From AwardAnnals
Results of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts Award in the year 1999. For a ranked list of films, try the honor roll.
Shakespeare in Love
John Madden
One of the most endearing and intelligent romantic comedies of the ‘90s, the Oscar-winning
Shakespeare in Love is filled with such good will, sunny romance, snappy one-liners, and devilish cleverness that it’s absolutely irresistible. With tongue placed firmly in cheek, at its outset the film tracks young Will Shakespeare’s overwrought battle with writer’s block and the efforts of theater owner Philip Henslowe (Geoffrey Rush, in rare form) to stage Will’s latest comedy,
Romeo and Ethel, the Pirate’s Daughter. Jokey comedy, though, soon takes a…
Elizabeth
Shekhar Kapur
One of the big Elizabethan-era films of 1998, Shekhar Kapur’s
Elizabeth serves up a brimming goblet of religious tension, political conspiracy, sex, violence, and war. England in 1554 is in financial and religious turmoil as the ailing Queen “Bloody” Mary attempts to restore Catholicism as the national faith. She has no heir, and her greatest fear—that her Protestant half-sister Elizabeth will assume the throne after her death—is realized. Still, the late Queen Mary has her loyalists. The newly crowned Elizabeth finds herself knee-deep in dethroning…
Saving Private Ryan
Steven Spielberg
When Steven Spielberg was an adolescent, his first home movie was a backyard war film. When he toured Europe with
Duel in his 20s, he saw old men crumble in front of headstones at Omaha Beach. That image became the opening scene of
Saving Private Ryan, his film of a mission following the D-day invasion that many have called the most realistic—and maybe the best—war film ever. With 1998 production standards, Spielberg has been able to create a stunning, unparalleled view of war as hell. We are at Omaha Beach as troops are slaughtered by Germans yet…
The Truman Show
Peter Weir
The whole world is watching—literally—every time Truman Burbank makes the slightest move. Unbeknownst to him, in this hauntingly funny film by Peter Weir, his entire life has been an unending soap opera for consumption by the rest of the world. And everyone he knows—including his mother, his wife, and his best friend—is really an actor, paid to be part of his life. In this intriguing and surprisingly touching 1998 film, writer Andrew Niccol imagines an ultimate kind of celebrity, then sees it brought to life with comic intensity and emotional honesty by Jim…
