2017 Capsule Reviews

Logan
rating: *****
review: One of the truly great superhero movies, the kind the genre will be able to tout among the classics in decades to come, at last treating Wolverine as the icon he is but also as the man he is.

Dunkirk

rating: *****

review: Christopher Nolan usually has some high concept attached to his films, and while stories play at different intervals, this one's merely a piece of WWII history at its most human level, tracking events related to a massive evacuation of the British army.  

Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

rating: ****

review: A wicked satire of the age but unexpectedly poignant for the two characters you least expect, played by Sam Rockwell and Woody Harrelson.

A Ghost Story

rating: *****

review: A modern classic from David Lowery.

Gifted

rating: *****

review: One of those movies that hits hard on a personal level, and another sign that Marc Webb is a modern treasure.  Chris Evans in one of his finest roles as a brother whose sister dies, leaving behind a niece who needs caring for, brilliantly portrayed by Mckenna Grace.

Justice League

rating: ****

review: At this point a DC movie being trashed by critics and/or audiences (and an MCU being praised by both) is so old hat you just have to laugh.  I loved this one, but the later Snyder Cut is better.

The Killing of a Sacred Deer

rating: ****

review: As far as esoteric movies starring Colin Farrell from this general period go, I liked The Lobster better, although this one does feature the secret origin of Barry Keoghan.

Star Wars - Episode VII: The Last Jedi

rating: ****

review: The period surrounding its release was a trying time for me, but even that didn't stop me from viewing Last Jedi very differently from its (un)popular reception.  Contains at least one definitive moment in the saga.

Wonder Woman

rating: ****

review: Took me a few viewings, but I eventually understood what everyone loved about it.

Murder on the Orient Express

rating: ****

review: The stellar cast led by director Kenneth Branagh makes this a statement on a classic.

John Wick: Chapter 2

rating: ****

review: I only got into the series later, so I was playing catch-up when I saw this one, but the ending brilliantly set up the next one, and as such sold me on the series itself.

Logan Lucky

rating: ****

review: What were the odds that two movies released in 2017 featuring "Logan" in the title would not only exist but be well worth watching?  This one stars Daniel Craig in probably the role that led to his far more famous turn as a Southern-voiced gentleman in Knives Out.  And a great cast around him, including Adam Driver.

I, Tonya

rating: ****

review: It wasn't just my sister who in later years carried the torch forward, but at the time these events played out figure skating was a huge deal, so you really couldn't help being aware, to the point where I have a distinct memory of a classmate acting out the programs that headlined the resulting Olympics, neither of which featured Tonya Harding.  This is a movie that will hopefully help you feel some sympathy for her.

Darkest Hour

rating: ****

review: Winston Churchill was a tough pill to swallow both before and afterward, but he was the hero Britain and the Allies needed, and Gary Oldman portrays him brilliantly.  

Wind River

rating: ****

review: Director Taylor Sheridan has become one of the voices of modern film, but at the time this was also one of the last headlining performances in film for Jeremy Renner.  Well worth experiencing for both.

King Arthur: Legend of the Sword

rating: ****

review: Sometimes people are just looking for disappointment, especially when they know there's something at stake, such as a potential franchise around this one.  But Charlie Hunham and company are a fine new version of the story all the same.  Also the movie that definitively made me a fan of Guy Ritchie.

Good Time

rating: ****

review: The Robert Pattinson renaissance began with this performance as a bank robber who makes one terrible decision after another.

The Beguiled

rating: ****

review: Sofia Coppola has been one of my favorite directors for years, and this is her take on a forgotten Clint Eastwood film, this time starring Coli Farrell and a host of famous actresses.

It Comes At Night

rating: ****

review: Joel Edgerton trumped, for me, the team of John Krasinski and Emily Blunt from the similar A Quiet Place.  I just couldn't bring myself to even let them compete.

Blade Runner 2049

rating: ****

review: Hey, I actually got into Ryan Gosling for this!  Probably a better film than its predecessor.  If Keanu Reeves can star in sequels to all his notable movies like Harrison Ford, he'll really have something.  

The Fate of the Furious

rating: ****

review: The one where everything starts blatantly hinging on Dom, which in this instance means that everyone thinks he's defecting (but he's really not).

The Hitman's Bodyguard

rating: ****

review: Ryan Reynolds and Samuel L. Jackson.  I mean, do you really need a further explanation?

Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle

rating: ****

review: This really shouldn't have worked.  But it did!

The Only Living Boy in New York

rating: ****

review: Marc Webb's other offering.  Not as compelling for me, but it's still a testament to his talent, and probably his most conventional movie to date.

T2: Trainspotting

rating: ****

review: The fact that this happened at all is amazing.  The fact that it repudiates the ending of the first one is astonishing.  But, since there's a sequel now, is maybe to be expected.  

Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets

rating: ****

review: I actually think Dane DeHaan and Cara Delevingne as disaffected space agents is a breath of fresh air in space opera filmmaking.

American Made

rating: ****

review: The fact that Tom Cruise even made a conventional drama at this point in his career should be celebrated.

Hostiles

rating: ****

review: Christian Bale as a soldier attempting to rebalance the portrayal of Native Americans after the hero worship of recent decades.

Molly's Game

rating: ****

review: Jessica Chastain navigating poker games and Aaron Sorkin.

Roman J. Israel, Esq.

rating: ****

review: Not quite the achievement Denzel Washington got out of Flight, but still noteworthy.

The Dark Tower

rating: ****

review: Another supposed bomb, but it really couldn't be with the perfect casting of Idris Elba and Matthew McConaughey, in exactly the opposite of the roles anyone would have expected, and all the more perfect for it.

Atomic Blonde

rating: ****

review: Charlize Theron stars in this straight up Cold War action flick from emerging director David Leitch.

Baby Driver

rating: ***

review: All style makes Edgar Wright lose some of his cool.

Get Out

rating: ***

review: A satire so wicked its point was completely lost.  

The Mummy

rating: ***

review: Tom Cruise starring in a would-be franchise starter that also features Russell Crowe.  Probably the only time these two will ever be in the same movie, which is itself fascinating.  A totally different tone from the Brendan Fraser movies, and that is itself refreshing.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2

rating: ***

review: Its best moment, Yondu's goodbye, elevates the results.

Baywatch

rating: ***

review: It's definitely better than the TV series.

Daddy's Home 2

rating: ***

review: I haven't seen the first one, but I don't think that really matters.  Love how this one basically subverts it, though.

Split

rating: ***

review: Got people to like M. Night Shyamalan again, and ends with a surprise link to Unbreakable, not to mention being the secret origin of Anya Taylor-Joy, but Glass is better.

The Greatest Showman

rating: ***

review: Probably gets a little ahead of itself, but a rare original musical in film, starring Hugh Jackman.

mother!

rating: ***

review: Darren Aronosky can get a little too precious, but this is worth experiencing.

The Bad Batch

rating: ***

review: In what is otherwise strictly B-grade material, this is actually the start of Jim Carrey's comeback in a supporting role.

My Little Pony: The Movie

rating: ***

review: Anyone who's seen the show knows exactly what to expect.  If you like one you'll like the other.  If your niece has you watching, there's no problem.

Spider-Man: Homecoming

rating: ***

review: I think Ned as "the guy in the chair" cheapens the results, but he's there for at least the next two movies, so what am I gonna do?  Not as riveting as the two previous incarnations.

Thor: Ragnorak

rating: **

review: I'm being generous, here, as I honestly think this was a jump the shark moment.  Of course, it was otherwise popular.  And of course Love and Thunder, which I love, is considered the shark moment for everyone else.  This only figures.

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales

rating: **

review: I will forever have to revisit the fourth and fifth films in this series, trying to figure out what they really add to it, except more entries.  Not terrible.  Just not noticeably necessary. 

2016 Capsule Reviews

Arrival
rating: *****
review: This is the movie that for me defines the genius of Denis Villeneuve, turning a smart story by Ted Chiang into a brilliant movie starring Amy Adams about a new kind of first contact with aliens.  

Silence

rating: *****

review: Martin Scorsese in his most subtle piece of filmmaking (that I've seen; there's a huge gap following Raging Bull I haven't gotten around to filling yet) that explores Jesuit missionary work in Japan, starring Adam Driver in his first truly great film and featuring Liam Neeson in his most recent live action classic.

