Top Films by Year
Top Films of 2020
Top Films of 2017
Top Films of 2015
Coyote vs. Acme – 7
Rather remarkable how the filmmakers mixed cartoon and human worlds, making both equally realistic, albeit totally absurd. Also remarkable how they brought both sets of characters to an emotional climax, capped and released by the Clash singing “I Fought the Law.” Will Forte and John Cena were pleasures to watch and Wiley Coyote was somehow […]
Mary Oliver: Saved By the Beauty of the World – 4
If you just don’t get something, an endless series of talking heads saying how great it is won’t make it happen. A rapid-fire montage of unrelated birds and bees as a visual background was more distracting than useful–how do you “film” poetry? At least now I know who Mary Oliver was, although I’m no more […]
Late Fame – 7
A sweet short story about a long-forgotten poet working for the Post Office who gets noticed and has a brief moment with a younger generation. The story plays out on Willem DaFoe’s expressively grizzled face and for me was a welcome return to normality from Spiderman. Also welcome was the simpler world these denizens of Greenwich […]
Spiderman/Obsession – 3
In an effort to monitor the zeitgeist, I double-featured two of the year’s hottest-at-the-box-office movies yesterday. Spider-Man: Brand New Day bored me out of the theater one hour into its Odyssey-like length. I couldn’t understand the mumbo-jumbo, the all-too-similar action scenes kept arriving like clockwork, and the love interest lacked mystery. In all, it was cartoon-like. We’ve […]
The Samurai and the Prisoner – 3
Reminiscent of The Odyssey in its length, focus on one man, beautiful cinematography, muddled philosophy and lack of narrative drive, this film does nothing than another Kurosawa didn’t do ten times better sixty years ago. Students of 16th-century Japanese history might appreciate the obscure references, but again like The Odyssey, it was Greek to me. […]