1997--The Year in Review

Even though a passel of terrific movies were released in 1997, this is among the weaker years of the decade. Its supposed jewel, James Cameron's magnum opus Titanic, tells a tale previously recounted on screen in better fashions--the 1958 British film A Night to Remember tops them all, and even the 1953 Titanic with Barbara Stanwyck and Clifton Webb is superior storytelling. In fact, it won an Oscar for its screenplay, while Cameron's film wasn't even nominated for a screenplay award--rightfully so, though I'm clearly in the minority since it, of course, became the primo moneymaker to that point. Though it was looked at as a possible bomb while its budget ballooned, Cameron's folly ended up highjacking the awards narrative this year, thus tainting the period with distinct air of blahness. The film went on to match another blah epic, 1959's Ben Hur, in its record number of Oscar wins--13, in all. Titanic, for me, was a waste of time until its stunning final hour, where it perfectly recreates the sinking of the supposedly indomitable sea craft (it's the reason the movie captured the popular vote, and this it matches Ben Hur and its ginormous chariot race, which similarly convinced everyone it was the best movie of its year). I don't get any of the larger subtext Cameron means for it ("We're on the Titanic now, worldwide, and we're heading towards the iceberg"). You have to read of Cameron's intent in order to get it, and even then it feels bogus and self-important. He missed a prime opportunity to make Titanic into an widely-swathed omnibus that suitably covered the stories of the multitudes that died and survived, and instead he concentrated on that goofy "Jack! Rose!" passion that obviously never existed. The picture cynically feels like it was made only for challenge of doing it.

In the face of this, most critics sided with Curtis Hanson's L.A. Confidential, an exciting, beautifully-produced bon-bon of retro-flavored action that smashes into you upon first viewing, but shows a certain air of still-entertaining phoniness upon revisitation. For me, the best movie of this year is a gorgeous, resplendently dour look at a dreadful school bus accident affecting a snowy Canadian community. The Sweet Hereafter, from writer/director Atom Egoyan, is a gorgeous, stout, time-juggling marvel studded with an impressive cast that continually takes our breath with their brave stares into the void (veteran Ian Holm, as a money-hungry lawyer, and newcomer Sarah Polley, as a secretive survivor, are its MVPs). It's handily the most emotionally devastating movie of '97, and feels like nothing Egoyan produced before or since. Quentin Tarantino, too, voiced a new tone with his chiefly humanistic, least derivative work Jackie Brown, for which I am totally happy to give acting awards to Pam Grier and Robert Forster, two deserving veterans who, faced with the finest roles of their long careers, modestly depicted a cozy romance, perfectly trumping the one that hoodwinked so many Titanic fans. NOTE: These are MY choices for each category, and are only occasionally reflective of the selections made by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (aka The Oscars). When available, the nominee that actually won the Oscar will be highlighted in bold.

