Licorice Pizza (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2021): 4.5/5

Or, ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE VALLEY (in 70mm)

Easy, breezy effervescence anchored by two absolutely impish charmers. So organic and delightful. Best PTA has done in a long time. Extra half star for Alana Haim who is a fucking SUPERNOVA star.

Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn (Radu Jude, 2021): 3.5/5

A hypnotic and absurd satire on the childish, misinformed and hateful state of contemporary life. It definitely won't be for everyone, not least because of the hardcore pornography scattered throughout and the bizarre expression of feminist fury that is the conclusion. I will definitely re-watch this film at some point down the line. Also, it will be interesting to see how this film is going to age, as it is firmly planted in the year 2020, with the ubiquity of face masks throughout (sometimes worn under the nose, and commented on by other characters; Covid is never a major topic, though, merely a nuisance on the side that the characters are dealing with), but also its highly political themes. During the runtime I thought of both Chris Marker and Abbas Kiarostami. Those are lofty comparisons, especially for a movie so raunchy, but the unique blending of fact and fiction bears all the requisite hallmarks.

The Humans (Stephen Karam, 2021): 2/5

Most films and stories begin with indirect commotion to set the scene. An establishment of people, places and things relevant to the experience you're about to have. Idle chit-chat, a roaming camera perspective that hasn't settled on its primary subject yet. What THE HUMANS presupposes is, what if that were the entire movie?

By the time an actual non-ambient "set piece" occurs for the first time, the movie is 5 minutes from ending and I realized I'd spent 100+ waiting for it to start. It's a challenging way to tell a story - through off-hand gestures, fleeting dialogue exchanges, and heavily symbolic use of physical space. It's like you're strolling past the door frame through which the movie is happening but you never really stop there to observe it at length. Interesting, yes. Altman must be beaming in pride from the afterlife.

But I needed something to grasp onto. If the grand theme is something along the lines of: families are fragile and messy, corrosive and rotting, full of pain and excruciatingly mundane, but also unbreakable, a lighthouse in the stormy sea of life, then I get it and I got it within the first 5 minutes, hoping for an expansion, a deepening, a series of subsequent examples that really stoked some cerebral or emotional embers. Relationships can be dreadful. Okay. I must be missing something here. Intricate, unsettling sound design, arguably meticulous blocking and some observant bits of conversational nuance can't mean that much to me in a vacuum. Despite the A+ cast, this is the waiting room of films.

What Do We See When We Look at the Sky? (Aleksandre Kobridze, 2021): 3.5/5

Still processing this but it's really quite lovely if you can persist through the lulls and grab onto the details as required. I really appreciated it as a romantic fable that didn’t try to manipulate you, and as a city symphony.

Spencer (Pablo Larrain, 2021): 3/5

Spencer soars in its technicals, and Stewart is a genuine doppelganger here. The Greenwood score, j'adore, especially when it's all plasticky beads and chintzy jazz, and Claire Mathon shot the hell out of this.

Benedetta (Paul Verhoeven, 2021): 3/5

Textbook Verhoeven. Her only crime was being horny and theatrical.

Last Night in SoHo (Edgar Wright, 2021): 2/5

Honestly the whole movie hinges on the wigs not looking stupid and they kind of do.

King Richard (Reinaldo Marcus Green, 2021): 3/5

This doesn't make any sudden moves and sometimes that's the assignment.

The Last Duel (Ridley Scott, 2021): 3/5

“Customary protestations.” If I feel angry at the state of current society I guess I only need to watch a historical drama to remind me of the progress we've made.

The most surprising thing about this medieval France Rashomon is how little the remembered accounts of the three characters differ in their basic facts, only disputing the degree of Matt Damon's loserdom.

tick, tick...BOOM! (Lin Manuel Miranda, 2021): 1.5/5

Glad theater kids finally got their BLACK PANTHER. Kinda a problem though when your least favorite part of a musical is the musical numbers.

