Monthly Top Five

Crazy to think PG Cooper watched Hot Fuzz and didn’t get any of the jokes.

And we can all agree that Bad Boys II is the best.

*chokes back laugh*

Al from Happy Days or Jackie Chan?

I watched a whole lot of garbage this month. Neverending was especially pissed that I spent my time watching Godsend instead of Justice League, which is highly understandable. While it was a crappy viewing month, here's the top five:

5. 1900 (Bernardo Bertolucci, 1976)- 8/10

I watched the extended, NC-17 cut of this film which comes in at a whopping 5 hours 17 minutes. This is a sprawling film about Italy in the early 20th century that mainly focuses on the competitive relationship between the son of a wealthy landowner (Robert De Niro) and the bastard son of one of the workers (Gerard Depardieu) and the oncoming waves of socialism vs. fascism. The cinematography by Vittorio Storraro is stunning, showcasing a dynamic color palette from golden autumn colors in childhood to the harsh grays and ugliness of the sweeping fascism that dominates their adult lives. This is an often unpleasant watch, with animal killings, lots of full frontal nudity, graphic violence, and a wonderfully vicious performance from Donald Sutherland. But it's also a beautiful movie that depicts the hardships of the peasant class while also showing their happiness and appreciation for life that the upper class and fascists can't possibly fathom. There's a lot to criticize about the film, mainly its exorbitant length, but I was impressed by the bold display of filmmaking that Bertolucci brought to his epic and, while I won't be revisiting 1900 again anytime soon, it's one of those films that stick with you no matter what your reaction to it is.

4. Enter the Void (Gaspar Noe, 2009)- 8/10

If Bernardo Bertolucci leaves you feeling unpleasant, then certainly steer clear of one of cinema's great antagonists in Gaspar Noe. Noe hasn't made many films, but almost all of them have left indelible stamps on cinema nonetheless. Noe isn't concerned with pleasing the viewer whatsoever, and his narratives can be frustrating, repetitive, and downright unpleasant. But his cinema is absorbing through his form, which is undeniably strong. Irreversible is always commented on for its brutal rape scene, but the moment that stands out most for me is his opening Z-axis rotating tracking shot through a BDSM club set to the hum of a frequency of sound designed to make humans nauseous. This is largely what Enter the Void consists of. At nearly 3 hours, Noe's style and thin, misanthropic characters do get tiresome after awhile, but then Noe pulls you back in with another spectacular set piece, birds-eye tracking shot, or something completely outlandish and crazy that his characters are doing. The amount of convincing VFX shots for this indie film is staggering, and that Noe is able to pull them off by blending practical effects and movements with it is pretty remarkable. You can hate his stories, his characters, and his content, but Noe is a master of craft as if Goddard and Von Trier's brains merged to make a movie attacking mainstream cinema. Like 1900, there's a lot to criticize Enter the Void for and it's not a movie that I'd be surprised at all to find several detractors for. But also like 1900, I was completely entranced by what Noe was able to pull off, and just because it's unpleasant cinema doesn't mean it's not compelling cinema.

3. Judas and the Black Messiah (Shaka King, 2021)- 8/10

Read my review for it. Or be like Neverending and don't.

2. Nomadland (Chloe Zhao, 2020)- 8/10

Same.

1. Kes (Ken Loach, 1969)- 10/10

I watched a lot of crap this month, but I also watched my first masterpiece of the year as well so it sort of balances things out. Kes is a remarkably fantastic film; the epitome of the British Kitchen Sink film movement and perhaps the greatest film to come out of the U.K. altogether. Billy Casper lives in a Northern England mining town where things aren't so much bleak as they are repetitive and complacent. The adults seem to have given up and take to berating the children instead of serving as role models for them. The children as a result have resigned to acting up in school and all seem destined for the mines or some other crap career in the footsteps of their parents. Casper doesn't seem to be interested in much of anything, that is until he finds a falcon (a kestrel) and begins training it after school. This may seem like the narrative will play out in the fashion of the many films that have attempted to copy Kes, where Casper finds salvation in Kes and Kes in Casper and blah, blah, blah. But that's not the case at all here. In fact, Kes is one of the most free flowing, anti-cliche narratives I've ever seen but never feels as obtuse as to be labeled neorealism either. The movie sifts from one day at school and home to another, much like the people in the town. Ken Loach has had a long, storied career and is still making films today, but Kes will always be his masterpiece. It's a deceptively simple film that is anything but, and Loach is able to oscillate between hilarious moments of Casper being berated by idiot adults to disturbing interactions with him and his half-brother, Jud. To call it a coming of age story is just doing it a disservice attempting to pigeon hole (falcon hole?) it into a sub-genre that basks in the very sentimentalism that Kes completely avoids. It's likely the most important film from the U.K. that I've seen and is one of the last great masterpieces in a decade full of them.

