How To With John Wilson (John Wilson, 2020): 5/5

A singular audiovisual experience. My jaw drops like 5 times per episode. I thought he couldn’t top getting into the referee dinner but then he follows it up with a woman putting a live pigeon in a Duane Reade bag and I am fucking screaming.

Curb Your Enthusiasm Season 10 (Jeff Schaffer, 2020): 5/5

Guffawed like a sick donkey as per usual. Missed Marty Funkhouser. RIP Bob Einstein.

Soul (Pete Docter, 2020): 3.5/5 

What a nice little movie. Frequently clever, and more visually inventive than the last handful of Pixar movies even while it plunges ever deeper into the platitudinous. 

P.S. I would like to be scooped up and ride in the Jerry blob. I think this would be both the best and most existential ride at Disneyland so it will never happen but I want it.

Siberia (Abel Ferrera, 2020): 3.5/5

The problem with the past is that by the time it starts to haunt you it's too long gone to mend. Unable to find peace in isolation, Dafoe's Clint goes on a "trip to the lake", a dream voyage deep into the subconscious in which he accesses repressed memories and childhood experiences. (This is a film that lives and dies on how open minded one is going in.) Reminiscent of Lynch, Tarkovsky, Malick, Fellini, and Matthew Barney. Extra half star for the Del Shannon's "Runaway" bit.

The Midnight Sky (George Clooney, 2020): 2/5

"the astronauts are sad again"

-me, 100 minutes into this film

Sure the film nails all of the technical elements, but these hardly compensate for excruciatingly slow pacing, underdeveloped characters, a disappointing lack of dramatic tension, and it also features one of Alexandre Desplat’s worst and most cloying scores.

Seduced: Inside the NXIVM Cult (Cecilia Peck, 2020): 3/5

The Vow (Karim Amer, 2020): 2/5

Cults are wild. This guy said shit like "women enjoy rape actually" and "where's the harm in a parent having sex with their child if the kid enjoys it?" in a seminar and rich-ass dumb-ass white people ate it up.

Cloud Atlas (Tom Tykwer, Lilly & Lana Wachowski, 2012): 2/5

Here we have six stories, each more tedious than the last, made semi-palatable by cutting them ever more frantically together as a virtuosic exercise in parallel construction. The constant cross-cutting successfully staves off boredom, but it also inadvertently underscores how fundamentally thin and didactic these episodes are, as they now build simultaneously to their respective pleas for inclusion and tolerance. And while I can applaud the everything-blind stunt casting in principle, it's a ghastly distraction in practice. Like most grand follies, this was worth experiencing once, but I wouldn't want to go near it again.

The Undoing (David E. Kelley, 2020): 2.5/5

Or, Big Little Lies East Coast Edition

Rich white people's lives being destroyed is actually one of my favorite genres.

Small Axe: Mangrove (Steve McQueen, 2020): 3/5

An impassioned, urgent retelling of the 1971 historic trial of the Mangrove Nine, which follows the struggle of Black immigrants in London as they fight against police harassment and institutional racism. With great performances all around, this is compelling and efficient in retelling one of the most pivotal courtroom moments in British history that is often forgotten by many.

Small Axe: Lovers Rock (Steve McQueen 2020): 3/5

Agree w/ Justin about this being reminiscent of Altman. AND only 70 minutes!

Small Axe: Red, White and Blue (Steve McQueen, 2020): 3.5/5

Destined to pale in comparison to the moral crusade of MANGROVE and the intoxicating sensuality of LOVERS ROCK, this story is just as important if decidedly less sexy. Boyega has never been better.

Small Axe: Alex Wheatle (Steve McQueen, 2020): 3.5/5

A great coming-of-age story about a lost young man finding his people and himself. The tribute to the fallen of the 1981 New Cross house fire was stirring, reminiscent of late Spike Lee.

Small Axe: Education (Steve McQueen, 2020): 3/5

Works much better as a critique of education systems than it does as a character piece, which is perfectly fine given its breezy runtime. Well crafted and with great performances. Ending this episode with Kingsley reading from Kings & Queens of Africa was both a beautiful way to end the episode and a powerful way to end the series.

rewatched A Charlie Brown Christmas (Bill Melendez, 1965): 5/5

A fearless exploration of post-war ennui and depression in small town America.

Time (Garrett Bradley, 2020): 3.5/5

I had an enormous crush on Garrett Bradley back when we were both at UCLA. (She was in Janet Bergstrom's French Cinema of the 1930s seminar with me.) Her new doc will surely resonate with viewers as she shows Sibil Fox Richardson’s story (Fox Rich) of trying to free her husband from prison who is serving a 60-year sentence for armed robbery. The film is a testament to Rich’s single-minded sustenance of her marriage and family (the couple has 4 boys), as well as an indictment of the criminal justice system that not only delivers punishment far outweighing the crime, but then doggedly does everything possible to obstruct an offender’s rehabilitation.

The crisp, black-and-white gorgeously shot sequences filmed in the present day, with a mixture of new HD footage and miniDV footage that spans 21 years emphasizes just how time is at once moving too fast and too slow for the Richardson family. Personal, subtle, and beautifully done. Really loved the airy, ecstatic piano music of Emahoy Tsegue-Maryam Guebrou too.

