Go out and see a movie - Please!

Constant companion and I caught a 4 p.m. matinee of the latest Pedro Almodóvar film yesterday at Spectrum 8 Theatres in Albany - and got a private showing, as no one else was there. Admittedly, when the mercury hits single digits, it takes fortitude to leave the house, but we love movies and enjoy seeing them the old-fashioned way, so we bundled up and headed out.

Parallel Mothers is a great movie, by the way, with plot twists, first-rate acting, a deeply felt perspective on the legacy of conflict, and the wonderful, colorful Spanish settings that Almodóvar always delivers. But we left the theater feeling a bit depressed by the experience. And it didn't help to see from the street that the drinks establishment next door was chock full of patrons.

With everyone streaming at home from a hundred platforms, spooked by the Omicron variant, and just plain self-absorbed, it's hard to have much hope for the future of the small movie theaters that dependably screen the sort of movies we love: independent, foreign, plot-driven, devoid of car chases and explosions.

I've chosen to have none of the home-based means by which the majority of us now enjoy films. No cable, no Netflix, no Amazon Prime - just antenna-fed TV and DVDs from the library, augmented by online rentals from Kino Lorber, a foreign-film distributor that fills the gaps left by the Spectrum. That leaves plenty of money in the budget to pay for tickets.

Currently, the Spectrum (an eight-screener on a main thoroughfare in the city) is showing several new releases that will contend for Oscars, including Licorice Pizza, Drive My Car, The Tragedy of Macbeth, and Nightmare Alley. I hope to see all of those before they leave the big screen, and will make an extra effort to do so. 

Going out to a movie still fills me with anticipation, freshens my step, and then fulfils that latent desire to be enveloped in the dark, alone or with friends, wrapped up in a story, with brilliant images, resonant sounds, and anonymous fellow theatergoers who sometimes have a word or two of comment during the credits.

I used to regularly run into friends at the Spectrum, and even made a new friend on occasion as we paused in the lobby to share our responses to a good film. Now, it's usually just the staff, who somehow still have jobs, but these days clearly seem to have not enough to do.

The Spectrum is part of a national chain (Landmark), which has theaters all over the United States, most of them in far larger markets than ours. I suppose those venues are making enough money to help keep this one open. But it's not something I would want to count on for long. 

So, please, if you value the presence of a great independent movie theater in your region, and wouldn't want to see it close, get up off the couch, grab a coat and the keys, and go support it. You'll be glad you did.

Note: I'm in Albany, so the Spectrum on Delaware Avenue is my go-to cinema - but there are several other small, independent movie theaters in the Capital Region that equally deserve your support, including the Criterion in Saratoga Springs and the Movieland 6 in Schenectady, both of which are owned by Bow Tie Cinemas, a national chain with 38 venues - coincidentally, the same number as Landmark.

Too much Tucci?

It was the early 1990s when people began telling me that there was an obscure television actor who looked just like me. Not being much of a TV watcher, I had no idea who he was until the movie Big Night* came out in 1996, and I realized they'd been talking about Stanley Tucci. I’ve been a fan ever since.

And yes, he still looks like me - but now he’s famous, and he’s written a nice little book about his lifelong love affair with food. As Tucci puts it, he is "Italian on both sides" … so obsessing about food comes naturally. He’s also an experienced writer, with several film scripts to his credit, making Taste: My Life Through Food much more than the average celebrity memoir. And, when it comes to food, he’s got plenty to talk about.

You may already be aware of a TV series that ran last winter on CNN called Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy, in which our hero goes to various regions of Italy and explores some of their local food specialties, oohing and aahing in ecstasy along the way. It's a great series, slated to continue until (I hope) all 20 regions of Italy have been covered.

Me and Stanley - He's got a better makeup
man, but I speak better Italian ... so I guess
that makes us even!

photo: Robert Blake

Between the first six episodes of Searching for Italy, and the book Taste, you get to know a lot about Stanley (or The Tooch, as I like to call him), including various facts about his family, but most of all you learn just how completely obsessed with food he is and always has been. Me, I don't resemble the Tooch in this way - which became a problem about halfway through the book, as I skipped over most of the recipes and, I'll admit, some of the slightly overlong descriptions of whatever Stanley loves to eat.

