shawshank Redemption may not only be the best Stephen King movie ever, but also the best prison movie ever. So rich is it with theme and pathos, it’s the kind of film that would make you sympathetic toward anyone doing hard time for murder. Tim Robbins and Morgan Freeman are two guys with the choice to get busy living or get busy dying in prison. Robbins is Andy Dufresne, an accountant convicted of killing his adulterous wife. He proves himself wily enough to hold his own in prison despite a few scrapes with some sociopaths. He befriends Red (Freeman), a man who keeps getting denied parole. What follows may be one of cinema's greatest bromances.
Arnold Schwarzenegger reunites with director James Cameron for this spy action comedy about the need to inject a little excitement in a marriage. Arnold stars as Harry Tasker, a spy on the trail of a terrorist and discovers his wife may be cheating on him. It turns out she’s just craving some excitement of her own and gets swept up in her husband’s secret life (Helen, played by Jamie Lee Curtis, thought Harry was a software developer). True Lies is one of Schwarzenegger’s more substantial action flicks, balancing effectively the home life with the set-piece action scenes. A dose of humor is provided by all involved, especially Tom Arnold, who plays Harry’s best bud and carpool partner. Cameron is usually remembered for his sci-fi epics (and Titanic), but shows a lighter side to the notoriously strong-willed filmmaker.
Ed Wood is widely regarded as America’s worst filmmaker ever. Often, his films are derided, ridiculed, and looked at as the crown jewels of so-bad-it’s-good cinema. How incredible then that director Tim Burton made this man's story one of the most beautiful and endearing biopics ever to hit the screen. We are shown how Wood was a man who just wanted to be accepted for who he was and had a passion for motion pictures. Wood grew up reading pulp magazines and watching genre films. He idolized Bela Lugosi and dreamed of creating something as great as Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane. He had a predilection toward ‘realism’, yet could never earn a big enough budget to buy anything better than cardboard sets and cheap props. He was blinded by his visions, unwilling to accept many notes, yet deeply cut by negative reviews. He was the complete opposite end of the spectrum from Lugosi and Welles. Yet these are the things that make the film Ed Wood deeply fascinating. Johnny Depp may have earned Academy nods for playing Captain Jack Sparrow, but his best work is as Ed Wood. Depp disappears into the role and brings us Wood’s passion, frustration, fears, determination, and desperation. Likewise, as forgotten screen legend Bela Lugosi, Martin Landau transforms himself into a dope-addicted, animated old cuss whose career ended with his indebted friendship and collaboration with Ed Wood. Often, this is probably perceived as pathetic given that Lugosi was once the iconic Dracula, that most powerful and enduring of Universal’s classic monsters. Burton shows us the trust and faith behind that collaboration; Wood was Lugosi’s only friend in the end. I’ve seen the films depicted here – and they’re truly awful (although I find Plan 9 from Outer Space way more tolerable than Glen or Glenda). But Ed Wood is probably the best film of Burton’s career.
During the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, Disney went through a creative explosion, a new Golden Age, and The Lion King was the culmination of that great period. I’ll go so far as to say it was the best film from that era. The opening teaser alone is a perfect example of how much beauty traditional animation can behold. Combined with the opening number ‘The Circle of Life’ and the title card appearing with a silencing BOOM!, those three minutes are enough to give me chills. The rest of the film, modeled after Hamlet, thankfully lives up to that moment, grappling with daddy issues, responsibility, and friendship. The Lion King may have its cutesy sidekick characters, but it is the closest since Pinocchio that Disney Studios ever got to transcending the animation genre beyond kids stuff.
Quentin Tarantino's sophomore effort not only has some of the best characters, dialogue, and structure ever put to film, but (like The Lion King) it also has one of the greatest opening title sequences. A couple in a diner have a pseudo-intellectual discussion about crime, which crescendos to a stick-up with Amanda Plummer’s threatening growl. Then that bass line kicks in and the title slowly crawls into view. A fantastic start to one of the decade’s most influential films. Pulp Fiction helped the careers of everyone involved: John Travolta’s career got a kick in the butt, Samuel L. Jackson became everyone’s favorite bad-ass, Uma Thurman became the cinephile’s IT girl, etc. It also started a trend of talky-violent crime films and, together with Kevin Smith's Clerks, revolutionized the indie film scene and made Miramax (and the Weinsteins) a force to be reckoned with.
That about wraps things up for the year 1994. Were there any of your favorites or notable trends that I overlooked? Feel free to leave a comment below or 'like' the new Facebook Fan Page to the right and leave a comment there. You can also email your thoughts to thegibsonreview@gmail.com Be sure to also vote on your favorite films of 1994 on the poll to the right.
Next time on Film Faves, a creepy and kooky family, Chaos Theory, a one-armed man, and Tom Hanks gets sleepless in one city and on the streets of another. It's 1993!