With today's addition, I have now seen every Best Picture winner from the present back through 1970! (It would go further than that, but the 1969 Best Picture never wants to work for me on Netflix Instant Viewer.) The last film that I needed to see in order to complete that streak was 2003's Best Picture, Chicago. The film also won Best Supporting Actress (Catherine Zeta-Jones), and was nominated for Best Director (Rob Marshall), Best Actress (Renee Zellweger), Best Supporting Actor (John C Reilly), Best Supporting Actress (Queen Latifah), and Best Adapted Screenplay (Bill Condon).
In 1920's Chicago, Roxie Hart (Zellweger), a former chorus girl now married to boring schlub Amos(Reilly), would give anything to be up on stage, the center of attention. When the guy she has been having an affair with reveals that he doesn't actually have any connections at the music hall where they met (on the night that singer Velma Kelly (Zeta-Jones) was arrested there for murdering her husband and sister), Roxie flies into a rage and shoots him. She goes to the same jail as Kelly, where, for a price, guard Mama Morton (Latifah) puts her in touch with shady lawyer Billy Flynn (Richard Gere). Flynn takes Hart's case and makes her a media sensation, giving her the fame that she always wanted, and that she now needs in order to get away with murder.
I was kind of dreading watching this one. There was a reason that it was the only Best Picture in 40 years that I hadn't seen yet. Imagine my surprise when I found that I actually quite enjoyed it! It turns out that I am actually a person who enjoys musicals from time to time. The story is entertaining, and timely - a story about people who can't tell the difference between fame and infamy. The characters are engaging and believable - well, as believable as characters who spontaneously break into choreographed song-and-dance numbers can be. And the songs themselves are catchy, entertaining, and visually very inventive. John C Reilly is heartbreaking in "Mr Cellophane," Gere is a scene-stealer in a press conference number in which he uses Zellweger as a ventriloquist's dummy, and more so in his courtroom tap dance number. Zellweger manages to be both sympathy-inducing and coldly manipulative, and is equally entertaining in either mode. Zeta-Jones is as good here as I have ever seen her, although I think Latifah deserved the Oscar more. Chicago far exceeded my expectations, and it had me entertained and laughing throughout.
Movie trivia question: What was the first film to win an Oscar for a non-English-language performance?
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