As before, the location of full reviews for each film are indicated at the end of each section should you wish to find and read them.
This "hanging around" movie, one copiously filled with an endless stream of proudly executed profanities and narcotically and scatologically filled vulgarities, was also one of the decade's most inventively raucous and hedonistic comedies.
Seth Rogen and Evan Golberg's ultra-meta film during which Rogen and his merry band of collaborators from the Judd Apatow universe and more, all play wildly exaggerated versions of themselves as they all confront the end of existence itself due to nothing less than The Rapture while holed up inside of James Franco's house is the brilliant brick launched through the stagnant motion picture window. It is a film that constantly surprises and defies expectations while constantly keeping you off guard through fall down on the theater floor comedy as well as legitimate terror and sharp theological debates, especially as Rogen and his friends all wonder why they did not ascend to Heaven and were left on Earth, which is engulfed in Armageddon.
Voluminously nasty, peppered with graphic violence and an honest existential crisis, "This Is The End" was a rarity indeed. It is rare to find a mainstream Hollywood film that is this riotously gleeful to subvert and downright break every possible convention, while also taking their film's concept all the way to the wall and beyond without blinking.
(Originally reviewed July 4, 2013)
Fully circumventing all of the cliches and standard rhythms of a "disease tearjerker" film with deeply perceptive characters, a heaping amount of unsentimental wit and an emotional rawness that cut straight to the bone, this film let me shattered to the point where I could not move.
The story of an introverted, laconic, emotionally guarded high school Senior (played by Thomas Mann) and his friendships with the titular Earl (RJ Cyler) and his neighbor Rachel (Olivia Cooke), who is dying from Stage 4 Leukemia may seem like a well intentioned but overwrought teen soap opera but on the contrary, is a scruffier, more acerbic and cinematically inventive affair complete with a non-linear narrative, movie parodies, stop-motion animation and a healthy amount of Brian Eno songs to augment the lives and times of this trio of intelligent, verbose teenagers all faced with a life altering and life ending event.
Yet for all of the razzle dazzle aesthetics, Director Alfonso Gomez-Rejon also knows precisely when to strip any sense of artifice away and just allow the characters and story to breathe and subject itself to silences that are piercing, all the while presenting the painful act of wishing to disengage with life just at the moment life is desperately trying to engage with you.
(Originally reviewed July 3, 2015)
Tackling our nation's gun violence epidemic with a force and fury he hadn't displayed in ages, Spike Lee's audacious satire, which updates the Greek play Lysistrata to 2015 Chicago, was rightfully and righteously explosive.
With a concoction that was equal parts Stanley Kubrick, Milos Forman, Baz Lurhmann and even the 1970's output from Funkadelic, as well as dialogue that is told almost exclusively in verse no less, Lee utilizes his Lysistrata (an excellent Teyonah Parris) and her band of female army to enact a sex strike to hopefully end the gun violence, which at the film's start, has claimed the life of an 11 year old.
Overflowing with raw anger, a cinematic inventiveness that defied easy categorization, wildly bawdy humor and a wrenching mid-film extended monologue from the crusading neighborhood anti-gun activist, Roman Catholic priest, played by a towering John Cusack (who speaks himself nearly hoarse and does the soul of Chicago proud), Spike Lee's "Chi-Raq" is an over-the top film for our over-the top times and it is also thunderously essential viewing.
(Originally reviewed December 9, 2015)
Magical, magnificent and majestic for the eyes, heart and soul, Ang Lee's metaphysical masterpiece (I love alliteration), adapted from Yann Martel's reportedly unfilmmable novel, is a timeless spiritual odyssey designed to be re-visited and re-experienced over and again.
Yes, the central survival story of young Pi (sensationally played by Suraj Sharma), lost at sea alongside an orangutan, a zebra, a hyena and a tiger named "Richard Parker" is a visual astonishment, where the CGI technology is utilized at its most artistic, as the wonderment we witness is fully representative of Pi's shifting states of sanity and spiritual crisis. But, Lee never allows the technology to overshadow the emotional reach of his film which delves deeply into themes of inter-connectivity, the symbiotic nature between humans, animals and the environment and most importantly, especially as we now all exist in a world where nuance is discouraged, the inter-locked relationship between spirituality and science, for they exist inside of each other while also inspiring both ends of the spectrum.
