Year: 2021

A 2021 Film Journey: Day 5

On By LaurenDolceVitaIn Movie ReviewsLeave a comment

Bear with me, I’m going to take you on a journey about my movie pick for today. In the end of 2011, my love for movies was already well established, but I had never really tracked what I had watched before. Then, in service of building my excel skills for my resume, I started keeping track of all the films I watched in the spreadsheet. Nine years later, it’s time to log my 2,000th unique film. It may be completely arbitrary milestone, but since I noticed it, I thought it was worthy of something a little special. I’m still working through my 2020 back log, but only one of the films on my list stars my favorite actress…

Promising Young Woman (2020, Dir. Emerald Fennell)

Carey Mulligan is ready to shock you with 'Promising Young Woman'

I’m so glad that I chose this film for this makeshift movie milestone. As I hinted at above, Carey Mulligan is my favorite actress. Ever since watching her performance as Sissy in Shame (2011, Dir. Steve McQueen) on the big screen I fell in love. Her newest performance as the 30-year-old Cassie in Promising Young Woman is another masterful role under her belt. The entire film hinges on her performance, and she sells the traumatized to the point of being violently unhinged while still seriously hurting and fragile. Every decision she makes feels perfectly in character. She even manages to overcome a less than tonally appropriate performance by her co-star Bo Burnham keeping the story focused.

Emerald Fennell shows a wealth of cinematic knowledge for someone making her first film. Playing off the traditional revenge fantasy trope, Fennell taps into the deeper horror that permeates the psyche of a woman forced to undergo the worst thing imaginable. The revenge in Promising Young Woman never takes on a cathartic feel; the damage has been done and the revenge acts only as punishment, not as a release from the pain. Trauma is unending, and that is what makes the damage so insidious. Cassie may have lived a decade past the event, but her life ended that day.

A 2021 Film Journey: Day 4

On By LaurenDolceVitaIn Movie ReviewsLeave a comment

Today was my first day back to work, and I honestly was not feeling it. Combine that with the beginnings of a sinus infection coming on, and I felt like in contrast with yesterday’s horror extravaganza, today would be a good time for something more heartwarming. Today, heartwarming means animated. I’m not trying to fall for the animated equals family friendly cliché, I promise at some point this year I’ll tackle some challenging animated films, but for today that’s what we’re going with. Sticking with animated also let’s me cross another 2020 film off my list, specifically…

Soul (2020, Dir. Pete Doctor and Kemp Powers)

Soul' reviews: What critics are saying about Pixar's newest film

Peak, late aughts, Pixar was so exceptional, that it made the concept of a Pixar film a near impossibility to live up to. Soul, like Onward (Dir. Dan Scanlon) from earlier in the year once again fails to live up to those lofty heights. While Soul was the standout of the two, watching it was the more depressing one as it came close to capturing some of that late aughts magic, only to be weighed down with decisions that have become all the too common in Pixar films.

What worked for me the best in the film was everything to do with Jazz. Pete Doctor and Kemp Powers do a wonderful job of capturing the idea of being in the zone; they use the cinematic language to articulate the world melting around you. Jamie Foxx is wonderful as the Jazz obsessed Joe. On the other hand, Tina Fey as the soul 22 was a serious detriment to my viewing experience. It’s not that she’s a bad actress, but she’s too much of an actress for the role. 22’s purpose in the film should be as a catalyst to propel growth in Joe, but the comedic sidekick casting is overbearing. It’s Disney deciding that nuance isn’t something that should be embraced but stamped out in order to appeal to the lowest common denominator. Not every animated film needs to be WALL·E (2008, Dir. Andrew Stanton), but I worry Disney is too concerned with money to ever allow Pixar a film that nuanced again.

