Some Other Movies From 1996 (2)

 

For further background in the year in film please refer to the Some Other Movies From 1996 entry.

The following things happened in 1996:

• 1996 was declared International Year for the Eradication of Poverty.  Remember back when we had poor people?  That was weird, wasn't it?
• The first flip phone appeared.
• A terrifically bad blizzard struck the eastern U.S.
• France conducted its last nuclear weapons test.
• A lot of planes crashed and a lot of boats sunk.  Really.  A lot.
• Taiwan held its first direct elections for the office of President.
• Theodore ("Ted") Kaczynski, also known as the Unabomber, was arrested.
• The Nintendo 64 was released.
• The Summer Olympics were held in Atlanta, Georgia. (for details refer to the movie Richard Jewell).
• The Iraq disarmament crisis was ongoing.

Excellent

1. Breaking the Waves

Mention Lars von Trier and most people jump right to the most extreme examples.  Antichrist, Nymphomaniac and maybe The House That Jack Built.  Those with a deeper knowledge of his filmography might go back even further, to artier movies like Europa or Dogville.  But in the jump to these more extreme examples simpler movies like Breaking the Waves are often forgotten, and that's a real shame.

In Breaking the Waves Emily Watson stars as a woman convinced that defiling herself in the arms of other men will somehow restore her crippled husband to health.  And I know this sounds ridiculous, and in the context of Lars von Trier it sounds like another shock tactic, but this movie is very restrained compared to some of his other movies.  It also makes a nice point about forgiveness.

Some Good Ones

1. Happy Gilmore

Adam Sandler is a former hockey player turned professional golfer.  Honestly, this movie still holds up.  You'll think: "Oh, but it's an Adam Sandler movie," but really, it's still funny.

The director of this movie, Dennis Dugan, has directed several other Adam Sandler films.  This was the first film they did together, and I consider a vast improvement over the earlier Billy Madison.  Dugan plays the commissioner of the tour in this movie.

Fun Fact (s): Both Carl Weathers (Rocky, Predator) and Richard Kiel (Jaws from the Bond films) are in this movie.

Thinking Too Much for an Adam Sandler Movie: His grandma taking him to see Endless Love when he was a child was completely inappropriate.

2. Independence Day

If you don't like this movie you're thinking more than I was when I thought about Adam Sandler's grandma taking him to see Endless Love.  It's a big dumb American disaster movie  - that's all.  Did you complain about the contrived situations in The Towering Inferno?  Did you scoff at the character development in Earthquake?  Of course you didn't, and for the same reason you bought into the fact that Jeff Goldblum deciphered the alien code with prehistoric 1995 technology, and you also believed that primitive fighter jets could challenge a spacecraft 1/4 the size of the moon.  Interstellar civilizations?  Advanced computing systems, unintelligible to our species?  If you're asking such questions you're already thinking to hard for Independence Day, and you've also forgotten that the answer to all such questions is always AMERICA.  These colors don't run, buddy!

Fun Fact: The use of "ID4" in the marketing of this film wasn't just a way of capturing attention.  There was another film named Independence Day, released back in 1983, and the studio was reluctant to give the producers the rights to the title.

3. Fly Away Home

In Fly Away Home Anna Paquin plays a girl returned to her father's care after the death of her mother.  Before she's really settled into life in rural Canada, she finds a gander of motherless geese in need of someone to show them the way south.  It's a solid movie, if predictable.

Uncomfortable Fact: Jeff Daniels and Anna Paquin play father and daughter in Fly Away Home, and later played lovers in 2005's The Squid and the Whale.

Comfortable Fact: What's Anna Paquin been up to?  She recently played Robert DeNiro's wife in 2019's The Irishman.

4. The Craft

Four Catholic high school girls practice witchcraft.  It's longer than it needs to be, but much better than I expected.  It's a very 90s kind of movie.

5. Last Man Standing

So, so manly.  But of course it is - Walter Hill directed it from a script he wrote.  Bruce Willis does his Bruce Willis thing, starring as a man pitting two gangs against each other in west Texas, and Christopher Walken always makes a good nemesis.  Is it as good as Yojimbo?  As good as A Fistful of Dollars?  I don't think so, but it's still pretty good.

