One-Liners

Three for the show ...

MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING (B+) - Joss Whedon serves up a modern take on Shakespeare, with a luscious black-and-white film populated by talented and appealing actors. I spent the first 20 minutes mostly lost trying to decipher Whedon's dialogue, which is faithful to the Bard's original.

The only actor I recognized was Clark Gregg ("Sports Night," "The New Adventures of Old Christine") as Leonato, who is marrying off his daughter Hero (Jillian Morgese). The others are mostly veterans of Whedon's previous projects. (The only thing of Whedon's I've seen is about two seasons of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer.") That includes the irresistible duo of Amy Acker and Alexis Denisof as the squabbling would-be couple Beatrice and Benedick. Finally, the small crowd I was with at the Southwest Film Center laughed at every move of Nathan Fillion (from Whedon's cult hit "Firefly") as Detective Dogberry, as if they were founders of his fan club.

I enjoyed not knowing the cast and instead letting them earn their accolades through the sheer force of their performances. They were in good hands with Whedon. He combines mesmerizing imagery with the Swiss timing of a precision storyteller. The narrative hits every mark, as taught in screenwriting classes, and I'm not sure whether that makes Whedon a hack or a genius. With this film, he proves himself to be a modern-day Orson Welles. At its best, "Much Ado" is about as entertaining as moviemaking gets. 

IN THE HOUSE (B+) - Francois Ozon maintains his near-perfect record. I've liked every movie of his that I've seen.* Here, we get less of his mournful side and more of his playful side, with the tale of a bitter high school literature teacher (he calls his students "barbarians") taking one student under his wing only to become engrossed in the real-life serial that the boy crafts with each assignment.

The student, Claude (Ernst Umhauer, suggesting a fresh-faced Ferris Bueller or a Hardy Boy), tutors a dorky classmate, Rapha (a rather Screech-like Bastien Ughetto) in math, mainly as a way to infiltrate his pal's home and hang out with Rapha's goofy father and attractive, impossibly middle class mother (the elegant Emmanuelle Seigner ("The Diving Bell and Butterfly")).

Ozon is nothing if not a master at casting. It's tough to go wrong when you've got Fabrice Luchini ("Intimate Strangers") and Kristen Scott Thomas ("I've Loved You So Long") in the third and fourth spot in your lineup. They play the teacher, Germain, and his patient wife, Jeanne, who is struggling to make an art gallery succeed. (The Pornographic Nazi exhibit is worth the rental alone.) The couple has a casual ease, and when Germain starts reading young Claude's soap opera about the happy suburban family, they're both hooked. They can't wait for the next installment, as each one ends, invariably with "to be continued."

What Claude has created is an old-fashioned serial. And Ozon, the master storyteller, has crafted a clever riff. How much is true? How much is fantasy on the part of motherless Claude? Ozon suggests a twist at the end, but we can't be sure. He lulls you with what seems like a harmless trifle of a movie; but he's really just toying with that idea. No, there's substance here. The fact that you may not notice that is part of Ozon's continued genius. A suivre ... 

IN THE FAMILY (B) - This is quite a curiosity. At times it's a film like few others. For starters, I've never seen a movie about a gay Asian Southerner in Tennessee, so right there Patrick Wang has the viewer pleasantly off balance if not intrigued.

Wang wrote, directed and stars as Joey, a craftsman who moves in with his partner, Cody (Trevor St. John from TV's "One Life to Live"), and Cody's son, Chip -- but then has to fight Cody's sister for custody of the boy after Cody dies unexpectedly. Wang's storytelling is shaky at times, but he manages to avoid Hallmark Channel cliches while deepening the narrative with effective flashbacks to the origins of Joey and Cody's relationship.

Wang also is confident as a director. He likes to park the camera at one spot in a room, usually at waist level, and let an entire scene play out from that static perspective. Returning to the same shot is particularly effective when Wang is conveying how stunned Joey is by Cody's death while Chip continues on with the same kitchen routine we saw earlier, during happier times.

Wang is in command for about two hours. Unfortunately, the film runs a hefty 169 minutes. And during those final 49 minutes, it all falls apart. We get a jarring shift in tone, and the Hallmark Channel cliches burst forth. Suddenly it's a completely different movie. And suddenly Wang seems like a maudlin, manipulative hack.

This showed promise of being a surprising indie revelation. And for nearly two hours, it's a fascinating slice of cinema. But in the end, it turns into a saccharine slog.


* BONUS TRACKS
My favorite Francois Ozon films, in order: 

1. Under the Sand
2. Time to Leave
3. 5 x 2
4. Swimming Pool
5. Hideaway
6. Ricky
7. 8 Women
8. See the Sea 

Auteur, Auteur

 A pair of films from two of our favorite storytellers, screened this month at the Guild Cinema.

 

THE STRANGER (B+) - It is no easy task to convert Albert Camus' 1942 novel L'Etranger to the screen, but this lush adaptation by Francois Ozon dives smoothly into the narrative and the mid-century era using crisp, tactile black and white.

 

Benjamin Voisin, as the anti-hero Meursault, is more male model than brooding cipher, but he gets the job done as emotionally vacant man who shoots an Arab in 1940s Algeriers for no apparent reason. (I suppose  he can kind of complain that the sun was in his eyes.) Rebecca Marder ("The Crime Is Mine") brings depth of character as the love interest Marie. And Pierre Lottin provides the passion as the suspected pimp Raymond Sintes. 

Ozon takes his time setting the table, following Meursault to his mother's funeral (at the retirement home he had consigned her to), where he can't be brought to tears. That will be one of the absurd assertions used by the prosecution at Meursault's murder trial, as an example of the gunman's heartless nature. Ozon spends two dreamlike hours on Camus' narrative, cutting back and forth among the young couple's love story, Meursault's grimy incarceration, and the circus trial, turning the production into a bit of a shaggy-dog tale.   

The director luxuriates in languorous images as if re-enacting a classic film noir.  He is especially partial to camera shots of light sources streaming down from above. He shoots the sun from underwater, and a beam of light filtering into a prison cell. One angle, from the perspective of a light fixture, is transfixing.  

I haven't read the book in ages (it's on the list), and I haven't seen other adaptations. But this is a mostly faithful rendering, and visually it is a modest work of art.

MIROIRS NO. 3 (B) - Paula Beer has been the star of the past four movies of Christian Petzold (and also Ozon's "Frantz"), going back to "Transit" in 2018, and she's up to the challenge again in an understated tale of a woman recovering from a car crash that killed her boyfriend.

In a photo negative of "Misery," Beer's Laura is doted on by Betty (Barbara Auer), who is estranged from her own husband and son, both of whom work as mechanics in town. Betty showers attention on Laura, who suffered only minor injuries. Laura seizes the opportunity to reset her life -- a pianist back in Berlin, she was unhappy with her jerk of a boyfriend, and she has no good reason to mourn. She revels in the mundane tasks of rural life -- painting a fence, snipping flowers, cooking dinner. 

It becomes clear early on that Betty is the one struggling with grief, and she is using Laura as a substitute to salve her own loss. While the details of that are withheld until the final third of the movie, Petzold supplies plenty of clues, and he is in no mood to cook up mystery or suspense. Instead, he is content to train his camera on Beer as Laura's trauma thaws and she inches toward a reckoning with her former existence. Meantime, Laura is a lure for Betty's son, Max (Enno Trebs), and a reason for Betty's husband, Richard (Matthias Brandt), to try to bond again with his distant wife. 

If that sounds messy, it's not. Petzold zips this along in 86 minutes. He employs a brief snippet of Chopin to encapsulate the sorrow and discord of all of his characters at once. He himself is working in a minor key these days -- the casual pace of the film matches that of "Afire" from 2023 -- but what he lacks in flashy plot twists he makes up for in tangible storytelling. 

