Dec 08, 2007 02:44 PM
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What is the difference between a merely good movie and a great movie?
I merely enjoy a movie, come back home, and then forget about it, I classify it as a good one. But if that movie stays with me, right after the end credits are over, I recommend this movie to every friend I know, I spend days together thinking about the characters, I spend hours discussing this movie with other people, I know this is a great one for sure.So here are some of my favorites from the 90's. Also the order of the movies has nothing to do with ratings please, so for heavens sake, please dont ask me, why this movie is above, and that movie is below.
Hope is always a Good Thing
Whenever I watch The Shawshank Redemption, two questions always cross my mind, How did this movie fail at the box office? and How did this not get the Best Picture? . Much as I love Gump and Gumpisms, for me Shawshank remains any day the far better movie. The tale of Andy( Tim Robbins) who is imprisoned for the murder of his wife, at the Shawshank Prison, and his friendship with Red( Morgan Freeman) is so wonderfullly uplifting and moving, that at so many times, in this movie, I would feel that lump growing in my throat. Every scene is so wonderfully crafted, and some like the scene, where one of the inmates commits suicide, unable to adjust to the real world, just leaves me shaken. And yes that last scene where Red reads the letter from Andy, and those words "Hope is always a Good thing, Red", I just feel myself, holding back my tears. Rarely have I ever felt so moved and touched by a movie. And the performances are just fabulous by Tim Robbins and Morgan Freeman. This without any doubt is my favorite movie of the 90's for sure.
Life is a Box of Chocolates
Forrest Gump is that kind of movie, you either hate it or love it. For me the basic theme of the movie "Life is a box of chocolates, you dont know what to find, some sweet, some bitter" is what makes it my favorite. And of course Forrests experience in life, his interactions with various persons like JFK, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, as well as his take on some of the more famous events of the 60's and 70's. Some have criticized it as being too simplistic and naive. While Gump is not a political and social commentary, it is not meant to be.
It is basically the story of how a person sees the world from his view point. Yeah it might be simplistic, it might be naive, but it is up to you to accept it or not. For me I love Gumpisms, and do not have any qualms in admitting so. And of course one of the best opening scenes in a movie, the feather floating along the sky, and then falling at feet of Gump, And a fantastic performance by Tom Hanks as Forrest Gump. Only reason why I rate it a notch below Shawshank is because of its climax, and the fact that some scenes just drag along.
A List that saved Lives
A womanizing businessman, a wheeler dealer with the Nazis, called Oskar Schindler( Liam Neeson); a sadistically cruel concentration camp commandant called Amon Goeth( Ralph Fiennes) who believes that all Jews are vermin, who need to be exterminated; a mild mannered Jewish accountant Ithzak Stern( Ben Kingsley), and of course one of the darkest periods in history the Holocaust. And add a director called Steven Spielberg,you get a movie that is a totally harrowing and realistic account of the Holocaust. **Schindlers List is the story of Oskar Schindler, who put his life, his business on the line, while saving Jewish people from Hitlers gas chambers, with the assistance of his accountat Stern. Memorable performances by Neeson, Fiennes and Kingsley. At the end of the movie, you come out wondering what makes people so cruel, that they can inflict such dastardly atrocities on other human beings.
8 Men for 1 Man
During World War II, the US Government had a policy, that every family, should have one single member alive. A mother informs that she has lost all her sons, save one, in the War. 8 soldiers are handpicked for this task, led by Cpt. John Miller( Tom Hanks). Using this theme, and the backdrop of the Normandy landings, Steven Spielberg again comes up with another masterpiece in Saving Private Ryan. As Miller and his team, undertake the search for Pvt. Ryan( Matt Damon), we are drawn into their encounters, with booby traps, Nazi soldiers, rain, and the fact that finding Ryan in war torn France is aking to looking for a needle in the haystack. If not for nothing, the movie is my favorite due to it's opening 15 min battle sequence. War has never been presented more brutally, more realistically on screen. That scene is enough to leave you totally shaken. Just ignore the flag waving Pax Americana* tone, and Spielberg's tendency to fit in a Hollywood style happy ending, this is a movie that spells classic.
Who is Keyser Soze?
An explosion , a murder, a crime, 5 crooks who are suspected, and one lone survivor. The cops have no clue, except for one name Keyser Soze. The Usual Suspects is one of the best noir movies, I have ever seen so far. Kevin Spacey in a brilliant performance as Verbal Kint, one of the few eye witnesses to the crime. The problem begins when he starts to narrate the incidents to the cops. The plot has twists and turns that leave you totally befuddled. From the scene where the 5 characters, Verbal, Keaton( Gabriel Byrne), McManus( Stanley Baldwin), Fenster( Benicio Del Toro) and Hockney( Kevin Pollak)** meet to get back at the cops who arrested em wrongly, to the present, where Verbal is leading the cops on a wild goose chase, with his constantly changing story, we like the cops are left wondering who is the culprit. And then there is Keyser Soze, who has to be one of the most fascinating characters to be ever seen. Watch it for that stunning climax, which just leaves you speechless. Loved thgis movie for its non linear mode of narration, as it cuts from past to present, back to past again.