The Lobster

rating: *****

review: Colin Farrell is my favorite movie, meaning I'll be seeing whatever he does anyway, but it's always nice when critics enjoy his work, too, which is how they responded to this oddball romance.

A Monster Calls

rating: *****

review: I remember attempting to qualify my love of this movie when I first saw it, since it was released not so long after my mother died of cancer, and that's what it's about, but I'm not going to quibble anymore.  Liam Neeson's most recent vocal performance in a classic.

Collateral Beauty

rating: *****

review: Like Seven Pounds before it this is a Will Smith movie that's hard to comprehend but much more worth putting in the effort to do so than the utter lack of appreciation it's so far gotten.

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice

rating: *****

review: Ambition has been a bad thing in American film in recent decades, doubly so in superhero movies, where it's only begun to surface, and mostly in DC projects.  This one is a conceptual miracle that does the impossible: finally have the two most famous superheroes of any company meet, and figure each other out.  Plus the sensational cinematic debut of Wonder Woman!

Moana

rating: *****

review: I'd argue that modern animated films don't really get better than this.  Also featuring a career-defining (vocal) performance from Dwayne Johnson, including what will likely go down as his most famous singing performance.

Hell or High Water

rating: *****

review: No one has done more for the modern Western than Taylor Sheridan (who wrote this and also, among other projects, created Yellowstone), and in any other era, this would have been recognized as an instant classic, and perhaps cemented Chris Pine's career.

Free State of Jones

rating: *****

review: This incredible true story of the Civil War proves how much more rich material there is to find in it, and that as of 2016 (and later) we're apparently just not interested.  Matthew McConaughey in another great project, costarring (and this is how I know critics were paying attention but were just too stubborn to admit it) Mahershala Ali, who went on to become a critical darling.

Star Trek Beyond

rating: ****

review: The most recent entry in the film franchise in its best moments reached operatic heights of depth but didn't quite know what to do with Kirk or Spock, unlike its immediate predecessors.  Another typically great supporting turn from Idris Elba, though.

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them

rating: ****

review: A fine start for what's looking at the moment to be a trilogy, but lacking, apparently, that big boost the next entry got from focusing squarely on Grindelwald and, oh, some dude named Dumbledore.

Manchester by the Sea

rating: ****

review: Casey Affleck in his most accessible performance.

Passengers

rating: ****

review: One of the touchstones of modern culture, in all the wrong ways, as too few people bothered to actually watch to find out exactly how Jennifer Lawrence ends up with Chris Pratt.

Midnight Special

rating: ****

review: Jeff Nichols, had this and/or Loving (which I still haven't seen) been embraced as the landmark filmmaking it is, would be embraced as one of the modern masters of the medium.  

Snowden

rating: ****

review: Oliver Stone has driven himself to distraction in his efforts to be subversive to the mainstream, but at least he took the torch for a number of worthy causes, including public oversight of government activities, such as the story of Edward Snowden.  

Suicide Squad

rating: ****

review: Will Smith's Deadshot, Margot Robbie's Harley Quinn, and a breakthrough performance from Jai Courtney as Captain Boomerang all suggest a better film than its reputation suggests.

Ben-Hur

rating: ****

review: This latest adaptation of the classic story was a breakthrough for Jack Huston, latest of a Hollywood acting dynasty, in the lead role.

La La Land

rating: ****

review: I've had my difficulties appreciating Ryan Gosling, but apparently when he's singing and dancing opposite Emma Stone, it's easier.

Billy Flynn's Long Halftime Walk

rating: ****

review: A sober meditation on a soldier returning from modern war.

Central Intelligence

rating: ****

review: Dwayne Johnson's career took a while to reach its current status, but his comedic turn here helped.  Also starring Kevin Hart, who's becoming, for me, a reliable source of cinematic treasures.

Criminal

rating: ****

review: Kevin Costner's career revival sort of began with this.

Jane Got Her Gun

rating: ***

review: Natalie Portman, Joel Edgerton, and Ewan McGregor all star in this.  They were also all in the Star Wars prequels, although Edgerton didn't reach breakout status until after they were completed, so this is a film where the playing field is leveled.

X-Men: Apocalypse

rating: ***

review: Things don't really get good in this one until Professor X and Magneto realize they have a common enemy.  That makes this one a landmark in the film series.

Captain America: Civil War

rating: ***

review: Sort of the unoffical Avengers film between Age of Ultron and Infinity War, becomes the most blatant of the internal franchise starters with the MCU debuts of Spider-Man and Black Panther.  Loses the point of being, y'know, a Captain America film a little too easily in the process.  

Now You See Me 2

rating: ***

review: I still haven't seen the first one, but it was still possible to enjoy this one, which features a tongue-in-cheek turn from Daniel Radcliffe.

Zoolander 2

rating: ***

review: Sometimes when compiling these I have to recuse myself from including movies I don't remember well enough, but I knew I had to include this one when I realized while watching Anchorman 2  recently I kept thinking back to it, having confused the two.  It isn't the classic the first one is, but it's still nice that someone somewhere remembers that the first one was.

Jack Reacher: Never Go Back

rating: ***

review: No one ever goes back and rethinks their views, but after the success of Top Gun: Maverick you'd think some people would reconsider how dismissive they'd been of recent Tom Cruise projects.  This was his second Jack Reacher.  I still haven't seen the first.  I made sure to see this one, since it's probably the only real reward Cobie Smulders will get for being a prominent bit player in the MCU.

The Accountant

rating: ***

review: Director Gavin O'Connor has my lasting devotion thanks to Warrior (a modern classic), and he also directed Jane Got Her Gun.  This was Ben Affleck proving he wasn't just going to be Batman, but still in an action role.

Risen

rating: ***

review: Joseph Fiennes in a movie about the resurrection.  About as close as current Hollywood gets to be religious these days.

Fences

rating: ***

review: Denzel Washington struggles to be a family man and also respect himself while wallowing in past glory.  If Training Day was his On the Waterfront, this is his A Streetcar Named Desire.

Warcraft

rating: ***

review: At the time I really wanted to like this because it's directed by Duncan Jones, who knocked Moon and Source Code out of the park.  The problem here is that he's unaccountably generic, other than allowing the audience to become emotionally invested in orcs.

The Magnificent Seven

rating: ***

review: At the time I wanted to believe that Denzel Washington and Chris Pratt could make the Western popular again.  They didn't, but it's still a pretty good movie.

Inferno

rating: ***

review: The last of Tom Hanks and Ron Howard's Robert Langdon adaptations to date, still reliable entertainment, probably the one you'd show if you wanted to prove so to doubters.

Independence Day: Resurgence

rating: ***

review: The very belated sequel is great for world-building, but was never going to succeed in the realm of pop entertainment without Will Smith.

Ghostbusters

rating: ***

review: Apparently it's easy to forget that the first one was basically a Bill Murray movie.  This one proved nobody wanted to view the franchise as "just" a platform for funny people, of whatever sex.  Silly fun.

Deadpool

rating: ***

review: I get that it's great Ryn Reynolds got to make the faithful version of the character everyone wished had been in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, but I don't think the concept really worked until the second one.  Obnoxious characters, for me, need a few counterbalances.

Doctor Strange

rating: ***

review: Although I'm a big fan of Benedict Cumberbatch, I think basically every appearance he's made as this character has been a disappointment, the true limits of the MCU personified.  He's become both the successor of Robert Downey Jr.'s Iron Man and his antithesis.  Nobody involved understands the role.  The results are basically the MCU version of Inception.

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

rating: **

review: It seems even the prequel TV show Andor has fans believing otherwise, but for me Rogue One represents a total misreading of Star Wars.  This isn't what the Rebellion actually looks like.  We saw that in, y'know, the original trilogy.  This is a collection of oddballs, and incidentally some terrorists, and I am not at all prepared to accept that the good guys in Star Wars were terrorists, or would have knowingly supported them.  That's just not how it works.  That being said, I really like how the otherwise reprehensible results gave us Ben Mendelsohn as a breakthrough actor.

The Adventures of Baron Munchausen (1989) Review

rating: ****

the story: Baron Munchausen dooms and then saves a European city thanks to his fantastical adventures.

review: I first saw The Adventures of Baron Munchausen in college some twenty years back, but eventually it took a backseat to other Terry Gilliam films (The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus and The Man Who Killed Don Quixote became my favorites, and Brazil became better known to me among his earlier efforts).  So in revisiting it, I've rediscovered it.