PICTURE: THE SWEET HEREAFTER (Canada, Atom Egoyan)
(2nd: L.A. Confidential (US, Curtis Hanson)
followed by: Jackie Brown (US, Quentin Tarantino)
A Taste of Cherry (Iran, Abbas Kiarostami)
Funny Games (Austria, Michael Haneke)
The Ice Storm (US, Ang Lee)
Starship Troopers (US, Paul Verhoeven)
Mother and Son (Russia, Aleksandr Sokurov)
Donnie Brasco (US, Mike Newell)
Eve’s Bayou (US, Kasi Lemmons)
The Apostle (US, Robert Duvall)
Boogie Nights (US, Paul Thomas Anderson)
Career Girls (UK, Mike Leigh)
Passion in the Desert (US, Lavinia Currier)
Lost Highway (US, David Lynch)
Waco: The Rules of Engagement (US, William Gazecki)
Open Your Eyes (Spain, Alejandro Aménabar)
Kundun (US, Martin Scorsese)
Ulee’s Gold (US, Victor Nunez)
Insomnia (Norway, Erik Skjoldbjærg)
Four Little Girls (US, Spike Lee)
Good Will Hunting (US, Gus Van Sant)
Gattaca (US, Andrew Niccol)
As Good as it Gets (US, James L. Brooks)
Lolita (US/France, Adrian Lyne)
Hana-bi (Japan, Takeshi Kitano)
The Full Monty (UK, Peter Cattaneo)
Breakdown (US, Jonathan Mostow)
In the Company of Men (US, Neil LaBute)
Children of Heaven (Iran, Majid Majidi)
Little Dieter Needs to Fly (Germany, Werner Herzog)
Four Days in September (Brazil/US, Bruno Barreto)
Nil by Mouth (UK, Gary Oldman)
Hands on a Hard Body (US, S.R. Bindler)
The Wings of the Dove (UK, Iain Softley)
Men in Black (US, Barry Sonnenfeld)
Princess Mononoke (Japan, Hayao Miyazaki)
Croupier (UK, Mike Hodges)
Private Parts (US, Betty Thomas)
Titanic (US, James Cameron)
Contact (US, Robert Zemeckis)
The Fifth Element (US/France, Luc Besson)
Happy Together (Hong Kong, Wong Kar-Wai)
Life is Beautiful (Italy, Roberto Benigni)
The Long Way Home (US, Mark Jonathan Harris)
The Spanish Prisoner (US, David Mamet)
Cop Land (US, James Mangold)
U-Turn (US, Oliver Stone)
The Butcher Boy (Ireland, Neil Jordan)
Face/Off (US, John Woo)
The Eel (Japan, Shohei Imamura)
Event Horizon (US, Paul W.S. Anderson)
Mrs. Brown (UK, John Madden); The Kingdom II (Denmark, Lars Von Trier and Morton Arnfred); The House of Yes (US, Mark Waters)
John Grisham's The Rainmaker (US, Francis Ford Coppola)
Amistad (US, Steven Spielberg)
Love and Death on Long Island (US, Richard Kwietniowski)
Ma Vie En Rose (France/Belgium/UK, Alain Berliner)
Fast, Cheap and Out of Control (US, Errol Morris)
12 Angry Men (US, William Friedkin)
My Best Friend's Wedding (US, P.J. Hogan)
Wag the Dog (US, Barry Levinson)
All Over Me (US, Alex Sichel)
Clockwatchers (US, Jill Sprecher)
Dream with the Fishes (US, Finn Taylor)
The Castle (Australia, Rob Sitch)
Cube (Canada, Vincenzo Natali)
She's So Lovely (US, Nick Cassavetes)
Character (Belgium/Netherlands, Mike van Diem)
Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil (US, Clint Eastwood)
In and Out (US, Frank Oz)
Mousehunt (US, Gore Verbinski)
Orgazmo (US, Trey Parker)
The Edge (US, Lee Tamahori)
The Game (US, David Fincher)
Men With Guns (US, John Sayles)
Grosse Pointe Blank (US, George Armitage)
Lawn Dogs (US, John Duigan))

ACTOR: Ian Holm, THE SWEET HEREAFTER (2nd: Robert Duvall, The Apostle, followed by: Peter Fonda, Ulee’s Gold; Al Pacino, Donnie Brasco; Matt Damon, Good Will Hunting; Homayon Ershadi, A Taste of Cherry; Jack Nicholson, As Good As It Gets; Samuel L. Jackson, Jackie Brown)



ACTRESS: Pam Grier, JACKIE BROWN (2nd: Joan Allen, The Ice Storm, followed by: Susanne Lothar, Funny Games; Helen Hunt, As Good As It Gets; Rebecca Pidgeon, The Spanish Prisoner; Helena Bonham Carter, The Wings of The Dove; Katrin Cartlidge, Career Girls; Lynda Steadman, Career Girls)



SUPPORTING ACTOR: Robert Forster, JACKIE BROWN (2nd: Burt Reynolds, Boogie Nights, followed by: Robert Blake, Lost Highway; Robin Williams, Good Will Hunting; Mark Benton, Career Girls; Bruce Greenwood, The Sweet Hereafter; Robert De Niro, Jackie Brown; Lady Chablis, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil)

