On the plus side, the cancelling of all activities combined with my unemployed status meant I had more time for movies this year. On the minus side, all but one 2020 film was watched right here, on this couch.
I’ve a new job and a new coworker and she’s looking for George Clooney recommendations. Here are mine divided up into four handy categories. Click on any orange title to find the three sentence review.
Movies Where George Clooney is a Cool Leading Man
Out of Sight
Steven Soderbergh directed and based on an Elmore Leonard novel, this is Clooney as a bank robber on a jail break and Jennifer Lopez as the US Marshall who is after him. There’s a great scene in a car trunk plus Steve Zahn pops up for comic relief.
Three Kings
David O. Russell directed this film about soldiers who set out to steal gold hidden during the first Gulf War. From the era when Mark Wahlberg was working to shed his Marky Mark persona and rebrand as An Actor. Plus, Ice Cube!
More Steven Soderbergh fun. World War II is over, but there are still things for Clooney’s war correspondent to uncover. This is a bit of a mystery, and also stars Cate Blanchett. Plus, Toby Maguire in a different role than his then-current job playing Spider-Man
All Star all around with Jody Foster directing Clooney and Julia Roberts, and includes a standout Jack O’Connell performance. O’Connell takes Clooney hostage on live TV, straps him into a vest of explosives and we’re left to discover how Roberts and Clooney are going to get everyone out of this situation alive.
Films Clooney Directed That I Enjoyed:
Good Night and Good Luck
Clooney is in this, but it’s really the story of Edward R. Murrow taking down Senator Joseph McCarthy. David Strathairn is great as Murrow, and it’s an interesting peek into early TV culture.
If you’re into movies about political campaigns, this will be your jam. It’s dark though, and even the sad-eyes of Ryan Gosling might not be enough to pull you through the muck. I found it engrossing if icky. (Update. After reading my review, I’m reminded that I was also annoyed by the lack of women in this film.)
Films where Clooney is Shabby, Schlubby, or Funny
I enjoy when an actor known for his general suave nature and incredibly good looks doesn’t mind looking ridiculous. Judging by this list, Clooney has Soderbergh for serious roles, and the Coens for comedy.
Alexander Payne gives us Clooney in pain as he discovers things he didn’t know about his marriage, reacts to his daughter’s troubles, and tries to do the right thing about the huge chunk of undeveloped land on Hawaii he is the trustee of. Shailene Woodley is electric as his pissed off daughter.
O Brother, Where Art Thou?
Clooney, John Turturro, and Tim Blake Nelson star in this Coen brothers adaptation of The Odyssey. There are memorable bit performances by Holly Hunter and John Goodman. Fun fact: eighty percent of the US population bought this soundtrack in 2001 and listened to it ad infinitum. (As I went down to the river to pray…)
Intolerable Cruelty
In my favorite Coen brothers film, Clooney and Catherine Zeta-Jones face off as a divorce lawyer and a gold digger. This uses Elvis Presley’s song to great effect to kick things off, and also includes a host of odd Coen characters, my favorite of which is Heinz, the Baron Krauss von Espy. (But Wheezy Joe is fun too.)
More Coens, more fun. Clooney is one of many great actors in this film about the golden age of the big Hollywood studios. Alternately funny and charming (and with a mystery) this includes a tap dance number with Channing Tatum, a synchronized swimming performance starring Scarlett Johansson, the best use ever of the phrase “would that it were so simple” and Tilda Swinton as rival gossip columnists who are also identical twins.
Danny Ocean is charming, he’s debonair, and we want him and his crew to get what they’re after, even if they’re going about it in very complicated, not-exactly-legal ways. Each one of these films is entirely ridiculous and incredibly fun, especially with the ensemble cast.
The first time I saw Greta Gerwig was as Frances, in Frances Ha, and her disheveled dithering completely delighted me. She was the most difficult of characters to pull off: someone enchanting and impossible to look away from, but also someone I wouldn’t actually want to be friends with in real life.
That was August of 2013. I hadn’t prioritized the movie (the poster didn’t do it for me, and Noah Baumbach wasn’t a must-see director at the time) so I first watched it a second-run theater. I shouldn’t have waited. It was my top movie of 2013.
From that point, I didn’t seek out Gerwig.
I repeat, I did not look for her in movies. Indeed, I did nothing to catch up on her back catalog until 2015, when Mistress America—her next movie with Noah Baumbach was going to be released. That spring and summer had me seeking movies with her acting roles at a moderate pace. They were movies chosen to fill time. But once I saw Mistress America, movies in which she appeared went to the top of my must-see list.
Greenberg
I still haven’t seen everything. It’s tough for me to watch all the movies of actors who are also women, as I learned with my aborted Jessica Chastain film fest. Women have too many roles where they barely appear on screen, or roles in movies that do feature them but in compromising positions that just feel icky. (Someday I might get overJolene, but it won’t be any time soon.)
So I’ve missed Gerwig’s mumblecore phase, which is unfortunate, because there’s a special place in my heart for mumblecore.
I purposely limit my exposure to actors and directors outside of the movies they create. I don’t think the press junkets that actors must appear in are helpful to their careers, and they tend to have me forming opinions about the actor as a person rather than an actor as a performer. The less I know about an actor (including their views about politics, lunch, or the weather) the easier it is for me to sink into a film’s story. So I don’t know much about Gerwig, aside from what I’ve seen of her acting and directing.
