Tag: movies

Favorite Films of 2022

Pretty much every year I’ve done this list (since 2007), I’ve published it soon after the beginning of the year to coincide with the bevy of other year-end lists. But every year I’d end up watching more movies after publishing that would have been eligible and affected my list.

So I realized: what’s the rush? This year I took my time and saw what I could to give myself the best chance at an accurate accounting of my favorites of the year. I didn’t see everything I wanted to, but I did my best.

What makes my 2022 film year unique is that, according to my Letterboxd profile, I gave 4 stars (out of 5) to 18 movies, with nothing rated higher that stood out above the crowd. Maybe that says more about me than the movies themselves, but that still left me without a clear frontrunner.

Given that unusual parity, I thought it fitting to do an unranked, alphabetical list this time—something I haven’t done since 2014. All of these movies, plus many of the honorable mentions, stuck with me for different reasons.

On to my top 10…

Apollo 10 1/2: A Space Age Childhood

Richard Linklater’s latest film synthesizes elements from two of his previous ones: it’s the memoiristic nostalgia of Boyhood mixed with the rotoscope animation style of A Waking Life. This is a closely observed, gently told, fantastically wrought, and personally held story that shows off Linklater’s knack for capturing the beauty of the quotidian. (Streaming on Netflix.)

Athena

Come for the absolutely gangbusters opening 10 minutes and stay for the tense, heart-pounding drama of Children of Men-meets-The Battle of Algiers in a French apartment complex. It’s hard to watch at times, but also has a “can’t look away” quality that makes it both deeply cinematic and compassionate at its core. (Streaming on Netflix.)

Avatar: The Way of Water

Much like Top Gun: Maverick, James Cameron’s long-gestating sequel offers incredible spectacle, impressive CGI, and powerful emotional beats that elevate its rather rote plot and character development into epic myth. Though, unlike Maverick, the resplendently rendered fictional world itself is the star even above the performers. Bring on the sequels!

Babylon

I’ve been on a slightly downward trajectory with writer-director Damien Chazelle’s filmography: high on Whiplash, mixed-to-positive on La La Land, then kinda bored with First Man. His latest on Hollywood’s bacchanalian early years is everything but boring and jolted my Chazelle Meter back upward. Also a great (unofficial) prequel/double feature with Spielberg’s cinema-obsessed The Fabelmans.

Decision to Leave

South Korean writer-director Park Chan-wook is back after 2016’s The Handmaiden with a riveting slow-burn whodunit featuring Park Hae-il as an insomniac detective on a murder case and Tang Wei as his prime suspect—and complicated love interest. Part Gone Girl, part Vertigo, yet fully its own creation, the film combines Park’s technical prowess with a terrifically twisty narrative and a haunting conclusion. Don’t sleep on this one.

Emergency

In this impressive debut feature from Carey Williams, three college roommates—two Black and one Latino—ready for a night of partying when they discover a young white girl passed-out drunk in their house. How they deal with that turns into a high-wire racial reckoning, tragicomedic social satire, and beautiful portrait of male friendship. Like Superbad meets Get Out. (Streaming on Amazon Prime.)

The Fabelmans

In a year full of autobiopics (Inarritu’s Bardo, Mendes’ Empire of Light, Gray’s Armageddon Time), Spielberg’s personal tale of the dark magic of moviemaking reigns supreme, and serves as a cinematic Rosetta Stone for his iconic decades-long career. It’s also the funniest Spielberg has been in a while. Michelle Williams and Paul Dano deliver top-notch performances, but it’s Gabriel LaBelle who wins the movie and our hearts with his earnest and affecting turn as the teenaged Spielberg stand-in Sammy. That kid—just like the man he represents—is going places!

Jackass Forever

A dirty, cringey, and gut-bustingly funny soul-cleanse. There’s just something about this crew of delightful degenerates debasing themselves for the sake of entertainment that warms my heart and makes me laugh harder than just about anything else.

Top Gun: Maverick

Much like Avatar: The Way of Water, this dominated the box office, saved movie theaters (according to Spielberg), and provoked couch-jumping enthusiasm among its admirers. Though, unlike The Way of Water, it did so with sheer movie-star charisma atop the spectacle. Maverick, Cruise, and movie theaters: not dead yet.

The Wonder

I’ve realized that I will appreciate almost any movie that has something to say about religion, and that’s the case with this adaptation of Emma Donoghue’s excellent novel starring Florence Pugh as a skeptical nurse tending to a “miracle” child in mid-19th century Ireland. (Double feature recommendation: Anne Fontaine’s 2016 film The Innocents.) (Streaming on Netflix.)