Munchausen, incredibly, based on a real historical figure, albeit one known for his incredible tales, which were themselves eventually written into fiction, was a famously troubled production that became a box office bomb, and so if you know of it at all, it's because of Gilliam, or your general interest in cult films.  And yet it was filmed in a decade full of fantasy productions chasing Star Wars, and is probably the best of them.  Probably?  It is.  It absolutely is.  How could the results be any different, with Gilliam at the helm?

Conceptually and artistically, there are few filmmakers who rival Gilliam's vision.  In order to achieve it, he usually goes all the way to hell and back (which is why Man Who Killed Don Quixote went into production twice, the first time producing only the documentary Lost in La Mancha, in which the epic collapse of the film is chronicled).  His old Monty Python colleague Eric Idle, who costars in Munchausen, had already gleamed such a reputation when he agreed to appeared in the film.  

Aside from Dox Quixote itself, it's hard to find a better, more natural story to showcase Gilliam's gifts than Munchausen, in which the world of the fantastic is superimposed on the real world by a charismatic and yet disconnected lead character, who in this case eventually has everyone believing in the same reality, mostly because there are supernatural elements that are so mythical they become accepted for reality, such as Idle's speedster.  (Although Idle's real talent is of course his voice; along with John  Cleese, who also hails from Monty Python, he has one of the most naturally hilarious voices of the past fifty years in film.)

The lead is played by John Neville, a fairly unknown commodity otherwise who nonetheless fills the fantastical shoes of Baron Munchausen regardless of depicted age (a sliding scale on par with all the other loose elements of reality).  He's got Gilliam's Brazil lead actor Jonathan Pryce, Oliver Reed (later best known for the role he died playing for Gladiator), Uma Thurman, and Sarah Polley, still just as a child, supporting him, plus a Robin Williams uncredited performance that seems like a preview of his Genie from Aladdin in hindsight.  

In fact, if I had never seen Tarsem's masterpiece The Fall, Munchausen would now stand as my favorite film in the fantasy genre.  Where Tarsem eclipses Gilliam, here, Gilliam would rally later to catch up (his Don Quixote was worth the wait).

Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore (2022) Review

rating: ****

the story: Grindelwald tries to trick his way to political power, with Dumbledore standing in the way.

review: I've been struggling with how to view this one since its theatrical release earlier this year.  I continued to struggle after reading the screenplay published last month.  A large part of this is that Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore was caught up in the continuing scandals surrounding J.K. Rowling, Ezra Miller, and Johnny Depp, which dampened interest in its predecessor, The Crimes of Grindelwald (which is otherwise my favorite movie in the Wizarding World cinematic saga, barring Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire).  Depp's legal hassles continued into production of Secrets, as so he was replaced as Grindelwald by Mads Mikkelsen, and Rowling, previously lone scripter of the Fantastic Beasts films, was joined by Harry Potter veteran screenwriter Steve Kloves.  After being unabashedly wowed by Crimes, I knew I wasn't with Secrets on first viewing, and second viewing didn't change that, and reading the screenplay didn't, and I began to wonder, were my reservations justified?  Or was this simply a different movie experience?

I kept trying.  Eventually my conclusion was that this is perhaps the first film in the saga where the human drama is more important than the wizarding drama.  I understood this on one level.  It's the first time the material has acknowledged what had previously only existed in Rowling's tweets, that Dumbledore is gay, and his relationship with Grindelwald is complicated by that, and by extension, his ability to fight him.

The film opens with a quiet conversation between them, in which Dumbledore explains that he has moved past their youthful ideas, and this offends Grindelwald, because of course he hasn't, and has become a notorious figure in the wizarding community as he presses on with them.  The conversation, and the film, and the series (this is Dumbledore's second appearance in them, after Crimes), still ignores how Dumbledore could ever have shared them, except by extension through the complicated nature of his sister Ariana, and her death, which ties into the character of Credence Barebone, whose story began in the first film, and whose true lineage was revealed in Crimes, but explained here in Secrets: he's Aberforth Dumbledore's son.  Dumbledore is his uncle.

Grindelwald has been manipulating Credence, as we saw him operating throughout Crimes.  He trades on fear in order to achieve his goals.  He also won Queenie Goldstein to his side last film, shattering a relationship with muggle baker Jacob Kowalski.  Dumbledore maneuvers against Grindelwald as best he can throughout Secrets.  He recruits Jacob, an unlikely ally as ever, as well as the Scamander brothers, Newt and Theseus, as well as others.

Newt was ostensibly the star of these films, certainly in the first one, until Dumbledore appeared in Crimes and then dominated Secrets.  And it might seem as if Newt indeed takes a definitive backseat, here, especially with the near absence of Tina Goldstein, the American wizard he fell in love with previously (some reports are that Katherine Waterston's participation was diminished, this time, due to her stance against Rowling).

And yet his unabashed enthusiasm for the title beasts, and his otherwise bashful demeanor, remain the heart of these films, as he gets to spend time with his brother as an actual colleague for the first time, which along with Jacob and Queenie and learning the truth of Credence's existence moves original stories from the first film along nicely.  Newt and Theseus have the best sequence of the film as they enact another of Newt's trademark beast-centric performances, this time scuttling like a crab.

Eddie Redmayne's star has dimmed in recent years.  I'm hard-pressed to think of his work outside these films, and yet the films themselves remain clearly affectionate of his unique charms.  Callum Turner, as Theseus, has become a more distinguished actor (for me, anyway, as I discovered in Emma.), so it's nice to see him in an expanded role.  Alison Sudol has been a standout as Queenie from the start, and I doubt anyone could've been more quintessentially American for the time period than Dan Fogler's Jacob, who has threatened to steal all of the movies.

But is there any real doubt that Jude Law's Dumbledore is the center of Secrets?  He had better be, getting his name in the title!  By the time Dumbledore and Grindelwald duel, we've seen Dumbledore do everything possible to avoid that moment.  When it's suggested he become the new leader of the wizarding community, the moment becomes the heart of how to interpret the movie around it.  No attention is called to Dumbledore, until he's pulled from a crowd as it happens, and he talks his way out of it, the way Harry Potter once convinced the Sorting Hat to place him in Gryffindor, and the moment passes.  No one argues the point.  No one draws attention to him at all.  It happens.  And the story moves on.

How to interpret it, and the whole film, rests on how comfortable you are with the rapid ascent of Grindelwald, and his just as rapid descent.  As viewers we're privy to nearly every beat of how this is accomplished, so relentlessly, throughout the movie.  The opening scene of Crimes was said to be distractedly dizzying, when Grindelwald breaks out of prison, and yet this is a whole movie in which, to accomplish what it needs to, the viewer has to accept two hours of logic that makes internal sense, and yet also feels as if, in a different reality, would have played out over several films.  Possibly.  The studio has been expressing doubt for years.  I follow a website that breathlessly reported every negative aspect of production, cheering on the possibility of failure.  Was this what it was always supposed to be?

And perhaps so.  This is what we never got to see with Voldemort, after all.  The other arcs feel so natural, this must always have been in the cards, surely?  Crimes ends dramatically with Grindelwald having split the wizarding community in half.  Secrets suggests winning the right allies makes even the impossible possible (from criminal to candidate, which even the Star Wars prequels didn't dare attempt; Palpatine appears the innocent even after his drastic transformation).

And...the more I live with this, the more comfortable.  At no point does the film dwell on Grindelwald as a real threat, except as Dumbledore's opposite number.  This is all supposed to build (like the Star Wars prequels) to a legendary duel, against which the one that happens in Secrets is mere prelude.  In some respects, there are notes in Secrets that feel like a possible concluding note (Jacob and Queenie marrying), should the studio decide to end the series early.  And yet Dumbledore acknowledges Newt as a valuable ally, even as Grindelwald has lost his (Credence, whose arc concludes here, too), which ought to sound...ominous.  The fight isn't over.  Grindelwald only becomes more dangerous, once more on the loose, nothing left to lose, and he has already endlessly proven his inventive resilience.  

The conclusion, for me, of how to view Secrets of Dumbledore is as a quiet success, in much the character of Newt himself, watching as all the drama around him boils down to Dumbledore and Grindelwald, as they're forced to confront the reality that they will one day have to fight each other.  Forget everyone else, every thing else.  This really does hinge on that conversation, at the start of the film.  And that's actually refreshing.

