Dir. Pablo Larrain. Starring Kristen Stewart, Timothy Spall, Sally Hawkins Spoilers for a recent film, but one of the best things about Spencer is that I’m not sure it can actually be spoiled in any meaningful way. In the first few minutes of the movie, a fleet of Land Rovers drives perilously close to the… Read More Spencer (2021)
Dir. Alfonso Cuaron. Starring Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, Emma Watson As a lad, I was so certain that the job of a filmmaker was to be as faithful as possible to the material s/he adapted. I have been wised up significantly since then, but I have to confess that because of that particular foible, I… Read More Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004)
For a brief introduction and a running list of movies covered in this project, click here 15) Mr. Turner (2014), directed by Mike Leigh J.M.W. Turner was famous for his seascapes. There’s nary a person to be found there; there are the clouds, the sun, the ships, of course the water. But people are of less interest,… Read More Better than BFI’s Top 100: 15-11
For a brief introduction and a running list of movies covered in this project, click here 35) The Man in the White Suit (1951), directed by Alexander Mackendrick The most successful of the British labor comedies, The Man in the White Suit does a good job of making the comedy work. This is a fairly zany movie largely… Read More Better than BFI’s Top 100: 35-31
For a brief introduction and a running list of movies covered in this project, click here 65 Straw Dogs (1971), directed by Sam Peckinpah Why didn’t they call it The Violent Bear Trap It Away? Hee hee. Seriously, though, when that thing finally goes off I gasped. It was not a cute “Oh, merciful heavens” gasp, but one… Read More Better than BFI’s Top 100: 65-61
Dir. Mike Leigh. Starring Brenda Blethyn, Marianne Jean-Baptiste, Timothy Spall I’m not the world’s foremost Mike Leigh expert or anything, but I was amazed when he did something I’d never seen him do before in a movie: he rushed. The movie’s final confrontation is like coming downstairs, missing one, stumbling, but adjusting in the last… Read More Secrets and Lies (1996)
Dir. Mike Leigh. Starring Timothy Spall, Dorothy Atkinson, Marion Bailey It takes a great will to make a biopic which does not lead to something. Say that Topsy-Turvy is a biopic, which I don’t know that I agree with but wouldn’t argue long about, and it is a clear case of leading up to a moment. Specifically, the movie… Read More Mr. Turner (2014)
Dir. Mike Leigh. Starring Jim Broadbent, Allan Corduner, Michael Savage Some movies are perfect in the grammatical, Latin sense. Casablanca is a perfect movie. Ali: Fear Eats the Soul is a perfect movie. So are The Leopard, Ordet, and The Thin Red Line. (Making a list of “perfect movies” might be a potentially fatal wormhole.) These movies accomplish: at the end,… Read More Topsy-Turvy (1999)
Dir. Mike Leigh. Starring Alison Steadman, Jane Horrocks, Jim Broadbent Dir. Greta Gerwig. Starring Saoirse Ronan, Laurie Metcalf, Tracy Letts Some spoilers below for Lady Bird. And Life is Sweet, too, but that movie is older than me and I think I’ll be forgiven for “spoiling” it. Patience is a virtue, so we hear, and… Read More Life is Sweet (1990) and Lady Bird (2017)
Seeing Things Secondhand 