SUPPORTING ACTRESS: Julianne Moore, BOOGIE NIGHTS (2nd: Sarah Polley, The Sweet Hereafter, followed by: Nicoletta Braschi, Life is Beautiful; Cameron Diaz, My Best Friend’s Wedding; Bridget Fonda, Jackie Brown; Gabrielle Rose, The Sweet Hereafter; Gloria Stuart, Titanic; Minnie Driver, Good Will Hunting)



DIRECTOR: Atom Egoyan, THE SWEET HEREAFTER (2nd: Curtis Hanson, L.A. Confidential, followed by: Abbas Kierostami, A Taste of Cherry; Michael Haneke, Funny Games; Quentin Tarantino, Jackie Brown; Ang Lee, The Ice Storm; Paul Thomas Anderson, Boogie Nights)



NON-ENGLISH LANGUAGE FILM: A TASTE OF CHERRY (Iran, Abbas Kiarostami) (2nd: Funny Games (Austria, Michael Haneke), followed by: Mother and Son (Russia, Aleksandr Sokurov); Open Your Eyes (Spain, Alejandro Aménabar); Insomnia (Norway, Erik Skjoldbjærg); Hana-bi (Japan, Takeshi Kitano); Happy Together (Hong Kong, Wong Kar-Wai); Children of Heaven (Iran, Majid Majidi); Four Days in September (Brazil/US, Bruno Barreto); Princess Mononoke (Japan, Hayao Miyazaki); Life is Beautiful (Italy, Roberto Benigni) (won in 1999); The Eel (Japan, Shohei Imamura); Ma Vie En Rose (France/ Belgium/UK, Alain Berliner); Character (Belgium/Netherlands, Mike van Diem))

DOCUMENTARY FEATURE: WACO: THE RULES OF ENGAGEMENT (US, William Gazecki) (2nd: Four Little Girls (US, Spike Lee), followed by: Little Dieter Needs To Fly (Germany, Werner Herzog); Hands on a Hard Body (US, S.R. Bindler); The Long Way Home (US, Mark Jonathan Harris))

ANIMATED FEATURE: PRINCESS MONONOKE (Japan, Hayao Miyazaki)



ANIMATED SHORT: THE OLD LADY AND THE PIGEONS (France, Sylvain Chomet) (2nd: Mermaid (Russia, Aleksandr Petrov), followed by: Geri's Game (US, Jan Pinkava))



LIVE ACTION SHORT: DA FUNK (US, Spike Jonze) (2nd: Cutting Moments (US, Douglas Buck); Little Red Riding Hood (US, David Kaplan); Come to Daddy (UK, Chris Cunningham)



ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY: Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, GOOD WILL HUNTING (2nd: Victor Nunez, Ulee’s Gold, followed by: Michael Haneke, Funny Games; Kasi Lemmons, Eve’s Bayou; Paul Thomas Anderson, Boogie Nights) 



ADAPTED SCREENPLAY: Curtis Hanson and Brian Helgeland, L.A. CONFIDENTIAL (2nd: Atom Egoyan, The Sweet Hereafter, followed by: James Schamus, The Ice Storm; Quentin Tarantino, Jackie Brown; Paul Attansio, Donnie Brasco)

CINEMATOGRAPHY: Dante Spinotti, L.A. CONFIDENTIAL (2nd: Frederick Elmes, The Ice Storm, followed by: Roger Deakins, Kundun; Alexei Yodorov, Mother and Son; Alexei Rodionov Passion in the Desert)

ART DIRECTION: TITANIC, Kundun, L.A. Confidential, Gattaca, Boogie Nights

COSTUME DESIGN: KUNDUN, Titanic, L.A. Confidential, Boogie Nights, Starship Troopers



FILM EDITING: L.A. CONFIDENTIAL, The Sweet Hereafter, Boogie Nights, Titanic, Funny Games