Passing (Rebecca Hall, 2021): 3.5/5

A lot to admire here, especially in how confident Rebecca Hall's direction is in knowing that this is her first feature film behind the camera - and also in what she brings out from both Tessa Thompson and Ruth Negga. Extra half star for the queer subtext.

The Eyes of Tammy Faye (Michael Showalter, 2021): 3/5

Great to watch the incredible journey of Andrew Garfield and Jessica Chastain’s jaws continuously grow over the course of 2 hours.

The Beta Test (Jim Cummings, 2021): 3/5

The tone of Eyes Wide Shut with the script of a 40s hard-boiled film noir that has the anxious danger of American Psycho lurking just beneath the film's surface. Juggles so many different ideas and critiques that it is on the verge of thematic incomprehensibility at every waking moment, but Cummings's performance is so maniacal (and honestly probably pretty accurate) that it's not too difficult to get onto this movie's wavelength for a bit. It's not fully cohesive, but it certainly holds your attention.

There's Someone Inside Your House (Patrick Brice, 2021): 1.5/5

Pretty blah. Not sure why Brice is concentrating on cheap chills rather than making more uneasy comedies like THE OVERNIGHT. What's that? Ka-ching, you say?

Introducing, Selma Blair (Rachel Fleit, 2021): 3/5

"This is what happens that I don't want people to see," says actress Selma Blair, as her comfort dog jumps off her lap and her speech begins to painfully shut down into a pall of spastic tremors.

You can't watch this scene without feeling profoundly moved.

Nine Days (Edson Oda, 2020): 1.5/5

Way too cute and superficially inspirational for my taste. Also, why is all the tech in this non-Earthly realm specifically from about four decades ago?

L'humanite (Bruno Dumont, 1999): 1/5

Soporifically uninteresting on every level save for its sheer cussed unconventionality. And Schotte's bizarro performance pretty much kills the movie for me. A stultifying debut. Any debate about the identity of the killer or the details of the murder investigation is utterly irrelevant.

Polisse (Maiwenn, 2011): 2/5

Tonally, a total mess. Vignettes veer from comedy to melodrama to kitchen sink drama to after-school-special and back again. The end is a baffling--yet gorgeously shot--moment that is completely unearned since no character is developed enough to make the beats really land. Would have made a gripping television show, but, I think CSI's got that covered.

rewatched Paris, Texas (Wim Wenders, 1984): 1.5/5

I kind of hate Sam Shepard, to be honest (as a writer, including for the stage)—his spill-your-guts approach to dramaturgy, while catnip to actors, tends to be the exact opposite of what moves me, and the extended finale here, which I assume the movie's ardent fans treasure, still seems to me that most egregious of sins, the regurgitated backstory. (And what a weird way of saying he was an abusive pedophile. But ok... as long as he is sad about it!)

Also, maybe I’m too stupid to understand Harry Dean Stanton's appeal but he doesn’t have the chops in the form of silent charisma to carry a movie like this.

Gervaise (Rene Clement, 1956): 4/5

Perhaps the ultimate example of what the Cahiers du Cinema critics meant when they were denouncing "la qualité française." The thing about "la qualité française" is that it was still, well, quality. GERVAISE fits the Howard Hawks definition of a masterpiece containing three great scenes and no bad ones: a wince-inducing sudsy fight at a laundromat, a long dinner with a bunch of miniature arcs in its own right, and a feverish cup-massage scene that goes out of control. Lots of fantastic little details along the way – mud on boots in the Louvre, a bunch of tiny sight gags that reveal character at a show – and Maria Schell is a great lead.

Valerie and Her Week of Wonders (Jaromil Jires, 1970): 1.5/5

Narratively in shambles, as deeply surrealist stuff tends to be. There's also a great deal of unintentionally silly imagery being put to poor use (e.g. just about all of the Nosferatu-looking demons, the powdery make-up of the mother, etc.).

Vic + Flo Saw a Bear (Denis Cote, 2013): 1/5

SPOILER ALERT:

Strictly speaking, no they didn't.

