They gave it to Crash. They can give it to pigs.

Good point.

The English Patient - When people say they don't like this movie, they usually mention Seinfeld, which is fucking stupid. If you have a problem with a movie, please explain why without resorting to quotes from fictional characters. Anyone posting a link to YouTube of that particular Seinfeld episode with "This is how I feel" in the hypertext is gay. It's been done a million times before. It's not clever, so stop it. Besides, this is a difficult, complex movie and it deserves more than a casual dismissal via sitcom reference. I loved this movie first time I saw it. I thought it was great. It's lost a bit of luster since then. I found myself checking the clock a few times throughout. And that's always been the primary complaint about it: It's too boring. It's a fair criticism, but I've sat through a lot worse here. If this is too slow for you, trying sitting through Ben Hur sometime. But back on topic, I always liked this movie and still do. It's got romance, mystery, intrigue, asplosions, and bodily mutilations. It's also got boobs. I'm happy to report this is the second movie in a row to feature boobs. Kristen Scott Thomas shows hers a couple times (along with bush, but no lippage.) Juliette Binoche shows only one of hers, but that's plenty since I could spank to her even if she wore a snowsuit. So really, this movie has lots going for it, and I don't understand the hate. Unless people are just generally opposed to lots of sand in movies. If so, I kinda understand. I understand if you think it's a movie you don't want to watch on a rainy afternoon, but it's worth revisiting every so often.

Did it deserve to win?: Fargo was the best movie of the year, and one I can watch anytime. Trainspotting is a great, disturbing look at addiction. Beyond those, The English Patient is probably the best of the year.

(out of 5)

Up next: Titanic

Come on stu, don't be that guy.

Babe is a great movie. I would have been ok with Apollo 13 winning too.

I'm a big fan of Toy Story but at 72 or so minutes it's barely a movie. Babe was okay but best movie? I'd rather give it to Matilda.

It's cool to hate on Braveheart.

Braveheart is good too. The dead chick had some great knockers. And gleason was a great sidekick.

Don't you know that all the cool kids hate on Ron Howard? I'm not sure how they reconcile his involvement with Arrested Development though.

I never understood the love for Apollo 13. It's decent movie but nothing great.

This is some good movie discussion.

Never seen English Patient. It's buried in my queue somewhere.

same here except for the queue part. I doubt that I'll ever watch it.

Babe = one of the best family movies ever. Even its sequel is great.

Braveheart = wasn't a huge fan when I first saw it (mainly because I didn't know it was three hours going in). Still think it is slightly overrated but I will stop down for it from time to time. Like sweet Tit said, it's the supporting characters that make it.

Apollo 13 = Ron Howard is second only to Zemekis in overratedness. Its a good movie but not great.

My gayness is showing but I thought Sense & Sensilbility was the best movie that year.

I am going to revisit the English Patient at some point soon. I saw it in the theater only. I remember thinking there was a lot of stuff going on but the plot led nowhere.

1996 I felt both Shine could've won. I was more partial to Slingblade which I will still argue is a great film. But this might be along the lines of Seven or the Usual Suspects the previous year. Great movies but not what you'd call Oscar movies.

Geez, and everyone calls ME a snob.

snob

YOU TAKE THAT BACK!!!

I'll think about it.

That's fair.

From what I remember of the trailer it looked like a long drawn out date movie, like Pearl Harbor or Titanic, neither of which I liked (except for the action scenes).

It doesn't have as much action, but the script at least is smarter than those other two.

On now on TCM.

Are you recommending it?

Titanic - Hi, I'm Tit Whistle, and I'm here to defend Titanic. This movie gets a bad rap for being too shallow, too popular, and too icky-girlish. I agree that the story is rather pedestrian, but it works well enough to get you to the ship's sinking, when it takes off and becomes a masterwork of escalating tension and action. Early on, the dialog is really awkward and even Kate Winslet can't do shit with it. It's not a deal breaker, however. Yes, these are conventional characters in a standard setting of class differences, but things improve steadily and you get past it to the point that you have heroes to root for and villains to hate. It may be reinventing the wheel, but it works, and all we need is for it to work so the climactic scenes actually have some emotional gravity. If you disagree, try watching something like Pearl Harbor, which tried to do the same thing but failed since the characters were such yutzes. So the story is good enough, but the real attraction is the sinking of the ship, which as I said before is masterful. I'm still amazed how Cameron builds the gradually builds tension from the moment the ship hits the iceberg until it finally completely sinks into the ocean. This is about 90 minutes of film in which the passengers move from casually inconvenienced to concerned to worried to fucking panicked. Never does it feel like it is rushing to show you something really cool. It makes you feel like you're on the boat and your fear is gradually increasing along with the doomed passengers. I've seen this movie plenty of times and the ship sinking still gets me all verklempt, and that's because the movie earns it. Also great is the scene afterward when they're clinging to each other among the driftwood. Again, the movie earns this moment by being good enough and getting us emotionally involved. We've been through a nightmare with these people that felt completely real. Now they're saying goodbye and we can take a moment to catch our breath, but we don't because we're still right there with them freezing in the water and hoping they turn out okay. So yeah, it's got clumsy dialog and standard cliches, but it overcomes those problems with great direction and pacing. For once, the screaming teenage girls were right.

Twist: I watched a recorded version of this on ABC Family. It wasn't edited much but it did eliminate sweet Kate's boobies and a couple of swear words. Worst is I had to fast forward through commercials. This was a 4 1/2 hour recording of a 3 hour 15 minute movie, so that's a lot of commercials. It also takes away some of the impact of the movie, like when the ship finally goes under and there's the wide shot of the hundreds of flailing and screaming soon-to-be-deads, someone had the dick idea that that's a good time for an ad for Mars Needs Moms. Kinda takes you out of the moment. I would like to thank Diello for offering me his DVD copy on loan. I would've preferred an uncut version, but I needed to get this one out of the way. Props to you anyway, bro.

Did it deserve to win?: L.A. Confidential was the best movie of the year. It had no flaws, while Titanic had some. Boogie Nights is a close second, and there are others which I think were better than Titanic, but I at least think Titanic is an acceptable winner since it's rewatchable and showed us so much we hadn't seen before.

(out of 5)

Up next: Shakespeare in Love

Sorry you didn't get to see Kate's boobies.

I looked them up on Mr. Skin. That's why the review took longer than usual.

I vote yay for the sinking but the story itself is really tough for me to watch. Kate's pancake boobs don't help. In fact, they're down right out of place in the movie, almost forced.

The story seemed too weak to win best pic but they sure weren't going to give it to a movie that showed a 12 dong in it. I didn't see LA Confidential.

4 stars for Titanic? I almost feel like we've just wasted the last 16 pages.

13

As great as the effects are while the ship is sinking, the wide shots of the ship at the beginning of the movie look straight out of a cartoon. I've always thought Titanic is pretty rewatchable, but LA Confidential was robbed.

Whoa now, it's not like I wrote an apology for Crash. It's a 3 star story and a 5 star ship sinking.

It looked like a cartoon in 97 but we looked past it. It really looks bad now, but even the first Toy Story doesn't look so great now.

You need to. Put it at the top of your Netflix queue immediately.

We'll see. For now, I'm skeptical.

I'm sorry I disappointed you, somey.

His heart will go on.

Whoa whoa whoa, the ship sinks?? How bout a spoiler alert there buddy?

aye aye, capn