1996 Cii Movie Awards (Take 2)

This list (Take 2) was compiled July 5, 2013.  Take 1 is available here.
                       For the criteria of the Cii Movie Awards, click here.

Top 10 Films of 1996
1. Lone Star (John Sayles)
2. A Moment of Innocence (Mohsen Makhmalbaf)
3. Mission: Impossible (Brian De Palma)
4. Secrets & Lies (Mike Leigh)
5. Drifting Clouds (Aki Kaurismäki)
6. The People vs. Larry Flynt (Milos Forman)
7. Fargo (Joel Coen)
8. Get on the Bus (Spike Lee)
9. Six O'Clock News (Ross McElwee)
10. American Buffalo (Michael Corrente)
Honorable Mentions: Irma Vep (Olivier Assayas), Kansas City (Robert Altman), Mother (Albert Brooks), Jerry Maguire (Cameron Crowe), Scream (Wes Craven), Stealing Beauty (Bernardo Bertolucci), Waiting for Guffman (Christopher Guest), The Rock (Michael Bay), Flirting with Disaster (David O. Russell), La Promesse (Luc & Jean-Pierre Dardenne)

Lone Star (1996)

Lone Star (John Sayles, 1996)
History lingers.  Unearthed in deserts, garages, drive-ins, restaurants, memories.
History lingers.  A stain coloring everything we've done.
Can we move beyond it?
Should we?

A PTA group argues history in south Texas -- how should it be presented to their children?  
Winners and losers.  Majorities and minorities.  Power and tradition.  
It is always political even when it isn't.

Sam Deeds stumbles upon a question he didn't know he needed to answer.  No one cares. He isn't sure he cares at first.  
But it lingers.  He must know, if only for himself.

He lives in the shadow of his father Buddy, former sheriff in the same small town.  Large, looming, revered: a legend, so they say.  Sam doesn't believe the hype; he lived with the man.
And Sam's mother?  A saint, though no one cares to say why.
They put up a plaque for Buddy down at the courthouse.  Everyone says the nicest things.
At least he was better than the guy before him.

Col. Payne has his own daddy issues.  He never had one.  Now the one he never had lives right down the road.  
His son knows, sneaking out to solve his own personal mystery, his own skeleton in the desert.

Can anyone move beyond their own history?
What good is history unremembered, like the mayor who knows more than he'll say?
We have to know it before we forget it.
We have to read what it says before we have the freedom to throw out the book.
Political or personal, it's all the same.

Everyone believes in clean slates but no one has ever had one.  Ever.
Even the illegals sneaking across the river now wade into their own conundrums and hang-ups.  Even language is history.
The land remembers.  Sam studies it just as carefully as the other clues.

There is always a continuing story.  There always will be.

"Forget the Alamo."

film journal entry: 05.01.2013

1996 Cii Movie Awards (Take 1)

This list and awards compiled February 28, 2013.  Take 2 is available here.

                      For the criteria of choosing the awards, click here.

Top 10 Films of 1996

1. Drifting Clouds (Aki Kaurismäki)
2. Mission: Impossible (Brian De Palma)
3. Fargo (Joel Coen)
4. Jerry Maguire (Cameron Crowe)
5. The Rock (Michael Bay)
6. Six O'Clock News (Ross McElwee)
7. Waiting for Guffman (Christopher Guest)
8. The Long Kiss Goodnight (Renny Harlin)
9. Lone Star (John Sayles)
10. Breaking the Waves (Lars von Trier)

Honorable Mentions: Shine (Scott Hicks), Sling Blade (Billy Bob Thornton), Mars Attacks! (Tim Burton), Bottle Rocket (Wes Anderson), Kingpin (Peter Farrelly & Bobby Farrelly)

Best Actor

* Tom Cruise – Jerry Maguire

Christopher Guest – Waiting for Guffman

Nathan Lane – The Birdcage

William H. Macy – Fargo

Geoffrey Rush – Shine

Best Actress

Brenda Blethyn – Secrets & Lies

Geena Davis – The Long Kiss Goodnight

Frances McDormand – Fargo

Kristen Scott Thomas – The English Patient

* Emily Watson – Breaking the Waves

Best Supporting Actor

Steve Buscemi – Fargo

Nicolas Cage – The Rock

Samuel L. Jackson – A Time to Kill

Eugene Levy – Waiting for Guffman

Matthew Lillard – Scream

* Edward Norton – Primal Fear

Best Supporting Actress

Lauren Bacall – The Mirror Has Two Faces

Juliette Binoche – The English Patient

Janeane Garofalo – The Truth About Cats & Dogs

Marianne Jean-Baptiste – Secrets & Lies

Courtney Love – The People vs. Larry Flynt

* Parker Posey – Waiting for Guffman

Best Director

Michael Bay – The Rock

Joel Coen – Fargo

Brian De Palma – Mission: Impossible

* Aki Kaurismäki – Drifting Clouds

John Sayles – Lone Star

Best Screenplay

Fargo (Ethan Coen & Joel Coen)

* Jerry Maguire (Cameron Crowe)

Scream (Kevin Williamson)

Six O’Clock News (Ross McElwee)

Trainspotting (John Hodge)

