CFB's Top 40 Films of 1998 (2011)

1. The Thin Red Line (1998)
2. The Big Lebowski (1998)
3. Happiness (1998)
4. Saving Private Ryan (1998)
5. Run Lola Run (1998)
6. The Truman Show (1998)
7. Gods and Monsters (1998)
8. Festen (1998)
9. Dark City (1998)
10. A Simple Plan (1998)
11. American History X (1998)
12. Shakespeare in Love (1998)
13. Show Me Love (1998)
14. Pleasantville (1998)
15. Pi (1998)
16. Central Station (1998)
17. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1998)
18. The Opposite of Sex (1998)
19. Elizabeth (1998)
20. Flowers of Shanghai (1998)
21. The Last Days of Disco (1998)
22. Black Cat, White Cat (1998)
23. Rushmore (1998)
24. Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (1998)
25. The Red Violin (1998)
26. Eternity and a Day (1998)
27. Out of Sight (1998)
28. The Apple (1998)
29. Velvet Goldmine (1998)
30. An Autumn Tale (1998)
31. Buffalo ‘66 (1998)
32. Xiao Wu (1997)
33. The Idiots (1998)
34. Wild Things (1998)
35. Primary Colors (1998)
36. Inquietude (1998)
37. Little Dieter Needs to Fly (1998)
38. Last Night (1998)
39. The Dream Life of Angels (1998)
    There’s Something About Mary (1998)

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CFB's Top 25 Obscure Films of 1998 (2011)

1. Cabaret Balkan (1998)
2. Christmas in August (1998)
3. The Power of Kangwon Province (1998)
4. 42: Forty Two Up (1998)
5. Mr. Zhao (1998)
6. Khrustalyov, My Car! (1998)
7. Of Freaks and Men (1998)
8. The Terrorist (1998)
9. The Farm: Angola, USA (1998)
10. The Last Days (1998)
11. Confession (1998)
12. Those Who Love Me Can Take the Train (1998)
13. Barrio (1998)
14. Dr. Akagi (1998)
15. Flammes (1998)
16. Secret Défense (1998)
17. Flatworld (1998)
18. Talking Heads 2 (1998)
    Billy’s Balloon (1998)
19. Ruskin (1998)
20. The Quarry (1998)
21. Hollywoodism: Jews, Movies and the American Dream (1998)
22. Jeanne et le Garçon Formidable (1998)
23. Place Vendome (1998)
24. David and Lisa (1998)

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Fawlty Towers: Series 2 (1979)

Essential Viewing

UK

Television Series

Director: Bob Spiers

Writers: Connie Booth, John Cleese

Cast: John Cleese, Prunella Scales, Andrew Sachs, Connie Booth, Ballard Berkeley, Brian Hall

Though Cleese’s performance is slightly less manic and physical than in the first series, and his character a tad more sympathetic, this second series is, if anything, even funnier, smarter, and more memorable than its hilarious predecessor.

1. Communication Problems

When Basil surreptitiously has a bit of luck on the gee-gees, his winnings get passed from person to person in an effort to keep it a secret from his disapproving wife – but, unfortunately for him, a deaf guest, who refuses to switch on her hearing aid for fear of running down the batteries, reports a similar amount of money to have been stolen from her room, leading to much suspicion and confusion.

2. The Psychiatrist

A holidaying psychiatrist does his best to ignore the odd behaviour of his manic host, Basil Fawlty; but said hotelier’s inability to avoid the breasts of a comely young Australian woman and his obsession with the sexual habits of another guest make doing so particularly difficult.

3. Waldorf Salad

When a pair of holidaymakers from California arrives after the kitchen has just closed, Basil has the idea to play at being chef, despite having just been bribed to keep the kitchen staff on with four crisp five pound notes – alas, all does not go smoothly, as the American gentleman and his British wife are soon unfathomably ordering screwdrivers and Waldorf salads (and they’re fresh out of waldorfs).

4. The Kipper and the Corpse

When a guest dies during the night, Basil, as keen (though incapable) as ever to keep up a level of propriety, soon has his staff carrying the body from room to room in order to hide its existence from his other guests – inevitably, he fails spectacularly.

