Miscellaneous Movie Moments XCV (August 2023)

That's right, it's BARBENHEIMER time. Here are my quick reactions to the…*counts*...twelve films I watched in August.

Haunted Mansion (2023) | Spy Kids | Oppenheimer | Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem | How to Blow Up a Pipeline | Blue Beetle | The Last Voyage of the Demeter | Meg 2: The Trench | Gran Turismo: Based on a True Story | Golda

Miscellaneous Movie Moments XCIII (May & June 2023)

I love summer movie season. I love living ten minutes away from a movie theatre. What a time to be alive!

The Hating Game | Big George Foreman | Love Again | The Green Knight | Five Easy Pieces | Fast X | Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse | You Hurt My Feelings | The Flash | Transformers: Rise of the Beasts | The Little Mermaid (2023) | Elemental | Asteroid City | No Hard Feelings | Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny

Miscellaneous Movie Moments XC (March 2023, Part Two)

Now that Oscar season is over, I felt it was time to go on an action movie spree! Also, my Spring break started. We've got five delightful (to me) films that are nonstop violence, LET'S GO.

Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves | Creed III | 65 | Shazam! Fury of the Gods | John Wick: Chapter 4

Miscellaneous Movie Moments LXXXVIII (January 2023)

The time has come, y'all! OSCAR WATCHING SEASON. I do like January as a movie-watching month--it's a good mix of genre stuff and awards bait stuff, and sometimes those two things even overlap.

Willow | Black Adam | Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery | Top Gun: Maverick | The Banshees of Inisherin | Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio | RRR | Elvis | Fire of Love | All Quiet on the Western Front | Shortcomings | Fancy Dance

Movie Moments LXVIII : Harley Quinn Edition (August 2021)

There's a new DCEU movie, so it seems like an homage to Harley is in order. (I originally reviewed the first Suicide Squad and Birds of Prey in my DCEU marathon.) But I have loved Harley ever since she emerged in Batman: The Animated Series. How much? I legit used "Harlequinade" for analysis in my classes a few years later.

Movie Moments LXIII: Superman Edition (May 2021)

I am neither anti- nor pro-Superman, I should say up front. Some folks think he’s boring and others think he’s a complex depiction of determination and integrity. I’m perfectly fine with the idea that he can be both.

Miscellaneous Movie Moments LIX (March 2021)

Raya and the Last Dragon, 10 March 2021, streamed via Disney+
SOUTHEAST ASIA REPRESENT. Y’all, it’s really hard to describe what it feels like to see a Disney protag that looks like me. (We got close with Moana, as well as Lilo & Stitch, but not quite.) I mean, not just one, but a BUNCH of them. Like, Raya’s hair is what my hair has been for most of my life.

Miscellaneous Movie Moments LIII (December)

Wonder Woman 1984, 25 December 2020, streamed via HBO Max

• Amazon Ninja Warrior looks really cool but, like, how many Amazons are there? I feel like that stadium is WAY too large, given the size of the island and the relative density in the spaces we’ve seen.
• How annoyed would you be if you were one of the women competing against a demi-god? (Tiny athlete actress is ADORABLE, though.)
• Yeah, sure, a jewelry store in a MALL is totally going to have a side business in black market antiquities. That totally checks out. I have zero questions.
• Pedro Pascal is waaaay pleased to use his face for acting, isn’t he?
• Steve really takes well to being in a different body decades in the future, geez. (Did people not miss that poor, possessed guy? Was he weirded out that half of his apartment seemed to be rearranged?

Movie Moments XXIX: June 2020 (DCEU edition)

What I’ve discovered after this run is that these movies are all actually pretty fun if you want to think about character and world-building, but the “plot,” such as it is, generally makes very little sense.

Wonder Woman, 01 June 2020, Blu-ray

• I will forever be grateful that they didn’t cast a milky-pale woman to be Diana, for the record.
• Everything about the Themyscira scenes are perfect. And the costumes! They’re made practical even while they seem skimpy. All those tunics look functional, and there isn’t any point when we’re looking at someone’s body simply for the sake of it. (I would absolutely wear any outfit we see Hippolyta wearing. I’d look ridiculous, probably, but it would be worth it. Those heavy skirts slashed so you can still ride and kick in them? WANT.) Everybody with long hair has it braided back in some way so it doesn’t get in their eyes! Seriously, everybody on that island looks like they could do some serious damage, given the need. And the fight choreography! Ah!