Other movies I enjoyed:

  • The Banshees of Inisherin
  • Prey
  • Everything Everywhere All At Once
  • Turning Red
  • Emily the Criminal
  • The Northman
  • Hustle
  • Barbarian
  • Kimi
  • Glass Onion

Non-2022 movies I watched and enjoyed:

  • Hud
  • Summer of Soul
  • Ponyo
  • The Hunt for Red October
  • Yojimbo

March 9, 2023 Add Comment

Ratatouille

Rewatching Ratatouille recently made me think of a line from the Guardians of the Galaxy Honest Trailer, which portrays Marvel as so dominant and drunk on its own power—and its fans so eager—that a weird movie with a trash-talking raccoon and monosyllabic tree can be a smash success. Their tongue-in-cheek name for the studio: “F— You, We’re Marvel.”

Ratatouille is Pixar’s “F— You, We’re Pixar” moment. 

A movie about a rat becoming a chef by controlling a human through his hair? Oscar win for Best Animated Feature. Portray the critic as a cadaverous meanie? 96% on Rotten Tomatoes.

Touché, Pixar.  

(Somehow Ratatouille is ranked only #7 on my Pixar rankings, which feels low. Though in my 4 year old’s unofficial Pixar rankings it’s tied for #1 with WALL-E.)

March 6, 2023 Add Comment

The Lion King

It’s hard for me to watch The Lion King objectively as an adult when it’s so deeply ingrained into my being, having been released when I was 7 years old and subjected to countless subsequent rewatches in our family VCR—not to mention inspiring my own adult creative endeavors.

But rewatching it now—with my 4-year-old son next to me wide-eyed and rapt—made me appreciate just how top-notch everything in the movie is, including:

  • the epic Hans Zimmer score
  • one of the musical numbers in particular, which I ranked the best Disney song of all time
  • the balance of meta and wacky humor with deadly serious drama
  • the stunning animated vistas
  • the strangely sensual “Can You Feel the Love Tonight” sequence
  • the delicious scenery-chewing voice work of Jeremy Irons
  • Rafiki keepin’ it real and real weird (in elementary school a buddy and I would reenact the Adult Simba/Rafiki scenes over and over again because we thought they were the funniest. thing. ever.)

Along with Moana, it’s one of the rare Disney musicals that gives me several goosebumps moments. (Though unlike most modern animated films for kids, it achieves all of this with aplomb in under 90 minutes.)

There’s so much fascinating stuff going on about family and trauma and destiny and shame and other things that went completely over my 4 year old’s head, but reminded me why it was such a massive hit at the time and endures in its appeal to all ages.

Two stray notes:

  • We’ve watched it on DVD and Disney+ and both versions obscure the legendary SEX/SFX conspiracy moment—the former by seeming to blur the design and the latter by cutting past it entirely. This feels like a win for the conspiracy theorists.
  • It felt wrong to have the modern, post-2006 Disney castle intro at the beginning of the Disney+ version. Use the classic version, you cowards!

March 1, 2023 Add Comment

Jack would NOT have fit on the door in ‘Titanic’

I’m sorry, but it’s true.

I say that in spite of the apparently real investigation into this internet-famous debate by National Geographic and James Cameron himself:

All the evidence you need is from the scene itself: When Jack tries to get on the door, it almost capsizes. Putting two grown, soaking-wet adults on it amidst the post-sinking chaos—especially without Jack being able to act as bodyguard—would’ve sunk it easily.

So RIP to Chippewa Falls’ favorite son and cinema’s most famous manic pixie dream boy.

February 15, 2023 Add Comment

Media of the moment

An ongoing series

Priestdaddy by Patricia Lockwood. Hilarious and insightful memoir/biography of Lockwood’s Catholic priest father and her experience living with her parents.

Blankets by Craig Thompson. A stunning graphic novel memoir about small-town life, religion, young love, winter, and so many more things.

The Climb. An excellent indie film told through episodic, slice-of-life sequences that add up to a deeply funny and humane portrait of male friendship.

Jurassic Park. Amazing just how leisurely this feels compared to modern action blockbusters, with its long shots and deliberate storytelling pace. Yet still thrilling and not a wasted minute. So refreshing!

Babylon. A great prequel to (and double feature with) The Fabelmans.

