Top Ten 2019

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As I get on in my movie-going career, I find that more and more I want to enjoy myself when I go out to see a film (or, less often, stream one at home).  Yes, it’s good to be intellectually challenged or recognize great craftsmanship, and those qualities are both included in selections below; but if something can make me smile for 90-120 minutes, I’m willing to overlook, say, triviality of subject or, perhaps, lack of originality. So, I offer apologies at the outset to Marriage Story, 1917, Little Women, The Irishman and Parasite, for reasons spelled out in my reviews. They were each, undoubtedly, expertly acted and executed, and perfectly fulfilled a director’s admittedly interesting vision. They didn’t grab me, however, and, for different reasons, left me with questions and complaints, not satisfaction. Some of this may be attributable to the advance notice that each of these Oscar nominees had received before I saw them. In any case, I will not contend that the following list comprises the “ten best” movies of 2019. They are just the ten I would most gladly recommend; the ten I enjoyed the most.

1. The Two Popes.  If the meek are to inherit the earth, the Papacy is a good place to start. This movie had a startlingly current subject, two of the best performances of the year, gorgeous visuals and provocative thoughts on faith, theology, politics, history, culture, humanity and probably more. The scenes of Anthony Hopkins and Jonathan Pryce alone together were, to me, the cinematic highlight of the year.

1A. Never Look Away. (A 2018 release, so not on any lists this year, but not seen in Santa Barbara in time for my 2018 Top Ten.) The best film about an artist I’ve ever seen, plus it’s a searing look at Nazi-era Germany and a charming love story. With six strong performances, the movie kept growing and getting richer over its fly-by three hours.

2. Once Upon A Time…in Hollywood.  An amusement-park ride of a movie, a paean to Hollywood filmdom and a loving recasting of a time and place. There was nothing serious here, but each new scene was its own bonbon, and the mastery of Quentin Tarantino was evident in every shot, every song, every performance. Brad Pitt was never better, and LDC fit in with the fun.

3. First Love.   A Japanese gangster-romance that melded classic samurai-movie types with a love affair of two innocents out of their depth. Nothing here might be original in Japan, but it was refreshing and new in New York and I smiled with delight all the way through.

4. Pain and Glory.  Nothing funny here, but painfully soul-bearing and honest. You had to admire and respect the way that Pedro Almodovar and Antonio Banderas  made art out of a dark view of the director’s life.

5. Transit.  A mystery thriller set in a modern-day Nazi occupation that kept you guessing, thinking and feeling, from the German director Christian Petzold, who has made this list with three films in a row.

6. Long Shot/Late Night. I’m combining two underrated pleasures, based on the commanding performances of Charlize Theron and Emma Thompson and their goofy humor. The Late Night setup was a tad more realistic, but you didn’t have to buy into the stories to enjoy the side characters and the funny one-liners.

7. The Sound of My Voice. A sweet documentary about Linda Ronstadt that so happens to have all my favorite ’70s California rockers playing and reminiscing alongside. What’s wrong with bathing nostalgia in golden haze?

8. Yesterday.  Lightweight, yes, and as improbable as any sci-fi story, but so goodhearted and filled with such fun music (and I’m not a Beatles fan!), that I could just sit back and enjoy Lily James and Kate McKinnon.

 9. Knives Out.  A devilishly tongue-in-cheek whodunit with scores of clues that ultimately hung together, all the while giving the first-rate cast scenery to chew en route to a happy ending.

10. Ford v. Ferrari.  An old-fashioned, conventional Hollywood drama with good guys, bad guys, personal relationships, car races and a bittersweet ending, all actually based on fact. Plus, Christian Bale is fantastic.

Elsewhere, I have handed out my Oscar selections; unusually, I don’t have to go far outside the official nominees to find my favorites. At this point I also like to make special mention of somewhat-acclaimed movies that I couldn’t stand: The Farewell, Booksmart, Judy and Hustlers.