I don’t want to end on too negative a note, I liked Soul more than I disliked it. I just wanted more from it. So as not to end on a sour note, I decided to watch one more thing. A personal goal I do each year, and that you’ll see a lot more posts on when it comes time, is watch everything that’s nominated for an Oscar, any Oscar. That’s why after watching the animated Soul, it seemed like a good time to check out an animated short frontrunner.

If Anything Happens I Love You (2020, Dir. Michael Govier and Will McCormack)

Short Films in Focus: If Anything Happens I Love You | Features | Roger Ebert

And I immediately eat my own introductory words by watching this beautiful but heart wrenching animated short about two parents grieving their child who died in a school shooting. The minimalist art style of the short heightens the morose subject matter. Significant white space breaks with the conventional norm to build the sense of isolation and listlessness. Characters existing both as bodies and shadows highlight the dissociation that comes from trauma.  A moving depiction of an awful reality.

A 2021 Film Journey: Day 3

On By LaurenDolceVitaIn Movie ReviewsLeave a comment

We’ve been in an artsy horror golden age for a while now. A24 has lead the way with their take on the genre, primarily long and slow burns. Even further outside of the norm, there’s been a renaissance of loud synth scored, neon highlighted horror films that have become their own unique genre. Nicolas Winding Refn’s may have the most prominent progenitor of the style, but each year the genre’s output is increasing. Earlier in 2020, I watched the Nicolas Cage vehicle Color Out of Space (dir. Richard Stanley) which was a fun entry if a little basic, but I had a few more 2020 horror films on my list yet starting with…

Possessor (2020, Dir. Brandon Cronenberg)

Possessor' Review: David Cronenberg's Son Has a Mind of His Own - Variety

Brandon Cronenberg proves that he inherited more than just a name from his father. Possessor was a brilliant horror thriller that borrowed just enough of Brandon’s father David’s penchant for body horror to create one of the most thrilling options this year. The body inhabiting plot seems a little overplayed on paper, but Cronenberg cranks the style to 11, fading back and forth between the characters inhabiting a single body, and with Jennifer Jason Leigh almost celestial voice beckoning from afar.

Short post on the film today, because after watching Possessor, I watched…

She Dies Tomorrow (2020, Dir. Amy Seimetz)

She Dies Tomorrow review: figuring out how to spend your last day is really damn hard - The Verge

While this film did not quite fit into the specific sub-genre I mentioned at the opening, it is an example of artistic revolution undergoing low budget horror. While Possessor relied on style to enhance the somewhat generic substance, She Dies Tomorrow thrived on its bat shit premise. Taking the concept of ideas as contagious to its most literal resulted in a truly unique experience. An extremely funny horror film that somehow never feels outright comedic, She Dies Tomorrow was a great watch.

And because tomorrow I’ll have less time when I go back to work, I decided a third 2020 horror film wouldn’t kill me and watched…

Run (2020, Dir. Aneesh Chaganty)

Run' Review: A Wheelchair-Using Teen Tries to Escape Her Sadistic Mom - Variety

Of the three films I watched today, Run is the most conventional both in plot and style, but it makes up for that by just being the best realized and an utterly terrifying film. Director Aneesh Chaganty comes off his gimmicky but highly effective Searching (2018) and proves that he’s just as talented at building tension with a moving camera as he is confined to a computer screen. Highlighted by an unhinged Sarah Paulson and a miraculous debut performance by Kiera Allen, Run was a great final film of the long weekend, and final film of the first weekend of this challenge.

A 2021 Film Journey: Day 2

On By LaurenDolceVitaIn Movie ReviewsLeave a comment

A task that has become progressively more polarized for me each year has been coming up with a best films of the year list each year. I love the practice of sitting down and working my way through the films critics decided were the best, as well as others that had been on my list for other reasons, but the pressure to find things before the end of the year stresses me out. This year, I allowed myself a slight reprieve, and instead of cramming everything in by December 31st, I’m working my way through my to-watch list and will put together my final thoughts when I’m ready. Speaking of 2020 films on my to-watch list…

Minari (2020, dir. Lee Isaac Chung)

Montclair Film Festival Review: 'Minari' is an Intimate Look at Assimilation - Awards Radar

Much like the Criterion “C” at the beginning of a home release, any film that begins its runtime with stylized A24 is going to have my attention. A24 existing as a low budget outlet for creative voices to make bold statements unbeholden to the impact on box office performance. Minari is the perfect film for the studio in that sense. While an American film, the dialogue is primarily in Korean, and the drama of the Korean-American Yi family is not something that will play to the masses.

