Detour (1945) – Ulmer’s fascinating drama
reeks of poverty, loathing, grievance; with Savage as an outright scary agent
of destruction
Favourites of the Moon
(1984) – Iosseliani’s notable transition to the West, observing humanity’s
densely intertwined freedoms & limitations
The Front Page (1974)
– Wilder’s late remake has old-fashioned expertise all over, but a lot about it
now seems coarse and mechanical
Blancanieves (2012) – Berger’s silent version
of Snow White inevitably evokes The Artist, but generates a fuller (if still
limited) response
Steamboat Bill, Jr. (1928) – must-see
Keaton, especially for its triumphant finale, a gorgeous, graceful communion of
man, chance & destiny
Timbuktu (2014) –
Sissako’s starkly, chillingly beautiful expression of mankind’s
self-destructive tangle of ideology, instinct and fate
Ghost in the Noonday
Sun (1973) – a bumpy voyage through trivial Sellers/Milligan goonery: inspires
a kind of respect at its very existence
Castaway (1986) – not perfect Roeg
material, but an intriguing, fairly complex examination of mythic ambition
yielding to human limits
The End of Summer
(1961) – a fine late Ozu film, somewhat ominously exploring a complex
opposition of self-determination and predestination
Exit through the Gift
Shop (2010) – Banksy’s irresistible light provocation, very nicely embodying
modern art’s perception/value paradoxes
The Middle of the
World (1974) – Tanner’s mesmerizing, intimate but coolly analytical exploration
of a time, a place and a love affair
Gone Girl (2014) – Fincher, for the second
film in a row, applies a golden polish to mostly tedious,
read-into-it-what-you-like melodrama
Les godelureaux (1961) – an early, often
strangely gripping example of Chabrol’s forensic sensibility applied to odd,
even anarchic material
Nothing Lasts Forever (1984) – Schiller’s
odd comedic mashup gets by on threadbare charm, although a bit more substance
wouldn’t have hurt
Madchen in Uniform
(1931) – Sagan’s pioneeringly empathetic drama of female bonding and desire
hardly seems dated, in the ways that matter
Captain America: the Winter Soldier (2014)
– the Russos give it an appealingly no-nonsense, disillusioned quality, but it
only goes so far
Stay as you are (1978)
– content just to be working, Lattuada barely bothers pretending there’s any
more to this than Kinski’s nude scenes
The Invisible Woman
(2013) – Fiennes excels here as both actor and director, highly alert to
emotional and social nuance and complexity
Uncle Yanco (1967) – Varda’s encounter with
an American relative; a concise cinematic kiss to the joys of family,
discovery, eccentricity…
Birdsong (2008) – Serra digs into the human
experience of the Biblical three wise men; not a major film, but one composed
with quiet power
Forbidden Planet
(1956) – still a lovely piece of visual & aural design, but the narrative
is a jarring tussle of the silly & sophisticated
Leviathan (2014) – Zvyagintsev’s film feels overly underlined, but maybe such a bleak
vision of all-encompassing corruption demands no less
Chapter Two (1979) – low-energy Simon
script isn’t very emotionally convincing as presented here, whatever its
real-life underpinnings
The Quince Tree Sun (1992) – Erice’s
detailed study of an artist attains a rare sense of privileged communion
between observer and observed
Queen Kelly (1929) – what remains of von
Stroheim’s abandoned epic is mostly a romantic romp, with delicious darker
streaks (whips! whores!)
Two Days, One Night
(2014) – a Dardenne fable, compassionately dramatizing the hopeless choices and
“freedoms” of the working class now
The Blockhouse (1973)
– Rees’ claustrophobic drama, perhaps aptly, is like taking a long squint at
the murky shapes within a stagnant pool
The Draughtsman’s
Contract (1982) – Greenaway’s breakthrough is almost chilling in its biting
erudition and immense formal intelligence
The Boss (1973) – tightly plotted and
executed Di Leo thriller doesn’t find too many points of spiritual light, on
either side of the law
The Immigrant (2013) – Gray’s fine,
luminous drama explores the profound contradictions of the American “dream”,
its romance and corruption
Dreams (1955) – lesser-known Bergman examination
of life’s poses and delusions has some piercing passages, but is rather limited
as a whole
Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol (2011) –
formidably ingenious at times, but was it worth saving a world of such polished
abstraction?
The Clowns (1970) – engrossing Fellini
semi-documentary celebrates/parallels the clown’s art while drawing out its
unsettling undertones
Oldboy (2013) – most interesting, if at
all, for Lee’s lack of conventional polish, making the film seem removed to the
point of abstraction
Outskirts (1933) – Barnet’s multi-faceted
WW1 drama overflows with such variety and incident, it might take you half the
film to catch up
The Humbling (2014) –
Levinson’s close thematic cousin to Birdman is to me a more steadily
insinuating film, and Pacino is mesmerizing
Playing with Fire (1975) – a lesser but
still almost elementally enveloping Robbe-Grillet oddity, with his work’s
customary pleasures (!)
Snowpiercer (2013) – Bong’s drama, despite
its flourishes, never seems like more than a wackier variation on the same
tired dystopian moves
My Childhood (1972) – Douglas’ classic
short work is painfully, ethically stark, without any sense of contrivance,
pathos or imposed meaning
Mood Indigo (2013) – Gondry in creative
overdrive even by his standards – massively accomplished, and all cringingly
painful to sit through
Too Late Blues (1961) – despite
limitations, the hard-edged behavioral choreography here is at least halfway to
fully-fledged Cassavetes
Chloe (1996) – without the spell of
Karina/Cotillard, Berry’s fallen teenager drama would probably seem merely dull
& sleazily calculating
A Star is Born (1937) – Wellman’s version
is still pretty sharp, but most interesting now as the skeleton for Cukor’s
richer rendition
Gloria (2013) – Lelio’s distinctively
intimate character study is well-observed and satisfying, despite various
points of excessive tidiness
The Out of Towners (1970) – Simon’s
hysterical if not outright reactionary urban chronicle; interesting enough but
hard to really enjoy
I Love Beijing (2001) – it’s highly
interesting, but Ning’s character study doesn’t say much new on modern China,
nor on existential drift
The Three Ages (1923) – not the best
vehicle for Keaton’s sublime inventions - the high-concept structure limits as
much as it liberates
Mur murs (1981) – Varda’s lively, socially
aware study of murals makes the form, despite its impermanence, seem all but
indispensable
The Vampire Lovers (1970) – pretty nimble
narrative keeps shifting and renewing itself (in vampire-like fashion!) to very
enjoyable effect
The Imitation Game (2014) – Tyldum’s
comprehensively undistinguished slab of prestige cinema, a sterile parody of
the film Turing deserves
The Kidnap Syndicate (1975) – fast-moving,
anguished Di Leo thriller, emanating disgust at the decrepitude of
corporate/rich person morality
Tim’s Vermeer (2013) – feels like
Penn/Teller’s persuasive but overly breezy anecdote should be a more important
film than it actually is
The Holy Mountain (1926) – Fanck’s
grandly-visualized paean to physical and moral robustness is often physically
gripping, otherwise turgid
Listen up Philip (2014) – overflowing with
exquisite observations and ideas, but Perry’s ultimate arrival point is a bit
disappointing
5 Dolls for an August Moon (1970) – forget
the plot, just go with Bava’s super-charged fragments of beautiful decadence
and moral emptiness
Into the Woods (2014) – Marshall does a
stronger job with individual songs than with the overall shape and tone; still,
better than nothing
La luxure (1962) –
given the limited driving concept, it’s rather remarkable how much variety and
incident Demy packs into this short work
Inherent Vice (2014) – Anderson sustains
the sense of an intimately textured cinematic refuge against rampant,
exhausting complexity
The Italian Connection (1972) – Di Leo
basically delivers one long pursuit, with all participants heading grimly
toward complete wipe-out
Mr. Turner (2014) – Leigh’s entirely
marvelous, staggeringly detailed exploration of existential vision and its
surrounding infrastructure
Twins of Evil (1971) – Hough keeps this
teeming grabbag of Hammer horror elements moving at a cracking pace, which is
basically good enough
The Free Will (2006) – Glassner’s lengthy,
often disturbing drama is consistently rewarding, despite various points of
artistic coarseness
Angel Face (1952) – Preminger’s very
interesting, genre-transcending drama, built around unusually multi-faceted
characters and desires
Adieu, plancher des vaches! (1999) – at its
best, Iosseliani’s elegantly wry observation evokes a graceful blend of Tati
and late Bunuel
The Reluctant Dragon (1941) – one part
dream factory to one part shameless Disney corporate promo; easy to surrender
to it for 75 minutes
Treasure Island (1985)
– Ruiz’s inventiveness sometimes evokes a malady, but more often a deeply
ethical process of intellectual husbandry
Straight Time (1978) – Grosbard’s character
study/crime drama is always interesting, even as formula moves push out
sociological observation
Glass Lips (2007) – Majewski’s audacious
exploration of family myth, trauma, madness; “difficult,” but at least fitfully
beautiful
The Barkleys of Broadway (1949) –
Astaire/Rogers reunion never transcends a sense of going through the motions,
albeit pretty good ones
El sur (1983) –
Erice’s fascinating jewel of a film - extremely specific as to period, place
and incident, and yet boundless, timeless….
The Man with the Golden Arm (1955) – a
disappointingly straightforward Preminger melodrama in many ways, but its core
is still affecting
Lea (2011) – Rolland’s study of a
student/stripper is often well-observed, but covers familiar ground with ultimately
unenlightening relish
Tess (1979) – in Polanski’s hands, the
world’s wondrous beauty constitutes a cruel denial of the tragic structures and
experiences within it
Life is Sweet (1990) – Leigh may have used
his “laugh and just keep going” template a bit too often, but seldom more
effectively than here
The Hands of Orlac (1924) – Wiene’s
effectively if forcibly creepy drama doesn’t have the broader resonance of the
great horror films
Non-Stop (2014) –
Collet-Serra’s superficially clever (substantively dumb), enjoyably cast action
flick; if nothing else, I’ve seen worse
Caliber 9 (1972) – Di Leo’s crisp,
impactful drama, in a city where the law exists only to be subverted, evokes a
more grounded Melville
The Sheltering Sky (1990) – Bertolucci’s beautiful,
wayward African odyssey almost comes to evoke the refined traveler’s Apocalypse
Now
Pastorali (1975) – Iosseliani’s mild
anecdote is as restrained and quiet as a film could be, which makes it hard not
to drift off from it…
Foxcatcher (2014) – Miller labors glacially
over this unimportant anecdote of the uselessly screwed-up mega-rich, as if it
actually mattered
The Passion of Anna
(1969) – Bergman’s challenging but rewarding reflection, precise yet
mysterious, on the creation of identity and truth
I Origins (2013) – Cahill’s film has a lot
of smart thinking and writing, but doesn’t finally amount to much more than an
ethereal “what if”
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920) – so
many moments and concepts from Wiene’s pioneering nightmare still shudder with
madness and trauma
Regarding Susan Sontag (2014) – more in the
line of popular than critical biography, rendering Sontag’s life into a
tempestuous page-turner
Le bel indifferent
(1957) – Demy’s early filming of Cocteau; effective, but inevitably limited by
the piece’s deliberately severe parameters
Youth without Youth
(2007) – Coppola’s over-deliberate, oppressively intricate weirdo concoction,
lacking cinematic youth to say the least
Santa Claus has Blue
Eyes (1967) – fine early work, both concise and sprawling, by Eustache, one of
cinema’s most tragic curtailed masters
Altman (2014) – Mann’s survey of Altman’s
life and work is a pleasant memory-jogger, but barely engages with the
substance of his films
Baron Blood (1972) –
even for the genre, Bava seems excessively tolerant here of dumb exposition
& arbitrary narrative, between grisly peaks
Fruitvale Station
(2013) – Coogler’s film has an unforced feeling for the strengths & limits
of community, with a powerful cumulative impact
Der Golem, wie er in
die Welt kam (1920) – in a time of rising anti-Semitism, Wegener’s myth remains
a complex, troubling reference point
A Hard Day’s Night (1964) – even with no
Beatles, this would be a smart, wide-ranging Lester satire/temperature taking;
with them, well….
Meantime (1984) – one of the fascinating
Leigh films where the abrasive bleakness pushes past realism, into a kind of
stylistic dance
Le mepris (1963) – a
Godard masterpiece that ceaselessly questions love & cinema, while yet
evoking an imposing, almost timeless certainty
The Drop (2014) – on the whole a minor
variation on extremely well-trodden ground, although Roskam & Hardy give it
a warily watchful quality
Les horizons morts
(1951) – Demy’s strenuous early short shows little hint of his future
greatness; no less interesting for that of course
Out of the Furnace
(2013) – Cooper’s sadly only semi-palatable amalgam of blue collar integrity
and hackneyed, tedious cartoon thuggery
Lived Once a Song-Thrush (1972) –
Iosseliani’s study of a life in constant motion, teeming with beguiling,
somewhat cautionary observation
My Old Lady (2014) – Horovitz doesn’t fully
realize the material’s darker aspects, relying on a lot of rather flat,
sub-Avanti machinations
Winter Light (1962) –
Bergman’s study of utter spiritual isolation, so sparse and withholding that
the priest’s loneliness becomes our own
The Two Faces of January (2014) – Amini’s
Highsmith adaptation is a solidly old-fashioned pleasure, but could use a dose
of malicious glee
The Adventures of Prince Achmed (1926) –
Reineger’s beautifully expressive silhouetted images make much subsequent
animation seem gauche
Dementia 13 (1963) – mainly of interest as
Coppola’s debut, but that aside, a modestly moody and eccentric piece of
concentrated mayhem
Vanishing Waves (2012)
– whatever the intentions, Buozyte doesn’t deliver much more than a Lithuanian
Altered States, and it’s less fun too
Oklahoma Crude (1973) – Kramer’s unpretentious
comedy-drama might go down easier now than some of his more obviously
“important” pictures
Nostalgia (1983) –
Tarkovsky’s Italian film draws heavily on ideas of exile and mispurpose,
ultimately crafting a grand vision of redemption
Moonfleet (1955) –
perhaps unlikely Lang material, but much elevated by his hard-edged, astute
depiction of dark, lusty human motives
Adieu au langage (2014) – Godard’s superbly
disruptive film, deploying 3-D to extend his magnificent lifelong critique of
human conventions
David Holzman’s Diary (1967) – McBride’s
classic experiment seems a bit strained now, but still expresses the elemental
joy & pain of cinema
Paganini (1989) – Kinski’s defiant,
self-directed last film seems dragged up from some narrow corner of his distinctively
turbulent psyche
Black Sunday (1977) – pretty solid,
although of course Frankenheimer emphasizes exposition and set-pieces over
politics and character
Venus in Fur (2013) – Polanski’s astute
film of the play, both an affirmation of creation & an implied confessional
on his own tangled past
Up the Junction (1968)
– Collinson’s breezy chronicle of a rich girl’s working class adventures, kind
of like a starter version of Ken Loach
Philomena (2013) – if
only Coogan had livened things up a bit by goading Dench into the occasional
Michael Caine or Al Pacino impression
Der verlorene (1951) –
Lorre’s fascinatingly anguished post-war story has elements of “M”, but the
madness now has eaten the nation’s soul
Lars and the Real Girl
(2007) – Gillespie brings some finesse to the fable, but it’s still useless
codswallop, nonsensical on every level
Trans-Europ Express
(1967) – Robbe-Grillet loosens the narrative bondage, tightens the sexual kind;
almost seems like light viewing now!
The Monuments Men (2014) – Clooney’s film
could hardly be more ponderous and shallow, making its pontificating on culture
merely eye-rolling
La drolesse (1979) –
Doillon’s very distinctive study of a transgressive relationship, evoking the
broader strangeness of social structures
Poison (1991) – one of
Haynes’ best films, superbly appropriating/blending diverse styles for three
radical, searching character studies
Il sorpasso (1962) – Risi’s largely
captivating study of the joys, limits, tragedies of unrestrained momentum, amazingly
embodied by Gassman
Birdman (2014) – Inarritu’s cleverly
ambiguous extravaganza constantly recalibrates between intimacy & grandeur,
to mostly interesting ends
Duet for Cannibals (1969) – Sontag’s
Swedish film embodies a happy, hyper-engaged era when art cinema was the finest
of causes, and of games
The Cat and the Canary (1927) – a prototype
of the fine Hollywood tradition of presenting silly material with ultimately
pointless panache
Our Beloved Month of
August (2008) - Gomes’ playful, extremely smart film; a banquet that leaves you
happily full and yet eager to eat again
Night Tide (1961) –
far more gripping than a plot summary suggests, reflecting Harrington’s quietly
rigorous attention to mood and character
Les Demoiselles ont eu 25 ans (1993) – for
me anyway, Varda’s commemoration of Demy is one of the lovelier projects in
recent cinema
Beat the Devil (1953)
– an enjoyable off-kilter Huston yarn, even if nothing in it echoes as loudly
as Bogart’s final rueful laughter
The Last of the Unjust
(2013) – yet another towering moral & historical investigation from
Lanzmann, with elements of aging self-reflection
The Terror (1963) – Corman puts an
impressive unity on it despite its ragged nature, but “The Mild Interest” would
still be a truer label…
Happy Together (1997) – an emblematic
example of Wong’s very distinctive (potentially rather repetitive?) cinematic
and emotional geography
Blind Husbands (1919) – less fully realized
than Stroheim’s later films, but with a climax almost as rawly emotional &
elementally physical
Promised Lands (1974) – Sontag’s
interesting, not hugely prophetic film on Israel/Palestine privileges myth and
trauma over specificity
Night Train to Lisbon
(2013) – August’s multi-layered drama is intriguing for about ten minutes, but
soon becomes a slow ride to nowhere
A Place for Lovers (1968) – De Sica’s
turgid tragic-love-affair-against-beautiful-backdrops exercise seldom feels
like anyone was trying
Metropolitan (1990) –
Stillman’s first film instantly defines the Stillmanesque, deftly exploring an
extremely precisely drawn social group
Donkey Skin (1970) - entirely satisfying as
a children’s tale, but Demy also fills it with more complex, even rather
disquieting resonances
Grudge Match (2013) – Segal’s glossily
feeble concept movie, not worth wasting the most lightweight of critical
punches on it
Hands over the City (1963) – Rosi’s
incisive, ever-relevant dissection of how power relentlessly buys & bends
social & political discourse
Flesh + Blood (1985) – the title accurately
evokes the texture of Verhoeven’s melodrama, as if it were built from sheer
visceral appetite
Sunflower (1970) – De Sica’s enjoyably
episodic, old-fashioned wallow in wartime loss and noble suffering, broadly
drawn to say the least
Kill Your Darlings (2013) – Krokidas
largely overcomes the film’s familiar aspects with tightly structured,
emotionally searching direction
The Doll (1919) – Lubitsch’s beautiful
little comedy has a Melies-like happy inventiveness, and a more adult undertone
of sexual anxiety
The Offence (1972) – Lumet’s examination of
a cop at the end of his tether is technically well-executed, but ultimately distinctly
hollow
The Wicked Lady (1983)
– Winner’s instincts are consistently terrible, but at least you can sort of
feel his enjoyment as he indulges them
Le joli mai (1963) – Marker and Lhomme’s
ever-meaningful study of the social and psychic prisons that underlie the grand
Parisian myth
Tabloid (2010) – Morris digs up an
enjoyable old yarn and gives it his usual pizzazz, but it’s hard to pull any
big insight from any of it
Le sabotier du Val de
Loire (1956) – Demy’s beautiful early short study hints at the darker
preoccupations that would underlie his own craft
Dream Lover (1986) – through escalating
visual and thematic complexity, Pakula almost transcends the weaknesses of his
central concept
C’era una volta (1967) – if they gave a
Nobel Prize for cinema, and Rosi won it, this tiresome fable sure as hell
wouldn’t be the reason
Tracks (2013) – Curran
makes the quest interesting enough, but what might peak-period Herzog and a
female Klaus Kinski have unearthed in it?
Mes petites amoureuses
(1974) – Eustache’s film, beneath a deceptively quiet surface, is exemplary in
its navigating of formative memories
At Any Price (2012) – Bahrani’s eventful
farming drama is too broadly drawn to be persuasive, with a disappointing lack
of broader resonance
The House on Trubnaya Square (1928) –
Barnet’s highly lively and varied comedy, one of the most delightful of the
period’s Soviet classics
Old Joy (2006) – Reichardt’s perfectly
observed, very gently ominous vignette of a friendship that’s seemingly inevitably
run its course
Elevator to the Gallows (1958) – Malle’s
classic thriller offsets its brilliantly contrived structure with a vein of
melancholy fatalism
The Counselor (2013) – Scott and McCarthy’s
interminable, head-shaking trash in deep thinker clothing; disgustingly full of
itself
Marriage Italian Style (1964) – De Sica’s
farce is more melancholy & fraught than its reputation may suggest, but not
too demanding about it
School Daze (1988) – an early example of
Lee’s dazzling strategic chaos, laying out faults & tensions beyond any
easy narrative containment
Arsenal (1929) – Dovzhenko’s anguished
symphony of loss and triumph, always galvanizing for its fragments, even when
the whole is evasive
Rush (2013) – Howard’s perfectly-named boys
with toys extravaganza does indeed deliver on its title (good thing it wasn’t
called “Insight”)
Successive Slidings of Pleasure (1974) –
Robbe-Grillet strangifies (but only so far) some reliably disreputable
cinematic pleasures
Loving Memory (1971) – Tony Scott’s peculiar
early study of quiet derangement, painstakingly designed and composed, but of
limited impact
The Trip to Italy (2014) – a beautiful,
funny sequel, making you realize the paucity of mature fun and cultural
engagement in movies now
Les amants (1958) – the film often feels
overly calculated, like much of Malle’s work, but the final rush of passion and
escape is indelible
The Act of Killing (2012) –Oppenheimer’s
moral ambiguity & formal inventions left me mostly cold, and I don’t think
that’s me being limited
Walk on the Wild Side (1962) – Dmytryk’s
mostly ludicrous, overcrowded melodrama doesn’t evidence much actual grasp of
any kind of wild side
The Fourth Man (1983) – Verhoeven’s almost
unhealthily entertaining drama, teeming with lusty, happily scandalous images
and concepts
Who’ll Stop the Rain (1978) – Reisz’s
solidly textured drama draws on the catalogue of post-Vietnam dysfunction,
personal and institutional
Head-On (2004) – Akin’s easily absorbing
high-energy tale ultimately seems like too much momentum and provocation, too
little inner truth
The Pajama Game (1957) – Donen and Abbott’s
gorgeous, varied musical, one of the decade’s best, and a positive portrayal of
union power!
