Capsule Reviews of first 15 Films I saw in 2018

1. The Death of Stalin-This comic retelling of the aftermath of Stalin's death is at least five times better than anything else Armando Iannucci has ever done. To do crack-pace dialogue with Julia Louis Dreyfus in the present day sort of writes itself: Just take two parts Aaron Sorkin and add one part dysfunctional workplace comedy. To take your style of screenwriting and work it into one of the most historically villainous regimes in history while staying true to the real-life tics of historic characters and maintaining overall lightness required for a comedy is downright operatic.

2. Disobedience-Rachel Weisz stars as a Rabbi’s daughter returning to an Orthodox Jewish community that has shunned her because she has chosen not to adopt their austere lifestyle. The film has a brilliant pseudo-horror vibe with the voyeuristic looks that others gaze upon her with, as she sits with them at dinner or walks through the streets alongside them. The film is advertised as a film about a lesbian relationship, but it's really a film about free will because being in a pre-marital sexual relationship, dating a secular jew, even having secular Jews in your friend circle or getting an education all lead to the same end result of shunning anyways. Perhaps it’s my experience in this type of community, but the film is beautiful, spot-on, tense, sexy (spoiler: the two Rachels get it on) , and treats each of the three leads (Rachel McAdams and Allesandro Nivola) with the respect to round out their character arcs..

3. Tag-Nope, it’s not a drama on any level, but it’s ok to have popcorn comedies high on your lists. This is funny on every level. The timing of the jokes, the rounding out of character tics, the multiple layers of the jokes and the call backs all work. Like “It’s Always Sunny”, there’s a lot of humor where we get joy in watching adults act childish in front of baffled adults who just don’t know how to react to what they’re seeing. Only complaint in the humor department: The attempt to Sherlockize Jeremy Renner’s character wore out its welcome as a repeating joke. The film is also sentimental at just the right level and speaks to how growing old doesn’t mean you need to stop having fun. A good lesson to any critics who didn’t appreciate this film. 

4. Ocean’s 8-To the people who think it’s too much of a feminist statement or not enough of a feminist statement: Shut up, both of you! It’s just a good movie with a legitimate sense of tension and flow, and a good cast that it utilizes well (also, there isn’t really a wrong way to utilize Rihanna or Helena Bohnam Carter for that matter). Sandra Bullock isn’t someone I would think of as a self-assured cat burglar type but I liked the sentimentality she bought to the role. When she toasted to her brother’s grave, it was a more meaningful moment than anything in the original Ocean’s series which was really just an overt self-congratulations of smug rich actors and Soderbergh’s “look at how good of a director I am” flashy stuff. James Corden is perfect as a bumbling foil. I had a couple minor problems with how things unraveled, even after suspending my disbelief and going with the absurdity of it all.

5. Leave No Trace-Best described as a less pretentious “Captain Fantastic”. Ben Foster, an underrated actor, plays a guy ill-at-ease with mainstream life so he lives off the grid with his daughter. The movie twists and turns in a few unexpected places and each of those defines the enigmatic protagonist better without revealing too much about him.

6. Ant Man and the Wasp-For someone who never cared about "The Avengers" or "Captain America", there was a distasteful amount of catch-up involved but nothing detrimental for me enjoying this film that largely knows it's about summer fun and not extended mythology. Paul Rudd is so solid at playing a "cool dad" type that I wouldn't be surprised if a whole generation of young viewers view him as the new archetype. The film works in humor at an extremely organic level and for that alone, I'd be extremely comfortable recommending this film to anyone who has been searching in vain for that comic action film that captures the feeling of the original "Indiana Jones" or "Star Wars" franchise. This is especially true for the micro-microscopic universe which had the feeling of a 1950's B-movie. Credit has to also go for TI, David Dastmalchian (ironically, TI is named David while Dastmalchian is named Kurt, how confusing), and Michael Pena which have graduated from background noise in this movie to a genuinely entertaining band of side kicks. 

7. Tomb Raider-Alicia Vikander and Anjelina Jolie both have the same number of Oscars, but as far as I can tell, Anjelina Jolie was mostly sold to audiences in the 2000s like waitresses at Hooters are sold to potential diners. I’m a sucker for archeological jungle adventures and while the McGuffin was ridiculously weak, the Alicia Vikander character was progressive without being obnoxious, compelling, and was a unique style of action star (mainly crashing into objects with minimal impact). The races and set pieces were pretty solid.

