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Quiz about Gatsbys Almost Best Movies of ALL Time
Quiz about Gatsbys Almost Best Movies of ALL Time

Gatsby's 'Almost Best' Movies of ALL Time Quiz


A while ago I chose my personal favorite films of all time (by decade). So many films came to mind as I went and they all deserved a mention, I thought. So here are some of those "almost bests" I admire so well. Have fun!

A multiple-choice quiz by Gatsby722. Estimated time: 12 mins.
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Author
Gatsby722
Time
12 mins
Type
Multiple Choice
Quiz #
249,265
Updated
Dec 03 21
# Qns
10
Difficulty
Tough
Avg Score
6 / 10
Plays
849
Question 1 of 10
1. 1920s: While the introduction of sound was finding its way into films, I've always had a passion for the 'silents'. My choice for a second best movie of these early days was a silent film released in 1927 and was non-American in its genesis to cinema. The project was intensely long, artistically sharpened in both technology and ambition AND was intended to be the first in a series of six films as it planned to unfold its large tale. The sequels never happened but this one is ours for history, especially in a restored version that was re-released in 2000, with a breathtaking orchestral score that deserved renewed attention. Which movie is the first on my 'almost' list? Hint


Question 2 of 10
2. 1930s: Rare is the movie fan who looks on any other decade as more influential in cinema history than this one was. Things were changing (sound, color, outrageous glamor/size of fantasies in general) on screen as life in the "real" streets of the world was rife with troubles in many directions. To me, the 1930s were captured well by the epitome of cinematic grace, class, romance and a dance that never needed to end. Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers did what the public only wished they could do and the classic pair did it with more style than any camera could have hoped to capture better. In this feast to the eyes, they played Jerry Travers (a hoofer in need of a show) who was trying to impress a certain socialite named Dale Tremont. Did he get his girl? You bet - and the film even picked up a nomination for Oscar gold as Best Picture, too! Which of these dance-filled classics am I liking a great deal right now? Hint


Question 3 of 10
3. 1940s: As usual, the movies reflected the times in which they were made in this rocky decade. The escapism (which is the value of the industry entirely) remained but some responsibility, call it a public service sensibility, crept in too. A war was tearing the world apart, so the movies got a bit more thoughtful about our lives as they were lived. The 1942 film I'm choosing got a little TOO serious perhaps. It remained shelved for a year with the studios fearing it was too much of a "downer" (in the middle of WWII that is saying quite a mouthful)! The novel upon which it was based, by Henry Bellamann, was a bit of a scorcher but the film was tame compared to it. By today's standards the movie was just a vintage look at five childhood friends who grew up in a small town. Their idyllic youth was interrupted by secrets and tragedy in adulthood. The plot thickened, backed by a widely respected soundtrack, at every turn. The cast was splendid, notably a young fellow who didn't have the lead role in it but certainly came to change the world in his own way, some decades after his work here. Which not-so-shocking movie am I sharing this time? Hint


Question 4 of 10
4. 1950s: I, personally, love the films of this decade more than any other. The screen was full of characters - rich in flaws, passion, challenges and fireworks. If an actor got a good part at all, it seemed even better in the climate of the way movies were made in the 1950s. The film I'm choosing this time is, without a doubt, a film that loved the art of film itself. It paid honor to all things that Hollywood had given us so ably in the past and assured that we'd get countless years more to come. Imagine it, a movie about fading goddesses of the silver screen, beauty once bold but now slipping away. Add a charming rascal of a love interest (who wasn't homely by a mile, of course) - a man with a heart so visible but a soul so convoluted. Throw in a decaying mansion, a mostly irritated (and frightening) manservant, a trusting young girl, Cecil B. DeMille, a bold-faced gigolo and, finally, a late-night swim in a less-than-inviting California swimming pool. This story has a whole new generation of fans too, what with a Broadway musical recently made of it. What unforgettable 1950 film was this one? Hint


Question 5 of 10
5. 1960s: My next pick was a 1963 film which involved a few things that make a movie unforgettable to me, every time they happen singularly and even more when they happen simultaneously. First, I can't get enough of an actress doing such a fine job in a role that she is burned into my memory forever. The character of Alma, in this gritty character study, surely managed that. I also am a HUGE fan of author Larry McMurtry and he wrote the novel this movie was based on. Then there was Texas and cowboys, which were both an arena of wild adventures in this young viewer's midwestern-born head at the time I first saw it. In this film it was mostly the acting that raised it to heights that it might not have reached in lesser hands. It didn't hurt watching Paul Newman doing an incredible job playing the most charismatic snake this side of the Pacific Ocean, either. Which film was this one?

