1999 Mochrie Award winners!

1999 was perhaps the best year in film, EVER (in close competition with 1939). Four of my top ten favorite movies were released in 1999. Picking the best films of the year was as difficult as it was enjoyable. What's unfair, here, is that in many cases, the #2 and #3 choices in several categories were better than the #1 choices for those categories in most other years.

Best Film American Beauty, Being John Malkovich, Fight Club, The Insider, The Sixth Sense, The Matrix Winner: American Beauty American Beauty is not the most original nor the most stunning film of the year, but it is host to the strongest screenplay of the year, perhaps of all time, and solid acting and directing. American Beauty is one of the best films ever made.

Best Screenplay American Beauty, Being John Malkovich, Election, Fight Club, The Insider, The Sixth Sense, The Talented Mr. Ripley Winner: American Beauty What a wonderful year for screenwriting! Four of the nominees are worthy of winning the best screenplay award, but American Beauty takes the prize. It is perhaps the best screenplay ever written.

Best Director Anthony Minghella (The Talented Mr. Ripley), Brad Bird (The Iron Giant), M Night Shyamalan (The Sixth Sense), Michael Mann (The Insider), Sam Mendes (American Beauty), Spike Jonze (Being John Malkovich), Steven Soderbergh (The Limey) Winner: Michael Mann (The Insider) The Insider is the most powerful film of the year. It's screenplay and acting are wonderful, but its direction is was allows it to overpower its competition.

Best Actor Edward Norton (Fight Club), Kevin Spacey (American Beauty), Michael Caine (The Cider House Rules), Michael Clarke Duncan (The Green Mile), Philip Seymour Hoffman (Magnolia, The Talented Mr. Ripley), Russel Crowe (The Insider), Haley Joel Osment (The Sixth Sense) Winner: Kevin Spacey (American Beauty) Kevin Spacey is believable, funny, intense, pathetic, and powerful in American Beauty. In a career of incredible roles, it is his best.

Best Actress Heather Donahue (The Blair Witch Project), Hilary Swank (Boy's Don't Cry), Nicole Kidman (Eyes Wide Shut), Toni Collette (The Sixth Sense) Winner: Hilary Swank (Boy's Don't Cry) No contest. Hilary Swank got the role of a lifetime and hit it out of the park.

Best Visual Appeal Run Lola Run, Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace, The Talented Mr. Ripley, The Matrix, Toy Story 2 Winner: The Matrix The Matrix is absolutely stunning. It pushed the boudnaries of special effects. Instead of just adding more polygons and shadows and particles and textures, The Matrix introduced a whole new technology to the game: Bullet Time. And the rest of the effects work doesn't slouch, either.

Best Score/Soundtrack American Beauty, Being John Malkovich, Bicentennial Man, Eyes Wide Shut, Fight Club, South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut Winner: South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut People may be able to dismiss South Park for its cheap animation and potty humor, but this is the best musical of the 90s.

Worst Quality to Box Office Ratio Big Daddy, Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace, Wild Wild West Winner: Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace No contest here. Phantom Menace is a terrible film, but made it to $430 million solely on two decades of hype and rabid fanboys. Phantom Menace is an inexcusable failure of a followup to a classic trilogy.

Most Important Film American Beauty, Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace, The Matrix, The Sixth Sense Winner: The Matrix The Matrix and its fresh approach to visual and special effects is the most important film of the year. Now we see its bullet-time in TV ads for soap and nachos. And the Matrix has already inspired more fan-made short films than Star Wars

Best Scene Dinner Argument (American Beauty), Frogs Fall (Magnolia), Helicopter Rescue (The Matrix), Hit Me (Fight Club), Opening Chase (The Matrix), Unmasked (Eyes Wide Shut), Stunning Revelation (The Sixth Sense) Winner: Stunning Revelation (Sixth Sense) The Sixth Sense has one of the most well-conceived reversals ever put on film. Shocking.

The most nominated films of 1999 were:

American Beauty - 7
Sixth Sense - 7
Fight Club - 5
The Matrix - 5
Being John Malkovich - 4
The Insider - 4
The Talented Mr. Ripley - 4
Eyes Wide Shut - 3

American Beauty won 3 times. The Matrix won twice. The Sixth Sense, with 7 nominations, won only once. Special note goes to Office Space, one of the most enjoyable films of this exceptional year that wasn't good enough in any any particular category to be nominated!