The Beatles: Get Back (Peter Jackson, Michael Lindsay-Hogg): 5/5

Massive. A band grinding out songs and arrangements, working hard and keeping things light and loose, inviting chance and grabbing ideas as they arise. You never get to see a band actually do this extremely common thing, and in this case WTF it’s the Beatles. Big takehome is how much John and Paul love each other. John would do anything for Paul except take seriously shit songs like Maxwell and The Long and Winding Road. Like late QT, Paul’s genius can no longer tell the difference between his hits and his misses, and he won’t listen or take hints. 

The French Dispatch (Wes Anderson, 2021): 3.5/5

Anderson’s densest text yet, which will turn some people off. His stop-motion stuff and live stuff are merging, and this one is for those folks who didn’t think Grand Budapest had enough frames within frames, models and animated sequences. His movies always get better on re-watch, but I suspect this one will remain in the bottom half of his films for me.

Old Henry (Potsy Ponciroli, 2021): 4/5

Reminiscent of early Coen Bros: a genre piece full of violence and irony. Good script with a perfect (for me) balance between talk (not much) and action (much). 

The Beta Test (Jim Cummings, 2021): 3/5

Lacks the funkiness and warmth of Cummings’ Thunder Road and Wolf of Snow Hollow. The douche-chills fragility and vulnerability remains, and there is a more savage edge here, plus extreme lying. Gah, a miserable character!

Last Night In Soho (Edgar Wright, 2021): 2.5/5

Wright’s most adult movie, which still displays a teenage conception of the world, at best. As always, there are a lot of hot shit CGI transitions and edits that would have felt 10x better if accomplished, however arduously, in camera. I can definitely see how this is Beat Girl (see below) plus Blood and Black Lace (see last movie run-down), so good on ya!? Critical consensus seems to be that the first half is good but the second half bad. But I found the beginning and end to be fun and good and the second act to be boring and bad.

Bergman Island (Mia Hansen-Løve, 2021): 2.5/5

The conflict in this travelogue is nonexistent or else extremely, extremely sublimated. It would certainly fall into the bottom quarter of Bergman’s works. 

Encanto (Jared Bush/Byron Howard/Charise Castro Smith, 2021): 3/5

Unusually, the protagonist does NOT undertake a literal journey. The drama is internal (all taking place in a single house), and although it was too slow for many of the kids in the theatre (Jack was fine), I was surprised by ending’s emotional punch. Chock full of tuneless Lin-Manuel rap songs: yuk. 

Blue, 12 min. (Apichatpong Weerasethakul): 4/5

A woman lies in bed, dreaming and remembering, until her soul catches fire and consumes her and then the world. (Or at least that’s my guess). Huge symbols with the barest cinematic means. 

7362, 10 min. (Pat O’Neill, 1967): 3.5/5

An exercise combining Matisse’s cutouts, Rorschach, acid and naked ladies. What’s not to like?

Angel (Ernst Lubitsch, 1937): 3/5

An uncharacteristically serious outing for Lubitsch, and a better love triangle than, say, Sabrina. Until the end, I really didn’t know which man Dietrich would pick, and I confess I was a bit disappointed by her choice. Best ever love triangle movies? Design for Living? The Philadelphia Story? Casablanca?

Bluebeard’s Eighth Wife (Ernst Lubitsch, 1938): 3.5/5

Screenplay by Charles Bracket and Billy Wilder. “The class of people who come here gets worse every year. [looks Gary Cooper over suspiciously] and this year we seem to have next year’s crowd already.“ I’m not sure Claudette Colbert manages to stitch together a coherent character from scene to scene, still each bit is pretty amusing. 

Only Yesterday (Isao Takahata, 1991): 2/5

An unusually straight-forward drama (for an animated movie) about a young woman taking a long vacation in a farming region of Japan and falling In love with a young organic farmer—while also remembering/flashing back to barely relevant moments of her life as a young girl.  