That said, she brings a verve to most performances that I’m guessing is a core part of her personality. And she’s tenacious. Over the years, she’s done the work to build her career starting with acting in tiny indies (the aforementioned mumblecore) in 2006, building on that with writing beginning in 2007, and directing beginning in 2008.
Greta Gerwig is a white person who is blond and of normal weight for female actors, though I think she has an above-average height. These are all advantages in the movie-making world, though of course her gender is not. But her body doesn’t seem to exist to be an icon. Nothing about her appearance could be said to be sculpted; rather it’s a vessel for projecting character.
In fact, the adjective I would use to describe a lot of Gerwig’s movements is flailing. Not a flail that is out of control, but a person that is so busy moving through life that her limbs tend to go hither and yon. She’s both graceful and awkward, and her characters often seem amused by, or curious about, whatever it is they are encountering.
20th Century Women
Most of all, she is funny. There’s both a puckish impulse and intelligent humor on display in her performances, and in the movies she writes and directs.
Jake Coyle, writing for the Chicago Tribune says it well:
But in films of any size, working either in front of or behind the camera, Gerwig’s aesthetic—awkward, funny, without artifice—is remarkably consistent. It’s kind of like the reverse of The Purple Rose of Cairo; instead of a movie character stepping off-screen, she’s like a real person stepping onto it—and one happy to join any genre.
Source: “After ‘Mistress America,’ Greta Gerwig will dive into directing.” 14 August 2015
It’s because of that consistent aesthetic that I’m interested to see if her announced directing feature, Barbie (co-written with Noah Baumbach and potentially starring Margo Robbie) comes to be. If anyone can bring life and humor to, “a live-action feature film based on the popular line of Barbie toys” (as it says on IMDB) it’s Gerwig.
Let’s take a look at the Gerwig films I’ve seen and see if there are a few for you to watch.
Acting:
Damsels in Distress
Whit Stillmen likes a mannered comedy/drama, but I’ve often found his films fall flat for me. (Exception: Love and Friendship.) But if you’ve liked his other films (Metropolitan, Barcelona, The Last Days of Disco) you might enjoy this film of women trying to “change the male-dominated environment of the Seven Oaks College campus, and to rescue their fellow students from depression, grunge, and low standards of every kind.” (IMDB)
I watched a funny clip on YouTube that has since been removed. It seemed promising. Yet I didn’t love this film. Maybe I need to watch it again?
Another headlining effort that I remember little about (and my review wasn’t specific enough to jog my memory.) It’s written by Zoe Lister-Jones though, who wrote and directed Band Aid, which is a movie I love. And you’ll clock a lot of Gerwig time.
Movies with an inciting incident of wedding plans not coming to fruition are touch-and-go for me. I’m not invested in a Happily Ever After, and more than a few decent movies have been ruined with a late-third-act change of heart. (I’m looking at you He’s Just Not Into You). My review gives me hope that this goes in a different direction.
Should you watch this? Maybe.
Again, a lot of Gerwig.
The fact that I don’t remember much about it has me lukewarm on a recommendation.
Here’s where Gerwig and Noah Baumbach meet, at least movie-wise. My memories of this film are vague, and the impressions in my brain are that Gerwig hung about, nodded, and stood with her hands in her pockets. Was she perhaps wearing overalls? I’m not willing to go back and check.
This movie is important, because it is what would lead to Frances Ha, which would lead to all the other good stuff.
Should you watch this? I’d say no.
You have to have Ben Stiller tolerance/appreciation.
O! This is a movie that when it appears as I scroll through things (as it has recently because it’s streaming on Netflix) my body involuntarily responds with a happy, “Aw!” I love it so much. It’s even has things that sometimes don’t go over well, like not really having a plot. But the characters are so strong it doesn’t really matter.
Gerwig plays a woman in transition. She’s dealing with cervical cancer, she’s trying to be a photographer (arty) while being a photographer (newspaper). Her pink hair reflects her punk aesthetic.
Most of the movie is about the generation gap between Jamie (Lucas Jade Zumann) and his mother (Annette Bening) who is forty years older than he is. But the various people who live in the broken-down mansion that is home also have their own generation gaps. There’s a great scene with Gerwig talking about a topic that everyone else at the table would not like to discuss. It’s fun to watch Lucas Jade Zumann’s eyes as she talks.
Should you watch this: Yep
Great performances by everyone.
Character driven, yet not boring.
So much curiosity on screen.
Lucas Jade Zumann is that guy who plays Gilbert in Anne with an E.
I talk about this movie all the time. Frances is lovable despite being annoying. It was my favorite movie of 2013. I recommended it to friends who were visiting New York City and wanted some NYC-set movies; they loved it. (A better NYC movie would have been Premium Rush because it’s a map movie, but I didn’t think of it fast enough.)
Hey, when’s the last time you’ve seen a screwball comedy? When’s the last time you’ve seen a screwball comedy that was filmed in the 21st Century? Tracy’s (Lola Kirke) mom is marrying Brooke’s (Greta Gerwig) dad and so the girls meet. Brooke is a whirlwind (it seems that every description ever of this movie uses that adjective to describe her) and she’s mesmerizing to Tracy.
