I’d forgotten how effective the finale of To Die For is, and what a collossal dumbass Nicole Kidman‘s Pamela Smart** was depicted as. And especially what a blood-chilling vibe David Cronenberg had. That voice, those executive duds, that smile.

For me the second all-time creepiest movie assassin is that burly, 60ish, working-class Crimes and Misdemeanors guy from New Orleans who knocks on Anjelica Huston‘s Manhattan apartment door and says “flowers!”

Director Gus Van Sant was peaking like a sonuvabtich when TDF opened in October 1995. His greatest ever film, Drugstore Cowboy, which Gus directed at age 36 and cowrote with Daniel Yost, had opened six years earlier. And then came the totally gay My Own Private Idaho (’91). Let’s forget Even Cowgirls Get The Blues (’93), but two years after To Die For Gus directed Good Will Hunting (’97), another major score in terms of box-office and awards.

Let’s forget the misbegotten Psycho remake (’98) and the altogether dreadful Finding Forrester (David Poland loved it!).

But soon after came the brilliant bare-bones trilogy of Gerry, Elephant and Last Days. Paranoid Park was pretty good, I felt, although Gus’s Milk (’08) couldn’t hold a candle to Rob Epstein‘s The Times of Harvey Milk (’84). I never thought Sean Penn was the right guy to play Harvey — he’s way too short for one thing.

So Gus’s peak period lasted just shy of 20 years…commendable.

** The real Pamela Smart wasn’t murdered by a smooth assassin. She’s serving a life sentence inside the Bedford Hills Correctional Facility for Women.