Answer: (One Word)
Question 6 of 10
6. 1970s: Filming a biography can be tricky. Even if the liberties taken or name changes make for a compelling tale, there's always the nay-sayers who find such poetic licenses unnecessary or even disrespectful. Such was the case for this 1974 masterpiece. To many, the venues it explored were unpleasant, the character(s) mostly obsessed in one way or another, and the legitimacy of the whole project was either mostly tainted or corrupted entirely. I found this film brilliant. I found the acting outstanding and I found the characters in it complicated enough to be bitterly interesting yet enjoyable enough to root for. One of these films was directed by Bob Fosse (and starred a thespian who would later win an Oscar for Best Lead Actor, less than a decade after this film was released). That film is the one I'm calling an "almost best" here. How far an artiste would go to explore his or her craft was the pervasive question this movie asked. The answer, by the look of it...as far as it took. Which film am I proud to appreciate this time? Hint


Question 7 of 10
7. 1980s: My selection for this decade should not be a surprise to anyone. "Raging Bull" (1980) was everything a "best" film experience should be. It was visually stunning, offering in slow motion the vomit-worthy violence of a boxing match as if it were ballet. Jake LaMotta, aside from being a real Middleweight champion in the 1940s and 1950s, was also a choice character to portray. He was ambitious, paranoid, corrupt and unable to emotionally connect purposefully with anyone. All of the elements of a phenomenally complex movie were there and director Martin Scorcese pulled all of it together, presenting what is now considered one of the finest films ever made. Critic Roger Ebert called the movie an "Othello" for our times ~ in Shakespeare's play, though, there was a fleshed-out traitor named Iago but in LaMotta's life he only thought he was surrounded by Iagos. The film gave us two characters who were the targets of Jake's suspicions - his brother/manager and his second wife. What were the REAL names of the characters of the brother and Jake's beleaguered wife in the rock-solid classic "Raging Bull"? Hint


Question 8 of 10
8. 1990s: This film, another ALL-time favorite, is not everyone's cup of tea. It looked far more at the thorns than it did the rose and it (sort of) had an unhappy ending, which was seen at the beginning! Clearly, the crises one experiences at the approach to middle-age are not new in films, or literature, or anywhere else. However, entering that plateau in life -erm- dead is a definite twist of things. A man with the beautiful job, life and home decided he'd much rather work at a burger joint, lust after a mere teenager and smoke marijuana behind the high school? His neighbor was another perfect picture of patriotism and rightness (until we found out that he's an obsessed, abusive and fatally repressed beast). The lovely young daughter liked to expose her breasts to a neighbor who photographs litter. The wife/mother was carrying on shamelessly with an associate named "King" - somewhat appropriate in this 'look-but-don't-see' neighborhood of life-sized chess playing. Everything in this film stood for something else and each something else was something with which we were all familiar. Lester was 'Everyman', just hoping to remind us that we all know that time goes by very very fast. He's up there to say that it's best to realize it before it runs out, that's all. Which dizzyingly crafty film am I admiring from 1999?

Answer: (Two Words)
Question 9 of 10
9. 2000s: The decade is unfinished as I write this. What to expect? The technology is still evolving, and the boundaries are almost limitless. My choice is a 2002 film that I hope indicates what the future of the movies has in store for us. Wladyslaw (based on a real fellow) was the main character in this gripping memoir. He was a musician in Warsaw circa 1939, when the Invasion of Poland occurred. At first he was not terribly daunted, as he hoped and assumed that this skirmish would end as suddenly as it began. The opposite happened, in more ways than this instinctively gentle soul of a man could fathom - but he survived it. By luck, by almost magical interventions, even by a chronic disbelief that this all could actually be real he put one day behind the last one, and watched the world disintegrate into this horrific thing that used to deserve his spirited accompaniments. As it went, there seemed no longer any rhythms in it at all. Did the music that he carried within save him in the end? All I will suggest is that you will never listen to Chopin the same way again after watching this fine film. What movie is it?