Movie Moments XXII: February 2020

Eighteen for February.

Jojo Rabbit, 02 February 2020, Cinemark Colonel Glenn 18
It’s the feel-good Nazi movie of the year? I really wish #JojoRabbit hadn’t plugged in actual Nazi footage set to wacky music in the intro, because I couldn’t quite settle into enjoying everything else for the rest of the time. But it’s cleverly written, gorgeously dressed, and perfectly acted. In the end, a really sharp satire that I wanted to get lost in more. (If it worked for you, great! It was just never going to work for me.)

The Two Popes, 04 February 2020, streamed via Netflix
I imagine this movie would be incredibly uninteresting to anybody who doesn’t dig thinking about theology and doctrine for a while. But it is so fun if you’re into that! And Pryce and Hopkins are pretty great in their face-offs, and the entire shebang is so multilingual. For me, a delight.

I Lost My Body, 05 February 2020, streamed via Netflix
So this Oscar-nominated animated movie starts with flies and dismembered body parts, so. I don’t know, man. Like, it’s about a severed hand trying to get back to its owner, having flashbacks to its owner’s wistfully traumatic life, but also, it’s a dismembered hand strangling a pigeon in a storm gutter in Paris. It was good, I guess? I just cared nothing about it.

Klaus, 06 February 2020, streamed via Netflix
The animation for this movie reminds me of nothing so much as a cross between The Emperor’s New Groove and a space-age Captain Crunch commercial. It’s a pretty standard Doc Hollywood narrative, though: snooty dude gets sent out to a rural area, tries to churn through work so he can escape, and then ends up healing all the rifts in the community. BUT it’s also a Santa origin story? It’s pretty fun.

For Sama, 07 February 2020, streamed via Amazon Prime
So this movie is about a mother making a film for her newborn daughter as the uprising goes on, largely framed by their work in the last hospital standing in Aleppo. It is...oof. Going straight from playing with a baby to seeing the walls of the hospital collapse from a bomb is just...oof. Dead kids and friends getting bombed; this documentary is 100% of the “the least we can do is bear witness” kind.

Honeyland, 07 February 2020, streamed via Hulu
Well, this movie is gorgeous. I really like that there’s no voiceover--we’re just...watching. I have no idea how the filmmakers made this movie, because seriously, a close-up shot of an elderly woman in a hut by candlelight? How? Anyway, by the end of the film, I was so invested I ended up yelling at the neighbors through my TV.

The Edge of Democracy, 07 February 2020, streamed via Netflix
“I feel our democracy was nothing but a short-lived dream.” Nope, no parallels to what’s going on in America AT ALL, like say the impeachment of a president of a corrupt government, thanks, Brazil for the warning. This was pretty interesting as a history, but the voiceover from the filmmaker sort of robbed it of something, though I’m not sure what.

Oscar Shorts: : Live Action, 08 February 2020, Cinemark Colonel Glenn 18

• Une Souer
• Brotherhood
• The Neighbors’ Window
• Saria
• Nefta Football Club

Four well-crafted films featuring kidnapping, terrorist families, child murder, and drug-running. One well-crafted and heart-warming comedic film about the ups and downs of life. Yup, this seems like a legit set of Oscar shorts.

Oscar Shorts: Animation, 08 February 2020, Cinemark Colonel Glenn 18

• Hair Love
• Dcera (Daughter)
• Sister
• Memorable
• Kitbull

They also included a few “Highly Commended,” which they usually do to fill in some time, for some reason.

• Henrietta Bulkowski
• The Bird and the Whale
• Hors Piste
• Maestro No offense to this one--the animation looked quite good--but I left when this started because I had been in the theatre for four hours and I was done being there.

BUT ALSO. Why are so many animated Oscar shorts about dementia? There are TONS, constantly. There was some fun weird ones, as well--Hair Love is as lovely as everyone says it is, though there’s a weird stutter in the animation midway through--and at least none of these was a leisurely exploration of a narco massacre.

American Factory, 08 February 2020, streamed via Netflix
Car factory student exchange! This was a pretty sweet story if you think about it as making friends from other cultures. It’s a pretty sad story when you think about it as a stark portrayal of decaying American industries. But also, a great watch.