I'm Your Woman (Julia Hart, 2020): 1.5/5

Remarkably boring, with vapid dialogue and a high degree of self-seriousness. I don't know about you, but if someone hands me a baby and tells me it's mine I'm gonna have a lot of questions.

Another Round (Thomas Vinterberg, 2020): 3/5

A tad underwhelming and too narratively/thematically simplistic, but I'll give an extra half star for that Mads Mikkelsen dance sequence.

Feels Good Man (Arthur Jones, 2020): 3.5/5

A reclamation project, FEELS GOOD MAN tries to rescue Pepe the Frog, a cartoon character created by Matt Furie for a 2005 comic called Boy’s Club, from the Internet trolls and hate groups who bizarrely co-opted him as a symbol and mascot during the Trump era. The interviews with 4channers and those on that side exist less to justify the racist, xenophobic and bigoted acts of those on the alt-right but more to both understand them and to give context to the battle at play. One of the better documentaries I’ve seen on internet culture and an understanding for not just how the internet functions and how it impacts popular culture, but an understanding of creative ownership to boot.

Sharp Objects (Jean-Marc Vallee, 2018): 1.5/5

This could be a textbook example of when not to implement the slow-burn. There’s no reason at all this should be 8 hours long. With a whodunnit murder mystery where the detective work goes nowhere leaving the journalist to explore her unexceptional small-town, her largely unexceptional family, and her unexceptional life (even her pity seems trite), itself, the slow burn's consequence is a borefest. A subdued, rewardless exercise in dark moody visuals and victimized trauma that hardly leaves (the dreadfully unlikeable) Amy Adams’ POV - the complete opposite of what made Vallee’s luminous ensemble BIG LITTLE LIES so compelling.

Let Him Go (Thomas Bezucha, 2020): 2/5

Lesley Manville is a scene stealer in LET HIM GO as the terrifying matriarch of the Weboy family. Too bad the film around her is every bit as tired and worn down as Kevin Costner and Diane Lane’s characters are from the drawn out, basic storytelling. Emotionally gripping at times but ultimately flat.

The Wolf of Snow Hollow (Jim Cummings, 2020): 2.5/5

More emotional meltdown cop comedy from Cummings, this time in a whodunit murder mystery premise involving a werewolf. I prefer THUNDER ROAD (2018).

Let Them All Talk (Steven Soderbergh, 2020): 2/5

Should have made this about Candice Bergen’s character working in retail. More evidence that she is being woefully underutilized by movies.

Luxor (Zeina Durra, 2020): 2/5

A subtle, gentle mood piece in what is essentially a spiritually-inflected BEFORE SUNSET. Riseborough impresses with an intriguingly ambiguous, restrained turn, but the film is a dud though, lacking in narrative momentum and at times feels more like a travelogue serving to deliver only a stunning sense of place of Egypt.

Happiest Season (Clea DuVall, 2020): 2/5

Depicts what should be an extinction-level event in this relationship between what appears to be an endlessly patient victim (who seemingly has no cause to trust anyone we meet in this film) and a gaslighting narcissist. If this was about a hetero relationship you'd be foaming at the mouth in fury about the level of abuse. I liked the weird sister and Aubrey Plaza here though.

Sound of Metal (Darius Marder, 2019): 3.5/5

Thought-provoking and emotionally absorbing, director-writer Darius Marder creates a highly empathetic drama in SOUND OF METAL, concerning a former addict/drummer who loses his hearing. Along with its evocative and inventive sound design, the film puts us directly inside the lead character’s headspace giving us a true immersion, presenting a convincing predicament of such tragic proportions. Riz Ahmed gives a mesmerizing, hurting performance.

The Dark Crystal (Jim Henson, 1982): 2/5

That it was a box-office hit surprises me, frankly, as it's seemingly too dark and grim for small children but unquestionably too earnest and simplistic for adults. Obviously an outstanding technical achievement, don't get me wrong, but at times so diabolically slow it feels more like a travelogue than an adventure. And impressive though it may be I just hate the design. Sure, let's build this richly imagined, intricately detailed fantasy world only everything is old and gross. I'd much rather watch Henson and Oz riff, honestly.

2020 Movies

Lovers Rock (Steve McQueen, 2020): 5/5

Reminiscent of peak Altman, it’s a great party and a portrait of a whole community and culture—the clothes, the food, the modes of transportation, the furniture, the social norms, but mostly the music—all in 70 masterful minutes. Even better if you watch Mangrove first, since all this beauty is demonstrated to be so fragile and hard-won.

Spontaneous (Brian Duffield, 2020): 4.5/5

A teenage love story where people are suddenly just exploding for no reason. Funny, fast-paced, bloody and heartfelt. 

Tenet (Christopher Nolan, 2020): 1.5/5

Soooooo boring. The idea that some people and objects move forward in time and others move backwards, if simply told and well executed, could have led to some fun and funky images. This movie manages to avoid all of them. 

Mank (David Fincher, 2020): 1.5/5

Boring and self-satisfied. A horrible script that where every line is delivered like it’s the bon mot that puts a button on the scene. What is this movie even about?

The Nest (Sean Durkin, 2020): 3.5/5

Like Durkin’s Martha Marcy, this movie perennially seems on the brink of becoming a horror movie. I wish the protagonists were more expressive, but alas symbolism will have to suffice. Still, the father reminded me of Melissa’s wacky dad, and the movie culminates in a four-character crescendo that gave me the chills. Michelle is right that Jude Law is on another level here.

