'97 In Review: The Good (Pam Grier), The Bad (`Speed 2') And The Dubious (`Two Thumbs Up!')

The expensive science-fiction spoof "Men in Black" ruled at the box office in 1997 with a $249 million domestic gross to date, followed by "The Lost World: Jurassic Park" ($220 million), "Liar Liar" ($181 million), "Air Force One" ($171 million to date), the "Star Wars" reissue ($138 million) and "My Best Friend's Wedding" ($126 million to date).

But smaller films made huge profits, too, among them "The Full Monty," "Soul Food," "Eve's Bayou" and "Bean," the little British comedy that grossed an astounding $150 million worldwide.

Warner Bros. had a terrible year, losing as much as $40 million on "Mad City" alone, while Twentieth Century Fox may have taken even more of a bath with "Speed 2: Cruise Control." The verdict is still out on Fox and Paramount's "Titanic," the most expensive American movie ever made, but studio executives are already making noises about cutting back on $100 million productions.

In Seattle, multiplexes continued to multiply, with the 1997 additions of the Redmond Town Center and the struggling East Valley 13, while the big chains that are represented here announced plans to merge or buy each other out. Watch for changes when Loews joins Cineplex Odeon, and General Cinema's 11-plex opens downtown in the fall of 1998.

The fate of the city's most popular and luxurious downtown theater, the Cinerama, continues to hang in the balance, as Cineplex Odeon favors booking such big movies as "Titanic" into its Meridian

16-plex. Alas, the Cinerama is currently stuck with "The Postman," but surely that won't be tying up the big curved screen for long.

Seattle was once again Festival City in 1997, with Polish, lesbian/gay, Mexican, Native-American, animation and Asian-American festivals turning up almost weekly and sometimes overlapping.

The Bumbershoot festival had the North American premiere of what every major critics' group has called the best American film of 1997: "L.A. Confidential." The Seattle International Film Festival brought in "Shall We Dance?" and "The Full Monty," which turned out to be the hit imports of the year. An offshoot of SIFF, the Eastside Film Festival, premiered some of the best films we'll be seeing next year.

The situation has reached a saturation point. The Rainy States Film Festival has decided not to hold its annual February celebration of Northwest films because, according to a festival publicist, "new festivals have emerged dividing audiences as well as the pool of entries." Still, the Rainy States people promise to be back at some unannounced date, and 1998 will probably be as crammed with festivals as ever.

As 1997 draws to a close, here's our annual roundup of dubious and other achievements in the movies:

Best performances in a lost cause: Brent Spiner and Gloria DeHaven in "Out to Sea," Reese Witherspoon in "Freeway," Kathy Baker in "Inventing the Abbotts," James Fox in "Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina," Dylan McDermott in " 'Til There Was You," Jeremy Davies and Ben Affleck in "Going All the Way," Kevin Bacon in "Telling Lies in America," Michael Caine in "Blood & Wine," Jessica Lange and Michelle Pfeiffer in "A Thousand Acres."

Worst performance in a lost cause: Chris O'Donnell as the young Ernest Hemingway in "In Love and War."

Best chemistry: Leon Lai and Maggie Cheung ("Comrades, Almost a Love Story"), Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet ("Titanic"), Johnny Depp and Al Pacino ("Donnie Brasco"), Helena Bonham Carter and Linus Roache ("The Wings of the Dove"), Jacqueline McKenzie and John Lynch ("Angel Baby"), Lothaire Bluteau and Clive Owen ("Bent").

Worst chemistry: Sophie Marceau and Sean Bean in "Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina."

Dumbest video innovation: DIVX, the digital video disc that allows you to play it any number of times for the first 48 hours after you've purchased it. After that, it becomes a pay-per-view disc; you get to pay every time you play. A consumer revolt is clearly in order.

Angels we can do without: Holly Hunter in "A Life Less Ordinary" and Anne Bancroft in "Critical Care."

What were they thinking?: The studios that released the dueling volcano movies, "Dante's Peak" and "Volcano." The Disney green-lighters who turned Mr. Magoo into a live-action character. The "Trainspotting" team that picked "A Life Less Ordinary" as its first American vehicle. Everyone who was involved in "Julian Po," "Kicked in the Head" and "The End of Violence."

Best Northwest film: Rodney Lee Rogers' "Steaming Milk."