BONUS TRACK

Chopin's Prelude in e-minor, Op. 28, No. 4:

  

Ozon goes for an obvious choice for his closing credits, jerking us into the modern era with the Cure's "Killing an Arab": 

This Year's Model

THE NEW GIRLFRIEND (B+) - Francois Ozon, truly a master storyteller, does it again. He takes a fairly straightforward premise, adds a twist, and slyly spins an irresistible tale of friendship, love, obsession, sensuality and empowerment.

Claire (Anais Demoustier from "Bird People") and Laura (Isild Le Besco) are best friends from grade school. A deft montage in the first 10 minutes shows them bonding as girls and growing up, meeting their future husbands the same night at the same disco. Laura then is shown gravely ill at the baptism of her daughter, Lucie. Claire vows at the funeral to always protect Lucie.

Popping in one day on the widower, David (Romain Duris), Claire finds him at home dressed like a woman. Repulsed at first, she finds herself drawn to him, especially after he shows her the bounty of clothes in the closet of her dead best friend. Eventually David grows brave enough to venture out -- for a girlish shopping spree.

Claire dubs him Virginia, so that her husband won't be suspicious when she goes off on outings with her new "girlfriend." Soon, it's obvious that Claire is excited to have found a way to rekindle her soulmate connection to Laura by hanging out with her bewigged widowed husband and baby -- be it club-hopping or waxing his back.

Ozon, playing with a bright color palette and a cheery classical score, creates a quirky, retro utopia in suburban France. But, as he always does, he suffuses a playful teleplay with subtext and meaning. He carefully weaves strong threads through the narrative: Will Claire's husband, Gilles (Raphael Personnaz), find out? Will he be jealous? Is David just acting irrationally following the death of his young bride, or does he truly intend to transition to female? Will Claire fall for the David underneath the blond wig and frilly underthings? Will David feel used as a cheap replacement for Laura? Is he gay or straight or something in between?

Ozon is simply a genius at assembling the nuts and bolts narrative. You can't find a bad movie in his catalog: "Young and Beautiful," "In the House," "Time to Leave," "5 x 2," "Swimming Pool," "Under the Sand," "8 Women." Here, a film that often feels frivolous or shallow has a powerful undertow. Moments of dread or subtle suspense appear out of nowhere. Ozon also uses efficient bookends in the film. The opening moments and a key climactic scene both involve lifeless bodies being tenderly dressed and beautified by makeup. He's not above a few cornball touches (a cutesy scene with Lucie reacting gleefully calls to mind the magical realism of "Ricky"). When Claire slips up and must explain to her husband why she's spending time with David, she fudges and tells him that David is gay. When she tells David that she chose gay over transvestite, David responds, "Great! I'll look ridiculous."

Demoustier carries the film with calm and restraint. Whereas in "Bird People" she brought to mind American It Girl Shailene Woodley, here she had the presence of a young, freckled Isabelle Huppert. Duris, the lantern-jawed star of "Populaire" and "The Beat That My Heart Skipped," looks alternatively attractive and hideous in a dress and makeup. David's shifts from male to female and back again are disconcerting, leaving Claire conflicted; she has never fully reconciled the love and passion she apparently felt for Laura.

Ozon works his puppets effortlessly, churning this plot to a touching conclusion. It's a bit of a mystery how he does it. Now matter what he touches, it's a little bit of magic.

BONUS TRACK
The centerpiece of the film finds "Virginia" and Claire at a drag show where an arresting performer lip-syncs to the anthem "Une Femme Avec Toi" by Nicole Croisille (1975). There are no subtitles here, but you get the essence of it as sort of a French "I Am Woman." My favorite line: "You were happy as an Italian / who knows there will be love and wine" (which rhymes so much sweeter in French).


 

Comedie Francaise

 

THE CRIME IS MINE (B) - What a delightful diversion. Francois Ozon twirls an entertaining screwball comedy set in Paris in 1935 about an actress who exploits the murder of a producer to advance her own career.

Ozon has written and directed some profoundly serious films the past 20 years (as recently as last year's release about a daughter honoring her father's suicide wish, "Everything Went Fine"), but he does have a lighter side. Sometimes, as in 2016 with "The New Girlfriend," he finds a beguiling mix of serious and slapstick. "The Crime Is Mine" is mostly slapstick, a true throwback to the screwball comedies of nearly a century ago (and apparently is loosely adapted from a 1930s French play).

Nadia Tereszkiewicz (above left) stars as Madeleine Verdier, an actress who storms out of a much older producer's home after he pulls a Harvey Weinstein on her. When hours later he turns up dead, Madeleine comes up with the idea of copping to the murder, even through she didn't do it, as a way to put her acting skills to the test on the witness stand and in front of a rapt nation. (She cares much less about marrying her suitor, who is heir to a rubber-tire fortune.) When she is acquitted, with the help of best friend and aspiring lawyer Pauline Mauleon (Rebecca Marder, above right), her career does, indeed, take off. 

But Madeleine, it seems, has stolen the thunder of the apparent real killer, faded ingenue Odette Chaumette (a bonkers Isabelle Huppert, above center), who wants her own chunk of the spotlight. Ozon has a ton of fun with this as a courtroom farce and Keystone Cops police procedural. He also lards on the costuming and decor, fully immersed in the era and its style. Huppert balances a giant bright-red fright wig on her head and should have been jailed for theft of scenery instead of murder.

Don't worry too much about the details of the plot and whether and how they might add up. The investigating judge is played by a wonderfully droll Fabrice Luchini, another Ozon favorite. This all would be frivolous and inconsequential if it weren't for the prodigious narrative skills of our generation's best overall storyteller. It's the kind of fun that makes you forget the world outside the dark movie theater.

GODARD CINEMA (B+) - With workmanlike precision, cinematic biographer Cyril Leuthy walks us through the career of Jean-Luc Godard, making the case for the French filmmaker as the foundational voice of the New Wave and what has come after it. Godard broke through in 1960 with "Breathless," and by the end of the '60s, he was burned out on commercial filmmaking, particularly radicalized by the May 1968 protests.

Leuthy, who has previously profiled Godard's contemporary Jean-Pierre Melville, shows a deep understanding of Godard as a man and as an artist. Talking heads are knowledgeable and articulate. The clips are generous. Some of his past loves -- still lovely -- weigh in on the man with a troubled mind. 

I'll probably never shake my fascination with Godard, even if I will forever be stranded in his '60s heyday and will never fully grasp his later movies, which just got denser and denser. The mystery is part of the allure; this documentary is a good example of the unpacking that is necessary to peel through the layers of the man and his art. My goal is to re-learn French to a degree advanced enough to not need subtitles for a lot of his later work and make it easier to comprehend the clutter that spills from Godard's mind. 

BONUS TRACK

Let's try to update our list of Ozon films, in order from our favorite on down, which is a very short step. They are all worth seeing.

1. Under the Sand
2. Time to Leave
3. 5 x 2
4. Young & Beautiful
   
5. The New Girlfriend
   
6. Swimming Pool
7. Everything Went Fine
   
8. In the House
9. Hideaway
10. Frantz
    
11. The Crime Is Mine
    
12. Ricky
13. See the Sea
14. Double Lover

Bizarre Love Triangle

FRANTZ (B) - Not bad for a prim post-Verdun romantic drama.

It doesn't seem sufficient to call Francois Ozon a writer-director or a filmmaker. He is a master storyteller. He takes just about any story -- whether he wrote it himself or whether, like here, he is adapting another's work -- and makes it riveting. And his simple visual style never gets in the way of that story.

Here, Ozon ("Under the Sand," "The New Girlfriend," "Young & Beautiful") travels back to the days after World War I, in crisp black and white, to unravel the story of Frantz, a German soldier seen in flashbacks who died during the war, and his widowed fiancee, Anna (Paula Beer), who is still close to Frantz's parents. (He is adapting a story told by Ernst Lubitsch in 1932, based on a stage play.)