Answer: (Two Words (first word "The"))
Question 10 of 10
10. Most of my choices here seem strangely mainstream to me, not so unlike the films many movie-goers might choose. When it comes to picking my personal favorites (film history aside), though, I have to reach a little farther outside of the box. I suspect this film would qualify. It is, however (and only in my opinion), one of the Top 5 films I have ever had the pleasure to watch. While not a 'Hollywood' backed film (which, really, might have been in its favor from the start) it told a simple story and was rich with "ordinary" characters. There was a successful young woman, named Hortense, who discovered that she had a heretofore unknown of birth mother, named Cynthia Rose. As the two met, the revelations, discoveries and moments that were so startling and right unfolded. That was (with intense interactions and performances of the highest calibre) the entire crux of this splendid exploration of the ungenerous nows, the mostly dubious thens and the entirely vague what nexts of a group of mostly average-yet-special and inventively fleshed out people in England. Which 1996 film do I think was almost the best of the rest? Hint



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Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts
1. 1920s: While the introduction of sound was finding its way into films, I've always had a passion for the 'silents'. My choice for a second best movie of these early days was a silent film released in 1927 and was non-American in its genesis to cinema. The project was intensely long, artistically sharpened in both technology and ambition AND was intended to be the first in a series of six films as it planned to unfold its large tale. The sequels never happened but this one is ours for history, especially in a restored version that was re-released in 2000, with a breathtaking orchestral score that deserved renewed attention. Which movie is the first on my 'almost' list?

Answer: "Napoléon" (directed by Abel Grance, French)

Napoléon Bonaparte could have easily filled six films worth with his story but this film tells of his youth, his military career as it built and ends with his triumphant invasion of Italy in 1797. Problems arose with both expense and length (the original version of this film, which debuted at the Paris Opera, was well over five hours long and the cost to make it was staggering).

By the time it reached the American shores it had been edited down to a mere piece of what it was and the audience stayed away in droves.

When it was restored and returned to theaters intact, some 70 years later, it was mostly true to the original version. Most footage had been found and used and much attention was given to its grandeur and the stirring score that Carmine Coppola had written for it.

The last time it was seen publicly, though, was in 2000 whereupon legal squabbles broke out as to who owned the rights to it. The movie starred Albert Dieudonné as Napoléon and Gina Manès as Josèphine (and a cast of thousands).

It was a fine, fine piece of art and worth every moment spent watching, rest assured.
2. 1930s: Rare is the movie fan who looks on any other decade as more influential in cinema history than this one was. Things were changing (sound, color, outrageous glamor/size of fantasies in general) on screen as life in the "real" streets of the world was rife with troubles in many directions. To me, the 1930s were captured well by the epitome of cinematic grace, class, romance and a dance that never needed to end. Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers did what the public only wished they could do and the classic pair did it with more style than any camera could have hoped to capture better. In this feast to the eyes, they played Jerry Travers (a hoofer in need of a show) who was trying to impress a certain socialite named Dale Tremont. Did he get his girl? You bet - and the film even picked up a nomination for Oscar gold as Best Picture, too! Which of these dance-filled classics am I liking a great deal right now?

Answer: Top Hat

"Top Hat" (1935) was, hands down, the most successful of all the Astaire/Rogers films (and the second most successful in Fred's entire career, with "Easter Parade" topping it - but Rogers wasn't in that one). It's a beautifully put together picture but not in such a way as to complicate the pleasure of just watching it. One could leave the drama and the challenges at the door! Irving Berlin once again delivered some timeless tunes, notably "Cheek to Cheek" and "Top Hat, White Tie and Tails". I expect you might ask why this deserves a highlight, out of all the movies in a landmark decade? Because it's silly, romantic, escapist and just plain entertaining.