The World of Jacques Demy (1995) – Varda’s
cinematic scrap book is so enthrallingly, lovingly assembled, potential
quibbles hardly matter
Foolish Wives (1922) – the restored version
of Stroheim’s grand dissection of posturing venality, built around his own hypnotic
performance
Vert paradis (2003) – Bourdieu’s somber
drama on the enduring influence of roots and home soil lacks any great defining
energy or character
The Long Goodbye (1973) – one of Altman’s
most perfectly realized films, wittily repositioning the classically abstracted
film noir hero
Renoir (2012) – Bourdos’ dawdling study of
the painter’s declining years is prettily useless, in the way you’ve seen a
thousand times
The Immortal Story (1968) – Welles’
wonderful, haunting miniature of the limits of power, each strange frame
brilliantly suffused with myth
Smash Palace (1981) – marital breakdown
drama connects pretty well, despite some overly heavy writing & directorial
underlining by Donaldson
Ars (1959) – Demy’s eloquent early short
film on priestly devotion, implicitly expressing the director’s own profound
sense of purpose
The Zero Theorem (2013) – Gilliam’s
colourful fantasy is never dull, but doesn’t ultimately yield much revelation
or allegorical weight
Pourquoi Israel (1973) – Lanzmann’s study
of Israel’s complex, imperfect necessity - no less valuable now, much as you
long for an update
The Big Lebowski (1998) – a one of a kind
Coen invention; perhaps amounting to almost nothing, but almost mythically
masterful about it
Le feu follet (1963) – Malle’s painstaking
but forced study of an alcoholic’s final days only elicits a strained, frosty
form of sympathy
Exit Elena (2012) – Silver’s deft, often
cleverly excruciating portrayal of a hemmed-in young woman, a rare film that
feels much too short
The Saga of Gosta Berling (1924) –
Stiller’s long chronicle has many interesting social and gender dynamics; still
somewhat stodgy though
The Best Man Holiday (2013) – no point
resisting, Lee makes a near-perfect, super- aspirational, ideologically
unthreatening modern weepy
Fox and his Friends (1975) – Fassbinder’s
class-sensitive tale of systematic exploitation is somewhat schematic, but
still nastily potent
True Confessions (1981) – Grosbard’s solid
tale has interesting moral shadings, but still feels in the end like a mostly
familiar sermon
Viaggio in Italia (1954) – Rossellini’s
piercingly desolate investigation of marital decay, inner and external
excavation, glimpsed renewal
Thanks for Sharing (2012) – Blumberg’s sex
addiction comedy/drama is best at its darkest, but a lot of it is
unthreateningly soft stroking
Les rendezvous d’Anna (1978) – Akerman’s
hypnotic, highly formal study of the elusiveness of meaning and connection in
(then) modern Europe
The Armstrong Lie (2013) – customarily
smooth documentary off the Gibney assembly line: is the ultimate hollowness a
conclusion or a flaw?
The Oyster Princess (1919) – sumptuously
fleet-footed Lubitsch comedy is delightfully silly, even if its only target is
the uselessly rich
Gospel According to Harry (1994) – highly
artificial Majewski parody of all things American, maybe too clever for its own
good, as they say
Black Moon (1975) – very peculiar adult
fantasy, on a bedrock of strange, primal sexuality, and yep, that really is the
same Louis Malle
Purple Noon (1960) – Clement’s irresistible
if limited Ripley adaptation remains the elegant epitome of tanned, inscrutable
scheming
The Formula (1980) – Avildsen’s
high-concept drama is dull and poorly executed in all respects; watch Pakula’s
masterful Rollover instead
El bruto (1953) – Bunuel is entirely
immersed in the hard-edged human dynamics, powerfully built on pervasive
struggle and social injustice
Night Moves (2013) – despite (possible)
flaws, confirms Reichardt as a major stylistically gripping, thematically
relevant American director
The Salamander (1971) – Tanner’s absorbing,
socially-grounded but playful tale of the capacities and limitations of engaged
storytelling
Deathtrap (1982) – Lumet’s film of the play
is of little specific interest, but you might feel nostalgic for such old-time
Hollywood filler
Fellini Satyricon (1969) – grandly
visualized of course, and not without thematic/political interest, but often a
tough slog nevertheless
In a World…(2013) – for all the fluidity
and intelligence of Bell’s film, it leaves little more impression than a
fleeting voice over
The Wildcat (1921) – weird and often quite
wonderful comedy, not so much an example of the Lubitsch “touch” as of the
Lubitsch happy slap
Boyhood (2014) – the escalatingly graceful
power of Linklater’s core concept more than outweighs some missteps and
over-idealization
Calcutta (1969) – Malle’s footage is barely
less relevant now, defeating all easy platitudes about India, or about our shared
humanity…
The Garden of Earthly Delights (2004) –
Majewski’s very fine study, both intimate and vast, of love and death,
deconstruction and connection
The Pied Piper (1972) – Demy’s fascinating
version of the tale is surprisingly dark and socially pointed, immersed in
ruling-class venality
Stranger by the Lake (2013) – Guiraudie’s
compelling network of desire, both painstakingly detailed and a classic
cinematic abstraction
Period of Adjustment (1962) – Hill makes
Williams’ insecurity-strewn material mostly grating; how much yelling/shrieking
can anyone take…?
Toute une nuit (1982) – Akerman’s often
ravishing string of incidents moves toward something elemental about cinema,
about experience itself
The Chapman Report (1962) – two breezy
Cukor hours of cautiously titillating “racy” material, most revealing (if at
all) in its limitations
Like Father, Like Son (2013) – Kore-eda’s
often schematic & obvious tearjerker, still highly palatable for his
practiced lightness of touch
The Visitor (1979) – epically misbegotten
supernatural mishmash prompts just one key question: what the hell did Huston
& Peckinpah think?
La commune (2000) – a near-magisterial
(apparent) ending to Watkins’ astounding career; who else will even try to
occupy such a place?
Destination Moon (1950) – Pichel and
Heinlein’s now somewhat doddery but still highly worthy uncle to 2001, and to a
myriad of others
Vic + Flo Saw a Bear (2013) – Cote’s
quietly but deeply observant little drama admirably cuts its own path through
the narrative forest
WUSA (1970) – Rosenberg ventures into the
confused heart of America, but rapidly gets weighed down and overwhelmed,
accomplishing little
The German Chainsaw Massacre (1990) –
Schlingensief’s scabrous, semi-interesting expression of the psychic mess
underlying reunification
Scarface (1932) – quintessentially nailed
down by Hawks, with a still astonishingly expressive high-stakes blend of
relish and disgust
The Roe’s Room (1997) – Majewski’s powerful
if sometimes rather stifling spell reclaims mundane domestic space for both
nature and culture
Electra Glide in Blue (1973) – like many a
70’s album cover, Guercio’s grandeur-deluded cop movie is both silly and
quasi-magnificent
They all Lie (2009) – it may indeed be
there’s nothing true in Pineiro’s film, beyond its inexhaustible delight in
invention and interaction
Frenzy (1972) – Hitchcock’s penultimate
movie is colorful & structurally interesting, but ultimately seems mainly
like a nasty artificiality
Contraband (1940) – Powell in semi-Hitchcock
vein, paying due tribute to the war effort while weaving in some stylishly
improbable melodrama
The Attack (2012) – Doueiri’s focus on the
personal enigma doesn’t ultimately serve the wrenching underlying politics
particularly well
Sorcerer (1977) – despite its fine
sequences, not really a Friedkin masterpiece, falling short as both spectacle
and as existential odyssey
Korczak (1990) – Wajda’s tale of heroism in
the ghetto surely miscalculates the balance of light and dark, however noble
its intentions
$ (1971) – Beatty (doing lots of
closing-stretch running) and Hawn serve as happy cogs in Brooks’ well-cranked
if impersonal caper machine
Klown (2010) – a big comedy hit in Denmark
– does this mean it’s a country consumed by deadly sexual and psychic
malaise?...can’t decide…
Lost and Found (1979) – Frank’s weirdly
underdeveloped, bleakly lurching attempt to make a second “Touch of Class”
falls wretchedly short
Almayer’s Folly (2011) – Akerman’s visually
stunning, deeply troubled drama, a meditation on the abidingly hurtful legacy
of colonialism
The Pawnbroker (1965) – Lumet’s often
moving drama retains its power, but its highly-strung manipulations are surely
ethically questionable
Ariel (1988) –
prime example of Kaurismaki’s mesmerizing, socially conscious if not ultimately
that impactful fatalistic low-rent coolness
Semi-Tough (1977) – seems now like a rather
odd grabbag of targets and notions, but Ritchie coaxes it into at least
semi-satisfying shape
I’m So Excited
(2013) – Almodovar’s oddly strenuous artificiality accumulates some minor
resonance as a nutty modern-day melting pot
Camelot (1967) – Logan’s filming of the
second-tier Lerner/Loewe musical doesn’t accomplish much more than a minimally
acceptable record
Zombi 3 (1988) –
poorly executed Walking-Dead-in-the-Philippines effort, bearing Fulci’s name
but with little trace of his earlier signature
Performance (1970) – the core of
Cammell/Roeg’s classic is less striking now, but the accumulation of style and
detail remains mesmerizing
Enemy (2013) – Villeneuve sustains the tone
of his modern-day enigma well, with finely-judged Lynchian touches, but even so
it’s a bit thin
Cries and Whispers (1972) – a masterful,
unsparing peak of Bergman’s mid-period, but less stimulating than many of the
preceding works
Someone to Love (1987) – Jaglom’s rambling
self-extrapolation would wear out its welcome pretty fast, if not for Welles,
and Dave Frishberg!
Phantom (1922) – restored Murnau drama of
human fallibility and pain is emotionally gripping throughout, often stunningly
expressed
Buddy Buddy (1981) – a sad end to Wilder’s
career, trying to disguise its lack of panache and energy with ill-judged bits
of “raciness”
Black Sunday (1960) – briskly assembled but
unremarkable basic material, made semi-classic by Bava’s sleek style and
Steele’s iconic oddness
Still of the Night (1982) – Benton’s icy
threading of Hitchcockian references is interesting enough, in a barren,
academic kind of way
Informe general…(1977) – Portabella’s
teeming information dossier for post-Franco Spain; exhilarated but also
clear-sighted, even anxious
Lee Daniels’ The Butler (2013) –
unsurprisingly, worth little as history, but generally successful as
sentimental evocation & commemoration
Nine Days of One Year (1962) – Romm
dramatizes an intertwined scientific & personal quest; interesting in
theory - in actuality mostly dull
Daniel (1983) – Lumet’s quiet approach to
Doctorow’s gripping material emphasizes chilling loss and incomprehension over
righteous anger
Jonah who will be 25 in the year 2000
(1976) – Tanner’s good-spirited but sharp-eyed portrait of a Europe drowning in
sociological sludge
Escape Plan (2013) – meaningless action
concoction doesn’t even deliver the trivial narrative pleasures one might have
minimally expected
Viridiana (1961) – one of Bunuel’s most
stunning films, an unprecedented, multi-faceted overturning of order, tradition
and virtue
Taste the Blood
of Dracula (1970) – Sasdy turns in an efficiently solid, although seldom very
stylistically striking, entry in the series
On the Road (2012) – easy to watch for
Salles’ handsome image-making and the sheer volume of incident, but leaves
sadly little impression
The Streetwalker (1976) – Borowczyk’s
erotic mystery (of sorts) perhaps maintains its psychological and causal
enigmas a bit too well?
Trail of the Pink Panther (1982) – Edwards’
weird patchwork might have been conceptually intriguing if it wasn’t so shoddy
& self-satisfied
Viva Maria! (1965) – Malle’s ambitious,
would-be rousing comedy is certainly beautiful to look at, but feels strangely
inert to me
Promised Land (2012) – Van Sant in
well-behaved message mode, sticking strictly to drilling pretty wells with
nicely landscaped dirt
Face to Face
(1976) – Bergman’s rather narrowly strained breakdown drama increasingly seems
to be mainly about observing pure performance
The Normal Heart (2014) – Murphy’s
adaptation is largely unremarkable as filmmaking, but still grippingly conveys
Kramer’s powerful anger
Pigsty (1969) – Pasolini’s endlessly
fascinating, biting, one-of-a-kind film bursts with great dialectical power and
creative perversity
Shadow Dancer
(2012) – Marsh’s worried Irish drama becomes increasingly consumed by spycraft
mechanics, shedding much of its interest
A Flame in my
Heart (1987) – Tanner’s gripping study of a passionate woman maneuvers rather
too strenuously toward ambiguous desolation
Rollercoaster (1977) – Goldstone’s
solidly-built drama has no depth, but is satisfying enough in an unshowy
middle-aged kind of way
Post Tenebras
Lux (2012) – Reygadas’ beautifully imagined and visualized fusion of piercing
localized detail and vast, ungraspable mystery
Railroaded! (1947) – Mann’s tight little
film noir is no great shakes, but the thematic and visual play of light and
dark is irresistible
We are the Best! (2013) – Moodysson’s
perfectly judged expression of the (old-fashioned?) virtues of grabbing your
own space & making noise
Kelly’s Heroes (1970) – Hutton’s
logistically impressive but cold-blooded caper feels like it should/could have
been a much richer satire
On the Beat
(1995) – Ning’s intimate, revealing study of a Beijing police precinct sets out
deep wells of personal and ideological fatigue
The Amorous
Misadventures of Casanova (1977) – a sluggish Curtis blithely trashes what’s
left of his image, propped up by rows of breasts
A King in New
York (1957) – Chaplin’s generally dignified late summation, a sometimes
sorrowful catalogue of American excesses and errors
City of Life and
Death (2009) – Lu’s powerful, often harrowing drama of the Nanking horror,
somewhat limited by its narrative calculations
Family Plot
(1976) – notable as Hitchcock’s last, this pleasantly rambling, psychologically
shallow creation isn’t so important otherwise
The Idiots
(1998) – von Trier’s study of therapeutic cleansing (or is it?) is a perfect
receptable for the likewise ambiguous Dogme virtues
Run of the Arrow
(1957) – through a fascinatingly anguished protagonist, Fuller memorably
expresses ongoing American errors and torments
Workingman’s
Death (2005) – Glawogger’s remarkable, charged record of community and
perseverance, more ambiguous than the title may suggest
The Wilby
Conspiracy (1974) – turns out pretty mechanical in Nelson’s hands, only
intermittently providing a meaningful window on apartheid
The Match
Factory Girl (1990) – Kaurismaki’s exactingly composed, compact tale of
suffering, almost has a touch of Bresson at times
The Quiet Man
(1952) – Ford’s grandly romantic dream of Irish community, rich with
intertwining simplifications and complexities
The Hunt (2012)
– Vinterberg’s narrative has an inherent queasy power, but it’s the kind of
film where you always know the dog won’t make it
Alice, Sweet
Alice (1976) – Sole’s quite interesting amalgamation of procedural 70’s
flatness and of visually striking grotesquerie
Rendezvous in
Paris (1995) – wonderful three-part Rohmer illustration of the complexities
& missteps of youthful self-examination & desire
In the Year of
the Pig (1968) – De Antonio’s impeccable dissection of America’s moral
self-destruction in Vietnam still leaves you chilled
Betty Blue
(1986) – Beineix’s three-hour version often feels arbitrary and shallow, but
the sex and nudity work OK as connective glue
So Young So Bad
(1950) – Vorhaus/Ulmer’s ragged, sometimes oddly touching institution drama,
forged from sincere but compromised liberalism
Ida (2013) – in classic art film manner,
Pawlikowski’s human exploration rivetingly evokes post-war Poland’s personal
and political traumas
A Star is Born
(1976) – Pierson’s update is mostly a mess, but somehow shambles its way to an
iconic kind of diverting goofiness
The Magician
(1958) – Bergman’s film ultimately seems like a rather hollow trick, but it’s
enthrallingly odd and intriguing throughout
Under the Skin
(2013) – Glazer creates an instantly classic filmic myth that’s also an
unsettling reflection on acting, being and desire
The Last Wave
(1977) – despite much anthropological interest and Weir’s strong imagery, it
ends up an unpersuasive mythological grab-bag
Many Wars Ago
(1970) – Rosi’s powerful depiction of war as moral wasteland, gripping even if
occupying mostly familiar cinematic territory
What Maisie Knew
(2013) – McGehee/Siegel’s somewhat over-sculptured but still sad, quietly
chilling study of monied parenting uselessness
Hotel des
Ameriques (1981) – certainly recognizable but rather distant early Techine
work, his sensibility perhaps not yet fully channeled
The World’s End
(2013) – Wright’s snappy handling & feeling for personal crisis only makes
it seem more colossally dumb than it already is
Statues
Also Die (1953) – Resnais/Marker eloquently reflect on black art, seeming
overly fascinated though by elements of black otherness
Only Lovers Left
Alive (2013) – Jarmusch’s “vampire movie” is a magnificent reverie on our
zombie-like immersion in a deadening present
Brink of Life
(1958) – a relatively small, sociologically curious Bergman film, with some
strikingly humane moments, and some chilling ones
Valentino (1977)
– Russell feels strangely neutered here, yielding a mostly flat &
unrevealing film, although with some closing poignancy
London (1994) –
Keiller’s multi-layered charting of the city’s eroding identity, very
poignantly prophetic given subsequent developments
Dragnet Girl
(1933) – one feels Ozu moving past the gangster melodramatics, burying into the
story’s universal, deeply melancholy centre
Don Jon (2013) -
Scarlett Johansson gets to be in a dull, mechanical movie; later on, Julianne
Moore scores a relatively somewhat richer one
Evening Land
(1977) – Watkins’ rare, densely-packed Danish work on the destruction of
democracy, single-minded but still as grimly relevant
Blue Ruin (2013)
– Saulnier’s intelligent genre exercise has its distinctive aspects, but not
enough to warrant the general high praise
Adieu Philippine
(1962) – Rozier’s sort-of-love triangle, depicting denial through constant
motion, makes for pleasantly loose viewing
The Tempest
(1979) – Jarman’s fascinating interpretation seems like a displaced meditation
on the artist, alternatively preoccupied & joyous
Adore (2013) –
feels like Fontaine should have gotten much more out of the potentially
transgressive material than just a golden-hued ramble
Ichijo’s Wet
Lust (1972) – Kumashiro’s odd erotic trifle has some fairly interesting
psychology, but probably works better for specialists
Into the Night
(1985) – Landis’ shiny comedy-thriller works as a fable of self-invention
through storytelling, or something like that
The Blue Angel
(1930) – Sternberg’s classic of self-destruction remains entirely riveting, a
collision of artificiality and seedy modernity
August: Osage
County (2013) – I remember a bit more to the play than shouting matches and
tedious revelations, but you can’t tell that here
Private Vices,
Public Virtues (1976) – Jancso’s increasingly interesting study of
self-destructive decadence, a cousin to late Pasolini
That
Championship Season (1982) – being charitable, maybe the movie’s creaky
decrepitude helps seal the sense of a vanishing American male
Nocturne 29
(1968) – Portabella’s experimental film evokes Bunuel, Antonioni and others,
while achieving its own gracefully mysterious unity
The Satanic
Rites of Dracula (1973) – surprisingly effective end to the series, way less
cheesy than its immediate predecessor anyway
Jimmy P (2013) –
Desplechin’s most even-toned film in many ways inverts his usual expansive
methods, creating a fascinating counterpoint
The Italian
Straw Hat (1928) – Clair’s famous but distant farce is now more just
interesting than it is funny or cinematically engaging
The Cannibals
(1970) – Cavani’s beautifully weird provocation, a time capsule from when
images of revolution seemed as necessary as sex
Pacific Rim
(2013) – del Toro’s relentless epic is always powerfully realized, but
disappointingly conventional, juvenile and affectless
Twenty-Four Eyes
(1954) – if not the most complex Japanese film of the period, Kinoshita’s may
at least evoke the most sustained sadness
The Shining
(1980) – Kubrick’s study of (among other things) an overwhelmed man’s obliteration,
a masterpiece of unease & strangeness
Mississippi
Mermaid (1969) – Truffaut travels compellingly from classic, clue-strewn genre
artificiality to bleak, gripping intimacy
Elysium (2013) –
Blonkamp’s tiresomely hypocritical elite-toppling fantasy, with a
conventionally overcooked grabbag of a narrative
Anita (Swedish
Nymphet) (1973) – looks now like a chronicle of how the crappy drab 70s even
screwed up the whole virgin/whore distinction
The Unknown
Known (2013) – Morris’ prettily presented philosophically-tinged sorrow seems a
poor substitute for the anger Rumsfeld deserves
Dr. Mabuse: the
Gambler (1922) – Lang’s extended drama of societal and psychological
manipulation, still amazingly potent and gripping
Women in Love
(1970) – after forty years, Russell’s strongly-articulated film still seems
almost radical in its no-nonsense frankness
The White
Diamond (2004) – Herzog pushes into yet another interesting situation, but this
time doesn’t really hit great thematic heights
Without Pity
(1948) – Lattuada’s hell-on-earth neo-realist drama seems rather too tightly
wound now, blurring the truth of its observations
Terminal Island
(1973) – it’s true! – Rothman’s energetic film remains interesting both as a
feminist statement & a broader progressive one
Daytime Drinking
(2008) – Noh’s bleakly comic anecdote of bad luck aided by over-consumption;
not revelatory, but intriguingly observed
The Great Race
(1965) – Edwards presumably gets the extended triviality the way he wanted it,
but it’s hardly his most enduring mode
Daughter of the
Nile (1987) – Hou’s loss-heavy drama shares elements with many of his other
films, but to a more minor effect than usual
The Laughing
Policeman (1973) – Rosenberg’s solid but not Lumet-level police drama, as
interested in process & wrong turns as in revelations
Jar City (2006)
– whereby Iceland gets the cleverly grotesque drama that every land deserves,
and Kormakur rightly arises to Hollywood
Touch of Evil
(1958) – Welles’ masterpiece is rich with expressions of moral & physical
decay, of the transition to a new politics & culture
5 Broken Cameras
(2011) – deliberately incomplete as analysis or history, but remarkable and
disturbing as personal testimony and witness
Across 110th
Street (1972) – Shear’s busy, often sociologically astute drama, seems to have
been aspiring to multi-faceted grandeur
Prenom Carmen
(1983) – Godard’s beautiful, sexy (if arguably limited) concoction illustrates
the immense adaptive richness of his methods
The Spy who Came
in from the Cold (1965) – Ritt’s desolate drama, properly if strenuously
chilly, and heavy with Burton’s self-disgust
Nymphomaniac,
Vol. 2 (2014) – von Trier pulls back on the giddier inventions of part one,
evolving into occasionally piercing bleakness
The Messiah
(1975) – Rossellini’s evenly controlled, worthy last film emphasizes the
sociological and cultural over the supernatural
The Purge (2013)
– DeMonaco has a reasonably promising pulp premise, but plays it out in
shallow, ideologically unthreatening monotony
Umbracle (1970)
– Portabella’s unique film, at times alluring or ominous or both, taking a
brave step toward a radically reconfigured cinema
The Grand
Budapest Hotel (2014) – one of Anderson’s best, refining his cinematic language
even further, & allowing darker themes & portents
Love Meetings
(1964) – Pasolini’s lively survey of sexual attitudes, in a nation of
repressive conventions and largely unexamined instincts
The Thief who
Came to Dinner (1973) – Yorkin’s undemanding fluff piece still has more adult
contours than a modern-day equivalent would have
Wadjda (2012) –
Al-Mansour’s film is largely conventional in tone & form, still riveting
for what it depicts, & foresees for its protagonist
The Blue
Gardenia (1953) – Lang’s generally atmospheric picture builds effectively, but
is ultimately a bit underdeveloped in most respects
The Consequences
of Love (2004) – Sorrentino impeccably delivers just about the least likely
film one might expect from that title
The Paper Chase
(1973) – Bridges’ briskly amiable, TV-spin-off-ready drama is pretty flimsy,
once you strip off the handsome veneer
Nymphomaniac,
Vol. 1 (2014) – von Trier artfully weaves provocations, positionings and
ambiguities, but little in the film feels really new
Merry Christmas
Mr. Lawrence (1983) – Oshima’s sociologically potent POW film, also a
Bowie-mystique-propelled, ravishing existential enigma
The Eclipse
(1962) – Antonioni’s magnificent journey through the heavy puzzle of
civilization, its interlocking beauty and order and chaos
The East (2013)
– Batmanglij’s infiltration drama feels much like watching Costa-Gavras’
Betrayed again, with a slicker modern sheen
La
collectionneuse (1967) – more academic & stifling than Rohmer’s subsequent
wonderful films, even if that suits the characters & themes
The Spectacular
Now (2013) – Ponsoldt & the actors generate some lovely moments, but the
movie as a whole rather disappointingly peters out
Good News (1979)
– Petri’s scathingly slippery comedy of scorching male inadequacy in a barely
functioning, historically poisoned culture
The Great Gatsby
(2013) – no doubt Luhrmann’s techniques can be justified as creative
strategies, but they’re still mostly boring/annoying
Operation
Thunderbolt (1977) – Golan’s authenticity-hungry Entebbe drama is fast and
straightforward, with all the attaching pros and cons
20 Feet from
Stardom (2013) – not fully developed as cultural history, but a pleasant, fluid
essay on chance and pragmatism
La ronde (1950)
– Ophuls’ beautiful, masterfully sustained artificiality, encompassing
wonderful feeling for human frailty and turbulence
At Berkeley
(2013) – Wiseman’s thoroughly absorbing record of the institution’s wonders,
and the worrying practicalities of maintaining them
The Golden
Thread (1965) – Ghatak’s bleakly powerful chronicle of personal rise &
fall, torn from painful societal upheaval & confusion
This is the End
(2013) – the more the fires burn and the returns diminish, the surer you are
the wrong people got knocked off at the start
Cousin cousine
(1975) – Tacchella’s mostly plain, often forced little comedy at least has some
happy non-conformity at its centre
Red Hook Summer
(2012) – Lee’s most sustained and interesting movie for a while, not least for
its startling sudden change of direction
Z (1969) – the
emblematic Costa-Gavras film, employing somewhat dated techniques, but still
enveloping, provocative and sadly relevant
Dallas Buyers
Club (2013) – if time is limited, skip Vallee’s surface-scratching narrative
and watch How to Survive a Plague instead
Mouchette (1967)
– a young girl’s defeated negotiation with a largely pitiless world; one of
Bresson’s most acute, overwhelming films
Oblivion (2013)
– Kosinski’s sterile “vision” is laughably short of the humanity that it’s
notionally concerned about redeeming
The Spiders
(1919) – early example of Lang’s epic paranoia mode, at this point just hinting
at the visual and thematic glories to come
Trance (2013) –
Boyle’s aggressively incoherent “thriller” only becomes nastier and more
wearying with each jarring forward motion
X, Y and Zee
(1972) – Hutton’s drab direction is actually pretty well suited to Edna
O’Brien’s fraught, emotionally claustrophobic material
From the Life of
the Marionettes (1980) – Bergman, with clinical savagery, shreds one’s optimism
about human structures and possibilities
Dead of Night
(1972) – Clark’s dubious but never-dull horror expression of the psychopathy of
Vietnam, with suitably anguished acting
The Broken
Circle Breakdown (2012) – von Groeningen’s film is contrived but still surprisingly
engrossing, distinctive in joy and pain alike
A Woman under
the Influence (1974) – Cassavetes’ brilliant behavioural dance, on the
wrenching fight between stability and inner truth
The Great Beauty
(2013) – Sorrentino’s teeming depiction of the circus and the void gorgeously
pulls out the stops as you seldom see now
Alice’s
Restaurant (1969) – as it recedes in time, the bleaker aspects of Penn’s film
become more prominent than Guthrie’s mythic wanderings
Close-Up (1990)
– Kiarostami’s reflective classic, humanely alert to how social injustice might
pervert cinematic identification
House by the
River (1950) – second-tier Lang, but with piercing imagery, and a gripping
portrayal of escalating, all-consuming venality
Love is all you
Need (2012) – Bier tones down her frequent structural artificiality, but
replaces it with little more than pretty pictures
Wake in Fright
(1971) – Kotcheff’s memorably traumatic culture clash, all the more
excruciating for being so sociologically convincing
Shark (1969) – a
famously messed-up Fuller movie, but with plenty of interesting pieces, even if
he couldn’t fully punch them into shape
The Past (2013)
– Farhadi’s conventionally well-crafted film suggests he might end up as
(artistically) hemmed in as his characters are
The Baby (1973)
– a strange but not negligible entry in the annals of, uh, unusual female
motivation, executed by Post in poker-faced manner
The
Counterfeiters (2007) – Ruzowitzky’s over-awarded film is engrossing enough,
though drawing on familiar themes and contrasts
Diary of a
Chambermaid (1946) – a fascinating human mess, but less incisive than either
Renoir’s earlier great work or Bunuel’s later remake
Gertrud (1964) –
near-hypnotic for what we increasingly perceive as the brutal emotional
implications beneath Dreyer’s ritualistic surface
Stoker (2013) –
despite Park’s constant virtuosity, mostly the same old wine (and blood) in a
cold-heartedly pretty new bottle
State of Siege
(1972) – as scrupulous and propulsive as all Costa-Gavras’ peak work, but all
seems rather abstract and distant now
Mud (2012) –
Nichols has a lot (too much) going on plot-wise; most interesting when digging
into the worried heart of community & family
Two Men in
Manhattan (1959) – Melville explores a thicket of moral fractures, beneath his
clear pleasure in the scintillating surfaces
Lola (1970) – a
real oddity in Donner’s and Bronson’s filmographies, and a major undisciplined
mess, although seems unlikely they cared
The Place Beyond
the Pines (2012) – smoothly executed, but Cianfrance doesn’t come close to the
epic emotional sweep he seems to aim for
Heart of Glass
(1976) – one of Herzog’s strangest films of the period, allowing us little
choice but to be carried to the edge of the abyss
To the Wonder
(2012) – Malick’s sustained investigation of the connectivity of things,
pushing fascinatingly toward a fresh filmic grammar
M. Hulot’s
Holiday (1953) – most fascinating for the variety of Hulot’s disruptions, the
multiplicity of his challenges to regularity
Her (2013) –
Jonze draws in many of our evolving age’s anxieties & uncertainties, but
it’s a pretty drippy, one-note exploration of them
The House by the
Cemetery (1981) – Fulci traumatically expresses a damaged collective
subconscious (embodied by the “Freudstein” monster!)