Best Cinematography

Breaking the Waves (Robby Müller)

The English Patient (John Seale)

* Fargo (Roger Deakins)

Michael Collins (Chris Menges)

The Rock (John Schwartzman)

Best Editing

Fargo (Ethan Coen & Joel Coen)

* Mission: Impossible (Paul Hirsch)

Shine (Pip Karmel)

Six O’Clock News (Ross McElwee)

Trainspotting (Masahiro Hirakubo)

Best Film Score

The English Patient (Gabriel Yared)

Fargo (Carter Burwell)

Mars Attacks! (Danny Elfman)

Michael Collins (Elliot Goldenthal)

* The Rock (Nick Glennie-Smith & Hans Zimmer)

Best Production Design

The Birdcage

The English Patient

* Independence Day

Mission: Impossible

Romeo + Juliet

Best Ensemble Cast Performance

* The Birdcage

Fargo

Lone Star

Scream

Waiting for Guffman

Take 2 is available here.

1996 Movies Seen (76 features seen as of 03.02.2013)

101 Dalmations )Stephen Herek, 1996)

Alaska (Fraser Clarke Heston, 1996)

Big Night (Campbell Scott & Stanley Tucci, 1996)

The Birdcage (Mike Nichols, 1996)

Bottle Rocket (Wes Anderson, 1996)

Breaking the Waves (Lars von Trier, 1996)

Broken Arrow (John Woo, 1996)

The Cable Guy (Ben Stiller, 1996)

Carpool (Arthur Hiller, 1996)

The Chamber (James Foley, 1996)

Courage Under Fire (Edward Zwick, 1996)

The Crucible (Nicholas Hytner, 1996)

Daylight (Rob Cohen, 1996)

Down Periscope (David S. Ward, 1996)

Dragonheart (Rob Cohen, 1996)

Drifting Clouds (Aki Kaurismäki, 1996)

Dunston Checks In (Ken Kwapis, 1996)

Emma (Douglas McGrath, 1996)

The English Patient (Anthony Minghella, 1996)

Eraser (Charles Russell, 1996)

Escape From L.A. (John Carpenter, 1996)

Executive Decision (Stuart Baird, 1996)

Fargo (Joel Coen, 1996)

The First Wives Club (Hugh Wilson, 1996)

Fly Away Home (Carroll Ballard, 1996)

From Dusk Till Dawn (Robert Rodriguez, 1996)

The Ghost and the Darkness (Stephen Hopkins, 1996)

Ghosts of Mississippi (Rob Reiner, 1996)

Happy Gilmore (Dennis Dugan, 1996)

Hard Eight (Paul Thomas Anderson, 1996)

The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Gary Trousdale & Kirk Wise, 1996)

In Love and War (Richard Attenborough, 1996)

Independence Day (Roland Emmerich, 1996)

The Island of Dr. Moreau (John Frankenheimer, 1996)

Jack (Francis Ford Coppola, 1996)

James and the Giant Peach (Henry Selick, 1996)

Jerry Maguire (Cameron Crowe, 1996)

Jingle All the Way (Brian Levant, 1996)

Kazaam (Paul Michael Glaser, 1996)

Kingpin (Bobby Farrelly & Peter Farrelly, 1996)

Larger Than Life (Howard Franklin, 1996)

Lone Star (John Sayles, 1996)

The Long Kiss Goodnight (Renny Harlin, 1996)

Mars Attacks! (Tim Burton, 1996)

Marvin’s Room (Jerry Zaks, 1996)

Michael Collins (Neil Jordan, 1996)

The Mirror Has Two Faces (Barbara Streisand, 1996)

Mission: Impossible (Brian De Palma, 1996)

Multiplicity (Harold Ramis, 1996)

Muppet Treasure Island (Brian Henson, 1996)

My Fellow Americans (Peter Segal, 1996)

Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Movie (Jim Mallon, 1996)

The Nutty Professor (Tom Shadyac, 1996)

The People Versus Larry Flynt (Milos Forman, 1996)

Phenomenon (Jon Turteltaub, 1996)

Primal Fear (Gregory Hoblit, 1996)

Ransom (Ron Howard, 1996)

The Rock (Michael Bay, 1996)

Romeo + Juliet (Baz Luhrmann, 1996)

Schizopolis (Steven Soderbergh, 1996)

Scream (Wes Craven, 1996)

Secrets & Lies (Mike Leigh, 1996)

Shine (Scott Hicks, 1996)

Six O’Clock News Ross McElwee, 1996)

Sgt. Bilko (Jonathan Lynn, 1996)

Sleepers (Barry Levinson, 1996)

Sling Blade (Billy Bob Thornton, 1996)

Spy Hard (Rick Friedberg, 1996)

That Thing You Do! (Tom Hanks, 1996)

A Time to Kill (Joel Schumaker, 1996)

Tin Cup (Ron Shelton, 1996)

Trainspotting (Danny Boyle, 1996)

Trees Lounge (Steve Buscemi, 1996)

The Truth About Cats & Dogs (Michael Lehmann, 1996)

Twister (Jan de Bont, 1996)

Waiting for Guffman (Christopher Guest, 1996)