8. Black Panther-The hype and much of the cheering from the left was pretty annoying considering it was a pretty nuanced film about the dangers of not being militaristic in your civil rights movement. In other words, the film was more nuanced than what people were taking from the films. There were good and bad white and black guys, after all. I thought the plot stretched a bit thin, but the narrative flowed smoothly from point to point so not a lot of wasted space while still doing a lot of world-building. The Afro-futurism angle is just a cool hook simply from the perspective of reimagining a world that’s so different but kind of plausible. Congo, for example, has natural resources found nowhere else in the world; the natural healing powers of African shaman medicine has been better than Western medicine in some points in history.

9. Set It Up-Up until the last 20 minutes, this much-praised romantic comedy is formulaic but watchable. In the last 20 minutes it finds a way to upend itself without being cheap or forced and that’s when it sticks with you much longer. Zooey Deutsch is a bit cutesy but she checks the boxes of a progressive feminist cheerleader so the critics are on board. Lucy Liu and Taye Diggs play strong villains and Pete Davidson (currently getting a lot of attention for being in the most high-profile relationship in SNL history) is surprisingly decent.

10. Ibiza-Every plot point here abides by the formula of “group of guys/women go wild and lose themselves for a night” and it’s getting slightly old. Despite a complete lack of anything original, it’s a good showcase for the three actresses.

11. Ready Player One-Like the “Transformers” franchise, it’s about shiny manly toys for the most part and doesn’t really sketch out this vision of the future as much as I would have liked but it’s a fairly compelling story. It’s definitely of a go-big-or-go-home style of Spielbergian artistry without being awful. I have a feeling I’ll look back on this a while and find it even less memorable.


12. Red Sparrow-A bit gruesome and repetitive but a largely coherent plot and less nihilistic than the female spy thriller I saw last year “Atomic Blonde.” Spy thrillers like these often have too many twists and turns and that can lose viewers at light speed, so that this is a coherent story is a major accomplishment. I also imagine a master’s level sociology thesis can be written about everything this movie has to say about sexuality and society. 


13. Racer and the Jailbird-I thought this was a sexy action film. Instead it’s a dark film about a couple who both go through extended periods of chronic illness and incarceration. Just a sad, sad story. This might be unfair to judge the film based on the package of information available to the me before the film, but if I was prepared for a sad story, my assessment might be different. At the same time, I do believe the film was legitimately depressing without having more of profound approach.


14. Game Night-I hardly see a reason to justify this film’s existence. A couple (Rachel McAdams and Jason Bateman) like playing games? That’s the hook? The violent take on comedy has been done a million times and it just feels tacked on here. The “when is this real, when isn’t this real” tension is stripped of its meeting when we know the plot is “thing that they think isn’t real becomes real.”


15. A Whisper in Time-This children’s film doesn’t treat its mythology as something worth caring about yet asks us to endure excruciatingly boring technobabble about said non-interesting mythology. The film is too tonally bizarre and its character dynamics too uninteresting to care about anything at all that’s happening on screen. Maybe we should just admit that Ava DuVerney (despite being a woman of color, yay!) is just not that good of a film maker. Selma" was "important" but not particularly captivating.

Every 2015 Film I've seen Ranked 1-30, Part I

Here is the ranking of the first 30 films I have seen in 2015 (Bottom Half can be found here):

1. Spotlight, dir. Thomas McCarthy, starring Michael Keaton, Mark Ruffalo, Liev Schreiber, Rachel McAdams, Brian D’Arcy James, John Slattery, Stanley Tucci- The critical consensus is that this film is the shit and I won’t disagree. It’s kinetic, does a great job of deepening its characters with little or no exposition, has a solid amount of world-building and has all that profound social significance you expect from an Oscar front-runner without being preachy. Did I mention it’s about journalism and I’m a journalist? I love that its best picture win is raising at least some degree of awareness that high-quality journalism adds up to something.

2. The Martian, dir. Ridley Scott, starring Matt Damon, Jessica Chastain, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Jeff Daniels, Sean Bean, Kate Mara, Kristen Wiig-A fun science-fiction film that doesn’t skimp on the science or the action. Matt Damon got his third Oscar nomination for this film but it’s more the way the character is written that deserves the credit. Damon’s character exists in a haunting isolation that he faces with a thin veneer of optimistic plunk and the fact that his struggle can hold your attention so well is a testament to the writing. The action is smartly divided between Mars’ sole resident, his ship mates in space, and mission control on Earth and the latter two settings are populated with all sorts of gems including Kristen Wiig, Donald Glover, Jeff Daniels, Sean Bean, Jessica Chastain, and Chiwetel Ejiofor. 

