Screen memories from the past decade
By: A.O. Scott The New York Times
Issue date: 11/19/09 Section: Entertainment
Many years ago, in an age of chaos and confusion, in a world where time was money and pleasure was work, I saw a movie that changed my life forever. It was called My Dog Skip.
Perhaps you remember it. To be perfectly honest, I don't. There was a dog named Skip, of course - who lived in Mississippi in some bygone, innocent era before the present age of chaos and confusion, in a world where . . . - but never mind. Kevin Bacon was in the movie and also Luke Wilson and the kid from Malcolm in the Middle. I recollect this stuff only because I looked back at an old newspaper review, the first I ever wrote as a film critic for The New York Times.
That was in January 2000. Since then, more than 5,000 movies have come and gone and been reviewed in The Times, most of them still living somewhere in the lucrative zombie limbo of DVD or cable programming. Some landed noisily on thousands of screens at once, gobbling up as much attention and money as the marketing machinery of the studios could buy, at least for a weekend or two. Others bloomed quietly in big-city art houses and were smiled on (if they were lucky) by ardent critics and die-hard cinephiles. Some won Oscars they didn't deserve. Many more deserved better than they got from the Academy or the public. There were extravagant spectacles of superheroism and planetary disaster; blue-chip biopics in which famous actors impersonated famous historical personages; handsome adaptations of prizewinning literary novels; coarse comedies; exquisite relationship studies; noisy cartoons; muckraking documentaries; D.I.Y. video oddities; and multisequel franchises with lovable heroes like Harry Potter, Shrek and Jigsaw.
Did I miss any? Not as many as I might have wanted, perhaps, though at the same time I often feel as if I have some catching up to do. And after 10 years, with the calendrical end of the decade as further excuse and inspiration, I find myself wondering which of those thousands will last. And also, how, why and in what form. The possibility of a digital, on-demand afterlife guarantees at least a theoretically universal long-tail immortality to blockbusters and curiosities alike. But this state of database nonoblivion is not the same as being held in memory. Which movies are sure to be remembered? Which movies deserve to be? Are these really two different questions?
Perhaps you remember it. To be perfectly honest, I don't. There was a dog named Skip, of course - who lived in Mississippi in some bygone, innocent era before the present age of chaos and confusion, in a world where . . . - but never mind. Kevin Bacon was in the movie and also Luke Wilson and the kid from Malcolm in the Middle. I recollect this stuff only because I looked back at an old newspaper review, the first I ever wrote as a film critic for The New York Times.
That was in January 2000. Since then, more than 5,000 movies have come and gone and been reviewed in The Times, most of them still living somewhere in the lucrative zombie limbo of DVD or cable programming. Some landed noisily on thousands of screens at once, gobbling up as much attention and money as the marketing machinery of the studios could buy, at least for a weekend or two. Others bloomed quietly in big-city art houses and were smiled on (if they were lucky) by ardent critics and die-hard cinephiles. Some won Oscars they didn't deserve. Many more deserved better than they got from the Academy or the public. There were extravagant spectacles of superheroism and planetary disaster; blue-chip biopics in which famous actors impersonated famous historical personages; handsome adaptations of prizewinning literary novels; coarse comedies; exquisite relationship studies; noisy cartoons; muckraking documentaries; D.I.Y. video oddities; and multisequel franchises with lovable heroes like Harry Potter, Shrek and Jigsaw.
Did I miss any? Not as many as I might have wanted, perhaps, though at the same time I often feel as if I have some catching up to do. And after 10 years, with the calendrical end of the decade as further excuse and inspiration, I find myself wondering which of those thousands will last. And also, how, why and in what form. The possibility of a digital, on-demand afterlife guarantees at least a theoretically universal long-tail immortality to blockbusters and curiosities alike. But this state of database nonoblivion is not the same as being held in memory. Which movies are sure to be remembered? Which movies deserve to be? Are these really two different questions?
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