The Cave, 09 February 2020, streamed via Hulu
Not that either of them are unworthy of a nomination, but between this movie, For Sama, and various documentaries, long and short, in the past few years, I feel like we’ve gotten a LOT of films about the Syrian war. They’re always well-done and thought-provoking, but one starts to wonder if those nominating have a bit of an obsession. (There are other humanitarian crises, guys.) It’s also worth noting that both The Cave and For Sama focus on civilian hospitals. The most notable difference in this film, though, is its number of women doctors--I don’t recall seeing any in For Sama. This movie, however, lacks framing, which I think poses a problem for the audience. There’s a lack of specificity that prevents folks from fully grasping the situation.

Before the Flood, 12 February 2020, streamed via Disney+
I showed part of this to one of my classes, as we’re researching climate change. I remain puzzled, however, about the DiCaprio-ness of it.

Harley Quinn: Birds of Prey AKA Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn), 14 February 2020, Riverdale 10 VIP Cinema
How feminist is #HarleyQuinnBirdsofPrey? Mid-fight, Harley gives Canary a frickin' HAIR TIE. This movie is everything a Harley Quinn movie should be: gorgeously choreographed, gratuitously violent, shamelessly cheeky, AND ALSO, not exploitative at all. Like, some of Our Protagonists wear some extremely flattering clothing, but there was not one shot framing anybody’s ass AT ALL. Also, so many brown folks! Montoya, Canary, AND Cassandra! And Helena was delightfully surprisingly awkward, and Chris Messina is blond for some reason, and all the dudes in this movie are TRASH and it’s great.

Last Christmas, 22 February 2020, Blu-ray via Redbox
I am so glad Emilia Clarke has this on her reel now, because it’s a pretty perfect anti-Daenerys. BUT ALSO, Michelle Yeoh has a romantic comedy subplot and I love it. ALSO, Henry Golding can stop being charming and tap-dancey ANY SECOND NOW, okay? Anyway, I am somewhat irritated at how charming this movie is. STOP BEING LOVELY, y'goshdarn romantic comedy. I also dig that the story is about a refugee Croatian family, except...most of these actors aren’t Croatian, are they? (A good slice of my extended family is from the former Yugoslavia, so that aspect felt kind of weird.) But Emilia Clarke and Michelle Yeoh and Henry Golding are really wonderful, so good work, #LastChristmas, you did the thing you meant to do.

The Good Liar, 22 February 2020, DVD via Redbox
There is a certain charm to watching McKellen and Mirren out-act a bit of a potboiler that is somewhat beneath their talents. Also, the plot twists do not hold up at all. Best to ignore them.

Playing with Fire, 23 February 2020, DVD via Redbox
Sometimes you just need something silly. Sometimes that means you’re watching a Nickelodeon nonsense movie about attractive people doing pratfalls to pop music a lot. (And not for nothing, but I watched this entire thing and didn’t get distracted once; I wandered away from The Good Liar several times.)

21 Bridges, 23 February 2020, Blu-ray via Redbox
I remain, and perhaps will always remain, uncomfortable with narratives that glorify he-had-it-coming policing (and I watch a LOT of them, let’s be clear). So this is kind of intriguing, as Boseman’s character is first painted as one of those vigilante cops, but then the circumstances of a robbery, with revelations of police corruption, means that he is ALSO the only cop not trying to kill the perps. There are a few too many complications, but it mostly works.

A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, 29 February 2020, Blu-ray via Redbox
Out of everything else, I was happily rattled that they ensured the show-within-the-movie had the same slightly fuzzled image that I remember from watching when I was a kid. Between Hanks being Hanks, Hanks playing Rogers, and the plot of a cynical journalist slowly understanding how to connect with humans, this movie is a hug filled with sunshine. Also, Matthew Rhys in bunny ears, people.

Movie Moments IV: May & June 2017

Guardians of the Galaxy: Vol. 2, 04 May 2017, 3D at Cinemark 12
It would be impossible for this movie to evoke the same joy that the first did, simply because the first movie was a surprise. This was predictably delightful (and delightfully predictable), but ye gods, the meta ran thick. (And Ben Browder! Doused in gold paint!) And there were so many stingers that I wasn’t sure if I should leave even after the screen went blank and the lights came on. Too many narrative branches! No clear signal of whether they’re Easter eggs or actually relevant to future stories! Giggles with diminishing returns! Guardians has become, it seems, the most Marvelly franchise of the MCU. I’m looking forward to the third.