One day, Anna discovers a man putting flowers on Frantz's grave. It turns out to be Adrien (Pierre Niney), a gawky, glum French veteran. To the irritation of the locals, Anna befriends Adrien and even falls for him.

The "mystery" here -- and it isn't intended to be much of one -- involves the question of how Adrien knew Frantz and why he travels to Germany to pay tribute to his former battlefield enemy. I'll give you two guesses, and the first one is too far-fetched to contemplate logistically, unless you know Ozon's work, and then you think ... well, maybe.

There is a loveliness and a dourness to the storytelling here. There are occasional splashes of color, including in several war scenes, as if to shock the senses with the vividness of life. The actress Beer is wonderfully sedate. Niney has a hangdog John Hawkes manner to him. And their awkward interactions feel natural and lived in.

It all unfolds over nearly two hours, but it never drags. It has two neat halves -- the introduction and innocent quasi-courtship, and Anna's trip to France to solve the mystery of Adrien and his background. It has echoes to some of Ozon's best work -- the riddle and detective work by Charlotte Rampling in "Under the Sand"; the dignified end-of-life maleness of "Time to Leave."

Even when he's borrowing a script and working in a minor key, Ozon finds humanity and beauty, refining it as if it's his own.

BONUS TRACKS
Our title track, from New Order, of course:



The trailer:


 

The Best of 2017

This is the danger zone
This is where I came in
They know not what they do
Forgive them all their sins
    -- The brothers Gibb

I knew, just a few days into this new year, that it was time to reboot. After a hugely disappointing 2017 for movies -- and the movie industry -- I'd been feeling a significant shift coming on.

On January 3rd, at the end of a long day, I craved mindless entertainment. I settled on the revived version of the TV game show "Match Game." And there, in the seat once reserved for Charles Nelson Reilly -- top row, right -- was Mark Duplass. A lot of people don't know his name. He is a Mumblecore legend, and, with his brother, Jay, the face of independent filmmaking. He is a great actor and producer. And now he has achieved the level of amiably yukking it up on game shows.

Seeing him cavorting on network TV presented the perfect dichotomy: It upends notions of me as a film snob and elitist -- because I was, you know, wallowing in "Match Game" -- yet it reaffirms my old-school Mumblecore gangsta cred, going back a decade or so. It's a neat bow to tie on the end of an era.

It's difficult to recall a worse year for films -- and for moviegoing -- than 2017. Besides the unmasking of the Hollywood machine, there simply were not very many good films released last year. I had to stretch things to get a respectable Top Ten list (below). Worse, the string of disappointments from favorite filmmakers of the past runs even longer. That list (also below) includes less than sterling films from the likes of Sofia Coppola, Noah Baumbach, Asghar Farhadi, Jim Jarmusch, Greta Gerwig, Luca Guadagnino, Steven Soderbergh, Mike White, and Francois Ozon. Francois Ozon, alors! And I didn't even bother to go see movies offered up by old favorites: the Coen brothers, George Clooney, Alexander Payne, Darren Aronofsky, Yorgos Lanthimos or Paul Thomas Anderson. I've pretty much given up on Christopher Nolan.

There is one filmmaker out there who can consistently knock me out, and he made the only great film of 2017: Sean Baker, who followed up "Starlet" and "Tangerine" with another profound character study of the underclass, "The Florida Project." Nothing else was close to that gem, with a cast full of newcomers. All is not lost, but that's a lot of responsibility to place on one filmmaker.

There were plenty of disappointments to fill up a C-list. Rehashed stories, trite set-ups, played-out plots. Maybe I'm just an out-of-touch middle-aged white heterosexual male who just didn't understand the subtle brilliance of darlings like "Get Out" and "Call Me by Your Name," but I couldn't wait for either one to be over.

Too often in 2017, I was shut out while searching for a decent Sunday matinee. The arsty multiplexes clinged longer to middling indie releases, and a ripple effect seemed to starve the rest of the food chain, including the next option for distributors, our beloved Guild Cinema. Last month, I picked up the new two-month schedule for the Guild, turned to February, my Sharpie at the ready -- and I didn't find one title worth circling.

I do think think the Weinstein scandal is a symptom of many ills, beyond the sexual predation of some men. We've never nurtured a hotbed of mainstream fare here, but why did we give even scant attention to the extended "Ocean's Eleven" fraternity and their good ol' boy enablers? Even the indie crowd is turning insular and indulgent. And archly mainstream. (Damn you, Duplass.)

Why am I so cranky? Am I getting burned out? That could be a part of it. Or maybe it is just the nature of the grinding cycle of cultural consumption. I believe in turning new chapters and evolving. Weeding out old standbys. Meantime, I feel called to other duties. My long-running feature "Life Is Short" has taken on an extra yip of resonance. I've even been distracted from completing this essay in recent days.

I plan to continue this blog, but in abbreviated form. For the past five years, I've posted about three times a week, often writing full reviews. I will scale that back in frequency and quantity; there will be more capsule reviews than extended essays. It should, however, continue to fulfill its primary function: providing a guide to worthwhile films that you might otherwise overlook or never hear about. (Click away at the links below.) We might dip more often into the archives, searching out the gems we ourselves overlooked.

Maybe this will be a temporary lull, a way to wait out this rain delay, so to speak, like when WGN used to turn away from shots of the Wrigley Field grounds crew dragging the tarp onto the field to air highlights of Oakland A's World Series wins from the early '70s. Maybe it's just the way things are these days, now that my boyhood team, the Cubs, ended their World Series drought and exorcised decades-old angst. Maybe I just miss Charles Nelson Reilly.

Pardon me as I shuffle along the row of seats toward the aisle and the exit. This is the part where I came in.

THE TOP TEN

 

  1. The Florida Project - Master storytelling with a mostly rookie cast. A true feel for the human condition. Including, for the second year in a row, the best director, Sean Baker.
  2. Baby Driver - I know it's flawed, but I saw it on the big screen twice and fell for it each time. The most fun I can imagine having in a cineplex. Thank you, Edgar Wright, for the music and the mania.
  3. Dawson City: Frozen Time - A mesmerizing, meandering trip to the turn of the 20th century, to a gold-rush era and the origins of Hollywood.
  4. Donald Cried - Kris Avedisian's manic title character is riveting from beginning to end, as he makes life miserable for an old high school buddy who is back in town for a visit. Featuring the year's best screenplay by Avedisian.
  5. Lovesong - The wonderful Riley Keough drives this moody road movie about an unhappily married young mother rekindling a crush on her college pal.
  6. Suntan - From Greece, a harrowing depiction of a middle-age basket case going off the rails as he tries to recapture his youth while fixating on a beautiful young woman. This depressing exercise is somehow sexy and intoxicating.
  7. The Big Sick - An old-fashioned feel-good movie about defying family traditions and pursuing true love.
  8. Rumble: The Indians Who Rocked the World - An impeccable documentary about unsung musicians of the modern music era.
  9. Brigsby Bear - This seems like it is too weird to work, but goofy Kyle Mooney pulls off one of the sweetest films of the year.
10. Abacus: Small Enough to Jail - Another meticulous documentary, from Steve James ("Hoop Dreams"), with a compelling story to tell about our nation's priorities.

BONUS TRACKS

     It took us a while to get to some leftovers from 2016. "Toni Erdmann" would have ended up in the top five on the 2016 list, if I'd seen it in time. Such a powerful father-daughter story -- quirky and uplifting, heartbreaking and soulful. And Daniel Burman, a true storyteller with heart, exploited the father-son dynamic for another of his charming little movies, "The Tenth Man." Meantime, Emmanuelle Bercot tore things up in "My King" as a woman paralyzed by rage in a frustrating marriage. And Denzel Washington was fantastic in "Fences."

