After my 1999 marathon of watching and reviewing the Best Pictures through that year, I posted new reviews of the Best Pictures as they were announced in the first few years afterward. And then it got to be too much to go back and write another review... but I’m sorry that’s the case. Some films just keep getting better with each viewing, and with each new reconsideration of them. From my Oscar review of Gladiator, the Best Picture winner from 2000:

I've seen Gladiator half a dozen times now -- thrice on a big screen and thrice on DVD -- and it gets me deeper in the gut every time: By the time Maximus whispers his final words, assuring Lucilla that "Lucius is safe," I'm starting to sniffle. By the time Juba is reverently burying Maximus's totems of his wife and son, I'm bawling. I'm not a gal turned off by big, bloody, rousing action flicks -- they are, indeed, among my favorite kinds of films -- nor am I one to look for the squishy soppy stuff in a manly movie -- I mostly can't stand that girly shit. But every time I watch Gladiator, I'm less taken with the admittedly incredible action sequences and more struck by the quiet, ardent, even reverent heart at its core, one that beats for the love of family.

• review of Gladiator, posted 06.06.01

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