This movie came and went without a lot of fanfare, but I thought it was a complicated story, funny, and had great performances by Gerwig, Ethan Hawke, and Julianne Moore, who has a Danish accent. Also Bill Hader and Maya Rudolph have enjoyable bit parts.
(Bill Hader also had a bit part with Kristen Wiig in Adventureland. Could I do a list of movies where Hader and another SNL cast member have bit parts? I just thought of a third one. Perhaps I could.)
Maggie’s original plan is to have a baby on her own, but when she meets John (Ethan Hawke,) things get complicated.
Should you watch this: Yep!
I mean, you have to be okay with adultery.
Not for yourself, but in the movies.
You really don’t want to miss Julianne Moore’s accent.
Plus, how else are you going to make your own list of Bill Hader/SNL bit parts?
Gerwig first solo directing effort was Lady Bird and man, was that a good start. Here’s a quote:
Gerwig wrote Lady Bird partly as a response to films about boys growing up. At the New York Film Festival, she asked the crowd: ‘What is Boyhood, but for a girl? What is The 400 Blows, but for a girl? What is personhood for young women?’
In most films, girls exist to be looked at. Sometimes they help a male protagonist come to a realization about himself. Sometimes they die. Gerwig makes Lady Bird the one who looks: at boys but also houses, magazines, books, clothes and at the city of Sacramento.
“Greta Gerwig’s Radical Confidence” Christine Smallwood, New York Times, 1 November, 2017
Lady Bird is the name that Lady Bird gave herself. She’s a senior at an all-girls’ Catholic high school, she moves through her life as if she were the center of a movie, and she has big dreams of East Coast colleges and getting far away from her hometown.
That all this buoyant confidence feels so effervescently radical is a testament to the humor and intelligence of Gerwig’s script. That it is so rare is an indictment of our woman-hating culture, which makes a depiction of a smart teenage girl who likes herself and chases her desires seem like news.
“Greta Gerwig’s Radical Confidence” Christine Smallwood, New York Times, 1 November, 2017
There are seven reasons to watch Lady Bird and those all have to do with relationships.
With her mother. (Laurie Metcalf)
With her best friend. (Beanie Feldstein)
With the cool girl. (Odeya Rush)
With her father. (Tracy Letts)
With her first boyfriend. (Lucas Hedges)
With the guy in the band. (Timothée Chalamet)
With the head of school Sister Sarah Joan. (Lois Smith)
The movie is built on those relationships, how they change, and how they change Lady Bird during her last year of high school. It was nominated for Best Picture, Best Performance by an Actress in both the Leading and Supporting categories, Best Director, and Best Original Screenplay. It was my 2017 movie of the year. It is not to be missed.
While nine years passed between the first movie Gerwig directed (Nights and Weekends) and Lady Bird, we only had to wait two years for her next feature. And thank goodness for that. Many directors who are also women have very long gaps between movies.
There’s a good chance you know the story of Little Women, but if not, it’s based on a beloved (but incredibly boring) book written by Louisa May Alcott in the nineteenth century. The book has a lot of frustrating plot turns, yet it remains oft-cited as a favorite by a good chunk of women.
As you may have guessed, I am not a fan. The novel has been adapted for film a number of times, most memorably for me in 1994 with an all-star cast of actors from that era.
And then, Greta Gerwig decided to take on this story.
She’s a fan, which is good, because my adaptation of Little Women would have the fans up in arms. What Gerwig did in her adaptation was to shift the focus of the movie from a chronological depiction of Alcott’s novel, to the story of the novel Little Women being published. Brilliant!
Because the book is based on Alcott’s life, we still get all the markers of the story, but we can see how the plot twists in the book come about. This is satisfying both to people who like movie adaptations to be like the books they spring from, and it also satisfied people like me who feel very strongly that a plot twist involving Jo is ridiculous.
Like the ‘94 adaptation, this one is packed with a star-studded cast, including Saoirse Ronan as Jo, Emma Watson as Meg, Florence Pugh as Amy, Laura Linney as Marmee, Susan Serandon as Aunt March, and Timothée Chalamet as Laurie.
The film was nominated for Best Picture, Best Performance by an Actress in both the Leading and Supporting categories, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Achievement in Music, and it won an Oscar for Best Costume Design.
I think it should have won for most of those categories, but I’m happy with the award it did win because the costumes were great, especially those wrap-front sweaters the girls were always wearing.
Should you watch this? By all means, yes!
If you hate the book, it’s interesting to see how the film was assembled.
If you love the book, you still get to see your favorite moments.
If you are not familiar with the book or the movie(s), now’s the time to get up to speed.
As a director with three movies under her belt, two of Gerwig’s films have 10 Academy Award nominations and one win. Here’s hoping that the Barbie movie comes to pass and that we get to see more from her in the future, either acting or directing.
If you are just getting to know her, there is a lot to catch up with. What will you start with?
“In other news, I’ve been watching Homeland, and who should show up but your friend, the wee Timothée Chalamet.”
Text from my friend S. North.