6. Set It Off

Four women from the Los Angeles Projects become bank robbers.  It starts out great but overstays its welcome.  That romantic subplot involving Blair Underwood really wasn't necessary.

7. Matilda

Is it just me or is Danny DeVito kind of like his generation's Jon Favreau?  I wouldn't push this comparison too far, but there are some parallels.

DeVito directed this movie about a precocious little girl with a special power.  It was adapted from one of Roald Dahl's books, and the author's trademark quirkiness remains in the finished product.  I really enjoyed the first half - it gets weirder and weirder - even if it runs a bit long.  If you enjoyed the brand of humor present in Jojo Rabbit you'll also enjoy this movie.

8. Primal Fear

Richard Gere stars as a defense attorney defending a man accused of murder.  This was Edward Norton's first movie, and although both he and Gere's costar Laura Linney are excellent I wished it had been shorter.  Taking out some of those courtroom scenes would have made the movie better.

9. A Time to Kill

Matthew McConaughey and Samuel Jackson star in this look at racial injustice in Mississippi.  It's a good movie, but I have two complaints: 1) Sandra Bullock's character is completely unnecessary; he advances the plot in no way, shape or form.  2) It's a story worth telling, but director Joel Schumacher's characteristic lack of subtlety is evident throughout.  He's always trying to turn every scene up to 11, when letting the drama play out naturally would have worked a lot better.  As it is, the jarring emphasis on certain scenes and over-explanation show a lack of faith in the viewer.

Fun Fact 1: That judge look familiar?  If so, it's because he's played by Patrick McGoohan, who appeared as the villain in Braveheart the year before.

Fun Fact 2: Both Donald and Kiefer Sutherland are in this movie.  I could be wrong (they've been in a lot of movies), but I believe this was one of two movies they both appeared in.

"If You Don't Like Space Jam, You Didn't Grow Up in the 90s!"

1. Space Jam

It's true - I didn't and I don't.  I turned 15 in 1990, and by the time Space Jam arrived I was 21.  Too old for Space Jam.  As a blend of live action and animation it worked a lot better for me than Who Framed Roger Rabbit, but I still had trouble focusing on it for any length of time.  This love letter to Michael Jordan via the Looney Tunes characters isn't bad.  I just couldn't relate to it.

Fun Fact: A sequel, starring LeBron James, will be released this year.

Some Bad Ones

1. Jingle All the Way

Back in the day I would have responded to this movie with a big 'ol NOPE, but in 2020 it exerts a certain retroactive charm.  Is it good?  HELL no, but seeing Sinbad, Phil Hartman and the Mall of America (not long after it first opened) brought back some memories.  Like The Craft and Space Jam above, a very 90s movie.

Fun Fact 1: The studio cast Sinbad over Joe "Home Alone" Pesci.  I guess they were worried about unflattering comparisons to another famous Christmas movie.

Fun Fact 2: Martin Mull, who appears briefly in this movie, also played a DJ in 1978's FM.

2. The First Wives Club

Goldie Hawn, Bette Midler and Diane Keaton team up to get revenge on their ex-husbands.  It's very contrived, the revenge taken isn't very satisfying, and the chemistry between the three leads is nonexistent.  It's really hard to buy into the idea that the three women would want to hang out with each other in the first place.

3. Sleepers

Kevin Bacon, Jason Patric, Robert De Niro, Dustin Hoffman, Brad Pitt... director Barry Levinson assembled an impressive cast for this one, but the script could have used some work.  Is it the story of four boys growing up in Hell's Kitchen?  Is it the story of abuses within a juvenile detention facility?  Is it a story of revenge?  Whoever wrote the screenplay kept falling back on The Count of Monte Cristo, but Alexandre Dumas' novel was a huge undertaking, with a deep understanding of both its characters and their place in the story he was trying to tell.  Sleepers isn't that.