SOUND: CONTACT, Titanic, L.A. Confidential, Starship Troopers, The Fifth Element



SOUND EFFECTS: TITANIC, L.A. Confidential, Starship Troopers



ORIGINAL SCORE: Jerry Goldsmith, L.A. CONFIDENTIAL (2nd: Mychael Danna, The Sweet Hereafter, followed by: Philip Glass, Kundun; James Horner, Titanic; Nicola Piovani, Life is Beautiful (won in 1999))



ORIGINAL SONG: “Miss Misery” from GOOD WILL HUNTING (Music and lyrics by Elliott Smith) (2nd: “My Heart Will Go On” from Titanic (Music by James Horner, lyrics by Will Jennings))

SPECIAL EFFECTS: TITANIC, Starship Troopers, Men in Black

MAKEUP: MEN IN BLACK, The Fifth Element, Lost Highway 

In Memorium: Philip Seymour Hoffman (1967-2014)

Blue-eyed and blonde-haired, yet often rumpled and unshaven, with a big body and a gentle soul, Philip Seymour Hoffman was committed to every role he assayed, regardless of its effect on his image. Adamantly devout to characters that were flawed, enraged or, indeed, near nervous collapse, Hoffman's death, on February 2nd, 2014 of a heroin overdose, has left a massive hole in the art world--one that can never be filled in quite the same way again.

A New York University alumni, in the early 90s Hoffman made the transition from an acclaimed stage star to tiny but impactful supporting roles in films like My New Gun, Leap of Faith, Scent of a Woman, Nobody's Fool, Hard Eight (the start of his career-long collaboration with Paul Thomas Anderson), When A Man Loves a Woman, and as a notably bright spot in the terrible box office hit Twister. But it was his portrayal of a sexually recalcitrant sound man in Anderson's Boogie Nights that brought him to our first and clearest attention. He was impossible to ignore after this: 



His showing as Brandt, the toadying assistant in The Big Lebowski, cemented him in my mind as an actor to watch. For many, he provided some of the most subtle laughs in this gigantic cult film. Here, I love his ridiculous stiffness, his phony cackle, his mastery of the Coens' rubbery language ("They're the Little Lebowski Urban Achievers--inner-city children of promise but without the necessary means for a necessary means for a higher education"), how the breath leaves him after The Dude almost refers to Lebowski as "a cripple." And that moment where his whole body tenses up after asking Jeff Lebowski not to touch Mr. Lebowski's award? Golden: 



Of course, over a tremendous career path, he kept on knocking it out of the park, as in Todd Solondz's 1998 film Happiness playing a lonely man suffering from a crippling depression. Now, given how he has passed, I wonder how much inspiration for this role was perhaps taken from his own life...



In P.T. Anderson's Magnolia--one of my favorite of his performances--he gets to be a hero for one of the few times in his career. His portrayal of Phil Parma, the hospice care worker devoted to a dying TV producer (Jason Robards) is a miracle of you-are-there acting. Though Anderson's film is filled with tremendous performances, it's Hoffman's appearance that really stays with you, because his character is only one in this mammoth movie who's completely giving. For this, he won the 1999 Supporting Actor award from the National Board of Review (they twinned it with his nasty supporting turn in Anthony Mingella's The Talented Mr. Ripley): 



In Cameron Crowe's 2000 film Almost Famous, he undertook the role of famed music critic Lester Bangs, and became the truth-telling conscience of Crowe's largely autobiographical work. Is there any greater line than this: "The only true currency you carry in this bankrupt world is what you share with someone else when you're uncool." With his often growly voice, Hoffman delivers the line with the assurance of someone who knows what he's talking about:  



In Spike Lee's 25th Hour, Hoffman was terrific as a school teacher devoted to a pal (Edward Norton) destined for prison. In Todd Louiso's little seen Love Liza, he was devastating as a lover dealing with an ex's suicide: 



And in Anderson's Punch Drunk Love, he was both doubtful and terrifying as a small-time con-man out to take advantage of an enraged Adam Sandler's loneliness (the concept of loneliness seems to be a through-line in Hoffman's career, and I don't think that's just hindsight talking here):  



In the 2003 film Owning Mahoney, Hoffman is again superb as a gambling addict who doesn't know when to stop playing:  



