Best/Most Significant of the Decade – Film

The past ten years have seen plenty of good movies and bad movies, but the decade will be most remembered for the rapid improvement in quality, lowering in cost, and widespread adoption of digital technology as traditional film gradually becomes a specialized medium for serious artists and for long-term archiving.

In 2010, very few people even take still photos on real film anymore, while at the start of 2000, film-quality digital cameras were far too expensive for the average consumer. While digital home moviemaking equipment still doesn’t rival commercial film or HD video, it greatly surpasses in price, quality, and convenience the analog tape technology that was starting to fade away a decade ago and has all but disappeared.

This has resulted in an explosion of independent movie production, even right here in North Dakota (see the Fargofilmmaking Wiki Project for more detailed evidence on locally-made features and shorts). It has also leveled the difference between commercial and consumer products to the point where it’s now affordable to have home screening rooms with picture and sound quality that rival or even exceed commercial theatres. Broadband internet is not yet the norm, but makes instant viewing possible for many titles at an adequate picture quality.

Not only that, but fans can now purchase their own high-quality copies of movies for about the same price as one or two tickets to see the same movie in a theatre, often only four to six months after their theatrical runs. The past decade saw DVDs replace VHS tape for cheaper, easier, more versatile, and much better-looking home viewing, and then the introduction of the almost theatre-quality BluRay home video format. This may be bad news for some exhibitors, but actually it increases the number of movies people now have access to in the long run.

However, in smaller markets like Fargo, Grand Forks, and the surrounding area, moviegoers whose tastes extend beyond the mainstream Hollywood product must still search out many titles on their own. It just means that now instead of driving to the Twin Cities or flying to one of the coasts, one need only wait a few months to a year to buy the BluRay edition on line.

And of course now the best films of 2000-2009 can be seen at home on DVD, many also on BluRay. It’s hard to pick a top 10 list of the decade, much less a best film of the decade. Among them would be “Mulholland Drive” (2001), David Lynch’s dreamlike exploration of love, jealousy, murder, Hollywood, and the human mind, his best work since “Blue Velvet.” Terrence Malick’s “The New World” (2005) is a lyrical, poetic meditation on the Pocahontas story, nature, civilization, and the power of love. Julie Taymor’s “Across the Universe” (2007) is a touching tale of love and coming of age during the turbulent 1960s, brilliantly designed around and set to the timeless music of The Beatles.

Live-action musicals are a rare commodity in today’s market, but the past decade saw several notable examples including “Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street” (2007), “Chicago” (2003), “Moulin Rouge” (2001), and the current “Nine” (2009).  Another once popular but now scarce film genre is the Western, with three of the best from just the past few years. “Appaloosa” (2008), “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford” (2007), and the “3:10 to Yuma” remake (2007) all are strong character studies as well as good Westerns.

Popular genres of the 2000s included the comic book movie, the best of which was arguably “Iron Man” (2008); the animated feature, easily the best of which was “Ratatouille” (2007); and the historical costume epic, exemplified by Antoine Fuqua’s daring reinterpretation of “King Arthur” (2004).

Of straight dramatic features of the decade, “The Lives of Others” (2006) stands out, as do “Babel” (2006), “The Reader” (2008), and “Crash” (2004), with strong competition from the magical fantasy “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” (2008).

Best of Decade – Grand Forks Live Theatre

Over two decades of strong drama programs in the Grand Forks public school system led to several outstanding live theatre productions with local talent during the past ten years.  The best of these were staged by the Crimson Creek Players, made up primarily of recent high school and college theatre graduates, and include brilliant productions of “Chicago” in August 2004 and “Sweeney Todd” in June 2006, plus a very energetic production of “Sweet Charity” in June 2007.

Two other memorable Grand Forks theatre productions were Red River High School’s hilarious staging of “The Foreigner” in January-February 2009 and the UND Theatre Department’s bold 1920s movie-studio version of Shakespeare’s “Comedy of Errors” in April 2007.

Several of the stars of these productions are currently doing theatre work in New York, demonstrating that small-town theatre need not be considered merely a hobby, and may lead to a career.

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