The Best Films of 2006

December 25th, 2006 by Scott Marks

Marty broke my heart, Clint sided with Spielberg on the disappointing Sands of Private Ryan, and a grateful American public once again leaped head first into a steaming pile of Pirate shit.

The worst of times just kept getting worse at the movies this year.

Summer seemed to last forever. The only relief multiplexes offered came from the air conditioner, not the platter. It should have been the summer’s most enjoyable blockbuster, but V for Vendetta opened (and flopped) in mid-March. Even though the enormously entertaining French action flick District B13 miraculously found its way to the multiplexes, the challenge of subtitles kept the illiterate masses at bay, awaiting instead the pre-digested, idiot-friendly MI3.

There was even an attempt to revamp 007. No more gadgets or thudding throwaway lines. Instead, the series was plainly Bourne again.

If quality is your thing there were plenty of outstanding films that washed up from foreign shores. The Asian Film Festival was wise (and brave) enough to host the one night San Diego “premiere” of Hou-Hsiao hsien’s essential These Three.

At age 73, and with almost 70 features behind him, Claude Chabrol’s The Bridesmaid added more credence to the argument that the director is the most powerful force to emerge from the French New Wave this side of Godard.

Satire fared best. Not since the late 60s/early 70s, when Woody Allen, Mel Brooks and a pre-MPAA John Waters convulsed audiences has there been such cause for ground breaking and side-splitting laughter in movie theaters. Albert Brooks returned to form in the Muslim World. Laugh-for-laugh, the year’s funniest films, Borat and CSA: Confederate States of America proved to be two of the most dead on anti-racist satires period.

A salon called Shortbus provided a liberating and explicit glimpse into the kind of sexual hang-ups that give us all a reason to get out of bed in the morning. Thanks also to Jason Reitman for Thank You for Smoking as well as the painstakingly insensitive gang from Comedy Central’s Strangers with Candy.

Clip what follows and post it somewhere near your computer to reference for future Netflix rentals.

