#389: Election (1999)

Director: Alexander Payne
Cast: Reese Witherspoon, Matthew Broderick, Chris Klein & Jessica Campbell



How can a Nebraska high school election make the front page of national newspapers? Do anything you can to stop the overzealous, Straight-A student. Start with getting the popular quarterback to run against her. Does that not do the trick? Then throw in the quarterback’s lesbian sister who plans to overthrow the student board.

This is one of my favorite comedies of all time. It is the movie that first brought Reese Witherspoon critical acclaim, nominating her for a Golden Globe. It is also the first film for Chris Klein, who went on to teen comedy fame with the American Pie films. And of course, Matthew Broderick always chooses some class films. His character goes through hell in this film, and it's easy to say he deserves it, though he maintains his charisma nerdy charisma throughout. It's also interesting to see him play a high school teacher for the first time, a turn-around from his most famous role as Ferris Bueller.

What makes the film so smart is how Mr. Payne demonstrates both the thoughts and the actions of the characters separately. On the outside, George Washington Carver High School is the picture-perfect school, with all teachers being extreme motivators and all students fitting perfectly into their own cliques. Everyone has a smile on their face, and they are all working for the future. At the same time, we see the school's most awarded teacher, Mr. McAllister, setting himself to crush the top student, Tracy Flick, while Tracy has no problems fighting back and threatening to destroy McAllister's personal life.

And you can never go wrong with the soundtrack from Navajo Joe.

Fun Trivia (Stolen from IMDB):

• In the text of a newspaper article in the film: "If you've paused the film in order to read this entire article, your time would be better spent renting Citizen Ruth (1996) from your local video store. Do you know how hard it is to write these fake few stories for newspaper movie props? I've got better things to do."
• When Tracy rips up the posters of Paul in the school hallway, the theme form Navajo Joe (1966) (which was also used at the end of Kill Bill: Vol. 2 (2004)) plays in the background.
• Since the movie was shot in a real High School (Papillion La Vista High School, Omaha, Nebraska), adjacent classrooms had real class going on while some scenes for the movie were being done. In the soundtrack, some background noises come from real teachers and students. The director decided to leave that in as to give the movie a more realistic sound.
• Reese Witherspoon's portrayal of Tracy Flick was voted as the 45th Greatest Movie Performances of All Time by Premiere Magazine.
• Ranked at #9 on Entertainment Weekly's 50 Best High School Movies (2006)

#494: Sideways (2004)

Director: Alexander Payne

Cast: Paul Giamatti & Thomas Haden Church

Sideways is one of those movies that doesn't require any crazy special effects, or even any complex camerawork. It's all in its Oscar-winning script and some great acting.

Based on Rex Pickett's novel of the same title, Payne juxtaposes Giamatti and Church to demonstrate the two opposite stereotypes of the male persona. Giamatti - as always, and as brilliant as ever - represents the depressed and shy Miles, while Church is the outgoing and sex-driven Jack. A week before Jack's first wedding, the two are off to California's wine country. Miles is anticipating exploiting his talent for wine tasting, while Jack is trying to get laid once before he's married.

The acting of both Giamatti and Church is amazing, neither of them ever stealing the spotlight. The two leading women, Sandrah Oh and Virginia Madsen, are not to be forgotten, either. Madsen has a particularly moving speech describing the life of a bottle of wine.

The film overall has a great atmosphere the whole way through. It's got some comedy comparable to The Big Lebowski and even a little I Love You, Man. It's also got a script to make your taste buds tingle for a glass of wine, which brings to mind Julia & Julia, though combined with the jazzy score by Rolfe Kent it is even more comparable to Ratatouille.

I've only seen two of Payne's other works: Election (1999) and the pilot of episode of Hung, both of which I'm a huge fan. His style is consistently simple, and it's really a breath of fresh air.

Fun Trivia (Stolen from IMDB):

• Most of the wine used in the wine-tasting scenes was non-alcoholic. The actors wound up drinking so much of it that it made them nauseated (and had to periodically switch to the real thing to clean out their palates).
• During an emotional scene in the film, Miles talks with great passion about Pinot Noir. After the release of this movie, sales of Pinot Noir wines rose by more than 20 percent over the 2004-05 Christmas/New Year period, compared to the same period the previous year. A similar phenomenon was experienced in British wine outlets. Miles is deeply disparaging, in a different scene, about Merlot, and sales dropped after the film came out. Ironically, Miles's prized bottle of wine, a 1961 Château Cheval Blanc, is a blend of Merlot and Cabernet Franc, another grape Miles disparaged.
• This is the first film to win best screenplay from all five "major" critic groups (National Board Of Review, New York, Los Angeles, Brodcast and National Society Critics), the Golden Globes, the WGA and, ultimately, the Academy Awards.