It served a mighty purpose being those things then and, in my opinion, continues to offer us the same service today.
3. 1940s: As usual, the movies reflected the times in which they were made in this rocky decade. The escapism (which is the value of the industry entirely) remained but some responsibility, call it a public service sensibility, crept in too. A war was tearing the world apart, so the movies got a bit more thoughtful about our lives as they were lived. The 1942 film I'm choosing got a little TOO serious perhaps. It remained shelved for a year with the studios fearing it was too much of a "downer" (in the middle of WWII that is saying quite a mouthful)! The novel upon which it was based, by Henry Bellamann, was a bit of a scorcher but the film was tame compared to it. By today's standards the movie was just a vintage look at five childhood friends who grew up in a small town. Their idyllic youth was interrupted by secrets and tragedy in adulthood. The plot thickened, backed by a widely respected soundtrack, at every turn. The cast was splendid, notably a young fellow who didn't have the lead role in it but certainly came to change the world in his own way, some decades after his work here. Which not-so-shocking movie am I sharing this time?

Answer: Kings Row

I'm always startled at how many of my peers (most who love the cinema as much as I) have not seen "Kings Row". I always recommend it. It's a fine piece - a story of love lost, crippling injuries, scandals brewing, success over adversity, on and on. The acting and the music made it stand up, though, led by the reliable Ann Sheridan and Robert Cummings. Those two showed firmly that they were talents to be dealt with, despite the fact that neither ever found the A-list stardom they deserved.

Then there was that other guy...the young man who played Drake McHugh. All agree this was Ronald Reagan's finest acting job caught on film and, upon losing both legs in this story, his waking up and exclaiming "Where's the rest of me?" is legendary.

The novel, by the way, dealt with both incest and homosexuality and those were found especially unsuitable for Hollywood back then.

At the hands of director Sam Wood, though, there was never a hint of anything very controversial in this fine example of low-key storytelling.
4. 1950s: I, personally, love the films of this decade more than any other. The screen was full of characters - rich in flaws, passion, challenges and fireworks. If an actor got a good part at all, it seemed even better in the climate of the way movies were made in the 1950s. The film I'm choosing this time is, without a doubt, a film that loved the art of film itself. It paid honor to all things that Hollywood had given us so ably in the past and assured that we'd get countless years more to come. Imagine it, a movie about fading goddesses of the silver screen, beauty once bold but now slipping away. Add a charming rascal of a love interest (who wasn't homely by a mile, of course) - a man with a heart so visible but a soul so convoluted. Throw in a decaying mansion, a mostly irritated (and frightening) manservant, a trusting young girl, Cecil B. DeMille, a bold-faced gigolo and, finally, a late-night swim in a less-than-inviting California swimming pool. This story has a whole new generation of fans too, what with a Broadway musical recently made of it. What unforgettable 1950 film was this one?

Answer: Sunset Boulevard

When I first saw "Sunset Boulevard" I was very excited and, as it played, thought: "This is a classic? It's like a live-action and silly cartoon!" Then I watched again, and again. It didn't take long before I 'got it'. This movie (and Gloria Swanson in it) had guts that wouldn't quit! Comedies that make fun of Hollywood are one thing but this film was deadly serious. Norma Desmond WAS the vintage Hollywood system grown old and mostly gone to Hell.

She'd do anything to hold on to her beauty, popularity and her manic need to be "loved". Along came Joe (William Holden) and he represented the new Hollywood, the next phase, the cynical but promising future. Norma would do anything to have him (and did), too, just like she would have done anything to remain a star, even though that was already just a memory to everyone that mattered. Swanson deserved more credit than can be given for doing this part at all and for doing it so well.

She was a garish image of a silent screen vamp, who seemed to have only just learned to speak.