3. Joy, dir. David O Russell, starring Jennifer Lawrence, Robert DeNiro, Bradley Cooper, Isabella Rossellini, Edgar Ramirez, Virginia Madsen-I don’t know if my head would agree that this is the third best film of the year, but it just worked for me emotionally. Made in the same history-as-a-loose-guideline-for-my-actors-whims spirit as “American Hustle,” Joy caters to the strengths of its players (particularly, Bradley Cooper’s manic confidence) but is more grounded in a narrative of the struggle to make it in a dog-eat-dog world. As with Spotlight and journalism, the film does a good job of world-building with inventions and QVC. I also like that the film is unapologetic of showing how bad Joy’s family is and doesn’t treat it as something that needs to be resolved in a bow at the end. Edgar Ramirez has a breakout performance here.

4. Star Wars VII, dir. George Lucas, starring Daisey Ridley, John Boyega, Adam Driver, Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, Oscar Isaac, Donmhall Gleeson-For this viewer, Star Wars’s biggest achievement was convincing me that it had a reason to exist. Return of the Jedi wrapped things up in such an uber-happy ending that I couldn’t see a possible reason for continuing the story except more money. J.J. Abrams’s version was transformative on that front. Not only did it achieve the task of investing me in a story I considered closed but it was about as good as a film could be. 

5. Big Short, dir. Adam McKay, starring Steve Carell, Christian Bale, Ryan Gosling, Jeremy Strong, Melissa Leo, Marissa Tomei, Brad Pitt-The comic genius behind the immortal line “I love lamp” has an Oscar. What a year it’s been for Adam McKay: He used to be known primarily as a skilled comic writer who found his way to some studio money, and now he’s being courted by Democatic presidential candidates for an endorsement. Big Short contains a pretty sharp ensemble with at least two highly memorable characters and contains the kind of comic bounce that protégé Tina Fey (yep, Adam McKay technically recruited Fey to SNL) and others use on TV: Supercuts, cutaways, and flashbacks keep the story moving.

6. Inside Out, voices Amy Poehler, Phyllis Smith, Bill Hader, Lewis Black, Mindy Kaling, Diane Lane-One of Pixar’s best and most original film in years. Few films really explore an outside topic so well (Inception and dreams comes to mind) that they serve such a pedagogical purpose which is important for a kids’ movie. The comedy and adventure are pretty masterfully done here. It’s an example of Pixar in its groove.

7. Mustang, dir. Deniz Erguven-I actually reviewed this one and you can read it here. In short, I described it as a hellish version of Little House on the Prairie. Following five orphaned sisters under a house arrest imposed by their conservative uncle in small-town Turkey, the film’s technicality recalls Terrence Malick for the ethereal exploration of the present or Jonothan Demme’s more small-scale stuff with a focus on found moments of joy. At the same time, it’s a pretty scary look at restrictive societies.

8. Everest, starring Jason Clarke, Josh Brolin, John Hawkes, Emily Watson, Jake Gyllenhaal, Michael Kelly, Kiera Knightley, Robin Wright-Not a popular film but, hey, you can’t win them all. I had the added benefits of watching this film in 3D AND of not really knowing that it was a disaster film. Perhaps, that’s why the heartbreak of the climbers not making it down resonated so much with me. Some complained that the film was too ambitious with its large ensemble, but there was a lot in Jason Clarke, Josh Brolin, Jon Hawkes and Emily Watson’s characters to keep their fates engaging. Like Inside Out and child psychology or Love and Mercy and the Beach Boys, this is a film that had me rushing to the library (or the internet or whatever) to learn all I could and become an Everest-phile.

9. Man from Uncle, dir. Guy Ritchie, starring Henry Cavill, Armie Hammer, Alicia Vikander,  Hugh Grant, Elizabeth Debicki, Sylvester Groth -Whether it was awards juggernaut Mad Max: Fury Road,  Jurassic Park tearing up the box office, or Star Wars VII realizing the dreams of fanboys and fangirls, there was an aura of credibility to tentpole films this year. My pick for best action film is this slick spy homage from action auteur Guy Richie. Like his last masterwork, Sherlock Holmes, he creates a distinct time and place: The luxury and extravagance of mid-century Italy (scenery porn galore! Even the shots of meals alone will make your mouth water) with an undercurrent of Cold War paranoia. The film’s buddy chemistry between the two leads and the girl is playful (with the appropriate level of homoerotic satire) and Alicia Vikander is an odd mix of Aurdrey Hepburnesque cuteness and playfully lethal in a way that works.

