What a great rebound year for movies. Barbenheimer has a cultural phenomenon. A bunch of our greatest living directors (Scorcese, Nolan, Gerwig, Payne, Fincher, to name a few) put out new movies, and all of them were good. And once again, I succeeded in seeing all ten Best Picture nominees before the Oscars. And unlike last year (looking at you, Triangle of Sadness and Women Talking), there wasn't a single one I disliked. Here's my ranking in order of how much I enjoyed them.
10 - Maestro - I didn't dislike Maestro, but what was it really about? A good biopic, like any story, needs a central conflict that defines a person's life, and for Leonard Bernstein, I'm not totally sure what that conflict was. If you put his wife at the center of the film, the conflict - her ambivalence about a man whom she loves but who constantly embarrasses her with his homosexual affairs - becomes clearer. Maybe she should have been the protagonist? The performances was incredible. We haven't properly celebrated Bradley Cooper - and we definitely haven't given due credit to Carey Mulligan, who matches him every step of the way with that transatlantic accent.
9 - Zone of Interest - There is nothing conventionally entertaining about Zone of Interest, which is of course the point. It's a film about the banality of evil, told through the lens of the Hoss family, who lived next door to Auschwitz during the years of WWII. Rudolf Hoss, the family's patriarch, was the commandant of Auschwitz. Everything about this movie is off-putting, from the noisy, atmospheric music, to the natural lighting, to the filming style, which stays away from close-ups, to the random fade to red at a certain point in the film. But its best choice is the radical decision not to show any of the actual suffering of concentration camp victims. The viewer sees smoke in the distance - presumably from the crematorium - and hears distant shouts and gunfire, but that's it. It's strange, upsetting, and ultimately very effective - and I never want to see it again. (Also, I just learned that its director Jonathan Glazer did the "Rabbit in Your Headlights" video, which is one of my all-time favorites. So that's cool.)
8 - Anatomy of a Fall - And the award for most memorable needle drop of the year goes to... an instrumental version of "P.I.M.P" from a French film about the investigation of a mysterious death in the Alps. I'll admit I did not see that coming. (The YouTube comments on the video are hilarious, by the way, especially if you've seen the movie.) I love a good cerebral murder mystery (accidental death mystery?), and this one had a lot going for it. It had the best explosive argument between spouses (just beating out that scene from Maestro). It had a fantastic performance by a child, and another by a dog. It had an interesting glimpse inside the French court system, which I'm not sure I've seen portrayed on film before - plus an excellent performance by the prosecuting attorney, in what was basically a thankless role. (The actor is Antoine Reinartz, and his character doesn't even get a name!) Hell of a year for Sandra Huller, between this and Zone of Interest. The similarities to The Staircase, a great multi-part documentary, later adapted into a very good show on HBO, are striking.
7 - American Fiction - I liked American Fiction, but I wanted to like it even more than I did. It's basically a mash-up of two movies: a biting satire about racial dynamics in literature and a sincere family drama. The family drama scenes were sweet and sometimes poignant, but it was hard for me not to feel a little impatient, hoping the movie would get back to the satire. What I'll ultimately remember about this one is Monk Ellison, aka Stagg R. Lee (played by the great Jeffrey Wright), and his Great American Novel, My Pafology - later changed to something even better. The scene when he and his agent are on the phone with the publishing company is priceless. Ditto for the We's Lives in the Ghetto book-reading scene. The rest was, for me, just all right.
6 - Oppenheimer - Here was a Big Movie about Great Men and Big Ideas. Oppenheimer is overwhelming in every way, but it's also a really important story and a fascinating history lesson. In its entire three-hour run time, I think the scene that sticks with me the most is Oppenheimer's meeting with President Truman, played by a heavily made-up Gary Oldman, who tells the scientist in no uncertain terms that his creation (the Bomb) is no longer his. Speaking of Oldman, what a flex by Christopher Nolan to cast three recent Oscar winners for Best Actor (Oldman, Rami Malek, Casey Affleck) and give them a combined five minutes of screen time. Again, it's a lot. Did there really need to be this many characters? But I can't help but admire the scope.