Her eyes, old as they had become, did all the work but her words were as if written so she'd never gotten used to using them. Billy Wilder directed with an iron fist and capably showcased his love for (and distaste regarding) the industry of film in this classic piece of sadness, madness, gladness and dreams sewn into one most unsettling package. It was priceless stuff!
5. 1960s: My next pick was a 1963 film which involved a few things that make a movie unforgettable to me, every time they happen singularly and even more when they happen simultaneously. First, I can't get enough of an actress doing such a fine job in a role that she is burned into my memory forever. The character of Alma, in this gritty character study, surely managed that. I also am a HUGE fan of author Larry McMurtry and he wrote the novel this movie was based on. Then there was Texas and cowboys, which were both an arena of wild adventures in this young viewer's midwestern-born head at the time I first saw it. In this film it was mostly the acting that raised it to heights that it might not have reached in lesser hands. It didn't hurt watching Paul Newman doing an incredible job playing the most charismatic snake this side of the Pacific Ocean, either. Which film was this one?

Answer: Hud

While her screen time was notably short, Miss Patricia Neal walked off with this film (and got an Oscar, too). She played the hard-as-nails, yet soft-as-cotton housekeeper who had the great misfortune of being both attracted to and repulsed by Hud. Nothing good came of that, but the performance Neal offered was heart-wrenching and never seemed to ring anything but sadly true.

The story itself was no more than a family feud with sick cows and conflicting ideals in the mix. Hud wanted to get rich, whatever it took, while his father (played superbly by Melvyn Douglas) expected to see the end of his life with ethics and compassion intact.

The moral of the story was not unexplored long before "Hud" did it, but it made one thing intensely clear in modern terms: Be careful what you ask for because you just might get it...and when you do it might not be what you hoped for at all.
6. 1970s: Filming a biography can be tricky. Even if the liberties taken or name changes make for a compelling tale, there's always the nay-sayers who find such poetic licenses unnecessary or even disrespectful. Such was the case for this 1974 masterpiece. To many, the venues it explored were unpleasant, the character(s) mostly obsessed in one way or another, and the legitimacy of the whole project was either mostly tainted or corrupted entirely. I found this film brilliant. I found the acting outstanding and I found the characters in it complicated enough to be bitterly interesting yet enjoyable enough to root for. One of these films was directed by Bob Fosse (and starred a thespian who would later win an Oscar for Best Lead Actor, less than a decade after this film was released). That film is the one I'm calling an "almost best" here. How far an artiste would go to explore his or her craft was the pervasive question this movie asked. The answer, by the look of it...as far as it took. Which film am I proud to appreciate this time?

Answer: Lenny

Let's take a quick look at the wrong answers first. "The Last Waltz" was a documentary about the rock group 'The Band' in 1978. "Nashville" (1975) wasn't really a biopic - even though many of the characters in it were loosely based on real country/western singers. "All That Jazz", also directed by Fosse in 1979, was not really biographical, either, but was certainly Bob Fosse's vision of his own life (and star Roy Scheider never won an Oscar in the 1980s). Lenny Bruce (1925-1966) was the sort of character Bob Fosse found greatly satisfying to probe and also the sort of part young Dustin Hoffman savored decades ago. Bruce was a stand-up comedian and a good one, but he was also one of the most controversial comics of the era.

His arrests for obscenity in his material were numbered and his off-stage life was tumultuous at best (he died of a drug overdose at just 40 years of age). Aside from Hoffman, young Valerie Perrine shone like lightning in this film, playing Lenny's equally troubled wife. Why was it a great film? In my opinion it was one because it gave a great showman/director a chance to stretch.

It also showcased a young comic who influenced several generations of those who followed him (despite the problems that finally killed him). It also offered a great modern actor a fine chance to prove further just how large his talent was and, most of all, it made a great film out of a very grayly-depicted life. It was a dazzling "little" film that is hard to forget, no matter that it was not a box office rocket at the time of its release. It is a definite must-see!
7. 1980s: My selection for this decade should not be a surprise to anyone. "Raging Bull" (1980) was everything a "best" film experience should be. It was visually stunning, offering in slow motion the vomit-worthy violence of a boxing match as if it were ballet. Jake LaMotta, aside from being a real Middleweight champion in the 1940s and 1950s, was also a choice character to portray. He was ambitious, paranoid, corrupt and unable to emotionally connect purposefully with anyone. All of the elements of a phenomenally complex movie were there and director Martin Scorcese pulled all of it together, presenting what is now considered one of the finest films ever made. Critic Roger Ebert called the movie an "Othello" for our times ~ in Shakespeare's play, though, there was a fleshed-out traitor named Iago but in LaMotta's life he only thought he was surrounded by Iagos. The film gave us two characters who were the targets of Jake's suspicions - his brother/manager and his second wife. What were the REAL names of the characters of the brother and Jake's beleaguered wife in the rock-solid classic "Raging Bull"?