One Shot (2021) Review

rating: ****

the story: A suddenly high value terrorist suspect is the subject of a highly coordinated extraction.

review: The concept of a film being, or appearing to be, one continuous tracking shot has apparently now reached the point where it can be taken for granted.  The likes of Birdman, 1917, Russian Ark, and Crazy Samurai have been joined by One Shot, which if it has been greeted at all, then as a glorified cinematic first-person-shooter experience, and yet the results are as thrilling as any other attempt of the technique yet attempted.

Part of the problem is that it stars Scott Adkins, best known as a stuntman or as the lead in direct-to-video releases, the bargain basement of the medium.  As far as I know, this is my first Adkins film, and I found him to be a riveting action hero, very much akin to Cole Hauser's performances in the TV series Yellowstone, the new "alpha male" template of popular entertainment, though Adkins achieves it mostly by surviving against all odds, being the de facto lead character, and engaging in at least one brawl that calls on his stunt experience.

Supporting him are Ashley Greene (billed here with her married name Ashley Greene Khoury) and Ryan Phillippe, a long way away from his potential as a new leading man some twenty years back, and not even getting to play a particularly heroic part (a glorified bureaucrat who stands in Adkins' way to get the job done).

The story is compelling and the odds are long.  The alleged terrorist in sympathetic in apparently the same way as the lead in The Mauritanian, claiming innocence deep into the film.  It doesn't even particularly matter to the actual terrorists arriving in a horde to break him free if he's what he appears to be.  They need him; it's that simple.  And so they throw their massive numbers (don't spend too much time worrying about how they amassed so many without anyone noticing), and it becomes a Black Hawk Down war incident.  Of course we'll route Adkins on!  We haven't had a guy like him in ages, and he's as close to an everyman there's ever been, although he's never less than compelling.

Bonus material insists there are points in which the footage breaks tracking, and yet it's virtually impossible to tell with the results.  If that's the only reason you choose to watch, fine, because it's impressive filmmaking by default, all the more given the constant fighting that necessitates constant choreography without ever bogging down.  Details lost in narrative are picked up everywhere else.

This is not a B movie.  In a different time it would've been a massive hit.  It should develop a following eventually.  It deserves one.

The Contractor (2022) Review

rating: ****

the story: A Green Beret is drummed out of the service, but ends up right back in the thick of it anyway.

review: Quite unexpectedly, a spiritual sequel to Hell or High Water.  Chris Pine stars as the Green Beret, who ends up drafted into a black ops outfit, although the results are less military maneuvering and more a spy game, in which Pine discovers he can't trust the outfit that recruited him.  Along the way, he's got to figure out if he can trust a colleague played by Ben Foster, his costar in High Water, which ought to be considered one of the key selling points of The Contractor.

Pine's charisma was a little long in coming to be recognized by filmmakers, but eventually, with his casting as Kirk in the J.J. Abrams Star Trek reboot, he at last became a movie star, and yet it ended up becoming a recurring problem: directors still had a hard time figuring out what to do with him.  Hell or High Water found a perfect fit, the rare antihero (a bank robber) who was actually sympathetic, a response to the Great Recession that cast the whole idea back to the feel of the Great Depression, or even Robin Hood.  Foster was the unambiguously less sympathetic cohort then, and he is again here, although he has a better shot at redeeming himself this time around.  Less so Kiefer Sutherland, in a rare bid to reclaim some of the shine he himself earned somewhat belatedly in the TV series 24, cast squarely as the villain.  Eddie Marsan, whose career often veers between such roles, has one of his welcome turns among the angels, although it's an unfortunately brief one, while Gillian Jacobs has a similarly thankless nod as Pine's wife.

But the compromise is worth it, as The Contractor works best as an atmospheric tour of Pine's troubles, spending little time worrying about things like dialogue, as he struggles along the labyrinth of doubt, accented frequently by the bum knee he needs to periodically inject just to keep functioning.  This is an aging action hero, after all, forced to control uncomfortable realities at every turn.

I think, given time, the results will garner greater interest, if only as a companion to Pine and Foster's previous work together.  At the moment it needs struggle against a shifting market, between a box office that is increasingly geared almost exclusively to big budget blockbusters and streaming services either desperately competing for the same aesthetic or proudly boasting the opposite, with everything else in between being ignored, such as the notion that movie stars exist and can carry their own material, same as they ever did.  

And Chris Pine, despite every adversity, is still standing, thank you.

Lincoln (2012) Review

rating: ***

the story: Lincoln pushes for the 13th Amendment.

the review: Gosh, so I spent a decade fearing I wouldn't like this one.  Sometimes, or perhaps very often, when you think you're going to have a certain reaction, whether good or bad, you end up having it regardless of the material.  In this instance, I ended up with exactly the reaction I always thought I would to Steven Spielberg's Lincoln.

Chalk this up to star Daniel Day-Lewis.  Beloved of Hollywood insiders but rarely outside of it, my first exposure to him was his Bill the Butcher in Gangs of New York, which was a wildly entertaining performance.  Then it was There Will Be Blood, a film I thought I would greatly enjoy, and was one of my most anticipated experiences of 2007, which instead became perhaps my greatest disappointment that year, when my impression of Day-Lewis greatly soured.  He's the kind of actor who immerses himself in his work, who reinvents himself with every performance, or so the story goes, and yet the disappointment of Blood was how much obvious connective tissue there was to Gangs, and none of it positive.  It was as if he dialed in on the villainous tones but lost all intonation.  Where his Bill chewed all scenery in delicious fashion, his Daniel Plainview was a lethargic inverse whose total dominance of Blood was unearned, with no chance at being checked.  He was among the antiheroes who came to dominate critical taste in the last few decades not because he deserved to, but because critics had fixated on the idea and wouldn't let go.

Lincoln is certainly no antihero, today.  Although in his time he was.  Which is perhaps one of the reasons Day-Lewis ended up playing him.  Spielberg's take is a riff on the popular history book Team of Rivals, which centers on Lincoln's political acumen, which the subsequent film zeroes in on as he desperately seeks approval for the amendment that will guarantee freedom for slaves.  He stoops to all available levels in the process, which is not to say his cause was not worthy nor his tactics justified, but nowhere is the inherent mythic nobility on display, and yes, that clip shown at the Oscars in which Lincoln exhorts his cabinet in an impassioned demand to fulfill the vision "Now! Now! Now!" really the central lasting impression...

In choosing such a narrow focus, and perhaps in selecting (there was much development of the project along the way, and so it really was a choice) playwright Tony Kushner over, say, Aaron Sorkin, who had made politics a truly operatic affair in The West Wing and would later become as well known a screenwriter in film, there is no chance to discover the man even as the myth is gently exploded, so that man nor myth, as the man lunges in one direction or another, receives proper focus.  At times it seems Day-Lewis is up to the challenge, when Spielberg, Kushner, and the actor are up to the challenge of the folksy charm of the man, but in their efforts to wring drama from him, they lose sight of it, and the wrinkly profiles they find of Day-Lewis, which are so often fixated on, are subsequently lost to clearer gazes, late in the film, in which Day-Lewis instead looks like, well, Day-Lewis.

Surrounding this is a host of incredible talent, from Tommy Lee Jones perhaps for the first time sinking into his aging gravitas, Sally Field asking no quarter as Mary Todd Lincoln, David Strathairn doing all the heavy lifting, James Spader playful in all the right ways for a change, Hal Holbrook, and a trio of young actors on the cusp of greatness, if film would let them: Joseph Gordon Levitt, the acknowledged preferential favorite; Lee Pace, so versatile and yet forever taken for granted; and Adam Driver in a thankless glorified cameo, years before anyone truly recognized his talent.

And there are others, curiously the black actors (Gloria Reuban, David Oyelowo) in roles Spielberg has no earthly idea what to do with among them, worth picking out.

The whole affair comes off as more a companion piece to Spielberg's earlier and far more triumphant Amistad, with far less historic grandeur to its credit and yet so much more power and cinematic achievement...This was the point where Spielberg really started to worry about his continued standing in Hollywood royalty, where he stopped trusting himself and instead just started doing what he thought his peers wanted to see, all the more bizarre from a director who had previously made his name on things audiences seemingly demanded...So much of modern film ignores the American heritage so passionately embraced in the past, it's all the more a shame that the most famous recent example has no idea what it's really trying to accomplish, other than demonstrate saintly Lincoln in his last desperate push for history, above and beyond, y'know, ending the pesky war around it.