Union Square (2011) – Savoca’s strangely
minor ode to family ties seems like a vague starting point for a film rather
than the thing itself
The Slightly
Pregnant Man (1973) – a pleasant satire, maybe because Demy is more interested
in the quirks of community than those of science
Berberian Sound System (2012) –
Strickland’s fascinating cinematic side street, strange and distinctively
unsettling at every turn
The Ruling Class (1972) –
Medak’s satire finds some novel ways to hit at easy targets, although it drags
almost as often as it dazzles
Me
and You (2012) – “small” material no doubt, but hugely enlarged by Bertolucci’s
classic capacity for human and cinematic interrogation
Silk Stockings
(1957) – contains beautiful moments of Charisse and late-period Astaire at
their best, so it’s easy to take the other parts
Reality (2012) –
Garrone’s film delivers some reliable Fellini/De Sica-type diversion, but
doesn’t really muster much of a cultural critique
The Godfather, Part Two (1974) – still a
great example of contemporary myth-making, brilliantly drawing on America’s
intertwined hypocrisies
Oasis (2002) –
Lee sustains a knowingly discomfiting multi-layered challenge to the often
self-serving prevailing ideas of behavioral ethics
The Last Movie
(1971) – Hopper’s cherishably mad, ego-strewn work shudders with love of cinema
even as it dreams of obliterating it
Whores’ Glory (2011) – Glawogger’s
astoundingly comprehensive, achingly humane but unsentimental film breaks
through layers of complacency
Gun Crazy (1950)
– Lewis’ wondrously vivid, cinematically and psychologically compelling
classic, justly valued as one of the genre's best
L’esquive (2003)
– Kechiche’s breakthrough film, highly immersed in its specific subculture,
charming at times, but under no illusions
Chinatown (1974)
– Polanski’s classic is one of the most formally immaculate of modern films,
unforgettable for its fluidity and complexity
Beau travail
(1999) – for all its strange power and complex engagement with masculinity,
surpassed for me by most of Denis’ other films
Enter
the Dragon (1973) – a shame that the price of admission for watching Bruce Lee
had to be all the other turgid sub-Bondian crap
Quartet (2012) –
making a weirdly late directing debut, Hoffman decides it’s enough just to get some
quality old-timers and happily hang out
Solaris (1972) –
Tarkovsky memorably explores the liberation and the turmoil of seeking escape
from personal and bureaucratic heaviness
Spring Breakers
(2012) – Korine’s strangely beautiful, well-sustained dream of varied
turpitude; alive to the raw, malleable hunger of youth
La bataille du rail (1946) –
not hard to feel one’s way into how stirring Clement’s chronicle of
determination must have been at the time
Inside Llewyn Davis (2013) –
one of the Coens’ best-judged films, its unforced narrative of failure laced
with gentle existential mysteries
Nosferatu the Vampyre (1979) –
Herzog’s fine take on the material becomes a poignant meditation on
helplessness and decay
The Company you Keep (2012) –
Redford barely articulates the ongoing relevance of the underground movement,
except in cliched terms
The Creatures (1966) – Varda’s
strange, haunting fantasy of imagination & exploitation; satisfyingly
contrived in classic art-house style
The Wolf of Wall Street (2013)
– Scorsese’s savage picture of ethical & moral vacuums in action; often
astonishing yet also largely familiar
Anatahan (1953) – Sternberg
somehow concentrates a whole world of inner churning and invention into this
strange, highly-controlled tale
White Shadows (1924) –
tempting to say one can feel Hitchcock’s presence in the background of this
busy melodrama, but it would be a stretch
The Cars that ate
Paris (1974) – Weir’s early work is an oddly sensitive, wittily Leone-inflected
parody of community and its excesses
The Angels’ Share (2012) –
after this and Looking for Eric, can feel a lot as if Loach’s socially-wired
passion has become a form of shtick
One Sings, the Other Doesn’t (1977) –
Varda’s gracefully biology-embracing celebration of women makes its political
points lightly
American Hustle (2013) – another Russell
movie that pretty much just goes by in a chaotic blur, with no great shape,
meaning or impact
The Night Porter (1974) –
Caviani’s study of Nazism’s abiding wreckage hardly constitutes the most
significant perspective on the matter
Touch (1997) – unfortunately,
not much of the Schrader touch comes through in this oddly passionless
landscape of lost or incomplete souls
Stroszek (1977) – Herzog’s odd
(of course) chronicle of America’s false promise; sadly meaningful despite its
veins of coarse opportunism
Prisoners (2013) – Villeneuve’s ponderous
film increasingly reveals itself as a grotesque contrivance, utterly lacking in
moral seriousness
Une si jolie petite plage (1949) –
Allegret’s fine, fatalistic drama, distinguished by an astonishing underbelly
of exploitation and disgust
Pretty Maids all in a Row
(1971) – has its peculiar merits, but Vadim could have made the satire much more
biting and politically charged
Memories of Murder (2003) –
Bong’s darkly ambiguity-laden serial killer piece is certainly a superior genre
picture; not really much more
The Conversation (1974) – one
of Coppola’s best observed movies, even if its examination of character and
morality is blunted by contrivance
Comedy of Innocence (2000) –
Ruiz leaves us elegantly disoriented about the truth & meaning of this
peculiar tale, maybe those of all tales
Dracula A.D. 1972
(1972) – given the attempts at "updating' the material, “Dracula A.D.
1972…maaan” might have been the better title
Nebraska (2013) – Payne’s
bleakly flavorful, indelibly acted study of American limitations, ultimately as
much fairy tale as social document
Rider on the Rain (1970) – Clement’s
low-key drama has an appealingly melancholy undercurrent, but doesn’t amount to
much otherwise
Private Benjamin (1980) –
seems pretty thin now, but maybe audiences of the time were just desperate for
any female self-discovery angle
Even Dwarfs Started Small
(1970) – from Herzog’s most astonishingly fertile period, a bizarre but
strangely meaningful vision of revolution
Magic Magic (2013) – Silva’s
quite effective and distinctive appropriation of the “terrorized young woman”
template (well-disguised though)
Xala (1975) – Sembene’s
wonderful tale of corruption & impotence seems to encompass the pains,
needs & rhythms of an entire time & place
Road to Nowhere (2010) –
Hellman’s wildly self-referencing, somewhat over-extended cinematic maze is at least
more compelling than not
Les cousins (1959) – Chabrol’s
early film remains one of his best, ruthlessly laying out the cruel
machinations of class and sex and fate
Eyes of Laura Mars (1978) –
the opening & closing credits remain the most striking parts of Kershner’s
overdone, not very sensible thriller
Days of Being Wild (1990) –
for me, this early Wong film remains one of his best, eerily weaving emotion,
denial, myth, clarity and loss
Loving (1970) – essentially
familiar, overly male-centric material, but within those limits, Kershner does
better than fine by it
US Go Home (1994) – by design
slighter and plainer than most of Denis’ work, but still a lovely study of
young emotions and desires
Demon Seed (1977) – Cammell’s
film is careful and well-imagined in some respects, somewhat goofily, trippily
over-reaching in others
La guerre est finie (1966) –
fully satisfying on every level, and more gravely gripping now than Resnais’
better known earlier work
Twelve Years a Slave (2013) –
always powerful and stimulating, but subject to many (albeit maybe inevitable)
compromises and limitations
Yeelen (1987) – Cisse’s film
stares into a densely mythic past; the absence of Africa’s present & future
is both its strength & limitation
The Entertainer (1960) –
off-stage as on-, too much in Richardson’s melodrama feels over-calculated now,
but the pieces are flavorful
Zardoz (1974) – hard to know
exactly how to react to Boorman’s multi-dimensional oddity; at best, the vision
is arbitrary and sputtering
Sandra (1965) – an unusual
Visconti film; a study of barely buried anguish that’s almost as chilling as
any tale of actual ghosts
Killing them Softly (2012) –
Dominik’s cinematic fluidity only makes the thudding mediocrity of his “big
ideas” all the more insufferable
Hatchet for the Honeymoon
(1970) – Bava’s intense but not quite fully charged, somewhat ragged expression
of the ultimate wedding bell blues
Upstream (1927) – newly
rediscovered Ford film in an atypical setting, narratively a bit thin but
brimming with great zest and affection
The Battle of Chile, Part 3
(1975) – in a brilliant decision, Guzman circles back to tragically illuminate
the underlying human commitment
Bullet to the Head (2013) –
incredibly violent and absurd material, but you can tell there’s a
conscientious old pro like Hill in charge
The Battle of Chile, Part 2 (1975) – Guzman
builds impeccably on Part 1, crafting an unforgettable indictment of
“nationalist” malignancy
42nd Street (1933)
– Bacon keeps it snappy and colourful and business-like until Berkeley’s
nuttily fascinating fantasias take over
The Wicker Man (1973) – still
as gorgeously odd as ever; drawing with eerie flavour on a tangle of myths,
repressions and human weirdness
Blue is the Warmest Color
(2013) – Kechiche’s greatest hits album of pretty lesbianism, kept aloft by
spellbinding observational dexterity
Spider Baby (1968) – is this a
more weirdly touching depiction of familial unity than many more high-minded
films, or am I just losing it..?
The Battle of Chile, Part 1
(1975) – Guzman’s precisely rendered, chillingly relevant essay ought to give
Tea Partiers something to consider
God Bless America (2011) –
Goldthwait’s justly angry opus often spellbinds with its furious eloquence,
although less so with its body count
The House is Black (1963) –
Farrozhzad’s stark record of leprosy sufferers all but dares a purportedly
benevolent God to explain himself
Romantic Comedy (1983) – even
though the generic quality is (presumably) deliberate, the intertwining of art
& life couldn’t be much flatter
I am Cuba (1963) –
Kalaztozov’s classic provocation has such constant virtuosic energy, the film
rather overruns its own analytical capacity
All is Lost (2013) – might
almost be Redford’s fascinating atonement for past vanities, facilitated by
Chandor’s painstaking stripping down
La faute de l’abbe Mouret
(1970) – Franju’s gripping if incompletely realized negotiation between
Catholic guilt and flower child freedom
Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992) –
Coppola ultimately pushes the film toward pure mood, design, encounter, without
much enhancing its relevance
Cairo Station (1958) – Chahine’s heated potboiler
remains surprisingly raw, stark and sexually charged, of great anthropological
interest
Casting By (2012) – Donahue’s
documentary, like so many others, shows little of the distinctive attitude it
purports to explore & celebrate
Lisa and the Devil (1973) –
Bava’s singular mix of old dark house slasher, romantically tinged dream logic,
& Telly Savalas (with lollipop)!
The Paperboy (2012) – Daniels’
valiantly pathetic, expectations-dodging attempt to rule the “so bad it’s good”
category
Black Girl (1966) – Sembene’s
indelibly sensitive case history of colonialism's false promise, an apt
stylistic anomaly in his body of work
Seduced and
Abandoned (2013) – Toback and Baldwin’s highly engaging, though somewhat
ramshackle, things-used-to-be-better ramble
Quadrophenia (1979) – Roddam’s
film is really all about the attitude & the scrapes; doesn’t dig so deep as
a social document, but no matter
Boy (1969) – one of Oshima’s
most bitingly immaculate films, consistently evading all conventional
expectations and interpretations
Sisters (1973) – still as
enveloping a creation as almost any other De Palma, with Hitchcock yielding to
something almost pre-Cronenbergian
Un Coeur en hiver (1992) – for all the
limitations of such icy precision, Sautet does steer his protagonist to a
certain perverse grandeur
That’s Life (1986) –
unfortunately, it’s not clear anything about Edwards’ film actually is life,
outside a purely movieland concept of it
Thomas the Impostor (1965) –
one of Franju’s more austerely strange, multi-faceted works, with some
unsettlingly beautiful images
Captain Phillips (2013) –
Greengrass remains a master low-bullshit orchestrator, although it ends up
mainly another hymn to American might
The Stranger (1967) – Visconti
presents a dutifully handsome transcription of the book, rather than a
productive filmic dialogue with it
A Touch of Class (1973) – Frank’s comedy,
slack as it generally is, remains a productive discussion topic re cinema’s
treatment of women
Sobibor, Oct. 14, 1943, 4 pm (2001) – a
more concentrated illustration of Lanzmann’s methods, narratively gripping but
superbly weighted
Betrayed (1988) – deeply unconvincing
liberal-thrill melodrama, where Costa-Gavras’ energy seems spent on keeping up
with the contrivances
Emak-Bakia (1927) – Man Ray
luxuriates playfully in the possibilities of cinema, ultimately daring us to
surrender to a sensual dream state
Save the Tiger (1973) – still
a solid if over-extended drama; not quite the intended all-encompassing summation
of its challenged times
A Touch of Sin (2013) – Jia’s
provocatively bleak narrative, visual mastery and analytical precision makes
this one of the year’s best films
Quick Change (1990) – given
that Murray co-directed this amiable meander, it’s a bit strange and sad he
kept himself on such a tight leash
King, Queen, Knave (1972) – Skolimowski’s
odd little film, both classical and jitterily modern, sliding between caresses
and knife-twists
Les maudits (1947) – Clement’s
fascinatingly atmospheric dramatization of the perverse, malignant existential
vacuum underlying Nazism
A Boy and his Dog (1975) – very strange,
wayward material, which gets somewhat more striking as a distorted prophecy of
American derangement
The Karski Report (2010) – a
piercing annex to Lanzmann’s core achievement, on the Shoah's challenge to
human capacity to believe & respond
Mean Streets (1973) – Scorsese
likely never equaled this for raw empathetic conviction; much of what followed
is (inevitably?) more mannered
Bastards (2013) -
only for Denis could a film as richly controlled and allusive as this one seem
like a relatively second-level work
Hell Drivers (1957) –
Endfield’s socially-wired drama, with a once in a lifetime cast, is a pioneer
of hurtling heavy-machine momentum
The Wicker Tree (2011) –
Hardy’s late sequel doesn’t add much to the mythology, but has moments of
intriguing (if rather diluted) flavour
The Working Class Goes to Heaven (1971) –
Petri’s scathing analysis of industrialized labour, as a choice between
capitulation and madness
Hitchcock (2012) – even less relevant to
appreciating Hitchcock’s achievements than The Girl was, although somewhat more
goofily enjoyable
Le notte bianchi (1957) –
Visconti crafts a lovely artificiality, but Bresson’s later version of the same
material would be truly remarkable
Gravity (2013) – Cuaron’s
visual achievement is remarkable; in other respects, it’s either less
impressive, or at best harder to assess
A Visitor from the Living
(1999) – a quietly devastating work, as Lanzmann meticulously exposes past
errors and continuing complacency
Dirty Mary Crazy Larry (1974)
– Hough’s no-bullshit, happily nihilistic chase movie; no great shakes, but
pretty smart by today's standards
A Royal Affair (2012) –
Arcel’s stuffy reliance on standard history-film vocabulary only squanders the
material’s political resonance
Bullitt (1968) – Yates’
sparsely matter-of-fact styling holds up pretty well, & McQueen’s
awesomely-controlled iconic presence even more so
Trouble Every Day (2001) –
Denis applies her immense skill and fluidity to material with a unknowably dark
heart, to remarkable effect
Airport ’77 (1977) – Jameson
shows little passion for the dutiful melodrama, but perks up big-time when the
mighty Navy rescue shows up
The Goddess (1934) – Wu’s silent Chinese classic is as fluidly complex
and moving and as indelibly acted as any Hollywood film of the period
Enough Said (2013) – as smoothly insightful as all Holofcener’s work,
but to more minor effect: could have said/shown/explored so much more
Eva (1962) – a fascinating entry in the ‘dangerous woman’ genre, marked
by Losey’s masterfully heightened strangifying of every element
Bay of Blood (1971) – Bava’s vividly enjoyable, gruesome parable on, I
suppose, the unenjoyably gruesome toll of unchecked avarice
Excalibur (1981)
– Boorman just about masterminds the nutty mythological mishmash into a moodily
coherent, earthy vision
Shoah (1985) –
Lanzmann far transcends the limitations of conventional documentary with
mesmerizing, often startling authorial choices
World War Z (2013) – Forster delivers some striking sequences &
jagged storytelling, but it’s been done before with much more sentient kick
Summer with Monika (1953) – the summer idyll aside, as close as Bergman
ever made to a stripped-down, patriarchy-conscious kitchen-sinker
Stand Up Guys (2012) – Stevens’ modern-day Wild Bunch variation
squanders all its potential gravity with endless cheap shots & contrivances
L'etoile de mer (1928) - Man Ray's early expression of the play of
desire, fetishization and denial that fuels so much subsequent cinema
Town & Country (2001) – Beatty’s grievously unfocused return to
Shampoo territory (with creakier bones) misses nearly every opportunity
A River Called Titash (1973) – Ghatak’s film often feels shaped out of
pure pain, its confusions flowing directly from India’s injustices
Passion (2012) – De Palma persuasively creates a sustained state of
waking dream, where nothing carries true weight or earthly consequence
Salon Kitty (1976) – Brass’ exploitation classic is more than just that
– a real high-low hybrid like they truly don’t/can’t make any more
Goldfinger (1964) – rather like perusing an album of isolated iconic
moments, with the reasons for that iconic-ness hard to remember now
Antiviral (2012) – Cronenberg Jr.’s boring, starkly imagined speculation
is all premise, with little in the way of interesting elaboration
Parking (1985) – largely forgotten late Demy illustrates all his
complexities – lovely, transgressive, piercing, banal, often all at once
The Impossible (2012) – the recreation is certainly impressive, but
Bayona has little more in mind, the usual “human spirit” stuff aside
Le retour a la raison (1923) – Man Ray’s short film vividly (and,
briefly, erotically) suggests how montage might encompass all things
This is 40 (2012) – Apatow no doubt effectively conveys the contours of
his own life, but it’s not clear what that does for the rest of us
Cuadecuc vampire (1971) – Portabella’s intriguing repositioning of
familiar material, reflecting on filmmaking’s rituals, its strange beauty
Drinking Buddies
(2013) – higher-end casting gives Swanberg’s movie a finer sheen, but it
doesn't really expand his artistic limits
Kanto Wanderer (1963) – Suzuki navigates to an endpoint of loneliness
and displacement, setting out the stubborn toll of the yakuza code
Ishtar (1987) – May’s famous flop is actually pretty astute and
clear-sighted on several levels, although still not her strongest film
Welcome (2009) – Lioret’s solidly multi-faceted film has lots of
sociological interest, although the romantic fatalism is a mixed blessing
Linda Lovelace for President (1975) – an amiable softcore mess; Linda's
satirical capacity starts off thin & only gets thinner as it goes on
Day for Night
(1973) – among Truffaut’s most enjoyable creations, even if (or because) it
downplays any possibility for directorial vision
Gambit (2012) – surely the plainest, most dispensable movie involving
the Coen Brothers; seldom puts up more than the usual genre stakes
The Night of the Shooting Stars (1982) – an absorbing Taviani testimony,
seemingly true to the texture of history, but quirkily seasoned
The Towering Inferno (1974) – as the 70’s disaster cycle goes, it’s no
Airport; and hard to watch it now without thinking of 9/11 parallels
The Grandmaster (2013) – Wong doesn’t greatly expand his universe here,
but still creates a meditative space of great, beautiful capacity
The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit (1956) – would have been so much richer
and thematically eloquent in the hands of Sirk or Ray or Minnelli
Come Play With Me (1977) – only in a pretty sad time and place could this
weird, titillating hybrid have been the (albeit minor) hit it was
In the House (2012) – Ozon’s fable on personal and artistic ethics and
boundaries is poised and engaging, although without his earlier bite
Only When I Laugh (1981) – Simon’s customarily polished fragments don’t
compensate this time for the lack of overall substance and bite
Death in Venice (1971) – Visconti embodies here what was once perceived
(some places) as cinematic art, but it’s not so galvanizing now
Red Lights (2012) – Cortes seemingly seeks to become progressively dark
and disorienting, but manages only silliness and incoherence
Such a Gorgeous Kid Like Me (1972) – Truffaut pulls off his apparent
ambition of making himself seem aggressively dumber than he really was
Clear History
(2013) – length aside, David doesn’t stray too far here from the Curb Your
Enthusiasm formula, but then, who needs him to?
