3. Crank These Up to Eleven and Roll Down the Window!
These movies were just what I wanted and needed and I lovelovelove them.
Avengers: Endgame
There are some hinky moments, but this was a very satisfying conclusion to an immense undertaking. The final battle is obviously the centerpiece we were all waiting for (PORTALS!), but I was not prepared for that time jump after the first act. Just boom, five years later. This world has been torn in half and the movie just leaves the characters there, forcing them to live with that reality and deal with it and work through it. Cap’s in group therapy over it, Tony has blown off to a cabin in the woods with Pepper and become a dad, and bless her, Natasha is still on the phones in case the remaining Avengers are needed. It gives the final battle its much-needed stakes and makes that final sacrifice so powerful. (Available on Disney+ and for rent on other streaming services.)
Captain Marvel
It took me a while to get into this one, even to figure out what was going on in the early scenes, but it ultimately works so well. I love the reveal about the Skrulls. I love the mystery of Carol’s backstory. I love the lady friendships. I love that Carol is just Not Here for men’s approval -- she doesn’t wear a sexy costume, she doesn’t need to smile, and fer cryin’ out loud she doesn’t need a man to tell her what she can and can’t do. Also, there is a cat/Flerken named Goose and he is the real star of this show. (Available on Disney+ and for rent on other streaming services.)
Daniel Isn’t Real
On the surface this looks like the worst kind of bro horror, but what I love about it is how it examines the notion of an id and gives its protagonist’s id a body and a will of its own, eventually outside of his control. There are some clumsy ideas about mental illness in this movie, but that’s hardly a first for horror. The titular Daniel looks an awful lot like the President’s oldest son to me, which only adds to his creepiness. Perhaps my favorite thing about the movie, though, is the casting of Mary Stuart Masterson, who I literally have not seen in a movie in over 20 years (1996’s Bed of Roses, to be exact). (Available on some streaming services.)
Doctor Sleep
I haven’t read the novel (or its predecessor, The Shining), but I know enough about King’s canon to know that this movie makes a lovely bridge between Kubrick’s film and the novels. There are a lot of great emotional beats in this movie, but there are some genuine scares as well — that scene with Jacob Tremblay is one of the most upsetting things I saw in a movie this year. I love the uncanny nods to Kubrick's The Shining — the bike down the hallway, Alex Essoe as Shelley Duvall as Wendy Torrance, and Henry Thomas as Jack (sort of?). And though this is Ewan McGregor’s show, Rebecca Ferguson steals every scene as Rose the Hat, unquestionably a villain but you understand why people are drawn to her. (Available to buy on VOD; will be available on disc in February.)
Dolemite Is My Name
PUT YOUR WEIGHT ON IT! A few years ago, the Yonkers Alamo Drafthouse screened a few of Rudy Ray Moore’s movies, which gave me a chance to see Dolemite. Moore’s movies are not great cinema (whatever that means), but they are wildly entertaining and you have to admire (or at least I do) the ambition. I would much rather see a fun, interesting bad movie than a technically proficient but lazy and cynical movie. Eddie Murphy stars as Moore and this movie follows its hero from record store worker to club MC to aspiring stand-up comic to HIT stand-up comic to film director and movie star. This movie has such a heart and such admiration for Moore and what he accomplished. I loved seeing all the film students he had working on the film sticking around, even after the money ran out to pay them, because they were rooting so hard for him. Eddie Murphy is obviously the star here, but Wesley Snipes and Da'Vine Joy Randolph are incredible as well. (Available on Netflix.)
Extra Ordinary
My goodness, what a delight! A hilarious send-up of all kinds of supernatural movies, including The Exorcist, Poltergeist, Ghostbusters and every movie about Satanists. A heroine who’s a driving instructor by day and a reluctant ghost-hunter by night. A man named Martin whose last name is also Martin — seriously, Martin Martin. Will Forte gnawing on every bit of scenery he can find. A flashback about a man who is possessed by a dog *and* a haunted pothole. Jars of ghost goo. Someone finally solving the “virgin sacrifice” dilemma in the way you wonder why they never seem to do in horror movies. And an absolutely perfect ending. (Not yet released; not date set yet.)