Arrival. Masterful work from Denis Villeneuve and Amy Adams, and an excellent metaphor for the creative life.

The Twilight World by Werner Herzog. Happened to stumble upon this bewitching creative-nonfiction novel on a Best Books of 2022 list. In my mind I read it in Herzog’s iconic voice, so that probably made it even better.

Yojimbo. Some incredible shots sprinkled throughout this 1961 Kurosawa classic. “Whether you kill one or one hundred, you only hang once.”

February 3, 2023

Barnes & Noble likes books again

Ted Gioia on the remarkable rebound of Barnes & Noble:

[CEO James Daunt] used the pandemic as an opportunity to “weed out the rubbish” in the stores. He asked employees in the outlets to take every book off the shelf, and re-evaluate whether it should stay. Every section of the store needed to be refreshed and made appealing. 

As this example makes clear, Daunt started giving more power to the stores. But publishers complained bitterly. They now had to make more sales calls, and convince local bookbuyers—and that’s hard work. Even worse, when a new book doesn’t live up to expectations, the local workers see this immediately. Books are expected to appeal to readers—and just convincing a head buyer at headquarters was no longer enough.

Daunt also refused to dumb-down the store offerings. The key challenge, he claimed was to “create an environment that’s intellectually satisfying—and not in a snobbish way, but in the sense of feeding your mind.”

His crucial move was refusing to take promotional money from publishers in exchange for purchase commitments and prominent placement of only certain books:

[Daunt] refused to play this game. He wanted to put the best books in the window. He wanted to display the most exciting books by the front door. Even more amazing, he let the people working in the stores make these decisions.

This is James Daunt’s super power: He loves books. 

“Staff are now in control of their own shops,” he explained. “Hopefully they’re enjoying their work more. They’re creating something very different in each store.”

This cheered me to read, not only because of my interest in the success of bookstores but also because I worked at Barnes & Noble for about six months back in 2011.

Freshly stateside after months abroad, I was nearly broke and working at a grocery store when my friend Brian let me know he’d be leaving his job in the Music & Movies section at our local B&N store and would put in a good word for me if I applied. I did so immediately and got the job, which boosted my pay (from “enough to avoid destitution” to “meager”) along with my spirits.

It turned out to be one of the best jobs I’ve ever had, despite lasting only about six months before I got full-time work elsewhere.

Since whoever was working in the Music & Movies section couldn’t leave it unsupervised, I would be stationed there during my shifts no matter how busy it got elsewhere in the store. Some might have found that suffocating, but as a movie lover I relished being sequestered with thousands of Blu-rays, DVDs, and CDs to browse through and organize when I wasn’t helping customers.

Another big factor of my enjoyment of that job was the manager of the Music & Movies section, Joe. He was the most laidback of the store managers but also probably the most effective because, as my friend Brian said after I sent him the above article:

This strategy reminds me of how Joe would run the music section. He gave us a lot of power over the music that was on the shelves and it allowed us to sell CDs when the industry was in decline. Well done, Barnes.

I guess that’s the takeaway for Barnes and for all purveyors of the fine arts: Be like Joe.

January 26, 2023 1 Comment

My ‘Back to the Future’ bonanza

Well, I finally did it: I finally revealed my decades-old collection of Back to the Future memorabilia.

With it being Sci-Fi Month at Cinema Sugar, I thought the timing was right to show-and-tell such items as:

  • A diecast 1:18 scale DeLorean
  • My handmade reproduction of Marty’s letter to Doc in Part I
  • A “Save the Clock Tower” flyer signed by Claudia Wells, aka Jennifer in Part I
  • The VHS set on which I first watched the Holy Trilogy
  • And many, many more things

I had a blast doing this, so please watch, enjoy, and share:

January 19, 2023 1 Comment

A COVID movie journal

As I’ve been going through my old journals and digitizing the entries—a tedious and time-consuming process that will eventually yield a much more accessible and searchable archive—it’s been fun and enlightening to rediscover things I was thinking about at any given time.

Like this entry from March 10, 2020:

A few pop culture references have come to mind as the coronavirus COVID-19 marches on:

  • the general escalation of uncanny surreality in Signs, as things progress and get ever close to home
  • Arrival and its shaky coalition of countries trying to understand an opaque, unsettling presence
  • Station Eleven [the book] and the global pandemic flu that paralyzes the world and makes humanity wonder what it is
  • Idiocracy with its president so not equipped for the moment

I hadn’t seen Contagion at that point, otherwise that would’ve been there too.