5. The Anniversary

Having forgotten their anniversary the previous year, Basil, to mark their fifteenth, arranges a surprise party with some of their closest friends – unfortunately, Sybil takes his faux forgetting for the real thing and drives off in a huff, leaving him to concoct an unworkable, illness-related excuse for when their guests arrive,

6. Basil the Rat

When a health inspector gives them a long list of things to clean and fix in order to avoid being closed down, the staff of Fawlty Towers quickly and busily gets down to it; unfortunately, just as he’s due to return, Manuel’s pet rat – he thought that it was a Siberian hamster – escapes, leading to much panic, confusion, and poisoned veal. Iain.Stott

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Fawlty Towers: Series 1 (1975)

Essential Viewing

UK

Television Series

Director: John Howard Davies

Writers: Connie Booth, John Cleese

Composer: Dennis Wilson

Cast: John Cleese, Prunella Scales, Andrew Sachs, Connie Booth, Ballard Berkeley

A bigoted, elitist hotel owner – prone to fawning over nobility and treating with disdain the common man – manages to find himself in farcical situation after farcical situation, in this hilarious, brilliantly written first series, which benefits greatly from Cleese’s wonderfully physical comic dexterity.

1. A Touch of Class
Fed up with the riff-raff that usually patronise his hotel, who he treats with utter disdain, Basil Fawlty takes out a £40 ad in a swanky magazine, looking to attract a better class of customer; so when a certain Lord Melbury checks in, he proceeds to fawn all over him, near enough ignoring the rest of his clientele – unfortunately, though, the titled gentleman is not all that he appears to be.

2. The Builders
Instead of hiring a respectable builder like Stubbs – as his wife, Sybil, had requested – to put through one door and block up another, Basil hires cowboy builder O’Reilly, with whom they’d had trouble previously, who proceeds to fill in the wrong door and put another were one was not needed, much to the unsurprised chagrin of his no-nonsense better half.

3. The Wedding Party
When an unmarried couple tries to book into a double room, Basil refuses to accommodate them, but Sybil, his more enlightened wife, does so any way, leaving his imagination to run wild; and before long he is seeing carnal desire everywhere, and comes to believe that the hotel is filled with sex maniacs, causing him to make a fool of himself when he asks them all, including his waitress Polly, to leave.

4. The Hotel Inspectors
After hearing a rumour that there are three hotel inspectors in town, Basil comes to believe that a particularly demanding guest is one of said assessors, and begins to fawn all over him; but when his true occupation comes to light, his sycophantic deference soon turns to irrational rage.

5. Gourmet Night
The inaugural not-for-riff-raff Fawlty Towers gourmet evening runs anything but smoothly, when their new Greek chef, the best that they've ever had, gets steaming drunk after a romantic rebuff from Manuel, leaving him unable to cater the event, and forcing Basil to quickly change the menu and look to their old chef André, now running a successful restaurant and who had recommended the soused Kurt in the first place, to come to the rescue – now, if only he’d paid a professional to fix his car.

6. The Germans
With Sybil in hospital to undergo an operation on an ingrowing toenail, Basil is left at the hotel with instructions to hang a moose’s head in the lobby and to perform a fire drill – a set of tasks that inevitably proves to be beyond him; and before long, concussed after a blow to the head, he finds himself unable to serve lunch to a party of German guests without making constant references to the war. Iain.Stott

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Northern Exposure: Season 2 (1991)

Recommended

USA

Television Series

Creators: Joshua Brand, John Falsey

Cast: Rob Morrow, Janine Turner, Barry Corbin, Darren E. Burrows, John Cullum, Cynthia Geary, Elaine Miles, Peg Phillips

The second season of Northern Exposure, following the misadventure of a Jewish New York doctor marooned in the rural no-man’s-land of Cicely, Alaska, is a consistently entertaining work with no real weak episodes and at least one classic – Episode 2: The Big Kiss

1. Goodbye to All That
On the eve of a two week trip to New York, Elaine, Joel’s fiancée, sends him a Dear John letter, detailing her love for a retired judge, sending him into an almighty funk, and prompting Ed (with the assistance of Holling and Maggie) to seek to ease his pain; at the same time, Shelly becomes addicted to television, when Holling buys her a giant satellite dish.