Wonder Woman, 03 June 2017, Carmike 12 Cinema
I cried four times during this movie: During pretty much the entire introduction of Themyscira, during the first battle scene, during Diana’s entry into the World War I trenches, and at the battle-climax of the movie. I clocked a couple of plot twists almost immediately (this is a superhero movie, after all, and tropes are tropes), but does anyone really watch these movies for plot machinations? I’d argue that any blockbuster-type movie isn’t really built to wow the audience with plot (though, ye gods, I wish that were a goal much of the time), but rather deliver a particular combination of emotional triggers: nostalgia, anticipation, vindication, and catharsis.

This isn’t a perfect movie. The romance with Steve Trevor is, possibly, lent too much weight, and thus Diana is fairly isolated from other human interactions once she enters the realm of humans. The plot twists, as I mentioned before, are way obvious, and the final battle is yet another iteration of Superpowered People Grimace Unconvincingly. And, while I’ll have to rewatch the movie to be sure, there weren't many Amazons clearly of Asian or Latinx descent, let alone humans--and like Captain America's Howling Commandos, this Steve’s band of merry misfits is a similar “gotta catch ‘em all” collection of token ethnicities.

But, Diana.



Diana, Princess of Themyscira, remains tank of my heart. Funnily enough, at the conference I was attending the weekend I watched the movie, I had actually presented on leadership and tanks (link to a PDF)--in some gaming parlances, “tank” means the member of a questing group who leads the way through the battlefield and draws the brunt of enemy attacks so the other members can get by. In the No Man's Land scene, the scene that so many, many folks cried through, that’s exactly what she does. And I’m tearing up right now, just typing about it.

X-Men Apocalypse, 07 June 2017, HBO Now
Three scenes into #XMenApocalypse and I mostly just wanted to watch X2 again. It's not a bad movie--it just feels like nobody but the studio stylists was really invested in the movie’s existence. Also:

• Folk rolling up on Magneto like he isn't always twelve minutes away from contempt for their petty human fears and cruelties.
  
• How can Erik be a Holocaust survivor but also have two children aged approximately ten years apart but also look exactly the same as he did at the beginning of First Class?
  
• Not that I don't dig Psylocke, but she's pretty out of place amongst the merry band of worldbreakers. (Angel is present mostly for iconographic mascot purposes.)
  
• I'm so down with the Wolverine cameo.
  
• We’ve established Magneto can frickin’ shift the planet off its axis, but sure, his contribution to the final battle is throwing some rebar around. Totally effective.
  
• #XMenApocalypse needed so, so much more Storm and Jubilee.

Deadpool, 08 June 2017, HBO Now
That was as vulgar and hilarious as everyone said it was, and yeah, meta and violent. And yet it kind of had actual feelings deep, deep down? Plus, Zamboni.

I would pay cash money for a team-up movie with Deadpool and X-23. Someone make that happen immediately.

The Huntsman: Winter’s War, 10 June 2017, HBO Now
This was fine? I guess? It just had waaay too much going on. Is it a sequel? A prequel? A new fairy tale spun with familiar characters? I legit had no idea what the first act of the movie was trying to accomplish, and that's a problem, even as things slowly started to resolve in the next hour.


Then again, this happened, so.

Haywire, 10 June 2017, Amazon streaming
I am deeply in love with a deep bench of the most attractive (male) actors they could find, all as setting to a movie devoted to shining a spotlight on how immensely powerful Gina Carano is. Ye gods, this woman.

It's not an extraordinary movie, but it's solid and doesn't do any narrative hand-holding. It trusts the audience will follow along. It's an action movie assured in its own confidence, and I dig it.

Galaxy Quest, 12 June 2017, Amazon streaming
Watching #GalaxyQuest for the first time:

1. This bench is DEEP.
2. Wow, I miss #SDCC.
3. Enrico Colantoni is a wonder, isn't he?

Friends with Benefits, 14 June 2017, Amazon streaming
Whoa, remember when Emma Stone and Andy Samberg were not-famous enough to be the opening exes for a movie headlined by Justin Timberlake and Mila Kunis? And flash mobs were exciting instead of annoying AF? The times, they have been changed.

