**** (Out of four)

Rating: 10/10 (7 May 1999)

Some general comments about the grave injustice of this film being robbed by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences would obviously be unnecessary due to the high amounts of people demanding an explanation for the inexplicable lack of a Best Picture Oscar nomination for this film. So let me just go about in praising this film: "The Truman Show" was definitely the best movie of 1998 and one of the five best of the decade, behind "Pulp Fiction", "Goodfellas", "Schindler's List" and "Forrest Gump". What struck me about the film is just how meticulous everything was. Andrew Niccol and Peter Weir really thought everything out to its fullest dimension! It took me two viewings to appreciate this film's greatness, but the scene that will always strike me is just how carefully orchestrated Truman's moonlight stroll by the beach with Lauren/Sylvia is used to elicit an emotional reaction. Chopin's "Piano Concerto No. 1 in E Minor" has never sounded so melancholy and beautiful as this wonderful scene, and the breathtaking imagery and careful build-up to Truman's makeshift assemblage of her face is one of the most impressive and subtle plot developments I have EVER seen. Weir does not bang us over the head with this film, unlike some films that were inexplicably crowned with the sheath of greatness (namely "The People vs. Larry Flynt" or "Saving Private Ryan"...a well-made film, no doubt, but not the greatest war film ever made). Whoever claims that this film could have been more missed the point of subtlety that this film was trying to get across...what did you want, Woody Harrelson and Juliette Lewis suddenly appearing on the screen to deliver some Oliver Stone-style message on violence or the JFK conspiracy? The film's climax is one of the most surreal and strangely moving pieces of cinema I have EVER seen, and just the way Carrey enunciates a pained "Was nothing real?" to Ed Harris was worth an Oscar nomination alone. Give me Carrey's nuanced performance over the contortions and muggings of Benigni anyday, a trait he must have inherited from...Carrey himself! Oh well, to give this film the recognition it deserves would be to misrepresent the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences as a sincere, incisive group of people instead of the smug and sanctimonious group of bootlickers they truly are.