2. The Big Kiss
After a viewing of Boys Town (1938), Ed becomes curious about the identity of his parents, and sets out to find them with the aid of his 256-year-old spirit guide, One-Who-Waits, who also advises Chris, who has had his voice stolen by a beautiful stranger passing through Cicely, that he must sleep with the most beautiful girl in town (Maggie) in order to remedy his situation.

3. All Is Vanity
When a John Doe drops dead in Joel’s office, the town’s populace, led by Chris and Maurice, take it in turns to watch over the body until a decision can be made about what to do with it; a stray comment from Shelly has Holling contemplating circumcision in order to please her; and Joel reluctantly agrees to play the part of Maggie’s boyfriend, when her judgmental father comes for a visit.

4. What I Did for Love
When Maggie has a dream about his death in a plane crash on the eve of his trip to New York, prompting the town’s populace to begin saying their goodbyes to him, the usually unsuperstitious Joel, already full of suspicion about his too-good-to-be-true temporary replacement, begins to rethink his travel plans, whilst also investigating Maurice’s breathing difficulties, reported to him by an astronaut groupie who visits him annually.

5. Spring Break
Just before the ice breaks, an event celebrated by the Running of the Bulls, the residents of Cicely become gripped with unusual passions – Joel and Maggie struggle to resist each other; Shelly develops a taste for reading; Maurice falls for a domineering state trooper; the usually placid Holling is itching for a fight; and somebody is stealing all of the town’s radios.

6. War and Peace
Nikolai Ivanovich Appalanov, a Russian singer loved by all but Maurice, arrives in town for a vodka-fuelled good time and, if the former astronaut agrees to it, a deadly serious game of chess; elsewhere, Ed falls for bad girl Lightfeather Duncan, and begins to woo her with the aid of Chris’s two-wheeled erotic poetry; and Holling, beset with vivid, unsettling dreams, struggles to get a decent night’s sleep.

7. Slow Dance
Further credence is given to idea of Maggie being cursed, or at least to all of her beaus being cursed on her behalf, when Rick is killed by a falling satellite; Maurice’s delight at finding buyers, with whom he has a great deal in common, for a property of his is soon tempered by the revelation that they are gay, prompting him to reconsider his decision to sell to them; and Shelly becomes the green-eyed monster when an old flame of Holling’s, who is closer to his age and has more in common with him, arrives in town. Iain.Stott

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Northern Exposure: Season 1 (1990)

Recommended

USA

Television Series

Creators: Joshua Brand, John Falsey

Cast: Rob Morrow, Janine Turner, Barry Corbin, Darren E. Burrows, John Cullum, Cynthia Geary, Elaine Miles, Peg Phillips

A newly qualified doctor from New York struggles to adapt to life in rural Alaska, in this decidedly gentle and relatively straightforward though never less than thoroughly entertaining first season of a series that would go on to much greater things.

1. Pilot
Jewish New Yorker Joel Fleischman, a newly qualified doctor, travels to Alaska in order to fulfil the terms of his scholarship, but instead of the Anchorage hospital that he was expecting he finds himself shipped off to Cicely, a small town in the middle of nowhere, peopled with oddballs and eccentrics, where he very reluctantly sets himself up as a GP.

2. Brains, Know-How and Native Intelligence
The broaching of the subject of Walt Whitman’s homosexuality by Chris Stevens on his radio show leads to his sacking by Maurice, who also replaces him, filling the airwaves with show tunes in the process, much to the chagrin of the local populace; whilst Joel struggles both to get Ed’s medicine man uncle to take his prostate cancer seriously and fix his own faulty shower in the wake of Maggie’s chastisement of him over his helplessness and general lack of self-sufficiency.