He’s the guy who had me memorizing the Unicode for é (Alt+0233), he’s an actor who has up and come, he’s the person you might be pronouncing his name incorrectly. (It’s TEE-MO-TAY SHALL-AH-MAY, though apparently he also answers to TIM-O-THEE.)
Maybe you’ve seen his curly head, lean body, and sharp features in a variety of places, or you’ve heard a variety of people (young girls, older girls, directors, actors) gushing about him.
Or maybe you haven’t?
For more about Timothée Chalamet, including a breakdown of his roles, read on.
Background:
Chalamet grew up in New York City, though the family spent their summers in France. A variety of his family members worked or work in theater, film, and television. (His mother was a Broadway dancer.) He started acting early, and attended the Fiorello H. Laguardia High School of Music & Art & Performing Arts and landed a few choice movie roles while in high school. After graduation there were more roles that were even choicer; between those roles and his good looks, he’s everywhere.
Chalamet (whose father is French) has also grown into an internet-heartthrob phenomenon. His haircuts are breaking news stories, he’s been hailed as the ‘new Brando’ and more than 61,000 people follow an Instagram account that Photoshops his face onto famous artworks.
Maybe you’ve decided it’s time to watch some Timothée Chalamet movies. But which one?
The movie you can’t watch:
Let’s talk about the film you aren’t going to watch. That would be A Rainy Day in New York which was shelved by Amazon after the combination of Woody Allen and #MeToo became too much. Chalamet and other stars donated their salaries to various charities.
Who knows if this is one of the insufferable Woody Allen films, or one of the magical ones. In the meantime, here’s a photo.
Movies with just a little Chalamet:
Men, Women, & Children
This isn’t a good film and I don’t recommend it. If you are watching it for Mr. Chalemet, you will see him for approximately 15 seconds. He’s a football player.
The cast list tricked me into thinking he had a bigger role because he’s listed seventh, but I see what they did. They put all the adults first, and then alphabetized the teenagers by last name which put him at the top of that list above Olivia Crocicchia, Kaitlyn Dever, Ansel Elgort, Elena Kampouris, and Travis Tope, all of who had plot arcs. And yes, that was already too many plot arcs for one film, but there are even more plot arcs with the five adults in the film.
If you are looking for Mr. Chalamet in this film, he can be found in a bit role in the first 15 minutes as Private Philippe DeJardin. After that, you’d better be in it for Christian Bale, Rosamund Pike, Wes Studi, and some very deliberate filmmaking.
One of a few “young” roles, here he plays Tom (15 years). Tom is Matthew McConaughey’s son and Casey Afflack portrays him later in the film. You can watch the a clip below. I didn’t rewatch Intersteller for this list, but I suspect there isn’t a ton more of him in this film.
2017 was a big year for Chalamet because he was in four films. This was my introduction to him, playing Kyle Scheible, the boy Saoirse Ronan is into after the thing with Lucas Hedges falls apart.
I recall some bit of press where Timothée Chalamet commented that he hopes that no one thinks he is anything like this character; it’s easy to see why. Kyle Scheible is exactly the type of boy where nothing good can come of being attracted to him, but attracted you are.
Total Chalamet screen time is about 15 minutes or so. But this movie, my favorite of 2017, is so good, it’s worth watching.
I found this quiet little drama on Kanopy earlier this year and I loved it. I was all in on Miss Stevens and her weekend at the state drama competition.
Billy is Chalamet’s character, and we get to see him do a monologue and also make things difficult for Miss Stevens. This is the film where he probably has the most screen time of his not-starring turns.
I would work with Greta on anything. I’m just totally in awe of her. I like working with filmmakers who are ten times smarter than me. Also I get to be the square to the circle of Saoirse Ronan’s affections again.
While I could see that a lot of women might want to grow up to play Jo in Little Women, and a few would love to sink their teeth into Amy, I doubt that many men grow up pining to be Laurie. But they should!
Chalamet’s Laurie is all rolling puppy, which makes him a great twin for Saoirse Ronan’s constant motion. He excels as the younger Laurie, though I think Christian Bale has more gravitas as the older Laurie. T.C. may be 25, but he comes across as younger.
But between the 1995 version and the 2019 version you’ve got a great range of Lauries.
Should you watch this? Of course!
It’s an movie I love, while hating the source material.
Timothée Chalamet and Kiernan Shipka (Sally Draper in Mad Men) play siblings with supernatural abilities. While this is a good vehicle for Chalemet (and Shipkin,) it is the most boring film I’ve watched in years.
Should you watch this? Nope.
Maybe if you are a completist, have the flu, and there’s nothing else?
In this film, young Timothée plays young Daniel, who is banished to Cape Cod for the summer. There, he orchestrates a scheme with Emory Cohen (who was so very good in Brooklyn) that gets out of hand.
This is not a good movie, but I watched it because it was set in the 1990s on Cape Cod and because I like to watch Timothée Chalamet fall in love on screen.
Should you watch this? Nope.
It’s not good, especially if you aren’t interested in movies set in the 90s on Cape Cod.
HAL is the computer in 2001: A Space Odyssey, but Hal in the King is the man who would be King Henry V.
In this film, adapted from Shakespeare’s Henry V parts I and II by Joel Edgerton and David Michôd, we get to see Chalamet go from disfavored son and drunkard to king with gravitas.