For true foodies, I'm sure this wouldn't be an issue, but I disclose to be honest and thorough. On the other hand, I am probably even more of an Italophile than the Tooch himself, so his stories that involve anything cultural fall on wide-open ears. And, boy, does he have stories, which he shares in a fluent, likeable voice that is clearly his own (no ghost writer here). Stanley seems to think of himself as great company, and for a time I thought so, too - but, after a while, that particular voice began to seem a bit self-indulgent, and I grew tired of it.

Another aspect of Taste that I found a bit of a bore was the name-dropping. OK, given that Tucci hangs out with the likes of Meryl Streep and George Clooney, it's understandable that he'd want the reader to know that ... and, maybe to his credit (I can't decide), he calls himself out on the name-dropping each time he does it. But it's still name dropping, and it's still tiresome to old, un-famous me.

The book also contains two big revelations, which ***spoiler alert*** I am about to detail. The first is that Tucci recently had a pretty bad form of mouth cancer that not only threatened his life, it took away his ability to enjoy food for two years. And that plain sucks. Luckily, treatment and endurance won out and, by the end of the book, he was back to eating almost normally.

The second revelation is even more disturbing - that Tucci has tired of acting and really just wants to feed people from now on. Aw, jeez, Stanley! As we aren't in the realm of Meryl and George (or of the Tooch's other friends and relatives), that makes us the losers. I will definitely miss Stanley Tucci the actor. Though there remains the fact that CNN has renewed his wonderful TV series ... and I can't wait to see what regions of Italy he'll visit next (my Italian-American wife is rooting hard for Abruzzo)!

*Big Night is a terrific independent film starring Tucci, Tony Shalhoub, Minnie Driver, Ian Holm, and Isabella Rossellini that put Stanley’s name on the map and boasts a 96% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

We went to the Spectrum!

Here's the evidence. You can see our
assigned seats highlighted in yellow
by the box office attendant.

I've been regularly attending movies at Albany's Spectrum 8 Theatre since it opened in 1983 (and its progenitor Third Street Theater for years before that), so you can imagine the excitement my companion and I felt last night as we set out to see Minari on the first day this venue was operating in more than a year. It was like being a kid again.

You also may be surprised to learn that I do not have Netflix (nor Amazon Prime, nor Hulu, etc. - not even cable TV), so with the theaters shut down since last March, and the library prohibiting on-site browsing until a week or two ago, the last year has had its challenges for my movie viewing habit. This was somewhat alleviated by the following compromises:

1. Netflix et al at a friend's house: A few of my friends and I came to an understanding early in the pandemic that we would trust each other's behavior enough to remain in each other's pods (thankfully, with perfect results, i.e. none of us got or transmitted COVID). And one of those couples has a bunch of streaming services and a generous heart. So, from time to time, we'd make a movie date and the four of us would cozy up in their living room to watch something special (among them: My Octopus Teacher).
2. Borrowing from the library (in my case, Albany Public): This has always been a primary source for me, both to pick up on recent stuff that I'd somehow missed (often due to too-short local runs) and to fill in any of the many gaps in my viewing history. Once the library began to accommodate curbside pickup, I began to regularly request and then borrow whatever I could think of to ask for that they had available (trickier than browsing, as you have to know what to look for, but still quite useful).
3. Hoopla: Another library service, this is a free streaming platform (well, free to use - I assume the library pays something for it) that has a very big selection of not always very desirable movies (from what I've heard, Kanopy is better, but Albany doesn't offer it). Through that, we haven't seen any current or recent hits, but in a pinch it proved to be a lifesaver, and we discovered some really cool stuff, especially documentaries (such as one about the thousands of rabbits that flourished in the no-man's-land between the two sides of the Berlin Wall).
4. Pay-per-view streaming: Some films that probably would have come to the Spectrum had it been open were not available on any of the other services, and could only be seen by paying a fee. Considering that we would have gladly forked over a twenty to see the best of these in the theater, paying $12 to watch them at home was well worth it (that's the usual rate for good stuff, though some movies are cheaper, depending on the source). This was great, once we got it going, but there were a couple of hitches at first, due to our not being hooked up for streaming to begin with. The really tricky part was finding an adapter to connect my new-ish laptop to our 12-year-old unsmart TV - and then waiting several weeks for it to be delivered, back when global commerce was totally disrupted by the "Wuhan" virus. But it worked out pretty great in the end, highlighted by our viewing of my favorite movie of 2020, Martin Eden. 