La fiancee du pirate (1969) – Kaplan’s provocative, mud-throwing sex
comedy is still enjoyably transgressive (in a museum piece kind of way)
Papillon (1973) – Schaffner’s approach is stylistically interesting at
times, but no real reason to watch this over Bresson’s Man Escaped
Feeling Good
(2010) – Etaix’s vision of imposed mediocrity is well-executed as always, but
covers much the same ground as his other work
The Quiller Memorandum (1966) – hardly the genre’s high water mark, but
draws with sparse precision on Cold War-era existential adriftness
Laurence Anyways (2012) – Dolan’s creative instincts, although rich and
generous, are already starting to seem a bit over-stretched
Altered States (1980) – Russell’s fiercely committed Chayefsky//monster
movie melting pot - too crazily compelling to worry about critiquing
Warm Water Under a Red Bridge (2001) – Imamura’s late work, a pleasant,
scenic grabbag of oddities, ultimately seems only vaguely meaningful
Dance, Girl,
Dance (1940) – Arzner’s sociologically penetrating masterpiece; both delicately
executed and thematically tough-minded
The Great Rock ‘n’ Roll Swindle (1980) – Temple’s one of a kind time
capsule, crazy and fascinating and at least as coherent as it needs
Pas sur la bouche
(2003) – the title maladie sums up Resnais’ enchanting musical exploration of
cinematic delight’s proximity to disquiet
Airport (1970) – Seaton's legendary, still quite fascinating hymn to the
American machine that holds its fractured human components together
Bed and Board (1970) – showing Truffaut’s rare gift of making largely
indifferent material unnaturally captivating; often quite funny too
Lovelace (2013) – a flat disappointment,
with dubious narrative strategies, misplaced emphases and little feeling for
emotional complexity
Salvatore Giuliano (1962) – Rosi’s powerful, multi-faceted debut shows
his style, sensibility and forceful clarity already fully formed
The Man with the Iron Fists (2012) – seemed
unlikely that such a collection of elements could turn out so murky and dull,
but there you go
Une femme est une femme (1961) – one of the most joyous films (a
dazzlingly rigorous, political, creative, only-from-Godard joy) of its era
The Canyons (2013) – hardly a train wreck; Schrader’s dead-eyed
execution is depressingly well attuned to the fuck-everything material
Le deuxieme souffle (1966) – Melville’s bleakly spellbinding piece of
cinematic, moral, thematic architecture is among his very best works
Blue Jasmine (2013) – one of Allen’s late career peaks, with the usual
strengths and limitations, but rather more social bite than usual
Ten Days Wonder (1972) – Chabrol’s strange but assured exercise in
unreliable narration, drawing on rich and varied actorly resonances
Safety Not
Guaranteed (2012) – has plenty of low-key, oddball charm, but doesn’t
ultimately amount to a hill of non-metaphysical beans
Stolen Kisses (1968) – hardly Truffaut’s most consequential film, but
warmly illustrating his great capacity for interaction and nuance
American Gigolo (1980) – Schrader’s film is as compelling as ever, as
shimmeringly absurd as America's decadence dictates it must be
The Intouchables (2011) – smoothly/shamelessly deploying some of the
oldest formulae in the book, for some actual laugh-out-loud moments
The Twelve Chairs
(1970) – interesting as a contrast to Brooks’ other work, although in truth he
was probably right to go on by aiming lower
Le capital (2012) – Costa-Gavras’ handsome examination of global finance
is ultimately too simplistic to yield much analytical power
I Love You, Alice B. Toklas! (1968) – like
nibbling forlornly on a mere hash brownie crumb, and wondering where the whole
plate went
The Burglars (1971) – Verneuil’s caper movie is mostly plain and
workmanlike at best, but with some striking extended action set-pieces
Only God Forgives (2013) – Refn’s mostly derided film is increasingly,
troublingly fascinating for its formal embodiment of moral absence
Benjamin ou Les memories d’un puceau (1968) – Deville’s deft anecdote of
hedonistic paradise fades as rapidly as most casual provocations
Blood and Wine (1996) – Rafelson’s unremarkable but pleasingly solid
thriller, with some of Nicholson & (especially) Caine’s best late work
Antoine et Colette (1962) – very pleasant bite-sized piece (half an
hour) of Truffaut-lite, with a nicely ironic but unforced arrival point
Smashed (2012) – Ponsoldt’s well-acted film has many sadly compelling
moments, but perhaps moves too speedily from darkness to redemption
As Long as You’ve Got Your Health (1966) –
Etaix’s mixed-bag anthology is at its best when elegantly skewering
contemporary foolishness
Rumble Fish (1983) – Coppola’s aestheticized style creates an overly
distanced viewing experience, even allowing that’s largely the point
Rebelle (2012) – Nguyen’s film is inevitably interesting, but dissipates
its power and evocative force with trite storytelling decisions
Point Blank (1967) – still as tightly plotted & allusive as any
thriller you can think of; Marvin pushes abstracted acting into a new realm
The Players (2012) – variable but mostly weak sex-themed comedy
anthology provides ample time to muse on the oddity of Jean Dujardin’s Oscar
Badlands (1973) – if only the wonderfully allusive but grounded,
character-attuned Malick had persisted for more than, well, one movie
Oslo, August 31st (2011) – Trier’s aesthetic calculations rather
undermine the central devastation, for an oddly indifferent overall effect
Two Weeks in Another Town (1962) – Minnelli's expertly piercing account
of exile and displacement, straddling the exotic and the downbeat
Vous n’avez encore rien vu (2012) – Resnais’ remarkable reflection on
the inexhaustible glory of artistic creation shows him undiminished
Wild at Heart (1990) – kinetic and diverting, but among the more
dispensable of Lynch’s major works, carrying something of a grabbag quality
Rendezvous at Bray (1971) – Delvaux’s immaculately-crafted period
miniature, both painstakingly specific and emblematically enigmatic
Juno (2007) –
Reitman maintains the film’s mega-distinctive tone very well, but it’s more
technically than emotionally engaging
Happy Anniversary (1962) – Etaix/Carriere’s perfectly executed
Oscar-winning short, a close cousin to Tati’s observer of modern problems
The Bling Ring (2013) – Coppola is mining a narrow vein of material
lately, but it's a meaningful commentary on degraded values and morality
Le combat dans l’ile (1962) – Cavalier’s strangely structured but
compelling thriller travels from political turbulence to romantic idealism
Killer Joe (2011) – beneath pretty much everyone involved, but at least
they follow the golden rule: in for a penny, in for a pound
The Bear and the Doll (1970) – Deville’s rather stretched comedy works
pretty well in showcasing Bardot’s beautiful pain in the ass quality
Sinister (2012) – Derrickson’s nastily inventive silliness might evoke
various adjectives but strangely, “sinister” isn’t really one of them
French Cancan (1955) – Renoir’s matchless, tireless whirl of dance and
colour and of the joy (and sometimes the cost) of the creative life
Frances Ha (2013) – by far Baumbach’s most wonderful film, marked by
enchanting shifts, repositionings, heartbreaks and Gerwigian delights
The Ceremony (1971) – straining what can be absorbed on a first viewing,
Oshima’s darkly handsome film is rigid with contempt and disgust
There Will Be Blood (2007) - Anderson takes classic raw materials, lays
them like blood-spattered implements to bake under a murderous sun
The Suitor (1962) – wonderfully conceived, controlled and nuanced, but
it’s still remarkable how rapidly Etaix would evolve from this start
People will Talk (1951) – a strange, unique, discursive movie, maybe the
best evidence for Mankiewicz as a really distinctive director
Polisse (2011) – Maiwenn’s police drama is most piercing in its feeling
for the children; otherwise often problematic (not unprodictively)
Another Woman (1988) – Allen’s meticulous but not particularly inspired
box of regret doesn’t give Rowlands much space to unleash her power
Alexandra (2007) – one of Sokurov’s more easily accessible films, on the
tough-minded persistence of human connection amid imposed bleakness
The Stranger (1946) – minor but with much interest, in particular when
Welles’ sensibility emerges in the cracks in the polished surface
Raavanan (2010) – Ratnam keeps it revved up, but the persistent dramatic
& emotional over-emphasis is wearying unless it’s really your thing
Separate Tables (1958) - the tables surely seemed creaky even at
the time, let alone now, despite the variable star power dining at them
Rupture (1961) – Etaix/Carriere’s funny, mordantly-subtexted debut short
film is deftly handled, although evidently a set of training wheels
Starting Out in the Evening (2008) - Wagner's subtly crafted study is
most uncommonly satisfying for such a knowingly "small" film
The Mattei Affair (1972) – one of Rosi’s most provocative, jam-packed
investigations; a key film in cinema’s consideration of corporatism
Before Midnight (2013) - more hampered by contrivance &
over-compression than its predecessors, even if dissatisfaction is part of the
point
L’insoumis (1965) – Cavalier tersely takes Delon, in a classic fraught
role, from political specificity to an existential vanishing point
Becket (1964) – powerful in a mainstream “great drama” kind of
tradition; it’s often a joy to the ear, maybe not as much to the other senses
Three Times (2005) – Hou’s wonderfully poised, culturally specific
trilogy about the abiding fragility and unreliability of human connection
The Arrangement (1969) – for all Kazan’s fascinating, raw neediness and
experimentation, often seems naïve and forced next to his best work
Therese Desqueyroux (1962) – Franju’s masterly grasp of the complex
constraints operating on Therese makes this perhaps his strongest film
Stories we tell (2012) – Polley’s family excavation is interesting
enough, but the intimations of greater significance are mostly a stretch
There’s Always Tomorrow (1956) – Sirk’s starkly melancholy, typically
visually eloquent slice of Eisenhower-era loneliness and compromise
Land of Milk and Honey (1971) – Etaix's mixed-bag documentary
experiment, rather prophetic re Europe’s failure to reflect its aspirations
The Dark Knight Rises (2012) – Nolan’s would-be “vision” is ultimately a
mere grab-bag, puffed up with trivial patches of topical reference
Elle a passé tant d’heures sous les sunlights (1985) – Garrel’s
difficult, unpandering, but rewarding reflection on memory & representation
Mulholland Drive (2001) – one of Lynch’s most astoundingly charged
films, nothing short of masterly in its layerings and repositionings
The Cranes are Flying (1957) – Kalatozov’s classic; too sculptured to be
fashionable now, but still a moving chronicle of war’s dislocation
Behind the Candelabra (2013) – for lack of a better term, would be more
historically and psychologically piercing if it were, well, gayer
Monsieur Ripois (1954) – Clement’s tale of a Frenchman working through
London women; much more unpredictable than that summary suggests
The Invisible War (2012) – Dick’s important, efficient and highly
informative briefing document, on yet another sleazy institutional outrage
Le grand amour (1969) – just about perfectly paced, conceived and
executed Etaix comedy, with a darker subtext about stifling of the spirit
Your Sister’s Sister (2011) – Shelton’s pleasantly crafted slice of
emotional messiness, ultimately more aspirational than observational
Good Morning (1959) – one of Ozu’s lighter, more minor films overall,
but still full of piercing insights, and glimpses of darker currents
The Outfit (1973) – Flynn’s lean-and-mean, no-nonsense action movie;
their move against the system becomes an unforced existential quest
The Raid: Redemption (2011) – Evans executes the violent physicality
with such detail and commitment, it becomes almost revelatory at times
They Live by Night (1949) – Ray’s achingly beautifully-crafted, socially
conscious debut, with its wonderfully tender central performances
Something in the Air (2012) – Assayas’ romantic but thrillingly rigorous
recreation of a time and place rich in possibility and engagement
The Osterman Weekend (1983) – the paranoid rot goes deep in Peckinpah’s
intriguing, deeply disenchanted but overly mechanical thriller
Happy New Year (1973) – Lelouch demonstrates an enjoyably varied palate
here, making this an unusually well-rounded, reflective caper flick
The Loneliest Planet (2011) – no doubt “slow cinema,” but superbly
well-handled by Loktev and the actors, around a brilliant central concept
Marat/Sade (1967) – Brook’s film of his unique stage production;
valuable for sure, but in truth hard to imagine watching it more than once
Trishna (2011) – pictorial quality aside, Winterbottom’s transition of
Tess to contemporary India is a bit flat & politically under-charged
Thief (1981) – Mann’s early film, a fully achieved, shimmering vision of
isolation, is already more than halfway to his highpoint of Heat
Yoyo (1965) – Etaix’s one-of-a-kind comedy reinvents and renews itself
so often you lose count, but keeps you oddly, happily transfixed
The We and the I (2012) – Gondry’s workshop piece is interesting enough,
“life-affirming” and somewhat horrifying in roughly equal measure
Landru (1963) – one of Chabrol’s more cluttered, if not overwhelmed,
films, but crammed with stylistic, political and thematic interest
Mighty Aphrodite (1995) – one of post-peak Allen’s funniest films;
fanciful and hardly relevant to anything, but well-controlled and -played
Pleins feux sur l’assassin (1961) – far from Franju’s strongest film;
even a master can lapse into little more than moving pieces around
Prometheus (2012) – at least halfway to an intriguing thematic &
mythic mix, but Scott’s instincts are too earthbound to cover the last half
Quadrille (1938) – Guitry extracts quite surprising mileage from his
narrow situation, though some might just view it as a one-note talkfest
Room 237 (2012) – Ascher enjoyably & affectionately indulges the
benign follies and occasional breakthroughs of cinematic preoccupation
Beyond the Clouds (1995) – Antonioni’s ravishing late reflection on
creation, possibility, the inexhaustible mysteries of human structures
The Central Park Five (2012) – a well-made but conventional operation,
on material which needed to feel like a furious untreated wound
A Man and a Woman (1966) – thin stuff, which in Lelouch’s hands actually
does come to seem iconic (is “iconic” always a compliment though?)
Hope Springs (2012) – Streep & especially Jones give real, often
moving performances, which the film as a whole only intermittently deserves
Underworld Beauty
(1958) – pretty damn entertaining, powered by its relentless narrative and by
any number of striking Suzuki “touches”
Premium Rush (2012) – Koepp’s bicycle courier thriller pretty much only
does the one thing, but does it with a lot of imagination and zip
The Railroad Man (1956) – Germi’s family drama ultimately seems largely conventional
next to the strongest work of his contemporaries
Lawless (2012) –
given Hillcoat’s and Cave’s participation, an inexplicably flat, unatmospheric
and uninvolving viewing experience
The Tree, the Mayor and the Mediatheque (1993) – maybe Rohmer’s
reflection on the burden of empathetically grasping an issue's complexity?
Total Recall (2012) – Wiseman's visually and narratively cluttered,
massively undistinguished, boring (and instantly recall-defying) remake
Socrates (1971) – Rossellini’s patient, precise examination constitutes
an eternally relevant reference point for our own deranged culture
The Queen of Versailles (2011) – has its scraps of relevance and
insight, but for the most part a somewhat random, grotesque spectacle
Les bonnes femmes (1960) – one of Chabrol’s most disquieting films, for
its unforced observation and its astute, escalating sense of threat
Pariah (2011) – Rees’ film has a largely conventional frame, but with
much that feels new, earning its ultimate sense of the light coming in
The Murderer
Lives at Number 21 (1942) – a witty and literate early expression of Clouzot’s
layered sense of scheming and malignity
Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take 2 ½ (2005) – an old man’s indulgence,
pleasantly playful and wide-eyed, even if with minimal ultimate impact
Touch of Death (1988) – creaky and fatigued next to Fulci’s greatest
works, but still enjoyable for its grimly stunned sense of black comedy
Dark Horse (2011) – Solondz’ worldview remains limited, but the movie
captures something poignant about the mental toll of being ordinary
Le quai des brumes (1938) - the sense of predestination limits Carne’s
film as a human exploration, but it remains a pristine, charged dream
Phil Spector (2013) – Mamet’s expectation-confounding, only sporadically
satisfying conception of the story as a darkly meditative “fable”
India: Matri Bhumi (1959) – Rossellini’s fictionalized documentary,
extraordinarily poised between wonder & informed, premonitionary sadness
Blue Velvet (1986) – Lynch’s spellbinding, eternally rewarding
meditation on the trauma and disquiet within the collective American psyche
Before I Forget (2007) – Nolot’s fine autobiographical reverie,
excavating his very specific subculture in unsentimental, surprising detail
The China Syndrome
(1979) – pushes familiar buttons of liberal indignation, but 34 years later,
they're still such damn pushable buttons
This Must be the Place (2011) – Sorrentino’s distinctly, beautifully
unprecedented cultural, geographical, historical, tonal, moral fusion
Blonde Venus (1932) – Sternberg puts through Dietrich through a
breathless odyssey of submission, defiance, degradation, transcendence…
Like someone in love (2012) – Kiarostami’s luminous, endlessly
compelling creation, far less problematically “enigmatic” than some have it
The Deer Hunter (1978) – Cimino’s messily powerful, flawed grapple with
American community and incoherence remains as fascinating as ever
Les femmes (1969) – a dawdling, gauzy time capsule, not without
interest, but unimaginative in its use of Bardot and in its sexual politics
Neil Young
Journeys (2011) – Demme’s sideline in making moderately adorned Neil Young
concert flicks beats stamp-collecting, as hobbies go
The Machine that Kills Bad People (1952) – Rossellini’s oddball fantasy
appeals for its deep grounding in real people and real injustices
Breathless (1983) – McBride never puts together a meaningful critique of
Gere’s character, and never draws productively on his kineticism
360 (2011) – Meirelles’ glacial deployment of the La Ronde structure
isn't much of a gateway into character, meaning or globalization
The Big Sleep (1946) – Hawks’ classic investigation: famously confusing
as detective story; utterly coherent in mood, attitude and character
Beyond the Hills (2012) – Mongiu’s painstaking attention to physical,
psychological and social detail yields a riveting, provocative work
Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me (1992) –
Lynch compellingly (and weirdly, naturally) illuminates the darkness at the TV
series’ tragic core
Culloden (1964) – Watkins’ debut is still savagely astonishing, laying
out with painful vividness the human cost of imperial calculations
Post Mortem (2010) – Larrain’s creepily troubling illustration of how
national atrocities perversely enable and spawn individual actions
Heaven’s Gate (1980) – the sad saga of
Cimino’s fine film grimly resonates against its rich examination of America’s
beautiful corruption
Bestiaire (2012) – Cote’s essay on watching animals is inherently
interesting, even if the ethical space it occupies is largely familiar
The Wiz (1978) – at least Lumet makes it more fluent and coherent than
the same era’s Sgt. Pepper musical; I know, faintest praise ever…
Ginger & Rosa (2012) – Potter gracefully and satisfyingly explores
the interplay in charged times of radicalization and biological destiny
Fear (1954) – intriguing if largely conventional psychological thriller,
made more disquieting by Rossellini’s observational exactitude
The Amazing Spider-Man (2012) – Webb’s version is pleasant & resists
being utterly deluged by digital artificiality, so I guess that’s fine
The War Game (1965) – Watkins’ indelible evocation of a nuclear attack
on Britain almost seems more real than the reality we lived through
The Whole Family Works (1939) – Naruse’s sad, ultimately at best only
conditionally optimistic tale of youth hemmed in by economic hardship
Life of Pi (2012) – Lee paints the prettiest of pictures, but the
"story that’ll make you believe in God" stuff makes you roll your
eyes
The Serpent’s Egg (1977) – unusual Bergman film – its disquieting
preoccupation with loss of self acquires a new kind of resonance with time
Searching for Sugar Man (2012) – pleasant little anecdote from the
margins of fame; hardly amounts to the year’s best documentary though
Germany Year Zero (1948) – chillingly gripping, illustrating how
Rossellini’s neo-realism enhanced rather than rejected narrative models
Pennies from Heaven (1981) – Ross squanders Potter’s incredible source
material with bland, unatmospheric handling and mostly poor casting
Les temoins (2007) – one of Techine’s most eloquent recent reveries, so
poised that it’s easy to undervalue its complexity and breadth
Naked (1993) – a film of often dazzling, unsettlingly well-executed
passages & concepts, even if not Leigh’s most perfectly conceived whole
The Fortune Cookie (1966) – expertly paced & structured (if
disenchanted) Wilder comedy, with Matthau in peak form; couldn’t go down easier
Bullhead (2011) – the crime drama elements gradually recede, to reveal a
rather unique study in masculinity and its turbulent sense of self
The Godfather (1972) – like a pilgrimage to the well from which all our
subsequent ideas about powerful American adult storytelling flow
No (2012) – very skillful and engrossing, maybe too much so, as it
slides away afterwards much faster than Larrain’s preceding two films
Caravaggio (1986) – Jarman’s deeply personal approach to the artist,
crafting an aesthetically complex, emotionally dense filmic space
Suspicion (1941) – Hitchcock’s seductive, flawed film is perhaps most
compelling for Grant’s fascinatingly, darkly ambiguous performance
Headhunters (2011) – a Norwegian entry in the global fight for supremacy
in high-concept plotting – good fun, if limited otherwise
Beyond Therapy (1987) – the mismatch in Altman & Durang’s
sensibilities increasingly yields something rather productively strange &
lovely
Vincere (2009) – Bellocchio’s accomplished, visually muscular meditation
on Fascism’s bizarre, distorting detritus and its cruel human cost
The Driver (1978) – Hill’s eternally fascinating genre distillation, a
stylistic universe away from the tiresome excesses of such films now
The Gleaners and I: Two Years Later (2002) – stretching Varda’s gleaning
metaphor to the limit, but hey, by now she can do what she likes!