4. La Belle Verte (The Beautiful Green)

When people say they hate French movies and then mention movies like this I get it.  I suppose you could sit through La Belle Verte for a French conception of the perfect society, but this story of an extraterrestrial tourist in Paris offers nothing but obvious statements.  Deep down we all know that money isn't that necessary; deep down we all know we should love others as we love ourselves, but without offering any solutions to the problems of modern life this movie says nothing.

Fun Fact: Coline Serreau, the director of this movie, was the writer and director of Three Men and a Cradle, which served as inspiration for the American Three Men and a Baby.

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Some Other Movies From 1996

I'm having trouble remembering 1996 - probably because I was stoned most of the time.  I was working at Home Depot, UPS, or JC Penney.  I was a student at either Shoreline Community College or Bellevue Community College.  I was living in Seattle, Kirkland, or Coer d' Alene, Idaho.

A good time as things went.  Plentiful jobs.  Many girls to chase after.  Parties to attend.  New things to do, see, and explore.  When you're 21 you sometimes think you're miserable, but 22 years later you realize that you were having a pretty good time.

The biggest movie that year was Independence Day.  I have never understood the appeal of this film.  Other big movies included Twister (below), the first (!) Mission: Impossible, The Rock, and Jerry Maguire.  I wouldn't say it was an especially good year for movies, though some of the lesser-known films were not bad.  If I had to pick a favorite it would be Ransom, Fargo, or Sling Blade.

Some Good Ones

1. Basquiat

Jeffrey Wright leads an impressive cast in this movie about the painter who was either a genius or a con-man.  I think you'd be better served by 2000's Pollock, but Basquiat is good too.  It's only that it doesn't start asking the really pertinent questions until the movie's halfway over.

Fun Fact: David Bowie, who plays Andy Warhol in this movie, had a longstanding relationship with Mr. Warhol.  The song "Andy Warhol" appears on his 1971 album Hunky Dory.

2. 2 Days in the Valley

Crime film set in Southern California.  James Spader plays an excellent psychopath, and the movie's full of many good performances.  My biggest complaint is that Eric Stoltz's and Jeff Daniels' characters seem to lack any real purpose or function in the film.  I'm thinking that many of their characters' scenes were removed from the final cut.

And only Charlize Theron could make Teri Hatcher look somewhat average.  2 Days in the Valley was Theron's second film, after the straight-to-video Children of the Corn III: Urban Harvest.

3. Bastard Out of Carolina

Jennifer Jason Leigh and Jena Malone star in this portrait of Southern child abuse.

...and goddamn some of the scenes in this movie are hard to watch.  I get why it was banned in Canada.  Yikes!

If you ask me, Leigh is one of the great American actresses.  When you think about the type of roles she's taken, and the breadth of her filmography, she's in a class by herself.

4. Twister

A lovable band of misfits chase tornadoes around Oklahoma.  And naturally there's another, "bad" group of misfits trying to steal their shine.  But worry not, dear viewer, Bill Paxton and Helen Hunt find true love in each other's arms by the end of the movie.  ...not that any of us saw that coming.

I'll watch any movie with Bill Paxton at least once, but this is definitely one of his more forgettable films.

Fun Fact: Joss Whedon wrote parts of the script.

Fun Fact #2: Burned retinas, concussions, back injuries - a lot of people got hurt during the making of Twister.  Many of the cast and crew blamed director Jan de Bont for the mishaps on set.

5. The Funeral

Christopher Walken, Chris Penn, and Benicio del Toro star in this most Catholic of gangster movies.  It's slow going, but it has its moments.  It was also directed by Abel Ferrara, so you know it's going to a dark place.

Fun Fact: Abel Ferrara directed a porno movie!  9 Lives of a Wet Pussy.  I kid you not!

6. Bottle Rocket

Two idiots try - and fail? - to become criminals.  It's Luke and Owen Wilson's first movie, and even though it sets the stage for 2+ decades of typecasting it's still excellent.  Oh, and it was also director Wes Anderson's first movie - the only one in which Bill Murray doesn't make an appearance.

