The many critics who declared that 2000 was not a good film year are, unfortunately, correct. Nor was it a good year either for my seeing virtually all the good films I wanted to see. 2000 started off slowly - no good films - then it caught me by surprise when things finally did pick up in the Fall and then it left me behind at year end when, as usual, so many of the year's really good films were released.

Almost every year dramas dominate my Favorite Films List. In 2000 every Favorite was a drama. There were 2 subtitled films on The List.

I saw no really good documentaries last year. Beyond The Mat was terrible.

Critically acclaimed films that I missed and but that I plan on seeing as soon as possible include Adrenaline Drive, An Affair Of Love, A Time For Drunken Horses, Beautiful People, La Buche, The Interview and Shadow Of The Vampire.

Popular films in which I have no interest and which I therefore have not seen and will not see include Erin Brockovich, Family Man, The Patriot, Charlie's Angels and The Legend Of Baggar Vance.

Love and Basketball and You Can Count On Me, both 4.5, and The Big Kahuna 4.0 were all fairly well received films that I felt didn't measure up.

The Worst Films I saw in 2000 were Woman On Top and The Price Of Glory both 2.5.

Best actors include Tom Hanks in Castaway and Christopher Walken in The Opportunists. Best actresses are Ellen Burstyn in Requiem For A Dream and Bjork in Dancer In the Dark. Catherine Deneuve is her usual magnificent self in the only film, Place Vendome, in which I saw her in 2000 and, if I were the Motion Picture Academy, I would probably give her the Lifetime Achievement Award (I think they call it) right now! Rebecca Pidgeon is very good in State and Main.

A word about Almost Famous is appropriate. This movie is about statutory rape. Worse, rape is a repetitive and humorously treated theme in this film. Still worse - no mention is made of what is really going on, i.e., rape, and, depending upon one's interpretation of some of the dialogue, the writer may even be trying to distinguish the use and abuse of children as portrayed in the film as something very, very different from rape. It is rape!!