Anyway, this movie is dumb, but I will never be immune to Mila Kunis. And, okay, fine, playing “Pumped Up Kicks” over the credits is pretty stellar punch line deployment. BUT THIS IS THE LAST AFFLUENT WHITE PEOPLE ROMCOM I WATCH, SO HELP ME GOD.

Spectre, 19 June 2017, Amazon Prime
Well, that was a movie that happened, I guess.

Finding Dory, 19 June 2017, Netflix
This movie has more suspenseful sequences than every single spy movie I've watched in a decade. And possibly the full run of Sherlock, I think. Also, two whales breaking out of Monterey Bay Aquarium (because, come on, it is), and nobody noticed? An octopus jacks a truck and nobody loses their frickin’ mind? What a jaded place Pixar World is.

The Girl With All the Gifts, 20 June 2017, Amazon Prime
This is a pretty canny zombie movie. I think it works a little better onscreen than on the page, even. (I famously cannot watch an episode of The Walking Dead without having a precise week of nightmares following.) The slow double-crack of a jaw being realigned pretty successfully conveys the horror without undue splatter.

Legally Blonde, 21 June 2017, Hulu

• I mean, having an understanding of the fashion industry would be good background for going into trademarks and corporate law?
• On one hand, I dig that the message is “don't let folks with their dumb biases constrain you,” but on the other hand, only a rich white person with a ton of support could pivot so extremely in a couple of months, no matter how much they study (but I appreciate the focus on studying)
• Victor Garber offering internships to his top law students, so I guess LB2 is Elle murdering someone and getting away with it.
• Good for Elle, but how hella lucky was she that the stepdaughter had a perm alibi?
• I'm glad the moral of the story is, in part, don't hitch yourself to a complete tool.

Wonder Woman (second viewing), 21 June 2017, Jordan Creek Cinemark 20

1. Still cried all through No Man’s Land
2. That Chris Pine sure can smolder.
3. Aside from the exact 90 seconds of reveal, I think I disagree completely with Thewlis's character work and the direction thereof.
4. I would be so down for The Further Adventures of Diana Prince and Etta Candy.

Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2 (second viewing), 25 June 2017, Regal Riverside Plaza Stadium 16
I should first note that our theatre was one of those fancy ones with reclining seats where you can reserve your spot when you purchase. The seats were plush, but of the wrong proportions for petite me. The experience of approved foot-raising was delightful, though.

As for the movie, the tonal whiplash is especially pronounced when you know when the smash cuts will happen--which, in turn, throws the manipulative music cues into sharp relief. Effective, but I'd rather have had them build Ego’s heel turn more organically. (For a dude millions of years old, he sure did fumble his “come to the dark side” pitch really, really quickly.) Even, yes, if it meant tacking on another twenty minutes. Or, HEY, doing something besides that cheesy as hell “playing catch” scene.

Anyway, knowing what happens to Yondu makes that two-second flashback of Yondu and young Peter a pretty painful gut punch. And the interactions between Nebula and Gamora have a depth I didn't quite catch while Gamora was hoisting a comically-giant piece of artillery onto her shoulder.

Groot: still adorable. Rocket’s arc: still overplayed, but touching nonetheless. Mantis and Drax: still delightful.

Movie Moments II

Twenty movies for this month! Plus the Oscar-nominated Live Action and Animated Short Films, which I’ve treated as two movie-length things. This was...a lot. More than the number of movies I watched in 2016, in fact. I’m really glad I did it, but it was pretty time-consuming. Depending on how things are going next year, I might once again try watching all the Oscar nominees--while there were a couple of clunkers (to my taste), I mostly enjoyed all the movies I saw, even though most of them were outside my viewing wheelhouse.

Hail Caesar! 03 February 2017, DVD via RedBox
I'm fairly certain this movie was written at an after-hours party, post-SAG Awards, when someone passed a hat around and asked everyone to toss in who they’d be in a silent murder mystery set on the Titanic. Also, why doesn't every movie have a dance interlude with Channing Tatum? Also, as a former theatre tech, every little glimpse of crafting was a shot of pure magic into my heart. Also, “would that it were so simple” is a masterpiece.