3. Soapy Sanderson
When 82-year-old hermit Soapy Sanderson takes his own life, leaving his 100 acre estate to Joel and Maggie, the oft bickering pair look set to be brought closer together, but a $50,000 offer from a local Indian tribe interested in using the land as a tax haven soon puts paid to that.

4. Dreams, Schemes and Putting Greens
Maurice’s plan to build a holiday complex on the outskirts of Cicely, complete with 18 hole golf course, grabs the attention of Joel, who embraces the idea wholeheartedly, striking a deal to become the resident physician in exchange for having a year knocked off his “sentence”, but news of Shelly’s pregnancy and impending nuptials threaten to disrupt matters, when the former astronaut’s eye is taken off the task of wooing of a pair of Japanese businessmen.

5. Russian Flu
When his fiancée, Elaine, flies in from New York for a weekend visit, Joel’s time is spent not in the carnal throes of passion that he had envisioned but attending to the town’s populace, who have all, barring one or two notable exceptions, come down with a particularly nasty strain of flu, which Marilyn, with her malodourous tribal remedy, seems better equipped to deal with.

6. Sex, Lies and Ed's Tapes
While Ed struggles to write a screenplay for the new, post-Jaws Hollywood, Holling develops a phantom neck injury in the wake of the arrival of Shelly’s secret husband, and Rick fears that he is to be the latest victim of Maggie’s curse, when Joel discovers an errant tumour during a check-up.

7. A Kodiak Moment
The death of Maurice’s brother causes him to contemplate his own mortality and seek a new heir to his empire; whilst Ed and Shelly accompany Holling on a hunting expedition, when it becomes known that Jesse, a great grizzly bear with whom he has a history, is back in the area; and Joel and Maggie fight and bond a little whilst giving a prepared childbirth class in Boswell.

8. Aurora Borealis: A Fairy Tale for Big People
The first of the series’ many great episodes: whilst the residents of Cicely struggle to sleep under a particularly bright full moon, an IRS worker from Portland rides into town on a motorbike, unable to explain why he’s there, and teams up with Chris, with whom he has an uncanny rapport, to help create his large Aurora Borealis sculpture; elsewhere, Joel, returning from a long-distance house call, breaks down in the middle of nowhere, where he encounters Adam, the legendary local bigfoot, who turns out to be a gourmet chef, albeit one with questionable hygiene habits and social skills. Iain.Stott

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Couples Retreat (2009)

Not Recommended

USA

Feature Film

Director: Peter Billingsley

Writers: Jon Favreau, Dana Fox, Vince Vaughn

Cinematographer: Eric Edwards

Composer: A.R. Rahman

Cast: Vince Vaughn, Malin Akerman, Jason Bateman, Kristen Bell, Jon Favreau, Kristin Davis, Faizon Love, Kali Hawk, Jean Reno, Peter Serafinowicz

An intense, uptight married couple, considering divorce, convinces three other couples to accompany them on a retreat to an idyllic island, promising sun, sea, sand, and relaxation, where instead they are confronted with intense couples counselling and oppressive rules and regulations, forcing them to reluctantly examine their own relationships, in this well enough acted though seldom funny and hopelessly predictable comedy. Iain.Stott

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Grown Ups (2010)

Not Recommended

USA

Feature Film

Director: Dennis Dugan

Writers: Adam Sandler, Fred Wolf

Cinematographer: Theo van de Sande

Composer: Rupert Gregson-Williams

Cast: Adam Sandler, Kevin James, Chris Rock, David Spade, Rob Schneider, Salma Hayek, Maria Bello, Maya Rudolph, Joyce Van Patten, Ebony Jo-Ann

When their championship winning junior high school basketball coach dies, five old friends and their families decide – as well as attending his funeral – to share a lake house in their old home town for the 4th of July weekend, reconnecting, bonding, confessing, regretting, and recapturing as they do so, in this occasionally mildly diverting though generally tiresome and decidedly undercooked comedy. Iain.Stott

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The Walking Dead: Season 1 (2010)

Highly Recommended

USA

Television Series

Developer: Frank Darabont

Cast: Andrew Lincoln, Jon Bernthal, Sarah Wayne Callies, Laurie Holden, Jeffrey DeMunn, Steven Yeun, Chandler Riggs, Norman Reedus, Emma Bell, IronE Singleton, Melissa Suzanne McBride, Jeryl Prescott

Adapted from Robert Kirkman, Tony Moore, and Charlie Adlard’s comic books, Frank Darabont’s visceral and gory yet affecting and perceptive series, following the trials and tribulations of a small band of survivors, as they struggle to find a way to live following the zombie apocalypse, gets off to a very promising start with this excellent first season.