I love how I wrote “the coronavirus COVID-19” as if I’d possibly get it confused with another global contagion sometime in the future. But hey, I’m all about clarity.

January 9, 2023 Add Comment

My own ‘Back to the Future: The Musical’

I finally listened to the original cast recording of Back to the Future: The Musical, which is making its Broadway debut in June 2023. I can’t say I loved every song, though the new showtuned rendition of “Power of Love” is most welcome:

It also reminded me that years ago I started making my own musical version of the trilogy. Well, it wasn’t a musical per se—more like an anthology of songs dedicated to various secondary characters.

Here are the more fully formed song ideas, which also have lyrics and a basic idea of the musical style:

  • “The Easy Way” — a doo-wop tune sung by Biff’s henchmen (inspired by Billy Zane’s line in this scene)
  • “I’m Jailbird Joey” — an outlaw country/blues song for Uncle Joey
  • “Raise a Glass for Red” — an Irish ballad campaign song for Mayor Red Thomas
  • “Can You Spare A Moment (For the Clocktower)” — a kind of military march for the “Save the Clocktower” woman
  • “Reese & Foley” — theme song for an ‘80s buddy cop TV show featuring the two cops who take Jennifer home in Part II

Other potential song subjects I sketched out: Chester the bartender, Terry the mechanic, Farmer Peabody, and Principal Strickland.

(Not) coming to a Broadway theater near you!

December 16, 2022 Add Comment

Top 5 Christmas Movies

Originally published at Cinema Sugar.

1. It’s A Wonderful Life

The once and future king of Christmas movies. I could praise a lot of things: the cinematography, the supporting cast, the dramatic depth of Jimmy Stewart’s first postwar performance. But its magic ultimately comes down to Harry’s closing line—“A toast to my big brother, George, the richest man in town.” George was rich in the end because he remembered. He remembered the barrenness of the ghostly alternate timeline where he was never born. And he remembered the meaning of family and friends and frustrating failures and small victories, all of which had accumulated into something like a wonderful life. Hot dog!

2. The Family Stone

The Rotten Tomatoes consensus of The Family Stone is that “this family holiday dramedy features fine performances but awkward shifts of tone.” Which, yeah: That’s why it’s so good. Maybe your experience was different, but “awkward shifts of tone” could be the definition of family—especially during the holidays. The film depicts a particular kind of cozy, Hallmark-approved, New England-flavored Christmastime while also vividly capturing what it’s like to spend extended time with the people you love but who are also most adept at driving you crazy. I know I’m in the minority on this one, but, to paraphrase Meredith Morton, I don’t care whether you like it or not!

3. Die Hard

True story: several years ago my wife and I were at my parents’ house for Christmas and the family was debating which movie to watch. Soon Die Hard emerged as the consensus pick. My wife hadn’t seen it and knew nothing about it, but since we told her it was a Christmas movie she was game. Turned out she definitely was not game—its brutal violence, shoeless glass-walking, and other decidedly un-cozy elements so traumatized her that she has since refused to acknowledge it as a movie worth watching, let alone a Christmas movie. To which I say: “Yippie-ki-yay, Merry Christmas!”

4. Grumpy Old Men

This movie’s combination of silliness, sincerity, and wondrously snowy northern Minnesota setting has kept me coming back every Christmastime. It’s schmaltzy to a fault, but also a showcase for the legendary comedic chemistry between Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau, forged over decades of working together. They fully commit to their acerbic, chops-busting banter, which is the core strength of the movie. That plus Burgess Meredith absolutely slaying as Lemmon’s horny, incorrigible father.

5. The Muppet Christmas Carol

I took an absurd amount of time trying to decide between this and Home Alone once it occurred to me that they’re pretty much the same movie. Both feature self-involved jerks who find themselves alone near Christmas and forced to endure challenging journeys of self-discovery after an encounter with Marleys—the ghosts of former business partners for Scrooge and a mysterious elderly neighbor for Kevin. Painful developments occur (spiritual/psychological for Scrooge, physical for the Wet Bandits) before concluding with joyous Christmas Day reunions and reconciliation. I ultimately went with the Muppets because they’re the freaking Muppets.

December 6, 2022 1 Comment

Movie trailers ruin movies

Alissa Wilkinson preaches the truth about movie trailers:

At best they’ll just show you stuff you probably knew anyway, or don’t need to know — who’s in the movie, what’s on the soundtrack, the basic plot setup. Maybe the look or the tone or the vibe. But trailers aren’t designed to give you a glimpse of the movie; they’re mini-movies, designed to sell tickets (or maybe subscriptions to a streamer). And they’re starting to feel increasingly divorced from their actual movies.