Sound of Metal (Darius Marder, 2020): 3/5

Title and marketing imagery makes one think that this will be hard core, but it is actually a sweet, routine (dull), well-acted movie made by sweet, routine people. I get their point and they are correct!! Acceptance is the bomb. I don’t regret my time but it’s no Whiplash. 

Zombi Child (Bertrand Bonello, 2020): 2/5

Is Bonello the right person to tell this story about a black girl and her multi-generational relationship with Haiti and its mythology? We may never know. 

Richard Linklater Mini Fllmfest

For a guy who has made several of my favorite movies, it’s fascinating that he also regularly makes impersonal pieces of industrial content. I’ve seen 16 of his movies.

Tape (Richard Linklater, 2001): 3/5

Good acting and a pretty compelling teleplay. These people really don’t seem to like one another. 

Last Flag Flying (Richard Linklater, 2017): 2/5

Dour and maudlin. A disastrous performance by the Bryan Cranston playing it too big as he lamely channels Nicholson from The Last Detail. 

Where’d you go, Bernadette (Richard Linklater, 2019): 2.5/5

Genius architect loses, then re-finds, her groove. Linklater is often interested in the slippery nature of creativity, and Cate Blanchett is always great, but there’s surprisingly little going on here.

Rossellini Mini-Filmfest

I generally have antipathy towards Rossellini, and very recently I actively hated The Taking of Power by Louis XIV. Nevertheless, these three movies are probably my favorite of the eight movies of his I’ve seen. Is it him or me?

The Flowers of St. Francis (Roberto Rossellini, 1950): 4/5

Told as a series of vignettes from St. Francis’ life. I enjoyed how unadorned this one was.

Stromboli (Roberto Rossellini, 1950): 4/5

The second half, with its Flaherty-like documentary big fish haul and a real erupting volcano of course, is extraordinary and emotional. The last 10 minutes in particular are ravishing and ecstatic. 

Europe 51 (Roberto Rossellini, 1952): 4/5

If Jesus were Alive Today, They Would Lock Him Up: The Movie. Compelling, moving and unsentimental. 

Fassbinder Mini-Filmfest

Previously I had only watched Ali (masterpiece), the Marriage of MB (should rewatch) and In a Year with 13 Moons (you couldn’t pay me enough to rewatch). I’m amazed (in a good way) how he just keeps retelling, The Blue Angel, with his characters again and again plummeting headlong and almost joyfully into masochistic and degrading relationships. The adored object almost seems to hypnotize the protagonist into self-destruction. Or as Rilke says, “Beauty is just the beginning of terror, which we are barely able to endure, and it amazes us so because it serenely distains to destroy us.”

The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant (Rainer Werner Fassbiner, 1972): 3.5

The first half is stagy and self-pitying, but the second half roars back with some superb masochistic degradation all around. Irm Hermann is excellently creepy as a mute servant.

Merchant of Four Seasons (Rainer Werner Fassbiner, 1972): 3/5

Points towards Haneke’s Cache, where the bourgeois existence is denied to a man because of the “original trauma” of Algeria. 

Fox and His Friends (Rainer Werner Fassbiner, 1975): 3.5/5

Extremely humiliating for the protagonist and degrading to the viewer. To root for this guy is to enter into a masochistic relationship with someone who will always disappoint and will always be taken for a schnook. As an actor, Fassbinder is superb and heartbreaking. How could he successfully portray someone so stupid, blank and naïve?

Lola (Rainer Werner Fassbiner, 1981): 3/5

Reverses The Blue Angel in that once the intellectual gives into the corruption, he is able to integrate into his community and everything is fine again. Filmed In the most hideous possible garish colors and light. One of the visually ugliest movies I’ve ever seen. 

Veronika Voss (Rainer Werner Fassbiner, 1982): 4/5

An actress who used to be a star during the Nazi era and is now heroin-addicted and out of work—and the masochist who destroys his life trying to help her! It was the PICTURES that got anti-fascist! 

And The Rest

Ugetsu, rw (Kenji Mizoguchi, 1953): 2.5/5

I keep trying with Mizoguchi, and I am starting to notice some cool things with long, gliding shots. But it’s still so glacial and performative. 

Trouble in Paradise (Ernst Lubitsch, 1932): 3/5

I don’t usually love “two wisecracking criminals who are in love” movies, a la Mr and Mrs Smith, but this was snappy as can be. The movie’s irony and detachment (which probably explains its popularity) also makes it a bit unemotional and insubstantial. 

To Be or Not to Be, rw (Ernst Lubitch, 1942): 4.5/5

It’s hard to believe this was made in 1942. Jack Benny revealing himself firmly in the line of Groucho, Bugs Bunny, early Woody Allen, and Bill Murray—guys that are outside of the drama looking in. 

Il Sorpasso (Dino Risi, 1962): 4/5

Very enjoyable—and generous towards all kinds of people. Serious Beat energy-of-the-road (like Going Places) and a very Bill Murray insouciance. Also full of lust, reminding me of the Czech New Wave. Hopper himself said Easy Rider was inspired by it. 

Big Deal on Madonna Street (Mario Monicelli, 1958): 2.5/5

Watched (more comedia d’Italie) after liking Il Sorpasso so much, but this one much broader and less spontaneous-feeling. 