7. The Evening Star

Bill Paxton again, this time opposite Shirley Maclaine.  Maclaine plays a domineering grandmother trying to come to terms with her past life.  Even though the characters are trying too hard to be quirky it's still an enjoyable film.

When I think about it, Shirley Maclaine has a real knack for elevating what would otherwise be forgettable movies.  It's no Terms of Endearment, but she manages to make The Evening Star memorable.

8. Gotti

Armand Assante was ill-used in Striptease (see below), but in Gotti he's on firmer footing.  Assante gives a masterful performance as the famous mobster, even if the film's too talky, and the low budget shows at times.

Fun Fact: John Travolta will be starring in another version of the same story.  His version of Gotti should hit theaters this year.

9. Kansas City

The best thing about this movie is the jazz.  If you like jazz, the parts in the club are great.  Jennifer Jason Leigh's character is somewhat annoying, but the recreation of 30s-era KC is fascinating.  For Robert Altman it was also a return to form.  One of the best movies of that year.

Fun Fact: Joshua Redman, Ron Carter, and many other jazz greats play in the band featured throughout the movie.

10. Secrets and Lies

Very British, very depressing, and full of actors you've never heard of.  If in 1996 the Academy had offered an Oscar for Most Crying, Secrets and Lies would have been the movie to beat.  As it was it received a lot of other awards, and remains a good movie.

11. Citizen Ruth

Finally - that movie about huffing/abortion you've been waiting for!  Alexander Payne is a very overlooked director, and Laura Dern is great in almost everything.  If you look real hard, you'll notice that the "paramilitary dude" from the Police Academy movies is the judge at her trial.

Hey Kids!  10 out of 10 doctors agree that inhaling patio sealant WILL LIQUEFY YOUR BRAIN!  So next time your friends pass around the old spray can, you might want to say "No thanks!"

Burt Reynolds is, by the way, also (see below) great in this movie.  It's just too bad that Striptease was so lackluster, and that so few people bothered to see Citizen Ruth.

12. Caught

Talk about some unhealthy relationships.  Infidelity, incest - these guys have it all going on.  

It's a decent movie that answers the question as to what Maria Conchita Alonso was doing after The Running Man.  Some of the story points could have been elaborated upon further, and Edward James Olmos' character is extremely underdeveloped.

One That Could Be Either Bad Or Good

1. Evita

I tried, but I can't hang with most musicals.  I'm a big fan of director Alan Parker, but I had to abort mission a minute or so into Antonio Banderas' first song.  I've heard that this is Madonna's best movie, but I suppose I'll just have to take other people's word for it.

Some Bad Ones

1. Before and After

Meryl Streep and Liam Neeson star as parents confronted by the possibility that their son has committed murder.  The parents are hard to both understand and sympathize with.  Streep hasn't been in many bad movies, but I'd have to say that this is one of those few.

2. The Mirror Has Two Faces

Like most Barbara Streisand's movies, this one's about "ugly duckling" Streisand finding the man of her dreams.  The first half is surprisingly good, and the second half proceeds with all speed to Implausible Land, a place where characters cease to be sympathetic and where plot points make little sense.

One That's So Bad It's Good

1. Striptease

What a weird movie.  It starts out all serious, and then turns into a comedy, and then turns into I don't know what.

Back in the day guys were probably pretending to see this movie out of an enduring love of Burt Reynolds.  But come on - you know Demi Moore is going to look amazing on that stage.  She might not have been the best actress in the world, but that woman was FINE.

Strip clubs and erotic dancing, however, have never done that much for me.  Even so, Demi Moore was quite impressive once upon a time, and if Striptease has a strength it's that very thing.  Showgirls is a much better "bad" movie, but Striptease is not bad (in a bad way?)

Burt Reynolds is, paradoxically, great in this movie.  He almost makes it good enough to be called "good."

Fun Fact: Striptease pretty much swept the Golden Raspberry awards in 1996.  The only "loser" (i.e. "winner") was Burt Reynolds, who failed to win Worst Actor.

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