TO ME, YOU’RE PERFECT
Batting .1000 – Hollywood’s Winning Streaks
Article by Paul Preston
Perfection isn’t easy. In sports, it happens very rarely. The perfect game in baseball – occasionally, only twenty-three times ever. The triple crown – twelve times in history. The perfect football season – once. And the perfect NBA season and countless other perfect records – never.
To achieve perfection in the arts is nearly impossible because it’s a widely subjective form of expression. And yet, there are a few filmmakers who you could say come close to a perfect record in their field. The recent release of Finding Dory had me thinking about this. Few filmmakers have had a winning streak quite like the one Pixar had from 1995 to 2010 – Toy Story, A Bug’s Life, Toy Story 2, Monsters, Inc., Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, Cars, Ratatouille, WALL-E, Up and Toy Story 3 – 6.6 Billion dollars, stellar reviews and eleven Oscars. That streak came to a halt with the poorly reviewed Cars 2, considered to still be the weakest effort put out by the studio (for the record, Finding Dory is a fantastic edition to the Pixar catalog, which returned to form with Inside Out).
Pixar’s box office/reviews/awards trifecta hadn’t been done and may not be done again. So criteria to hold filmmakers to when determining a perfection-level of excellence has to be modified some. Many great films couldn’t find audiences or many great films somehow skirted awards recognition. There’s one filmmaker who is currently batting .1000 in my opinion (which is what it will always come down to) who is my favorite, but let me get a couple of close competitors out of the way first.
STANLEY KUBRICK – The key word above is “currently”. Kubrick’s quality streak came to an end, obviously, with his death in 1999. But until then, every Kubrick movie was of high quality, a signature vision from someone who lobbied hard for total control, and universally dubbed a classic, if not by the world (The Shining, Dr. Strangelove), by the filmmaking community (Lolita, Paths of Glory). His specificity of filmmaking made everything he made worth watching, and the dominance of his vision in every frame made an impression with everyone. Although his early films haven’t been seen by many people, they’re still well-regarded. Kubrick is one of the closest filmmakers to have skirted career perfection.
JAMES CAMERON – Avatar, Titanic, The Abyss, True Lies, Aliens, The Terminator and its sequel make up a near flawless directorial run that’s hard to match, if…that was all Cameron directed. His first film was Piranha Part Two: The Spawning, a horror sequel from the “Jaws rip-off” trend that included the deadly Amazonian fish attacking people by flying. They fly. The Piranha. They fly. His post-Titanic obsession with the deep sea led to IMAX efforts Ghosts of the Abyss and Aliens of the Deep, which still garnered excellent reviews, but couldn’t meet the box office of his traditional narrative films, thus dragging his box office average per movie DOWN to TWO-HUNDRED AND TWENTY MILLION. He’s good, but those flying fish keep him from being perfect.
CHRISTOPHER NOLAN – Never satisfied with a simple story, Nolan reflects Cameron in that his films push the boundaries of technical achievement. He always attracts top-notch actors and has managed to reach audiences even with the most challenging material like Interstellar. I find superhero movie game-changer The Dark Knight and the nothing-like-it-anywhere mind-tripper Inception to be his masterpieces. Every one of his feature-length films is certified “Fresh” at that vegetable-rating website, now if he could just calm down with the producing, so we don’t have to talk about Batman v. Superman or Transcendence…
JOEL & ETHAN COEN – The quality level The Coen Brothers maintain is remarkable, given that they change style and genre with EVERY MOVIE. The way they jump genres, they’re almost begging for inconsistency, yet they’ve endured as filmmakers to watch for three decades. Whether it’s a western, an Irish mob tale or a film noir, they nail a new and individual tone for every project, layered with their own brand of quirkiness, and you buy it 100%. I’m more a fan of their pre-No Country For Old Men works than their last ten years of films. Hail, Caesar! and Burn After Reading didn’t really connect with me, and The Ladykillers and The Hudsucker Proxy didn’t really connect with critics, but the films for which they are most known (No Country, Fargo, Raising Arizona and The Big Lebowski) have made them legendary.
QUENTIN TARANTINO – Tarantino is a wildly visceral and unique talent whose connection with an audience has often surprised me. He takes so many risks and makes movies as broadly as he cares to and still gets great box office for someone who has never become a studio blockbuster director (it doesn’t hurt that he mostly keeps his budgets low). The bump in his road is the only film of his that didn’t make money – Grindhouse (could it be because he CO-directed?), yet the one that cost the most (Django Unchained), made the most. Finding a way to work in his unwavering style and please those who would release his features (The Weinstein Co., and Weinstein’s Miramax before that) is impressive as hell.
PAUL GREENGRASS – This summer sees another big film opening for Greengrass, as his Jason Bourne, with Matt Damon back in the lead role, racked up a $60 million first weekend, putting it right in line with The Bourne Supremacy and franchise-best The Bourne Ultimatum. The Gilroys (Tony and Dan) took a shot at extending the Bourne film series, but it didn’t hit quite the way it has when the franchise’s best actor and director team-up. Greengrass has a wild realism in his films that’s unparalleled, you often feel as if you’re eavesdropping.
ALEXANDER PAYNE – This is my winner for career perfection thus far (as a director – just as Nolan has his producing fails, let’s not forget Payne co-wrote I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry…). One of Payne’s best traits is the ability to make movies that are easy to relate to and understand, without making them melodramatic, sappy or broad. Most of time, they’re hilarious, even when poignant. The opposite of the above-named directors, he’s achieved greatness through simplicity, never building a “style” to be imitated, but merely being true to the story and finding bracing authenticity in every scene. Plus, he’s pulled career performances out of actors like Jack Nicholson, Paul Giamatti and George Clooney. Here’s his filmography, and you should see every one of these movies:
Citizen Ruth – A comedy about abortion. You heard me.
Election – The only film of his that didn’t make money, but I defy you to find anyone who doesn’t enjoy this movie (perhaps it suffered from a limited release).
About Schmidt – One of the best endings to a movie you’ll ever see.
Sideways – Payne’s masterpiece of comedy layered with pain, just about the highpoint of the careers of everyone involved.
The Descendants – Welcomed Shailene Woodley to the world and delivered Payne his second writing Oscar.
Nebraska – Another great ending, and the chance to watch Bruce Dern in his FIRST leading role at 77 years old!
The best part about Payne’s career-long streak is that it’s still going! Next up for him is Downsizing with Alec Baldwin and Matt Damon.
I’m accepting all arguments. As I mentioned, it’s all subjective. David Lean fans certainly have a case. Paul Thomas Anderson got too esoteric for me, but he’s been a critical darling from the get-go. If nothing else, I hope this article inspires you to see the work of these exceptional directors. True vision is what separates the real artists in the filmmaking community from what studio heads have determined you want to see based on focus groups compromised of dumb people.