Answer: Giuseppe "Joey" La Motta and Beverly Thailer LaMotta

That was tricky, I suppose. LaMotta himself was born Giacobbe La Motta (which, when shortened, makes sense). The film referred to his brother entirely as 'Joey' and Jake's second wife was known in the film and in life as 'Vicki', but her name at birth was Beverly. Joey (played well by then newcomer Joe Pesci) and his sibling were on and off in terms of closeness from beginning to end - he was too often no more than LaMotta's patsy and was blamed for everything that went wrong. Jake and Vicki (young actress Cathy Moriarty) eventually divorced, after having three children together, and a quarter century before her death at age 75 she posed for 'Playboy' magazine (although I'm sure it wasn't one of their more popular layouts).

The movie pulled no 'punches' in showing the boxers' life...exploring Jake LaMotta's was just especially colorful.

It is no mystery that Robert DeNiro exacted many physical changes upon himself to play him. He went from a physically agile young athlete to a middle-aged bloated - almost elephantine - drunken has-been without the use of padding or special effects. DeNiro's work here was powerful for sure.

He took his character from one brutally gut wrenching situation to the next. Whether it was in the ring or in the courtroom, defending himself against accusations of mob ties, or when he was a pathetic overweight (and NOT funny) stand-up comedian the audience felt like they knew this man. DeNiro makes NOT paying attention entirely impossible. LaMotta was born in 1921 and as of early 2007 is still alive. To his credit, the likely most remembered thing about his life, as time passes, is that he was the subject of film history in "Raging Bull". For a man such as he was, that's much more than he should have realistically expected or deserved.
8. 1990s: This film, another ALL-time favorite, is not everyone's cup of tea. It looked far more at the thorns than it did the rose and it (sort of) had an unhappy ending, which was seen at the beginning! Clearly, the crises one experiences at the approach to middle-age are not new in films, or literature, or anywhere else. However, entering that plateau in life -erm- dead is a definite twist of things. A man with the beautiful job, life and home decided he'd much rather work at a burger joint, lust after a mere teenager and smoke marijuana behind the high school? His neighbor was another perfect picture of patriotism and rightness (until we found out that he's an obsessed, abusive and fatally repressed beast). The lovely young daughter liked to expose her breasts to a neighbor who photographs litter. The wife/mother was carrying on shamelessly with an associate named "King" - somewhat appropriate in this 'look-but-don't-see' neighborhood of life-sized chess playing. Everything in this film stood for something else and each something else was something with which we were all familiar. Lester was 'Everyman', just hoping to remind us that we all know that time goes by very very fast. He's up there to say that it's best to realize it before it runs out, that's all. Which dizzyingly crafty film am I admiring from 1999?

Answer: American Beauty

Kevin Spacey is, in my estimation, the finest actor of his generation and this is one of his finest showings as an actor. Lester Burnham was a puzzle (so is Spacey, for the most part) and it seemed a role tailor-made for him - even though Tom Selleck [no kidding!] and Jim Carrey were considered for the part first.

In the film itself the characters seemed to bump into each other like panicked rabbits, each in search of some way out of something inescapable. Maturity/aging and the super-charged superficiality of society were the biggest targets. Lester, though, was really not so afraid of growing older as much as he seemed to be afraid of growing anonymous as he grew older.

He just tired of the images as they were presented and got duly carried away with how living those pretty pictures felt.

The moral of the story was not new. He wanted to go back and start over and, until it bit him square in the rear, thought he could! Sam Mendes directed this whirlwind of words and symbols and horn-blowing frustration with a mighty skill.

