I’m fixin’ to do something dumber than hell, but I’m going anyways.

Ten years ago, movies like this didn’t win Best Picture. They lost to safe, happy movies like Forrest Gump and Shakespeare in Love. By their usual standards, the Academy voters would have gone with Michael Clayton, the safe and respectable choice. In the last couple of years, however, the Academy has been on a serious indie kick, and the Coen Brothers’ dark character study is about as indie as mainstream movies get. Was the best film of 2007? Perhaps, perhaps not. At least this makes up for Fargo losing out to The English Patient.

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