5 - Poor Things - On its surface, Poor Things is insane, but underneath it all, it's kind of a traditional fable about a woman (albeit, a mutant baby-woman) gaining independence from a society that wants to limit her options. I generally have pretty conventional tastes, and I don't always like weird for weird's sake, so I wasn't sure I'd like this one. Plus, I have mixed feelings about the other Lanthimos films I've seen: I liked the first half of The Lobster, and The Favourite sort of left me cold. This one was good wacky fun, though. Emma Stone is an unbelievable talent. Mark Ruffalo, whom I already liked, played his pathetic loser character to perfection. Also, this was the best Unethical Brain Transplant movie since Get Out.
4 - Barbie - No film on this list was as creative, original, clever, and crazy as Barbie, save for maybe Poor Things, with which the movie actually has a lot in common thematically. Who would have thought? The first twenty minutes especially - the whole introduction to Barbie World - is fantastic, but really the whole movie is good. There was a whole conservative talking point last summer that the movie was anti-men. I don't know about that, but I do know that the supposed anti-men scenes in the second half made me laugh the most. The one Ken who explains The Godfather to the Barbies? Fantastic. And the scene on the beach, when all the Kens are singing Matchbox Twenty might have been my favorite scene of the year. As someone who used to use my guitar to get attention from the opposite sex, I felt seen.
3 - Past Lives - Such a sweet, sad film. It unfolds like a short story. Films are getting increasingly long and increasingly big: my top two picks both log in at three hours or more, and are populated by a cast of thousands. I love that a small film like Past Lives, with its simple plot and its cast of essentially three characters, can make such an impact. It speaks to anyone who has a "one who got away" - or even anyone who wonders what might have happened if they ended up with so and so... That long take at the end, just the two would-be lovers looking at each other for a full minute, is every bit as affecting as the Trinity Test.
2 - The Holdovers - Like Past Lives, The Holdovers is a drama on a human scale. No car crashes, no explosions: just great actors portraying complex characters. Paul Giammati was great as the curmudgeon professor that reminded me a little of Ignatius J. Reilly from Confederacy of Dunces: a brilliant misanthrope who's repressing some deep regrets and insecurities. And Dominic Sessa, a complete unknown, goes toe-to-toe with him in every scene. And Da'Vine Joy Randolph is like the movie's beating heart. That scene at the end, when Hunham confronts the kid's parents, is my favorite. "I don't give a shit." I have yet to dislike an Alexander Payne movie.
1 - Killers of the Flower Moon - Speaking of important stories, here's a dark chapter from American history that, prior to David Grann's book, almost no one knew. The story of the Osage massacre is brutal, and it presents white people in the most unflattering possible light, and that's what makes it important. Yes, it's long - like really long. Whatever. This is a great film - and besides, people routinely binge-watch multiple episodes of Netflix shows that amount to a much longer length of time than the run time of Killers. Lily Gladstone has gotten a ton of press for this movie, and she may well win the Oscar. No complaints here - she's great. But what I think has been lost is that this is one of Leo's best ever performances, which is truly saying something. He plays a greedy moron with few redeeming qualities. Credit to him for willing to go so unglamorous. De Niro is great too - and has a better Oklahoma drawl than I would have given him credit for.
Other Notable Movies I Saw This Year:
May December - Loved this one. The subject - a woman's affair with a boy twenty-three years her junior - is just so lurid. Charles Melton, whom I didn't know before, really carries the second half.
Saltburn - A goddamn mess. Goes in hard for shock value, and ultimately doesn't have much to say. But still kind of fun as a guilty pleasure. That tub scene. Holy shit.
Spiderman: Across the Spiderverse - The animation is dazzling. The plot is just so convoluted. My son was thoroughly confused. Even I was hanging on for dear life. But it has some cool ideas, and it's just such a spectacle.
Nyad - Pretty basic Hollywood movie about a really difficult woman who did some really unbelievable things. Annette Bening and Jodi Foster are both outstanding as usual - especially Foster.
Rustin - Kind of a pedantic history lesson about the Civil Rights Movement. But with an amazing performance by Coleman Domingo.
The Killer - Stylish story of a highly meticulous hitman, played by Michael Fassbender. I usually like David Fincher, and Fassbender too for that matter, but this movie had a weirdly detached quality that left me cold.
The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar - All this time, I thought I didn't like Wes Anderson. Turns out maybe I just didn't like his feature films. This adaptation of an obscure Roald Dahl story is a lot of fun - and, at forty minutes, just the right dose of Wes Anderson.
"The After" - I can't believe this exploitative, manipulative short film was nominated for an Oscar. Avoid it. David Oyelomo is a great actor, though.
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