A “Mid” Winter

 

It Was Just an Accident (Jafar Panahi, 2025): 4/5

I’m amazed at the tone for such as story: relaxed and funny, yet so clearly addressing ultimate things. Fascinating to see what normal life in Tehran is like. It’s pretty there—tree-lined streets not unlike Paris or the Valley. The final showdown could have been on dirt Mulholland. Typical of Pahani’s characteristic depth that his revenge movie is mostly about doubt and empathy. I also appreciate all the scenes in a car, which is very much a tradition of Iranian film from Kiarostami’s Taste of Cherry to Pahani’s own very humanistic Taxi from 2015. Shots in a car are so glide-y, and provide a rare sense of private space and source of identity in this regulated city. Not my favorite Pahani (See: No Bears, Crimson Gold, Taxi), but as with PTA, if everyone wants to get behind a good film by one of my favorite directors, I’m here for it. 

 

Frankenstein (Guillermo del Toro, 2025): 3/5

There are some disastrous decisions: lots of CGI slop, and really the whole first 20 minutes, with its unkillable The Thing-like monster. But overall, I could appreciate the film’s old-fashioned high drama and set design. It’s crazy that GDT makes a movie about killing your father/killing God/ killing your Idols to live—and he made it an homage to his artistic forefathers and idols (Universal, Whale, and Karloff). The guy has no grasp on irony at all. It also suffers from the fact that Oscar Isaac already played a more interesting Victor Frankenstein character in Ex Machina.

 

Blue Moon (Richard Linklater, 2025): 3/5

A beautiful, literate and sad script. And it’s a good thing, since that’s pretty much all there is here. I bow to no one in my appreciation for Ethan Hawke (once upon a time, I even read his goddamn book (not bad!)), but is he really the right person to play this gay Jewish dwarf?

 

Train Dreams (Clint Bentley, 2025): 3/5

Beautiful and sad sad sad, but it’s hard to love this film in a world where Malick himself is, in fact, alive and well. 

 

* Avatar: Fire and Ash (James Cameron, 2025): 3/5

I still remember the feeling of something very fresh and new while watching the first Avatar. In contrast, there’s almost nothing new here. Still, Cameron still knows how to assemble an action sequence, and I guess I just like immersive, world-building sci-fi. 

 

Wake Up Dead Man (Rian Johnson, 2025): 3/5

I have little interest in the cleverness that powers these films, but Josh O’Conner makes this one the most watchable of the three. Who could possibly give a shit about the solution to random puzzles like these?

 

The Perfect Neighbor (Geeta Gandbhir, 2025): 2.5/5

I take no pleasure in a documentary like this. To me, there’s a big difference between this and a movie where emotions (no matter how horrific) are simulated and the people who are shot stand up and go back home at the end of the day. A movie like that is allowed to mean nothing or anything. Movies like this have to justify their exhibition of real suffering through relevance, which I’m not sure this movie does.

 

Jay Kelly (Noah Baumbach, 2025): 2.5/5

it’s a pleasure to watch Clooney (who is reliably good here), but the style and tone distractingly derivative of Fellini’s 8 1/2. Disappointingly, I didn’t relate at all to Kelly’s desire to cling to his daughters. 

 

Eternity (David Freyne, 2025): 2.5/5

Someone on Letterboxd commented that if Luca Guadagnino had made this, he would have had the boys kissing by the 20 minute mark, and yes that’s exactly what this premise demanded.

 

Die My Love (Lynne Ramsay, 2025): 2/5

That title promises an undelivered intensity and mayhem. This is mere depression with the occasional self-harm. Of course, I like these actors, but neither really bring the goods. It’s also unfortunate that the film comes on the heels of a much better one about postpartum depression, If I Had Legs I’d Kick You. Upon reflection, I don’t care much for any of Ramsay’s five features. 

 

The Lowdown, Season One (Sterlin Harjo, 2025): 3.5/5

Hawke is much better here than in Blue Moon, and the series is admirably wooly—filled with rich asides and side characters. A nice sense of place, and good performances from Dinklage and Kyle MacLachlan. 

 

Pluribus, Season One (Vince Gilligan, 2025): 3/5

The first two episodes are exceptional, but next 7 hours could have been summed up in an email. The central question is a good one: would you rather be happy or yourself? We are really going to have to know more about the “weirdos” to be able to answer this question. Like: Is the end of art? 

 

Rewatch December

 

Buster Scruggs (Joel and Ethan Coen, 2016): 3/5

The Coen’s last movie, to date. I like the short-story nature of it, and there is a likable interested in adventure and death. But it’s plagued with the same broad performances and tone that can plague the Coens’ weaker films, (Hudsucker, O Brother, Intolerable Cruelty, The Ladykillers, Hail Caesar,)

 

Under the Skin (Jonathan Glazer, 2013): 5/5

My favorite of Glazier’s films, an exceptional mix of realism and high art. Unnerving, full of ambiguity, and oh so sexy until it isn’t. Johansen has never been so beautiful. The seduction scenes in the flat black room offer something startling and new—with a perfect use of music. The turn toward self-discovery in the third half is as welcome as it is sad and grotesque.

 

Kaili Blues (Bi Gan, 2015): 5/5

The 40-minute long one-er is the purest of cinematic pleasures and one of my favorite sequences of the 21st century. A dreamy you-are-there trip by scooter and on foot, into a beautiful unknown down the valley, across the river, and around.