I almost hate to admit it, but “Kill Bill: Volume 1” is more fun than any movie I’ve seen all year. A first-rate pulp adventure, a parody of a pulp adventure, and a love letter to pulp adventures and guilty cinematic pleasures everywhere, “Kill Bill” is a director’s fantasy and a movie-lover’s dream: an unsentimental, sugar-free way to say it’s okay to have fun with garbage. Director Quentin Tarantino (“Pulp Fiction”) packs the movie with pop culture references you don’t need to get and features a high-velocity soundtrack that mixes hip with dork, including the now-infamous “Battle Without Honor or Humanity.” R
David Gordon Green (“George Washington”) directed and co-wrote this quiet, elegant tale of a small-town romance between a wide-eyed innocent (Zooey Deschanel) and an inarticulate, redneck Casanova (Paul Schneider). Stunning photography by Tim Orr and Adam Stone show how life, nature, and the seasons go on and on, despite the discoveries and heartbreak of the young lovers. R
My two favorite films this year could not be more different. One is almost all technique, an absolute movie movie, a movie that can be appreciated more and more, the more movies we see. The other is straightforward and empathic, asking us to sympathize with its characters, to grow happy when they are happy, and sad when they are sad.
Favorite Films of 2003: Nos. 9-15
Favorite Films of 2003: Honorable Mention
Special Jury Prize: Girls Gone Hollywood
Power is in the details of Clint Eastwood’s working class tale of loyalty, betrayal, fathers, sons, and secrets from the past. Three boyhood chums (Sean Penn, Tim Robbins, and Kevin Bacon), all married and all fathers, reunite when one of their daughters disappears, one as investigator, one as suspect, and one as blind vengeance. Written for the screen by Brian Helgeland, the Oscar-winning co-screenwriter of “L.A. Confidential.” R
Comic book artist-turned-filmmaker Sylvain Chomet combines the grotesque and the adorable to stunningly realize this animated story of Champion, a young bicyclist kidnapped by gangsters during the Tour-de-France. Only Madame de Souza, his short plump grandmother, and their dog Bruno are willing to travel the impossible distances to rescue him from the industrialized clutches of Belleville. But all the great imagery, catchy music, and cleverly pantomimed story (the movie is almost entirely dialogue free) would be empty spectacle if we didn’t care about the ugly but determined Madame de Souza, the phlegmatic Champion, and the hopelessly canine Bruno—and I certainly did. PG13
Director Fernando Meirelles’s film is a towering, aggressive tale of crime in a Brazilian ghetto, spanning nearly thirty years and dozens of characters, told with frantic editing, overlapping flashbacks, and no end of tangents. The film’s theme of there being no easy answers to the entwined dilemmas of poverty and crime is perfectly embodied by its sheer size and sprawl. (2003 wide release) R
Director Peter Weir’s straight-ahead tale of a British warship stalking a French adversary in the days of Napoleon is a refreshingly uncluttered adventure, free of speeches, frenetic camera work, Oscar-clip acting, and overwrought music. “Master & Commander” is almost Kubrickian in its decision to be observant and not judgmental, yet, like Kubrick, it asks us to admire the humanity of its characters even as they are trapped in the dehumanizing shackles of war and being pressed into service. Russell Crowe and Paul Bettany star as the tenacious English captain and his passive Irish surgeon, whose arguments over the treatment of the crew and the pursuit of the enemy become a political microcosm. All this, despite a bad preview and a kind of stupid title. PG13
The point isn’t whether you hate Robert McNamara or love him, whether you think he’s telling the truth or lying, or whether you want him to apologize, or admit he was wrong or recant nothing, or if he’s just flat-out crazy. The greatness of Errol Morris’ documentary is that it gives us the chance to hear a real-life power broker speak candidly and to take a glimpse, however skewed, into those smoke-filled backrooms where history is made. R
The most human movie of the year is a bittersweet tale of a washed-up actor (Bill Murray) and a young photographer’s wife (Scarlett Johansson) who become friends while spending a week in Tokyo. Their relationship has elements of family, romance, and joviality, but mostly it’s about finding someone who will listen when we think no one else will. Writer-director Sofia Coppola (“The Virgin Suicides”) tells their story in stark, bare images, while Murray and Johansson quietly give two of the year’s best performances. A fascinating film that introduced a new emotion into me that, if I ever feel that way again, I can say “that felt like ‘Lost in Translation.’” R