Le Million (Renè Clair, 1931): 3/5

A cross between a farce and a light opera. From that era when some of the sequences are silent (and terrific) and others have sound (and are fine.)

Night and Fog in Japan (Nagisa Oshima, 1960): 1.5/5

“I despise therefore I am.” Bitter personal recriminations and resentments are aired about the “failed” youth protests against the treaties between the U.S. and Japan. Spectacularly anti-dramatic.

Muriel, or the Time of Return (Alain Resnais, 1963): 3/5

I think I might have watched this before, but one may never know. 

Les Dames du Bois de Boulogne (Robert Bresson, 1945): 3.5/5

Nasty people playing a cruel trick on an innocent. Revenge is best served to oneself. 

Donkey Skin (Jacques Demy, 1970): 3/5

Like Cocteau’s Beauty and the Beast in bright colors, a lighter tone, and songs by Michel Legrand. Not close to Umbrellas or Rocheford but not nothin’.

Limite (Mario Peixoto, 1931): 3/5

Abstract, perhaps ambient, Brazilian silent. Fun with the right music. 

Citizen Kane, rw (Orson Welles, 1941): 5/5 

Complex and beautiful, with an astonishing iterative structure. The song and dance sequence with its costumes and high contrast lights while simultaneously Joseph Cotten is pointing out everyone’s hypocrisy is utterly masterful.  Heavy, heavy Trump vibes. 

The Dark Knight Rises (Christopher Nolan, 2012): 2/5

Wherein Bane and the uprising of the multicultural orphans-of-the-system are … repressed by an army of police, supported of course by the Bat Man.

Devil’s Doorway (Anthony Mann, 1950): 3.5/5

An unflinching and downbeat depiction of race. Some of the greatest action sequences I’ve seen.

Night Nurse (William Wellman, 1931)

Frank and modern attitudes toward career woman abound.

Tabu: A Story of the South Seas (F.W. Murnau, 1931): 3.5/5

A luxurious romantic idyll, which is punished. As inauthentic as it is, it reminded me of Flaherty terms of the realism of its setting. It’s a shame it all has to be filtered through the lens of Female Suffering.

2020 films (so far)

Mank (David Fincher, 2020): 2/5

Greatest film ever made about the 1934 California gubernatorial campaign. The Welles vs. Mankiewicz authorship kerfuffle that's being used to hype this movie is a dead horse; Robert Carringer's archival scholarship has conclusively demonstrated how Welles's revisions significantly improved Mank's draft.  And, thankfully, the film largely avoids that issue, as it's really about how Mank arrived at his script titled "American."  But the characterization of Mank is mostly a one-note repetition of cynical Hollywood insider schtick, which isn't half as clever as Fincher et al think it is.  Perhaps this would play better in a theater, but on TV the photography and score look and sound like standard episodic Netflix fare.  The fake cigarette burns signifying reel changes and Fincher's appreciation of film culture only highlight how flat, grey-scaled, and "digital" this looks compared to celluloid.  A disappointment all around.

Sound of Metal (Darius Marder, 2020): 5/5

An alt-rock art-metal drummer loses his hearing and must cope with how it upends his life.  Here's a movie that really benefits from quarantined viewing in silence, as the story is told as much with sound design as words and images.  One could quibble with some gaps in plot or perhaps a predictable resolution, but lord knows we could use some fucking resolution these days.  Holding it all together is a stunning performance by Riz Ahmed (mesmerizing in the HBO series The Night Of and as the hapless sidekick in Nightcrawler), who has a vulnerable intensity and expressive eyes rivaled only by Chiwetel Ejiofor.

I'm Thinking of Ending Things (Charlie Kaufman, 2020): 3/5

I couldn't agree more, Charlie.  The argument in the car featuring a verbatim recitation of Pauline Kael's review of A Woman Under the Influence was priceless.  This being a CK film and all, I didn't give a shit about figuring it out, and just enjoyed it while it lasted.

Hillbilly Elegy (Ron Howard, 2020): W/O

I attempted a hate watch but couldn't make it past 20 minutes.  But I'm sympathetic to Ron Howard's frustration with the source material. 

 Tenet (Christopher Nolan, 2020): 1/5

Or, WHY BOTHER: THE MOVIE

Just absolutely atrocious all around. The paper-thin characterization. The joyless ostentatious ploys toward spectacle. The ceaseless exposition and loud, convoluted setpieces. (Yet no matter how didactically it explains its physics to you, the mechanics never come close to making sense.) The editing is some of the worst in a major blockbuster for years, frequently foregoing logic entirely in the vague hope the viewer will get caught up in its simultaneous “forwards/inverted reality” setup. And don't get me started on the sound mixing. (What good is a complex plot if it’s too hard to hear or understand???)

Pretty sure Nolan has a dick swinging contest with his future self to see who can come up with the most emotionally unsatisfying, quasi-philosophical concept that is half-well executed.

Mank (David Fincher, 2020): 2.5/5

Touching though it may be that Fincher has brought to screen the script written by his late father, and love letter though it might be intended to the golden era of Hollywood, MANK is aggressively disappointing. While much effort was put into creating the feel of a film from the era of CITIZEN KANE, not enough effort was put into translating the concerns of its historical story in a way that makes audiences actually care. This is a film to be intellectualized over, not to be resonated with - which is a shame because there is a human story here, buried underneath all the masturbatory "old-Hollywood" fetishism. An impressive simulacrum of classic Hollywood, but it contains zero revelations, historical or human. And then there's that distractingly inept score.