Alphabetical List of 2020 Movies

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An Easy Girl
The Assistant
The Bee Gees: How Can You Mend A Broken Heart
Borat the Subsequent Moviefilm
Boys State
Collective
Dick Johnson Is Dead
Emma
The Fight
First Cow
If You Could Read My Mind
Jimmy Carter, Rock’n’Roll President
John Lewis: Good Trouble
Just Mercy
Les Miserables
Lost Girls
Lovers Rock
Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom
The Mangrove
Mank
My Octopus Teacher
Never Rarely Sometimes Always
Nomadland
Once Were Brothers
The Painter and the Thief
Palm Springs
The Personal History of David Copperfield
Seberg
Social Dilemma
Soul
Sylvie’s Love
Time
The Traitor
The Trial of the Chicago 7
The Truth
Uncut Gems
Yes, God, Yes

 

Uncut Gems – 7.5

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“Intense movie,” said the usher as I, and the two other men in the audience, left the theater. High-stress, high-volume is another way to describe the life of jeweller Howard Ratner, played brilliantly by Adam Sandler – neither hero nor antihero, a gambling addict, basketball fan, unfaithful husband, lousy father whom you don’t exactly root for or against but can’t take your eyes off of. You accept the dramatic license, which packs about six months of traumatic incident into six days, partly because the Safdie brothers weave real-life touches – an Ethiopian mine accident, the Celtics’ NBA finals against the 76ers, a club performance by the Weeknd – so smoothly into the frantic narrative of Howard’s existence. Kevin Garnett and newcomer Keith Williams Richards are memorable in secondary roles. It’s a serious movie with a great performance and fitting ending, but it’s not for everyone.

My Oscar Ballot

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Picture: I still refuse to see Joker, and The Two Popes, my favorite, didn’t make the cut; so for me this is a decision between Ford v. Ferrari and Once Upon A Time…in Hollywood, the two on the list I can say I thoroughly enjoyed. The scope and ambition of the latter was far greater, and if I had to watch one a second time, that would be it.

Director: It follows: Quentin Tarantino. Also, I love what he does with music in his films.

Lead Actor: Far and away the toughest competition, even without seeing Joaquin Phoenix, the expected winner. It would be even tougher if Christian Bale had replaced Leonardo DiCaprio. Antonio Banderas and Adam Driver were superb, but Jonathan Pryce was a revelation in a subtly more difficult role.

Supporting Actor: Anthony Hopkins in a role that should qualify as co-lead, but the same could be said for Brad Pitt and Tom Hanks, with Al Pacino not far behind.

Lead Actress: I haven’t seen Bombshell yet, but I’d almost vote for Charlize Theron based on the un-nominated Long Shot. Harriet (Tubman) must have had charisma that Cynthia Erivo lacked to earn her place in history. Renee Zellweger was an uninspiring performer and rather unlikeable as Judy. I liked Scarlett Johansson better in Marriage Story than in JoJo Rabbit, but the nod goes to Saoirse Ronan, who absolutely carried Little Women on her back.

Supporting Actress: I’ll pass, in the hope that Kathy Bates or Margot Robbie might be better than the three I saw. Laura Dern was fine, but nothing out of her comfort zone. Every time Amy Pugh was on screen I couldn’t wait for her to leave.

For Screenplay I will vote for Knives Out (Original) and The Two Popes (Adapted), a consolation prize since they are the only two not nominated for Best Picture, but also because I found them the most clever. Pain and Glory is certainly a worthy choice for International Film, but Les Miserables blew me away.

I am not qualified to vote on any of the other categories, but I will make my usual observation that there’s no reason that Sound Editing,  Costume Design and the other technical awards should be limited to Best Picture nominees. Maybe those are the only films a sufficient number of Academy members actually see?

