2019 Movies

2019 Movies

● The Lighthouse - Best movie I saw in theatres this year. Unbelievably ambitious, intentionally claustrophobic, didn’t quite land what the director was attempting, I think, but still a remarkable achievement. Both Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson should be up for acting awards.

● Spiderman: Into the Spiderverse – arguably the best comic book movie ever made. Up there certainly with Logan and the Batman trilogy, though clearly a different kind of movie. There were real stakes, serious humour, a coherent plot, wackiness, and significant character growth. And technically the art was incredible. Well deserving of the Academy Award, should have been nominated for Best Picture.

● Amazing Grace – Stunning. Documentary footage of the live Gospel album Aretha Franklin recorded at a Baptist Church in L.A.. When she sings Amazing Grace, you believed it. Balm to a weary soul.

● Smoke Signals: One of the funniest movies I saw this year. Also very moving. Touches on really important issues both big and small, but never forgets that it is telling a story. Incredibly engaging.

● Wind River – a staggeringly beautiful and brutally painful movie. Centres on the murder of two young, Native women in an Arapaho reserve. A genuine Western-noir crime thriller that is mixed with a tale of processing grief and underscored by the scandalous reality of missing and murdered Native women in North America. The film has many Native characters who are wonderfully filled out, not caricatures but living, breathing, deciding humans living under shattering pain. Graham Greene is excellent, as usual. One man, the father of one of the girls who was killed, paints a “death face” for himself as he contemplates suicide. Another character asks how he knows what it is supposed to look like, and he responds: ”I don’t know. I made it up. There is no one to show me.” Director Taylor Sheridan (Sicario, Hell or High Water) is working in the vein of Clint Eastwood here, and doing it well.

● Shoplifters  – a deceptively simple tale of a Japanese “family” that subsists on a dubious pension and a lot of shoplifting. It appears at first glance to be a well-worn tale of the struggle to survive on the edges of society, but this is not your typical story. It is extremely human, gently funny, a deeply moving and sad. The performances are excellent, the characters are real and their relationships feel genuine, not contrived or sentimental. Highly recommended.

● Capharnaum  – remarkably beautiful and hugely troubling. This is the story of twelve-year-old Zain, a Lebanese boy (played by a Syrian refugee) born into a poor family with lots of brothers and sisters, who begins the movie trying to save his eleven-year-old sister from a horrific marriage. He ends up running away and joining up with an Ethiopian mother who faces threats and dangers of her own. The story is a chilling account of real-life in Lebanon (the title of the movie also refers to “Chaos”) and the people trying to survive in it. The acting is unbelievably affecting: most of the characters are played by people who have experienced these life-situations themselves. And the movie is shot and told brilliantly. But the central statement of the movie is, in my view, close to contemptuous. Zain, after going to jail for a violent act of vengeance, tries to sue his parents for bringing him into the world. His desire is for incapable (read: poor) families to not be allowed to have children, and his position – though the simplistic solution of a child – is obviously given sympathy by the director (and by the progressive Vancouverites in the theater with me, who were clearly glad to have this “out” so they didn’t feel personally responsible for the tragedy). It veers into poor-blaming, and even eugenics territory. This emphasis was simplistic and hacky, and it made me angry.

● The Favourite  – I love the odd directorial work of Yorgos Lanthimos (The Lobster). This movie is a bizarre take on Queen Anne and her court, which centers the action and intrigue (and power) on three women: Anne herself, and two rivals for her attention. The acting is spectacular, especially Olivia Colman who justifiably won the Oscar, the soundtrack is wonderful, and the story is tense, funny, and even moving. This is a new view on political machinations, and from an angle that we don’t normally get to see.

● Avengers Endgame – A phenomenal wrap up of the Infinity Stones storyline. Meaningful, real stakes, emotional, funny, excellent action, some kick-ass scenes with the female Avengers (all of whom are differentiated, strong characters!) and above all, fun. Did not feel like three hours at all.

● Free Solo: You know how the movie is (probably) going to end, but it still has you on the edge of your seat. Excellent documentary on a man who is driven to break limits and do something extraordinary (climb El Capitan without ropes), even if it kills him.

● The Dead Don’t Die - the weirdest and one of the funniest zombie movies I have ever seen, and that is saying something. Bill Murray, Tom Waits, Adam Driver, Tilda Swinton and Selena Gomez and Iggy Pop (type-cast as a zombie) star in this Jim Jarmusch vehicle. A slow-burn that leads to nowhere in particular, but has a lot of zombie mayhem and dry-humour along the way. Fantastic stuff, but definitely not for everyone.

● Sicario – A story of cross-border crime and punishment from French-Canadian director Denis Villeneuve, who has shown an unwillingness to turn away from the darkness in humanity. This movie is about evil advancing on every side: the evil of drug trafficking, human trafficking, kidnapping, gangsterism, cartels, murder, revenge; and the evil practices that the so-called “forces of order” believe they need to employ in order to counter this evil. Amongst other things this movie raised the question for me: Am I as committed to opposing evil with good as those who oppose evil with evil? No, came the answer. I am not as tireless in the pursuit of evil in my own heart or in the world around me. Until I am, until we are, there is little hope.

