Top Film for Each Year of My Life – 1998

Rushmore

“You think I got kicked out because of just the aquarium? Nah, it was the handjob. And you know what else? It was worth it.”

“These are O.R. scrubs.”
“O R they?”

The movie that introduced me to Wes Anderson. This is a bit of a cheat because Rushmore wasn’t released wide until 1999, but my desire to see it was planted back in ’98. There aren’t many instances in which I was more anxious to see a film than this one. Mostly because I love Bill Murray and heard he gives an incredible performance. Rushmore also seemed like few other movies I’d ever seen. I’ve always loved movies (I’ll always remember an incident in church, when I was around 8-10 years old, when a friend asked me, “don’t you ever stop talking about movies?”) but I hadn’t really scratched the surface in terms of what I’d seen. I was all about Mel Brooks, Monty Python, Adam Sandler (and the other SNL contemporaries), and Leslie Nielson at this time. My VHS collection explains a lot about who I was in my formative years.
I remember trying to gather friends to check Rushmore out with me, but for one reason or another, no one ever could. Until one day, on what turned out to be the last week it was in theaters, a friend agreed to go. The problem was I think she thought it was a date and it made the experience a bit awkward (in her defense, I definitely led her on several times, not thinking about it then, but feeling awful about it now). Once the movie started, though, the awkwardness washed away. My eyes transfixed to the screen and I took it all in and loved it. What’s weird is I remember how I felt walking into the theater and walking away from the theater, but not how I felt inside. It’s like I was hypnotized into feeling elated after the movie was over.

Anderson gets a lot of flack for being overly quirky, having a pretentious visual style (or being pretentious in general), and for his music choices. I’ve never had a problem with any of these complaints. Rushmore is a quirky movie, but not in an annoying, overly written way. The humor is dry, subtle, and witty. The set design and photography are always stunning. And the use of music fits the tone perfectly. People complain that the music is used against what the song is about, but music is about feeling as much as content. Anyway, it’s our right to interpret art however we like, intention-be-damned. And we must not forget Devo's Mark Mothersbaugh contributions to the soundtrack, which fits Anderson's films so well that they have become inseparable.
I love the interaction between Murray and Jason Schwartman (in his first film role). The battle of “wits” and its escalation is endlessly hilarious and I could watch an entire film of just that. Much like their characters, I developed, and still harbor, a crush on Olivia Williams. And I don’t know who wouldn’t want to live in Max Fischer’s world of extracurriculars.

Owen Wilson and Anderson wrote a perfect movie, it has a perfect cast, perfect music, and perfect visuals. In short, Rushmore is perfect. I still think it’s a crime that Bill Murray wasn’t nominated for the Supporting Actor Oscar. To me, everyone nominated in that category in 1999 was expendable. Does anyone even remember James Coburn’s performance in Affliction (that years winner)?

I feel I need to acknowledge the elephant in the room that is The Big Lebowski, which also has a story to go along with it, but I won’t tell it. It’s a fantastic movie and deserves its enormous cult, but it simply doesn’t hit me in the same resonant way that Rushmore does. Also of note is Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, which is simply a fun and wacky ride. 1998 was just a great year for some of my favorite directors.