Ranking the Best Pictures, Part Three: 28-6

by Chris Marshall:

Finally, at long last, we come to the Tier One movies. The best of the best. The cream of the crop. Again, it’s really, really long, so I’m going to get straight into it. The shortest one of these rankings posts is still 500 words longer than the previous longest Oscar Project post, and it’s 1,000 words longer than the average.

In case you missed them, here are links for parts one and two:
Part One: #84 through #57
Part Two: #56 through #29

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Ranking the Best Pictures, Part Two: 56-29

by Chris Marshall:

I realized a little too late yesterday that these articles are going to be super long, so I’m just going to jump right into the rankings. Tier two movies commence!

In case you missed it, here's part one, which ranks the winners from 84 to 57.

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Ranking the Best Pictures, Part One: 84-57

by Chris Marshall:

At long last, it’s time for the Ultimate Best Picture Winner List! I’m going to post these over the next three days, 28 movies at a time. Before I get into it, I just want to point out that there were very few of these I disliked. Ok, I probably disliked most of the movies in today’s post, but even those ranked in the 50s and 60s aren’t that bad. They’re just comparatively worse than many of the top-ranked films.

All right, that’s enough of a preface. This post is going to be long enough as it is. Let’s get into it, shall we?

The Oscar Project Coda: Best of the 2000s/Best Decades

by Chris Marshall:

It is so, so strange not having any more Oscar winners to watch. I mean, I guess I could go back and watch all the nominees, but there’s a limit to my masochism. Besides, there are no existing prints of one of the early nominees, so I would always feel like there’s something missing. On the other hand, I am very much looking forward to watching movies that are more fun, more offbeat, and more interesting than the standard Oscar fare.

Most Best Picture winners are obviously high-caliber films, but the Academy virtually never picks anything that comes out of left field. I complained in my last post about people who called The Artist a safe pick. I stand by what I said, simply because by Best Picture standards, it was actually quite a bold choice. But compared to what exists out there in the wide world of cinema, it’s pretty tame.

The Oscar Project #84: The Artist (2011)

by Chris Marshall:

I think the symmetry between the first and most recent Best Picture winners is absolutely perfect. Way back in 1927, Wings became the first film to win the top award at the Oscars, and as it turned out, it was the only silent picture to ever win… until this year.

Yes, in some sense, The Artist is not a true silent film. There are moments of sound and even color in the movie, but I have to imagine it’s the closest we’ll ever get to it again. And in another fitting connection, The Artist was set in 1927, the year Wings came out. I know this symmetry only exists because I happened to choose to do The Oscar Project this year, but it almost seems pre-ordained.

I do have to admit that I prefer this year’s winner to the first one, as much as I’ve defended the quality of some (thought definitely not all) of those early winners. But that’s mostly because The Artist is a very good film, finely crafted and well-acted. It didn’t win because it was a gimmick. I wouldn’t say it was the best movie of 2011—that title goes to Drive, based on what I’ve seen from last year—but it was certainly one of the best.

The Oscar Project #83: The King's Speech (2010)

by Chris Marshall:

It’s hard to believe that I’m at a point in The Oscar Project where I’m watching a movie that I originally saw in a theater in Ohio. While watching The King’s Speech, my main thought was, “Didn’t I just see this?” It has, amazingly, been a year and a half now, but it still seemed so fresh in my memory.

I genuinely enjoyed the film, both this time and the first time, but I also believe it was nowhere close to the best movie of its year. I thought that honor went to The Social Network, and I say that even though I hate, hate, hate Aaron Sorkin. But there’s nothing wrong with The King’s Speech, and it certainly feels like the type of movie that the Academy loves.

It recounts the true story of George VI’s[1] struggle with his stuttering problem and his efforts to overcome it, at least to a great enough extent that he could deliver speeches when World War II broke out. His speech impediment was quite severe, and it was made worse considering how, shall we say, insensitive people were back then. If you look back at the Best Picture winners from the 1930s, you will often see stutterers portrayed as the bumbling comic relief.