Ammonite (Francis Lee, 2020): 3/5

I came here for Gay Kate Winslet yearning and that's what I got. Overall though, this film just makes you recognize the true sorcery that is PORTRAIT OF A LADY ON FIRE.

Hillbilly Elegy (Ron Howard, 2020): 1/5

Glenn Close's makeup - zoo-wee mama! A milquetoast, exasperatingly mawkish adaptation of a controversial memoir from doltish venture capitalist J.D. Vance. At no point do any of the filmmakers seem to have considered answering the question: Why should I care about this awful little shit?

Thunder Road (Jim Cummings, 2018): 3.5/5

EIGHTH GRADE for dads. On-point-tragicomedy that shows how highly talented Jim Cummings is. A nice, touching, and enjoyable movie.

Mute (Duncan Jones, 2018): 1.5/5

Less of a film and more of a test on how long you can sit through an absolute mess. And there's honestly no reason for this story to take place in some BLADE RUNNER knockoff future dystopia, which makes the truly crappy-looking BLADE RUNNER knockoff future dystopia all the more disappointing.

A Rainy Day in New York (Woody Allen, 2019): 2/5

I mean, we’ve run out of things to say about new Woody Allen movies, right? Not just because those things inevitably become subservient to what we know about him as a person, but because Allen himself long ago seemed to run out of things to say worth making a new movie about. His latest attempt at effervescent dramedy casts Timothee Chalamet and Elle Fanning as Gatsby (yes, swear to god) and Ashleigh, a college couple who head to Manhattan for a weekend, where Ashleigh's assignment to interview a famous movie director (Liev Schreiber) and Gatsby's wandering spirit lead them on very different misadventures. Gatsby and Ashleigh are merely the latest variations on familiar Allen types—he the intellectual Woody surrogate who drops references to Irving Berlin songs, she the doe-eyed ingenue that older men can’t help but fall for—in a narrative that suggest the cultural interests of American 20-somethings ossified 70 years ago. If there’s anything of interest here, it’s Selena Gomez as the sister of Gatsby’s ex-girlfriend, in an eye-opening performance that somehow manages to make Allen’s ridiculous dialogue sound frisky.

Guest of Honour (Atom Egoyan, 2019): 2/5

Trashy yet ponderous tale of a persnickety health inspector and his bizarrely self-righteous/self-castigating daughter, needlessly told in flashback to kindly priest Luke Wilson. Little of what happens makes much emotional sense and ultimately there was just no rescuing this one.

Rebecca (Ben Wheatley, 2020): 1/5

“Why should you hate me?” Rebecca (2020) asked; “what have I ever done to you that you should hate me?”

“You tried to take Rebecca (1940)'s place,” said everybody.

Absolute garbage.

Braindead (Peter Jackson, 1992): 2/5

Jackson leans too hard on the gross-out for my (uh) taste, I prefer the first two acts, when Lionel is valiantly attempting to pretend this zombie apocalypse isn't happening, to the extended bloodsoaked finale. And the film loses me completely at the rooftop climax, with Mum for some reason re-emerging as a lucid behemoth.

Crime and Punishment (Josef von Sternberg, 1935): 3/5

Josef von Sternberg, Peter Lorre, and Fyodor Dostoevsky – that’s quite a combination. But leans too heavily and simplistically on religious moralizing, leaving behind the entire punishment phase of Crime and Punishment. Loved when Raskilnikov smashed Luzhin's hat and Tonya's actor was visibly holding back laughter.

rewatched Possession (Andrzej Zulawski, 1981): 2/5

Isabelle Adjani to all of the sane bitches out there: I respect it but it ain’t me.

Sarah Cooper: Everything’s Fine (Natasha Lyonne, 2020): 2/5

Like most people, I've been a huge fan of Sarah's Trump lip-sync videos during this year, and was curious to see if this obviously talented breath of fresh air would be able to hold an entire netflix special, and to find out if she had some other tools in her arsenal. (Answer: ehh and meh. But keep those lip-sync vids coming please!)

White Rabbit (Daryl Wein, 2018): 3/5

Authentic as fuck. Great vehicle for Vivian Bang. Looking forward to seeing what she does next.

The Dark End of the Street (Kevin Tran, 2020): 2.5/5

A little film that throws a lot of characters at you with no real rhyme or reason. The acting is a mixed bag, but the writing is decent, I wish it had more substance than a slice of life in a distressed neighborhood, but still an interesting watch.

Saint Frances (Alex Thompson, 2019): 3/5

It has the same ‘cutesy’ vibe that most lighthearted indies commonly fall victim to, but the performances are appropriately organic and the final product radiates with a level of honesty that makes it hard not to appreciate.

Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga (David Dobkin, 2020): 2/5

As I write this, I have been watching this movie for days. It hit a logical endpoint 30 minutes ago and yet somehow it still has 90 minutes to go. Full song performances are included, often more than once. I mean you hear the song from the first note to the last.

