Robert Altman - The Player (2)

I knew I had seen and loved it, but as with Shortcuts, I couldn't remember a thing. Now, memory is an odd fellow, and often you'll immediately recognize what you couldn't actively remember - but not me, in this case. Every part of it was just as fresh and new as it was when I first saw it, and that is just as well, for it is a terrific and clever script, and surprises in general work much better when you don't know they're coming. Tom Hanks is wonderful as the lead character, an asshole producer in trouble, there are numerous celebrity cameos, and the opening scene rivals the one in Bertolucci's 1900. In fact, just seeing this long continuous setup made me want to rewatch 1900, and to my dismay I found that it is available neither at Netflix nor Amazon, and the studio doesn't currently offer DVDs of it for sale. A remark oddly fitting for the end a minireview of a satire about the movie business.