This has been a hobbyhorse of mine for a while, so I was delighted to be validated by a professional movie watcher (i.e. film critic).

I’m so serious about not watching trailers for movies I want to see that when I’m seeing a movie in the theater, I’ll close my eyes during the pre-show trailers (or just try to arrive after them). I’ll still hear them, but usually the audio and dialogue are abstracted enough from their use within the actual movie that it doesn’t spoil anything.

There’s certainly an art to a great movie trailer, both in its construction and purpose. One I think about a lot is Little Children, a movie I still haven’t seen.

It’s fine that most trailers aren’t high art, but it’s not fine when they spoil what they’re supposed to be promoting. Alissa:

It’s surprising how many movie trailers just mess up the viewing experience for someone who wants to see the film. I watched both The Lost City (very funny) and Ticket to Paradise (intermittently funny) before I saw their trailers. Why, oh why, would you put all of your film’s best jokes in the trailer? Does that not telegraph immense insecurity on the studio’s part? I guess once they get you in the door, they’ve got your money?

Her advice, which I co-sign:

Pick a few critics, maybe three, who you like, and rely on their writing to help you decide what to watch. Or, Google a movie to see who’s in it, who directed it, who wrote it, and what their previous work is, and make a judgment based on that. Or, even better, just watch a movie with little to no idea what it is and see if it surprises you — one of the best experiences you could ever have.

This is pretty much all I do, a recent example being The Banshees of Inishiern. A new movie reuniting the In Bruges crew of Martin McDonagh, Colin Farrell, and Brendan Gleeson? Sold. I’m in. I deliberately avoided all information about it and went in fresh. Even though I liked-it-not-loved-it, it was fully worth the experience of encountering a movie without any preconceived notions beyond an earned trust in the artists to deliver something worth seeing.

December 3, 2022 Add Comment

7 Hard-Boiled Lessons from Noir Films Old and New

Originally published at Cinema Sugar.

These are dark times. It’s tempting to feel that it’s never been darker, that the weight of our modern struggles is unprecedented. 

But I take comfort in knowing that film noir—a genre that has existed for almost 100 years—has been there before. It’s seen some shit. To show this, I’ve picked a few timeless, hard-won lessons and two noirs that illustrate them: one classic and one modern.

So let’s light up some cigarettes, pour a round, and stare down this cruel world together.

1. Crime Doesn’t Pay

The plan is always simple at the beginning. Maybe you want to knock off an old rich guy for the insurance payout (Double Indemnity) or stage a kidnapping for ransom money (Fargo). Doesn’t matter, because it’s not going to work and you’re going to pay hard—with your dignity, livelihood, or worse.

2. Beware Who You Marry

Do you really know your spouse? Can you ever be sure they won’t plot your grisly demise with clockwork precision, only to have the act go awry and ruin your life (Dial M for Murder) or morph into twisted mind games (Gone Girl)? Think really hard about whom you’ll commit yourself ‘til death do you part.

3. Fame is Dangerous

The greatest illusion of showbiz isn’t what we see on the screen but how it hides everything sacrificed to get it there. We don’t see the screenwriter of Sunset Blvd face down in a pool and shot in the back by a jealous actress, or the darkly absurd lives of aspiring actors in Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. The cost of a movie ticket is a lot cheaper.

4. Sometimes the Bad Guys Win

For every evildoer held accountable there are several more who get away with it, whether it’s an abuser engaging in real estate fraud (Chinatown) or a real-life serial killer eluding capture (Zodiac). You can drive yourself mad trying to seek justice in an unjust world.

5. Nothing Is Real

Go ahead, chase all the shadows you want through the tunnels of Vienna (The Third Man). Follow all the mangled clues to your mystery woman (Under the Silver Lake). In this world, what you seek isn’t always what you get. Whether that be love, justice or the cold hard, bloody truth—reality is a moving target.

6. The Media is Manufactured

Sometimes it really is #fakenews. The movies about righteous, crusading reporters taking down a big bad villain may win Oscars, but they usually don’t show the full story behind how the news gets made, whether it’s a journalist prolonging a crisis for personal gain (Ace in the Hole) or hunting for voyeuristic crime footage (Nightcrawler). (Mis)trust, but verify.