1. Days Gone Bye
After waking from a coma in a derelict and deserted hospital in the midst of the zombie apocalypse and gradually coming to realise his situation, Rick Grimes, a small town sheriff’s deputy, shot in the line of duty some weeks earlier, sets off towards Atlanta in search of his wife and son, whom he believes to be still alive.

2. Guts
Rick becomes trapped in a department store with a group of survivors he meets in Atlanta, who are in the city scavenging for supplies, when it becomes surrounded by walkers, and is forced to think very creatively in order to escape and survive.

3. Tell It to the Frogs
After returning to the camp with the rest of the survivors and reuniting with his wife and son, Rick, along with three others (including Merle’s decidedly angry brother) decide to return to Atlanta to attempt to rescue their hand-cuffed and stranded compatriot, whilst also recovering the bag of guns abandoned the previous day.

4. Vatos
Unable to locate Merle, Rick and the others turn their attentions to the abandoned bag of guns, which has also caught the eye of a rival gang of survivors, who attempt but fail to snatch it, instead taking a hostage – an act reciprocated by our heroes – which leads to a potentially violent showdown; whilst back at camp, tensions begin to rise.

5. Wildfire
In the aftermath of the deadly zombie attack on the camp of the previous evening, the survivors begin to deal with the dead and the dying, whilst attempting to formulate a plan for the next step in their bid for survival, and eventually set off towards the Center for Disease Control, hoping to find some official help.

6. TS-19
After a night of relative comfort and luxury in the CDC, the survivors begin to pressure their lone host for answers to the cause of their plight, and – finding what they hear decidedly sobering – realise that they must go back out into the world if they are to survive: that is if they can actually get back out of the locked down building. Iain.Stott

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Blow Out (1981)

Recommended

USA

Feature Film

Writer/Director: Brian De Palma

Cinematographer: Vilmos Zsigmond

Composer: Pino Donaggio

Cast: John Travolta, Nancy Allen, John Lithgow, Dennis Franz

A film soundman for trashy exploitation flicks, out in a remote spot one night recording new sounds for his latest project, manages to capture the fatal car crash of a presidential candidate on tape, as well as rescuing his comely young companion, and becomes convinced, as film footage also comes to light, that it was an assassination, not the tragic accident peddled by the official line, in De Palma’s stylish and greatly entertaining if occasionally rather silly (though often pleasingly so) thriller, which is also somewhat clumsily written in spots. Iain.Stott

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The Trip (2010)

Recommended

UK

Feature Film

Director: Michael Winterbottom

Writers: Steve Coogan, Rob Brydon

Cinematographer: Ben Smithard

Cast: Steve Coogan, Rob Brydon, Claire Keelan, Marta Barrio, Margo Stilley, Rebecca Johnson

Edited down from the excellent mini-series of the same title for an international release, Winterbottom, Coogan, and Brydon’s warm, witty, and affecting concoction – a tale of friendship, one-upmanship, middle-age regrets, and fragile entertainers’ egos – loses a little in the process, shedding some of its laughs and a degree of its emotional power, bit it remains, never the less, hugely entertaining. Iain.Stott

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Blotto (1930)

Not Recommended

USA

Short Film

Director: James Parrott

Writer: H.M. Walker

Cinematographer: George Stevens

Cast: Stan Laurel, Oliver Hardy, Anita Garvin, Tiny Sandford

Stanley, forbidden by his wife to go out on the town with his great pal Oliver, hatches a plan (involving a fake telegram and a stolen bottle of booze) to remedy his situation – unfortunately for him, his better half is onto him from the start and sets out to teach him a lesson, in this surprisingly tedious and drawn-out one-joke Laurel and hardy short. Iain.Stott

