I NEVER SAVED ANYTHING FOR THE SWIM BACK. Following on our previous discussion of albums that you, alone, seem to appreciate, I offer a similar discussion about movies. What movie do you find brilliant but to which your friends are indifferent? Here it's more about the yawning gap between you and your people, less about a unique acceptance of a film. So unless you find Shawnshank Redemption to be an unparalleled achievement, on par with the Immaculate Conception or Thomas Keller's salmon tartare coronets, where your friends find it merely great, move along.
For me, it's 1997's Gattaca, probably the finest science fiction movie ever made. I mean that, first, in the fact that it's science fiction, not an action movie with lasers. There are rules to how that universe operates -- genetic material drives that society like petrochemicals drive our own -- and those rules operate as both background to and backbone of the story. Without the science, there is no story. But it's a tale, as all good movies are, that's been told before, of the underdog, the outcast, doing more than even the annointed.
But more than that, the movie is beautifully shot, sparesly told, and compelling. Vincent is given nothing, not even his father's own name, but exceeds by human will -- and, in the end, a very human mercy -- alone.
I don't know why people don't rave about this film. It was one of the first DVDs I bought and one of the few movies I feel I need to watch at least once a year. Sure, if you know me, you know that I-Want-To-Go-To-Space thing is enough to draw me in to begin with. But the cast is great (Ethan Hawke, Jude Law) but with terrific small performances by Gore Vidal (playing someone other than Gore Vidal), Ernest Borgnine, Tony Shaloub, and Alan Arkin, the movie just sings.
Also, Uma Thurman naked.
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