At 2 hours 20 minutes, it’s a little too long, but it’s nearly all Chalamet all the time.
Co-starring with Steve Carell, Beautiful Boy is the twin stories of Nic and David Sheff. Nic is mired in drug addiction and David is doing his best to help his son.
Timothée Chalamet conveys all the drug abuse feelings, though he never slides into that scuzzy, wasted, burnt-out look of chronic abusers.
Should you watch this?
How burnt out are you with drug abuse narratives?
Does knowing two stars of the Office are playing serious roles motivate or hinder your interest?
As someone who grew up in a time when the few men who played gay men onscreen were always asked, “But you’re not gay, right?” I’m glad I live in a time when two guys can play men in love without the details of the personal sexual preferences discussed.
In this film, Timothée Chalamet plays Elio, the only son of wealthy academics who summer in the most gorgeous of places: Northern Italy. Armie Hammer is Oliver, the graduate student who comes to live with the family for the summer.
The boy and the man fall in love. It’s a slow film, but full of so many delightful moments and gorgeous scenery that I don’t mind watching it multiple times.
Should you watch this? Yes!
This is the reigning über Chalamet.
And why wouldn’t you want to spend a summer in Italy watching two guys fall in love?
Plus, I suspect in 10–15 years the age difference will be too creepy (it’s 17 and 24 in the book; the actors were 19 and 31)
Dune. Directed by Denis Villeneuve. Much online chatter about this. We shall see if this turns me from someone who eyerolls at any mention of Dune into a fan.
Questions:
If you haven’t yet seen Chalamet, what’s keeping you?
If you have, what’s your favorite of his performances?
David Bowie’s “Modern Love” is a bright, peppy song about that has enough repetitive parts that anyone can sing along to the backing vocals, even if they aren’t sure what the song is actually about.
Two articles have two different takes:
“The bright communal joy of ‘Modern Love’ masks a spiritually empty view of life, in which work is the last religion standing. As such, it was a song made for its times.”
“‘Modern Love’ is about the struggle to find solace in love and religion. David was never one to openly admit too much about his songs, but the title is a phrase occasionally used in gay circles about homosexual love. His spoken opening line, ‘I know when to go out, and when to stay in,’ indicating that he knows when it’s acceptable to admit that I’m bisexual or gay or not because later he sings, ‘never gonna fall for Modern Love.’”
Is it a song about work? Or about a certain kind of love? What do you think?
The video is a straight concert video. As Pushing Ahead of the Dame notes: “It was a rock video as tour commercial—don’t miss the giant inflated crescent moon! the horn section wearing pith helmets! Coming to your town next month!”
The song is fun for Karaoke and shines in movies. I’m surprised it hasn’t been used more. Here are four movies improved by “Modern Love”
In this sweet film about Leonardo (Ghilherme Lobo), a teenager who is blind, who finds his world upended when Gabriel (Fabio Audi) shows up in his life.
At one point, Leonardo attends a party where “Modern Love” is playing in the background.
James Brennan (Jesse Eisenberg) has his summer all planned out: college graduation then Europe with his friends. Alas, the plans fall through and he ends up working at a broken-down amusement park running the carnie games.
Early on, as “Modern Love” plays, he’s doing a bad job calling the Derby Race when Bill Hader gives him advice: “Take it to a 10.” Kristen Wiig does her scene stealing thing in the background.
In Noah Baumbach’s Frances Ha (my top movie of 2013) Greta Gerwig is adrift in her 20s. She would be irritating, if she wasn’t so darn likable. And also, it helps that she’s a character on screen, not your actual friend.
“Modern Love” furthers our love of her character, as she leaps and dances as she runs through the streets of Manhattan on the way to her new apartment in Chinatown. (Her roomates are the very cute Lev (Adam Driver) and Benji (Michael Zegan)
Jason Sudeikis and Alison Brie are a couple who have pledged to be friends and only friends. They do their best in scene after scene, but it becomes apparent to everyone around them that this cannot continue.
“Modern Love” appears when the two attend the birthday party of a friend’s child. They have ingested a specific substance that guarantees they will have a little remove from a teeming horde of kids. When the party seems to be going south, Alison Brie steps in to teach the kids a dance. Movie magic: the kids pick up the dance from the first beat. When she loses focus, Sudeikis steps in with free dancing, while other characters make the point that this platonic thing cannot last much longer. It’s a joyous scene from start to finish.
Top movies watched in 2018 from individual decades
I like some structure to my movie watching. But only some.
I’ve got a scratch-off movie poster* that had me chasing some old classics in 2018, plus some catch up viewing for Filmspotting Madness, 2000s edition. That meant that I watched some things from decades other than the current one.
Oh, and there was a movie that was scheduled to be released that had three previous versions. I couldn’t let that opportunity go by.
Here are my favorite old favorite discoveries in 2018
Janet Gaynor is Esther Blodgett, an aspiring actress and Frederic March is the aging alcoholic actor who wants Ms. Blodgett to be the film star she’s always dreamed of being.
While there was a lot of subject matter that usually would sink the film for me (May-December romances, falling in love with an alcoholic) I adored this film.