Jack Reacher: Never Go Back, 04 February 2017, DVD via RedBox
I will just always enjoy a Tom Cruise action movie. I rented this without even knowing Cobie Smulders and Aldis Hodge were co-stars! Had I paid more attention, I totally would have seen this in the theatre. Also, one sequence shows five other actors trying to keep pace with Tom Cruise as he runs, which was both hilarious and delightful. ALSO, they went back, like, four times, so that title was clearly some false advertising.

Kubo and the Two Strings, 05 February 2017, streamed via Amazon
I was wide-eyed with wonder at the first twenty minutes of Kubo, and I cried through the last twenty minutes. It's a gorgeous movie, and a lovely meditation about the power of memory and storytelling. Also, I would watch an entire series about the adventures of Monkey and Beetle.

Suicide Squad, 05 February 2017, Blu-ray via RedBox
“Stay evil, dollface.”
So as far as I can tell, 50% of the budget was music licensing, and the other half was actors' salaries. No money left for script doctoring, I guess? Because, just as I thought with Dawn of Justice, they’ve got a killer cast (Will Smith and Margot Robbie and Viola Davis, y’all, come on), the heft of DC’s story-making history, and a spectacular tech crew. Between those three things, this movie should have been a complete cakewalk with extra cake--good actors and good tech crew mostly can't stop themselves from digging in--but instead we got...this. What the hell is this? Also, they’re sort of ridic to combat metahuman aggression: only Diablo and (arguably) Croc have actual powers, and the rest of them just have a lot of experience in mayhem. Come on, Waller. You can do better.

The Lobster, 06 February 2017, Blu-ray via RedBox
This feels very much like a Wes Anderson version of Animal Farm crossed with a BBC production of Children of Men. It’s quirky, but (intentionally) incredibly disturbing. By the time the third act rolled around, I was ready to declare I was being held hostage by the friggin’ DVD. I ended up cleaning the kitchen and paying my bills during the last forty minutes, and I still want to take a sledgehammer to the cello that WOULD NOT STOP ARGH.

Florence Foster Jenkins, 07 February 2017, Blu-ray via RedBox
So, on one hand, I’m like, hey! A mostly whimsical movie starring three way-beyond-competent actors that can make a meal out of the slightest hint of inner conflict! And in a script that juggles about the tensions of patronage and sycophantry, and the tug between honest critique and not being a dick to folks who are trying their best. On the other hand, seriously, we don’t need to nominate Meryl Streep EVERY year; she could have done this role in her sleep, and for all I can tell, she did.

Sully, 09 February 2017, DVD via RedBox
I mean, it's difficult to dislike a Tom Hanks movie, so this was fine. And the movie does well to harness the heft of the unshakeable goodwill Hanks has garnered over the years. I also really dig the way the movie slingshots around to different viewpoints and times and what-ifs. It's about 23% too showy and 96% too predictable, but I enjoyed the narrative web.

Captain Fantastic, 11 February 2017, DVD via RedBox
NGL, Captain Fantastic is pretty much how I imagine Viggo Mortensen parenting IRL. Early-ish in the movie, one of the teenagers muses on how she feels reading Lolita: sympathetic, appalled, confused. That's sort of how I feel about this really frickin’ weird movie.

The Jungle Book (2016), 12 February 2017, Blu-ray

1. I know nothing about the ecology of South Asia.
2. Opposable thumbs are AWESOME.
3. I was going to say the kid in this is just an okay actor, and then I remembered he’s acting entirely with CGI characters, so I’m upgrading him to very good.
4. They folded in bits from The Lion King, which I think worked out relatively well.
5. “Do you have a language?” And that's possibly the most provocative part of the movie, if we want to be real about things.

20th Century Women, 13 February 2017, Fleur Cinema
This is yet another movie about somewhat affluent white Californians learning how to cope with dissatisfaction, but it actually feels like they’re saying something different, and interesting. The titular triad played by Annette Bening, Greta Gerwig, and Elle Fanning are prickly, luminous, frustrating, and complex. The two male characters (played by Billy Crudup and...a talented young man whose name I don’t remember) are more perplexed than complex at times, but their relationships with the three women beautifully illustrate how gender roles are often constructed in reaction. I struggled with the movie for the first twenty minutes, and then realized halfway through that I loved it. Plus, one conversation around a crowded dining room table is possibly the most transcendent bit of comedy I’ve watched so far this year.