Beat Girl (aka Wild for Kicks) (Edmond T. Gréville, 1960): 3.5/5

A juvenile delinquent, good-girl-gone-wrong movie, capitalizing (I imagine) on the sexual frankness of And God Created Woman four years earlier. Here, English Bardot-look-alike Noëlle Adam (who will later be picked up in the record store by Malcolm McDowell/Alex and mechanically screwed in fast-motion—as well as photographed in the nude by David Hemmings/Thomas) explores the gamey of world of London Strip clubs. Includes a half-dozen real boobs (in 1960) and an extremely sexy, frank and dirty strip club scene for the time—or any time. 

Novelistic-or-Not Film Fest

Re-watching Secret Sunshine just as I finished Franzen’s Crossroads (which I took great pleasure in) prompted me to think about what “novelistic” means. Setting aside the issue of “interiority,” we’re probably talking about movies that are long and full of characters and situations that evolve/change radically. Some movies that seem novelistic in this way, off the top of the dome: The Godfather, Giant, Gone with the Wind… (I’m afraid I’m not really doing much with this definition other than making Jerry’s skin itch, yet I persist).

Secret Sunshine, 2h22min. (Chang-dong Lee, 2007): 5/5

Zeroing in on this idea of a “novelistic” movie, here our heroine moves through the widest possible range of emotions and situations—which demonstrably changes her fundamental attitude toward her life and being alive, multiple times. Unlike so many movies focusing on female pain, her character remains active. Doing things (even if they are self-destructive and meaningless) seems powerful and hopeful—in fact pretty much the essence of the human condition. And Lee is smart to also include a more “basic” character to always ground her suffering in dumb joy and hope. 

Our Time, 2h57min. (Carlos Reygadas, 2018): 2/5

Not novelistic. Lots of beauty here but in its bagginess, indulgence and dissipation, the work it reminds me the most of is Inland Empire. Sicinski claims this tale of a humiliating open marriage is autobiographical enough to have “removed the frame” to the extent that he wonders whether it is even art (!?). If this is true, it is a true act of Fassbinderian masochism.

My Sex Life…or How I Got Into an Argument, 2h 58min. (Arnaud Desplechin, 1996): 2/5

Not novelistic.  A gabfest chock full of solipsistic characters, very much a la The Mother and the Whore and just as dull. I ask myself whether I would have liked and related to these characters if I was closer to their age, but I believe I would have then been if anything even more puzzled and antagonized by this tone poem of the sexy and self-satisfied. 

Once Upon a Time in America, 3h49min. (Sergio Leone, 1984): 3/5

Novelistic. Full of grand and epic street scenes, with 100s of people walking through massive sets or just 40 people casually sitting around. Three time-frames in a dreamy jumble. The kid stuff has a certain Bugsy Malone quality except there’s a lot of 14-year-old prostitution-adjacent content. In fact, the movie is fascinated in general with all possible below-the-belly-button activity, always to embarrassingly dated effect. For example, our fine, handsome and soulful protagonist very certainly commits two screaming, crying rapes. Yippee! To emphasize the grand emotions, the last 30 minutes slows to a deadly, Refn-ish crawl. 

Marketa Lazarová, 2h42min. (Frantisek Vlácil): 2.5/5

Not novelistic. In fact, barely narrative. Hawks, slaughter and miles of mucky pools of standing water in 16th century snow and slush. Do you find Andrei Rublev insufficiently dreamy and incoherent? Then this is the epic for you. 

Love Exposure, 3h57min. (Sion Sono, 2008): 1.5/5

Not novelistic. A silly, broad, adolescent sex comedy. This was something of a sensation in Japan, which doesn’t speak well for the country and its future. 

Margaret, 2h58min. (Kenneth Lonergan, 2011): 4/5

Novelistic. Addressing a complex moral problem (ones own responsibility for and contribution to the everyday horrors of the world) with many casually real scenes, filled with swirling and intense emotions and, at times, great acting. Also on some level a portrait of a divisive post-911 NYC.