John Huston’s classic is a classic for a reason. You may be intrigued because it’s a Humphry Bogard film, but John Huston cast his own father as Howard, the old gold prospector delighted to be out in the gold fields again. Howard steals the show.
1950s
6 movies watched from the 1950s I really hit the jackpot with this decade
Gary Cooper, Grace Kelly
Directed by
Fred Zinnemann
Five stars.
Gary Cooper doesn’t have much time to raise up a posse to greet Frank Miller, the criminal Cooper sent to prison several years before. But it shouldn’t be too hard. After all, everyone remembers how bad things had been when Frank Miller was around.
A publicity still from the 1950 Academy Award®-winning drama “All about Eve” features (left to right): Gary Merrill, Bette Davis, George Sanders, Anne Baxter, Hugh Marlowe and Celeste Holm. “All about Eve” received a record 14 Academy Award nominations and won six Oscars®, including Best Picture. Restored by Nick & jane for Dr. Macro’s High Quality Movie Scans Website: http:www.doctormacro.com. Enjoy!
Five stars.
If you’re like me and your only exposure to this movie is a few quotes, well then “fasten your seat belts, it’s going to be a bumpy night.” Bette Davis is amazing, as is the rest of the cast.
Billy Wilder, Marlenia Dietrich, Tyorne Power, Charles Laughton. Big names! And a big story of a lawyer defending his client from a murder charge. Best enjoyed if you know nothing about the film. Do you like courtroom dramas? Queue this one up!
Okay so 2018 was the year I spent a goodly amount of time gushing over three of the four versions of this movie. But there is a good reason for that! This time, Judy Garland plays the aspiring actress and James Mason plays the alcoholic has-been. And Judy Garland was a force. Watch the below scene and see if you don’t want to invest another another 150 minutes in this movie.
1960s, 1970s, 1980s
For these decades I have no movies to recommend. I didn’t watch any movies from the 60s, only one from the 70s (that was the terrible version of A Star is Born) and only two in the 80s.
Four stars. This film isn’t going to be for everyone. You’ve got to be a fan of stories incrementally told while not a lot of action happens. In fact, the action that mostly happens is young men in the French Foreign Legion doing training exercises in the sun. But watching young, fit men work out isn’t the worst way to spend your time. And if you are like me, the ending scene with Denis Lavant will captivate you.
2000s
I watched 18 movies from the ‘aughts in 2018. Only one of them was a five-star movie.
Five stars. Eleven actors, all at their sparkly best. A heist plotted against a guy who deserves to lose his money. Julia Roberts. This film is the filmiest of films and so much fun. Get the team together, get the plan together, execute the plan, deal with the fallout. It’s hard to stop smiling while watching this.
Further sentences:
*It appears that my version of Pop Chart’s 100 Essential Films Scratch-off Movie Poster has been substituted for this one. Most of the movies look the same, though. Oh, but they added Lady Bird (my #1 movie of 2017) Sorry to Bother You (Boots Riley for the win!) and Black Panther (If you’re only going to see one Marvel film, this is it). Good choices.
Avengers: Endgame’s release last weekend, got me thinking about how the seventeen years I’ve been in a relationship with Matt have coincided with the rise of the modern superhero movie.
We both like superhero films. He grew up reading comic books, I love an origin story. We both experienced Christopher Reeve’s Superman and the sequels that followed. There was the Batman in the 80s.
The start of “us” was around the release weekend of the 2002 Spider-Man movie. We watched the movie separately, but we talked about it in one of those long start-of-relationship phone call or email.
Quantity increasing:
At the beginning, we watched most of the superhero movies as they were released, usually on opening weekend, or close to it. And now? We mostly do the same thing, but there are so many more opening weekends for us. Look what happened:
Anniversary Celebrations
Because our anniversary is always celebrated the weekend before Mother’s Day, and that’s often the launch of the summer movie season, we’ve had more than one anniversary at the movie theater. Actually, there have been six, and had the last two Avengers films not moved their release dates one week earlier, we would be at eight.
(The self-portrait skills have not improved over the years. In fact, they may have degraded.)
Who we like:
Our films fall into four categories:
DC (Navy)
Spider-man (Red)
X-Men (Purple)
Marvel (Orange)
You can see which universe is the clear winner in our house. It’s Marvel by a long shot, probably because they have perfected the superhero film universe. Matt’s a big fan of X-Men, I have a soft spot for Spider-Man and neither of us prioritizes DC. Most of those DC films are Christopher Nolan’s Batman series.
DC
While I liked the Christopher Nolan Batman world overall, and we both liked Batman Begins and The Dark Knight Rises, Matt and I disagree about the Dark Knight. It’s his favorite, I thought it was much too dark.
I like Superman, but haven’t made time for him among the superhero glut and we’ve missed most of the DCEU. Exceptions: Wonder Woman, because no way was I missing that female icon’s big-screen debut, especially with a female director; Shazam! because the podcast Feminist Frequency gave it their seal of approval so Matt wanted to go. We both liked it, me more than him.
Here’s a nice 8-minute analysis of DC that compares that world unfavorably to Marvel.
Spider-Man
I’m not sure if the fact there have been four different actors portraying Spider-Man says more about our longevity, or the lack of originality in Hollywood.