Black Caesar (1973) – a great Cohen genre picture, with a smart,
committed blend of strut and despair, and that startling, charged climax
Poppy (1935) – a finely realized, melancholy-tinged reflection on doing
the “right” thing, if a little below Mizoguchi's greatest work
Wittgenstein (1993) – despite the film’s brevity and limitations, Jarman
conveys both the torture and bliss of Wittgenstein’s life and work
2 Days in New York (2012) – compared to say Friends with Kids, Delpy at
least generates some engaging silliness (Rock, Gallo, wacky French)
Santa Sangre (1989) – Jodorowsky gloriously sustains his intricate vision,
you willingly surrender…but then at the end it means so little
Mea Maxima Culpa (2011) – Gibney tells the story chillingly well, but
the sick rationalizations at its heart remain beyond comprehension
Zvenigora (1928) – despite Dovzhenko’s forceful expressive power, a bit
taxing to succumb to across this span of time, distance and ideology
Nobody Walks (2012) – mostly successful study of a young woman’s
complicated impact, even if its preoccupations are ultimately rather narrow
Diary of a Chambermaid (1964) – yet another uniquely poised,
desire-ridden, politically charged Bunuel film, beyond anyone else’s imagining
Agency (1980) – tired Canadian paranoia thriller might have had a vague
chance if Alan Pakula directed it, but he sure as hell didn't...
The Pilgrim (1923) – late Chaplin short film perfectly embodies the
legend, moving smoothly between tightly executed, laugh-out-loud set-ups
Brighton Rock (2010) – one of those movies
where you feel the filmmaking mechanics turn, never really creating a compelling
cinematic space
Where Now are the Dreams of Youth? (1932) – Ozu’s fluid, funny silent
film is as emotionally rich and eloquent as most garrulous talkies
Hysteria (2011) –
Wexler chooses the most sterile possible approach – not enough hysteria, sex,
dirt, anger, deprivation, anything
The Terrorizers (1986) – with great finesse, Yang builds to a finale
privileging human sadness over our mechanistic narrative expectations
The Hunger Games
(2012) – sadly under-nourishing, under-imagined, flatly realized; from the
kiddie cookbook of dystopian fantasies
Days and Nights in the Forest (1970) – Ray’s film is increasingly,
bleakly frank about the depth of India’s dysfunctionality and sadness
The Cabin in the Woods (2012) – hardly as stimulating a genre
meta-rewrite as some suggested, although what about that monster purge scene!
The Organizer (1963) – compelling social justice filmmaking by
Monicelli, even if it might seem a bit square next to the period’s key works
Arbitrage (2012) – squandered by gross simplifications & unhelpful
contrivances, Jarecki’s artistic investment flames out, Madoff-style
Deux hommes dans la ville (1973) – striking if stolid exercise in
misdirection; promises a standard Delon thriller, turns out much grimmer
Salmon Fishing in the Yemen (2011) – rather
surprisingly lovely, if only for its odd premise, scenic qualities &
old-fashioned performances
Hiroshima, mon amour (1959) – Resnais’ narrative landmark, interrogating
almost every aspect of itself, & of the world that made it possible
Marley (2012) – feels like Macdonald might
almost have had too great a wealth of material to work with, ending up all but
overwhelmed by it
The Beast (1975) – strange tale of erotic displacement, whereby
Borowczyk conclusively seals his place in the history of the cinematic penis
Side Effects (2013) – Soderbergh intriguingly explores how our ethically
hollowed-out culture easily spirals into total moral bankruptcy
This Man Must Die (1969) – one of Chabrol’s most impeccably sustained,
quietly despairing studies in displaced human motivations and guilt
Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1978) – just as the legend has it,
remarkably foolish, wrong-headed, cheesy, misconceived, etc. etc.
Farewell my Queen (2012) – Jacquot’s vivid, elegantly charged
humanization of an often-told story, dense with intermeshing perspectives
Trouble in Paradise (1932) – what they say about the “Lubitsch touch”,
it’s all true! – it’s extraordinarily, tenderly elegant and deft
Monsieur Lazhar (2011) – Falardeau’s
intentions for this elegant fable of recovery and catalysis are too modest to
place much value on it
Gloria (1980) – flatly conventional by Cassavetes’ standards, enlivened
throughout by his alertness to behavior, interaction, possibility
Where Do We Go Now? (2011) – well, Labaki
seems to ask, why shouldn’t Middle Eastern conflicts also be fair game for an
airheaded movie?
House Calls (1978) – I’m a bit of a sucker
for such low-ambition, mature-skewing 70's comedies; this is a pretty
low-wattage example though
The Day I Became a Woman (2000) – wonderful
reflection on Iranian womanhood, built on Makhmalbaf’s starkly powerful images
and concepts
Our Hospitality (1923) – Keaton’s
conceptual precision and grace are still delightfully modern; his larger
inventions remain astounding
The Woman in the Fifth (2011) – Pawlikowski
sustains it pretty well, but sadly, if a thing’s not worth doing, it’s not
worth doing well
Tomorrow Never Comes (1978) – standard siege drama with weird
co-production trappings; Collinson can do little more than direct traffic
Amour (2012) – Haneke’s highly accomplished proposition that the primary
horror of death lies in our fuzzy denials of its specificity
Cheyenne Autumn (1964) – this late, discursive
Ford drama never completely satisfies, but maybe that’s what this grim history
demands
Seven Beauties (1975) – hard to understand
now how Wertmuller’s artful grotesqueries and unsophisticated morality ever
caught such a wave
Friends with Kids (2011) – straining
impotently to capture some kind of zeitgeist, Westfeldt’s film all but
dissipates before your eyes
Jour de fete (1949) – Tati’s wonderfully sustained, often exhilaratingly
paced debut, powered by a very sweet take on modern threats
Bernie (2011) – another finely entertaining
example of Linklater’s prowess as the most easy-to-take of experimental
American filmmakers
Fellini Roma
(1972) – Fellini has never seemed that major to me, yet his committed
situation-making here is surprisingly enveloping
Darling Companion (2012) – could Kasdan’s
weirdly minor lost-dog chronicle possibly be meant as deadpan parody?...sadly,
probably not…
Accattone (1961) – Pasolini’s stunning debut, anticipating all the
turmoil, interrogation, profound social awareness of his subsequent work
Being Flynn (2012) – Weitz’s conventionally scrubbed notions of craft
generally squander the actors’ willing waywardness and ferocity
Conversation Piece (1974) – Visconti’s claustrophobic study in
politically-charged decadence; maybe more provocative in theory than practice
We Bought a Zoo (2011) – you know kids, they do say that once upon a
time, some considered Cameron Crowe a significant American filmmaker
Woman in the Moon (1929) – Lang’s lumpy,
only sporadically visionary amalgam of paranoid thriller and romantic reverie;
enjoyable but weird
Inventing David
Geffen (2012) – pleasantly crammed with good stories, but doesn’t get far on
examining the nature and perils of such power
Vivement Dimanche (1983) – Truffaut’s
handsome but low-stakes final film is hard to dislike, despite the mainly
cursory storytelling
Zero Dark Thirty (2012) – accomplished and
gripping, but plainly a selected narrative: Bigelow’s “just the facts” claims
are disingenuous
Il posto (1961) – Olmi’s insinuating
premonition, bearing a watchmaker’s detail and a sad prophet's reach, of the
terrifying road ahead
Savages (2012) – despite the perverse
romantic streak and practiced gleaming kineticism, as disposable a movie as
Stone has ever made
La femme aux bottes rouges (1974) – Bunuel
junior’s surreal-flavored film lacks his father’s elegant precision, mostly
seeming just messy
All Night Long (1981) – mostly minor stuff,
but with an appealingly offhand, understated quality, and maybe Streisand’s
oddest performance
Rust and Bone (2012) – Audiard knowingly
courts near-absurdity, but transcends it throughout with his superb feeling for
human possibilities
The American Friend (1977) – one of
Wenders’ most enduring works, a well-maintained thriller-fable on America’s
cultural seepage into Europe
Keyhole (2011) – Maddin’s film noir version
of The Shining perhaps; strangely tangible & persuasive even as it evades
any easy assimilation
Black Narcissus (1947) – dramatizing a
culture of rectitude at the tragic end of its tether, through Powell’s most
intensely charged images
The Lady (2011) – Besson couldn’t have
followed the standard biopic playbook much more dutifully, nor achieved much
more negligible results
Revenge of the Pink Panther (1978) – the
heavy-heartedness would be intriguing if Edwards did it deliberately, but he
probably didn't...
Boudu sauve des eaux (1932) – Renoir is
unparalleled in unforcedly evoking social fragility, the allure of so-called
“creative destruction”
Django Unchained (2012) – a disappointment
overall; this time round Tarantino’s tactics prove more stimulating in theory
than practice
Weekend (1967) – Godard’s beautiful
nightmare of a vision on the horror of the bourgeoisie and the further horror
of overcoming it
Everybody Wins (1990) – just about the
least a Reisz/Miller pairing could have yielded – ambitious but heavy-footed,
with poor instincts
Barbara (2012) – with superb, almost
subliminal precision, Petzold conveys the complex toll of lives lived under
perverse constraints
The Yakuza (1975) – gets by on Pollack’s
solid unforced genre mechanics, but its sense of Japan is superficial &
unprobing to say the least
The Decameron (1970) – Pasolini’s utterly
engrossing, highly diverse meditation on the earthly machinations that stifle
our higher selves
A Late Quartet (2012) – a bit short on the
transcendent moments Walken’s character talks about, although his final scene
comes close to one
Desire (1937) – Guitry’s film stands far
below the somewhat related (much more ambitious) Regle du jeu, but has its own
pleasant contours
Breaking the Waves (1996) – almost absolute
codswallop, no matter how much conviction von Trier and Watson bring to
stirring up the pot
56 Up (2012) – Apted’s enduring project is
severely limited as social history, but fascinating as a kind of serendipitous
art installation
Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore (1974) –
amiable, ultimately limited ramble of discovery; shows Scorsese’s resourcefulness
if nothing else
The Leopard (1963) – Visconti’s absorbing,
vastly pictorial but painstakingly subtle study of figures in a complexly
eroding landscape
The Tempest (2010) – Taymor’s digital
paintbox stifles almost as much as it liberates, yielding a fluid but
distinctly non-tempestuous film
Les amants du Pont-Neuf (1991) – not hard
to see why Carax paid such a sad price for this; even what’s beautiful about it
often feels forced
Honky Tonk Freeway (1981) –
incomprehensible choice for Schlesinger (he thought it was Altmanesque?) –
treats its woman especially shabbily
A Talking Picture (2003) – de Oliveira’s
wonderful, slyly courtly reflection on our collective cultural heritage, and
hey, what an ending!
The Iron Petticoat (1956) – incredibly
heavy-footed, laughless long-lost comedy, with Katharine Hepburn as bad as
you’ll ever see her
Girl Model (2011) – a documentary on young
girls lost in translation, commerce and hypocrisy; interesting, but lacking
full analytical force
Gate of Flesh (1964) – Suzuki’s often
luridly erotic and yet deeply felt tale, a true vision of post-war hell, turns
morality on its head
Into the Abyss (2011) – Herzog has never
before applied his sense of the absurd to such a stark case study, nor with
such steely discipline
L’amore (1948) – Rossellini’s transfixing
meditation on female desire in two extreme situations, and on the nature of
cinematic performance
The Girl (2012) – trivial “study’ of
Hitchcock/Hedren relationship has little apparent point, certainly won't aid
one’s sense of his films
I Can’t Sleep (1994) – somewhat cruder than
Denis’ greatest works, but with all her mastery of connection, implication and
impermanence
Silver Linings Playbook (2012) – despite
Russell’s facility for nervily wound-up interactions, overall it’s a sort of
poor man’s Desplechin
The Canterbury Tales (1971) – my favourite
of the trilogy, for Pasolini’s brilliant formal experimentation and eye-popping
earthiness
Sherlock Jr. (1924) – beautifully
structured Keaton film, still belongs near the centre of any essay on cinematic
dreaming and inspiration
Miral (2010) – well-meaning Palestinian
chronicle does little to advance Schnabel’s standing as a film artist, even
less that as a thinker
Britannia Hospital (1982) – what hope was
folded into Anderson’s O Lucky Man has largely congealed (although
fascinatingly) by this point
A Fistful of Dollars (1964) – still
entirely fascinating and striking, although Leone's work would acquire much
more layering subsequently
Skyfall (2012) – Mendes ably restores
something of Bond’s classic essence, but it mainly shows how meaningless that
essence has become now
Feu Mathias Pascal (1926) – L’Herbier
fluidly crafts an engrossing psychological & existential space, built
around the compelling Mozzhukhin
Lincoln (2012) – an engrossing, stimulating
study of political process, limited by Spielberg’s adherence to Great Man
filmmaking conventions
Pola X (1999) – takes on the sense of a
deeply troubled personal testimony by Carax, powered by thrilling edge-of-darkness
performances
Lola Versus (2012) – Gerwig’s best efforts
notwithstanding, not quite a fair fight, given the movie’s low ammunition re
laughs and insights
“M”
(1931) – still an amazing example of Lang’s control and reach; just slightly less
powerful in its breadth than his very greatest work
Autoerotic (2011) – Swanberg/Wingard’s
offbeat sex anthology is mostly, what’s the word, flaccid...has trouble
performing for the 72 minutes
Detective (1985) – Godard plays with
notions of detection while luxuriating in star power – not his most important
movie, but very seductive
Tabu (1931) – initially a bit tedious, then
escalatingly dazzling and tragic as Murnau’s play of shadow, desire and loss
comes to the fore
Marina Abramovic: the Artist is Present
(2012) – fascinating, but the movie’s conventional seductiveness doesn’t
particularly serve the work
Ivan the Terrible, Part Two (1958) –
continues the sense of escalating aesthetic & psychological siege, with a
remarkable colour sequence
Mysterious Skin (2004) – Araki’s brave,
unforseeable chronicle of abuse & loss of self, ultimately marked by great
seriousness of purpose
Ivan the Terrible, Part One (1943) –
Eisenstein’s intense filmic sculpture on power's inner & outer
architecture; still elementally powerful
An Almost Perfect Affair (1979) – seemingly
the sad no-return point where Ritchie’s satirical and analytical instincts
largely deserted him
Millennium Mambo (2001) – its impact is
perhaps more fleeting than most of Hou’s films, but then that’s fundamental to
its portrait of youth
Games (1967) – Harrington’s drama of
manipulation twists out in largely predictable manner; most intriguing when
it’s at its freakiest
Holy Motors (2012) – perhaps the year’s
most necessary movie; Carax stares the death of film in the mouth and extracts
inexhaustible life
The Super Cops (1974) – pleasantly loose
Serpico-lite, hardly major, but with an unforced colour almost absent from
Hollywood movies now
Norwegian Wood (2010) – adaptation of
Murakami’s novel drifts around in finely-crafted wistfulness and bewilderment,
to no great end
Bye Bye Braverman (1968) – one of the many
oddities dotting Lumet’s career, with good local flavor, and a sense of lives
beyond the frame
Import/Export (2007) – Seidl’s single-minded
immersion in Euro-grimness is almost hypnotically thought-provoking, both to
his credit and not
Dial M for Murder (1954) – Hitchcock’s
drama is highly artificial but compelling, meshing us in a complex network of
cruel intentions
Sans soleil (1983) – astounding expression
of Marker's soaring consciousness; might almost prompt depression at one’s
relative limitations
Flight (2012) – a strong central character
study & meditation on relative morality, although significantly limited by
Hollywood conventions
Once Upon a Time in America (1984) –
Leone’s engrossing, sometimes odd epic – musing on the unreliability of memory
and of experience itself
Sebastiane (1976) – Jarman/Humfress’s
gorgeous poetic/political appropriation for gay cinema of previously
underexplored space and language
The Hunger (1983) – Tony Scott’s
meaninglessly stylish debut falls unproductively between various stools,
despite amazingly iconic casting
The Sword of Doom (1966) – Okomoto’s
samurai film is almost unbearably bottled-up at times, and then the bottle
breaks, and goes on breaking
Terri (2011) – Jacobs delivers on
"troubled teen" genre pleasures, while keeping his eye consistently
on larger spiritual & societal issues
Trois couleurs: rouge (1994) – might it
ultimately all be a fiction imagined (eavesdropped on?) by the judge, or a
tangled, longing memory?
The Sessions (2012) – certainly engaging
viewing; does sufficient justice to O’Brien that you tolerate the overly
conventional pill-sugaring
La main du diable (1943) – Tourneur’s
effectively creepy piece of mythological yarn-spinning; a great ride, with
Occupation-era echoes
War Horse (2011) – Spielberg largely
destroys the play's stark impact; the focus on the horse here does nothing to
deepen our sense of war
Judex (1963) – Franju’s stylish version of
the silent-era serial is enormously entertaining, knowingly emphasizing
intrigue over implication
Sing your Song (2011) – an unwavering
tribute to Belafonte rather than any sort of examination of him, but then, man,
he's easily earned it
Death Watch (1980) – Tavernier’s rather
weirdly conceived and visualized speculative fiction is always interesting but
seldom impactful
Cloud Atlas (2012) – the time goes by
handsomely enough, but I can’t for the life of me see any meaning, much less
"vision," to the thing
Kagamijishi (1936) – Ozu’s short,
respectful documentary on kabuki; encourages a reflection on how its
conventions helped shape his own work
Dust Devil (1992) (final cut) – Stanley’s
troubled vision is indeed often very striking and charged, although hardly 4
DVD’s worth of it
The Iron Lady (2011) – flaunting one lousy
artistic judgment after another, as if cinema had learned nothing about
engaging with history
The Model Couple (1977) – Klein’s
diverting, eye-filling meditation on the demented wrong turns and existential
drift of the modern method
The Swell Season (2011) – monumentally
unimportant documentary on the post-Once Hansard/Irglova relationship – mainly
for fans I guess
Salo (1975) – Pasolini’s intellect,
cinematic architecture and moral courage are so vast here, he all but defeats
your powers of reaction
In Time (2011) – Niccoll’s movie is all
convoluted Occupy-type metaphor, little or no actual content, beyond the usual
bewildering momentum
Eyes Without a Face (1959) – Franju’s
hypnotically perverse, strangely meditative horror, elevated by amazingly
haunting, iconic images
Mystery Train (1989) – one of Jarmusch’s
less necessary films, but a very engaging meditation on America’s tangled cultural
influence
The Portuguese Nun (2009) – Green’s film
feels like Bresson exhaled and then merged with a Lisbon travel agent, which
wouldn’t be all bad
A New Leaf (1971) – Matthau's entirely
awesome in May’s at least quasi-awesome comedy, edited down from legendarily
even greater awesomeness
Route Irish (2010) – a bit schematic
overall, but Loach’s severely pessimistic ending makes its point effectively
(albeit not a new one)
Masculin feminin (1966) – an inexhaustible
film - Godard brilliantly intertwines provocation and beguilement, possibility
and melancholy
Argo (2012) – occasionally evocative, and
always well-paced, but inherently no more worthy or serious than the sci-fi
crap it mocks
Secret Defense (1998) – Rivette’s masterly
deployment of thriller-genre concepts, full of ambiguities, doublings, and
productive oddities
Lord Love a Duck (1966) – once the dated
college trappings get scratched away, Axelrod creates a surprisingly
wide-ranging and morose satire
We Have a Pope (2011) – Moretti keeps it
all shambling along, and it looks good, but it's ultimately hard to muster much
more than a shrug
Vertigo (1958) – if not the “greatest”
film, perhaps the most moving illustration of an impact cascading beyond the
mere sum of the parts
Montenegro (1981) – can’t help but seem
relatively conventional, even timid next to Makaveyev’s remarkable works of the
previous decade
The Experiment (2010) – pretensions
notwithstanding, useless as any kind of window on human behavior, but passable
as a B-movie timewaster
La truite (1982) – Losey's film is
intermittently stimulating; lacks the glistening slipperiness its central
metaphor might seem to demand
Looper (2012) – impressively structured and
paced; despite its mindbending concepts, has a very grimly practical sense of
earthly limits
Story of Women (1988) – one of Chabrol’s
finest later films - a painstaking, sensitive case study of twisted morality in
wretched times
Down the Road Again (2011) – 40 years of
nostalgia gives the movie a big head start, which Shebib’s heavy-handedness
doesn’t quite squander
Goin Down the Road (1970) – still a
landmark although, in hindsight, Shebib sacrifices some social impact &
grit for narrative efficiency
Baby Doll (1956) – the hungry underbelly of
sexual frustration is still fairly compelling; as a whole though, one of
Kazan’s plainer works
Audition (1999) – Miike’s very gripping and
pristinely disorienting classic, makes the best possible case for transparency
in relationships…
The Master (2012) – Anderson’s
mesmerizingly intense contemplation of the fractured, incoherent, lie-ridden
post-WW2 American landscape
Sweet Movie (1974) – maybe only someone
supremely rigorous in his passion for freedom could transgress as stunningly as
Makavejev does here
Martha Marcy May Marlene (2011) – Durkin’s
minutely judged, very effective, existentially creepy study of a young woman’s
disorientation
Don Juan ’73 (1973) – Bardot is seldom even
titillating in her last film; Vadim all but submerges her with portentous
glossy mythmaking
Jeff Who Lives At Home (2011) –
surprisingly pleasant and beguiling, but any movie that keeps referencing Signs
is gonna be meaning-lite
Wind from the East (1970) – Godard et al’s
provocation seems mostly lost in time, but still underlines the paucity of
political dialogue now
Sleeping Beauty (2011) – Leigh’s icily
crafted movie raises some familiar issues re female sexuality, not least by
being so damn watchable
Bamboozled (2000) – for me, Lee’s most
fascinating film, dense with ambiguities and as mysteriously, darkly complex as
its subject requires
Nuit et brouillard (1955) – Resnais’
unsparing, undiminished essay on the evil of the camps and the venal seductiveness
of forgetting
Trouble with the Curve (2012) – old-time
bread-and-butter star vehicle throws nothing but softballs, and even then
doesn’t always connect
Ivan’s Childhood (1962) – can see why some
might value the sparser beauty of Tarkovsky’s debut over his later works (even
if I myself don’t)
Margaret (2011) –
crammed with fascinating behavior & debate, but (at least in the shorter
version) rather lacks true complexity and mystery
Credo (1997) – early Bier work is a weirdly
overstuffed cult drama, probably best seen as capturing an artistic personality
in formation
The Prince and the Showgirl (1957) – yep,
she must really have been a goddess, to be this magnetic amid such unbroken,
joyless stiffness
The Future Is Now! (2011) – inexplicably
peculiar meditation on it all; kind of The Trail of the Pink Panther of
philosophical investigation
The Young One (1960) – raw, sweaty,
transgression-laden island drama, not easily recognizable as Bunuel’s work (at
least superficially)
In the Land of Blood and Honey (2011) –
Jolie’s engaged debut is mostly proficient, but undermined by overly
conventional instincts
Sweetie (1989) – Campion’s openness to
varying structures is quietly & funnily radical, without diluting the
feeling at the film's center
British Sounds (1970) – Godard/Roger’s
manifesto for revolutionary cinema, built on a Britain at its drabbest –
strangely romantic now..