And yet Spielberg's peers have been so driven to distraction concerning political maneuvering, I suppose, in the grand scheme, it's only fitting that such are the results of the effort.

The Irishman (2019) Review

rating: ****

the story: An aging Frank Sheeran reflects on his life highlighted, among other things, by a close association with Jimmy Hoffa.

review: Martin Scorsese ignited a firestorm of controversy when he lamented the current state of filmmaking while releasing The Irishman, which was done on the streaming platform Netflix rather than exclusively in theaters.  Scorsese is a filmmaking master, so the fact that he had to use Netflix at all is either high praise for Netflix or faint praise, and an indictment of current pop culture's appreciation for talent on the level of Scorsese.  Much of the initial reception of The Irishman centered either on this or the de-aging CGI work stars Robert De Niro and Al Pacino experience to tell the stories of Sheeran and Hoffa.

To get that other point out of the way, the de-aging only matters if you really think it has to.  Because it shouldn't.  It should have no relevance to your appreciation of the results.

The results of the film itself have often been described as an elegiac response to Scorsese's career, often exploring the life of mob figures, in pop culture most famously in Goodfellas, which for me has long been the least interesting of his films, the most obvious, least nuanced, which should otherwise not be words associated with a filmmaker of his caliber.

It's a long film, but it doesn't really feel like it is.  I had previously read the book upon which it's based, which is sometimes itself considered somewhat a work of fiction, as it ultimately turns on whether or not you believe Sheeran's confessions, about being responsible for Hoffa's disappearance (by being his assassin) or even the suggestion that he played a role in JFK's assassination (by helping ship the weapons responsible).  The latter is heavily downplayed in the movie, but the Hoffa angle is clearly the focus, other than Sheeran's relationship with Russell Bufalino, a mob figure who ages along with him, whose aging is itself the most visible element of the film's true message, a meditation on aging, on the rare instance of Hollywood allowing the elderly to be the point of a drama without necessary fixating on the inevitable death, but rather the decline itself.

Bufalino is played by Joe Pesci, a familiar figure from the Scorsese catalog, playing well against type as a restrained figure, possibly because he's the one most reflecting that element, a figure being chauffeured on his final rounds in a road trip that helps begin the film's journey.  Some critics have focused on the significant lingering shots that begin and end the film, but I think it's inside the car with Pesci, Robert De Niro, and the actresses playing their wives, as Pesci asserts his no-smoking policy that's just as promptly ignored, and Pesci doesn't pitch his usual fit...

De Niro is the star, and oddly, when we see him at his oldest he looks his least convincing.  I don't even understand how that's possible.  He's the obvious target for criticizing the de-aging effects, but the scene where his younger self stomps someone, which some say looks least convincing, is most important as the moment Sheeran's daughter realizes she wants nothing to do with him.  

Pacino doesn't sell Jimmy Hoffa so much as deliver another Al Pacino performance, and since it's been so long since we've gotten one of those, who's to really argue about this?  The idea of Hoffa, now, means the mystery of the disappearance, which is what the film features, because his image as the ultimate union boss is no longer relevant.  

Arguably, the real draw here is of course getting to see De Niro and Pacino act together.  After decades of being described as the best actors of their generation, they shared the screen in Heat, which ended up being better known for the wide ensemble around them, and then Righteous Kill, which no one counts.  Here it's almost all De Niro and Pacino, delivering their signature performances.

Which is not to say there isn't plenty of talent around them.  Besides Pesci there's Ray Romano, Bobby Cannavale, Anna Paquin, Harvey Keitel (another Scorsese veteran, his De Niro before De Niro), Jesse Plemons, and Jack Huston, playing and sounding like Bobby Kennedy but otherwise recognizable.  Someday he'll be considered a major selling point all his own, given the opportunities.  

So much of the past fifty years has been chasing The Godfather, and arguably Scorsese has been doing exactly that for much of his career, and The Irishman is probably the closest he'll ever come, with a story that follows real events and therefore carrying more than just great acting and mob intrigue, and on that score weighing nicely against the iconic Marlon Brando performance, the breakthrough Pacino.  

It's too early to say for certain.  But it's another great film from Scorsese.  Not his best.  For me those are Taxi Driver, Raging Bull, The Departed, Silence.  But darn close.  In the conversation.  The one that matters.

Space Jam (1996) Review

rating: ***

the story: Michael Jordan ends up playing basketball with the animated cast of Looney Tunes.

review: I didn't actually get around to watching this until this year.  Given how much my family enjoyed Looney Tunes, this seems a little absurd.  Given how much at least one member of the family was into basketball in the '90s, it's doubly absurd.  As it turns out, Space Jam is great as a time capsule for that '90s basketball era, as it's pretty entertaining otherwise.

If you honestly expect more than that, you're asking too much.  Michael Jordan was one of the cultural touchstones of the era, when athlete celebrities were all over the pop landscape.  You would be equally foolish to expect great acting from him.  That would be well beside the point.  Something I didn't know until watching it is that Space Jam also acts as a reprise of the old commercials Jordan and Larry Bird made back then.  Playing third fiddle to them, as always, is Charles Barkley (but don't tell my brother that), and a host of other recognizable players populate what's left after you add in Bugs Bunny and most of his well-known cartoon associates, as well as the aliens led a stooge voiced by Danny DeVito.

The result isn't high, or even close to it, but for sheer nostalgia's sake, it's good enough.  Normally nostalgia is about remembering a specific thing or elements of an era, but Space Jam achieves it by evoking and borrowing elements, which is a special kind of distinction.  I don't know if the filmmakers could possibly have been banking on this, and very likely it was the furthest thing from their minds, because in Hollywood, as in life, usually the next possible moment is the most important one, to capture immediate attention.  If something becomes a classic it's usually because it was instantly massively popular.  Space Jam wasn't a huge success, but it certainly had people talking, and it's become a kind of cult classic, which belatedly spawned a sequel (which, of course, I haven't seen yet, but soon!), which only time can tell if it evokes its era as successfully.

The other big surprise, for me, was Bill Murray.  In 1996, Murray was in the midst of a career transition.  He'd made his most popular '90s films already, and was years away from a critical revival.  You won't often see him as a selling point for Space Jam, in other words, because at the time, it just didn't seem relevant anymore.  But for me, in 2022, seeing him pop up in a supporting role can only be described as sheer pleasure, and the needed element in turning Space Jam from mere nostalgia to a repeatable experience.  

It's also interesting that the whole movie pivots around Michael Jordan's real life attempt to switch sports from basketball to baseball, which was quickly reversed with little help from cartoon shenanigans.  In hindsight it makes the results all the more relevant.  Bugs, meanwhile, was struggling, too, with whether it was still important that there was a Bugs Bunny anymore.  On TV, there was a new generation of his ilk in Tiny Toons, while The Animaniacs was busy making the argument that even they weren't headlining the conversation.  While Disney constantly reshuffles Mickey, Bugs at one point had such a radical redesign, around this time, you wouldn't even have known it was him without being told.  He and his friends now existed, if at all, in hybrid movies like this, or in the classic cartoons.  One thing Mickey never got was a movie like this, though.

Space Jam should never be confused for great filmmaking, but it's a rewarding curiosity, on a number of levels.

2015 Capsule Reviews

Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens

rating: *****

review: For me the sequels started out with a significant bang.  Admittedly, I'm not exactly square with a lot of mainstream opinion, particularly about the Star Wars saga.  I loved the prequels, and I loved the rest of the sequels, too, but didn't much care for Rogue One, which is the only recent entry fans actually did like.  I loved the new characters instantly, but what really seals it for me is that thing that made everyone instantly love the trailer: Harrison Ford's return as Han Solo.  I thought even his death was handled perfectly.  Too many people accept the simplest way of describing a thing to be the only way to view it, and of course Force Awakens has parallels with A New Hope.  But the results are very different.  I'm a huge admirer of J.J. Abrams as it is, so the fact that he got this assignment at all was absolutely best case scenario.

The Hateful Eight

rating: *****

review: Quentin Tarantino has been able to assemble absolute dream casts throughout his career while also pursuing talent he himself sought out that was otherwise being ignored.  Eight is as close to an all-star Tarantino cast as he's gotten, led by Samuel L. Jackson, whose breakthrough film was Tarantino's Pulp Fiction, and Kurt Russell, star of what too many dismiss as a minor Tarantino flick, Death Proof.  Famously, Tarantino initially thought to shelve this script when it leaked, but thankfully he thought better.  Unlike other period films he's pursued this one doesn't much worry about its place in history, but simply allows Tarantino to settle into the characters he's created, and there are few writers in any medium who creates as vivid characters as he does.  An underrated pick for best film he's yet directed.