JUST MISSED THE LIST

(Honorables mentioned)

• A Quiet Passion
• The Glass Castle
• The B-Side: Elsa Dorfman's Portrait Photography
• The Teacher
• A Wolf at the Door
• The Salesman
• Graduation

MORE TOP DOCS

• I Am Not Your Negro
• Bombshell: The Hedy Lamarr Story
• Obit
• Kedi 
• Jane

GUILTY PLEASURES

• The Little Hours
• Battle of the Sexes
• The Trip to Spain
• Patti Cakes
• Wilson
• The Lure
• Band Aid
• The Disaster Artist

 

TOP PERFORMANCES

• Kris Avedisian, bonkers in "Donald Cried."
• Young Brooklynn Prince in "The Florida Project."
• Frances McDormand and Sam Rockwell going mano-a-mano in "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri."
• Timothee Chalamet, mostly rising above the corniness in "Call Me by Your Name."
• Cynthia Nixon, fascinating as Emily Dickinson in "A Quiet Passion."
• Woody Harrelson with the hat trick in "Wilson," "The Glass Castle" and "Three Billboards."
• Fred Armisen, fiercely funny in "The Little Hours" and "Band Aid."
• Riley Keough, following up "American Honey" with a sorrowful turn in "Lovesong." 
• Emmanuelle Devos as a mother obsessed with vengeance in "Moka."

IT'S NOT YOU, IT'S ME

(Some of our favorite directors didn't thrill us this time around)

• Noah Baumbach is at least getting back to equilibrium with "The Meyerowitz Stories"
• Sofia Coppola's totally indulgent and unnecessary remake, "The Beguiled"
• Asghar Farhadi made a really good movie, rather than a great one, "The Salesman"
• To a lesser extent, a minor disappointment from Francois Ozon, the lovely "Frantz"
• Greta Gerwig's solid but unspectacular debut, "Lady Bird"
• Jim Jarmusch's water-treaders "Paterson" and "Gimme Danger"
• Writer Mike White with "Beatriz at Dinner" (and probably "Brad's Status" if we'd gotten around to that one)
• Martin McDonagh's fussed-over "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri"
• Steven Soderbergh's big return, the fun but underwhelming "Logan Lucky"
• Eliza Hittman ("It Felt Like Love") turning in a dreary "Beach Rats"
• Dee Rees, who splashed with "Pariah," floundering with "Mudbound"
• Luca Guadagnino following up "A Bigger Splash," a perfect film, with the ridiculous "Call Me By Your Name"

COMING ATTRACTIONS

(Haven't caught these yet)

• Columbus
• Sieranevada
• Ex Libris: New York Public Library
• Brad's Status
• Rat Film

Stay tuned for reviews of those five titles and plenty more, albeit in condensed form, as we hold out hope for 2018.

BONUS TRACK
Speaking of guilty pleasures, our title track:


 

Young & Old

The French chronicle the cycle of life:

YOUNG & BEAUTIFUL (A-minus) - There may be a few directors out there I'd rank higher, but no one tells a story on screen like Francois Ozon.

For much of the running time of this seemingly standard coming-of-age film, the narrative rarely rises above ordinary. Isabelle (Marine Vacth), a 17-year-old beauty, spends a summer vacation at the beach with her family. She chooses a German boy, Felix, to give up her virginity to, and the event is unsurprisingly underwhelming for her.

Suddenly, she starts sneaking out of her parents' house and turning tricks with mostly older gentlemen in a ritzy hotel. The segue is jarring. Redubbed Lea, she still doesn't enjoy the act of sex very much. But somehow she finds a sense of liberation. Just as she seems to be growing comfortable with her body and her skills, something goes tragically wrong with her favorite john, an elderly man she actually has developed feelings for. Isabelle's double life is exposed. And the movie finally gains texture.

The parents become fleshed out. Sylvie (Geraldine Pailhas) must finally deal with her daughter as a complex person. Sad-faced stepfather Patrick (the compelling Frederic Pierrot from "Polisse" and "I've Loved You So Long") mostly tries to stay out of the way and out of trouble.

Ozon crafts a series of small subtle twists in the final 20 minutes, a succession of false endings that grow more and more intriguing. Finally, Ozon brings it all home with a clever sleight of hand, involving a legendary actress who not only lends gravitas to the proceedings but also subconsciously reminds us of her own sensual early work. It's a brilliant touch.

Stream it for the cheap sex, stay for the compelling drama.

(NOTE: Here's our list of our favorite Ozon films.)

ON MY WAY (B+) - The legendary actress mentioned above is not Catherine Deneuve; here she is commanding as a grandmother, feeling suddenly rudderless, who sets off on a road trip around France, not necessarily searching but just wandering.

Deneuve plays Bettie, a former Miss Brittany (1969), previously widowed now freshly dumped by her boyfriend, who walks out of her restaurant during the lunch rush and away from the aged mother she lives with, hitting the road just to get lost.

Written and directed by Emmanuelle Bercot, who (symmetry!) co-wrote "Polisse," "On My Way" has a shambling nature not unlike our favorite film of 2012 and a verite feel from an ensemble cast that buzzes in and out of Bettie's world. It's a lackadaisical victory of sorts for this icon of French cinema, who feels more human here than she ever has.

After drinking and smoking and snogging a bit too much on her little bender (a man about half her age tells her "You must have been gorgeous when you were young"), Bettie gets a call from her estranged daughter, asking Bettie to drive her boy, Charly (Nemo Schiffman), to his other grandfather's place a good day's drive away. The second half of the film thus settles in with Bettie and her adolescent ward.

Charly is a showy smart mouth who acts like a brat but quickly bonds with the grandmother he hardly knows. He encourages her to attend a reunion of the regional beauty queens of 1969, an invitation she has been shunning, wary of revisiting the era. Their journey is a satisfying one, as Bettie soldiers on, trying to shut out the intermittent news from home suggesting that her restaurant is on the brink of failure.

Bercot brings much of the cast together at the end, essentially an overtime session which reminds us that the movie is about 15 minutes too long. We get a reveal from Bettie's past, connected to that regional competition 45 years earlier; it spills out during an argument and lands with a thud. An unsatisfying happy ending wraps up the proceedings with a spoonful of sugar.

It's all about the journey, not the destination.

Other People's Children

A pair of French films streaming on Amazon: 

WHEN FALL IS COMING (B) - I can't think of anyone who could pull off this slight, odd narrative -- about a grandmother's unhealthy compulsion to be with her grandson -- anywhere near as well as master storyteller Francois Ozon. 

Helene Vincent is endlessly charming as Michelle, a stylish grandmother who may or may not be having cognition issues. She picks mushrooms with her dear friend Marie-Claude (Josiane Balasko) and ends up poisoning her own daughter, Valerie (Ludivine Sagnier), who thinks it might have been an intentional act so that Michelle could get more time with Valerie's adolescent son, Lucas (a sharp Garlan Erlos). Eventually something does happen to Valerie (and Michelle might have something to do with that), and Lucas comes to live with Michelle.

Meantime, Michelle extends kindness -- perhaps an unhealthy amount -- to Marie-Claude's ex-con adult son Vincent (a menacing but amusing Pierre Lottin). Helene Vincent shoulders the production like the old pro she is. Michelle's friendship with Marie-Claude (who is unhappy and unhealthy) is sweet, and her generosity -- if that's truly what it is -- is admirable. A couple of narrative zags keep the viewer guessing until the end.

This probably tracks most with Ozon's "In the House," another shaggy-dog story that meanders with some real and perceived twists. It also feels compatible with a recent Ozon film, "Everything Went Fine," which also dealt with death and family relations. Here he crafts a satisfying low-key thriller. 