Beyond even all of those accomplishments, Ang Lee has fashioned a story which is entirely about the art of storytelling itself, and how stories are designed to being essential forms of connective tissue binding us to each other, all living things as well as to our deepest inner selves. Absolutely remarkable, thrilling work that dazzles the eyes, invigorates the mind and satiates the soul
(Originally reviewed November 25, 2012)
A brilliant, multi-layered film housed with a tremendous empathy, Director Bill Pohlad's biopic of The Beach Boys' Brian Wilson fully transcends music as it celebrates Wilson's iconic songs and flies divinely into the heights and depths of the human spirit.
Completely eschewing with the standard "rise, fall and rise" narrative structure, we are given a cross-cutting exploration into Brian Wilson during two crucial periods of his life: the mid to late 1960's creative and chart topping heights and eventual mental breakdown (played in these sections by Paul Dano) and the late 1980's where an over medicated, depressed, psychologically damaged Wilson (played in these sections by John Cusack) is under the full control of of his duplicitous therapist (Paul Giamatti) and hopes to rebuild his life and sanity through the love of a car saleswoman (played by Elizabeth Banks).
The idea of having both Dano and Cusack portray Brian Wilson at different life stages was a masterstroke as each of them not only delivered two of the finest performances of their respective careers, it was truly eerie to see how well they played off of each other while never sharing a scene, completely merging two performances into one man. Even further, these two masterful performances are contained within Pohlad's masterful filmmaking, via stunning Cinematography by Robert Yeoman and Composer Atticus Ross' outstanding sound collage which creates the sensation of living inside of a Beach Boys soundscape, which flows effortlessly through time itself and throughout themes of imprisonment to empowerment, selfishness to selflessness, clarity to madness, the long ranging damages of physical and psychological abuse and the healing powers of love and acceptance.
(Originally reviewed June 12, 2015)
Believe me, I was of the mind that the world never needed another "Rocky" anything ever again, and so who knew that Director Ryan Coogler would enter Sylvester Stallone's conceptual arena and create what is nothing less than the finest installment since "Rocky II" (1979).
What a feat is was for Coogler, to step into the ring, so to speak, and then continue and re-invent the Rocky Balboa chronicles via the character of Adonis Creed (Michael B Jordan), the illegitimate son of the long deceased Apollo Creed, who is wrestling with issues of self-discovery, identity, determining his place in the world and building a legacy while trying to understand the legacy he was born from and lives within the shadow of. Jordan, visibly hungry in this star-making role, turns in a ferocious performance, while Stallone, returning as Rocky, emits a wonderful piece of work as he had not been this natural, loose and honestly affecting in decades--his Oscar nomination was more than deserved.
But "Creed" in its entirety, is truly one of the most unlikely films to succeed so highly with me. As entertaining as it is, it is the honesty and authenticity of the proceedings that makes this film soar. There is not one moment of contrivance as Coogler ensures all of the emotions are as raw and as lived in to the point of being primal. Therefore, we re-connect to why we fell in love with Rocky Balboa in the first place while we simultaneously and instantly become invested in Adonis' journey as "Creed" pays homage and forges ahead with superior class and passion.
(Originally reviewed December 13, 2015)
This stunning, exquisite coming-of-age romance drama set "somewhere in Northern Italy" during the summer of 1983 is as lush and as languid as a warm, humid, lazy, long summer's day where possibilities seem endless and yet, time itself feels as if it has all but ceased entirely. It is also a film of transformative sexual awakening, fueled by all manner of emotional and existential ideas and ideals that clash, confound and congeal.
Although the film's central relationship between teenager Timothee Chalamet and older graduate student Armie Hammer is homosexual, "Call Me By Your Name" is not necessarily a "coming out coming of age" film. But it is one that will unearth deeply internalized desire(s) that may prove to be as revealing and as painful as they are for the characters. Guadagnino's story delves meticulously into intimate themes of sexuality from repression, confusion, concealment, exuberance, acceptance, anxiety and self-denial, which even then forces the characters, as well as ourselves, to ask the following: What is the truth of myself and what does it mean to deny myself that truth?
"Call Me By Your Name" is an aching, purposefully meandering film, one that invites you to luxuriate in memory and its resplendent sense of timelessness where self-discovery arrives like a puzzle finally completed, which each piece is a mental breadcrumb meant to be re-discovered, leading you to a newfound sense of home.