Weekend (2011) – a politically charged
repositioning of romantic conventions, deftly exploring the continuing
compromises forced on gayness
Duck, you Sucker (1971) – Leone’s sort of
displaced cartoon of modern America’s melting-pot origins; a great spectacle,
even when overcooked
Manhattan Murder Mystery (1993) – a neatly
executed fantasy of middle-aged reinvigoration through paranoia, but still a
step to lesser Allen
Harlan: In the Shadow of Jew Suess (2008) –
the flood of family testimony often seems to obscure Veit Harlan more than it
illuminates him
Seven Days in May (1964) – Frankenheimer’s
political drama is rather arid at times, distinctly dated; still, good
page-turner kind of stuff
Empty Nest (2008) – Argentinean Burman's
increasingly impressive meditation on the shifting equilibrium between inner
and outer lives
Scarecrow (1973) – Schatzberg’s bleak road
movie (of sorts) is unusually attuned to underlying loss and pain, eschewing
easy pictorialism
L’avventura (1960) – Antonioni’s legendary
film is still overwhelming for its portrayal of modernity’s hopeless gaps and
contradictions
Vito: A Man for all Seasons (2011) – a
moving portrait of Russo, perhaps ironically more conventional in form than he
deserves
Man with a Movie
Camera (1929) – Vertov remains thrillingly provocative re the creative process
(and for that matter, re everything else)
The Future (2011) –
sure, July has things to say about the beauty and fragility of our moment in
time, but honestly, life’s just too
short
The Cloud-capped Star (1960) – Ghatak's
devastating study of a young woman's quiet destruction; the celluloid almost
crumbles with shame
The Girl with the
Dragon Tattoo (2011) – for all its oddly mythic qualities, polished to a dark
gleam, surely Fincher’s least crucial film
Les enfants du paradis
(1945) – still dazzling & surprising, even if its cinematic & thematic
power ranks slightly below the greatest films
Another Earth (2011) –
hard to imagine a wetter, fuzzier and less productive use of the parallel world
premise; watch Melancholia instead
Yol (1982) – its greatest vindication lies
in its very existence – sociologically and politically heartbreaking even when
flagging as cinema
Compliance (2012) – terrifically executed
by Zobel, capable of bearing almost as much metaphorical weight as you want to
place on it
Death of a Cyclist (1955) – Bardem's
bleakly precise examination of the Spanish bourgeoisie's degraded morality and
desperate ruthlessness
Repulsion (1965) –
early instance of Polanski’s mastery of trauma & claustrophobia – still
formally impressive, although inherently limited
Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll
(2010) – entertaining Ian Dury biography hits the rhythm stick real fast, still
rather fails to illuminate his art
Red Beard (1965) – I prefer Kurosawa in
this lower-key vein, although the film doesn’t ultimately yield much moral or
thematic revelation
The Debt (2010) –
dramatically and visually well-crafted by Madden, but at the cost of attaining
the appropriate moral weight and complexity
Belle de jour (1967) – Bunuel’s
astonishingly iconic reverie on fantasy and transgression; even the smallest
moment feels indelibly rich
Buck and the Preacher (1972) – inherently
interesting, but Poitier is too ordinary a director to exploit the historical
& genre complexities
The Princess of
Montpensier (2010) – Tavernier’s fascinating examination of a closed system,
within which withdrawal is the only victory
The Doom Generation
(1995) – wonderfully and sparsely iconic, as Araki comprehensively reshapes the
meaning of a ‘heterosexual’ movie
Night and Day (2008) –
ultimately seems like an endless series of evasions, although Hong almost makes
this feel like an actual subject
The Best Years of our Lives (1946) – prime
if largely conventional example of Hollywood’s classic fluidity, punctuated
with piercing moments
House of Tolerance
(2011) – Bonello’s painstaking recreation of a high-end Paris brothel; I’m torn
on its merits, which is likely the point
The Private Files of J Edgar Hoover (1977)
– Cohen makes Eastwood’s later version, for all its own strengths, seem
unfocused & heavy-footed
Alps (2011) – in its
own way (which sure isn’t anyone else’s) rather glacially magnificent,
conveying Greece’s extreme existential turmoil
The Sunshine Boys (1975) – we all have our
quirky tastes I guess - I find this cantankerous Matthau/Burns showdown just
mesmerizing (sorry!)
Cold Water (1994) – early Assayas film
already demonstrates his sensitivity and facility, although the overall
trajectory is a bit forced
Restless (2011) – you might say it’s
delicate and impressionistic; to me it’s ridiculously fey and dreary; a wanton
denial of pain and death
Sawdust and Tinsel
(1953) – riveting early-ish Bergman; a brutally unsparing depiction of the pain
and resignation underlying the cavalcade
London Boulevard (2010) – quirky (if
strained) characterizations provide the main entertaiment; the rest is mostly
just the same old trudge
The Man who fell to
Earth (1976) – almost always dazzling, unprecedented; although some other Roeg
films achieve a greater cumulative impact
Alphaville (1965) - as
we watch Godard’s sparse, feisty vision, we feel more deeply and creepily how
much of ourselves has become imperiled
Beasts of the Southern Wild (2012) –
Zeitlin's rather remarkable modern myth, sometimes ungainly, but crammed with
odd, memorable fragments
Les biches (1968) – one of Chabrol’s great
intuitive, unforced enigmas of the period, perpetually but subtly shifting to
keep us off balance
The Rum Diary (2011) – strangely muted ,
tired-seeming fictionalization of Hunter Thompson’s origins; not enough rum,
not enough anything
The Damned (1969) –
one of Visconti’s sludgier films, pounding simplistically away at Nazism’s
malleable ideology and inherent decadence
A Face in the Crowd
(1957) – helplessly watchable, but one of Kazan’s more mechanical films, its
‘prophetic’ aspects heavily underlined
The Lemon Tree (2008) – pleasant enough as
a fable and intermittent postcard; negligible as an engagement with Palestinian
complexities
Night and the City
(1950) – Dassin's gripping expression of post-war dislocation &
frustration, propelled by Widmark’s terrific needy energy
Tales of Ordinary Madness (1981) –
Ferreri’s seems like the wrong kind of madness though, yielding a
disappointingly ordinary provocation
Page One: Inside the
New York Times (2011) – solid stuff, but often feels like it focuses more on
the page B6 than on the page A1 material
L’Age d’or (1930) –
still astonishing for the scorpion-like precision of Bunuel’s transgressions,
for the rawness and outrage at its center
Sex and the Single
Girl (1964) – hard to imagine by what process the source material led to this
flat movie, but also not worth dwelling on
Le gamin au velo
(2011) – more handsomely conventional than other Dardenne films perhaps, but
its existential core is entirely as compelling
Homicide (1991) –
Mamet smartly (a bit too airlessly?) baits us with melodrama before implicitly
chiding us for thinking it’s ever so simple
A Man Escaped (1956) – Bresson illustrates
how in war even the slightest of gestures and moral determinations becomes more
deeply charged
Crazy, Stupid, Love. (2011) – if only the
movie’s devices were calibrated with the same mysterious care as the
punctuation of its title
Le cercle rouge (1970) – mesmerizingly,
almost transcendentally poised; ultimately still a simpler creation than
Melville’s greatest works
Red State (2011) – at least demonstrates
that Smith can operate in a different register, although not ultimately one
with much more depth
Cleo de 5 a 7 (1961) –
Varda's beautiful, timeless artificiality – you lose yourself completely in the
film’s graceful glides and pivots
The Devils (1971) –
one of Russell’s must-see films; eccentric and no doubt “excessive,” but
remarkably powerful, stirring and sustained
Trigger (2010) – a
predictable narrative contrivance (rock-chick Sunshine Boys), but gracefully
and affectionately executed in all respects
La Strada (1954) –
like much (not all) Fellini, to me a rather grotesque, unrevealing creation,
far from the true heights of Italian cinema
To Rome with Love
(2012) – happily confirming Allen’s late, unfussy serenity; his gentle
transcendence of temporal and sexual boundaries
Empire of Passion
(1978) – a handsome enough yarn, precisely told; but ironically or not, one of
Oshima’s least impactfully passionate
Bigger than Life
(1956) – one of the finest of 50’s monster movies (in effect); spellbinding
when Ray’s expressive energy hits its peak
Impardonnables (2011) – Techine’s work
remains perpetually underrated, but this one, although very smooth, adds
relatively little overall
Alice (1990) – however
pleasant, one of Allen’s more dispensable movies up to that point - a thin,
rarified chronicle of self-awareness
Westfront 1918 (1930)
– Pabst’s recreations of battle have remarkable verisimilitude and texture, but
the film as a whole is a bit too dour
Magic Mike (2012) –
pretty much emblematic Soderbergh – a virtuoso performance, but never really
letting you see the size of his junk
Tout va bien (1972) – Godard/Gorin’s
terrific provocation, alert to modernization’s perverse beauty, but
fundamentally near-despairing
Finian’s Rainbow (1968) – passable record
of lovely and provocative material; could only ever have been made by Coppola
(no, I’m joking)
The Guard (2011) - fills out its
conventional outlines with good colour, sometimes too much of it
(philosophy-quoting drug smugglers?!)
Le boucher (1969) – one of Chabrol’s most
gripping forensic examinations, charting a sick knot of pain and lack beneath a
bucolic surface
Body Heat (1981) – repeated viewings make
the pastiche seem a bit over-calculated, but it remains probably Kasdan’s
best-realized film
Mad Detective (2007) – a worthwhile dip
into Hong Kong genre cinema, energized by inspired plottings of inner states
(whether mad or not)
Spartacus (1960) – a magnificent spectacle,
yielding amply satisfying (if incompletely realized) Kubrickian complexities
and intertwinings
Take this Waltz (2011) – Polley’s film is
full of wonder, but almost overly alive to possibilities, denying us any
ultimate specificity
The Milky Way (1969) – another
extraordinary Bunuel film, rendering Catholic dogma the fount of immense
narrative dexterity and visual grace
Dream House (2011) - continuing the mystery
of why these garish, unrewarding meta-reality concepts are so appealing even to
mature directors
The Innocent (1976) – Visconti’s last film,
built on familiar entanglements, increasingly reveals itself as a satisfyingly
dark moral tale
Absence of Malice (1981) – very little
rings true in Pollack’s contrived, largely passionless consideration of media’s
valueless "truths"
Partie de champagne (1936) – only 45
minutes, unfinished by Renoir, but perfectly calibrated, almost seeming to
contain the whole world
Higher Ground (2011) – Farmiga is as
sensitive a director as an actor, although the film’s equanimity limits its
power and political clout
Floating Weeds (1959) – Ozu’s masterly late
exploring of chance, fate, compromise, inevitability; blissfully full, even if
not his very best
The Help (2011) – quite moving in its
moments of hard truth, but it’s unduly difficult to figure out which moments
those actually are
Persona (1966) – Bergman’s indispensable
marvel of a film, intimate and vast, containing (yet evading) everything from
Brakhage to Kubrick
The End (1978) – well cast, and
interestingly deadpan at times, but Reynolds too often delivers mere blankness
in lieu of real darkness
Even the Rain (2010) – ultimately has too
conventional a sensibility to fully realize its intertwining of cinematic &
real-world engagement
Mad Love (1935) – an arresting if tenuous
assembly of images and concepts, with Lorre’s hypnotic presence almost making
it seem coherent
My Week with Marilyn (2011) – a nice little
anecdote, mostly well-evoked, but not very revealing, hardly ever approaching a
heat wave
The Idiot (1951) – Kurosawa pounds
tediously away at his notion of a good man destroyed by a faithless world; only
minimally rewarding
Harry and Tonto (1974) – far from
Mazursky’s most resonant film, limited by its episodic nature, but still a
pleasant chronicle of renewal
The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975 (2011) –
a deeply resonant assembly, alert to history’s inevitable conflicting truths
& to overriding ones
The King of Comedy (1983) – my favorite
Scorsese film: still his most rigorously analytical work, and crammed with
incidental pleasures
Tuesday, after Christmas (2010) – an
observant Romanian relationship drama; familiar cinematic territory, but often
remarkably well-mapped
The Steel Helmet (1951) – the film where
Fuller became Fuller; extraordinarily concentrated & expressive, but also
with an unsettling purity
Cosmopolis (2012) – for all its
provocations and intelligence, feels like a staid establishment movie dreamed
up from a position of comfort
The Marriage of Maria Braun (1979) –
another gorgeously rich, politically resonant Fassbinder film, not quite the
equal of Lola in my mind
The Myth of the American Sleepover (2010) –
a piercingly poised and grave (if ultimately limited) study, remarkably free of
"teen" clichés
The Flesh (1991) – Ferreri’s more garish,
much less challenging or politically-charged variation on the central situation
of his Last Woman
Cracking Up (1983) – bizarre by any
measure, but at the risk of being pretentious, sort of holds together as a
quasi-despairing Lewis vision
Nous ne vieillirons pas ensemble (1972) –
more schematic than Pialat’s greatest works, but no one better captured the
shifting human mess
Haywire (2011) – Soderbergh's "take it
or leave it" statement; completely watchable, seemingly designed to
solicit only lukewarm reactions
City of the Living Dead (1980) – not as
fully realized a vision as Fulci’s The Beyond, but compellingly direct,
unsparing and transgressive
Moonrise Kingdom (2012) – a beautifully
crafted aesthetic object, rendering dreamily irrelevant the question of whether
Anderson's “limited”
Autumn Sonata (1978) – engrossing reverie
on the pained incompatibility of art (if not life) & family, but far from
Bergman’s fullest work
The Bed Sitting Room (1969) – if nothing
else, maybe one of the preeminent statements on the sheer desolate weirdness of
the British psyche
Hemingway and Gellhorn (2012) –
sporadically interesting for its craft, but lacking in much texture, or even in
a real sense of character
Le plus vieux métier du monde (1967) –
compilation of prostitution sketches is mostly dire, until Godard massively
redeems the whole thing
Dark Shadows (2012) – not much reason to
have woken up this material, but it's fluent and precise enough that it
actually almost feels alive
The Last Woman (1976) – Ferreri’s amazingly
primal, intense, committed, justly notorious meditation on sexual and
structural breakdown
Riff-Raff (1991) – well-observed like all
Loach’s work, but it's too transient to satisfy (even if this reflects its
characters' plight)
Hollywood Dreams (2006) – Jaglom generally
strikes a distinctive, sometimes beguilingly weird perspective on familiar
tensions and tinsel
Boccaccio ’70 (1962) – a 4-part anthology:
Monicelli’s episode is the most socially resonant; Fellini’s the most
cinematically irresistible
Mammoth (2009) – facile and handsome, but
doesn’t amount to too much, beyond an obvious meditation on the vast inequities
of existence
Lightning over Water (1980) – fascinating
by any measure, and moving for what appears real in it; sometimes a bit
grotesque for what doesn’t
Logan’s Run (1976) – mostly silly,
plasticky and perfunctory, running past thirty years’ worth of contrivances and
unaddressed plot issues
Miss Bala (2011) – consistently and
artfully disorienting, with provocative undercurrents, but doesn’t accumulate
to as much as you hope for
Pretty Poison (1968) – more pretty than
truly poisonous perhaps, but a wickedly easy pleasure; Weld and Perkins are
mesmerizingly perfect
The Iron Rose (1973) – a very
well-sustained, unforced Rollin mood piece, largely set in one of cinema's most
lovingly filmed cemeteries
Midnight Run (1988) – one of my favorite
mainstream entertainments, so finely structured, written and acted it seems
mysteriously profound
Rocco and his Brothers (1960) – Visconti’s
epically sad tale of the city’s toll, forcing a painful reckoning of familial
gains and losses
Detachment (2011) – a diverting mix: two
parts the fiery, committed, resourceful "Lake of Fire" Tony Kaye, to
one part the notorious nutball
Ginger and Fred (1986) – a resigned,
unforced evocation of Fellini’s circus of life; the transience of it all is a
large part of the point
And Everything is Going Fine (2010) –
Soderbergh’s perfectly judged commemoration of Spalding Gray, entirely in
Gray's own recorded words
Carry on Camping (1969) – has the core cast
at their most comfortable and emblematic; flies by as rapidly and classily as a
propelled bikini
Bob le Flambeur (1957) – less stylized than
most of Melville’s later films, but entirely as magnificently calibrated, both
mythic and humane
Carnage (2011) – highly engrossing for
Polanski’s drolly painstaking control of the elements and of its constantly
shifting equilibrium
The House of Mirth (2000) – a quietly
devastating study in cruelty & sociological complexity, poignant for
Davies’ lost decade in its wake
The Herd (1979) – a film that feels torn
from Turkey’s land and heart, an increasingly powerful portrait of its
fractures and corruptions
The Baron of Arizona (1950) – a great yarn,
although Fuller’s cinematic fist had yet to fully clench (take the soft ending
in particular)
A Complete History of my Sexual Failures
(2008) – fills time well enough, but as filmic essays go, not exactly in Chris
Marker territory
Le dejeuner sur l’herbe (1959) – Renoir’s
fantasia on France’s (and Europe’s) soul in an age of “progress” – odd, and
oddly prophetic
Straw Dogs (2011) – the original’s
mesmerizing strangeness is smoothed down throughout. leaving just another
efficiently repulsive mutt
Lola (1961) – Demy’s beautiful reverie on
love and chance; places one foot in the limitations of reality, the other in
dreams, never tumbles
The Long Day Closes (1992) – superbly
clear-eyed cinematic poetry, true to memory's odd contours without ever seeming
remotely indulgent
Beats Rhymes & Life: The Travels of a
Tribe Called Quest (2011) – peppy, but without much perspective; sticks mostly
inside the beat box
Leaves from Satan’s Book (1921) – early
Dreyer meditation on the complexity of evil, full of interest, but lacks his
later expressive power
The Sterile Cuckoo (1969) – Minnelli is
sometimes touching, but the movie (unrecognizable as Pakula’s) too often turns
away from the dark
Zidane: a 21st Century Portrait (2006) –
intriguingly captures a loneliness within the hubbub, while strenuously aiming
for the gallery wall
Sunrise (1927) – it’s still miraculous how
Murnau intertwines the specific & the transcendent; at times the film’s
capacity feels limitless
Gambit (1966) – a pleasant, modestly
inventive dawdle, but with the rather stodgy affect typical of secondary star
vehicles of the time
Once Upon a Time in Anatolia (2011) – an
increasingly impressive reflection on the eternal multiplicity of human
fictions and fallibilities
I Shot Jesse James (1948) – terrifically
paced, concentrated Fuller version of the Bob Ford tale, its tone cast in
anguish and self-loathing
Death Line (1973) – not a big deal, but a
witty, well-considered injection of gruesome urban mythology into mundane,
unadorned Britishness
The Red and the White (1967) – Jancso’s
starkly beautiful, immense vision of turmoil, capturing both mankind’s
magnificence and its futility
Damsels in Distress (2011) – a quietly
intense project in deconstruction & strangifying; its hermeticism at times
both a strength & weakness
I vinti (1953) – relatively early, episodic
Antonioni, with more of a sense of rolled-up sleeves, but filled with his
intelligent precision
Warrior (2011) – well, you didn’t come here
to find something new; ridiculous in the usual ways, but well-grounded and
moving in others
Carry on Loving (1970) – funny by its own
standards (which rely a lot on repression & drabness) - thank God if those
standards aren’t yours
JCVD (2008) – has its moments, quite deftly
handled, but doesn't amount to much given Van Damme's inherent limitations and
insignificance
Pulp (1972) – surprisingly pleasurable in
its knowing incoherence, radiating laid-back imagination and delight in
invention and storytelling
The Hawks and the Sparrows (1966) – very
peculiar, funny but despairing, deliberately largely ungraspable in its fable
of inherent confusion
The Deep Blue Sea (2011) – spellbinding for
its delicacy and control; in Davies’ hands the smallest of films can feel like
the largest
Barcelona (1994) – very interesting, funny reflection
on the necessity and limitations of sex, family, country, structures, theories,
etc.
Story of a Prostitute (1965) – for all its
frequent despairing expressive power, most of the thematic and emotional space
is familiar
Cold Weather (2010) – a generation where
established meaning no longer holds; being Sherlock Holmes is as plausible as
having a real career
Days of 36 (1972) – seems to me to verge at
times on very bleak deadpan comedy, to reveal the odd kinship between
Angelopoulous and Tati
Outrage (2009) – a bit inconsistent &
possibly opportunistic in its thesis, despite one’s sympathy for the
examination of extreme hypocrisy
Le diable par la queue (1969) – seemingly
intended as a madcap send-up of the useless, venal nobility; mostly feels like
watching old drapes
Singles (1992) – pleasantly loose, unforced
and flavorful, although Crowe’s observations are mostly either contrived or
else unremarkable
Jericho (1937) – a crammed portrayal of a
black man’s ascendancy; progressive and compromised in ways that can hardly be
disentangled
Conte d’automne (1998) – another beautiful
precisely calibrated Rohmer examination of relationships, musing on what’s
innate versus imposed
Friends with Benefits (2011) – cheekily
parodies some Hollywood clichés while chewing lustily on others, but at least
everyone looks great
Das Testament des Dr.
