- The Last Seduction (94, A-): Nasty, sexy noir stays slick even as its morals and manipulations build layers. Fiorentino’s perfection. 6/1/19
- Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (94, B-): Energetically grooves to its own beat. Dated and uneven in different ways, some more fun than others. 6/5/19
- Never liked the dancing in the drag performances. Costumes utterly delightful, but should they be the *whole* show?
- Gosford Park (01, A-): A singular entry in Altman’s career, outside his milieu yet richly in conversation with his style and themes. 6/6/19
- My very first Altman – saw it sometime in high school, hitting that sweet spot of “I know I like this and am sure I need to learn a lot more to fully appreciate this since it’s pretty slow”. Remember being confused why Scott Thomas wasn’t nominated, a sentiment I still hold
- In the Bedroom (01, C+): Wan yet visibly strained mood of tragedy. Fields shows disproportionate attention towards his characters and actors. 6/7/19
- Iris (01, B): Colder than Still Alice. Equally capable of moving, deft, and histrionic scenes. Strong quartet of performances. 6/7/19
- A Beautiful Mind (01, C-): Few qualifications to handle its increasingly complex story. Some cohering elements. Overstuffed yet hollow. 6/8/19
- The Royal Tenenbaums (01, B/B-): Characters deserve better setup than Bad Dad Returns, even if it works. Key artists vivify it beautifully. 6/12/19
- Julie & Julia (09, B-): Delectable comfort food, even if the recipe isn’t perfect. Interesting on fame and fandom. Streep, Tucci a lovely couple. 6/12/19
- The Cell (00, A-/A): Audiovisually astounding. Recoups its cliches. Cat/Carl bond indelible. Sense it could implode only strengthens it. 6/12/19
- Detective Pikachu (19, C+/B-): Some perfunctory beats, but a genuinely fun time that doesn’t get wrapped up in fan service. Odd mash of tones. 6/14/29
- The Man Who Cried (01, D+): Blanchett nails it. Handsomely made. Otherwise: bad lipsyncing, blank actors, foggy politics all doom it. 6/14/19
- A.I. Artificial Intelligence (01, B+/A-): First hour as tense a sci-fi study of personhood and family as I’ve ever seen. Second loosens into something baggier, messier, equally fascinating in its own way. 6/14/19
- Baby Boy (01, B): Singleton’s take on a grown man finally growing up. Winning cast. Equally appealing with lower and higher stakes. 6/15/19
- The Man Who Wasn’t There (01, B): Thornton, Deakins hold it together. I admire the varied attempts at tone but it just plays as uneven. 6/16/19
- Thornton’s quiet, observant performance kept bringing me back to Yoo Ah-in’s work in Burning, another noir I couldn’t quite “get” but had a lot of real assets. Johansson and Jenkins were unexpected high points for me, too.
- John Wick (14, C): Amazingly less stylish and interesting than Atomic Blonde. Some vivid scenes, but not always in a good way. 6/17/19
- Wit (01, B+): Steadfast hold to a tough story, reservoir of feeling, and fluid craft a rare trifecta for play adapatations. Atkins the MVP of a solid cast. 6/17/19
- Vanilla Sky (01, D+/C-): Can bad direction really hurt material this messy? Cruise irritating. Weirdness inchoate instead of interesting. 6/19/19
- Ali (01, B+): Not all its experiments work, but so exciting to see a biopic this formally vigorous and this aloof about impressing us, even as it fully attunes to the man it celebrates. 6/19/19
- Amores Perros (01, A): Rot, blood, and sadness, served plausibly and viciously but without moralizing or fetishism. Iñáritu’s best. 6/20/19
- Memento (B+/A-): Layers of temporal and personal dissonance all the more impressive for being so personal in scale. Pearce! 6/22/19
- La Cienága (01, A-): The depth of a great novel, emboldened by Martel’s singular ideas about what a movie can feel, look, and sound(!) like. 6/22/19
- The Shipping News (01, D): I can’t even pretend to have thoughts on this. It’s well shot. Almost every other individual component is hard to believe, or hard to stomach. Wavey Prowse???? Beaufield Nutbeem????? 6/23/19
- John Wick 2 (17, B/B+): Massive step up in style, plot, worldbuilding. Welcome beats of humor and paranoia. An ideal sequel. 6/24/19
- You think there’s like. A gig economy of underpaid millennial assassins in the John Wick universe
- How many degrees away is John Wick from Emilio Echevarría in Amores perros? Feel like those dudes would have a lot to talk about
- Laura (44, A): Watched Laura with my friend Will tonight and it just struck me this time that the exorbitant loans Judith Anderson gives Vincent Price is maybe about what I make in a month on $10/hr part time. 6/24/19
- $1500 a month? Oh, I can make that. I won’t have it, cuz of rent and food and clothes and stuff, but I can make it. Send me back to the 40’s and I hope to have a home exactly like Clifton Webb’s, including that bizarrely placed bathtub.
- The Deep End (01, B+): Richer, more insightful take on upper-middle class domestic traumas than In the Bedroom. Marvelously shot. Tilda! 6/24/19
- The Devil’s Backbone (01, B): Some notes familiar to del Toro, but darker and nervier than I expected without betraying his sensibilities. 6/28/19
- Godzilla: King of the Monsters (19, C+?): I see and agree with the complaints against it but can’t care. Godzilla’s a friend. Monster fights are cool. I see what’s bad and loved the good stuff. 6/31/19
- Shin Godzilla (16, B+/A-): My favorite interpretation of Godzilla. Politically sharp, with layers of tone and allegory. Excitingly made. Peak lizard design. Pretty cool humans too, 6/31/19
- Donnie Darko (01, A-): Brilliantly nimble with tone. Gives equal attention to its characters and the mysteries of the universe. McDonnell! 6/31/19
- That it gets to be so many wonderful things while keeping its core an enigma only makes it richer.
- Shadows (19, C+): Ravishing colors and costumes. Great fights. Wish its dramas felt more interesting but I admire its excesses. 6/31/19
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