"Blue Velvet"(1986)
Total Film magazine named this the best movie of 1986. Entertainment Weekly named it the fourth best movie of the last 25 years. It's not the four hundredth best movie of the last 25 years. I'm amazed at how highly regarded this film is in some circles and wonder when was the last time anyone actually watched it. Director David Lynch's look at a small town's seedy underbelly may have been shocking stuff at the time of it's release but it barely kept me awake last year. The first half was intriguing and I kept waiting for something to happen. Nothing really did. Kyle MacLachlan is a bland boring actor and we're with him for the entire film. Dennis Hopper's Frank Booth was a memorable psycho but one good scene(you know the one I mean) does not a great movie make.
"Do The Right Thing"(1989)
I always considered Spike Lee the worst 'good' director in Hollywood. If "Do The Right Thing" is his best film, then there's no need to see anything else that he's done. Spike doesn't make entertaining movies. He always has an agenda. A not so subtle statement to make about the black experience. He's made about a dozen movies about race relations. Does he have nothing else to say as a filmmaker? This may have been one of the first mainstream films to deal with these issues but it's hard to care about or sympathize with any of the characters in this ensemble with the exception of Danny Aiello's pizza shop owner Sal. In the end, nobody in this movie really does the right thing. Spike actually once said that "Do The Right Thing" is better and more deserving of the Academy Award for Best Picture than 1989's "Driving Miss Daisy". It's okay if somebody else wants to say that, but he's speaking about his own work. I guess nobody rates Spike higher than he rates himself.
"Glengarry Glenn Ross"(1992)
Al Pacino, Jack Lemmon, Kevin Spacey, Ed Harris, Alec Baldwin. I should have loved this movie. So why didn't I? It could be because I've actually worked in the real estate business and it's nothing like this. There's not one female in this office and I never once heard anyone speak of these coveted 'leads'. Sure, there's some good David Mamet dialogue, but it gets exhausting, and the film is just too stagey and claustrophobic. Baldwin's quotable cameo may have convinced passerby that the whole thing is great. That's just not the case. You wouldn't buy property from any of these desperate shysters, and you don't want to spend an hour and 35 minutes with them either.
"The Usual Suspects"(1995)
Director Bryan Singer's debut received widespread acclaim in '95. Kevin Spacey took home the Best Supporting Actor Oscar. He's really the only standout in the ensemble cast. Most of the actors in this film did not go on to have big careers and none of their characters ever really clicked with me. If you take away this flick's famous twist ending, you're not left with much more than an average crime drama with a messy and confusing narrative. This movie is all about pulling the wool over the audience's eyes and I think Roger Ebert said it best in his review- "To the degree that I understood what was going on, I didn't care".