Mabuse (1933) – stunning vision of crime and madness; the pessimism easily
outweighs the notional victory of the good
Jesus Camp (2006) – anthropologically
interesting for sure; some of the kids seem pretty happy, but I came out the
same heathen I was before
Diary of a Country Priest (1950) – other
Bresson films speak to me more directly, but this may be his most quietly
complex and deeply felt
Beginners (2011) – ooh, isn’t life big and
tough and scary and yet kind of, uh, sweet, and look how nicely and quirkily I
captured all that
The Coward (1965) – an appealing Satyajit
Ray miniature, illuminating both personal missteps and the stranglehold of
societal expectations
Some Like it Hot (1959) – a terrifically
maintained, if knowingly rather grotesque comic machine, by no means Wilder’s
most resonant work..
Little White Lies (2010) – a French Big
Chill of sorts; for all the glossiness and superficial skill, wearily over-calculated
and artificial
The Last Hurrah (1958) – mostly
warm-hearted dawdling & remembrance - it's a bit poignant its
class-sensitive politics are still so relevant
Carry on England (1976) – lamentably old,
tired and joyless; everyone seems too disengaged even ever to think of sex, let
alone have any
Footnote (2011) – not ultimately such a
major film, but enjoyably different, like taking time off to attend an
enjoyably peppy seminar
The Man who would be King (1975) – perhaps
Huston’s finest film, an adventure story with immense pictorial grandeur and
behavioral relish
From the East (1993) – with great quiet
intelligence, forces us to question our reading of the images & our sense
of the underlying culture
Night Nurse (1931) – terrifically crisp,
sexy, often cold-blooded illustration of the pre-Code sensibility, and of
Stanwyck’s magnificence
Made in Dagenham (2010) – sacrifices grit
and heart for easy formula; the movie might have trundled off the same assembly
line it depicts
Padre Padrone (1977) – an interesting
personal journey to enlightenment, quirkier and more lightly experimental than
one might remember
Exposed (1983) – completely fascinating,
odd and provocative; an artistic stream of consciousness barely possible in
American cinema now
The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964) – the
loveliest and most perfect (although not most complex) film by one of the
directors I most cherish
Game Change (2012) – the movie is largely
efficiently glossy, even amiable, assembly and memory-jogging - you supply your
own revulsion
Pleasures of the Flesh (1965) – a lesser
Oshima, ultimately mainly an exercise in bitter irony, but still startlingly
well-articulated
Take Shelter (2011) – a horror movie of the
most productive, resonant kind, calibrating modern American insecurities to the
nearest dollar
Ordet (1955) – beautifully strange
meditation on faith and knowledge, and how our dogma and culture may only
obscure our sense of them
The Last Detail (1973) – grimly suggests
the dehumanizing distortions of military culture; so darkly unadorned it seems
almost radical now
Barbarella (1968) – generates some
nostalgia for a time when a movie could be so confidently shabby and shoddy,
but that’s about it
A Better Life (2011) – engages more from
one’s preexisting sympathy for the immigrant experience than from any inherent
skill or insight
Where is Liberty? (1954) – easy to imagine
this as a standard star-driven comedy, but Rossellini makes it surprisingly
socially resonant
Only Angels Have Wings (1939) – maybe Hawks’
most perfect self-expression, told with breathtaking behavioral and existential
momentum
Heartbreaker (2010) – prime example of
France beating Hollywood at its own game: utterly weightless, but the
calculations mostly don't grate
Magnum Force (1973) – easy nostalgic
diversion, despite a pervasive lack of subtlety and style and of any kind of
analytical sensibility
The Crucified Lovers (1954) – so
extraordinarily calibrated and well-told, the immense underlying social
complexity might almost evade you
Filming ‘Othello’ (1978) – a wonderful late
expression of Welles’ personality & creative force, if rather poignant for
its modesty of means
The Beekeeper (1986) – much as if
Angelopoulous was aspiring for the prototypical European “art house” picture
(Mastroianni, young nudity..)
Rampart (2011) – hardly entirely
successful, but constantly fascinating, bursting at the seams with
incoherencies, implications and oddities
Sanders of the River (1935) – barely
watchable as drama, but a grimly informative illustration of colonial attitudes
and insecurities
Lacombe Lucien (1974) – extremely
skillfully, sensitively controlled by Malle, but less cinematically exciting
than Black Moon for instance
If a Tree Falls (2011) – a bit short of
broader analysis, but maybe we’re so hopeless at this point that any analysis
could only be a sham
The Nun (1966) – atypical for Rivette, but
evidencing his interest in incoherent earthly structures and their toll, on
women in particular
The Killing of a Chinese Bookie (1976) –
fascinating, though Cassavetes is less focused here on expression than
suppression & displacement
Seraphine (2008) – although interesting
enough on its own terms, dwarfed by Pialat’s Van Gogh as an evocation of time,
place and artistry
Under the Volcano (1984) – rather
heavy-going chronicle, usually interesting for Finney’s showiness, but
ultimately not very meaningful
Ceddo (1977) – gorgeous Senegalese film
about a village jihad, stylistically almost unprecedented, but also still
startlingly relevant
50/50 (2011) – constantly pleasant, but
calibrates the pain and messiness too carefully, becoming meaninglessly arbitrary and forgettable
Sauve qui peut (la vie) (1980) – constantly
satisfying, even weirdly beguiling, as it deconstructs art, commerce...well,
almost everything
Four Lions (2010) – a foul-mouthed suicide
bomber comedy, often funny, quietly scary for its take on the "existential
threat"'s mundanity
The Exile (1947) – nonsensical as history,
and certainly thinner than Ophuls’ greatest works, but still captivatingly
beautiful at times
In Darkness (2011) – largely
undistinguished presentation of important material, obscuring truth and meaning
with constantly lame choices
The Anderson Tapes (1971) – a secondary
Lumet movie, but still with more substance & individuality than most
American films can harness now
Van Gogh (1991) – a fascinating evocation
of the man, but highly attuned to how the man will ultimately be subsumed by
myth and commerce
Island of Lost Souls (1932) – terrifically
grotesque, the early-Hollywood limitations actually weirdly nurturing the
twisted creation theme
Machete Maidens Unleashed! (2010) – quite a
bit less rewarding than its Australian predecessor, but with the same
underlying giddy romance
The Mirror (1975) – a precursor of sorts to
Tree of Life, but even less compromising, envisaging a memory-cinema as
unrestricted as a poem
Passion Play (2010) – not quite as
unwatchable as some claimed, but everything about the movie squeaks heavily of
training wheels (or wings)
Circle of Deceit (1981) – gripping
evocation of Beirut, but increasingly weighed down by writerly notions that
ultimately illuminate little
We Need to Talk about Kevin (2011) –
powerfully visualizes all-consuming trauma and bewilderment, easily transcending
echoes of (say) Orphan
Under Capricorn (1949) – a deliberately
paced but rich study in psychological trauma, drawing on the sense of a land
still in formation
Flowers of Shanghai
(1998) – a rigorously unerotic, mesmerizing film about brothels, meshing
desire, calculation, convention, oppression..
Starting Over (1979) – Pakula tries to do
for romantic comedy what he already did for urban paranoia, with intriguingly
peculiar results
Leon Morin, pretre
(1961) – one of the most galvanizing of films "about" religion,
astoundingly rich in (tightly-controlled) implication
The Whistleblower (2010) – a very
well-maintained expose of institutional evil, somewhat limited by its
conventional narrative strategies
L'amour en fuite
(1979) – pleasantly nostalgic, seemingly reflecting Truffaut’s contentment with
(or resignation to) the state of things
Celebrity (1998) – pretty diverting
overall, not least for Branagh's car wreck performance, but with an unusually
inert center for Allen
A nos amours (1983) –
a vital text on female sexuality and self-definition; few movies match Pialat’s
scintillating emotional contours
Bad Teacher (2011) – if she was bad like
the Keitel bad lieutenant was bad, and with real sick laughs, then it might be
on to something...
Flavor of Green Tea over Rice (1952) –
rarely for Ozu, the conciliatory ending is less persuasive than the earlier
portrayal of fractures
Night Moves (1975) – one of the best 70's
genre films - a detective investigation that illuminates a whole clueless
country and culture
Three Resurrected
Drunkards (1968) – almost bewilderingly loopy at times, but deadly serious
about the grim price of imperialist folly
The Interrupters
(2011) – a vivid, moving documentary, about an America almost incalculably far
removed from the deranged political debate
La vie est un roman
(1983) – a strategically absurd fantasia on the tussle between imagination and
education, our capacities and limitations
Mr. Arkadin (1955) – Welles reconfigures
Citizen Kane’s brilliant investigation (almost as brilliantly) for a time of
paranoia & confusion
Tyrannosaur (2011) – a volatile,
mesmerizingly well-acted (if ultimately a bit thematically limited) treatment
of broadly familiar territory
L’amour braque (1985) – perhaps the film
where diminishing returns seriously start to set in on Zulawski’s stylish
exercises in extremity
City Lights (1931) – a lot of it is
conventional Chaplin, not to say that’s peanuts, but the ending really is
transcendent (I cried again…)
Black Venus (2010) – an unsparing,
chillingly fascinating examination of exploitation, indicting culture &
science (& our viewership) alike
The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943)
– gorgeously articulates the limitations of Englishness, while also embodying
its abiding virtues
Mikey and Nicky (1976) – feels much like a
Cassavetes movie, but somewhat tougher-minded, more preoccupied by an
underlying malignancy
A Separation (2011) – the ambiguity has its
contrived aspects, but still compelling for how it explores the complexities of
Iranian culture
Super (2010) – a home-made superhero yarn
that often plays like an anguished, violent character study; bemusing, but
weirdly good in parts
Orphee (1950) – a wonderful reverie on
poetic inspiration and identity, with an entirely unique blend of fancifulness
and practicality
I Spit on Your Grave (2010) – you hate how
unflinchingly effective this is; feels classier (but perhaps not truer) to view
it as a metaphor
The Moon in the Gutter (1983) – many
glorious moments, especially when pushing to the extreme, but overall an
incompletely realized vision
Fear and Desire (1953) – despite its
poverty of means, has a powerful Kubrickian sense of war as a moral labyrinth
born in human inadequacy
Attack the Block (2011) – a pretty cool
deal - a tight, accomplished monster movie and a credible piece of social
observation, all in one!
Chinese Roulette
(1976) – bourgeois Germany's poisonous loose ends shaken up and bottled; the
kind of film Fassbinder could do in his sleep
A Dangerous Method (2011) – brilliantly
rigorous, seeped in implication, quivering with the sense of modern ideology
painfully taking shape
Le lieu du crime
(1986) – a strong example of Techine’s evasive complexity; easy to overlook the
quiet radicalism of its rejection of norms
Margin Call (2011) –
plays flashily, often grippingly with the cream of a fiendishly complex
situation; leaves what's below mostly untouched
Playtime (1967) – my
favorite Tati, dense with details, patterns, cross-references, alive to both
modernity's possibilities and its lacks
Forever Mine (1999) –
unrecognizable as Schrader’s, except for a wan obsession theme; lacks the
energy to make a virtue of the absurdity
Secret Sunshine (2007) – a film of great
humanity and awareness, subtly but firmly critiquing the easy blather about
closure and coping
Ganja & Hess (1973) – revolutionary,
genre-transcending vampire movie is also a rich meditation on black identity,
provocative at every turn
Pina (2011) – a
near-miracle after two decades of unproductive, grating Wenders gyrations; made
me engage with dance as I never have before
Source Code (2011) –
one of those concept-dense movies that’s glossily clever but not very
intelligent, ending up merely fancifully loopy
Landscape after Battle (1970) – effective
at evoking the depth of trauma and confusion, but the calculated artistry sits
rather heavily now
The Adjustment Bureau (2011) – dubious
theology (oh sure, belief is all about free will), but great star chemistry,
and good use of hats
L’amour a mort (1984) – an elegantly
devastating reflection on the limitations of conventional discourse, and a key
text about suicide
Tinker Tailor Soldier
Spy (2011) – admirably controlled, but this moral labyrinth is so well-explored
already, hardly a new turn remains
The Housemaid (2010) – very interesting, if
a bit limited; the evolution from the 1960 version eloquently indicts the
widening social chasm
Shame (2011) – fascinating but utterly
overwrought, a Spielberg movie for artisans; the hectoring title (why not, uh,
"Glee"?!) says a lot
Roselyne et les lions (1989) – stunning
lion taming sequences: the rest is variable and surprisingly conventional, but
I can’t say I minded!
Bananas (1971) – funny enough of course,
but feels more now like leafing through a formative notebook than like watching
a realized movie
The Lost Son (1999) – doesn’t dishonor its
terrifying subject, but the genre clutter is especially hard to take in the
circumstances
The Artist (2011) – a pristinely engaging,
even endearing oddity, especially when it uses silence as a strategy, not just
a condition
Inferno (1980) – a diverting, tactile
vision of all-consuming malignancy, although Argento’s visions never seem as
potent as, say, Fulci’s
The Muppets (2011) - a happy enough
Christmas compromise, especially if you enjoy old photos of the likes of Rich
Little (and don’t you?)
The Devil (1972) – a scabrous,
politically-charged vision of degradation, where the only hope of avoiding hell
lies in man lacking a soul
Young Adult (2011) – lots of terrific
observation and a striking cruel streak; suggests an even more fascinating,
bleaker road not taken
The Illusionist (2010) – evokes Tati’s
screen persona, but doesn’t otherwise feel like a Tati film, rendering the
point a bit mysterious
Funny Face (1957) – a beautiful and joyous
musical; for me it's perhaps the film best capturing Audrey Hepburn’s
ethereally fragile appeal
L’Amour l’apres-midi (1972) – one of
Rohmer’s most alluring films, a wonderful study in bourgeois diminishment of
the capacity for action
The Ward (2010) – draws solidly and
creepily on a long iconography of women oppressed by medicine, but the ending
is woefully generic
Spies (1928) – Lang creates a sense of
magnificent unreliability, of capitalistic advancement scheming absurdly,
helplessly against itself
Hugo (2011) – Scorsese’s most cherishable
picture in years; a dazzling feast of cinema, in generous commemoration of its
origins
La femme publique (1984) – never achieves
the alchemy of Zulawski’s best, feeling mostly rather sterile and distant, for
all its provocation
Hanna (2011) – a fairy-tale for
dehumanized, violent times; stylish and polished until it gleams, but
essentially utterly silly and useless
I Only Want You to Love Me (1976) – more
grimly resonant than ever in depicting how the math of a working man’s life
just doesn’t add up
The Descendants (2011) – full of intriguing
variations on familial parameters and responsibilities, but limited in its
range and insights
Coup de torchon (1981) – a great little
drama, laconically depicting escalating madness as a mirror for the perversions
of colonialism
Unstoppable (2010) – an impressive exercise
in physicality, raw industrial power, human limits, although with mostly
conventional intentions
Le beau Serge (1958) – fascinating early
Chabrol, with much terrific observation and flavour; less successful in its
climactic spirituality
Family Diary (1962) – unusually somber and
quietly anguished, defined by death and lost possibilities, and so knowingly
embracing monotony
Limitless (2011) – entertaining in riffing
on the material possibilities of enhanced capacity, but the inner life goes
mostly unexamined
Violence at Noon (1966) –as fluidly bleak
as any of Oshima’s movies, daring to posit double suicide as the only viable
reward of love..
Possession (1981) – weirdly compelling
parable of stagnation & renewal (sort of), built around fabulously outrageous
scenes from a marriage
J. Edgar (2011) – an unusually quiet, oddly
moving meditation on history, reflecting on the human frailty that drives the
exercise of power
Sous le soleil de Satan (1987) – the film
tempts us to read it too easily, reflecting our fallible tracing of God’s hand,
and the devil’s..
Beeswax (2009) – engaging and
well-observed, quite distinctive, but still a bit of a flyweight, lacking much
thematic or existential impact
Fear of Fear (1975) – Fassbinder’s eerily
well-controlled study of “mental illness” and its rationality as a coping
strategy for a drab life
Two Weeks in Another Town (1962) – a
piercing Minnelli melodrama of exile and displacement, cunningly straddling the
exotic and the downbeat
L’important c’est d’aimer (1975) – like a
Cassavetes film with bruised lipstick, on the necessity of extremity and pain
in locking down love
Bill Cunningham New York (2010) – a
pleasant chronicle of a decent man, but with no critical edge; about as
important as last year's fashion
Blood Relatives (1978) – Chabrol in
Montreal, seeming too preoccupied by logistics to make this much more than a
perfunctory investigation
Melancholia (2011) – audacious by any
measure, often stunning; I could imagine some restless soul responding to it as
to nothing before
The Blacksmith (1922) – vivacious (if
scattershot and fanciful) Keaton short, with enormous inventiveness and a
terrific sense of pace
Equinox Flower (1958) – Ozu’s beautifully
observed study of the inevitable capitulation of old men to the gentle strength
of young women
Down by Law (1986) – a deadpan parable of
existential repositioning, perfectly attuned to its raw ingredients (maybe
Benigni in particular)
The Pearls of the Crown (1937) – quite the
narrative banquet, full of inventive charm, but its impact is ultimately
somewhat superficial
A Letter to Three Wives (1949) –
irresistibly witty and poised, and sharp-eyed about the compromises entailed by
the plush American Dream
SS Experiment Love Camp (1976) -
bastardizing the moral decay of the Nazis to no good end, much of the time the
film seems barely conscious
Submarine (2010) – a transplanted Annie
Hall of sorts, crammed with minutely observed subtleties, flights of fancy,
unconventional beauty..
The Third Part of the Night (1971) –
strange, dislocating film on the degradation of war, both gruesomely intimate
and wrenchingly visionary
Starting out in the Evening (2007) – very
engrossing, surprisingly thematically and psychologically intricate, with a
radiant Lauren Ambrose
Love Affair…the Missing Switchboard
Operator (1967) – note Makavejev’s considerable sensitivity, often undervalued
relative to his daring
One Night Stand (1997) – Figgis sure knows
how to polish and jazzify conventional material, but falls short of working
miracles with it
Attenberg (2010) – interesting if limited
study of identity & the finding of one’s self, drawing much resonance from
its bleak Greek setting
We Can’t Go Home Again (1976?) – a vital
component of Ray’s overall artistic legend, by design almost impossible to
anchor oneself within
Bitter Rice (1949) – perhaps crude if
compared to Rossellini’s work of the period, but immensely pictorial, powerful,
sexy and evocative
Love and other Drugs (2010) – uses up all
its relative daring on the raunchy stuff, leaving everything else too often
unfocused and bland
The Round Up (1966) – often feels like
Kafka on the plains; masterfully done, although you respond as much to its
theory as its practice
Page Eight (2011) – engrossing for its
laconic articulacy, until its essential narrative thinness and familiar
morality become inescapable
The Hypothesis of the Stolen Painting
(1979) – Ruiz is the most brilliant, if difficult, antidote to an easy,
complacent mainstream cinema
Lost in America (1985) – very nicely and
concisely exploring the compromise and existential sacrifice at the heart of
what we call “success”
Le Havre (2011) – a very pleasant,
elevating tale of community and everyday miracles, emphasizing the weight of
every moment and connection
Bridesmaids (2011) – some nice invention
& observation; certainly capable of being more biting & affecting, but
then doesn't want to be
The Profession of Arms (2001) – a
heavy-going study in the bygone processes and ethics of war; more interesting
in theory than actuality
Night on Earth (1991) – so cool and easy to
take, you could overlook the existential precision, how death increasingly
occupies the fabric..
Barbe Bleu (2009) – gorgeously distinctive
reverie on sexual destiny and ideology;
beautifully intuitive and complex, often surprising
Hot Blood (1956) – overflowing with
hokiness and dubious storytelling, and yet compelling for Ray’s often savagely
dynamic compositions
Everyone Else (2009) – another exquisite
illustration that the shifting mysteries and pained edges of relationships will
never be exhausted
The Electric House (1922) – reconstructed
early Keaton with missing scenes; a bit too breezy and conceptual to deploy his
greatness ideally
The Skin I Live In (2011) – lovingly and
lovably absurd; Almodovar’s sumptuous conviction overrides just about all
potential reservations
Insidious (2010) – impressively handled
throughout, demonstrating the “haunted house” genre’s eternal capacity for
renewal and embellishment
Merry-go-Round (1981) – not Rivette’s
strongest, but still a wonderful, playful reverie on family trauma, narrative,
creation and fantasy
Never Let Me Go (2010) – not a major film,
but achingly sad almost throughout, and delicately seeded with thematic and
ethical implication
Machine Gun McCain (1969) – appealingly
terse, but the real pleasure is in the trace of a phantom Cassavetes/Rowlands
movie buried within
Barney’s Version (2010) – bland, mechanical
concoction is just one thing after another, lacking flavor, intimacy, sense of
time or place...
Japanese Summer: Double Suicide (1967) – a
remarkable distillation of lost, violent times and twisted instincts; never
remotely predictable
The Way Back (2010) – depicting extreme
human endeavor and myth as inseparable, marked by Weir's surprising but unshowy
creative choices
Age of Consent (1969) – appealing for its
wacky primitivism, but very ragged, seldom approaching Powell’s major works (albeit,
what could?)