The movie, Mendes, Spacey and the screenplay all were deserved Oscar winners.
9. 2000s: The decade is unfinished as I write this. What to expect? The technology is still evolving, and the boundaries are almost limitless. My choice is a 2002 film that I hope indicates what the future of the movies has in store for us. Wladyslaw (based on a real fellow) was the main character in this gripping memoir. He was a musician in Warsaw circa 1939, when the Invasion of Poland occurred. At first he was not terribly daunted, as he hoped and assumed that this skirmish would end as suddenly as it began. The opposite happened, in more ways than this instinctively gentle soul of a man could fathom - but he survived it. By luck, by almost magical interventions, even by a chronic disbelief that this all could actually be real he put one day behind the last one, and watched the world disintegrate into this horrific thing that used to deserve his spirited accompaniments. As it went, there seemed no longer any rhythms in it at all. Did the music that he carried within save him in the end? All I will suggest is that you will never listen to Chopin the same way again after watching this fine film. What movie is it?

Answer: The Pianist

Adrien Brody probably got more mileage, strangely enough, for that massive smooch he laid onto Halle Berry when he won his Oscar for "The Pianist" than he might have for the truly fine work he did in the movie. We can chalk much of that up to shock, too, since he really wasn't expected to win and Daniel Day-Lewis was. Brody, another mostly unknown actor at the time this movie found us, did a meticulous job in this film.

He captured the gentleness of Wladyslaw Szpilman, the resilience of him, the vulnerability of him and finally the ultimate honesty in him.

The man was no hero. He was lucky above all - and came to learn much from his plight. Yes, he was nearly shot, almost starved to death, narrowly escaped being sent to Treblinka where he'd have been gassed but, at the end of it, he was saved by his enemy? A German who loved the piano and who remembered this Jewish man's skill at the instrument; a man who finally gave the pianist his coat before the German himself was to be arrested. When Brody wore it, it showed on his face that the coats were what people saw but it was the man under them that mattered, Jewish or German notwithstanding.

It was a powerful exploration of a terrible time and Roman Polanski directed it with a keen eye (and a personal interest as he was a victim of those times in his own childhood).
10. Most of my choices here seem strangely mainstream to me, not so unlike the films many movie-goers might choose. When it comes to picking my personal favorites (film history aside), though, I have to reach a little farther outside of the box. I suspect this film would qualify. It is, however (and only in my opinion), one of the Top 5 films I have ever had the pleasure to watch. While not a 'Hollywood' backed film (which, really, might have been in its favor from the start) it told a simple story and was rich with "ordinary" characters. There was a successful young woman, named Hortense, who discovered that she had a heretofore unknown of birth mother, named Cynthia Rose. As the two met, the revelations, discoveries and moments that were so startling and right unfolded. That was (with intense interactions and performances of the highest calibre) the entire crux of this splendid exploration of the ungenerous nows, the mostly dubious thens and the entirely vague what nexts of a group of mostly average-yet-special and inventively fleshed out people in England. Which 1996 film do I think was almost the best of the rest?

Answer: Secrets and Lies

I know, I know. This would hardly rank as a "Best Film of All Time" to anyone else, but it does to me. The director, Mike Leigh, is the first compelling reason I choose it. The film was mostly unscripted. He relied on his instincts to find the right actors for the right parts, cast them, told them the outline of the story as he saw it and allowed them to improvise the rest (with only his intermittent guidance as a boundary).

It worked fabulously. For example, the scene where Cynthia was to meet her long-lost daughter was shot without telling actress Brenda Blethyn anything more than that the daughter had been taken from her at birth. No one mentioned that the now-adult woman was black! The scene kept rolling, genuine shock sensibly intact, for nearly ten minutes.

It was brilliant filmmaking, proving that - even today - less can be much, much more. The other high-pitched brilliance in the movie came in the performance of Miss Blethyn. While not a well-known actress at the time of "Secrets and Lies" she brought a resounding heartbreak to her performance that was nothing short of unforgettable.

She was annoying, clingy, almost dim-witted, lost completely in the tenses of her life - yet she was the heroine here, the one we could only hope got the best that was left for her. The way she brought this film to life was, in a word or two, acting that transformed a cinema's wall into deep and involving places. I love this movie and see something new in it every time I watch. And I'll never stop watching.
Source: Author Gatsby722

This quiz was reviewed by FunTrivia editor skunkee before going online.
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