The Two Popes – 9

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What an intelligent film! What acting! And how daring – to base a film on the life of a living person, and the Pope, no less! I’m not a Catholic, but the spectacle of cardinals in robes, the scale of the Vatican and Castel Gondolfo, and the power and beauty of Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel were awe-inspiring. The story itself, capturing the doctrinal debate within the Catholic Church, was smoothly laid out and instructive. But all was background for two Oscar-worthy performances: Anthony Hopkins can be a ham, but being God’s right-hand man provides a license for excess. The revelation was Jonathan Pryce, who somehow matched Hopkins with his modesty. The scenes of the two of them in conversation together were absolutely riveting. I could have used less of the Argentine flashback story, but that may be because I was eager to return to the splendor of Rome.

Ford v. Ferrari – 8

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For a welcome change, a red-blooded bromance, mavericks-against-the-establishment, Americans-vs.-Italians action drama, made memorable by the protean Christian Bale’s portrayal of race driver Ken Miles. Matt Damon is solidly good, as he always is, and the rest of the supporting cast is almost as fun to watch. My only quibble – and in such a long movie having only one is remarkable – is that the Ford VP bad guy (Leo Beebe) is wildly overdrawn; but hey, what’s wrong with setting up a villain to root against. That’s what this film provides, in spades: a chance to root.

Little Women – 7

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Not having read the book, I first struggled to identify the four sisters, then I continued to struggle with Greta Gerwig’s constant cutting between “seven years earlier” and the present. Then I had to adjust to the semi-saccharine tone of the girls (with the occasional exception of nasty little sister Amy), the mother, and the neighbors all doing good and constantly playing happily together. All the jumping around certainly kept me on my toes, and Saoirse Ronan is a delight to watch. Timothee Chalamet was as beautiful as ever, although I’m wondering if by now I’ve seen too much of his beauty. And speaking of beauty, the camera shots were a little too beautiful: they distracted my attention from the actors and didn’t seem in keeping with the homespun story. As my (female) companion said, “I liked it, but I didn’t love it.”

Harriet – 5

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Sorry, I know I’m supposed to feel warmhearted about Harriet Tubman’s story, but the movie left me cold. First, the characters were too, pardon the expression, black-and-white. Second, Cynthia Erivo may have looked like Tubman but was neither inspired nor inspiring enough to convince me. The two supposedly rousing speeches she gave, to abolitionists in Massachusetts and Union soldiers, were flat and left me cold. She was presented as a black Joan of Arc, but I never saw it. Third, the escapes with the runaway slaves, however grounded in historic fact, seemed wildly implausible. Harriet may have made it out on her own, through daring, luck and the kindness of strangers, but the film offered no evidence for her repeating the feat with a half-dozen others, old and young, with an armed posse and bloodhounds on their trail. Janelle Monae was excellent, but the rest of the film was bleached of subtlety or shading.

1917 – 5

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Despite theoretically compressing 18 non-stop hours into a two-hour film, the pace was so slow that I kept overanalyzing  the absurd story. Yes, war is senseless, but if 1,200 lives are at stake, can’t you do better than send a total greenhorn and whomever he chooses off on a horrendously challenging rescue mission? And why do they have to crawl over corpses through no-man’s land when there is an armed caravan of Allied troops driving up the road ahead of them? And when our hero meets this caravan, why is he sent off alone on this crucial mission? And what about the planes flying overhead? Can’t they deliver a message? And why are our heroes loath to hurt the Germans when they encounter them? As other critics have noted, we bounce from obstacle to obstacle like a video game, without any effort at characterization; and this movie competes with Harriet for glossing over how the end zone is miraculously reached. Having Colin Firth and Benedict Cumberbatch in the roles of commanding officers only accentuated the inappropriateness of entrusting our two with anything.

Honeyboy – 5

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Enough already of movies about losers, fathers as bullies and situations that make you scream, just leave, for Pete’s sake. If I want to be miserable I can read the New York Times, I don’t need to spend two hours in a movie theater. The film’s structure resembled Pain and Glory, but that may be giving Shia LeBoeuf too much credit by association. It was undoubtedly cathartic for him to make a movie about his tortured childhood, but it didn’t help me any.