Eeriest moments in a disappointing movie: Robert Blake's scenes in David Lynch's "Lost Highway."

Oscar-worthy performances that won't be nominated because no one saw the movies: Philip Baker Hall as the enigmatic Reno gambler whose mysterious philanthropy drives the plot of "Hard Eight"; Parker Posey as the Kennedy-obsessed psycho-recluse in "The House of Yes"; Giovanni Ribisi as the eloquently embittered community-college drop-out in "subUrbia."

"Springtime for Hitler" award: "The Pest," starring John Leguizamo as a con artist whose chief talent is reviving offensive Jewish, Chinese, Japanese, African and gay stereotypes. It was produced by The Bubble Factory, which also gave us such unasked-for comedies as "McHale's Navy" and "For Richer or Poorer."

More is less award: Two hours and 10 minutes of giant bugs attacking fascist teenagers in "Starship Troopers."

Bigger is not better: The rifle in "The Day of the Jackal" (1973) becomes a two-ton machine gun in "The Jackal" (1997).

Annual Academy Awards boo-boo: In the foreign-film category, all the major contenders are once more ineligible: "Shall We Dance?" (the National Board of Review's choice for best of 1997), "La Promesse" (the Los Angeles Film Critics' pick), "Ponette" (the New York Film Critics' favorite) and "Underground" (the Boston Society of Film Critics' selection). The Academy's archaic and unworkable system, which allows China, Turkey and other countries to select and reject entries for political reasons, must be overhauled.

Versatility prize: Julianne Moore, who went from "Lost World" to "Boogie Nights" to "The Myth of Fingerprints" to the upcoming "Big Lebowski."

Suddenly he's everywhere award: Jude Law of "Gattaca," "Bent," "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil" and "I Love You, I Love You Not," all of which opened in the same month.

Most convincing impersonation of a fish: George Shevtsov in "Love Serenade."

Most promising husband-and-wife directing debuts: Kasi Lemmons ("Eve's Bayou") and Vondie Curtis Hall ("Gridlock'd").

Best short subject: The first half hour of "Men in Black." Too bad there weren't enough good jokes for a feature. The rest was mostly attitude.

Cheekiest opening line of a movie review: "So sue me. I liked the movie better." (The New Yorker's Daphne Merkin, defending her minority opinion on the film version of a beloved bestseller, "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.")

The Ebert/Siskel "thumbs up" hit parade: "Speed 2: Cruise Control," "The Matchmaker," "Feeling Minnesota," "The Disappearance of Garcia Lorca." They really, really liked them.

Love it or hate it: A survey of Associated Press critics placed "The Rainmaker" and "Deconstructing Harry" on the group's 10-worst list, yet "Harry" wound up on Cinemania's 10 best and "The Rainmaker" placed on the National Board of Review's 10 best.

Stop him before he directs again: Joel Schumacher ("Batman & Robin").

Stop him before he writes/produces again: John Hughes ("Flubber," "Home Alone 3").

Sexiest scene: Two friends, played by Leon Lai and Maggie Cheung, remove each other's bulky bad-weather clothing and discover they're in lust in "Comrades, Almost a Love Story."

Most grating trend: The virtually uninterrupted fall box-office reign of the serial-killer thrillers "Kiss the Girls," "I Know What You Did Last Summer" and "Scream 2." How, when and why did slasher films become the No. 1 choice of so many moviegoers? The "Friday the 13th" series never achieved this level of multiplex popularity. (At least the vigilante wave of 1996 appears to have faded; "187" failed to revive it.)

A star is born: Djimon Hounsou in "Amistad."

A star is reborn: Pam Grier in "Jackie Brown."

A star at last: Seattle's busy Brendan Fraser finally had a breakout box-office hit with "George of the Jungle" and won a Seattle festival best-actor prize for "Still Breathing."

Most indelible child's performance: Sam Bould as the withdrawn, abused son of Joely Richardson and Martin Donovan in "Hollow Reed."

Clueless critics: Reviewers who persist in claiming that movies such as "Love! Valour! Compassion!," "Crocodile Tears" and "Alive & Kicking" are period pieces because AIDS is over.

Biggest surprise: The box-office wallop of the "Star Wars" reissue and, to a lesser extent, its sequels. However, the magic didn't rub off on re-releases of "The Godfather," "Das Boot" or "The Graduate."