OTHER PEOPLE'S CHILDREN (2023) (C) - Tripping over the line between legitimate drama and Hallmark shmaltz, Rebecca Zlotowski turns in an earnest examination of a woman with a loudly ticking biological clock who seeks true love with a hunk who has a 4-year-old daughter. Will they make it? Will they make their own baby?

Virginie Efira (who played a woman with two families in "Madeleine Collins") stars as Rachel, a high school teacher who finds her dream guy in ruggedly handsome Ali (Roschdy Zem), who is separated from his wife and shares custody of little Leila. Zlotowski mixes dewy eyed romance and gauzy cinematography (the Eiffel Tower is photographed reverently) with generous "Red Shoes Diary" nudity and R-rated lovemaking.

Rachel falls hard not just for Ali but also for Leila. At school Rachel fends off a randy co-worker and nurtures a troubled student who could be the son she never had. Elsewhere, she bonds with her sister over the continued mourning for their mother, who died when they were little. Meantime, Rachel still must compete with Leila's mopey mother (a miscast 50-year-old Chiara Mastroianni). There is also a dying mother of one of Leila's classmates to ratchet up the melodrama.

The second half descends into soap-opera territory, and the drawn-out theatrics expose Efira's limitations as a leading actress beyond looking good in a shortie nightshirt. (We previously described her as bland, in a Kim Cattrall way.) A heartfelt epilogue helps, but many won't make it to that ending unless they can find a way to care about where all these folks end up. 

BONUS TRACK

The trailer for "When Fall Is Coming":

 

In "Other People's Children," Rachel and Ali cement their affair to Dave von Ronk's "Cocaine Blues" ("... all around my brain"):

Auteur, Auteur

  A pair from two talented writer-directors who broke through in the Aughts.

SHOWING UP (B-minus) - Kelly Reichardt re-teams with Michelle Williams (they go back to "Wendy and Lucy," from 2008) for this minor-key depiction of the week in the life of an artist. This is as slow and uneventful as a movie can be, so it's the little things that make this worth a view.

You know how we go on about Theater People? They can be a lot to take. Well so can art departments. Thankfully, Reichardt does not dwell on the quirks of artists or deify their pursuit of genius. On the contrary, this movie is about the tedious existence of a modest artist, bland Lizzy, who dresses in baggy clothes, wilts under a mop of soccer-mom hair, and lives to make lovely statuettes of female figures. She is hustling to finish her latest crop before her upcoming exhibition.

But life keeps getting in her way. Her landlord, Jo (Hong Chau from "The Menu" and "Inherent Vice"), won't fix the hot water and then saddles Lizzy with a wounded pigeon she found. (Lizzy feels guilty because it was her cat who wounded the bird and Lizzy who dumped it out the window, leaving it to die.) Yes, get ready for a giant Wounded Bird Metaphor. Meek Lizzy gets walked all over in the art department and is at her wit's end dealing with her bipolar brother.

All of this can be quite interesting at times. And Williams is a wizard at disappearing into a complex character. The deep supporting cast also includes engaging small turns by the likes of Judd Hirsh (Lizzy's father), Amanda Plummer, James Le Gros (I recognized his voice before I recognized his face), John Magaro as the brother, and Andre (3000) Benjamin as the kiln operator who could probably be better at his job.

There's a lot to like here. But there's a whole lot of nothin' goin' on, too. It's just ... too ... slow. At the one-hour mark, I thought to myself, "OK, time for the plot to start." Fifteen minutes later one of my friends ducked out; he reported later that he just didn't have the patience to find out what would happen to those two wounded birds -- Lizzy and the pigeon. It's a delightful ending that my friend missed; but for too many people, it will be a chore to wade through nearly two hours to get there. I made it OK.

EVERYTHING WENT FINE (B+) - Francois Ozon has been one of the great storytellers of the past 20 years. His edge has dulled a bit in recent years. Earlier work -- "Under the Sand" with Charlotte Rampling, "Time to Leave" and "5 X 2" -- includes flawless, unsettling character studies.

Here he takes on the story of a woman who assists her dying father with his final wish. Sophie Marceau is riveting as Emmanuele Bernheim.  Apparently always her dad's favorite since childhood, she steps in to be at the side of Andre (Andre Dussollier), who has suffered a stroke and struggles to maintain his dignity or even care for himself. Dussollier, too, commands the screen in this emotionally draining pas de deux. Emmanuele's dour sister Pascale Geraldine Pailhas) can't work up the same amount of drive to accommodate the old man, but she offers support when she can.

Andre is cranky and petulant. He was a bad father and was an even worse husband to the traumatized and now-ailing Claude (a defeated Charlotte Rampling). Some might find him irredeemable; others might appreciate his candor. When he tells Emmanuele (whom we also see in childhood flashbacks) "you were such an ugly child," he delivers it as if he thinks it's a compliment about her current beauty. Marceau does make it difficult to look away as her face constantly fills the screen, even if the melodrama is painfully raw. (For one thing, she sports a shag haircut to end all shag haircuts.)

Dussollier's performance -- a raw depiction of a fallen, helpless man -- can be difficult to watch. And this could have been shorter than 113 minutes. But Marceau pours so much grit and nuance into her role of Everywoman that you are inclined to quietly cheer everyone on. Ozon teases us as to whether the old man might change his mind. Andre harbors a secret -- involving a pest called Gerard -- which unspools gradually until it completes the picture of a man hoping to go out on his own terms. The ending is near-perfect.

Daydreams of Cannes

USA Today reports on the lineup for next month's Cannes Film Festival, and we pick through it to craft a wish list of movies we're hoping to see in the coming months.

• The Coen Brothers, who have been on a spectacular roll, return with "Inside Llewyn Davis" starring Carey Mulligan, Justin Timberlake and some adults.
• Sofia Coppola, who got back on her game with "Somewhere," shows promise with another juicy tale of privileged young women, "The Bling Ring."
• The brilliant Jia Zhangke ("The World," "Still Life," "24 City") returns from a long break from feature films with "A Touch of Sin."
• Arnaud Desplechin ("Kings & Queen" and "A Christmas Tale") offers "Jimmy Picard," starring Benicio del Toro and the wonderful Mathieu Amalric. 
• Francois Ozon, whose "In the House" opens this week in New York, already has his follow-up ready to unspool: "Jeune et Jolie (Young and Pretty)," which features Charlotte Rampling.
• Veteran actress Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi, who starred in Ozon's "5x2," sat behind the camera for "A Chateau in Italy."
• Steven Soderbergh presents his swan song, the Liberace biopic "Behind the Candelabra."
• Iran's Asghar Farhadi follows up the Oscar-winning "A Separation" with "The Past."
• A father-son story? A road movie? Alexander Payne ("The Descendants") promises both in "Nebraska."
• J.C. Chandor, who wowed with his debut, "Margin Call," serves up a sophomore effort, "All Is Lost."
• Japan's prolific pulp master Takashi Miike ("Audition") presents "Shield of Straw."
• BEWARE: The last time Nicolas Winding Refn and Ryan Gosling got together, they tortured us with "Drive." They are teaming up again for something called "Only God." (As in, "Only God can help us now.")
• BEWARE II: The insufferable Baz Luhrmann, who will never be forgiven for the horrific spectacle "Moulin Rouge," will not only present "The Great Gatsby," but he'll do his best to desecrate the literary classic by screening it in 3-D. 

Bonus Track
Here's the exhilarating trailer for Sofia Coppola's "The Bling Ring," near-perfection in less than a minute, a joyful retro explosion of music and graphics:

Crises

BRAD'S STATUS (C+) - We are big fans of Mike White, and he has a wonderful touch with stories centered around struggling women: "The Good Girl," "Beatriz at Dinner" and HBO's "Enlightened." Here, he puts forth a midlife crisis of a do-gooder mensch with a perfectly fine life -- cute, understanding wife and brilliant son who is headed off to college. But the voices in his head tell him that he doesn't measure up, to either his uber-successful former college buddies or to the potential of his own son.

