The Year the Studios Let Us Down

Talk to filmgoers and they say the year just ending has been a particularly disappointing one. Talk to Oscar prognosticators and they say it’s hard to come up with a list of five potential best picture nominees. Talk to critics putting together year-end lists and they say it’s much harder to fill the top spot than Nos. 2 through 10. Put all that together and you have a picture of 2001 as the year the studio system let us down. Big time.

Although it doesn’t seem that way, this past year has actually been a superb one for small films, from this country and especially from overseas--excellent but little-seen pictures that came and went under most people’s radars because they did not possess the advertising and publicity budget needed to break free of the crowd. How many people have heard of, let alone seen, “The Vertical Ray of the Sun,” “Thomas in Love,” “101 Reykjavik,” “Bad Company,” “Cure,” “A Matter of Taste” or “The Taste of Others”? And those aren’t even the very best of the crop.

What 2001 lacked was satisfying major films from Hollywood. Studios, straitjacketed by the enormous costs of their projects, stuck to high-concept, low-risk ventures predictable enough to possibly recoup their investment before bad word of mouth caught up to them. The result was a year almost totally lacking in the kind of prestige successes like last year’s “Wonder Boys,” “Almost Famous” and “Erin Brockovich.” No wonder the ambition and scope of “Apocalypse Now Redux” captivated critics and viewers with a glimpse of the way things might have been.

There was, however, a ray of hope in that bleak picture, a big-budget blockbuster that was made with intelligence as well as a checkbook. Given that we may be doomed for the foreseeable future to a Hollywood addicted to event pictures intended for that key youthful demographic, it was heartening and more to see one that did not leave its mind and heart at the door. “The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring” was an epic adventure with the nerve to be all that it could be, and that is certainly cause for celebration and my pick for top film of the year.

Co-written and directed by Peter Jackson from the massive J.R.R. Tolkien novel, “Fellowship” succeeds because it has made its mythic story as real as possible, especially in terms of character. Having a director with the perception to make the penetrating “Heavenly Creatures,” someone with insight into the intricacies of human nature, eager to take on this very different kind of story is the rarest thing, and it has made all the difference.

The rest of the Top 10 are:

2. “In the Bedroom.” An unadorned, unflinching film about the fierce and terrifying passions that can devastate a relationship, Todd Field’s directing debut gives Sissy Spacek, Tom Wilkinson and Marisa Tomei the chance to do some of the best acting of their careers. Also worth mentioning for their potent treatment of adult concerns are the Australian “Lantana” and the British all-star “Last Orders.”

3. “Memento.” A haunting, nervy thriller, the most inventive in years, that gave Guy Pearce a terrific role as a man trying to solve his wife’s murder despite an absence of memory. It announced the arrival of writer-director Christopher Nolan as a major talent.

4. “Black Hawk Down.” Working from Mark Bowden’s landmark book on the ill-fated 1993 U.S. helicopter raid on Mogadishu, Somalia, director Ridley Scott has done a breathtaking job of re-creating the harsh, pitiless chaos of modern warfare. Not always easy to sit through but impressive from beginning to end.

5. “The Deep End.” Driven by a remarkable performance by Tilda Swinton and directed with a mesmerizing sense of style by Scott McGehee and David Siegel, this quintessential independent film turned out to be a compelling reworking of a traditional melodrama Hollywood had had a crack at half a century ago.

6. “Shrek.” Casual, carefree and gleefully amusing, this computer-animated treat about an ogre’s search for himself made great use of the voices of Mike Myers, Cameron Diaz and especially Eddie Murphy to create the only studio picture of the year that was more sophisticated than anyone anticipated.

7. A tie between “Divided We Fall” and “Together.” It proved impossible to choose between these two unexpectedly satisfying foreign-language films--one about complicity and collaboration in World War II Czechoslovakia and the other exploring the coming apart of a 1960s Swedish commune--that both find unexpected humor and compassion in their stories.

8. “Sexy Beast.” Helped by galvanizing performances by Ben Kingsley as the anti-Gandhi and Ray Winstone as his antagonist, Jonathan Glazer’s jazzy British gangster picture demonstrates what happens when a talented commercials director decides to pay attention to the script as well as the visuals.

9. “Va Savoir.” French master director Jacques Rivette has been in the business for 50 years, and he uses all the skill and knowledge he’s accumulated to make this elegant and very cinematic exploration of love, jealousy and animal attraction a rich and lively experience.

10. “Lumumba.” Politics puts people to sleep in this country, but overseas it’s another story. Along with two other excellent films, “The Circle” from Iran and the current “No Man’s Land” from Bosnia, director Raoul Peck’s story of the dark fate of the former Congolese leader showed how compelling and intensely involving real world issues can be on the screen.

If there was room for an 11th spot, the choice would be split between a pair of delicate but potent human dramas: “Last Resort,” Pawel Pawlikowski’s neo-realistic look at the plight of a Russian woman who applies for asylum in Britain, and “Our Song,” Jim McKay’s surprisingly moving look at the lives of three Brooklyn girls.

Given the gloom most of this year engendered, it wouldn’t be fair to end without a mention of two films, both from Hong Kong, that provided pure cinematic pleasure. “In the Mood for Love,” directed by Wong Kar-wai, was a ravishing, swooningly cinematic exploration of romantic longing that luxuriated in color, texture and sound. And in some ways the most out-and-out fun experience of the year, a film that raised formula to the level of exhilaration, was Yeun Wo Ping’s “Iron Monkey.” True, it was made back in 1993 and only just released in the U.S., but in a year like this one, who has the heart to quibble?