 The Queen's Gambit (Scott Frank, 2020): 3/5

I do find it hard to believe that 1) Russian people would absolutely instantly fall in love with a rich white American girl that beat one of their best grandmasters, in the midst of the Cold War at that, and 2) a bunch of white snobby chess boys would take losing to a girl that gracefully in the 1960s. 

Fireballs: Visitors from Darker Worlds (Werner Herzog & Clive Oppenheimer, 2020): 3/5 

Herzog noting Chicxulub today vs. the devastation of 66 million years ago: "Nothing out here is reminiscent of it. Only leaden boredom weighs upon everything." Classic. 

Strictly Ballroom (Baz Lurhman, 1992): 2.5/5 

A Mentos commercial mixed with an 80s after-school special. I wonder what Baz Luhrmann's sequin budget was.

The Nest (Sean Durkin, 2020): 3.5/5
The story of one family's jarring cross-continental relocation and the ways in which its desperately status-conscious patriarch makes everything much worse. Jude Law's performance is a knockout —hearty and jovial with an undercurrent of self-loathing.

 

Bullets or Ballots (William Keighley, 1936): 2/5

Great title but lousy movie that's really about bootleggers, not politics.  Not even the great Eddie G. can save it.

Trusting the nation who had to be told not to eat Tide Pods to do the right thing tonight

 

Borat Subsequent MovieFilm (Jason Woliner, 2020): 3.5/5

I wish I saw this in a packed movie theater. That entire cake shop to “abortion clinic” segment was a standout. High fives to Janise the Babysitter, to the woman actually nodding approvingly during Tutar's speech (Maria Bakalova is a force of nature, equally daring), and that girl who was disgusted by her father's comment at the debutante ball. Extra half star for Sacha Baron Cohen who literally risked his life making this; his complete and utter disregard for his own safety has really provided us with some of the best content of the 21st century. One of the only movies that could ever capture the complete insanity that this year has been.

Totally Under Control (Alex Gibney, 2020): 3/5

Two hours of smart people looking sad, angry, and scared because they were silenced and suppressed by a legion of unremarkable dipshits who fell upwards in the anti-meritocratic hierarchy of the Republican Party. (Fire up the guillotines and set up mass trials STAT.)

And I get that it’s hard to watch a horror movie when you’re still living in the horror movie, but at the very least, watch this to see the twenty-something year-old Max discuss his experience of what it was like to volunteer on Jared Kushner's task force of unpaid, inexperienced college kids trying to acquire PPE in the midst of the pandemic from their own personal Gmail accounts. Just fucking unreal. Kushner is so confident in his ability to easily solve ANY issue, despite being hopelessly average and unsuccessful in all his endeavors.

The Trial of the Chicago 7 (Aaron Sorkin, 2020): 2.5/5

2-hour courtroom drama that’s deliberately, depressingly timely (not to mention a little centrist) in a way I find sanctimonious and not entirely productive.

Black is King (Beyonce Knowles, 2020): 3/5

No surprise, a huge dose of gorgeous, often poetic imagery and stunning performance. The LION KING stuff robs it of a not-insignificant amount of power. Felt like calculated corporate synergy, really bummed me out.

On the Rocks (Sofia Coppola, 2020): 2.5/5

Sofia Coppola got a call from Apple and gathered all of her rich friends together to make this generic corporate assignment about tedious rich people with nothing problems.

Kajillionaire (Miranda July, 2020): 2.5/5

Typical July: maudlin and aggressively quirky; absurdism mixed with earnestness. Kajillionaire, which indeed kicks off in full-bore crazytown mode, got less and less interesting to me as Evan Rachel Wood's bizarrely-named and -voiced Old Dolio gradually becomes conscious of the emotional void that she's inhabited for her entire unorthodox life. It's essentially a weirder variation on that old favorite of mine, "my parents didn't love me, or failed to demonstrate it enough." Also never quite bought the stealth romance, either, despite first-rate work from Gina Rodriguez as the ostensibly normal character.

Unhinged (Derrick Borte, 2020): 2/5

What is there to discuss? This man is plainly not hinged!

The Rhythm Section (Reed Morano, 2020): 2/5

How about LA FEMME NIKITA except a big mopey drag and shot like a prestige TV pilot?

Sling Blade (Billy Bob Thornton, 1996): 3/5

There's just no getting around the fact that it's really pretty squishy and sentimental at its core, like a version of Old Yeller in which Old Yeller shoots himself to save Travis. (At the same time, I'm incredibly susceptible to stories of self-sacrifice, so there is still that.) Thornton gives an amazing physical performance.

Irresistible (Jon Stewart, 2020): 2/5

I’m convinced this movie was somehow written and shot in 2006 and kept in a vault until now. Basically a dogshit version of "Veep" that feels like it was written by A.I. fed a diet of cable news, Pod Save America, and right-wing radio.

The Way Back (Gavin O’Connor, 2020): 2/5

Mighty Ducks style basketball team, kids with cancer, drunk Batman—this movie’s got everything, except...show us the fucking BACK TATTOO, AFFLECK.

Chemical Hearts (Richard Tanne, 2020): 1/5

How do movies like this get approved? How did the actors feel comfortable speaking these words?

