6B - The MIc n Daily- Weekehdi, e agdZilTe ;T uTrsday, taM 18, 1999 Film reviewers pick their 19l98 favorites *The Mihigan Daily-I \ekend, etC. Magj Payback notion can help to sway some Acac Matthew Barrett 1. Rushmore 2. Saving Private Ryan 3. Happiness 4. Out of Sight 5. Shakespeare in Love 6. A Simple Plan 7. The Truman Show 8. The Spanish Prisoner 9. He Got Game 10. The Thin Red Line Soderbergh returned to form, Solondz scored the controversy and Spielberg will likely win the Oscar, but the real jewel of 1998 is "Rushmore." Original .and refreshing, this story of an endear- ing teen, a depressed tycoon and their battle over a first grade teacher appeals to audiences of all ages, and should for generations to come. Plus, it has Mr Littlejeans. Bryan Lark 1. Out of Sight 2. Saving Private Ryan 3. Happiness 4. Shakespeare in Love 5. Rushmore 6. Gods and Monsters 7. A Simple Plan 8. Life is Beautiful 9. The Truman Show 10. There's Something About Mary Just like the uncut diamonds that drive the plot of Steven Soderbergh's "Out of Sight;" the film itself might look like a plain old rock -ifa rock with an Elmore Leonard pedigree. But beneath its exteri- or lies a cinematic gem that finds its foun- dation in lust and builds upon it with sus- pense, wit, technical trickery and real res- onance. Sodeibergh deserves more than just his status as the other Steven. KristinLong 1. Shakespeare in Love 2. Rushmore 3. Out of Sight 4. The Spanish Prisoner 5. Life is Beautiful 6. The Opposite of Sex 7. Gods and Monsters 8. A Simple Plan 9. Saving Private Ryan 10. The Truman Show "Shakespeare in Love" is a completely ingenious story that captures creative film making and storytelling at its finest. It touches on the humorous and the sensitive, while, at the same time, it stimulates thoughts abput Shakespeare's true inspiration. "Shakespeare in Love" is a film that longs to be loved and ought to be loved as the year's best. Erin Podolsky 1. Out of Sight 2. Happiness 3. The Truman Show 4. Rushmore 5. Shakespeare in Love 6. Saving Private Ryan 7. The General 8. There' Something About Mary 9. The Big Lebowski 10. The Thin Red Line POLITICS Continued from Page 28 unseen "Save the Tiger," a win that can only be explained as recompense for his "Some Like It Hot;' "The Apartment;" and "Days of Wine and Roses" losses. But the payback rule isn't foolproof, as evidenced by first-time nominee Lauren Bacall's shocking loss in 1996's support- ing actress race to written-off underdog Juliette Binoche in "The English Patient" This illustrates the second-most impor- tant rule of Oscar politics: Don't attempt to forecast the supporting actress category. This is the left field of the baseball dia- mond that is the Academy Awards, as most often the Academy chooses, without warning, to honor ingenues and wacky comediennes over respected character actresses - Marisa Tomei over Joan Plowright and Judy Davis in 1992 and Mira Sorvino over Joan Allen and Kathleen Quinlan in 1995, just to name a few recent examples. Though comedy is often king - or queen - in the supporting actress catego- ry, the Academy rarely sees anything funny about giving awards to comedies. Of the Academy Awards' 70 Best Picture winners thus far, only about 10 are comedies, from 1932's sweeper "It Happened One Night," to the sad-funny weepers "Terms of Endearment" "Driving Miss Daisy," and "Forrest Gump" The last all-out comedy to triumph was Woody Allen's 1977 "Annie Hall," which stands as an exception to two other Oscar rules: First, that length does matter and second, that Oscar is stuck on the past. "Annie Hall" breaks the former rule by running less than 100 minutes, one of only two Best Pictures (the other being "Driving Miss Daisy") to do so - the average Best Picture running time, according to Oscar scholar John Harkness, is 156 minutes. "Hall" breaks the latter rule not because of its running time but because of its place in time - Oscar usually honors history when it comes to Best Picture. Eight films have won Best Picture so far this decade and only one, "The Silence of the Lambs," was set entirely in a time contemporary to its release. With "Annie Hall," "Rocky," "The French Connection;""One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest," and "Kramer vs. Kramer," the '70s were much more pre- sent-oriented. With five of five Best Picture hopefuls set before Armistice Day - some mere days prior, some entire centuries - this year looks to be less so. But in any year Oscar's political agenda extends into the Best Director category. The Academy looks first to the Director's Guild of America when bestowing highest honor upon a director. The number of times a director t home DGA honors, announced pric the Oscar ceremony, and fails to win Oscar can be counted on one hand. According to this Oscar policy, year a certain Steven Spielberg, hon by the DGA for "Saving Private Ry will storm the podium again. In fact, Spielberg seems to have r tered the game of Oscar politics, spe cally in 1993 when he was despera courtesy of Universal Pictures George Clooney and Jennifer Lopez get very close and friendly in Steven Soderbergh's "Out of Sight," one of the year's best films. I Aaron Rich 1. The Thin Red Line 2. The Celebration 3. A Simple Plan 4. The Butcher Boy 5. Saving Private Ryan, 6. Happiness 7. The General 8. Buffalo '66 9. Affliction 10. He Got Game Terrence Malick revolutionizes movie making in "The Thin Red Line" by adding true beauty - in all aspects of his film - to poetic cinema. Malick's vision of the world is crisp and emo- tional, highly sensual and his ideas transcend every-day narrative scenar- ios. "The Thin Red Line" ranks highly in a small class of the best films ever made. Ed SholiUnsky, 1. Saving Private Ryan 2. Out of Sights 3. Zero Effect 4 The Big Lebowski 5. Life is Beautiful 6. The Truman Show 7. Central Station 8. A Simple Plan 9. The Thin Red Line 10. Rushmore Though much attention has been paid to the battle sequences in "Saving Private Ryan;"the film's real action comes in the film that lies between them. It's the raw humanity and emotion that Steven Spielberg brings to the work that makes it a masterpiece, differentiating it from the classic war films it honors. Excepting the present day sequences, this is a true cinematic treasure. Cough. twi Do you have a BACHELOR'S DEGREE? We need you! Measurement Incorporated is an educational testing company that hires hundreds of people each yearlto hand-score tests. 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