By the way, last night was the fourth time I've been to the actual movies since the pandemic re-openings began, and my recent experiences seeing two films at The Madison Theatre in Albany, and one at Criterion Cinemas in Saratoga Springs were very good - I will gladly return to either of them as needed. 

But, now, we have our favorite Spectrum again, and I am stoked, both for the sheer pleasure of it and because it means it won't be long before I've seen enough of the best films of last year to be able to write my annual roundup - maybe even before they announce 2020's belated Oscar winners.

Note for the potentially nervous: At all three theaters I've attended, you get an assigned seat, there's plenty of distance between groups, and masks are required - so it's as safe as you're going to get in this world.

DEAR DAVID / HI JAN: Brickman & Galligan discuss film

In an editorial recently published at Nippertown, David and Capital Region expat Jan Galligan discuss the film 1917 through a series of emails. The piece is also being published in print in the Puerto Rican journal En Rojo (pending translation into Spanish).

Here's a taste of their discussion:

David:

Thanks for sending your Nippertown article with your selections for The Best of 2019. We enjoyed your take on all the films being considered for the 2020 Academy Awards and agree with your selection of 1917 as one the best films of last year.

Here’s our interpretation of that Sam Mendes movie:

The first half of the film, until the main character is shot and the screen goes black (for a significantly long time) is all real, it actually happens.

The second half of the film, when he “wakes up” after that long blackout, all takes place in his imagination ... 

To read the rest, click here.

The best films of 2019

George McKay, center, probably deserved an Oscar nod for his lead role in 1917.

Well, I'm a little late to the party, but I have a couple of good excuses - and, anyway, at least I get to publish my list before the Oscars are announced this evening. Proud to say, this year I actually saw every Best Picture nominee (and all but one in an actual movie theater - the one being Joker, which I caught on DVD the day after it was released in that format).

Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem
star in Everybody Knows

As usual, I have a quibble or three with the Academy, but it looks like the front-runner this year is 1917, which is also my top pick, so you never know. Following right behind, however, is a film that got zero notice from the Academy (though some critics gave it due props), which is sadly ironic in that it's an all-black production that easily deserved the attention and could have helped to save the annual hue and cry about Oscars-so-white if it had been properly recognized.

Instead, The Last Black Man in San Francisco is this year's most-overlooked movie at Oscar time (see my full review here). Honestly, I'm not cynical enough to think that Academy voters disregard good material just because the people who made it are black; rather, I think they are simply too self involved to be able to appreciate a lot of fare that isn't right up their alley - hence, outstanding non-traditional or foreign material often gets overlooked.

That said, you may notice that the much-ballyhooed Korean film Parasite didn't make my short list (though its Oscar success may have helped the Academy dodge the racism bullet this year). I acknowledge that Parasite is extremely well made, but it is too brutally dehumanizing for my taste. I've gotten the impression that many people found its class-struggle story to be groundbreaking - however, 2018's Japanese production Shoplifters told a very similar story, while humanizing all its subjects, which to me was both more difficult and much more worthwhile. (Then again, a movie-savvy friend told me that Parasite was his favorite film of 2019 and Shoplifters his favorite of 2018, so maybe I'm just confused.)

Other films that the Academy liked more than I did were Ford v. Ferrari, which told a very good story, but in such a drawn-out fashion and with so much time spent inside a race car that I got bored (despite great performances by Christian Bale, Tracy Letts, and others, as well as a lot of unsubtitled but perfectly executed Italian dialogue - a surprise treat for me); and Little Women, which also featured some very good acting but was almost unbearably twee and, at times, so anachronistic as to be groan-inducing.

But the rest of Oscar's favorites made my list - so, here we go:

1. 1917 - This is what a truly great movie is supposed to be. Advice to anyone who a) hasn't seen it and b) hasn't seen the trailer: Don't watch the trailer, it will ruin the film - just go see it. And, yes, I mean GO to a movie theater and immerse yourself in the darkness for an unforgettable experience.
2. The Last Black Man in San Francisco - A stunning achievement by a crew of first-timers, strikingly original and deeply personal. Will hold up just fine on video, so borrow this one from your library or (if you must) stream it.
3. The Irishman - Scorsese and his team of regulars do it again. Forget what they say - it's not too long!
4. Once Upon a Time in ... Hollywood - Tarantino does it again, only this time with a bit more subtlety (though not too much of that, after all, it's Tarantino). Leonardo DiCaprio is really good here, but Brad Pitt is even better, and ought to win the Supporting Actor Oscar.