Alice ou la derniere fugue (1977) -
stylish, under-appreciated Chabrol, a precursor to later meta-movies, with a
diverting feminist slant
Sweetwater (2009) – majestically scenic and
respectful, but also increasingly troubled, generating an unexpectedly complex
after-effect
Man is not a Bird (1965) – maybe not, but
engaging as this is, you feel Makavejev gearing up to fly onto splashier,
wilder canvases
All Good Things (2010) – doesn’t achieve
the complexity and allusiveness it aims for, merely seeming increasingly messy
and mechanical
Taris, roi de l’eau (1931) – a small thing, but its sense of joy
and fascination is delightfully
consistent with Vigo’s more major works
Punishment Park (1971) – still startlingly
provocative & compelling, clearly as relevant as ever post-Guantanamo Bay
(as complacency rises)
Mysteries of Lisbon (2010) – an enthralling
film - it feels capable of extending itself forever without ever sacrificing
your devotion to it
The Cameraman (1928) – very enjoyable, but
creaking from limited resources, seldom exhibiting the gracefulness of Keaton’s
greatest films
Red Psalm (1972) – stunning for Jancso’s
gorgeously fluid staging and filming; at times almost persuades you the
revolution might triumph
George Harrison..Material World (2011) –
mostly effective; best seen as a largely impressionistic seasoning to the
overall Harrison myth
Shakespeare Wallah (1965) – shows how early
on the Merchant Ivory approach was honed; it’s sensitive but strangely bland
and affectless
Alexander Nevsky (1938) – resembles now an
artifact from a worldview of expired grandeur, and strenuous (if still
fascinating) artistry
The Ides of March (2011) – so lazy and
deficient it tends to make you reassess all you supposedly believed about
Clooney’s taste and smarts
Taxi zum klo (1980) – a significant
milestone of gay and human rights cinema; still eye-opening (and informative!)
in numerous ways
Valhalla Rising (2009) – murky and
ponderous mythmaking, only minimally interesting; Refn is much more rewarding
in his splashier Drive mode
Wild Rovers (1971) – a quietly solid yarn,
but the mythic ambitions, and musings on morality and predestination, are never
fully realized
Before the Revolution (1964) – Bertolucci’s
still fascinating amalgam of (perhaps rather strained) societal pessimism and
cinematic optimism
Vanishing on 7th Street (2010) – not for
the first time, Anderson’s proficiency seems largely squandered on thin,
unrewarding material
The Touch (1971) – has an oddly displaced
quality (Elliott Gould?); interesting but thin, adding little to one’s overall
sense of Bergman
Poetry (2010) – one of the most stunning
recent films; a delicately beautiful but unsentimental study of liberation and
transcendence
Tiny Furniture (2010) – well-considered,
resourceful study of a generation pre-wired for status, still floundering on
how to make it happen
Christiane F (1981) – still kinda makes you
want to flirt with degradation, while allowing you to believe YOU wouldn’t be
consumed by it
Network (1976) – as everyone says, still
spookily relevant and prophetic, bracingly mature and literate, full of
indelible actorly moments
Sing a Song of Sex (1967) – dazzlingly
provocative, constantly astounding Oshima reflection on horny Japanese youth in
deranged times
Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps (2010) –
mostly successful as a shrewd cartoon of finance’s lost soul: but the home
stretch is disappointing
Zero de conduite (1933) – among cinema’s
most remarkable 45 minutes, and most cherishable expressions of creative and
institutional freedom
Caligula (1979) – generally enjoyable as a
grand folly, often visually striking, but its relative strengths are lost in a
morass of genitals
Moneyball (2011) – highly enjoyable
throughout, but hardly a significant case study, unless you really strain for
metaphorical applicability
L’enfant sauvage (1970) – fascinatingly
quiet and economical, focusing productively on incremental progress and its
associated morality
The Scarlet Empress (1934) – an astonishing
unified vision, although the play of desire grips slightly less than Morocco or
Shanghai Express
The Keys to the House (2004) – intensely
focused on the joy and pain of the unpractised caregiver; narrow in its aims,
but very successful
Maurice (1987) – succeeds at setting out
the stifling intricacy of class structures, somewhat less at conveying the pain
embedded in them
Smiley Face (2007) – has the inherent
appeal of Araki’s worldview, but could have used more ambition, even if its
heroine doesn’t need any
L’Atalante (1934) – still a unique vision,
with one socially conscious foot firmly in this world, the other consumed by
fevers and dreams
Drive (2011) – the rare mainstream film in
which the use of “style” (and silence) is viscerally jolting and even
intellectually provocative!
Combat d’amour en songe (2000) – a
gorgeously elegant challenge to conventional narrative, at once highly rigorous
and awesomely unbound
The April Fools (1969) – the Deneuve/Lemmon
pairing never really makes emotional sense, especially when dropped into such a
ramshackle movie
Le pont du Nord (1981) – has one of
Rivette’s greatest endings, a mystically grand assertion of intuitive
self-discovery and connection
Machete (2010) – sporadically strikes the
right garish iconic retro pulp mix, but Machete himself is a fatally
underdeveloped focal point
Drole de drama (1937) - strange plotting indeed; always elegant, but
lacking the inspiration to amount to more than the sum of its parts
Contagion (2011) – highly engrossing and
informative; even its omissions speak to the inherently ungraspable nature of
such mass trauma
Revanche (2008) - makes unusually productive use of outrageous
genre contrivance, drawing power from tonal contrasts & social
undercurrents
Wanda (1970) – remarkably free of vanity
and artifice, a quietly militant challenge to conventional portrayals of
“fallen” women
Innocents with Dirty Hands (1975) –
ventilated by Chabrol’s feeling for human perversity, but nevertheless mostly
perfunctory/indifferent
Doubt (2008) – never more than a contrived
theatrical extravaganza; enjoyable actorly tension at times, but
philosophically mostly vacuous
Tulse Luper Suitcases, Pt 3: From Sark to
the Finish (2003) – likely only for Greenaway completists; even for them, a
rather dull work-out
The Defector (1966) – interesting but
under-powered Cold War dynamics, gaining depth from its steely grey images and
Clift’s evident pain
The Company Men (2010) – lots of
interesting details, but hampered throughout by the simplifying, too-tidy
effect of Hollywood conventions
A Time to Live and a Time to Die (1985) –
gorgeously illustrating Hou’s remarkable capacity for capturing the totality of
life experience
Mr. Nice (2010) – works well enough as a
mildly colourful diversion, but doesn’t inhale the material deeply enough to
make a major impact
The Spanish Earth (1937) – valuable as a
bleak historical record, and for Hemingway’s narration, almost anticipating
later neo-realism..
Genova (2008) – perhaps one of
Winterbottom’s most subtly complex and intuitive works, with an often superb
sense of mood and place
Tony Manero (2008) – meticulously considered,
superbly nuanced Chilean study of a vicious criminal obsessed with Travolta’s
iconic character
Jew Suss (1934) – still whips up
appropriate revulsion, but most interesting now as a (rather stodgy) chronicle
of personal redemption
Win Win (2011) – blows a potentially
productive premise through relentless superficiality, shallow characterization
and moral obviousness
Peppermint Frappe (1967) – less
scintillating than the many films it evokes at times (Vertigo, Blow-Up,
Bunuel...) , but well sustained
The Arbor (2010) – a film where even the
possible weaknesses raise stimulating questions about the nature of
representation/interpretation
Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One (1968) – a
movie strenuously in search of itself, ultimately yielding a kind of deadpan
existential comedy
Les egares (2003) – unusually intimate for
Techine, examining how the destruction of war yields some capacity for
liberation and reinvention
The City of Your Final Destination (2010) –
some interesting reflection, but flatly handled; the title is more evocative
than the movie
The Man who Loved Women (1983) – no
"10," but oddly (and often somewhat intriguingly) recessive, as much
a study in bemusement as “love”
Haut bas fragile (1995) – a great,
beautiful Rivette meditation on the attaining of feminine self-determination,
with a complex use of music
Tamara Drew (2010) – Tamara herself gets
increasingly lost among generally odd and/or pointless (if scenic and
easy-to-take) conceits
Deep End (1970) – a fabulous creation; a
perfectly sustained play of repression and desire, brilliantly attentive to
time, place, character
Toy Story 3 (2010) – has enormous panache,
and persuasive moral resonance; sure, it's a calculated commercial machine, but
what packaging...
The Men Who Tread on the Tiger’s Tail
(1945) – intriguing, but the entire film would be a mere strand in Kurosawa's
later, fuller works
Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011) –
probably just about as sane & smooth an origin story for the Apes mythology
as one could ever devise
La ville des pirates (1983) – stunning
piece of poetic mythology, unbound by normal rules, evoking the dark fluidity
of creation & identity
Munich (2005) – potent in many ways, but
never feels sufficiently complex; a comparison with Assayas’ Carlos underlines
the limitations
Essential Killing (2010) – often intriguing
but somewhat limited in its impact; clinical abstraction isn't Skolimowski’s
best register
Land of the Pharoahs (1955) – great
spectacle; you vaguely detect a Hawksian worldview in the ultimate affinity for
pragmatism over grandeur
The Strange Hostel of Naked Pleasures
(1975) – moody & wacky; almost convinces you at times it has a viable
theological vision & purpose!
Stone (2010) – a surprisingly stimulating,
but strange, incompletely realized attempt at exploring spiritual/moral purpose
and awareness
Folies bourgeoisies (1976) – in many ways a
weird, ill-handled mess, and yet that's appropriate to the film’s theme of
chronic dysfunction
The Next Three Days (2010) – mostly
diverting, with some handy crime hints, but overall impact is much like the
last three Hollywood flicks
The Children are Watching Us (1944) –still
a delicately provocative examination of social structures and desires in
hopeless conflict
Sleeper (1973) – an enduring modest
pleasure; the loosely-knit absurdity seems almost radical now at times,
compared to most of later Allen
Small Town Murder Songs (2010) –
demonstrates Gass-Donnelly’s control and discipline, but just too narrow a
canvas to warrant major praise
Wings of Desire (1987) – often beguiling,
but looks now like the start of Wenders’ decline away from relevance,
frequently into pure drivel
Piranha (2010) – smart exploitation
package, as proficient at tits and ass as at mass trauma; a shame Aja isn’t
feeding in a bigger tank
The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie
(1972) – so alluring you can hardly disentangle the (often staggeringly)
radical from the playful
Madeleine (1950) – inherently interesting
as sexual politics, although Lean's rather passionless craftsmanship doesn't
seem ideally applied
Project Nim (2011) – the story’s still a
useful reference point for considering our hopelessly confused attitudes &
morality toward animals
Goto, Island of Love (1969) – gorgeously
strange, as if from a parallel universe; causing regret for Borowczyk’s later
narrower evolution
A Prairie Home Companion (2006) – one of
the most delightful, magically appropriate (as if prophetic) end-points of any
director’s career
Red Riding…1983 (2009) – even with a
"happy ending" of sorts, horrifyingly extends the endemic corruption
& moral decay of the earlier films
World on a Wire (1973) – a forerunner to
Inception, plopped down in the magnificently grim, tackily existential
laboratory of 70’s Germany
The Tillman Story (2010) - another kick-ass exposure of institutional
lies and evasions, in effect of
America’s fear of its own richness
Red Riding…1980 (2009) – a more
claustrophobic, slightly less artful vision than the first film, but
masterfully integrating real & imagined
Spirit of the Beehive (1973) – comes close
to forging an alternative language of childhood, and the quiet darkness
underlying its innocence
Divorce American Style (1967) –
surprisingly biting, instructive and inventive satire at times, although it
largely goes soft in the end
Red Riding…1974 (2009) – a narratively
powerful 1970’s Yorkshire-set Chinatown of sorts; a grim vision of corruption
and degradation
The Beyond (1981) - Fulci's astonishing vision of breakdown
between worlds, leaving normal horror movie conventions in the bloody beyond
The Tourist (2010) – takes itself too
seriously in some ways, not seriously enough in others; astute direction &
acting take a big vacation
Billy Budd (1962) - gripping, but like
Ustinov himself, the obviousness of the calculations and emotions evokes
respect rather than love
La signora di tutti (1934) – a superb
investigation of a woman, exploring throughout the fragile dance of truth and
illusion, life and death
The Trip (2010) – consistently and
distinctively entertaining; although satisfying more in the way of a great meal
than of a great poem
Casino Jack and the United States of Money
(2010) – another pristine exposure (there’s a lot of ‘em) of the degradation at
America's heart
Alice in the Cities (1974) – in some ways a
familiar and contrived set-up, but increasingly intriguing for its echoes &
lack of affectation
Kaboom (2010) – repositions raw materials
of gay-friendly sex comedy as apocalyptic markers; softer than early Araki, but
still subversive
The Strange World of Coffin Joe (1968) –
strange is the least of it; certainly stamps Marins as an intriguing
go-his-own-twisted-way auteur
Shoot the Moon (1982) – magnificently angry
and agonized at times, but Parker’s heavy approach strangles more often than it
nurtures overall
Cave of Forgotten Dreams (2010) – Herzog
necessarily plays things straighter here than sometimes, but still delivers the
“ecstatic truth”..
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (2010) – clever
and tonally astute, but you get that after ten minutes; ultimately monotonous
and unrewarding
Vivre sa vie (1962) – for all its
structural brilliance and bleakness, has a delicacy and even a relative
optimism rare in later Godard
Handsome Harry (2010) – a small, maybe
overly restrained, but interesting contribution to the cinema of gay identity
reaching for the light
The Freethinker (1994) – long, deliberately
disorienting but rewarding example of Watkins’ radical approach to historical
investigation
Knight and Day (2010) – most engaging when
it escapes the machine and surrenders to happy abstraction, which isn’t almost
often enough
Les astronautes (1959) – a quirkily sweet
14-minute addition to cinematic dreams of transcendence, gently prophetic in
its fragility
Macao (1952) – full of echoes of
Sternberg’s earlier work, but comparatively mechanical and starved of true
desire; easily watchable though
Police (1985) – a powerful and insinuating
drama; astonishing in the scope of its reflection on the fluidity of morals,
structures, emotions
The Tree of Life (2011) – Malick’s
deployment of cinematic possibility is often stunning, but the film is too
intangible to fully satisfy
Ashes and Diamonds (1958) – most complex of
the trilogy; less rawly powerful than Kanal, but appropriately to its theme of
moral bereftness
Freakonomics (2010) – much like the book,
saturated in misplaced breeziness; even serious implications seem like mere
mental masturbation
Victim (1961) – limited by the necessity of
telling rather than showing, but remains a landmark, and still very moving and
provocative
Lola (1981) – a scathing fever-dream of
post-war Germany, as a new venality and savage self-gratification push
rectitude to the sidelines
Joan Rivers: a Piece of Work (2010) –
surprisingly revealing, informative & serious-minded; feels more important
than it objectively should
Kings of the Road (1976) – a fascinating,
unadorned & unforced amalgam of myth and character study; Wenders’ early
stature was well-deserved
The Pie-Covered Wagon (1932) – emblematic
Western drama enacted in ten minutes by toddlers; every bit as vital to film
history as it sounds!
Divorce Italian Style (1961) – the title
promises a romp, but the undercurrents are rather gloomy; sad characters
grabbing at what they can…
Howl (2010) – an effective memorial,
although I wonder if the animation (however proficient) doesn’t deny the
essential nature of poetry
Kameradschaft (1931) – still imposing for
its grim physicality; the ideology (let’s dissolve European borders!) has a
different flavor now…
Let Me In (2010) – amazingly successful at
evoking the spirit of the original without merely replicating or inadvertently
parodying it
The Green Room (1978) – strange, almost
perversely narrowly-focused film from Truffaut, alluring for its lack of
compromise if nothing else
Too Big to Fail (2011) – interesting and
remarkably efficient, but that’s also a limitation: we need the 6-hour Olivier
Assayas version!
Kanal (1957) – a powerful, unsparing vision of war as the death of all dignity,
light and hope; perhaps Wajda’s most enduring film
Red (2010) – even with
that cast, doesn’t take long until diminishing returns set in; Malkovich hints
at a more rewarding road not taken..
La Bande des quatre
(1989) – one of Rivette’s most vulnerable-seeming works, clinging to art as
protection against the chaos and darkness
Young Mr Lincoln
(1939) – among much else, remarkably contemporary in its focus on Lincoln’s
control of what we’d now call his ‘image’
Le petit theatre de Jean Renoir (1970) – a
beautiful farewell, evoking his classic achievements while still pushing in
quirky new directions
Midnight in Paris (2011) – Allen at his
most easefully assured and pleasantly self-referencing, evoking the comfort
level of his heyday
Miss Oyu (1951) – another fascinating study
in longing suppressed by ideology and culture, twisting lives into perverse,
tragic structures
Scott Walker : 30
Century Man (2006) – near-revelatory documentary on the musical genius (yes!),
superbly explaining his achievement
Le doulos (1962) – grimmer than Melville’s
later films; painstakingly grows into a near-textbook of existential survival
strategies…
Catfish (2010) – hard to react to, beyond
asking which of the participants in this relationship is really ultimately the
sadder case study?
Os Canibais (1988) – a rather neat filmic
joke, with increasingly tedious high art suddenly giving way after an
hour to sheer nonsense
The Southerner (1945) – Renoir's
mesmerizing study of a land still in formation, but already carrying much
embedded ideology and enmity
Le quattro volte (2010) – a sublime viewing
experience, maybe as much cosmic joke as profound meditation (but maybe there’s
no difference..)
Such Good Friends (1971) – very strange,
often remarkably perverse take on the acquiring of consciousness, with Burgess
Meredith’s bare ass!
N.U. (1948) – a reminder, if it were
needed, of the social observation and unforced humanity that nourished the
roots of Antonioni’s work
Quantum of Solace (2008) – squanders almost
every aspect of the Bond formula without injecting anything in return; messy
and humorless
36 Quai des Orfevres (2004) – yet another
movie seemingly inspired by Heat, but more proficient with guns and attitudes
than with souls
Stage Fright (1950) – structural &
tonal oddities & general eccentricities make a pretty interesting
counterpoint to Hitchcock’s major work
The Maid (2009) – an unusual, sometimes
blackly funny, ultimately shrewd and convincing take on a familiar theme of
feminine self-discovery
The Naked Kiss (1964) - carries a
remarkable ideological scope beneath a dazzlingly tight narrative, exposing
weakness and corruption galore
A Generation (1955) – the film’s
effectiveness as character drama and with ‘action’ sequences perhaps limits its
resonance as history now…
Rabbit Hole (2010) – well-crafted of
course, but never much more than a series of devices, lacking any distinct
insight on loss or grief
L’enfance nue (1968) – magnificent,
rigorous, deeply humane examination of an abandoned child, deep in “nature vs.
nurture” implications
The Informer (1935) – despite Oscar-winning
status, a minor Ford work; atmospheric, but forced and overwrought and
insufficiently nuanced
Alamar (2009) – a beautiful film, often
gently but radically apart from almost any other in its storytelling &
relationship with the planet
I Love You Philip Morris (2009) - always energetic and proficient, but never
really meaningful; one scene feels much the same as the next…
Scenes from a Marriage (1973) – a virtuoso, exhausting behavioral dance;
eerily fascinating, even if only intermittently identifiable
Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice
(1969) – easy to forget the seriousness (however genial) of Mazursky's
underlying sociological investigation
Grown Up Movie Star (2009) – ultimately
somewhat limited in its family dynamics, but with lots of real colour and
provocation along the way
The River (1951) – a beautiful, gently
complex meditation on maturity and acceptance, albeit deploying a selective
portrait of India
Giallo (2009) – an oddly flat and mostly
uninvolving Argento creation, with barely a trace of The Mother of Tears’ giddy
flare and "vision"
Not Quite Hollywood (2008) – as happily
galvanizing a documentary as you’ll ever see, breezily making the case for
Australian genre cinema
A Tale of Springtime (1990) – despite the
ultimate optimism, has a pervasive, fascinatingly conveyed sense of lives just
missing the point..
Mother and Child (2009) – impressive,
frequently even thrilling acting and characterization wins out over frequent
over-calculation
Cronaca di un amore (1950) – fascinating
early example of Antonioni’s filmic and emotional architecture, paving the way
for later heights
Meek’s Cutoff (2010) – a remarkably allusive, restrained,
meaningful film; Reichardt is already one of the indispensable American
directors
Trois couleurs: Bleu (1993) – handsome and scintillating on its own terms, but in a
way that’s ultimately unrevealing of real life I think
The Living End (1992) - still gorgeously
vivid and provocative, even visionary, in setting out an unapologetic
alternative ideology of HIV
Il Bidone (1955) – rooted in Fellini’s
early grittiness while dropping hints of the greater sprawl ahead; a bit
contrived, but engrossing
Slap Shot (1977) – hard to begrudge the
film its semi-classic status; has a great feel for hockey lore and culture (the
good, bad and ugly)
Last Train Home (2009) – finds an
intimately gripping narrative within a life built on parameters and sacrifices
one can hardly process
Nowhere Boy (2009) – a bit too polished to
evoke the period, but a terrifically charismatic, legend-friendly portrayal of
the young Lennon
The Case of the Grinning Cat (2004) – a
very witty, graceful, dead serious but clear-sightedly optimistic essay on
contemporary turbulence
Straw Dogs (1971) – still a savagely
brilliant quasi-cartoon, but also an extreme, troubling parable on America’s
directional crisis
Gente del Po (1943) – an 11-minute film
that captures an entire grim, unchanging world; you feel Antonioni’s emerging
mastery in every shot
Salt (2010) – very well-judged and
controlled, with Jolie a perfect focal point; consistently seems much less
absurd than it actually is
Notes toward an African Orestes (1970) -
intriguing text on the relevance of our cultural heritage in diagnosing a
complex, evolving world
The Party (1968) – it’s no Playtime, but
still a fascinating fantasy on (relative) purity grinding down the venal (if
only for one night)
The Adversary (1971) – an eloquent,
troubled study of a transitional generation in India, oddly forgotten relative
to Ray’s other works
Looking for Eric (2009) – much more
fanciful than Loach’s usual work, with a significantly diluted impact; sadly,
almost boring at times
Solutions locales pour un desordre global
(2010) - terrifically provocative and informative, with no time for pointless
gloss and "balance"
The Criminal Code (1931) – a cracking,
expertly-paced crime drama, its moral preoccupations pointing the way to Hawks’
greatest works
W.R. – Mysteries Of the Organism (1971) –
you remember the transgressive highpoints, but may forget the underlying
vulnerability (of a kind)
Best Worst Movie (2009) – a documentary
barely more objectively important than its subject, Troll 2, but no doubt a bit
more warm and human
Paisan (1946) – perhaps the film that,
through its amazing (if bleak) scope & humanity, best embodies the
achievement of Italian neo-realism
This Movie is Broken (2010) – beguiling
love song to Toronto, and to Broken Social Scene as embodying its diverse,
romantic if messy heart
Proces de Jeanne d'Arc (1962) - perhaps a
key counterbalancing statement by Bresson, in holding out the possibility of
true transcendence
Fair Game (2010) - lacks the moral
complexity of the greatest political movies, but still effective in pushing a
lot of important buttons
The Soft Skin (1964) – a forensic,
sociologically astute examination of a love affair; one of Truffaut’s gravest
and most gripping films
The Great Dictator (1940) – a bizarre,
brave amalgam of high and low; maybe its essential incoherence is its most
potent statement on war
A la conquete du pole (1912) – as with much
of Melies, delightful throughout, but also confirms his vision's repetitiveness
and odd limits
Deep Throat (1972) – occasional goofiness
aside, often now feels rather glum and grim, in part no doubt because of
Lovelace's ambivalence
In a Better World (2010) – gripping
throughout and often moving, but its modestly provocative thinking doesn't
ultimately go too deep
One, Two, Three (1961) - a brilliantly
constructed/paced comedic machine; one of Wilder’s most technically
stunning (if maybe not deepest)
When We Leave (2010) – engrossing and often
moving, but too straightforward to evoke anything more complex than
short-lived blood-boiling
Ministry of Fear (1944) – a terrific, compact
thriller; expertly & disorientatingly skeptical about allegiance, ideology,
reality itself
Dr. Jekyll and his Wives (1981) – strangely
alluring Borowczyk vision, driven less by eroticism than a dark sense of
escalating desperation
The Last of Sheila (1973) – superbly
conceived & pristinely executed; a nice cruel streak distinguishes it from mere hermetic game-playing
La nostra vita (2010) – rattles glossily
along, using up enough plot for two movies, but almost weirdly unprobing and
unrevealing
Rebel Without a
Cause (1955) - seems a bit forced and over-heated now, less subtle than Ray's
greatest work, but Dean remains mesmerizing
The Seventh Continent (1989) – clinically
eerie examination of a family’s utter breakdown; may leave you fearful for your
own stability
We Live in Public (2009) – perhaps most
interesting in contrast to The Social Network, emphasizing the capriciousness
of success & “vision”
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