Ava (Tate Taylor, 2020): 1/5

There isn't a single novel moment or exciting twist or decent action beat in this entire misbegotten endeavor. Aggressively generic, cheap-looking and ugly, embarrassingly acted, and haphazardly edited. You've seen better terrible TV pilots.

rewatched La Haine (Matthieu Kassovitz, 1995): 4/5

Kassovitz hasn’t made anything worthwhile since. One-hit wonder.

October Halloween/Horror Movie Month

rewatched The Shining (Stanley Kubrick, 1980): 4/5

A tuxedo-clad man with a furry fetish has the best night of his life rudely interrupted by a marital dispute.

rewatched It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown ( Bill Melendez, 1966): 5/5

TRY AND FIND A FLAW YOU CAN'T

rewatched The Exorcist (William Friedkin, 1973): 5/5

Still scary, but now it’s less scary than heartbreaking, suffused with grief and guilt and dread, with the sense that there's no system truly prepared to combat madness or pain; there's only the trial and error of barely surviving them.

The Exorcist III (William Peter Blatty, 1990): 3/5

Missing the all-encompassing sadness and blunt craft of the original but still an idiosyncratic movie with some good shocks and sturdy performances. It also contains one of the best, scariest scenes in the entire history of horror (you will know it when you see it).

rewatched The Sixth Sense (M. Night Shyamalan, 1999): 3.5/5

Still very good. Shyamalan's seemingly effortless formal patience generates all of the tension here, because not much actually takes place narratively. Mostly you're watching this kid slowly have a nervous breakdown because he can see ghosts. It also can't be overstated just how good Osment really is here, especially in his scenes with Toni Collette.

rewatched The Elephant Man (David Lynch, 1980): 4/5

The rare hybrid of horror and weepie in which both genres prove equally potent. This time I teared up at the conclusion of the Romeo and Juliet reading.

Boys State (Jesse Moss & Amanda McBaine, 2020): 3/5

If you are really interested in politics in high school you should be constitutionally barred from ever becoming a politician, and probably from voting as well.

Relic (Natalie Erika James, 2020): 2/5

Glacially-paced allegory on growing old, specifically the toll of degenerative illness, stated with all the subtlety and insight you’d expect from a twenty-something, self-proclaimed fan of J-horror.

Nightmare Cinema (Alejandro Brugués, Joe Dante, 2018): 0.5/5

Amateur hour. The ineptitude (filmmaking and performances alike) is only matched by its shameless lack of imagination.

rewatched Psycho (Alfred Hitchcock, 1960): 5/5

One of my greatest regrets (as a cinephile, that is—let's not get carried away) is that I never got the chance to see this film properly, without foreknowledge of its, uh, change in perspective. (Though I feel like the unusual credit order—"and Janet Leigh as Marion Crane"—would tip a contemporary audience that something is up. Maybe that wasn't a convention yet in 1960? It was clearly intended to justify her early exit.) I was denied the initial, unrepeatable raw pleasure of being fully invested in Marion's predicament, only to have that investment abruptly and cruelly yanked away. What's remarkable is how magnificently the first 50 minutes work even when you know that most of what you're seeing is fundamentally irrelevant. Still my favorite Hitchcock film.

rewatched The Blair Witch Project (Daniel Myrick, Eduardo Sanchez, 1999): 5/5

I won't be dissuaded: found footage horror begins and ends here. This is literally the blueprint and I don’t think anything will ever top this super specific kind of scary or their landmark marketing campaign. Brilliant use of the dislocation of sound and image throughout; Heather Donahue's screams echoing from afar, captured by someone else's DAT, as we see her own direct viewpoint via handheld camera. Love the tent attack; Heather tearing through the darkness, shrieking in blind terror at something we cannot see and she cannot understand. The Blair Witch Project remains frightening because the source of its high-strangeness horror is incomprehensible. Whereas your Paranormal Activities and the like lazily operate on tired cliches of ghosts and demons, the threat of Blair Witch is nebulous and unknowable—at bottom, all we can really be sure of is that a group of people are trapped in a hostile landscape stained with centuries of atrocity, from witch lynchings to child murders and environmental destruction.

rewatched Diabolique (Henri Clouzot, 1955): 4.5/5

A superb vise-tightener, the template for pretty much every thriller predicated on spooky inexplicable shit that's been made since. If only its successors wrapped up so succinctly.

rewatched May (Lucky McKee, 2002): 3/5

Jeremy Sisto's character does not fall in love with May after she serves him Gatorade in a wine glass, what a completely fucking unrelatable character. Loved Anna Faris as that horny slutty lesbo.

rewatched Carrie (Brian De Palma, 1976): 3/5

A film constructed entirely around one bravura sequence, which De Palma executes so thrillingly that the rest scarcely matters.

A Tale of Two Sisters (Kim Jee Woon, 2003): 3/5

The strange is strong in this one. Creepy sisters, jump scares, misdirection and synchronized periods. This is your honest to goodness fully kosher South Korean horror flick.

rewatched Hellraiser (Clive Barker, 1987): 2.5/5

I’m not here to kink-shame but ew.

rewatched Evil Dead (Fede Alvarez, 2013): 2.5/5

Definitely one of the better horror remakes out there. (Arguably the best, according to Leigh.) A decent balls to the walls gorefest. Yikes, what does the NC-17 cut look like???

Horror October 

From the Criterion Channel 70s Horror collection, and more...