Getting better all the time: Mathieu Kassovitz in "A Self-Made Hero," Helena Bonham Carter in "The Wings of the Dove," Greg Kinnear in "As Good as It Gets" (we'll try to forget about "Dear God" and "A Smile Like Yours"), Peter Fonda in "Ulee's Gold," Bridget Fonda in "Jackie Brown," 87-year-old Gloria Stuart in "Titanic."

Best villain: Aaron Eckhart in "In the Company of Men."

Most audacious moment: Kevin Spacey's exit in "L.A. Confidential."

Savviest casting: Guy Pearce and Russell Crowe, two Australians chosen to play 1950s Los Angeles cops in "L.A. Confidential."

Fastest fade: "Mortal Kombat: Annihilation," a sequel that ruled the box office for less than a week, then fell off nearly 60 percent during Thanksgiving weekend, when a movie's attendance usually goes up.

Most underrated actor: Bruce Greenwood, whose grieving father in Atom Egoyan's "The Sweet Hereafter" (an echo of his earlier work in Egoyan's "Exotica") is the best performance in the film. American movies and television continue to waste him in such bilge as "Fathers' Day."

Newest old movie: John Huston's "Reflections in a Golden Eye." As a revival screening at the Varsity demonstrated, this flop oddity from 30 years ago now plays as a delicious black comedy.

Oldest new movie: "Turbulence," a crackpot collection of airline-disaster-movie cliches that encourages instant audience feedback. No sooner does a character on board an endangered Boeing 747 announce that "We can't just let it crash into downtown Los Angeles," than someone in the audience fires back, "Why not?" At a rowdy preview screening earlier this year, a good bad time was had by all.

Candidate for future cult status: "Forgotten Silver," Peter Jackson and Costa Botes' meticulous and almost-convincing tribute to a pioneering New Zealand filmmaker who never existed.

Most promising directing debut: Paul Thomas Anderson, for "Hard Eight," followed by "Boogie Nights."

Best argument for remakes: "Titanic."

Worst arguments for remakes: "That Darn Cat," "The Jackal," "Fathers' Day," "Pippi Longstocking," "Flubber," "Mr. Magoo," "Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina."

Department of Redundancy Department: "Batman & Robin," "Home Alone 3," "Speed 2: Cruise Control," "Free Willy 3," "Tomorrow Never Dies," "Mortal Kombat: Annihilation," "An American Werewolf in Paris," the punishing finale of "Scream 2."

Best popcorn movies: "The Lost World: Jurassic Park," "Alien Resurrection," "Love and Other Catastrophes," "Hercules," "Air Force One," "Face/Off," "Operation Condor," "The Rainmaker," "The Full Monty," "Bean," "The Game," "Soul Food," "Irma Vep," "Prefontaine," "Grosse Pointe Blank."

Overhyped and overrated: "Cop Land," "Breakdown," "Con Air," "The Delta," "The Devil's Own," "Black Circle Boys," "Female Perversions," "Ulysses' Gaze."

European blockbusters that failed to equal that impact on this side of the Atlantic: Germany's "The Superwife," France's "Beaumarchais the Scoundrel."

Unrepeatable high point of the Seattle International Film Festival: Thomas Jane playing the James Dean role in a reading of Stewart Stern's uncut script for "Rebel Without a Cause." Runner-up: Sean Penn quietly chain-smoking and stealing attention while his wife (Robin Wright Penn) and director (Erin Dignam) answered audience questions from the Egyptian Theatre stage about their unreleased picture, "Loved."

All dressed up and nowhere to go: "The Devil's Advocate," which featured creepy special effects galore but couldn't raise a goosebump.

Best news for soundtrack fans: Nonesuch's new recordings of the scores to "East of Eden," "Rebel Without a Cause," "The Bad Seed" and many other classics.

Most lamented theater closing: The Bay in Ballard.

Hastiest theater closing: The Newmark.

Most attractive new theater: The Casbah Cinema in Belltown.

Guilty pleasure: "The Postman," which in its square sincerity and ambition suggests the mirror image of "Titanic." In this case, unfortunately, all that commitment doesn't mean a thing. The movie is so monumentally, memorably terrible that it will be talked about for years.