7. You Can’t Escape Yourself

Try as you might, you’ll always come back to yourself. You can work hard to project an image of normalcy to others, but your shadow self will eventually reveal itself: while you stalk a creepy motel (Psycho), attempt to solve a mystery (Memento), or otherwise attempt in vain to beat back the darkness.

November 28, 2022 Add Comment

Media of the moment

An ongoing series

Athena. Come for the gangbusters opening 10 minutes—stay for the tense, heart-pounding drama of Children of Men-meets-The Battle of Algiers in a French apartment complex. (Streaming on Netflix.)

The End of Education by Neil Postman. My third Postman book after Amusing Ourselves to Death and Technopoly. Would probably rank it below those two but still a barnburner.

The Writing of the Gods: The Race to Decode the Rosetta Stone by Edward Dolnick. The story of discovering the Rosetta Stone (thanks Napoleon!) and the decades it took to decipher it, thus unlocking the secrets of ancient Egypt to modernity.

The Hunt for Red October. Finally got around to see this. Enjoyed it but still have to give the ’90s submarine action thriller edge to Crimson Tide.

Kiki’s Delivery Service. Been going through the Miyazaki oeuvre with the 3 year old and some, like this one, are first watches for both of us. Love being able to show him animated movies with a completely different pace and style than what he’s used to with Bluey/Curious George/Disney, etc.

The World’s Worst Assistant by Sona Movsessian. Sona is a key part of the success of Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend podcast so I’m glad she’s able to cash in on it.

Why Fish Don’t Exist: A Story of Loss, Love, and the Hidden Story of Life by Lulu Miller. A remarkable memoir/biography hybrid that reminded me of The Feather Thief with its nature/animals obsessives at the center and the ethical dilemmas they encounter (and create).

November 17, 2022 Add Comment

Lord of the Rewatch

I just finished a rewatch of the Lord of the Rings trilogy extended editions, something I was saving for after I finished season one of The Rings of Power. And I’m glad I did because I was able to appreciate the trilogy that much more, with the events of Middle-earth’s earlier age as captured in the series adding an extra weight and significance to what happens in the movies.

Some stray thoughts on each movie as I went through them…

Fellowship of the Ring

  • This film is so indelibly etched into my being, not to mention my favorite films of 2001 and of all time. There’s so much I could say about it—so many memories it created for me—but just one is that one of my first dates with the woman who’d become my wife was an all-day marathon of all three Extended Editions during a blizzard worthy of the Caradhras Pass.
  • Ok, one more: our wedding processional was a combination of “Concerning Hobbits” and “The Breaking of the Fellowship” from Howard Shore’s magisterial score.
  • I’ve bounced back and forth about whether this one or Return of the King is my favorite of the trilogy, but I’ve landed back on this one.

The Two Towers:

  • While some of the extended footage that didn’t make the theatrical version made sense as cuts, dropping Faramir’s flashback absolutely didn’t. It provided useful context for both his relationship with Boromir and his father, added color to Boromir’s character, illustrated Faramir’s motivations, and helped set the stage for the Denethor drama to come. I get that it was a long-ish scene, but they could have easily trimmed several minutes from the battle of Helm’s Deep if we’re being honest.
  • This remains my third-favorite of the trilogy despite having some great moments.

The Return of the King

  • Listening to Annie Lennox’s “Into the West” as the credits rolled provoked a deep sense memory of sitting in the theater seeing this for the first time. In a stunned stillness I attempted to absorb the enormity of the epic journey that had just concluded.
  • This time around I was able to better appreciate:
    • just how long and exhausting the journey was for Frodo and Sam
    • the ring as a metaphor for addiction (Gollum as a troubled addict, Frodo slowly getting hooked, Sam as conflicted loved one)
    • the full evolution of Aragorn’s arc from reluctant ranger to confident king (also as a model “warrior poet” a la William Wallace in Braveheart, though for some reason much more appealing???)
    • the courage of Merry and Pippin as they faced constant peril and/or underestimation
    • Gandalf’s struggle with leading and inspiring others while harboring his own doubts and guilt about sending Frodo to his likely demise

November 7, 2022 Add Comment

Top 5 Noir Movies

Originally published at Cinema Sugar.

1. Double Indemnity

This isn’t the first major noir (fedora-tip to The Maltese Falcon) but damned if it isn’t the genre’s absolute peak: femme fatale, no-nonsense narration, crime gone wrong, investigator on the case. It’s hard to pick Billy Wilder’s best movie but this has to be near the top.