● Mission Impossible: Fallout – One of the best action movies I have seen in a long time. Lots of double crosses and implausible plot twists, of course, but that is normal. Incredible action sequences.

● Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far on Foot: a wonderful movie about addiction, disability and recovery. Feels very, very genuine.

● Shazam – Fun, funny and sweet (though very dark in parts as well). The demons that represent the seven sins are genuinely creepy, the focus on the foster family is beautiful, and Darla steals every scene she is in. Not a great “film” by any means, but it captures well what comic books are really about: child and adolescent wish-fulfillment.

● Us - Creepy and interesting, though not as good as Get Out. The message of this movie seemed a little more ambiguous. The acting is great, and there are some genuine eerie bits. Loved the throwbacks to old horror movies as well. But the plot kind of didn’t make sense. I get that he is playing with the concept of our shadow selves, and especially those shadow selves that society has locked away and called evil.

● Star Wars, The Rise of Skywalker: Ok. I liked this one. The Force Awakens was clearly modelled after A New Hope, and it did a pretty good job. Safe, fun, a good set-up. The Last Jedi was obviously trying to be The Empire Strikes Back, and it failed magnificently, taking with it whatever good will and plot set-up that had been generated by The Force Awakens. It veered so sharply away, in fact, that a lot of The Rise of Skywalker was an attempt to course-correct. It did a pretty good job of this, all the while trying to complete the franchise in a clear emulation of The Return of the Jedi. It was a crowded movie, and the first half seemed to not know where it was going, often sending the characters off on video-game type quests to find clues and keys and what not. However, once it settled in and slowed down, and the characters revealed a sense of why they were doing what they were doing, I think it worked. Particularly they got the relationships between the characters right, something that was done terribly in the prequels and in The Last Jedi, but was one of the defining factors of the original trilogy. You care about the characters because you see that they care about each other - even new characters that are introduced. And it is this factor which makes the sacrifices real, the stakes high, and the victory sweet.

● Captain Marvel – another solid MCU offering. Very fun, lots of humour, a nice twist and some real empathy with the Skrulls. And a fantastic 90’s soundtrack! I would put it in my top ten MCU movies, though not top five.

● Spiderman: Far From Home - Good, not great. Aimed at teens, which is entirely appropriate. The stakes are so much lower than Endgame and Captain Marvel, though, it takes a bit of adjustment.

● Split – Split came out a few years ago, but no one knew it was a sequel to Unbreakable until the last scene. It is a decent thriller with a great twist at the end, though honestly the twist is handled ham-fistedly.
Still, this movie appeared to signify a return to form for Shyamalan, and features an amazing performance by James McAvoy, who is called upon to play 24 different characters all within the same body. There is genuine tension, it is very dark, and you feel like there are real stakes. 
Worryingly though, it is another example from this director of a troubling message. In both this movie and The Village, the "real monster" is the character who is mentally ill. I’m not sure how you entirely get around that in horror/thriller movies as every villain in cinema history could be described as criminally insane to some degree or other. But Shyamalan is pretty on the nose with this. It is kind of the point of the movie. 
To be fair, in Split the mental illness might be characterised as something different altogether – some new form of capacity that goes beyond a disorder and into superhuman categories. Interestingly, the psychological talking cure, while compassionate and helpful for a time, is portrayed as ultimately futile in the face of genuine darkness. M. Night might be trying to say something there. 
More controversial is what he seems to be saying about incestuous pedophilia and self-harm, the results of which actually "save" the protagonist at the end. There is strength that comes from brokenness, but that is very dangerous ground to tread in the way that this movie does. I'm not convinced M. Night has the requisite skill and depth to pull off that conversation.

● Hotel Mumbai - Heavy on the body count here, and I can’t imagine any Muslims would be happy to see this depiction. Not a good tourist movie for Mumbai either. Some good evidence of heroic sacrifice in the movie though.

● The Crimes of Grindewald  – I liked it. Bit of a confusing series of plots, but there is real consequence to the decisions people make, especially because we don’t really know who is going to die (for the most part). Clearly a middle movie, but still pretty good.

● Aquaman - overwhelming visuals, lots of adventures, felt like a video game quest structure. But fine and funny. Still, this movie is another clear example of one (possibly two) female characters who are bad-ass, competent, and even qualified to be the lead (ie to have the throne of Atlantis) but their arc is entirely subsumed in the need to get Aquaman throned. I get itm the movie is called Aquaman. But  it was just so obvious how much better a fighter/ruler Mera was and would be.

● Yesterday: If it focused more on wonder than worry, I think this would have become one of my favourite movies. It is still very good, but I kept waiting for them to get back to introducing Beatles songs to everyone again.