As a big fan of Toby Maguire’s Spider-Man, I wasn’t a big fan of the reboot with Andrew Garfield coming so soon after Spider-Man III. We still watched the Amazing Spider-Man, though we both skipped the sequel.
For the next reboot, Matt went on opening day and I skipped it, but the argument “it’s a really great high school film” eventually won me over and Matt watched Spider-Man: Homecomingwith me on DVD. Tom Holland is a delight; he might just be the best of the bunch.
When Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse was released, I was feeling rather full of superhero movies and almost didn’t go, but was so glad we did see the film. Miles Morales is the best animated Spider-Man I’ve ever seen and the movie is visually stunning. Plus, it has a great plot.
If they keep going at this rate, there will be another actor portraying Spider-Man by the time we celebrate our 25th anniversary.
X-Men
X2: X-Men United was the first superhero movie we watched together. We saw it at the Laurelhurst Theater as part of a double feature with the original Superman.
Hot tip: a double feature of those two films should start with Superman, as following early-2000s filmmaking with 1970s filmmaking makes the older film feel like it is playing at half speed. Plus there’s a rhyming poem-like series of thoughts in the middle that we both cringed through.
Since then we’ve seen an X-Man film that Matt still refers to as “the fan film” and refuses to acknowledge as part of the cannon. We’ve gone back in time to see James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender portray younger versions of Patrick Stewart (Magneto) and Ian McKellen (Professor X)
We’ve also seen the titles of films featuring everyone’s favorite mutant (Wolverine, of course) shed punctuation and articles as the years go by.
We’ve seen Logan’s origins (X-Men Origins: Wolverine) (terrible film), watched him go to Japan (The Wolverine)(okay film) to the end of his story (Logan)(a very violent, but higher quality film)
I’m guessing we will be at the theater for X-Men: Dark Pheonix. I’m looking forward to Evan Peter’s re-appearance as Quicksliver. His Jim Croche scene in X-Men: Days of Future Past was a highlight of the franchise for me.
Marvel
Marvel reigns supreme over our superhero moviegoing world. We’ve been to films with Marvel characters since the Marvel Cinematic Universe was a pipe dream.
That’s right, we’ve seen Hulk.
Not only that, but we watched The Incredible Hulk, and not just to catch up before the first Avengers movie came out.
What is it about the MCU that is so good? They take their movies seriously. They cast brilliant actors. They create a unified movie world, where one movie builds on another for an ultimate story, but where also each movie can stand on its own.
And they never lose sight that super heroes are fun, and the best ones are funny.
Though I have superhero fatigue right now, I still want to watch their films, because they do good storytelling. And that’s led them to a $20 billion worldwide box office take on movies that have cost around $4.5 billion to make.
(Numbers come from Wikipedia and are probably changing every second since Endgame’s release.)
In summary:
It’s been 17 years and an average of 2.35 new superhero movies per year. Will we keep up with the pace? I don’t know, but probably. But regardless, I’ve enjoyed our shared interest in the superhero world.
Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising was a great film, by which I mean it made me laugh very hard when I watched the preview and then even harder when I watched the film. And behind this dumb comedy are four women who have given us some very good performances.
Here’s my list of the quality actors and their movies that you should watch
Rose Byrne
She gets cast in all sorts of things and her poised, porcelain looks fuel a good drama or thriller. But she’s got the heart of a comedian and I love her most in comedies. I suspect there is a nerdy girl hiding in Rose Byrne’s past.
I recommend you check her out in Juliet, Naked, where she plays the fed-up girlfriend of a superfan. She’s also quite good in Spy as Rayna Boyanov. But one of my favorite comedic scenes of all time is of her as Nat in I Give it a Year. This scene is even funnier when one has the knowledge that Rose Byrne is terrified of birds.
Chloe Grace Moretz
As a teenager, she had enough poise to seem much older than a teenager, which is the reverse of what we usually see, what with 20-somethings playing teenagers.
I love her as a teenager who befriends Kiera Knightly in Laggies, and I love that movie in general and I bet you haven’t watched it. Go do yourself a favor and take in Lynn Shelton’s tribute to adult confusion. Moretz was a good anchor in If I Stay and, she makes a great usurping young actress in The Clouds of Sils Maria. But she first caught my eye as the wiser, much younger sister of Tom in 500 Days of Summer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y8FuwUhAfUY
Kiersey Clemons
Oh my goodness, I hope there is much more Kiersey Clemons on tap. I first saw her as Diggy in the hilarious Dope, where she wasn’t initially recognizable as a girl. But she was even better as Sam Fisher, the reluctant half of the duo We’re Not a Band in the movie Hearts Beat Loud. IMDB tells me she has a lot of acting credits. I’ll look out for her more in the future.
Beanie Feldstein
Aside from her great “who is that person?” turn as Nora in Neighbors 2, she also played best friend Julie in Lady Bird. The internet provides no clips for her good scenes, so I give you this clip in which both uniquely named actors talk about the origin of their names.
Arrrrrgh! That clip has just alerted me to the fact that Awkwafina is also in Neighbors II. She’s amazing too. So we add one more actress and two more movies.