Ben Stiller mopes through the proceedings, whining in endless voice-overs about the injustices raining down on a 47-year-old with a bounty of riches, even if they are not all monetary (and even if some of the riches come from his in-laws). His old buddies, often depicted living it up in simplistic montages, have snubbed him to the point of not inviting him to one of their weddings, a rebuff that Brad just can't let go of. But one of the pals (Michael Sheen) comes through for Brad when he needs a Yale alum to put in a good word for Brad's music-prodigy son, Troy (Austin Abrams, whose mumbling millennial manner provides the only fresh take among a talented cast). The twist here is that Troy seems to have his act together while Brad is a tightly packed ball of resentments.

Despite the hurdles that White sets up for viewers seeking entertainment, Brad does have qualities that a middle-aged white guy can identify with, exemplified in Brad's brief, innocent flirtation with one of Troy's female friends. But any substantive ideas put forth here are scattered and conflicting. In the end, Brad doesn't have it so bad, and we don't need to be lectured about his midlife angst.

DOUBLE LOVER (B-minus) - Francois Ozon, the best pound-for-pound storyteller in film today, fumbles an adaptation of a Joyce Carol Oates short story and turns in the least affecting movie of his two-decade feature career. He once again taps Marine Vacth, from his 2014 release "Young & Beautiful," now in her mid-20s, to play Chloe, a paranoid woman who is tormented by her boyfriend's evil twin (both are played by Jeremie Renier).

This is a fairly pat horror film that comes not so much a twist as a gradual 180-degree rotation throughout the tense 107-minute running time. Is Chloe being deceived about her boyfriend's true nature? Why is she indulging her basest desires with his brother?

Ozon barely makes this worth viewing. He still knows how to have fun with a narrative. And Vacth, like in "Young & Beautiful," uses her steely, boyish model attractiveness to lure the viewer into the story. Grand dame Jacqueline Bisset turns up toward the end to effect a key plot swerve, but not in time to rescue this pulpy plaything from being only slightly above average.
 

New to the Queue

 A mutiny of the bounty ...

Favorite storyteller Francois Ozon ("In the House," "Frantz," "Everything Went Fine") is back, this time with a screwball romp with echoes of "Chicago," "The Crime Is Mine."

A documentary examining the work of the French legend of filmmaking, "Godard Cinema."

A drama about a middle-school teacher who gets stressed out by a theft investigation, "The Teachers' Lounge."

We're normally wary of biographies of artists, but this looks like so much more, "Apolonia, Apolonia."

From Kleber Mendonca Filho ("Aquarius," "Neighboring Sounds"), a tribute to his hometown, "Pictures of Ghosts."

The Best of 2025: It's Not Me, It's You

 

Generation X is in a millennial slump. 

There is no need for a grand essay this year, or a diatribe. As usual, you may jump down to the lists and you'll find dozens of movies to stream right now. But I do want to address Gen X's midlife malaise. So this year we are going to offer a sort-of anti-list upfront. 

As a Gen X elder (let's not debate this), I'm saddened to see so many filmmakers lose their mojo as they trail me into middle age. Some of my all-time favorite directors have lost me with their releases in recent years.  

I believe in chapters, and I learned early on that it's not easy to sync with an artist throughout their career. The three-album rule was invented for a reason, and feel free to apply it to filmmaking. I had my quarter-life crisis after college, realizing that some of my favorite bands just didn't thrill me anymore. Now, at the three-quarter mark, I find that it is a parade of filmmakers who leave me disappointed. (By the way, I have long since forgiven Joe Jackson.)

So let's elevate the annual "It's Not You, It's Me" category from below and highlight a list of 2025's offenders, who either outright offended or just fell short in some way:

• Noah Baumbach, age 56. ... His 2025: Back in the day he made a handful of brilliant movies; this time he excreted the maudlin "Jay Kelly" with his new pal George Clooney. Baumbach has made one good film in the past decade. ... His Heyday: "The Squid and the Whale" (2005) and "Frances Ha" (2013)
• Paul Thomas Anderson, 55. ... 2025: He once made a handful of brilliant movies, but he has grown as bloated as his budgets. The latest is his fetishism of fascism, "One Battle After Another," which follows the fun but lightweight "Licorice Pizza" (2021). ... Heyday: "Magnolia" (1999)
• Kelly Reichardt, 61. ... 2025: She was onto something with "The Mastermind," but a bland star (and a blaring soundtrack) under- and overwhelmed her thin plot. ... Heyday: "Certain Women" (2016)
• Wes Anderson, 56. ... 2025: We walked out of 2023's "Asteroid City." We made it through "The Phoenician Scheme," but barely. ... Heyday: "The Royal Tenenbaums" (2001)
• Chloe Zhao, 43 (cuspy). ... 2025: She somehow managed a decent final half hour of "Hamnet," but the first hour was nearly unwatchable. For some reason, I did not walk out. ... Heyday: "The Rider" (2018)
• Lynne Ramsay, 56. ... 2025: She produced something powerful and compelling at times with "Die My Love," but she tripped over some tropes and didn't earn the ending. ... Heyday: "Morvern Callar" (2002)
• Rian Johnson, 52. ... 2025: He ran the well dry with a weak third installment of his "Knives Out" series, "Wake Up Dead Man." ... Heyday: "Looper" (2013)
• (We pause, briefly, in honor of our onetime service to the country as a copy editor, for a discussion of commas. Is there an argument for leaving out the comma in "Wake Up Dead Man" and "Die My Love"? Doubt it. "Sorry, Baby.") 
• Yorgos Lanthimos, 52. ... 2025: He continues to botch scripts, this time muffing the last 20 minutes of "Bugonia." ... Heyday: "Alps" and "Dogtooth" (2010-12)
• Francois Ozon, 58. ... 2025: The man is in his own league, but even he is working in a minor key, with 2025's "When Fall Is Coming." ... Heyday: "Time to Leave" (2006) and too many others to list
• Jia Zhang-ke, 55. ... 2025: Even an all-time great could barely hold our interest in his career pastiche "Caught by the Tides." ... Heyday: "The World" (2006)

This doesn't take into account:

• The occasional Boomer -- Rob Reiner's soggy "Spinal Tap" sequel, or Nuri Bilge Ceylan's so-so "About Dry Grasses."
• Or the clouds forming on the horizon for a couple of Millennials: We've struggled twice so far to make a dent in 37-year-old Celine Song's "Materialists" (her "Past Lives" was No. 1 in 2023), and we gave up on "Pavements" from Alex Ross Perry, 41. (We preferred the Pavement doc "Louder Than You Think," about their crazy drummer/producer.) 
• Meantime, Walter Salles, 69, got back on his game with "I'm Still Here," and 73-year-old Boomer Jim Jarmusch is still steady-as-he-goes, maintaining his niche as the zen master, with his latest, "Father Mother Sister Brother."

OK. So I'm in a funk. The good news is that there are fresh voices out there; look below for movies from the likes of Eva Victor, Nina Conti, Isabella Roland, Rungano Nyoni, Michael Strassner, and more. The future remains promising, as the generations churn.

***

Below you'll find a ton of movies to sample, most from 2025, but some that hurtle you back decades (see "The Leftovers" below). Where possible I point out where you can stream them. My main go-to services are HBO, Mubi, Criterion, Netflix, and the library's free Hoopla (or Kanopy in your jurisdiction) or DVDs. Each film citation has a link to my original review.

THE TOP 15 of '25

(For the first five movies, I watched them more than once, confirming them as top picks.) 

