The Decade List: George Washington (2000)

George Washington - dir. David Gordon Green

Few directors hit their mark on their first outing, and, as David Gordon Green has shown us, few sustain the momentum of such heights (Lynne Ramsay might be the exception, but she only has two features under her belt at the moment). George Washington is spellbinding. With its Terence Malik-inspired rural beauty (cinematographer Tim Orr would shoot all of Green's subsequent features), Green crafts such unexpected tenderness and horror, a combination that usually goes about as well as oil and water. It's hard to say Green hasn't lived up to the promise of George Washington, as so many of my Zooey Deschanel-obsessed mates would list All the Real Girls among one of the best films they've ever seen. Like Ramsay's Ratcatcher, which was releasing theatrically in the US during 2000 and by no small coincidence was also released on DVD by Criterion, George Washington captured adolescence without the taste of nostalgia and romanticism so many filmmakers can't get away from. However, for me, Green, especially after the curious, though nowhere near terrible, teaming with the Judd Apatow crew last year, Green's output will probably never exceed his first feature, a glowing, poetic dream of a film.

With: Candace Evanofski, Curtis Cotton III, Damian Jewan Lee, Donald Holden, Rachael Handy, Paul Schneider
Screenplay: David Gordon Green
Cinematography: Tim Orr
Music: Michael Linnen, David Wingo
Country of Origin: USA
Studio: Criterion/Janus

Premiere: February 2000 (Berlin International Film Festival)
US Premiere: April 2000 (Los Angeles Independent Film Festival)

Awards: Discovery Award (Toronto International Film Festival)

A Lot Of People Come To Me And They Say, "Hey..."

"...Admiral, I need to know, and I need to know now. What is perfection? Is it the innocent smile of a happy child? Is it the excited gleam in a lover's eye? Is it the sun rising over the fog-shrouded city of Macchu Picchu?" And now I can answer, with 100% confidence, "No. It's Seth Rogen leaping onto Gary Cole like a spider monkey at the 2:09 point in this trailer for Pineapple Express."



You're welcome. I know, I know, that trailer's been around for ages, and the majority of humanity has already seen it, but I just watched it for the thousandth time this year and I had to link to it, just to become yet another cog in the hype machine. It's in my blogging contract that I use up a day a week lazily sticking a movie on the blog. Failure to comply means having to review all four seasons of Desperate Housewives, which ain't happening while I've got a say in the matter. Posting a trailer as beautifully constructed as that makes up for being a studio-fellating shill/whore hybrid.

Rogen and co-screenwriter Evan Goldberg performed a bit of miracle writing with their first collaboration Superbad, a movie that escalated perfectly from an inauspicious beginning to a full-on meltdown of comic payoffs that had been set up with such elegance that the blood, sweat, and tears they had shed to polish the script were all but invisible. So, great writer and likeable actor, but I never realised what a great physical presence Rogen has. Like a flying bear, he sells that moment perfectly. I think I snapped three ribs laughing when I first saw it.


Apatow gets a lot of flack for what is seen to be misogyny, and I'll agree Superbad had some dodgy moments (Canyon is also in two minds about it), but even taking that into account it only narrowly missed my 2007 top ten list. That escalation of comedic intensity, and the confidence with which the movie flirted with audience estrangement, really impressed me. From what has been said about Pineapple Express, it seems like Rogen, Goldberg, and director David Gordon Green have added violence to the mix, which could be a brave step too far, but advance reports are very promising.

Besides, that trailer is so good it not only makes me forget James Franco's phoned-in Spider-Man 3 performance (which I don't entirely blame him for, but still), and it not only circumvents my general (ironic) apathy toward stoner comedies, it even makes me want to track down that M.I.A. song despite my hatred for her first album being so strong that I considered selling my ears just so I wouldn't risk accidentally hearing it again.


Fly, cuddly bear-man, fly!