After more fine work in the HBO movie Empire Falls and in Mingella's Cold Mountain, then came Bennett Miller's 2005 biopic Capote. Though some said he was miscast in the role, being much taller and bigger than the diminutive author, Hoffman latched onto and owned the role. With his impeccable style and vocal gymnastics, it's clear no one had any problem (at the time, at least) with this magnificent performance. In one of the finest scenes in this underrated movie, Hoffman's Capote talks with a source for his book In Cold Blood, and reveals to her his most inner hurts:

  For Capote, Hoffman won his only Academy Award, for Best Actor:



The award, and the following years, brought a hurricane of great acting from Hoffman to the fore. In Brad Bird's Mission Impossible III, he finally brought gravitas to a misbegotten series with his steely, superbly villainous support to his former Magnolia co-star Tom Cruise: 

 
In Tamera Jenkins' underseen 2007 film The Savages, he paired with Laura Linney as the siblings trying to take care of an aging, unloved dad (Philip Bosco). And in Sidney Lumet's final film, Before The Devil Knows You're Dead, he played the desperate, drug-addicted son of a jewelry store owner to an ultimate degree. Opposite a withering Ethan Hawke, this is one of his bravest performances; it's impossible not to feel, to your toes, Hoffman's utter allegiance to this role: 



In Mike Nichols' complex 2007 film Charlie Wilson's War, Hoffman brought a stern yet strange tenderness to his role as a wild CIA operative who becomes a guide through the machinations of modern foreign relations for Tom Hanks' distracted senator. Hoffman won his second Oscar nomination here, opposite Mad Men's John Slattery, for Best Supporting Actor: 



Perhaps my favorite of his lead roles was for Charlie Kaufman's 2008 directorial debut in Synecdoche New York. Hoffman here makes you feel every moment of an unrecognized artist's life that's passing before our eyes. It's an incredibly difficult movie, but Hoffman--the biggest diamond in a jewel-studded cast--makes it work despite any misgivings the viewer might have. This would be my choice as the Hoffman performance I wish more people would see and appreciate: 



With John Patrick Shanley's adaption of his play, Hoffman again deservedly landed a Supporting Actor Oscar nomination as priest battling the derision of a snarling Mother Superior (Meryl Streep) in 2008's Doubt: 



I loved his nearly unrecognizable foray into animation voicing, as the cloistered pen-pal of a little girl in Adam Elliot's brilliant stop-motion film Mary and Max:  



And, again, I loved his quiet supporting portrayal of a baseball team manager who feels he's being undercut by a new way of crafting a team's roster in Bennett Miller's incredible Moneyball, from 2011: 



Hoffman contributed his sole film directorial effort with 2010's mournful Jack Goes Boating. He continued to make deep impressions with movies like A Late Quartet (a beautiful film, that)...



...and in George Clooney's The Ides of March, and the immensely popular The Hunger Games: Catching Fire (he was filming its sequel, Mockingjay, at the time of his death, and it's not known at press time whether he completed the role). But it was with P.T. Anderson's 2012 film The Master that he gave arguably his greatest performance as the megalomanical cult leader Lancaster Dodd, opposite Joachin Phoenix as his obsession-worthy friend Freddie Quell and Amy Adams as Dodd's controlling wife. A co-lead with Phoenix, Hoffman was wrongfully placed in the supporting role when it came time for the awards to be handed out, and so he easily earned his final Supporting Actor Oscar nomination. But, man, just LOOK at this scene, where Dodd uses his method of breaking down a person's most secret wounds on Quell. This is astounding work, on an equal par with Phoenix's magnificence:  

 
With all this, plus all of his landmark stage work as an actor, writer and director--in Sam Shepard's True West (switching roles on alternate nights with John C. Reilly), in Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey Into Night, and as Willy Loman in Arthur Miller's Death of a Saleman in particular--well, anyone would have to conclude that all actors would have given their very guts for a career like this. 