  1. Blue Moon. Richard Linklater (a late Boomer with an X sensibility) directs a pitch-perfect Ethan Hawke in "this endlessly clever and charming tale of the bittersweet final days" of songwriter Lorenz Hart. Including Best Screenplay, in fact one of the best of all time. (In theaters; Netflix 2/14) 

  2. The Ballad of Wallis Island. "It is funny and full of heart; it's an earnest labor of love that tells a somber story without wallowing in any emotional muck." (Amazon Prime)

  3. Eephus. The best feature film about baseball ever made, with a tiny budget and a cast full of mostly non-actor ringers. (Mubi)

  4. Sorry, Baby. One of the many quiet indie gems on the list, often starring the writer-director (here Eva Victor), that stuck with us a long time. (HBO)

  5. One to One: John & Yoko. A meticulous, fascinating deep dive into the culture of New York City at the time an ex-Beatle showed up. (HBO)

  6. Sunlight. A buddy-movie road trip across New Mexico full of wit, heart and charm, led by stars Shenoah Allen and Nina Conti, who directed. (Rental on demand)

  7. Sentimental Value. Another mature, thoughtful character study from Joachim Trier (age 51). (In theaters)

  8. Diane Warren: Relentless. A documentary buoyed by the sheer force of the personality of its subject, a prolific MOR songwriter. (Hoopla/Kanopy)

  9. I'm Still Here. A tale of bravery and endurance from Walter Salles, whose exploration of Brazil's secret police will feel hauntingly relevant. (Netflix)

10. The Alabama Solution. A searing indictment of a state prison system, from the prolific Jarecki family. (HBO)

11. D(e)ad. Isabella Roland's family, working with a tiny budget, helped produce this clever comedy, one of the funniest movies of the year. (Rental on demand)

12. Song Sung Blue. When was the last time -- if ever -- you danced in the aisles in joy after a movie? The most fun at the theater in 2025. (Coming to Peacock)

13. Pee-wee as Himself. A filmmaker does a personal exploration of one of the most fascinating artists of the past 40 years. (HBO)

14. Listers. Microbudget DIY filmmaking at its finest; this documentary about birdwatching is the best movie most people never saw. (Free on YouTube)

15. Is This Thing On? Bradley Cooper wrings pathos and humor out of a disintegrating marriage, thanks to his star, Will Arnett. Including Best Director. (In theaters)

JUST MISSED THE LIST

(Honorables mentioned)

• The Baltimorons (AMC+)
• It Was Just an Accident
• Die My Love (Mubi)
• Friendship (HBO)
• Drowning Dry (Mubi)
• Father Mother Sister Brother (Theaters, then MUBI)
• Matt and Mara (Mubi) 

 

MORE TOP DOCS 

This was a particularly strong year for documentaries. Buckle up for a long list of releases, mostly in the B+ range. Many, too, Just Missed the List: 

 

• The music profiles: "Devo" explored in detail the origins of an art collective (Netflix); "Janis Ian: Breaking Silence" was intimate and revealing (PBS); "Becoming Led Zeppelin" gave the old boys their due (including drummer Jon Bonham through archival recordings) (Netflix); "Sunday Best" explored Ed Sullivan's commitment to civil rights on his variety show (Netflix); "Swamp Dogg Gets His Pool Painted" was a total hoot (rental on demand).
• Ben Stiller excavated his family history in "Stiller & Meara: Nothing Is Lost" (Apple TV)
• Raoul Peck powerloaded "George Orwell: 2 + 2 = 5" (rental on demand)
• A fascinating profile of Andy Kaufman, "Thank You Very Much" (rental on demand) 
• "Breakdown 1975" examined not just movies but our fraying culture during a pivotal year (Netflix) 
• "Secret Mall Apartment" had a great little-known story to unpack (Netflix)
• "The Perfect Neighbor" told a tragedy mainly through police body-cam footage (Netflix)
• I enjoyed getting to know comedian/podcaster Marc Maron in the gloomy documentary "Are We Good?" (rental on demand)
• Laura Poitras showed why she is one of the best, with her complicated profile of Seymour Hersh in "Cover-Up" (Netflix)  

 

TOP PERFORMANCES

• Songwriter Lorenz Hart in "Blue Moon" was the role Ethan Hawke was born to play, and no other performance came close this year. 
• Fernanda Torres was riveting throughout "I'm Still Here." 
• Susan Chardy was a well of guarded emotion in the disappointing culture study "On Becoming a Guinea Fowl" from Rungano Nyoni. 
• Jennifer Lawrence, fierce and feral in "Die My Love." Robert Pattinson and Sissy Spacek managed somehow to keep up with her.
• Tim Key walked a tightrope between comedy and drama in "The Ballad of Wallis Island," with an assist from Tom Basden and Carey Mulligan.
• No one can quite do what Renate Reinsve does every time, including this past year in "Sentimental Value."
• Hugh Jackman melted into his character, a Neil Diamond impersonator, in "Song Sung Blue."

 

GUILTY PLEASURES

• The Lost Weekend: A Love Story. The sweet story told by John Lennon's girlfriend in 1974, May Pang. (Amazon Prime)
• Splitsville. Another fun romp from filmmaking team Michael Angelo Covino and Kyle Marvin. ("The Climb") (Rental on demand)
• Dig (XX). An updated music doc that revisits the aughts "rivalry" between the Dandy Warhols and the Brian Jonestown Massacre. (Leaving Criterion) 
• The Merchants of Joy. A cheesy but effective profile of sellers of Christmas trees in New York City. (Amazon Prime)

 

THE LEFTOVERS

Some 2024 films we caught up with:  The powerful PBS documentary about workers organizing, "Union." ... The fascinating four-hour mystery saga, "Trenque Lauquen." ... We walked out of the Dylan biopic "A Complete Unknown," and instead went back in time to two classic documentaries about the man. ... The offbeat study of asexual adults, "Slow." ... Anne Hathaway was charming in the rom-com from Michael Showalter, "The Idea of You."

Wayback Machine: There were three of the all-time classics from the American New Wave: "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest," "Rosemary's Baby" and "Shampoo." ... We went back to the '80s to hang out with Spike Lee ("Do the Right Thing") and John Hughes and Molly Ringwald. ... We enjoyed Goldie Hawn in Steven Spielberg's "Sugarland Express." ... There were two Rolling Stones-related nuggets, "Performance" and "Gimme Shelter." ... We paid respects to Gene Hackman (R.I.P.) in "The Conversation" and Peter Sellers in "Being There." ... We dove deeper into the oeuvre of Joan Micklin Silver ("Between the Lines"), with "Crossing Delancy" and "Hester Street." ... Then there were the '70s hippie spectacles "Hair" and "Jesus Christ Superstar." ... Along with a documentary about Tura Satana, we screened the Russ Meyer B-movie classic "Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!" ... And, of course, we sampled liberally from Guild Cinema's annual summer film noir series (here and here).

R.I.P: We paid tribute to David Lynch and Robert Redford. We still have one more Lynch entry to go. ... We owe a tribute to Diane Keaton. ... We sampled "Spinal Tap," then and now, in memory of Rob Reiner, and we have a follow-up to that due in a few weeks. 

 

IT'S NOT YOU, IT'S ME

(Well, maybe this time it is you. 

Some of our favorites let us down.)

 

• (See above)

COMING ATTRACTIONS

Here are a bunch we wanted to see but didn't get the chance:

• The Secret Agent
• The Ice Tower
• Bob Trevino
• Sirat
• Miroirs 3

Join us in 2026 as we track down those titles and more of the finest movies you wouldn't otherwise think of watching.

The Greats

Richard Brody, at his New Yorker blog, takes a shot at listing the 12 greatest living narrative filmmakers.  He's riffing off of a 20-year-old list by Jonathan Rosenbaum.