2. Memento

Seeing this in early high school was my first encounter with Christopher Nolan, Guy Pearce, and the unique thrill of getting my mind blown by a film. It’s also the rare twist-ending movie that offers more to see and untangle with every rewatch.

3. The Third Man

Most noirs of the classic era were pretty clearly filmed on backlot sets. Not The Third Man—you feel every inch of postwar Vienna’s rundown streets and cavernous sewers. Though it starts a little ho-hum, once Orson Welles shows up you’d better buckle up.

4. Notorious

Had to represent Hitchcock on this list. The triptych of Cary Grant, Ingrid Bergman, and Claude Rains—legends of ’40s Hollywood—turn this into a crackling espionage thriller with an all-time ending.

5. Fargo

God bless the Coen Brothers for injecting their unique brand of weird into what can often being a deadly serious genre. Add to that its emphatically rural and Midwestern flavors and you’ve got a neo-noir more vibrant and vital than an early-morning egg breakfast.

November 4, 2022 Add Comment

Top 5 Horror Movies

Originally published at Cinema Sugar.

1. The Ring

Seeing this Gore Verbinski joint in early high school did three important things: it initiated my undying love of Naomi Watts, it showed me how artful scary movies can be, and it scarred me so deeply that I subsequently swore off horror for a long time. So congrats to The Ring for killing both the VHS tape and my desire for cinematic scares.

2. Shaun of the Dead

As far as I’m concerned, this remains Edgar Wright’s best film. It establishes the tropes we’ve come to expect from the British writer-director’s oeuvre—snappy editing, ingenious use of music, an alchemical mix of humor and heart—while also injecting some scathing, 21st-century social satire into the zombie horror canon.

3. Alien

In space, no one can hear you scream “oh hell no” when an alien bursts through an astronaut’s chest and then torments the other poor souls trapped inside a spaceship with it. This was only Ridley Scott’s second film and you could argue that, in his now decades-long career, he never topped it.

4. Get Out

Though more psychological thriller than straight-up horror, Jordan Peele’s debut feature holds up beyond its hype and heralded twist simply because of how well it’s made. The cast, the script, and Peele’s attentive directorial eye all come together to create a story and setting that even a horror-averse scaredy cat like me couldn’t resist.

5. The Witches (1990)

Had to give some love to the film I watched at a sleepover as a kid and haunted me long after. Despite having read the Roald Dahl book it’s based on, I just wasn’t ready to see those evil child-hating witches come to life—though now, in retrospect, I’m absolutely here for Anjelica Huston really going for it.

October 10, 2022 2 Comments

Media of the moment

An ongoing series

Barbarian. Despite being a big baby about horror films, I went to see this opening weekend when I came into some unexpected free time. To say it’s surprising in many ways is a gross understatement.

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power. Thus far it’s managing to strike the right balance of serving a global audience, LOTR trilogy fans, and Tolkien nerds. I quit on House of the Dragon after one episode because I’ve had my fill of Game of Thrones content, but I’m all in on this one.

Bluey season 3. Every season of this show (the best on TV) has a handful of episodes that are stone-cold masterpieces, and thus far “Rain” is holding the championship belt.

Nope. With this and Barbarian, it’s been a delightfully horrific summer at the movies.

The Last Movie Stars. A documentary miniseries about fame, love, art, and work.

Salty: Lessons on Eating, Drinking, and Living from Revolutionary Women by Alissa Wilkinson. A delectable book about food, activism, art, and work.

A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon. Just straight-up funny for any age. They don’t talk the whole time and my 3 year old loved it!

September 14, 2022 Add Comment

Top 5 High School Movies

Originally published at Cinema Sugar.

1. Brick

If you found high school to be a dark, inscrutable enigma with a rigidly enforced social-class structure and impenetrable lingo, you’ll deeply appreciate Rian Johnson’s lean and masterful debut feature that renders adolescence as gritty film noir. A young, sphinx-like Joseph Gordon-Levitt investigates his ex-girlfriend’s mysterious disappearance like a teen Dashiell Hammett detective, navigating double-crosses and life-or-death stakes that feel right at home in the high drama of high school.