Life, Animated, 14 February 2017, streamed via Amazon Prime
I'm not much of a documentary watcher, really, so I can't comment on this in relation to the genre. That said, the Disney bit is a nice hook--some feel-good marketing made the liberal sprinkling of clips and music possible, despite one guy sheepishly considering “Disney porn” as a way to broach The Talk. And there are a couple of beautiful sequences that illustrate the subject’s own inner world where he’s joined by and protects a number of sidekicks from Disney movies. The examination of a family with a member on the autism spectrum is as touching and verklempting as I imagine it's designed to be.

13th, 15 February 2017, streamed via Netflix
I read The New Jim Crow three years ago, and heard the author, Michelle Alexander, speak a few months after that. So I wasn't shocked by the subject of this documentary, but my anger level was about the same. I hope, this being easily accessible and relatively easy to work through, that more folks will talk about this. Slavery didn't end.

A Man Called Ove, 16 February 2017, streamed via Amazon
For the first bit of this, I thought we were in for a dark comedy of an angry old man learning to let joy into his life again through the insistence of a spikily optimistic young neighbor, and it is, yeah, that (and how wonderful is Parvaneh?), but also about a dude so beholden to lawful good that he can't manage to die. Also, I kind of want to just stare at Ida Engvoll's face forever.

I Am Not Your Negro, 18 February 2017, Fleur Cinema
I Am Not Your Negro is amazingly and painfully good. And heartbreakingly necessary. I’ve read only a small bit of James Baldwin’s work, but I need to make it a priority. The authorial voice is taken from an unfinished book Baldwin began on the assassinations of three of his friends, civil rights icons Medgar Evers, Malcolm X, and Martin Luther King, Jr., but the director folds in some of Baldwin’s speeches and media appearances, and cleverly laces in clips from movies and news media that either demonstrate or highlight the absurdities and incivilities that Baldwin faced, and with which we continue to grapple.

Deepwater Horizon, 19 February 2017, DVD via Netflix
I am embarrassed to admit I didn’t remember how, exactly, this event unfolded. I realized this about twenty minutes in, when the protagonist’s daughter MacGyvered a demonstration of how the ship worked using a shaken can of soda, a metal straw, and globs of honey to hold back what she adorably labeled “the angry dinosaurs. I quickly looked up “Deepwater Horizon blowout” on Wikipedia page, but as I found with Sully, knowing what happened didn’t in any way alleviate the tension of watching the movie. I flinched every time we got an SFX shot of the rumbling beneath the ocean, and winced at every metal clang and ping. For a short time, I felt that having a clear villain in the BP execs was a bit too narratively convenient, but then realized that, yes, there would have been at least one guy who made that final call to proceed without appropriate safety checks. (Two of them, in fact, were indicted for manslaughter, but it seems like that case sort of went away.) This is a solid movie, and well-sold by the slew of solid character actors (and Mark Wahlberg and Gina Rodriguez) who made up the cast.

Moonlight, 20 February 2017, Century 20 at Jordan Creek
Holy crap, this movie is beautiful. Moonlight is just as good as everyone says it is. I constantly marveled at its use of silence and light, and the actors are thrilling with silence, too. I can also see why it's treated like the antithesis of La La Land. Both movies are crafted perfectly, but La La Land highlights its artifice, while Moonlight emphasizes verisimilitude. (Or, if I can be a theatre geek: La La Land is for the proscenium, and Moonlight is in the round.) But I’d give the edge to “Moonlight.”

Manchester by the Sea, 25 February 2017, Century 20 at Jordan Creek
Yet another movie where I cried through the last twenty minutes. I thought this was extraordinary. (And surprisingly funny.) What happens to us after tragedy hits? How are we changed? Because, as one character puts it, our heart will always remain broken. And yeah, maybe sometimes we learn to take moments of small joy, but the pain will still live beside us.

Also, if anyone's interested in seeing pretty humane deconstructions of modern American masculinity, I highly recommend watching Moonlight and Manchester by the Sea back to back.

The Red Turtle, 25 February 2017, Fleur Cinema
This is such a weird and beautiful movie. I have no idea what to say about it. There was no spoken dialogue at all--a couple of times, a character shouted, “Hey,” but most of the vocalizations weren’t verbal. It’s magic realism.