 I don't know about "great," but, for grins, let's list our favorite directors, living or dead (but let's call them "modern"), without thinking too hard, knowing we will miss a bunch and will do this again someday with different names. OK, I'll reverse the numbers and do 21 because I'm lazy:

• The Coen Brothers
• The Duplass Brothers
• The Dardenne Brothers 
• Michael Winterbottom
• Francois Ozon
• Noah Baumbach
• Danny Boyle
• Nuri Bilge Ceylan
• Sofia Coppola 
• Steven Soderbergh
• Wes Anderson
• Zhangke Jia
• Nicole Holofcener
• Tsai Ming-liang
• David Lynch
• Jim Jarmusch
• Lynn Shelton
• Bela Tarr
• Bobcat Goldthwait (hey, he put Jerry Lewis on his list)
• Guy Maddin
• Pavel Chukhrai
• Someone from Romania

In memoriam:

• Kryzystof Kieslowski
• Robert Altman

New to the Queue

Into the breach ...

We're wary of Bong Joon-ho's movies (like "Snowpiercer," for godsakes), but we have a good feeling about the class-clash psych-out "Parasite."

A mass extinction offers an opportunity for a low-key rumination on humanity and self, "In My Room."

Francois Ozon is back with his take on the sexual abuse by Catholic priests, "By the Grace of God."

A documentary about twins agonizing over the memories from their childhood, "Tell Me Who I Am."
  

New to the Queue

The other side ...

Sally Potter ("Yes," "Orlando") returns with another chi-chi chamber piece, this time with Patricia Clarkson leading a solid cast, "The Party."

We liked Ryan Coogler's "Creed" so much that we're willing to gamble on a super-hero movie, "Black Panther."

The inimitable Francois Ozon ("Frantz," "Young & Beautiful") whips up another juicy plot, a love triangle this time, in "Double Lover."

Guy Maddin's preternaturally odd tribute to Hitchcock, an homage to the San Francisco of "Vertigo," the hourlong fever dream "The Green Fog."
 

New to the Queue

Cooling off ...

Our guy Alex Ross Perry ("The Color Wheel," "Listen Up Philip") is back, with Elisabeth Moss in tow, for "Queen of Earth."

Our boy Jason Schwartzman is enough of a draw for the droll, lightweight indie film "7 Chinese Brothers."

A strong new documentary entry from director Stanley Nelson, "The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution."

An emotional and psychological battle between teen female friends, from France, "Breathe."

A documentary about a polygamous Mormon fundamentalist sect, "Prophet's Prey."

A harrowing look at endangered species, Louie Psihoyos' documentary "Racing Extinction."

A debut feature from Steven Piet, the hardboiled mystery "Uncle John."

This one looks sketchy, but we're still giving Francois Ozon an opportunity to disappoint us for the first time: "The New Girlfriend."
 

Onto Toronto

From the film festivals in Telluride to Toronto and from Venice to New York, here's what we've cobbled together as titles to look for this fall and beyond:

First Out of the Gate

THE SKELETON TWINS - Hugely talented "SNL" alums Kristen Wiig and Bill Hader get dark with a family drama of estranged siblings. 

THIS IS WHERE I LEAVE YOU - An appealing ensemble cast joins hack director Shawn Levy in another family tale. Starring Tina Fey, Jason Bateman, Adam Driver, Kathryn Hahn and Rose Byrne. 

THE ZERO THEOREM - Familiar Terry Gilliam dystopia porn, starring Christoph Waltz and screening at the local art house cinema. It's been a while since we checked in with the Python alum, having missed his more recent "Tideland."

Auteur, Auteur

STRAY DOGS - Taiwan's Tsai Ming-liang ("What Time Is It There?") finally returns with the story of a family in poverty.  

TWO DAYS, ONE NIGHT - Marion Cotillard stars in the latest from master filmmakers Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne. 

AN EYE FOR BEAUTY - Canadian Denys Arcand ("The Barbarian Invasions") spins a new love story. 

THE NEW GIRLFRIEND - Francois Ozon is back with the story of a young woman who makes a startling discovery about the husband of her dead best friend. 

BIRDMAN - Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu ("Amores Perros," "Babel") recruits Michael Keaton as an aging actor trying to relive his heyday as a superhero. 

THE CUT - Fatih Akin ("Head On," "The Edge of Heaven") casts Tahar Rahim from "A Prophet" to turn a spotlight on the Turkish genocide of the Armenians between the wars in the 20th Century. 

NED RIFLE - Indie darling Hal Hartley completes the trilogy he began with "Henry Fool" and "Fay Grim," with Henry and Fay's son taking over. 

LISTEN UP PHILIP - Alex Ross Perry follows up "The Color Wheel" with a Jason Schwartzman frolic as a writer going off the rails as his second novel is to be published. 

LAGGIES - Lynn Shelton continues her slog toward the mainstream with a story of a 30-ish woman (Keira Knightley, meh) ditching her fiance to hang out with a teenage girl. 

WHILE WE'RE YOUNG - Noah Baumbach teams with Ben Stiller and Naomi Watts as a couple whose career and marriage are shaken up by a younger pair. 

99 HOMES - Ramin Bahrani ("Man Push Cart," "Chop Shop," "Goodbye Solo") returns with the story of an unemployed construction worker and a shady realtor who foreclose mortgages. 

FOXCATCHER - Bennett Miller ("Capote," "Moneyball") casts Mark Ruffalo and Channing Tatum in another promising wrestling film. (See "Win Win.")

Familiar Faces

CAKE - Jennifer Aniston is a woman in a chronic-pain support group who investigates the suicide of a fellow group member (Anna Kendrick). Also starring William H. Macy and Felicity Huffman. 

WHIPLASH - Miles Teller and J.K. Simmons team up as rivals between a college band leader and the drummer he recruits. 

MANGLEHORN - David Gordon Green casts Al Pacino as a local locksmith still heartbroken by the woman he loved and lost decades ago. 

MEN, WOMEN & CHILDREN - Jason Reitman corrals Adam Sandler for a comedy about sexual angst in the Internet age. Also starring Kaitlyn Dever, the little punk from “Short Term Twelve." 

ST. VINCENT - Bill Murray stars as a brooding former Vietnam War vet who befriends a neighbor boy and takes the lad on inappropriate adventures. 

THE THEORY OF EVERYTHING - "Man on Wire" director James Marsh dramatizes Stephen Hawking's life story. 

DUMB AND DUMBER TO - The originals are back with a sequel to one of the stupidest and funniest movies of all time. 

INHERENT VICE - Shall we give Paul Thomas Anderson and Joaquin Phoenix another chance? Here they adapt Thomas Pynchon's gonzo 2009 novel about a Southern California private eye investigating the disappearance of his ex-girlfriend's wealthy boyfriend. The cast includes Josh Brolin, Owen Wilson and Reese Witherspoon.

Pulp Fiction

GONE GIRL - Warily, we dive into the juicy adaptation of that great summer novel despite director David Fincher and star Ben Affleck. 

KILL THE MESSENGER - The sad story of Gary Webb, the west coast journalist who pursued the explosion of crack in the inner city during the 1980s. Starring Jeremy Renner, with Mary Elizabeth Winstead ("Smashed").

EDEN - Greta Gerwig stars in the new film from French director Mia Hansen-Løve ("Goodbye First Love"), which focuses on the rise of the French electronic-music boom in the 1990s.

New to the Queue

Apres le deluge ...

The latest from Christian Petzold ("Afire," "Transit," "Barbara") teams him with Paula Beer again for a story of a woman dealing with the aftermath of an accident, "Miroirs No. 3."

Francois Ozon takes on Albert Camus, with a black-and-white take on "The Stranger." 

Nadav Lapid ("The Kindergarten Teacher," "Synonyms") returns with a more madcap tale of a married couple getting decadent with the power elite, "Yes."

Romanian provocateur Radu Jude ("Aferim," "Do Not Expect Too Much From the End of the World") clocks in under two hours with his latest satire, "Kontinental '25."