10. Love and Mercy, starring John Cusack, Paul Dano, Elizabeth Banks, Paul Giamatti, Bill Camp, Erin Drake, written by Oren Moverman, Michael Lerner-Like Everest, this is a film that turned me onto something new. I’m embarrassed to say that I previously only knew of the Beach Boys as the group of famous musicians who would randomly pop in on the Tanner residence when Full House needed a ratings boost. The film’s split narrative device can be wobbly at times and there are more than a few awkward  moments (the Brian and Melinda courtship comes off as strange to say the least) but the film brings it on the emotional front. The four principals in the cast each carry very heavy material: Paul Giamatti channels some pretty epic villainy, Elizabeth Banks makes a very awkward courting process on paper work and unleashes a killer instinct in later scenes, John Cusack impresses with quiet moments, and Paul Dano steals the show by selling the genius and the emotional breakdown of a young Brian Wilson

11. Trumbo, dir. Jay Roach, starring Bryan Cranston, Elle Fanning, Louis CK, Diane Lane, Michael Stuhlbarg, John Goodman-As a sucker for Hollywood history, it’s hard to resist watching actors of today doing their best impressions of Hollywood royalty. It’s a solid story dragged down by Bryan Cranston’s slightly cartoonish take and half-hearted attempts to infuse the material with a comic tone (though Stephen Root and John Goodman pull off the funny quite well). It’s an important film that successfully avoids being overly preachy.

12. Our Brand is Crisis dir. David Gordon Greene, starring Sandra Bullock, Anthony Mackie, Joaquim de Almeida, Billy Bob Thornton, Zoe Kazan, Ann Dowd, Scoot McNairy- An underlooked political drama about the rivalry between two ace political strategists (Sandra Bullock channeling a slightly darker version of her frazzled but endearing rom-com persona and Billy Bob Thornton channeling James Carville) working different sides of a Bolivian election. With a supporting cast that includes Scoot McNairy (he with the name that’s extremely easy to misspell), Zoe Kazan and Ann Dowd, the film boasts an enjoyable camaraderie and this is easily one of Sandra Bullock’s best performances. Like Trumbo, it successfully threads the needle of thought-provoking without being overly preachy, even if the resolution is slightly less profound than it thinks it is. Bonus points if you’ve recently been to Bolivia (i.e. me!)

13. Mad Max: Fury Road dir. George Miller, starring Tom Hardy, Charlize Theron, Nicholas Hoult, Hugh Keays-Bryne, Rosie Huntington-Whitely-In light of the fact that putting such a popular film somewhere in the middle of the queue will draw complaints, it seems preferable here to pre-emptively answer the question “why isn’t this in your top five?’ and it would be even better if I had a good answer to that question. The things that are praised- the exploration of society’s male-female dichotomy and the can’t-be-faked special effects – are things I agree with on all counts but I don’t necessarily think the special effects or the gender explorations of other films are particularly lacking. I also think that Imortan Joe and his goons could have used just a tad more subtlety. Still, this certainly was something unique and different and the narrative worked whole-heartedly.

14. Sicario, dir. Denis Villeneuve, starring Emily Blunt, Josh Brolin, Benicio Del Toro, Dan Kaluuya-I’ve wanted to see a good Mexican border/drug cartel film for a while, but aside from a great performance by Emily Blunt, this isn’t that film. It felt slightly more like a slightly tired entry of the gangster genre than something profound and new.  I prefer the series “The Bridge” which is truly all that and a bag of chips and while I can’t personally recommend Stephen Soderberg’s “Traffic” (I’ve inexplicably never seen it),  it sounds like a great film. “Sicario” is still a pretty good film and I can’t say enough good things about Emily Blunt, but I just don’t think it’s THE film.

15. Hot Tub Time Machine 2, starring Rob Corddry, Craig Robinson, Clark Duke, Adam Scott, Gillian Jacobs, Kumail Nanjiani-I can’t imagine there are more than half a dozen people on the entire planet who bothered writing up a comprehensive ranking of their greatest films from 2015 and ranked Hot Tub Time Machine 2 ahead of Bridge of Spies. I realize this got negative reviews for crude and dumb characters, but there is a lot dumber and cruder stuff out there (Adam Sandler, Johnny Knoxville, Tyler Perry, Eddie Murphy, “Entourage the Movie”, the “Dumb and Dumber” Series, etc, etc., etc.). Yes, these characters are idiots but there’s a comic rhythm to their shared idiocy that hit the sweet spot for me and the naiveté of Adam Scott’s character made him a great straight man and contrast to the trio. I read this film as a trippier version of Back to the Future with a higher level of Murphy’s Law-infused stupidity.

