Top 10 Movies of '99 - Miscellaneous - http://maxpages.com/pure2000stuff/Top_10_Movies_of

1999 was indeed a strange year. Movie-wise anyways. The year's biggest film, The Phantom Menace, disappointed critics and fans alike. Yet it still managed to take in over $420 million, and actually sparked audience interest in its competitors. The Matrix was there to take up the sci-fi slack, and The Sixth Sense and The Blair Witch Project scored big with their decidedly low-tech appeal. All three films made the My Top 10, as did a passel of generally unhyped, intelligent, and solidly entertaining films, from Kevin Spacey's beauty to John Malkovich's baby. There are some quietly fantastic films on our list, and on the lists of the esteemed the critics. Presenting the best films of the last year of the millennium.

1. The Matrix
Combining a cyber-punk ethos with a love for Hong Kong chop-socky, the Wachowski brothers dare to posit Keanu Reeves as a computer hacker Messiah. The martial arts, enhanced by great special effects, are loads of fun and more than make up for a serpentine plot and Reeves' rather limited palette of expressions.

2. American Beauty
Kevin Spacey goes through the midlife crisis of the millennium, and does it with a pitch-perfect performance of extraordinary skill and sympathy. His work coupled with Alan Ball's consistently surprising script and a supporting cast of talented newcomers makes the best film of the year.

3. Election
A droll antidote to the glut of slick and dumb teen flicks and TV shows, Alexander Payne's razor edged satire targets the politics of popularity among mid-western high schoolers and reveals more truths than the PTA would like to admit. Matthew Broderick excels as a jaded teacher, a sort of anti-Ferris Bueller.

4. Being John Malkovich
Cameron Diaz and John Cusack have never been better — or looked worse — than in this wildly inventive (and just plain strange) look at the meaning of identity. Director Spike Jonze milks the absurdity and John Malkovich is game as the man whose skin everybody wants to slip into.

5. The Sixth Sense
This subtle horror story refuses to pile on massive doses of gore and special effects. Instead director M. Night Shyamalan patiently unfurls an actual story laced with subtlety, intelligence, and a big-time twist. And who's that kid stealing scenes from Bruce Willis?

6. The Talented Mr. Ripley
Anthony Minghella delivers nuanced, old-fashioned moviemaking of a sort rarely seen these days. And what a cast — Matt Damon, Jude Law, Gwyneth Paltrow and Cate Blanchett are all superb in this involving tale of deception and murder. The locations are grand, the cinematography beautiful and the chemistry palpable.

7. Toy Story 2
No mere rehash — everything, from the story to the incisive wit to the CGI — is ramped up here, as Woody the cowboy (voiced by Tom Hanks) confronts toy mortality. More, in this rare case, is definitely better.

8. The Insider
Yes, Michael Mann's film occasionally drags at 2-plus hours, but with Russell Crowe commanding the screen and Al Pacino shouting like the Godfather, you can't blame him for keeping the cameras rolling. Simply a challenging and engrossing film.

9. Run Lola Run
Who would have expected a movie about nothing more than a woman running could be so much fun? In a triumph of style over substance, this kinetic German import riffs on the vagaries of fate with a boffo blending of split screens, video, and cartoon imagery. A novelty film, but it's a dazzling novelty.

10. The Blair Witch Project
You never see what's tormenting those kids, and that's what makes this low-budget enterprise so genuinely frightening. What we do see is dread turn to panic, and finally to unhinged terror before it all goes black. The year's most horrifying scene: the young filmmaker tearfully recording her last will and testament on the night she disappears. The best part of this movie was the hoping and waiting for the kids to die.

Honorable Mentions:
Three Kings, The Straight Story, Boys Don't Cry, Deep Blue Sea, Sleepy Hollow

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