Self/Less

rating: ****

review: Tarsem caught everyone else's attention with The Cell, a visual spectacle starring Jennifer Lopez just before she became Jennifer Lopez, but it was The Fall that continually captivates me, and I have been following his lamentably sporadic career ever since.  Self/Less also has the virtue of starring Ryan Reynolds, whose career instincts generally seem to intersect with my viewing interests.  Reynolds often chooses roles in which the person he's playing is someone other than he actually is, for a variety of reasons.  This one is a richly textured role in a truly impossible situation where he's trying to reclaim his life, bringing forth his perennially underrated dramatic chops.

Aloha

rating: ****

review: There are a few hallmarks of reaching the ridiculous culture we currently inhabit, and one of them is the rejection of this film on the basis of "Emma Stone isn't Hawaiian!!!"  Which anyone actually watching the movie couldn't possibly have had an honest problem with.  But, as I said, such are the times we live in, and now Cameron Crowe can't be taken seriously anymore.

The Age of Adaline

rating: ****

review: For a brief moment, it seemed as if Blake Lively was going to become a bona fide movie star.  It was during this period she got to star in what's probably going to remain her most interesting role, an ageless woman who finally gets to come to grips with how she reached this state.  Narrated, as with The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, brilliantly by Hugh Ross.

The Martian

rating: ****

review: I honestly thought we were going to enter a golden age of Matt Damon as a movie star, as in him becoming a reliable top box office attraction, after this one.  That didn't really happen, but the results are still pretty magnetic in this adaptation of one of the viral literary hits from that time.

The Revenant

rating: ****

review: Everyone now thinks of this as the one where Leonardo DiCaprio has that encounter with the bear, but it's also the role that finally snagged him the Oscar, and gave Tom Hardy his closest shot at mainstream legitimacy, which of course he accepted in one of his most unrecognizable appearances ever.

Legend

rating: ****

review: If you remember, Hardy had that shot for a movie we'll reach a little later in this chronicle, but there was also this gangster flick in which he plays brothers, which ended up being dismissed "because we'd seen that movie before."  Which is crazy, because no, nobody had.  But this was also the point at which everyone seemed to conspire in dismantling the old Hollywood system of, y'know, movie stars.

Tomorrowland

rating: ****

review: If you want the poster child of modern Disney, you only have to look at the inexplicable rejection of this movie, the most recent attempt by the studio to create something of its own.  And, I guess, the last time Geoege Clooney was a movie star.

Ant-Man

rating: ****

review: I honestly don't believe any movie in the MCU has nailed the MCU formula better than this introduction of Paul Rudd's Scott Lang.  Except maybe the sequel.

Joy

rating: ****

review: David O. Russell had finally built himself into one of Hollywood's most significant directors when he chose this project as a star vehicle for Jennifer Lawrence.  The result is everything it should have been, except a project that let him keep that spot.

Pan

rating: ***

review: Instantly considered a ridiculous bomb, once I got around to watching it I of course loved the results.  Hugh Jackman gets to do what he wants, but more importantly this is the first time I actually enjoyed a Garrett Hedlund performance.  He seems to be having the time of his life as a youthful Hook.

The Peanuts Movie

rating: ***

review: Sometimes these things will be filled with movies I really just need to watch again (and somehow I didn't even manage that when I was spending recent months wading through that back catalog).  But I suspect doing so would improve my opinion of these particular results.

Ex Machina

rating: ***

review: One of the prototypical modern cult classics, propelled by a fresh cast including Oscar Isaac, Domhnall Gleeson, and Alicia Vikander.

Jupiter Ascending

rating: ***

review: I still find it baffling how the Wachowskis became such pariahs after essentially becoming the patron saints of modern film lore.  This was obviously an attempt to craft a space opera out of the same basic premise of reality not matching up with perception as The Matrix, but as with Force Awakens, perception was instead chosen to eclipse reality.  

Sicario

rating: ***

review: This one became a full-blown phenomenon, and further propelled Denis Villeneuve to Hollywood royalty, and yet its ambiguities are such that the apparent lead character is overshadowed by two characters even the sequel (not directed by Villeneuve) is uncertain that we should cheer them on, even when one of them is Benicio del Toro in a role worthy of his talents.

Home

rating: ***

review: I've long struggled over this one.  On the one hand it has deep personal meaning that goes beyond the actual movie.  On the other, and while I very much enjoy it, I don't know...Either way I'll always be fond of it.

Terminator: Genisys

rating: ***

review: It's the popular thing to dislike every new Terminator movie past the second one, to find some reason to utterly dismiss it, so it really doesn't matter what you've heard or personally think of this one, it's already obvious.  But popular opinion isn't always right.  Another entertaining entry in the series.

Spectre

rating: ***

review: The third Daniel Craig entry in the Bond series left me cold, and circumstances left a considerable gap in my viewing of this fourth one, and so I'm probably still processing it.  But for me, there's little question that his are the entries that will, at least to this point, best stand the test of time, once we stop worrying so much about protecting older material.

Ted 2

rating: ***

review: I've developed this weird thing about seeing sequels without having seen the original, and this is one of them.  It's pretty much exactly what you would expect.

The Visit

rating: ***

review: M. Night Shyamalan redeemed some of his credentials with this one, but it's never going to be one of my favorites.

Furious 7

rating: ***

review: I've gotta be honest, I love this series, but a thorough rewatch is gonna be necessary.  This one is Paul Walker's final appearance, and is best remembered for that, including how they include a subtle nod to "retiring" his character at the end.  But at the moment it's the only thing I remember about it.

Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation

rating: ***

review: It's more popular to think of it as the one where Rebecca Ferguson joins the ensemble, but I tend to lament it as the one where Jeremy Renner takes a huge step back after having briefly threatened to take over in Ghost Protocol.

Fantastic Four

rating: ***

review: "There's never been a good film version!!!" is what you're always going to hear, but of the three that've been released to date, I like 'em all, including this effort to give the team a more youthful appearance.  The only problem with Miles Teller's Reed Richards is that he necessarily takes a passive role in the proceedings, since the rest of the team has to catch up with him eventually, even though the movie clearly pivots around him.

Mad Max: Fury Road

rating: ***

review: This is the one everyone went absolutely crazy about, and so of course it features as minimal a role for Tom Hardy as possible, surely the only Mad Max film yet produced, with his name right there in the title, to be able to say that.

In the Heart of the Sea

rating: ***

review: Based on the true story that inspired Moby-Dick, this is one I unabashedly just need to watch again.

Strange Magic

rating: ***

review: I absolutely adored this when I first saw it, a kind of fond creative farewell from George Lucas, but the visual results are so far below current popular standards it's not surprising that it's completely slipped out of the popular consciousness.  But even if he'd attempted a live action rather than animated approach, I doubt the result would be different.  This was just about the time when audiences started expecting the expected (and yet still mostly grumbling about it).

Minions

rating: ***

review: Hey, the Minions are the Minions.  Either you enjoy their hijinks or you don't.

Avengers: Age of Ultron

rating: ***

review: Hugely ironically, because I'm no big fan of his, but Joss Whedon did exactly what Joss Whedon always does with this one.  I honestly think the only reason it's not popular is because audiences were disappointed not to find Thanos in it.  But it proved integral to later developments in the MCU anyway.  Eventually fans will just view it as another entry in the series.  For me it's just par for the course.

War Room

rating: ***

review: This is exactly par for the course in the kind of movie it wants to be.

The Divergent Series: Insurgent

rating: ***

review: I'm not currently able to be overly objective about this series, either.  Eventually, while watching it, I began to view it as posing even more of a model's stance at blockbuster filmmaking than the Hunger Games movies it clearly wanted to be, which themselves just as clearly wanted badly to be Twilight, which badly wanted to be Harry Potter.  In the process, the biggest victim in all of this was Shailene Woodley, who before everyone realized what was going on was poised to become a reliable movie star.

