Everywhere you look is a story unfolding. Everything explodes with potentiality. From the crumbs of the mundane comes something magical and alive, and you must train your eyes to see it.
Marjorie Prime (Almereyda, 2017)
The ending of Marjorie Prime is magnificent. It’s the sneakiest of culminations, summing up everything that comes before it while giving significant payoff to a key “omission.”
Kiss Me Deadly (Aldrich, 1955)
One thing’s for sure: I’ve never watched a noir quite like Kiss Me Deadly before. From the moment it begins, with Cloris Leachman breathlessly running on that deserted road, it never lets up on its relentless assault on our senses.
John Wick: Chapter 2 (Stahelski, 2017)
Am I no fun? Because I think John Wick: Chapter 2 is just okay. Not bad, not amazing, and certainly not as good as the first film.
Murder on the Orient Express (Branagh, 2017)
Boy, is Murder on the Orient Express a hard book to adapt. Everything lies in that ingenious solution, and for it to work, a number of elements need to be kept intact. The most important one? The number of suspects.
Personal Shopper (Assayas, 2016)
Personal Shopper contains my favorite Kristen Stewart performance, and I would heartily argue it’s also her personal best.
Hidden Figures (Melfi, 2016)
It painstakingly fenceposts its plot developments to an almost embarrassingly obvious degree, it wants your heart to swell as the protagonists overcome their adversities (and adversaries) and get where they want to be, and it doesn’t scream highbrow cinema at all—and is almost proud not to.
Silence (Scorsese, 2016)
Trying to explicate all the resonances, nuances, brushstrokes and calibres that make up this staggering (yes, staggering) masterwork would take a long time, and it’s time I, sadly, don’t have.
20th Century Women (Mills, 2016)
I wasn’t alive during the 1970s, so I can’t speak as to the “accuracy” of this film getting the period and its anxieties right (although I take it for granted that it does). So I had to find my own entry point into this deeply personal, reflective film.
Hacksaw Ridge (Gibson, 2016)
I could have done without the blatant allegorizing, which is dialed 1-800-TOO-MUCH to the point of self-parody at times.
Fire at Sea (Rosi, 2016)
This slice-of-life documentary from Gianfranco Rosi is an important watch at a time when Muslim migrants and refugees are being vilified under the Trump presidency. It’s easy to forget that many of them don’t use planes to seek asylum—most have to do so by boat, and the route from Africa to the Sicilian island of Lampedusa is particularly deadly.
Allied (Zemeckis, 2016)
To tell the truth, Allied would have been infinitely more interesting if the roles were reversed, and it was Cotillard who was investigating Pitt as the potential spy.
Deepwater Horizon (Berg, 2016)
An interesting one. I really admired the visual effects, which made the second half suitably cinematic. There’s a good amount of buildup to the disaster, so that it rains down on you as it did on that fateful day.
Moana (Clements & Musker, 2016)
I think 2016 was a good year for animated films, but if I had to pick just one to take with me to a desert island (sorry for the cliché), then I think Moana would be my choice.
The Florida Project (Baker, 2017)
Shockingly, I may have underestimated The Florida Project when I saw it two months ago. I praised it highly then… and yet, after seeing it again tonight, I think I didn’t praise it enough. Because there’s virtually nothing wrong with it.
The Lonely Film Critic 