● The Art of Self-Defense: Like Fight Club but not quite as good, equally dark, and an equally vicious take-down of extreme toxic masculinity. Seems a bit more on the nose than Fight Club though, a bit more caricatured in its bad guy character. May be slightly funnier though.

● Detective Pikachu: Maybe Ryan Reynolds’ best work. Absurd plot, but funny and with incredible visuals.

● Bumblebee: Best (live-action) Transformers movie to date, which is not saying a lot, but it is saying something.

● Bad Times at the El Royale: Great set-up, terrible execution, ultimately disappointing. Another attempt to “do Tarantino”, but there is a reason QT is the best at it.

● Glass – Whoo boy. This is a garbage movie. Set 15 years after Unbreakable and only 3 weeks after Split, the three main characters get caught and spend almost the entire movie inside a hospital for the mentally disturbed. Which is just one of around a hundred huge mistakes made by this movie. There are no real stakes; the villain's plan is absurd; the twists are either telegraphed or come entirely out of nowhere with zero foreshadowing; and the ending suggests that the real good guys include at least two genuinely homicidal maniacs. There is also an unbelievable irresponsible scene wherein an actual Beast/Man is "redeemed" through the loving touch of a sixteen-year-old girl. 

● Godzilla: King of the Monsters – a very silly movie with awesome Kaiju-fighting scenes. Every scene with a human in it was atrocious. The writing was absurd, the acting poor, and the science ex machina relentless.

Movies I Watched Again

● LOTR Marathon – watched this at the Rio Theater with Noah and Karah. It is my second time watching the extended editions back to back to back at the Rio, and I believe my sixth time doing the LOTR marathon altogether. I admit, I love settling into a long day of immersion into Middle Earth. The book is still better, but these are my favourite films, and I never fail to be moved by their epic grandeur mixed with small, intimate moments.

● The Hobbit Trilogy (Nick Cut) – The Hobbit trilogy, uncut, is something of an abomination. It is bloated, greedy, unnecessary, and contains an Elf-Dwarf romance which is the very height of stupidity. Yet there is a kernel of something good there, so a friend of a friend took all three movies (extended editions) and pared them down into one 4-hour movie. All the excess and nonsense is ruthlessly cut out. All the stuff that brought me close to screaming at the screen in theaters is excised. What is left is, good. Not great, but good. Certainly watchable and often quite fun. Thank you, Nick.

● To Catch a Thief – a lighter romantic comedy/thriller from Hitchcock, still filled with wonderful dialogue, suspense, innovative camera work, and a lot of fun. Carey Grant and Grace Kelly are predictably magnificent. There are some very long driving sequences though.

● The Terminator – still holds up. Dominic’s “Oh my gosh!” when the Terminator’s torso rises up to attack Sarah Conner at the end was worth the whole thing.

● Terminator 2 – up there in my books with the greatest Action movies of all time. Great mix of chases, fights, explosions, comedy, drama and genuine tension. And you can’t really figure out how the Conners and Arnie are going to get away until the very end. Watched this one on Family Day, which I think is appropriate.

● The Three Amigos – pure comedic silliness and genius.

● Shaun of the Dead – one of my favourite movies, in my favourite genre – Zombie Romantic Comedy (Zom Rom Com). Watched this one with the kids, to introduce them to the Cornetto Trilogy.

Television

● Good Omens - a wonderful 6 part series that sticks incredibly close to one of my favourite books  by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett. A story of a beautifully unlikely friendship and the end of the world.

● Stranger Things Season 3: Starts slow, but the build up is worth it. Fantastic latter half of the season, filled with absurdity and genuine character development and tension. It did feel like there were too many moving parts and plots going on, but it all came together in a delicious finale that has one of the greatest scenes of all time, featuring a long-distance duet smack dab in the middle of the rising action. Oh, and Spoiler Alert, but Hopper ain’t dead. No way.

● The Good Place Season 3 - keeps on rolling, though it is harder to keep the central conceit going once everyone leaves the good place and returns to earth.

● Lost, Season 1-2: Re-watching it with the house. Fun to see it again through new eyes.

● The Boys: a very violent, graphic take on superheroes, the idea being they accidentally kill a ton of innocent standerbys every year. Turns out they get up to even  worse than that, but the real villains are the corporate entities controlling and profiting off them. So a group of normies decide to take them on, for a variety of reasons, mostly vengeance based. All the characters are intricate and flawed, the supes included, but the main superhero, Homelander, is at once the most victimised and the scariest of them all.

● Pete Holmes: Dirty-Clean: very funny stand-up special

● Castlerock: I usually watch more episodes on airplanes. Creepy, lots of call-backs to Stephen King books, sometimes graphic, and ultimately a little slow.

● American Gods Season 2 - ugh, what a disappointment. Season 1 was really good, but I don’t think anyone knows what is meant to be happening in season two, least of all the showrunners (who are different from season one). Leaves very little hope for season three, if it even happens.