2021 Movies Viewed/Ranked

 Viewed/Ranked

1. The Last Duel
2. The French Dispatch
3. The Courier
4. The Green Knight
5. No Time to Die
6. Boss Level
7. Snake Eyes
8. Die in a Gunfight
9. Last Night in Soho
10. Settlers
11. Needle in a Timestack
12. Judas and the Black Messiah
13. The Mauritanian
14. Belfast
15. Dune
16. Pig
17. Zola
18. Copshop
19. Death of a Telemarketer 
20. Chaos Walking
21. Venom: Let There Be Carnage
22. Old
23. Every Breath You Take
24. The Little Things
25. House of Gucci
26. King Richard
27. Our Friend
28. City of Lies
29. F9
30. The Matrix Resurrections
31. Spider-Man: No Way Home
32. Mortal Kombat
33. Profile
34. Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard
35. Voyagers
36. Nomadland
37. Wrath of Man
38. Naked Singularity
39. Reminiscence
40. State Like Sleep
41. Spiral
42. The Virtuoso
43. Ghostbusters: Afterlife
44. The Suicide Squad
45. Lansky
46. Till Death
47. Those Who Wish Me Dead
48. Godzilla vs. Kong
49. Midnight in the Switchgrass
50. Lady of the Manor
51. Crisis
52. French Exit
53. Twist
54. The Card Counter
55. Zone 414
56. Cosmic Sin
57. Dangerous

Other Notable Releases

• A Quiet Place Part II
• American Underdog
• Black Widow
• C'mon C'mon
• Cruella
• Encanto
• Eternals
• The Eyes of Tammy Faye
• Free Guy
• In the Heights
• Licorice Pizza
• Jungle Cruise
• Nightmare Alley
• Shangi-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings
• Sing 2
• Space Jam: A New Legacy
• West Side Story

Box Office: 2021 Top Ten

I've chronicled this over a number of my blogs over the years, but it's probably a good idea to finally do so at one dedicated to movies.  Here, then, according to numbers at Box Office Mojo as of this writing, are the ten highest grossing movies of 2021, both in the U.S. (the first list) and around the world (the second).

1. Spider-Man: No Way Home ($804 million) The MCU unsurprisingly broke the box office back wide open on the domestic front, driven in part by the unexpected chance to see three generations of the cinematic webslinger (the distributors really wanted to keep that a secret, but it's such an important element of the movie, and obviously many people have already seen the results, including probably everyone, at this point, who cared whether or not they knew about such spoilers).  This has been my least favorite incarnation of Spider-Man on the big screen, but as of this entry I think I can move past that.
2. Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings ($224 million) Equally unsurprisingly the next biggest winner is again from the MCU, though you'll find its success to be far more in-line with pandemic numbers as they finally began to expand again last year.  This is probably a film that would've performed at exactly these numbers ever before the pandemic, although of course now we'll never know.
3. Venom: Let There Be Carnage ($213 million) Technically associated with the MCU although moreso with the Sony/Spider-Man wing.  Me, I'll just be happy it's Tom Hardy in a bona fide hit, crowd-pleasing movie.
4. Black Widow ($183 million) The MCU strikes again, with an entry that's about a decade late, somehow featuring its original superheroine in the second entry in the franchise to be headlined by one, after her canonical death.  That's exactly where the MCU is these days, folks...
5. F9: The Fast Saga ($173 million) The surprisingly popular franchise that isn't the MCU has endured so long there's as many people baffled by its popularity as who continue to eat it up.  Like Black Widow, it's an installment that draws on material from earlier in the timeline, in more ways than one.  Dom's brother, for one.  But also: Han's back!
6. Eternals ($164 million) Like Shang-Chi I assume Eternals greatly benefited from lower expectations, another new MCU platform that might have seemed far more extraneous previously.  Now it's a welcome distraction and a top ten hit by default.
7. Sing 2 ($162 million) Given Disney's penchant for releasing so many of its recent animated films directly to streaming, a different studio claimed box office glory this year.
8. No Time to Die ($160 million) The final Daniel Craig entry in the James Bond franchise sends the actor out with a bang (I'd call it an historic entry that doesn't deserve the dismissive remarks it's so far generated).
9. A Quiet Place Part II ($160 million) Because these films share a premise with another movie (It Comes at Night) I've seen, I personally have little interest in watching them, because I'm not really a horror fan and so don't need to double down on such things.  Though clearly movie fans like them.
10. Ghostbusters: Afterlife ($129 million) It was nice to see this one succeed, although I wish it had followed its own story beats rather than eventually end on a familiar note.

Global results:

1. Spider-Man: No Way Home ($1,901 billion) As you can see, U.S. audiences were in perfect agreement with their global neighbors for most popular movie, which is usually the case.
2. The Battle at Lake Changjin ($902 million) The Chinese box office has surged to become the second most important one globally in recent years, although Chinese films themselves will only be successful like this there, whereas a global hit depends on how (or if) it plays there.
3. Hi, Mom ($822 million) Here's another Chinese movie.  Was never even released in the U.S.
4. No Time to Die ($774 million) Here's our first real difference, Craig's final turn as 007 having a much more rousing international reception.
5. F9: The Fast Saga ($726 million) A large part of why this series has been so popular is thanks to its multicultural cast, which no doubt helps its international appeal.
6. Detective Chinatown 3 ($686 million) Bet you can't guess which country produced this!
7. Venom: Let There Be Carnage ($506 million) At this point you'll notice how the MCU suffers if left out of Chinese theaters, and who benefits as a result.
8. Godzilla vs. Kong ($468 million) Here's a whole franchise that's been happening with very little actual attention drawn to it.
9. Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings ($432 million) You'd think this was made for Chinese audiences, but Chinese politics thought differently.
10. Sing 2 ($411 million) Just so you don't think its success was a fluke.

Rewatches March 2022

I managed to round out the end of the alphabet last month (paradoxically I will begin it later). So let’s get started.

William Shakespeare’s Romeo + Juliet (1996) Arguably the source of Leonardo DiCaprio’s popular career, the project that led to Titanic, I spent a long time being fascinated by it without really having spent time…watching it. So this rewatch was long in coming. As it turns out, it’s a kind of spastic version of what Hollywood has been so paranoid about, a Tarantinoesque take that doesn’t really understand what “Tarantinoesque” is, but is very clearly trying to be so. Thankfully Baz Lurhmann figured out his mistake in later projects, although he’s never really regained creative trust from the mainstream. I’m hotly anticipating his latest film, Elvis.

Wind River (2017) This was another needful rewatch, and now I have the proper appreciation of its achievement. Director Taylor Sheridan is one of the major filmmakers of the modern era, and Jeremy Renner is one of the significant stars, although neither enjoy enough acclaim for their efforts. Jon Bernthal has a brief but crucial supporting role that lets him, for once, avoid the antagonist’s spot he usually inhabits.

Wing Commander (1999) Popular opinion doesn’t like to admit how it’s formed, but this is a film that’s suffered, since it debuted in theaters, as impossible to measure against The Matrix and, at least as of 1999 (later revisions of taste obviously changed this), The Phantom Menace, and as such hardly worth considering at all, and as such, only worth dismissing at best…But I’ve always liked it. Even fans if the games from which it was adapted couldn’t wrap their heads around this one, since it spends most of its time on a concept unique to it, the idea of prejudice against the main protagonist based on his ancestry. If it had been released any other year prior to the same one in which the first new Star Wars in a near-two decade span, this clear homage to the saga, which still manages to become itself, would have been welcomed far differently.

The World’s End (2013) As it turns out, sometimes if you end up sleeping through most of the first viewing of a movie, you’re probably not really going to get an accurate interpretation of it. What I did see the first time I found…obnoxious. I apparently saw very little, and it only bewildered me. This is Edgar Wright’s final of three collaborations with Simon Pegg and Nick Frost. Pegg had become an unlikely Hollywood staple by this point (a regular in Mission: Impossible and Star Trek films as well as star of various films), and as such was beyond being a mere costar with Frost. So in hindsight, and watching, y’know, the whole thing, this is quite the end of an era, and now stands as possibly by favorite of the three (and my previous wasn’t Shaun of the Dead, but Hot Fuzz, which itself will be a keen subject of further rewatching).

The Wrestler (2008) In 2008 mainstream audiences had once again definitively relegated wrestling to a niche market, so the release of a major film production attempting to reverse engineer its appeal by peeling back the curtain. And yet, I think it does so in a fashion it doesn’t really understand. Mickey Rourke’s character is never really put in a definitive context. Wrestling fans are as aware of their history as any other medium. If this were a baseball movie about, say, a Pete Rose figure, that would be pretty clear. But Rourke’s character was created from a false premise. If he is, for instance, Hulk Hogan, or Ric Flair, or Shawn Michaels (who at the time was winding up his career and actually evoking the movie in storylines), his arc would not lead to ending up working in a grocery store. The filmmakers certainly found plenty of aging wrestlers who were leading such lives, but a Hogan, a Flair, a Michaels would never be among them. So the results have to be interpreted through this lens. And can only be a qualified achievement. 