Fighting with My Family
This movie had me at Motley Crue’s “Wild Side” and never let me go. Florence Pugh has been on fire this year with this movie, Little Women and Midsommar, and I loved seeing her in a role like this, with this great family dynamic with Nick Frost, Lena Headey and especially Jack Lowden who plays her brother. I love the conflict at play when Paige is the one chosen to go train for the WWE, because everyone had just assumed it would be her brother. And I really liked that she was forced to reevaluate her preconceptions of the other women in the program. There has been a theme of that in a lot of my favorite movies this year. (Available to buy on most streaming services.)
Ford v. Ferrari
I wonder if I would have enjoyed this as much if I hadn’t done SpeedVegas this year and gotten the experience of actually driving a Ferrari (*coughs* and a Porsche and a Lambo) around a track. Whatever, this was a great, solid, grown-up movie with excellent performances and great driving scenes. I especially love the scene (and this is hardly original) where Shelby takes Ford for a ride-along (seen in the pic above). Everyone’s talking about Bale and Damon, but I also really dug Caitriona Balfe in the “Claire Foy in First Man” role (and whose character I found a lot more compelling). (In theaters.)
Good Boys
The whole concept of this movie seems so wrong, but anyone who remembers their middle school and junior high years knows there’s some truth to it. It’s a great spin on the “one wild night” plot and an even better exploration of how friendships change as we grow out of childhood (not unlike Superbad) and how at this age your choices in friends have been limited and your friends are your friends because you all live near each other and are in the same class. All three boys are incredible, but my personal fave is Keith L. Williams who plays Lucas and who wins my just-made-up award for Greatest Scream of the Year. (Available on most streaming services.)
Horror Noire: A History of Black Horror
This was a fascinating documentary. Horror as a genre has relegated black actors and characters as supporting players, caricatures, and almost always That First Death, Showing The Audience How Serious The Situation Is. Even in movies made for black audiences, with predominantly black casts, accurate explorations of the black experience have been hard to come by, mostly because those movies were largely made by white directors. This is a great documentary about the importance of having black people tell their own stories, and how Get Out in particular has changed the horror landscape. (Available on Shudder.)
In Fabric
I’ve loved Peter Strickland’s two previous films, Berberian Sound Studio and Duke of Burgundy, but In Fabric is a whole other animal altogether and I was Here. For. It. On the surface, it’s a story about a cursed red dress, but it has so much more going on and will leave you with so many questions that you will never want to be answered. It’s supposedly set in 1993, so why does it feel so very 1980s (especially the commercials for the department store)? What exactly are the saleswomen doing with those mannequins at night (besides the obvious)? Why do those men get turned on by descriptions of appliance repair? Why does every unmarried man in London have a coupon for pudding? (Available on most streaming services.)
John Wick 3: Parabellum
Holy worldbuilding, Batman! How do these movies keep raising the stakes and complicating the relationships and leaving us with such great cliffhangers and fascinating questions?! It seems like every time I think “it would be cool to see such-and-such,” the movies deliver it to me (case in point, the deconsecration of the NYC Continental). How long can they keep this up? What will a war against the High Table look like? Whose side is Winston really on? Will we see more Mantzoukas in the next movie? WTF HOW WILL THE UNIVERSE HANDLE JOHN WICK 4 AND THE MATRIX 4 COMING OUT ON THE SAME DAY NEXT YEAR?!?! (Available on most streaming services.)
Knife + Heart
I love me a good slasher, and the seedier the better, so a slasher that takes place in the world of gay porn in the seedy late 1970s seems like a perfect fit. It pairs well with William Friedkin’s 1980 film Cruising, which is set in a similar world, but it feels less lurid than that movie. It also handles the “Bury Your Gays” trope better because nearly everyone — perhaps literally everyone — in the movie is gay and there is far more to these gay characters than just being, errr, bladed dildo fodder. There’s a great sadness about this movie as well, as it depicts a wild and reckless world that AIDS tragically destroyed forever, and you can’t help seeing the murderer in the film as a symbol for the virus itself. And oh wow, that ending! (Available on Shudder and to rent on some streaming services.)