The Oscar Project #82: The Hurt Locker (2009)

by Chris Marshall:

In 2009, a war film once again won Best Picture, and like all the previous winners, it focuses on a small group of individuals rather than providing any broader context for the events depicted. This time around, our protagonists are members of a bomb squad in Iraq, faced with the extremely dangerous task of defusing IEDs.

We spend an extensive period of time with three different characters, but the true focus of the film is on William James (Jeremy Renner), who takes over as head of the squad when the previous leader (Guy Pearce) is obliterated by a remotely detonated bomb[1]. James seems like a normal enough guy at first, but it soon becomes apparently that there is something a little off about him. It’s as if he cherishes the thrill of his job.

That’s a positive characteristic in many occupations, but when your job entails a significant risk of dying every time you do it, it can be a little unsettling, especially if you are one of the guys with the duty of protecting him. Making matters worse is that James is not much of a communicator, going so far as to remove his headset during one mission.

The Oscar Project #81: Slumdog Millionaire (2008)

by Chris Marshall:

On the surface, a movie about trivia seems like it would be perfect for me. I’ve virtually dedicated my life to the pursuit of becoming a great trivia player[1]. Then again, Slumdog Millionaire is no more about playing trivia than No Country for Old Men was about finding a briefcase full of money. It’s a love story, and the game show plot is only a contrivance to facilitate the real point of the film.

Jamal Malik finds himself on the Indian version of “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?” and stuns the world (well, at least India) by advancing all the way to the final, 20 million rupee question. The buzzer sounds, though, meaning he will have to wait until the next night to see the question. Immediately after walking out of the studio, he is arrested on suspicion of cheating.

Why does he seem so suspicious? He’s from the slums and has extremely little formal education. How, then, could he possibly advance so far when doctors, lawyers, and professors can’t advance past the 16,000 rupee question? After some rudimentary torture at the hands of the police, he explains how he knew each answer.

The Oscar Project #80: No Country for Old Men (2007)

by Chris Marshall:

Even though it is starkly different from most of their earliest movies, No Country for Old Men is one of the finest Coen Brothers films. It takes a very serious, somber tone, but it would be a mistake to say there are no laughs; they are just of a much different variety than typically seen in their past work.

But that makes sense. This is by no means a comedy—Cormac McCarthy has never been considered much of a jokester. Instead, its goal is no less than to personify Evil in the character of Anton Chigurh (Javier Bardem). Is he human? Is he a monster? Some combination of the two?

He actually reminds me in many ways of Leonard Smalls, the biker from Raising Arizona. They both seem to appear out of nowhere and take joy in killing the innocent. Even animals aren’t spared. Smalls blows away a rabbit and a lizard as he rides down the highway; Chigurh shoots at a crow with his shotgun. Both of them seem, paradoxically, more and less than human simultaneously. Chigurh appears completely unfazed by pain. Even he’s limping or otherwise physically impaired, his face betrays nothing.

The Oscar Project #79: The Departed (2006)

by Chris Marshall:

At this point in The Oscar Project, it’s hard to summon up much excitement about the last few films. It has nothing to do with their quality—all the remaining movies range from good to great—but rather the realization that there’s nothing new left to watch. The true point of this endeavor was to give me motivation to watch all the Best Picture winners I’ve never seen, and now that there are none of those left, it feels like I’m just going through the motions.

That’s not to say I won’t finish; I would have to be a crazy person to quit at this point, something I have no intention of doing. But it is true that I’m more looking forward to the Director/Franchise/Genre of the Week posts than I am the last few Oscar winners, simply because those are all movies I haven’t seen before.

That’s enough navel-gazing for one post, though. Let’s move on to the film. The Departed is a very good movie, both in terms of its technical merit and how enjoyable it is to watch. I don’t, however, believe it achieves the same level of greatness as some of his previous films that were unfairly passed over for Best Picture, such as Taxi Driver, Raging Bull, and Goodfellas.