Zodiac (2007) a year before Iron Man, Robert Downey Jr. happens to costar with Mark Ruffalo in this David Fincher film that actually pivots on Jake Gyllenhaal’s conviction that he solved the mystery of the identity of the notorious killer. This is another rewatch I needed to do, because I hadn’t previously managed to stay awake through the whole thing, and in hindsight it’s another classic Hollywood movie that isn’t being made at the moment, filled with bona fide movie stars, but not necessarily at that time a cast that would really have been recognized, all three stars at different points in their careers. Actually, this might even have been the film that led RDJ to Iron Man. 

I’m not diving in immediately back to the catalog, so this marks a bookmark in the project, and April will be the first time since last August material for this blog won’t be focused on it.

Rewatches February 2022

After the relatively stuffed month that January turned out to be, I had to scramble to make my efforts look decent in February, but I think I managed nicely...

Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets (2017) A lot of viewers dismissed this because they didn't think Dane DeHaan and Cara Delevingne carried enough weight as its stars, but I love the results except as a version of the current popular interpretation of world history being an unapologetic destruction of virgin territory, which is ridiculously simplistic.  

Vice (2018) A fever dream that allows the viewer to believe what they want to about its conclusions (the ending cleverly leans into the current culture divide), although it clearly has one interpretation in mind as Christian Bale hilariously leans into the Dick Cheney voice even in his early years.

Walk the Line (2005) When this was released in theaters I'd been listening to Johnny Cash music pretty heavily with my dad, so I was very prepared to enjoy a movie about him, and while Roger Ebert was very much mistaken when he claimed there was no distinction to be made between Cash's singing and Joaquin Phoenix's version, it's still fun listening to Phoenix's, and this is easily my favorite Reese Witherspoon performance, in which she stops trying to be a precocious individual and actually is one.

Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (2005) For me, anyway, the Wallace & Gromit shorts were the last time I particularly cared about short films that weren't attached to Disney and/or Pixar films, so this feature-length version of their shenanigans, with its ridiculously adorable rabbits, will long be one of my favorite animated movies.

Warcraft (2016) The career of Duncan Jones fell apart fairly completely shortly after this, and watching Warcraft specifically again was to find I maybe wasn't as interested in the movie itself, originally, as the career of Duncan Jones, but it's still an accessible alternative to a fantasy landscape that isn't beholden to any specific knowledge of the source material.

The Way of the Gun (2000) It's amazing how paranoid critics have been about "another Tarantino," so that they've routinely rejected any material they deem remotely similar, including this movie, which is a great showcase for Benicio Del Toro and Ryan Phillippe, both of whom as a result had a much harder time impressing their careers, and talent, on the popular consciousness because of it.

We Are Marshall (2006) Looking back, I'm not quite as enamored with this one as I used to be.  In 2006 it was, as it in hindsight remains, for me a spotlight outside of Lost for the appeal of Matthew Fox, but as it was for me then an introduction of sorts to Matthew McConaughey, I've since watched other material I think I can say I reliably enjoy more.

Rewatches January 2022

I made a concerted effort to tackle more of the catalog movies to start off the year, coming up with a whopping seventeen (two bonus, but I'll explain).

Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby (2006) This is easily one of my favorite movies, and my favorite Will Ferrell, in which (and he had a whole string of sports movies at one point) he plays a NASCAR driver dueling an evil Frenchman played by Sacha Baron Cohen.  It's one of Ferrell's John C. Reilly movies, too, and is one of Amy Adams' breakthrough appearances.  

They All Laughed (1981) A Peter Bogdanovich film (good timing, since he just passed away) in which John Ritter and Audrey Hepburn, among others, are involved in unlikely romantic pairings.  Included in the DVD release is an interview between Bogdanovich and Wes Anderson, in which I suspect Anderson was most interested in talking with a guy who knew Orson Welles, one of the few people who put as much effort into making movies as Anderson himself.

Thirteen Days (2000) Kevin Costner's second JFK flick revolves around the Cuban Missile Crisis, and for me is a prime example of Kennedy's brilliant leadership.

Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017) Martin McDonagh finds mainstream success with this cautionary tale about social media logic starring Francis McDormand as one of her iconic Midwestern roles (see also: Fargo, Nomadland), plus Sam Rockwell being Sam Rockwell, and Woody Harrelson in what seems like it's a villainous role, but isn't.

Three Kings (1999) David O. Russell's breakthrough movie, George Clooney's second classic (after Out of Sight), and the first classic movie based on a war in Iraq.

The Time Traveler's Wife (2009) I'm convinced a large part of what's wrong with the culture today is that there are too many idiots who are getting to control the narrative.  This movie was one of the early victims.  Adapted from a bestselling book (which I didn't read until later; I saw the movie originally because Eric Bana was one of the leading stars of Hollywood at that time, and I was a big fan), viewers found it creepy instead of romantic, that little girl in the field finding the naked time traveler being interpreted in exactly the manner you would if those few words are all you know about it.  But it's a classic book, a classic movie, and that's that.

To the Wonder (2013) The final movie Roger Ebert reviewed before his death, it was also the movie other critics chose to decide Terrence Malick was no longer someone they wanted to enjoy.  Their loss.  Unlike Tree of Life, which I found riveting, I couldn't make it through the first time.  This time was easier.

Tomb Raider (2018) Another movie that didn't deserve total instant dismissal.

Tomorrowland (2015) The movie that proved Disney was no longer capable of generating its own hits, quite undeservedly so.  Criticizing the continuing impulse to complain without actually doing anything, this was one of several high profile laments over the apparent death of the space program that happily has finally gotten back on track.  Also another George Clooney movie needlessly dismissed.

Topsy-Turvy (1999) I originally saw this in college as part of a world cinema series.  It's the story of Gilbert & Sullivan's production of The Mikado (which later popped up as a favorite of Grissom's in CSI), which in the grand Hollywood tradition of movies about making movies, is instead a movie about making an opera.

Training Day (2001) Denzel Washington, reaching an acting crescendo in the final moments of a brilliant performance.  I'm not sure he's found material worthy of it since.  Similar, but never of comparable challenge.

The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948) Bogart drives himself crazy trying to justify a wasted existence.  The gold becomes just an excuse.

Tristram Shandy: A Cock & Bull Story (2006) Based on the book (which I actually read, although I was greatly distracted by Uncle Toby, much as Steve Coogan is so paranoid about), one of the great movies.  It really is.

True Romance (1993) One of two scripts Quentin Tarantino did not direct himself (the other being Natural Born Killers) is grounds for a Christian Slater performance that at its best transcends his Nicholson act, and features one of those trademark Tarantino moments, in which Dennis Hopper very inappropriately tricks Christopher Walken into killing, rather than torturing, him.

Under the Silver Lake (2019) Released the same year as Tarantino's Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Andrew Garfield stumbles into a weird cult phenomenon of his own, including a bewildering revelation about an old songwriter that's the best scene in the movie.

And, in Tampa, January means Gasparilla, the pirate festival, which means I watched two additional movies, out of the regular catalog, filed by franchise:

Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (2011) The fourth in the series, revolving mostly around Jack Sparrow, Blackbeard, and the Fountain of Youth, featuring Sam Claflin before I later caught back up with him in Every Breath You Take.

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (2017) I admit, at the time I had little patience for the fourth and fifth films, because they violated what was a key draw for me with the first three: Jack Sparrow is balanced by an equally compelling costar or two.  Penelope Cruz is the replacement costar in Tides, but there really isn't one in Tales.  Orlando Bloom does return, but only for glimpses, in it (with an even briefer look at Keira Knightley).  Fortunately, like the later Claflin role that caught my notice, the replacement costar in Tales, Brenton Thwaites, ended up back on my radar in the TV show Titans, making it easier to revisit.  Claflin's role is incredibly minimal, by the way, in Tides, where Thwaites, playing the son of Bloom and Keira's characters, is in effect taking Bloom's spot.  The whole thrust of Tales is revisiting the feel of the first one.  

So I will have to officially include both as worthy installments in the series.  I enjoyed them.