A month or more ago, I had read about Hoffman's incomprehensible heroin problem, and understood he'd checked himself into a treatment facility. Not being one to pay extra attention to actors' personal lives, I'd hoped this was a mere dalliance with the drug and that he was getting it taken care of. But I do have to admit, this past week, seeing Victoria Will's photo taken for Esquire at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival, I instantly became extremely worried for him; his look is of a man spent, and though the picture is intentionally antiquated, with its ghostly impressions, it seems to intuitively illustrate the bottom of this man's downward spiral. And only now I learn this was an ongoing battle for him.

I'm torn up and crying over this--Hoffman was a highly unusual and courageous actor, unafraid of going to the darkest places and yet always we were there with him, simply because there was just something so intrinsically lovable about him. I wonder if he knew we all felt this way. Somehow, given how it all turned out for him, I think not. And, more than I once did, I'm forced into noticing  his own personal hurt buried in his portrayals of the damaged. I also have to wonder if he gave perhaps too much of himself to his roles; their complexity and nakedness perhaps depleted him (acting, contrary to many opinions, is not the easiest art to tackle). But I'll finally say: I loved him, and he was always someone I looked forward to seeing again, and now we're left with his tremendous output, snipped tragically short. I just can't even process the magnitude of this loss we're suffering. This final scene, from The Master, slayed me the moment I first witnessed it. But it does so even more now--it feels like a lush epitaph to a consistently revelatory career. 

RIP to Philip Seymour Hoffman, an artist of the highest order.

Free winds and no tyranny for you. Freddie. Sailor of the seas. You pay no rent. Free to go where you please. Then go. Go to that landless latitude, and good luck. If you figure a way to live without serving a master--any master--then let the rest of us know, will you? For you’d be the first person in the history of the world...  

Film #147: Boogie Nights

Even though it has an immense cult following, Boogie Nights is one of those films I love in spite of my better judgment.

I can recall gendering at the beautiful one-sheet for Paul Thomas Anderson's breakthrough movie months before it was released in the fall of 1997. I marveled at its huge cast, and was excited about the subject matter--a trip through the Los Angeles porn industry of the late 70s/early 80s. I didn’t know who Anderson was at that time, having not seen his first feature, the small-time con film Hard Eight, but that would soon change. The Boogie Nights poster, though, with its intricate photo collage of characters from the film, promised an epic portrayal unlike anything ever attempted. I was extremely thrilled about seeing it.

In it, we follow its naïve central character, Eddie Adams (Mark Wahlberg, in his first really notable lead role), as he's ensnared into a makeshift family of porn mavens. As he’s performing tricks on the side at his busboy job at an L.A. nightspot, he’s spotted by the patriarchal porn auteur Jack Horner (Burt Reynolds, in one of the best roles of his career). Impressed by his entire...um...package, Horner invites Eddie into the porn fold, and there his triumphs and troubles begin.

Eddie’s eventual transformation into the XXX-star Dirk Diggler is followed in great detail, but this story is really a kind of connective tissue for all the many other tales the film has to offer: Julianne Moore is a top-tier porn actress battling the courts and her ex-husband (John Doe) over custody of their son while using Horner’s coterie of performers as sort of stand-in children; William H. Macy is a meek assistant director struggling with his wife (porn queen Nina Hartley) and her hurtful infidelity; John C. Reilly is an amiable second-string performer (with a penchant for magic tricks) attempting to forge a stronger identity for himself; Don Cheadle is another beaten-down porn star who’s finding his race as a barrier to breaking into the world of stereo sales; Heather Graham is the sexy but largely innocent Rollergirl, searching for the family she can’t find at home.

And Horner himself is battling pressures to convert to video rather than film--an idea he finds abhorrent (this is especially poignant now, seeing as how 35mm is dying right before our eyes, and Anderson is on the front lines in keeping film alive). Throw into this mix Philip Seymour Hoffman as a schlubby sound guy, Luis Guzman as an enthusiastic outsider, Robert Ridgely as a troubled producer (he has a great scene at his downfall, and the movie is dedicated to him, as Ridgely died soon after production), Philip Baker Hall as an imposing moneyman (you have to love Anderson for resurrecting Hall's career), and Ricky Jay as Horner’s loyal photographer/editor, and you can get a sense of this film’s monumental ambition.