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Our Wife (1931)

Recommended

USA

Short Film

Director: James W. Horne

Writer: H.M. Walker

Cinematographer: Jack Stevens

Cast: Stan Laurel, Oliver Hardy, Babe London, James Finlayson, Ben Turpin, Charley Rogers, Blanche Payson

With Mr. Finlayson ecstatic at the prospect of his daughter’s marriage right up until the point at which he sees a photograph of her intended, Mr. Hardy, Ollie, with the aid (read: hindrance) of his best pal Stan, is forced to change his plans and arrange an elopement – unfortunately, said midnight flit relies rather too heavily on said dim-witted chum, in this entertaining Laurel and Hardy short, featuring a memorable turn form Ben Turpin and a cracking punchline. Iain.Stott

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Our Relations (1936)

Recommended

USA

Feature Film

Director: Harry Lachman

Writers: Jack Jevne, Charles Rogers, Felix Adler, Richard Connell, W.W. Jacobs

Cinematographer: Rudolph Maté

Composer: Leroy Shield

Cast: Stan Laurel, Oliver Hardy, Alan Hale, Sidney Toler, Daphne Pollard, Betty Healy, James Finlayson, Iris Adrian, Lona Andre, Ralf Harolde, Noel Madison, Arthur Housman

Stan and Ollie, happily married pillars of the local community, find their reputations plummeting for no apparent reason, when, unbeknownst to them, their long-lost, no-good twin brothers, Alf and Bert, sail into town looking for a good time – albeit on a budget, in this atypical, intricately and tightly plotted Laurel and Hardy feature, a well crafted and consistently entertaining film. Iain.Stott

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Saps at Sea (1940)

Recommended

USA

Short Feature Film

Director: Gordon Douglas

Writers: Felix Adler, Harry Langdon, Gil Pratt, Charles Rogers

Cinematographer: Art Lloyd

Composer: Marvin Hatley

Cast: Stan Laurel, Oliver Hardy, Richard Cramer, James Finlayson

After suffering a nervous breakdown brought on by his job testing horns (and exacerbated by a cockeyed plumber and a decidedly stupid best friend), Ollie, along with said chum, Stan, set off to recuperate (under doctor’s orders) on a safely moored, newly hired boat – but rest and relaxation are hardly forthcoming, as they soon find themselves Shanghaied at sea with a notorious killer, freshly escaped from prison, in this entertaining, action- and gag-packed episodic Laurel and Hardy feature. Iain.Stott

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You're Darn Tootin' (1928)

Recommended

USA

Short Film

Director: Edgar Kennedy

Writer: H.M. Walker

Cinematographer: Floyd Jackman

Cast: Stan Laurel, Oliver Hardy, Otto Lederer, Agnes Steele

14 weeks behind on their board, and just sacked from their musical orchestra, Stan and Ollie suddenly find themselves kicked out onto the street, where they attempt to put their tuneful “talents” to use busking for change – but run-ins with a police officer, a drunk, and a sewer worker ensure that things run anything but smoothly, and before long, nerves frayed, a fight breaks out between them, soon escalating to engulf the entire street in a dance-like shin-kicking orgy, in this inventive, oft hilarious silent Laurel and Hardy short. Iain.Stott

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Below Zero (1930)

Recommended

USA

Short Film

Director: James Parrott

Writer: H.M. Walker

Cinematographer: George Stevens

Cast: Stan Laurel, Oliver Hardy, Frank Holliday, Blanche Payson

In this hugely entertaining, plot-packed Laurel and Hardy short, Street musicians Stan and Ollie find business tough going outside of the Deaf & Dumb Institute, and even harder going farther down the street where people can actually hear them, but a lost wallet, filled to the brim with money, looks set to perk up their cold, snowy winter's day – that is until they inadvertently try to treat its rightful owner, a police officer, to a steak dinner. Iain.Stott

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