Despite all of this, for people willing to give the A24 brand a watch, Minari does what so many of their dramas accomplish: highlight the universal through the specific. The film is portrayed as a classic American Dream story when the family purchase a farm in Arkansas. Unlike the American fairy tale that has been told for generations, the American Dream has never been true. There will be no pulling oneself up by their bootstraps. Instead, the film focuses on how the poisonous indoctrination to father capitalism creates rifts in the family.

I don’t think it’s just my politics that are finding this reading; the only way that the film is specifically dated as being from the 1980s is through a Ronald Reagan name drop after all. The movie opens with their relocation to the remote acreage that will become their farm, and from the beginning it’s clear that the father is making decisions for the family in accordance with his dream.  While he may think it’s in the family best interests, it’s clear that it’s not. The mother, rightfully, counters that the lure of financial independence is no reason to live an hour away from the nearest hospital when you have a child, David. with a potentially deadly heart condition. This argument once again comes to a head when the family is in an Oklahoma City hospital for David to get an ultrasound, and the father chooses the safety of his crop samples over being with David for the appointment. The climax of the film, which I’ll avoid spoiling, plays directly into this thesis as well.

I got a little lost on a tangent with this one. The film is beautiful and will undoubtedly be appearing on my best of 2020 list when I get around to it. It pulled at my heart strings as well as my political mind, and the blurb it receives on an eventual year end list will reflect that. Expect quite a few more 2020 movies in the weeks to come. There’s still 20 or so films that I’d like to see before then.

A 2021 Film Journey: Day 1

On By LaurenDolceVitaIn Movie ReviewsLeave a comment

There’s nothing special about New Years day. It’s often considered a fresh start, and clearly I’m no different in seeing it as such as I chose to start this project today, but nothing separates today from yesterday. Well one thing does differentiate today from yesterday: I have today off. And because of that important difference, I’m starting my 2021 film journey with…

Fanny & Alexander (1982, dir. Ingmar Bergman)

Film Forum · FANNY AND ALEXANDER II & III

I prepared a section of my couch for the 5-hour 20-minute mini-series version of the Ingmar Bergman classic. With my new weighted blanket covering me (and a bonus 10 pounds of cat on top of that). I was prepared to not move for an extended period while I allowed the film to wash over me, and that mentality proved indispensable to my Fanny & Alexander viewing experience.

Through the first part of the film, I was mostly unenthused. The bloated cast size at the Ekdahl Christmas party with scant appearances but the titular children left me cold toward film. I felt a decisive lack of a welcoming presence for me as the viewer. As the movie progressed, it became more focused, and in doing so I understood the purpose of the opening section. Immediately after the emotional high of the Christmas party, Life for Fanny, Alexander, and their mother Emilie are forced into emotional trauma starting with the death of Oscar, Emilie’s husband and Fanny and Alexander’s father, and then being thrust into an abusive household once Emilie re-marries. As the hours of the film continue, the Ekdahls feel ever further away from the joy from the initial act. The films length enhanced the empathy I felt for each character. Despite the deliberate pace, I found myself anxiously holding my cat tighter than he appreciated, desperately hoping the family could just return home.

And that is how my year started. A restful day filled with a movie from my classic cinema blind spots, and one less movie on my shelf torturing me as something I’ve purchased without seeing. I only hope that the next 364 days will remain as calming as today.