I find many facets of Boogie Nights to be quite wonderful. The widescreen cinematography, by Anderson regular Robert Elswit (who would go on to win an Oscar for his work on Anderson’s There Will Be Blood) is always vibrant and inventive, as is the diverse '70s-era source music score (pairing nicely with a sad circus-flavored underscore by Michael Penn). Anderson’s writes dialogue for dumb people particularly brilliantly, so there’s always funny conversation ensuing. The period detail in the garish art direction (by Bob Ziembicki) and costume design (by Mark Bridges, who's gone on to do The Fighter and The Artist) are spot-on. I love seeing Burt Reynolds tearing into a meaty role again and Julianne Moore is beautifully histrionic here, as she would be in Anderson’s Magnolia as well (both she and Reynolds received supporting Oscar nominations). As always, I find John C. Reilly to be a hoot as Reed Rothschild, and Phillip Seymour Hoffman is sweetly doofy as the crewman who gets a crush on Eddie (his tortured confession of this to the unsuspecting Wahlberg is, I think, the movie’s most shattering scene).

But I also find that many parts don’t work: William H. Macy is a shamelessly barely-sketched punching bag of a character; Don Cheadle’s story fails to make a deep impression (note: any time you see a character in a white suit doing something as innocuous as buying donuts, you can bet that suit’s gonna be covered in blood by the end of the scene); and Graham’s Rollergirl, while extremely cute, also seems thinly-written. It feels like Anderson just has too much movie here for 2½ hours to hold (as wonderful as it is on the wide screen Boogie Nights would have been, storywise, a much more effective TV series). Also, the film owes a bit too much to the Goodfellas style of soaring-then-crashing storytelling (with the onslaught of the '80s being the rather too-obvious turning point, though thankfully the AIDS virus doesn't even make a cameo appearance, though it obviously looms in the world's future). I know that this sort of structure is an old trope that dates back to silent pictures, but that's kind of why it feels too pat, too easy for a filmmaker like Anderson (who's clearly shown in his subsequent work how complex a storyteller he can be). However, there's no crime in being young, and Boogie Nights feels like a young artist's playground.

Nevertheless, it is required viewing, if only for its extremely tense final third, which finds Eddie struggling with a cocaine addiction while trying to launch a hilariously ill-conceived musical career (the songs, performed bravely and horribly by Wahlberg and Reilly, include the original “Feel My Heat“ and an excruciating cover of "The Touch," the closing song to The Transformers Movie). Particularly memorable in this segment, too, is one of the great scenes in movie history, where a destitute Wahlberg, Reilly and ne’er-do-well Thomas Jane are stuck inside a free-basing coke-dealer’s house. The gun-toting dealer is played with maniacal energy by Alfred Molina; he’s so coked up, he has well-hidden suspicions that these three desperate guys are planning to rip him off. With firecracker’s being thrown left and right by his houseboy, he holds the guys semi-hostage as he insists on playing “Jessie’s Girl” and “Sister Christian” for them on his stereo. You’ll never hear these two songs in quite the same way again. It’s really a marvelously scary moment that puts you right there in this mess and gets your heart pounding like you've been smoking crack alongside Molina.

There are many other things I like about the movie: the note-perfect, stiffly-acted porn sequences, shot on a scratchy 16mm; the famously dazzling tour through one of Horner’s house parties, done in one long shot that recalls a scene out of Kalatozov's I Am Cuba, where we eventually follow a girl as she jumps into the pool out back, all to the perfectly-chosen tune of Eric Burdon and War’s “Spill the Wine”; and the final shot of the film, which recalls another Scorsese classic, Raging Bull, but which ends with, at last, a glimpse of what made Dirk Diggler famous. Most centrally, I wish Boogie Nights as a whole was as good as these individual elements. It stumbles in its enthusiasm, but it’s got moxie, ambition, and know-how; often overpraised, it remains an important film if only as the breakthrough for an electrifying artist like Paul Thomas Anderson who, with each passing work, only seems to be getting more and more challenging.