The Lighthouse
The story of two lighthouse keepers (played by Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson) stationed on a remote island who go crazy when they are stranded by a storm, this is a delirious hallucination of a movie. Director Robert Eggers, whose previous movie The Witch was one of my favorite films of 2016, used all kinds of old-fashioned camera techniques and lenses, as well as sound design, to create a very particular sense of time and a feeling of claustrophobia, and the smaller frame deliberately hides things from the audience. Watching this, you get the feeling you might be going a bit mad as well as the characters you’re watching. The use of “Doodle Let Me Go” in the closing credits is just the right touch to cap off the experience. (Still in a few theaters.)
Ma
This was wild and ridiculous and I loved every minute of it. Between this movie and Greta, this was a good year for movies about young people who don’t want to hang out with middle-aged women and who pay the price for it. Octavia Spencer is clearly having a ball, and at a certain point you realize that there’s a lot more going on than just a sad lady who buys beer for minors so she can have someone to hang out with. Juliette Lewis is pretty great in this as well, and I was glad to see Diana Silvers in this too, having seen her earlier this year in Booksmart as mean girl lesbian Hope. (Available on most streaming services.)
Queen & Slim
Gosh, this movie is gorgeous. People have been comparing it to Bonnie and Clyde, but I think it’s closer to Thelma & Louise. Two people on a Tinder date (and not a good one) get pulled over by a cop on the way home. As the two in the car are black and the cop is white, you can guess how this goes, but it’s actually even worse. The situation escalates until the cop shoots the woman and the man shoots and kills the cop in self defense, and suddenly these two are on the run, stuck together. And they don’t even like each other that much. I love a lot of what this movie has to say, but there are also things about it that are squishy and don’t feel quite right. Some decisions that are made and actions taken feel far-fetched or out of character. It’s still a hell of a movie, though. That shot of the two of them on the hood of the car is iconic. (In theaters.)
Rocketman
More musicals should be like this, and more biopics should be like this: unafraid to lean in to the medium and do things that only cinema can do. Not long before this movie came out I’d seen Elton John in concert for the first (and I’m guessing the last) time and I’m sure I don’t need to explain why he’s such an icon. All the musical numbers in this are incredible, particularly the dreamlike title number (and I love how they inserted Taron Egerton into the “I’m Still Standing” video). Speaking of Taron Egerton, I’ve been a huge fan of his since the first Kingsman movie and he CRUSHES it as Elton, showing everyone why he should be a way bigger star than he is. I have zero interest in comparing this to Bohemian Rhapsody (which I also dearly love), except to say that this movie makes me wonder what BoRhap would have been like with Dexter Fletcher as its sole director (though it sadly would have meant he probably couldn’t have directed this). (Available on most streaming services.)
Us
I like the metaphor of this a lot, and I love the ideas at play here, particularly about class, which reminds me quite a bit of Parasite. The “Who are you?” / “We are Americans.” exchange is the movie in a nutshell. There are some tremendous dual performances in this, most notably from Lupita N’Yongo, who, if there were any justice and awards bodies respected horror at all, would be at the forefront of the Best Actress conversation. I would never compare this to its predecessor, Get Out, but I didn’t love this quite as much and it mostly has to do with the twist. It just comes too late, considering who is involved and what they both must know and weirdly never say anything about to each other. It’s still an outstanding movie, and genuinely unsettling. Incredible use of a Siri-esque device. Also, Winston Duke can get it. (Available on streaming, but only to buy.)
You Don’t Nomi
I had not seen Showgirls until a few days before I saw this documentary, so I probably didn’t have quite the perspective needed to fully appreciate this movie, but it was better than not having seen it at all. This is a pretty great deep dive into many of the ways Showgirls is both a disaster and deservedly iconic, and how it has become a cult favorite. All of the most ridiculous elements of the film are examined — Elizabeth Berkley’s bizarrely aggressive delivery, everyone’s obsession with well-painted nails, the diet of brown rice and vegetables, the truly astounding “doggie chow” conversation, and the way every black person in this film exists to keep Nomi’s story going. This movie made me want to program a series of Paul Verhoeven’s American films. Also a triple feature of Valley of the Dolls, Mommie Dearest and Showgirls — all of which were referenced in this movie as films centered around performances that are bizarre and over-the-top in similar ways. (Not yet released; no date set.)
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