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For Christmas, five golden films

By Leslie Gray Streeter, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Saturday, January 4, 2003

For most of the year, Tinseltown gave us the cinematic equivalent of
black roses and chocolate-covered maggots. But the recent crop of
Oscar-bait holiday flicks are a thing of beauty, and I've got five
examples to prove my point. Talk about Christmas every day!

Evelyn

This true tale of a suddenly single Irish father's fight to reclaim
his kids from the Catholic Church is basically a Lifetime movie with a
bigger budget and a better cast (read: no Valerie Bertinelli). It
pulls out all the heartstring-tugging stops -- painfully cute
children, mean teachers, dedicated lawyers and quirky townsfolk.

What sets Evelyn apart from "movie of the week" territory? The single
dad is played by the lovely and talented Pierce Brosnan, who should
track down People's "Sexiest Man Alive" winner Ben Affleck and snatch
back the title that is so rightfully his.

When the rest of the movie is lapsing into schmaltzdom, Brosnan's
Desmond Doyle is a real, flawed human being. He's a guy who drinks a
little too much and gets by partly on his charm and swooniness. But in
the end, Desmond loves his kids and is willing to fight tirelessly to
get them back.

Sure, the flick does everything but reach into the audience, squirt
onion juice in your eyes and scream, "Weep, you bastards!" Brosnan's
so good, though, that I didn't feel completely ashamed for tearing up.
Then again, I have no shame.


Antwone Fisher

Speaking of weeping, here's Denzel "Oscar Winner" Washington's
directorial debut. Like Evelyn, it's a sob-inducing true story of a
child separated from his or her family. But where Evelyn seems a wee
glossy, Antwone Fisher is sometimes uncomfortably in-your-face. It
follows the painful young life and gradual redemption of Antwone
Fisher, an angry young Navy man who must make peace with the horrible
things that have happened to him before he can believe in himself.
Yes, that sounds sappy. But it's not.

Derek Luke, who plays the grown Antwone, works because he seems like a
real guy. He actually reminds me of some of my cousins.

There's nothing actor-y or showy about him; he wears his pain in his
beautiful face and his strong shoulders. But he's able to go
toe-to-toe with the fiercely intense Denzel, who plays his therapist.
Any actor who can take your eyes off Denzel is worth noticing.


Gangs of New York

Boy, was this violent! Gripping, gorgeously shot and well-acted. But
way bloody. Then again, what should you expect from a movie with the
word gangs in the title?

Yet another historically-based flick, Gangs stars a furry Leonardo
DiCaprio as Irish-American thug Amsterdam Vallon. Amsterdam returns to
the mean streets of 1860's New York to avenge the death of his father
at the hands of crazed and criminally coiffed bad guy William "Bill
the Butcher" Cutting (Daniel Day-Lewis).

Bill is the leader of a group of so-called "nativists" who fiercely
guard their home against the immigrants (and blacks) who might
threaten their supremacy and jobs. And they're willing to do that by
any means necessary, as Malcom X would say. Of course, Bill and
Malcolm wouldn't have gotten along. But I digress.

Besides gritty performances by everyone involved, including Leo, Lewis
and (surprise!) Cameron Diaz, Gangs is a welcome reality smack in the
head to anyone with fantasies about this nation's origins.

It's always been bloody, there's always been hate and the ones
wielding the weapons aren't just of one racial group or nationality.
OK, I'm stepping down from the pulpit now. And not a moment too soon,
because these heels are beginning to hurt.


Catch Me If You Can

While we're on the Leo tip, let me reiterate what I said in my "Top
10" column. DiCaprio is the man. And I can't even say that he's
getting better, because the kid was already good. Just as in What's
Eating Gilbert Grape?, he makes you laugh and then guts you in the
next moment. I think it's that vulnerable man-child thing he has
happening, that makes you want to take care of him, even when he's
robbing you blind.

I saw a dumb ad for this movie that called it "fun." Though it has fun
parts, that's misleading, because teen con Frank Abagnale's life is
fueled by pain, youthful arrogance and major fraud. And schmaltz king
Steven Spielberg doesn't shy away from the truth that, charming as
Frankie is, he's still breaking the law.

But what a smooth criminal he is.


Chicago

She cheesed me off in Entrapment. And America's Sweethearts was just
cheesy. But after watching what Catherine Zeta-Jones can do with a
Louise Brooks haircut, a skimpy chorus-girl outfit and her amazing
pipes, I'd be willing to forgive her anything. Mrs. Michael Douglas is
the very best thing in the celluloid version of Bob Fosse's classic,
and since everything about it is fantastic, that's saying a lot.

You know how, every couple of years, critics say that musicals and/or
westerns are about to make a comeback? American Outlaws and Texas
Rangers stiffed like a giant can of spray starch, so I can't vouch for
the cowboys. But Chicago certainly makes a ###f+uf-u###case for
big-screen singing and dancing.

The music's great, the hoofing is first-rate (Richard Gere rocks!) and
everybody just looks fantastic. The standouts include Renee Zellweger
as killer chorus wanna-be Roxie Hart, Queen Latifah as mercenary
prison matron Mama Morton and John C. Reilly as Roxie's sad sack
hubby, Amos.

Bonus: Taye Diggs doing... who the devil cares what he's doing? It's
Taye Diggs!