Black Christmas (Bob Clark, 1974): 4/5

The first slasher movie, they say. It still works. Clark goes on to make Porky’s 1 &2, A Christmas Story and Stallone’s Rhinestone.

Deathdream (Bob Clark, 1974): 3/5

When people came back from Vietnam, they were pretty messed up/dead.

The Hills Have Eyes (Wes Craven, 1977): 4/5

The bad guy stuff is campy and fun in a deformity-representative-exploito way. Competent acting and excellent lighting contribute substantially to why it all works so well. Also, our protagonist is super-gay and repressed, which is interesting.

Season of the Witch (George A. Romero, 1972): 2/5

Unhappy housewife gets into witchcraft. Restrained.

Let’s Scare Jessica to Death (John Hancock, 1971): 3.5/5

Zohra Lampert’s excellent performance as the titular Jessica anchors this film in almost Cassavetes-type realism, which really helps when the spooky stuff overtakes the more interesting relationship stuff. 

Long Weekend (Colin Eggleston, 1978): 3/5

A couple breaks up over the course of weekend camping trip on a remote beach (where there’s also some desultory metaphoric nature-fights-back stuff.) This was when I started to just watch Bergman movies, where I could enjoy couples breaking up without the other stuff getting in the way.

The Beyond (Fulci, 1981):2/5

Someone built a hotel over one of the gates of hell. Fucking contractors. Bananas but boring anyway. 

Trick ‘r Treat (Michael Dougherty, 2007): 2.5/5

Pastiche of 80s horror. Skin deep but pretty fun.

Martyrs (Pascal Laugier, 2008): 3.5/5

Part of the French extreme horror wave of the aughts, this is at times extremely hard to watch. A visceral experience, nihilistic and thrilling.

The Descent, rw (Neil Marshall, 2007): 3/5

This story of a caving expedition gone wrong was not quite as good as I remembered. I did turn it off half-way through (and returned to it the next night) but was it because I “didn’t like it” or because I couldn’t take the feeling of claustrophobia? I’ll never know.

Kwaidan (Masaki Kobayashi, 1964): 2/5

Painfully slow and long but at times worth it for the magnificently beautiful artificiality akin to Gene Kelly/Vincent Minnelli dream ballet sequences. Features a lot of that eerily slow Noh play-influenced stuff that shows up in a lot of Japanese cinema. Completely opposite feel from the director’s 10-hour trilogy, The Human Condition, (which I also watched: a 3.5/5) which is much more Western in its pacing, mise-en-scene and dramatic strategies. 

What Ever Happened to Baby Jane (Robert Aldrich, 1962): 3/5

As fan of John Waters and last year’s Feud, I can’t believe I waited so long to watch this. I was surprised to discover that the acting was quite good, especially from Crawford. I thought it would be grotesquery for its own sake—and it was—but it was more traditionally entertaining than I had anticipated.

And some horror and other stuff from 2020

The Wolf of Snow Hollow (Jim Cummings, 2020): 2.5/5

Surprisingly bland, coming from the writer/director of Thunder Road, which pushed the small-town cop plot in an idiosyncratic direction full of self-loathing and self-destruction.

Invisible Man (Leign Whannell, 2020): 1.5/5

Hate-watched the final hour. I loved the deadly-empty-room stuff, but the social politics was garbage—and I say that as someone who basically agrees with the filmmakers.

Babyteeth (Shannon Murphy, 2020): 4/5

Ben Mendelson and the rest of the cast are excellent. How do they keep making movies about teenagers dying from cancer? Still: Sob sob sob.

On the Rocks (Sofia Coppola, 2020): 3.5/5

I was charmed. Nice to see Bill Murray actually deal with a script and character—he’s really good at it. In a way, it’s another Sofia Coppola movie about a poor little rich girl who’s a prisoner of her privilege, but this one also offers Woody Allen-ish effervescence. 

Borat Subsequent Moviefilm (Jason Woliner, 2020): 3/5

I was amused. The satire could easily have been more specific, yet I kept being reminded of Blazing Saddles (highest possible compliment). If Trump wins tomorrow, I will personally throttle everyone involved for pre-celebrating.

Where All Those Horror Movies Pointed

This is not a particularly original observation, but I started to notice that many of these horror movies were essentially past-trauma, relationship-on-the-rocks movies that used horror metaphors and degenerated into besides-the-point bloody resolutions. If you throw out that those two latter elements, you get a Bergman movie, right? All these movies convinced me that Liv Ullman was one of the greatest of all time.

Scenes from a Marriage (Ingmar Bergman, 1974): 4.5/5

I had to wait until I had some distance from my marriage and other relationship breakups to enjoy this. Not banal bickering, but instead adults changing over 10 years and really fucking having it out about things that are meaningful to them. Incisive and exact.

Autumn Sonata (Ingmar Bergman, 1978): 3/5

In the movie’s central scene the daughter tells the mother exactly and at length what was wrong with her parenting. Harrowing. 

Shame (Ingmar Bergman, 1968): 4/5

Actually a pretty great war movie in the neutral, men-with-guns mode of The Red and the White. Plus, all the while, the story of a relationship coming together and breaking up. 

The Passion of Anna (Ingmar Bergman, 1968): 4/5

Four psychologically rich and realistic characters full of philosophies and past traumas bounce off one another. Full of lovely, soft colors that contrast with the violence of the emotions on display.