Awkwafina
Ocean’s Eight had many really great women (eight, to be exact) and Awkwafina was a scene stealer as Constance (Appropriate. Constance is a pickpocket.) She was also the person in Crazy Rich Asians I looked forward to appearing on screen as I grew less enchanted with that movie.
Late-breaking alert. The movie Booksmart has come on my radar and I’m exited. Not only does it star Beanie Feldstein, but it also stars Kaitlyn Dever, who stole every scene in Laggies. This will be a see-it-opening-weekend movie for me.
In honor of On Chesil Beach, which was 2/3rds of a good movie, let’s look at movies that I loved, but have some cring-y endings that make me recommend them with qualifications.
The Hate U Give
The scene in The Hate U Give with her brother and the gun was not present in the book and has the stench of Hollywooding up a perfectly good story. I don’t love that scene. The rest of the movie? Funny, warm, caring, sad, scary. I love Star (Amandla Stenberg) and her family so much I watched this twice in the same day. In the theater.
Crazy, Stupid, Love
(L-r) KEVIN BACON as David Lindhagen, JOHN CARROLLL LYNCH as Bernie, RYAN GOSLING as Jacob and STEVE CARELL as Cal in Warner Bros. Pictures comedy CRAZY, STUPID, LOVE a Warner Bros. Pictures release.
Oh my gosh, I love so many things about Crazy, Stupid, Love. Ryan Gosling as a Don Juan taking the hapless Steve Carell under his tutelage. Emma Stone in all her fierceness. Julianne Moore in her hurt. Even Analeigh Tipton’s underage pursuit of Steve Carell is still funny, though it’s fast becoming squirmy. But then there’s the graduation scene which is one hundred ways of awkward and a pale shadow of the greatness that came before. Just turn the movie off after the fight.
Notting Hill
Photo by Clive Coote/Polygram/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock (5884062d)
It’s been 20 years of Julia Roberts films and nothing has yet topped Notting Hill as my favorite of her performances. Was there anyone better to play internationally famous movie star Anna Scott? Was Hugh Grant not perfect as the every man who fell in love with her? Was the roommate not endlessly amusing? Was that scene of walking up the street through the seasons not a great piece of non-montage time passing? Was there ever a better use of the phrase oopsy daisy?
And then there’s this weird car chase scene that has me asking, “Why? Why, Richard Curtis did you do that? It’s not really funny, and drags down your otherwise perfect film. Do like I do for the “Broadway Ballet” scene in Singing in the Rain and fast forward.
I know there are more out there. Leave your bobbles in the comments.
Sometimes, I think it’s harder to get nominated in this category than it is for best actress. After all, most movie roles for women aren’t for the lead. They are for the wife, or the mother, or the girlfriend. You know, the women who are ready and waiting to boost that man who is the real story. (In fact, our first contender fits neatly into that slot.)
Whereas movies that are really ABOUT women are much fewer and far between. And then sometimes they can’t be too much about women (ahem Tully) or supposedly “people” won’t want to watch them. So there are a lot more supporting roles than there are lead ones.
Oh, Amy Adams, you’re just good in everything, including Vice. The academy likes you so much they have nominated you for six Oscars. Your performance as the steely Lynne Cheney was equal to your many other nominated performances. However, I think you are a long shot to win.
Fun fact: Amy Adams’ performance in Enchanted was so good I left the theater without my purse.
Oh Emma Stone, you are also delightful, especially in The Favourite. You’ve already won an academy award (for La La Land) and you brought steely conniving to your role as Abigail. Will this be your year? Again? My guess is no.
Fun fact: we only know her as Emma Stone because there was already an Emily Stone already registered with SAG
Marina de Tavira, nominated for Roma
Marina de Tavira as Señora Sofía in Roma, written and directed by Alfonso Cuarón.
Photo by Carlos Somonte.
Marina de Tavira, you keep your own secrets in Roma. As the mother of four and the head of household you keep going as your marriage falls apart. Like Yalitza Aparicio, your performance is subtle. If the 2019 Academy Awards is going to be a night all about Roma, you might just win.
Fun fact: Marina de Tavira is a well-known actress in Mexico. I have no real fun facts because I mostly only watch movies in English.
Rachel Weisz, nominated for The Favourite
Rachel Weisz stars in Fox Searchlight Pictures’ “THE FAVOURITE.”
Rachel Weisz, in The Favourite, you get what you deserve and also manage to make us feel sad that things have turned out this way for you. It’s a great performance of friendship, and scheming, and control. I think two nominated actresses from the same movie will split the vote, so it will be a surprise—but a welcome one—if you win.
Fun fact: the first names of her former partner and current husband both begin with the letter D. But who are her former partner and her current husband? I’ll leave you to Google.
Regina King, nominated for If Beale Street Could Talk
Well hello Regina King, the matriarch holding things together in If Beale Street Could Talk. This is your first nomination, though IMDB tells me you have 52 wins and 53 nominations in other awards categories. You’re the one I’m hoping will win.
Fun fact: both her and her sister Reina’s first names mean “queen”
Predictions
So who will win? If it’s Roma’s night, then Marina de Tavira. If it’s not, then Regina King. Rachel Weiss and Emma Stone, maybe. Amy Adams, long shot.
My preferred winners, in order: Regina King, Rachel Weiss, Emma Stone, Marina de Tavira and Amy Adams