No honorable mentions this month. These are the only ones that scored an 8 or higher. Sad.

In a movie filled with grotesque imagery, that was indeed the worst of all.

Doomsday is watching Peckinpah movies while I'm watching Monkeybone. I need to get my shit together before Neverending has me committed.

March's Top 5

1) Dersu Uzala (1975) - This one has been on my list for a while as I always welcome new watches of Akira Kurosawa films. It's a story that doesn't necessarily have a traditional story structure but is still broken up into clear acts as we watch a Russian Captain and his team of surveyors come across Dersu, a 'Goldi' who knows his lay of the land and survival skills that impress his new companions and saves their necks on more than one occasion. Eventually time and innovation catches up to Dersu and the relationship he has with the Captain changes accordingly. It's more subtle than many of Kurosawa's other films but it's still powerful and deep, making it another one that I wish Criterion would release on blu-ray. I can't even remember the last Kurosawa they put out or even upgraded but I feel like it's been years

2) A Sun (2019) - I hadn't heard of this until Dracula wrote about it in his Golden Stake thread and I thought it might be good to squeeze another movie in from last year considering how few I even watched. I'm glad I did though as A Sun is a heavy yet enjoyably watchable movie about a boy who goes to juvenile detention for a crime he participated in then struggles to rebuild his life with his family who are also experiencing their own hardships. It's a 150 minute film that feels like it's half as long which is funny considering it's a family drama that expertly mixes drama, comedy and suspense in perfect amounts. It's a fine film and hopefully it finds a more widespread audience which it rightfully deserves.

3) High Sierra (1941) - A pre-Casablanca Humphrey Bogart stars as a bank robber sprung from prison to lead a heist while hiding out in the Sierra Mountains of California. It's a pretty straight-forward crime caper with Bogart playing the hardened gangster as he was typically cast before Casablanca helped change his image. It's a pretty straight forward noir and if you ignore the fact that these characters seem to travel back and forth between the Sierras and Los Angeles in a matter of minutes instead of the several hours it would really take then you'll find a more than capable crime drama with some fun crosses, double crosses and Bogart carrying the movie in his usual style.

4) You Only Live Once (1937) - A Fritz Lang movie starring a young Henry Fonda (he wasn't even top billed). This was in the Lovers on the Run collection on Criterion Channel and is certainly one of the earliest iterations of that plotline that I know about. Fonda stars as an ex-con who's framed for a job and on the day of his execution he escapes prison and runs off with his wife. These movies always and only end one way but it's still a compelling watch with some great shots from the always compelling Lang.

5) TIE - Deadline U.S.A. (1952) - Humphrey Bogart stars as an editor at a newspaper during its final days before being bought out. Hearkening back to the noble intentions of its founder, he tells his reporters to investigate a gangster so his newspaper can go out on a high note regardless of the danger it puts him in. There are some sappy moments like when the Battle Hymn of the Republic (Glory Glory Hallelujah) plays over some of the third act scenes but its a fast paced movie that puts the news in focus which could work in any time period.
5) TIE - Leave Her To Heaven (1945) - An author meets a beautiful woman on a train, get caught up in a whirlwind romance and within days find themselves married. He soon realizes though that her obsession with him forces her to drive people away with sometimes violent and deadly results. It gets off to a slow start but when the wife finally sinks her claws into her new husband things start to go downhill at a pretty swift speed. There are also some pretty brutal themes that you normally wouldn't see in a movie of that time period but hey, I always welcome something that pushes the envelope.

Honorable Mention:
The VelociPastor - You would think #1GodzillaFan held me at gunpoint to watch this but alas, someone at work recommended I watch it. It's actually quite funny and the whole thing is completely tongue in cheek and there are quite a few laugh out loud moments with ridiculous gags, funny dialogue etc. These kinds of movies aren't usually in my wheelhouse but this was a fun one to see.

Other watches:
Scoop
The Foot Fist Way
Justice League (2017)

It's one of the eight I was going to offer, yes.

Nailed it.

Also while I won't spoil my bottom ten of 2020 list, of the movies I watched this month I just feel like saying that no matter how bad you think Tom & Jerry is...it's way worse.

Well the pedigree attached to the project is certainly there. Looks fun.

They definitely missed the boat on all the quarantine memes that would've been inspired by it, and as we all know that's how we measure a film's true success these days.