Oscar Short Film Nominees: Live Action, 25 February 2016, Century 20 at Jordan Creek

• Sing: This one is slight and adorable, until it gets really terrifying in an existential way. It’s a beautiful demonstration of young friendship and solidarity.
• Silent Nights: This felt like a full-length movie smushed into 30-odd minutes. I like the way it addresses issues of immigration and racism on multiple levels, all while charming us with a complex love (?) story.
• Timecode: If this isn’t what parking garage attendants don’t do during their quiet time, I will be vastly disappointed.
• Enemies Within: I’m torn on this one. It’s super-topical (a Muslim man of Algerian descent being grilled as he applies for French citizenship), and certainly tense, but it also felt the most like a student project. I can’t decide if it’s the static location, or the simplicity of its message. It’s certain worth watching, though.
• The Woman and the TGV: SO WHIMSICAL. Almost too whimsical, but the focal character was lovely, and I have a soft spot for small Swiss towns, I suppose.

After the live-action films were done (most were about 30 minutes, though Timecode was only about fifteen), a screen for intermission popped up, which is when, I kid you not, every person in the theatre asked aloud, “How long is this supposed to be?”

Oscar Short Film Nominees: Animation, 25 February 2017, Century 20 at Jordan Creek
To bulk up this half of the showing--most of these films were less than ten minutes--they included a handful of not-nominees-but-almost, which was kind of fun.

• Borrowed Time: This was simple, and only seven minutes--an older man, revisiting the spot where his father (?) died, during a breakneck chase. I sort of quibble with the details (would that object still be lying there, unburied by dirt, after decades), but it packed a wallop.
• Pearl: An adorable movie, and fairly short, but the style of animation made me feel like we were just watching an overlong commercial for the latest Apple product.
• Piper: Pixar gonna Pixar.
• Blind Vaysha: I loved the style of this, as it took its cue from the originating folktale and looked like a bunch of woodcuts brought to Van Gogh-style life.
• Asteria: A super-silly showdown between humans and aliens trying to claim a planet for their own. It felt like CGI-enhanced scene from Futurama, honestly.
• The Head Vanishes: I’m kind of surprised this one didn’t earn an Oscar nom--it’s imaginatively framed, and it feels really nonsense, until the last fifteen seconds whiplash you into the role of the "villain": this is what it’s like to have a parent experiencing dementia.
• Once Upon a Line: I dig the Harold-and-the-Purple-Crayoness of this, though I do sort of side-eye the choice to introduce a romantic subplot with the color pink. Basically, the gendered stereotypes used to depict the formation and dissolution of the relationship were kind of annoying, but the film overall was cute and clever.
• Pear Cider and Cigarettes: This was the final film, thirty minutes long, and preceded by TWO warnings that content wasn’t appropriate for children. And nope, it was not at all. Telling the story of a man’s friendship with a reckless buddy whose addictions got the better of him, the film played like noir and leaned into the aesthetic, as well. It was morbidly funny and gloomy, and yeah, women were not people so much as objects, because noir.

Fences, 26 February 2017, Century 20 at Jordan Creek
Fences is the least showy of the Oscar nominees this year, but the audience gasped more during this showing than all the rest combined. Theatre geek that I am, I’ll always have a soft spot for stage written into screen, and I was absolutely impressed with how well it translated. Denzel Washington and Viola Davis won Tonys for their performances in these roles, and they were just as mesmerizing on the screen. (Stage acting requires a very, very different skillset than acting for the camera. Not everybody is able to do both.) I loved the complexity of the ending, where nobody could really articulate the feelings they were experiencing. And oof, that last shot, after the trumpet blared. Killer.

Lion, 26 February 2017, Century 20 at Jordan Creek
I can’t imagine being a parent and watching this movie. I’d go into full-on panic, I think. It starts out so adorably, with Saroo and Guddu--certainly they’re poor and scrambling, but there’s so much joy in their interactions, too. Saroo showing his brother that he can TOTALLY lift stuff? Ugh, my heart. So then, of course, we descend into the first half of the movie in which Saroo escapes multiple horrifying situations because he is surprisingly canny for his age. UGH, MY HEART. The second half, with Dev Patel and Rooney Mara, was less compelling, mostly because “dude uses Google” is not really a riveting tale. Overall, though, this was lovely.