Radford Reviews Best of 2002

Article posted Mon Jan 13 12:27:31 2003

Here is a sampling of some of 2002’s best films. Caveat: I did not see every film released last year!. Some film critics and reviewers, when coming up with “Best Of” lists, toss in a critically acclaimed film or two they haven’t seen to make it look like they saw all the Important Films that year. I could do that, but I don’t want to be in the position of endorsing a film I haven’t seen. I don’t pretend that my endorsement means much, but I do owe that much to my readers. Plus, I often find that films that many critics love (such as, for example, The Hours and Far From Heaven) I’m not terribly impressed with. Many of the best films came out very late in the year (such as About Schmidt and Adaptation)— some even widely released in 2003. This is done for a variety of reasons, including studios jockeying for Oscar nominations. The more recent the film, the more likely it is to be remembered by Academy voters; Oscar-worthy films that came out in the beginning and middle of 2002 have the cards stacked against them.

I present my list in no particular ranking order and no particular group. I get irritated at the media’s constant need to list and rank and categorize things; it reminds me of little children, who love to count things: their fingers, trees, Teletubbies, etc. The Ten Most Intriguing People and the Twenty Best Dressed and Entertainment Weekly’s “Power 101” lists are all useless and arbitrary anyway, most often used by entertainment writers and magazine editors as copy filler. Dispensing with the dismal decimal system, here’s (most of) the best of 2002:

About Schmidt

Often terribly funny and terribly sad, About Schmidt is a moving character study of one man’s fight against obsolescence. Recently-retired Warren Schmidt is vaguely unhappy, and begins to have a sort of late mid-life crisis that crystallizes when his wife of 42 years suddenly dies. Floundering emotionally, Schmidt decides to take a road trip to try and convince his daughter not to marry a loser. The film is about Schmidt, about loneliness, alienation, and finding satisfaction and redemption where you can.

Rabbit-Proof Fence

An Australian film set in 1931, Rabbit-Proof Fence tells the true story of a fourteen-year-old mixed-race Aboriginal girl who, along with her younger sisters, is taken from their mother and transported 1,500 miles away to a state-run dormitory to be trained as a servant. The girls, determined to be reunited with their family, escape and head home on foot by following the longest fence in the world. Kenneth Branaugh is excellent as a government official who embodies a patronizing and colonial view of the native peoples—one which has only recently started to wane. With great performances all around (especially by the non-actor children), Rabbit-Proof Fence is an important and moving film that can be seen as Australia’s answer to South Africa’s anti-racism film Cry Freedom.

Spirited Away

After a young girl’s parents are captured by a magic spell, she enters a strange spirit world where humans are forbidden. A mysterious youth protects her from threatening spirits, and in order to stay alive and rescue her parents she must work in a bath house where Japanese gods and nature spirits come to clean and relax. Hayao Miyazaki, who wrote and directed the film, is considered the master of Japanese animation. The animation is incredible, and all done by hand. The results are gorgeous and incomparable to computer animation. The film is very suitable for kids, but is not essentially a children’s film.

Frailty

Frailty is a spectacularly creepy gothic mystery/thriller strongly reminiscent of the film Seven. Like Seven, Frailty involves Bible-inspired serial killings. And also like Seven, the film has a smart script with twists and turns that keep the audience guessing and riveted to the screen. Frailty doesn’t have a stable of A-list actors, but is a taut, original thriller with genuine surprises.

Adaptation

Adaptation is about Charlie Kaufman, a neurotic and insecure screenwriter who has been hired to adapt a 1998 best-selling book titled The Orchid Thief into a film. Reality and fiction don’t collide so much as they comfortably commingle in this inventive film, a confluence of great acting, clever writing, and virtuoso directing. Adaptation loses some steam and focus in the last half hour, but even on three cylinders it’s more entertaining than most other films.

Secretary

Lee Holloway is a troubled young woman who still lives with her mother and has never held a job. Unhappy with herself and seeking the independence a job can provide, she answers a newspaper ad for a secretarial position to a lawyer for whom the line between professional perfectionism and personal sadism is fuzzy. Secretary is a study of two people who are empowered by each other’s personalities and sexual quirks. At its heart, Secretary is really a love story (or a dark romantic comedy), and an acknowledgement that in this world there are all sorts of people in all sorts of situations. Not for everyone’s tastes, but Secretary is a fresh and intriguing story well told.

Spider-man

Yes, it was a mass-market popcorn muncher; so what? It was also a damn fine film, with great acting, solid story, and nice special effects. Spider-man brings character and humanity to the screen, unlike other superhero films which were serviceable but dour and too often simply empty costumes crashing around elaborate sets and explosions.