Hou-Hsiao hsien’s Three Times: An experience that single handedly substantiates my emulsion compulsion. Three times? I’ve seen it ten! At least the opening segment for it contains one brain-bending continuity gap that continues to haunt me. The actress working the billiards parlor in the opening shot is unmistakably Shu Qi, yet the very next scene shows her arriving at work for what appears to be her first day on the job. So how is it possible that a film with such a glaring blunder tops my ten best list? It’s like a pimple on the Mona Lisa. Everything else is faultless and I am delighted to overlook, even embrace a defect. In the A Time for Love sequence, the simple physical act of two people holding hands has never been depicted in a more passionate and delicate manner. If you love cinema, see to it that you discover Three Times.: Albert Brooks’ Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World: The first movie I saw in 2006 turned out to be the best American film of the year. The premise was pure genius: In order to bring about peace through understanding, Albert Brooks is asked by the government to travel to <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = “urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags” />Pakistan and compile a report on what makes the locals laugh. You didn’t see it. Nobody saw it. The title terrified distributors and exhibitors. Landmark balked and it was dropped in an upstairs Gaslamp for couple of weeks. First and foremost, film comedy must be judged on formal presentation, not laugh quotient. Aside from being one of the funniest men alive, Albert Brooks is also a master visual storyteller. As with all great comics he is constantly aware of his body placement in the frame. His timing is impeccable; no one cuts a comedy quite like Albert. When it comes to film as a means of comedic expression, Brooks leaves Borat in the dust.
Claude Chabrol’s The Bridesmaid: A beautiful bridesmaid’s darker shadings don’t come to light until after she runs off the groom. The “French Hitchcock” is still firing on all suspenseful cylinders. Claude Chabrol comes through with another masterful journey into the mind of a cold-blooded psychopath. The good news is, with two films in post-production, the ageless Mr. Chabrol shows no signs of slackening his pace.
Michael Winterbottom’s Tristram Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story:
Leave it to journeyman filmmaker Michael Winterbottom to tackle the unfilmable and make it work. The New York Times dubbed Laurence Stern’s 18th Century avant garde masterwork one of the ten greatest novels of all time. Winterbottom skillfully structures his adaptation by blending passages from the book with behind-the-scenes glimpses into the private lives of a fumbling crew at work on a contemporary film version.
Lu Chuan’s Kekexili: Mountain Patrol: A rousing, thoroughly enjoyable true-life adventure tale about a devoted band of loyal volunteers bent on saving wild Tibetan antelope from being slaughtered for their pelts. I warned you back in April that this one demanded the big screen treatment and given the subject matter, a $30 million opening weekend was never to be. It lasted a couple weeks before quietly moving to home video.
Kevin Wilmot’s CSA: Confederate States of America: Brilliance on a budget (would you believe $10,000?), CSA posits what would have happened if the South won the Civil War and slaveryremained legal. This meticulously researched and painstakingly detailed mockumentary contains some of the edgiest satire since SCTV. Considering that the film is structured as a History Channel special, complete with commercials, it doesn’t lose much voltage on the small screen.
John Cameron Mitchell’s Shortbus: The feel good picture of 2006! Honestly, I hated Hedwig and entered Mitchell’s follow-up feature kicking and screaming. The guy drinking his own spooge almost forced me out the door, but I stayed and was so happy that I did. A cast of uninhibited non-professionals play the walking-wounded who gather weekly at a sexual healing salon in New York. Fresh, spontaneous, brutally honest, consistently hilarious and surprisingly innocent, this was easily the year’s most unexpected delight.
Karen Moncrieff’s The Dead Girl: A cold, almost Lynchian examination of the murder of a young crack whore. Dark and deeply unsettling, the events play out in reverse order and are told from the unrelated points of view of five women somehow connected to the crime. It’s taken me days to shake this film. Forget Bobby, here is the finest ensemble cast assembled this year. How’s this for a sentence I never though I’d write? Brittany Murphy gives a career making performance as the title stiff.
Michael Haenke’s Cache: Another dark puzzle that’s been tagged “a critic’s film.” An unhappily married couple begins receiving surveillance videos that monitor their everyday existence. Could the tapes have been made by an Algerian that our protagonist tortured in his youth? Taut, suspenseful and ultimately satisfying even though we are never really quite sure who the videographers are.
Michael Cuesta’s 12 and Holding: A small town teenager is forced to come to terms with the accidental death of his twin brother and subsequent separation of his parents, both of which he feels responsible for. This ferociously honest, cliché-free examination of alienated American youth outdoes Larry Clark on his own turf. The mean spirited exploitation of an oversized family brings much needed comic relief.

Heirs to the Throne: Borat, Notes on a Scandal, Why We Fight, The Proposition, Babel, V for Vendetta, District B13, The Promise, Don’t Come Knocking, La Moustache, Sir! No Sir!, Tideland, L’Enfant, Factotum, Perfume, Who Killed the Electric Car?, The Cave of the Yellow Dog, Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles, Deliver Us from Evil, Fur, Stranger than Fiction, The Illusionist, Haven, Thank You For Smoking and Strangers With Candy.

And the awards should go to:

Actress: Judi Dench in Notes on a Scandal, Helen Mirren in The Queen, Amy Sedaris in Strangers with Candy, Evan Rachel Wood in Down in the Valley and Nicole Kidman in Fur.

Actor: Matt Dillon in Factotum, Steve Coogan in Tristram Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story, Ken Takakura in Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles, Forest Whitaker in The Last King of Scotland and Peter Muller in On a Clear Day.

Supporting Actress: Brittany Murphy in The Dead Girl, Juliette Lewis in Aurora Borealis, Lili Taylor in Factotum, Adriana Barraza in Babel and Lily Tomlin in A Prairie Home Companion.

Supporting Actor: Bob Hoskins in Hollywoodland, Len Cariou in Boynton Beach Club, Alan Arkin in Little Miss Sunshine, Michael Pena in World Trade Center and Gary Cole in Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby.

Best Performance by an Oil Painting: Bob Hope in Who Killed the Electric Car?