My Oscar wish list

Dear Oscars,

First off, I'd like to thank you for:
1. Nominating Leonardo DiCaprio
Despite being a three-time Oscar nominee, DiCaprio gets overlooked quite a bit. DiCaprio's role in Wolf of Wall Street is not just another great role indicative of the best actor of his generation (I can't speak from personal experience) but one that has been sparking water cooler discussion as well
2. Nominating Amy Adams and Christian Bale in American Hustle
While I'm not a huge fan of Cooper or Lawrence's performances, Adams and Bale are both phenomenal in their categories. I see Amy Adams in approximately 2-3 films a year (not intentionally. It just so happens she's in everything) and I've never seen these sexy and vulnerable sides to her. Christian Bale completely transforms into his role as well.
3. Snubbing Oprah for Best Supporting Actress
She's a talk show host who doesn't need an acting award. The five people who were nominated in place of her all act for a living and would likely benefit from it more.
4. Nominating guys like Pharell, U2, and Arcade Fire in the music categories
At the Golden Globes, with Justin Timberlake, Taylor Swift, Coldplay, and U2 all being nominated for best original song, we had that category alone having more twitter followers than all the other categories combined. Three of those artists got left off but I won't really miss them. We now have music producer and all-around cool guy Pharrell Williams and Arcade Fire nominated for Oscars in addition to U2. Great to see popular music artists at the Oscars.
5. Selecting nine solid films
This is somewhat subjective but I think this is the first year I can remember where I'm actually excited to see all nine films. I've seen six (seeing a seventh tonight) and have nothing but positive things to say about all of them and the other three look promising as well.


Please:

1. Choose a good host for the Oscars ceremony
This one has already been botched. Ellen DeGeneres is a wonderful personal success story having risen from gay pariah from a less tolerant era to America's favorite talk show host. But that was ten years ago and being gay or lesbian should be no big deal. I'd argue she's no longer the funniest lesbian comedian (Wanda Sykes is) or the most adorable out actress named Ellen (hello Ellen Page) anymore. In other words, we should be at the point where Ellen DeGeneres should be awarded or denied something as prestigious as the host of the world's most viewed television event on the basis of her merits. While she's great at certain things, I don't believe hosting an Oscars telecast is one of them. Her whimsy observational humor consisted barely registered the last time she hosted the Oscars in 2007 and this is even more of a travesty when there are so many gifted comedians who would kill at this gig.

2. Give Bruce Dern a solid chance
If you told me two years ago that Matthew McConaughey-- who has spent fifteen years as a poster boy for acting mediocrity -- would have a string of good roles in 2012 that boosted him to even better roles in 2013 including one that would land him an Oscar, I would have thought you were insane. Before I saw "Dallas Buyers Club", I spent much of this Oscar season thinking McConaughey's winning streak was shameful considering he was such a lousy actor for so long. I now understand what the buzz is about: McConaughey walking away with the Oscar wouldn't be a travesty as it's a capable performance. The thing is Dern also blows you away. Comparing Dern's performance to McConaughey's performance is like apples and oranges but I hope voters are giving Dern a solid consideration. After all, McConaughey's been a great film actor for two years, Dern's been at the top of his game for a period nearly twenty times that long.

3. Allow the performers to sing. Show some decent clips.
There are so many opinions on what works and what doesn't  in the "Oscars." I think most can agree that montages tend to be excessive. Personally, I think a short clip for each film and a film for each performance are most welcome additions. It even becomes somewhat of a parlor game among Oscar buzzers to guess which clips will be shown for which nominees so don't deprive them of that.
The Oscars tend to play with the format for score and song quite a bit. This is a year where we have some great musical artists so not letting them play during the ceremony would be a mistake.
 
4. Don't award Jennifer Lawrence a victory
Not only is she not that good in her role, she just won last year and is only 23 years old. Two-time Oscar winners are a rather elite club: There's no need to let her in prematurely. Of course, the Oscar should be decided on merit but let me point you to that "not that good" part of my argument above.

5. Give the original screenplay to "Her"
There seems to be some sense that David O. Russell is owed something because he's been nominated three of the last four years in the picture and director categories. That's simply not true. Being nominated three times is humongous for someone like David O. Russell who isn't yet idolized in film schools and doesn't have an amazing commercial reputation. We can afford to give the screenplay to the best candidate in this scenario and that would be "Her" by a mile. It's innovative, it's delicate, it's well-paced, and it's both depressing and inspiring. Besides,  Russell didn't even write "American Hustle" the way you saw it on the screen with all the ad-libbing and scenes that were entirely thrown in at the last minute. Russell deserves more credit as a director this year and unfortunately better candidates have that slot locked up.