(Originally reviewed January 26, 2018)
This film might seem to be an unlikely choice to place upon this list but as I remember it and the emotions it stirred, it felt more than natural that it should be included. Yes, indeed, none other than Martin Scorsese made this PG rated children's film but that being said, it is a film that never once plays to the lowest common denominator regarding entertainment directed at our youngest viewers. On the contrary, Scorsese, as would be expected from a filmmaker of his caliber and rightful legend, has created a film experience that is unapologetically artful, demanding and truthfully, a film that could conceivably grow with a young audience...that is, if given the chance to see it.
Based upon the novel by Brian Selznick, the 1930's set "Hugo" finds our titular hero (Asa Butterfield), orphaned, alone and secretly living within the walls of a massive Parisian train station who soon forges crucial relationships with Georges (Ben Kingsley), the mercurial proprietor of the station's toy shop, and the smart, voracious reader Isabelle (Chloe Grace Moretz), who is also Georges' goddaughter.
Again, Scorsese has constructed an experience that informs audiences that even our smallest viewers deserve nothing less than the best we can provide for them and in terms of movies, he has delivered a sumptuous masterpiece that is superbly child friendly with a simple plot, gorgeously bold colors, stunning motifs of heart shaped keys and all manner of gears and lustrous moving parts, a child hero and heroine to root for and deeply emotional messages of community, friendship and family. Visually immersive and enchanting for certain but also profound in its love for art, literature, inspiration and dreams, to the point where this film also exists as Scorsese's voice to us as to why he became a filmmaker, "Hugo" is distinctly clean, pure of heart and spirit and elicits the spark to provide endless creativity. It is nothing less than Martin Scorsese's gift to us should we choose to open it.
(Originally reviewed November 25, 2011)
This unrepentantly bitter comedy from Jason Reitman, scripted by Diablo Cody and starring Charlize Theron in a bruising performance as an unrepentantly unlikable character, a former high school mean girl and now a 37-year-old mean woman ghostwriter for a fading teen book series caught in the downward spiral of her life, who attends her school's class reunion, is a grim unforgiving effort that never strikes a false note.
In his very best work, Reitman has more than proven himself to being a masterful chronicler of modern 21st century American life, and "Young Adult" is no exception as his storytelling hand remains consistent, unforced and unafraid to reveal dark, uncomfortable truths and behaviors, which are indeed universal. Charlize Theron, in a decade of terrific performances, delivers one of her strongest as she acts from the inside out and with a complete lack of vanity. For as attractive as we know Theron clearly is, her performance perfectly reveals an ugliness which ultimately reflects her character's damaged inner being combined with her rampant alcoholism. It is a portrait of a raw arrested development of a woman attempting to still live her adult life through the prism of her cherished 1990's teen years, terrified to admit to herself that she is failing and therefore, unleashes her rage at the world.
"Young Adult" is a painful ode to the realization of how middle age does not always mean that one has ascended to a newfound state of maturity. This is a film about adult adolescence and emotional paralysis.
(Originally reviewed December 19, 2011)
DIRECTED BY MICHAEL RAPAPORT (2011)
One of the decade's best music documentaries arrived with this joyous, illuminating effort and filmmaking debut from actor Michael Rapaport, whose tribute to one of hip-hop's most influential, innovative and downright greatest groups richly enhanced and enlivened their untouchable artistic legacy.
Rapaport succinctly and lovingly performs the requisite duty of presenting the story of A Tribe Called Quest from formation to disbandment in vivid detail and featuring interviews with all four members, Q-Tip, Ali Shaheed Muhammad, Jarobi and the late Phife Dawg (who passed away years after the completion due to complications from diabetes), all of whom are loquacious, individualistic, fascinating men, each of whom are deserving of their own documentaries. Beyond that, the film scales tremendous heights as it details the band's intensely personal connections to the world that inspired them, from the neighborhoods in which they grew up and first met, to the local DJs and radio heroes and most certainly, to each other and like minded artists from the collectives of De La Soul, The Jungle Brothers and more.
Yet, the beating heart of the film is the then fractured, yin-yang relationship between Q-Tip and Phife Dawg, and how these two men, these fluidly lyrical wordsmiths and magnetically compelling individuals and interview subjects were unable to simply speak their hearts to each other during this period and Rapaport presents this dichotomy with truth and eloquence.
(Originally reviewed September 17, 2011)
COMING SOON...#30-21!!!
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