2. October Sky

Chris Cooper and Laura Dern would be enough for a solid cast, but even at 17 years old Gyllenhaal brings the charisma and authenticity emblematic of his now long and impressive career. (Still, the secret star: composer Mark Isham’s devastating heart-punch of a theme.) The movie is about family and friendship and science and America, but ultimately it’s about a teenager with a dream. “This one’s gonna go for miles…”

3. 10 Things I Hate About You

Heath Ledger beaming with rascally charm (and pulling off an epic lip-dub years before they were cool). Julia Styles taking no prisoners. Joseph Gordon-Levitt aw-shucks-ing his way into our hearts. Sorry Clueless: this is the best ’90s Shakespeare film adaptation and it’s not close.

4. Dazed and Confused

Tag your high-school self: were you kinda skeevy like Wooderson, mama-bear protective like Jodi, effortlessly cool like Pink, pseudo-intellectual like Tony, a live-wire bully like Darla or O’Bannion, victimized like Mitch? Dazed lives on because it’s all of us, and that’s alright, alright, alright.

5. Booksmart

This directorial debut from Olivia Wilde was charming as hell. In conjunction with the natural chemistry between Beanie Feldstein and Kaitlyn Dever as straight-laced overachievers out for one crazy night before high school ends, Wilde’s script brings the film to depths of character, understanding, and humor that are rare in debut features and especially in movies about teens.

September 6, 2022 Add Comment

The High School Movie Party: That’s L-I-V-I-N

Originally published at Cinema Sugar.

Too many unsupervised teenagers at a fancy house. Red Solo cups strewn about. A couple making out. A skater kid sliding down the stairs into a tower of beer cans. Someone throwing up at just the wrong moment.

Welcome to a high-school movie house party.

Despite seeing this kind of party depicted on screen over and over again, I never actually went to one in real life. I was an introverted and mostly well-behaved Christian lad who considered sex, drugs, and drinking taboo. Which is how I usually found myself on Friday nights hanging out with my church youth group friends.

It was a lot more fun than it sounds! We goofed off, played games, pranked each other, watched movies, and shared an occasional deep discussion.

I’m grateful for those times because they kept me out of serious trouble and proved you don’t need mind-altering substances to have a good time.

But they weren’t very cinematic.

A Better Story

As I’ve gotten older, I’ve come to adopt a deeper appreciation for the high school movie party. The best ones aspire to more than just adolescent revelry; they act as a catalyst for chaotic, dramatic, comedic, or romantic things to happen to the main characters in order to further the story.

Sometimes those things happen away from the ruckus, in a quiet or intimate moment. Think Kat and Patrick bonding on the swings in 10 Things I Hate About You or Josie crushing on Guy while trying to conceal her ruse in Never Been Kissed.

And sometimes the heightened environment of a party can bring simmering conflicts to a boil, as with Seth and Evan’s street showdown in Superbad or Amy and Molly’s bracing blow-up in Booksmart.

Those crucial moments didn’t happen while the characters sat at home dutifully studying for a test or even watching things happen to fictional characters on a screen.

They had to go get into a little trouble. They had to take chances and for once risk not making the safest choices.

If I could share a bit of wisdom with my 15-year-old self—and any other high schooler who’s a little too comfortable with the safe and responsible path—it’s this: Lighten up just a little bit. You can stay true to your convictions (which, by the way, are going to change) while still living your young adult years to their fullest.

So go ahead: join that party. Cheer on Schmidt pulling the knife from his back in 21 Jump Street. Jump into the “Paradise City” mosh pit in Can’t Hardly Wait. Cruise through a moon tower kegger like in Dazed and Confused.

Find ways to make a better story. Because that’s L-I-V-I-N.

September 5, 2022 Add Comment

A spoonful of Cinema Sugar

I’m very excited to share a new thing I’m part of that’s now live on the internet: Cinema Sugar, a website/newsletter/social media destination for people who love to see, think about, and talk about movies.

Our mission statement:

We are not interested in celebrity culture. We are not interested in hate-watching, takedowns, or tasteless criticism. We believe movies make life sweeter.

It started as an idea from my pal and Chicagoland singer-songwriter Kevin Prchal, with whom I love to nerd out about movies and movie culture. We’ve been building out the brand and website for the last month and a half or so, and are thrilled it’s finally out in the world.

Each month will be dedicated to a different theme or genre, featuring top fives, interviews, curated playlists, movie night guides, personal essays, and so much more.

For September’s theme of High School Movies, I have an essay on what I learned from high school movie parties, which were so alien to my own high-school experience.

We’ve got a lot more cool stuff coming, so please check out the website, sign up for the newsletter, and join us on social media to talk movies with your fellow movie lovers.

September 1, 2022 Add Comment