my favorite movies of 1996:

(1) Fargo

(2) The People vs. Larry Flynt

(3) Secrets & Lies

(4) Hard Eight

favorite of 1996:

Fargo

(Frances McDormand, William H. Macy, Steve Buscemi. Directed by Joel Coen.)

Ebert wrote an extraordinary review:

“Fargo” begins with an absolutely dead-on familiarity with smalltown life in the frigid winter landscape of Minnesota and North Dakota. Then it rotates its story through satire, comedy, suspense and violence, until it emerges as one of the best films I’ve ever seen. To watch it is to experience steadily mounting delight, as you realize the filmmakers have taken enormous risks, gotten away with them and made a movie that is completely original, and as familiar as an old shoe — or a rubbersoled hunting boot from Land’s End, more likely. … Films like “Fargo” are why I love the movies.

The hero of Fargo (Frances McDormand, in an Oscar-winning performance) is a pregnant woman whose interactions with her husband (John Carroll Lynch) are strikingly ordinary. He wakes up with her when she receives a call about a recent homicide, and he makes a quick breakfast for her before she leaves. While she’s solving crimes, the big news in his life has to do with … his painting of a mallard. The scenes focused on this married couple might seem dull, but there’s a reason the movie juxtaposes them with scenes of brutal violence.

Some of the criminals’ conversations also aren’t what we’d expect. In this scene, the two men in the car are on their way to kidnap a woman, planning to hold her for ransom:

Hey, look at that, Twin Cities! The IDS Building, the big glass one — tallest skyscraper in the Midwest, after the uh, Sears in Chicago, or John Hancock Building, whatever. You ever been to Minneapolis?

Nope.

Would it kill you to say something?

I did.

“No!” The first thing you’ve said in the last four hours. That’s a — that’s a fountain of conversation, man! That’s a geyser! … I’m sitting here driving, doing all the driving … just tryin’ to chat, you know, keep our spirits up, fight the boredom of the road — and you can’t say one fucking thing just in the way of conversation?

Watch someone react to seeing it for the first time in the video below:

I weirdly loved that movie. I want to watch it again right now, because I need to pick up on even more randomness. … I wonder if I can even explain. … Why is it so good? Because it’s half funny and half horrible?

Stream Fargo on Max or these sites.

2nd favorite of 1996:

The People vs. Larry Flynt

(Woody Harrelson, Courtney Love, Edward Norton. Directed by Miloš Forman.)

Miloš Forman’s speciality was making a movie that revolves around a wild man who shakes up the system, like One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest (my favorite movie of 1975). The People vs. Larry Flynt stars Woody Harrelson as Larry Flynt, who boasts: “I am the publisher of the most tasteless, sleaziest, most disgusting, greatest porn magazine on the face of the earth!”

But this movie isn’t really about pornography or sex. It’s about freedom. The person who does the most to test our beliefs about freedom might be obnoxious, but might also be a funny sort of hero.

In that clip, Flynt’s lawyer (Ed Norton) makes his closing argument:

I am not trying to suggest that you should like what Larry Flynt does. I don’t like what Larry Flynt does! But what I do like is that I live in a country where you and I can make that decision for ourselves. I like that I live in a country where I can pick up Hustler magazine and read it if I want to — or throw it in the garbage can if that’s where I think it belongs. Or better yet, I can exercise my opinion and not buy it. … Because we live in a free country. You know, we say that a lot, but I think sometimes we forget really what that means. … But there is a price for that freedom, which is that sometimes, we have to tolerate things that we don’t necessarily like. … So go back in that room, where you are free to think whatever you want to think about Larry Flynt and Hustler magazine. But then ask yourselves if you want to make that decision for the rest of us. Because the freedom that everyone in this room enjoys is in a very real way in your hands. And if we start throwing up walls against what some of us think is obscene, we may very well wake up one morning and realize that walls have been thrown up in all kinds of ways that we never expected.

By the way, the actor who plays the judge in that scene is … Larry Flynt.

Stream The People vs. Larry Flynt on these sites.

3rd favorite of 1996:

Secrets & Lies

(Brenda Blethyn, Marianne Jean-Baptiste, Timothy Spall. Directed by Mike Leigh.)

That video about this movie says:

How many films can you think of that portray day-to-day ordinary life … stories that act and feel almost like documentaries, with characters so real you’re left feeling like you just observed a two-hour family reunion, rather than witnessing a work of fiction? Whatever your answer may be, I guarantee you that few films come as close as British director Mike Leigh’s 1996 masterpiece Secrets & Lies — a film which beautifully pays tribute to the kitchen-sink genre British cinema often excels at, but one that also paints its own unique portrait of modern Britain, thanks to the beautiful souls of its class-divided characters.

The story follows Hortense, a successful, well-to-do optometrist (played by Marianne Jean-Baptiste), who decides to trace her family history after the death of her adoptive mother. Gathering the documents she needs, Hortense tracks down her birth mother, Cynthia (played by Brenda Blethyn), who lives a shabby, working-class life with her daughter, Roxanne [Claire Rushbrook]. …

There are two things I did to appreciate this movie more. One was to turn on English subtitles, because the British accents and occasional mumbling can be hard to understand. The other was, as I often do right after seeing a movie for the first time, to rewatch parts of it. It gains meaning that way, as in early scenes when Cynthia’s brother, Maurice (Timothy Spall), a professional photographer, takes one portrait photo after another of rather awkward subjects, gently encouraging people to smile — while assuring them that they’re “under no obligation” to do so, since “it’s a free world.” Later, at a family gathering, he breaks down and admits that he’s spent his life trying to make people happy, yet the people closest to him hate each other.

You gotta laugh, ain’t ya, sweetheart? Else you’d cry.

Stream Secrets & Lies on the Criterion Channel (with extras) or Max. If you don’t subscribe to the Criterion Channel, try a free trial.

4th favorite of 1996:

Hard Eight

(Philip Baker Hall, John C. Reilly, Gwyneth Paltrow, Samuel L. Jackson. Directed by Paul Thomas Anderson.)

This unconventional neo-noir starts when an aging, poker-faced gambler, Sydney, played by the late Philip Baker Hall (1931 - 2022), finds a homeless young man named John (John C. Reilly) and, for no apparent reason, becomes a father figure to John, helping him reinvent himself and get on a path to stability — starting with a scheme to bilk free stuff from casinos. Both men seem to be spontaneously creating a new family in this sleazy, amoral world … after their real family has gone.

Eventually, Sydney also acts as a father to Clementine (Gwyneth Paltrow). When she assumes that Sydney has brought her to a hotel room to have sex in exchange for money, Sydney makes clear that he doesn’t view her that way. In a refreshing break from movies that so often pair young, attractive women with much older, plainer men, Sydney respects that she belongs to a different generation from him, and that the last thing she needs is one more person objectifying her. Later on, we’ll have a better understanding of why the morally ambiguous Sydney is treating Clementine and John with such care, but I won’t spoil that here.

This movie can be fairly criticized for leaving out some key information; it isn’t the thing to watch if you want a perfectly satisfying story. And yet I wish there were more movies with this atmosphere. It isn’t a typical crime movie — oh, there are some violent or angry scenes, but the soul of this movie is in smaller, quieter moments. Watch Hard Eight for understated but powerful acting, and a directorial debut that hints at the greater heights Paul Thomas Anderson would reach with his next movie, Boogie Nights (my favorite of 1997).

Stream Hard Eight on Pluto (free with ads) or these sites.

Click here for the full list of my favorite movie(s) of each year from 1920 to 2020.