Not Coming to a Theater Near You | 2005 in review
by Matt Bailey
Top ten film/video type things I enjoyed this year, in vaguely alphabetical order:
The rapid-fire montage of several men getting hit, whacked, or kicked in the nuts on a rerun of America’s Funniest Home Videos (which is for some inexplicable reason abbreviated by ABC as “AFV.” Baffling.) I literally did fall on the floor laughing, skinning both my knees. Instant punishment for my schadenfreude? Whatever. The laughs were completely worth the pain.
Arrested Development. I didn’t start watching until about halfway into the second season, so rapidly catching up with missed episodes via reruns and DVD provided a valuable lesson in not having food or drink in my mouth while watching the show.
Birth. I’m not surprised this film was a total failure at the box office. I will be surprised if it is not resurrected as a major film of the 00s within twenty years.
Discovering, at long last, the films of Mike Kuchar. Granted, I’ve only seen three, but I knew I loved The Craven Sluck as soon as Floraine Connors jiggled her ample and aging bosom for the camera, and the film vaulted instantly into my mental list of favorites the moment Bob Cowan’s wig fell off.
Sticking with Claire Denis’ L’Intrus despite being dead tired and not having any clue what was going on in the film. I knew I was watching something great and I didn’t want to disappoint myself by failing as a viewer.
The Mad Miss Manton broadcast on Turner Classic Movies. I caught an airing of this heretofore unknown to me screwball comedy almost by accident this past spring. It reconfirmed for me my belief that there are dozens (if not hundreds or thousands) of forgotten films that are worth rediscovering.
Charles Coburn’s pants flying out the window in The More the Merrier. This moment had the perfect mixture of absurdity, comic timing, physical humor, and pure acting skill to make me nearly fall on the floor with laughter.
Second Run’s DVD release of Portrait of Jason. Shirley Clarke films seem like the kind of thing that no one would be interested in releasing on DVD even if you gave them a million dollars to do it. Nobody – but nobody – seems to care about American independent film of the late-1960s unless it has the name Cassavetes on it somewhere. Second Run released the film on DVD and – to no surprise of anyone who owns any of their other releases – did it exceptionally well.
Tropical Malady. Nine months after watching it, I’m still unable to shake it.
The release of Twentieth Century on DVD. I even started an online petition to further the possibility of this release, and I’m not an online-petition-starting kind of guy. The year has been good for DVDs of screwball comedies directed by Howard Hawks, but we’re still missing Ball of Fire.