5. Jojo Rabbit - Imperfect, but enhanced by extreme originality, it's gratifying to see a film this quirky get noticed by the stuffy ol' Academy. Probably won't win anything but, in this case, the nomination is the prize.
6. The Farewell - Nominated for a bunch of less prestigious awards (and winning quite a few), this movie was inexplicably left out of the running for Oscar, despite being a near-perfect indie film by an American (albeit Asian-American) director. The story would fit any family, especially any family with recent immigrants, but ol' Hollywood apparently couldn't relate. Extra props to UAlbany product Awkwafina, who starred and earned a Golden Globe for her efforts.
7. Transit - Similar to Jojo Rabbit, in that it re-imagines a WWII scenario with deft originality, this film takes place in the France of the present, but depicts the displacement of people there under the German Nazi invasion of the 1940s. Lyrical, beautifully filmed, heartbreaking.
8. The White Crow - I'm no ballet critic, but I enjoyed every minute of this adaptation of the true life of Russian dancer Rudolf Nureyev, probably because it so effectively shows how the passion of a great artist helped him overcome terrible odds.
9. Joker - Much better than I expected, and not at all a comic-book movie (though based on comic-book characters), this film captured my attention and never let it go. Joaquin Phoenix will win the Best Actor Oscar for his brilliant performance as the horribly mentally ill Arthur Fleck.

10. This is a tie. Marriage Story and Everybody Knows have significant commonalities - family relationships gone dramatically awry, superstar casts, indie vibes - but they are also starkly contrasting: One takes place between brutally competitive New York City and Los Angeles, the other in a charming Spanish village; one involves a rather superficial decision to divorce, the other a decades-old, crime-laced mystery. But they share crackling dialogue, beautifully shot scenes - many of them intensely intimate - and a couple of nice twists. While Marriage Story earned best-actor nods for Scarlett Johansson and Adam Driver, Everybody Knows got bupkus, though its male lead, Antonio Banderas, was nominated instead for his work in Pain and Glory. Obviously a good year for him - and for Johansson, who also was nominated for Best Supporting Actress for her work in Jojo Rabbit. Impressive achievements for both.

Still to be seen: I've yet to catch up with the aforementioned Pain and Glory, and would also like to catch The Two Popes (which had each Pope interpreter get an Oscar nod), and another African-American themed movie called Waves that got an 84% rating on Rotten Tomatoes (compared to 92% for Little Women and a perplexing 68% for Joker).

In all, 2019 was a far better than average year for films, as was 2018 - a promising trend, with Amazon and Netflix deserving much of the credit.

Transit, starring Franz Rogowski, center, was one of the best films of 2019
and earned a 94% critics' rating on Rotten Tomatoes

The best movie of the year so far ...

Jimmie Fails stars as a young man trying to recapture an imagined past
in The Last Black Man in San Francisco

My frequent movie-discussing companion Dick said it, and I agree: The Last Black Man in San Francisco  is the best movie of the year so far.

Dick and I have often noted that originality is the holy grail of contemporary filmmaking, and we value it above other qualities (e.g., production values) when rendering a judgment. In the case of TLBM in SF, no compromises need to be made.

This debut feature co-written and directed by Joe Talbot is miraculously successful as a story, as a visual experience, as a vehicle for some very fine acting, and - most important - as an original, heartfelt, poignant, and challenging work of art. It tells about a young man (Jimmie Fails, played by Jimmie Fails) whose day-to-day existence is rooted not in the reality of his circumstances (lacking home, family, career) but in the greater reality of his love affair with a Victorian house in a rapidly gentrifying neighborhood in San Francisco.

Along with his sidekick, the budding artist and writer Mont (beautifully portrayed by Jonathan Majors), Jimmie maintains and then, after it's been abandoned by the current owners during a contentious estate battle, squats in the house he believes his grandfather built with his own sweat in the 1940s.

What follows is worthy of Shakespeare. Masterfully photographed by Adam Newport-Berra, and sensitively scored by Emile Mosseri, it belongs on the big screen. Don't wait for streaming or video - see it now.

Jimmie peers into the house he would love to re-occupy

The Best Films of 2018

The ensemble cast of Hirokazu Koreeda's Shoplifters

I suddenly realized the 91st Academy Awards will run tonight, and I haven't posted my annual take on the best films of the year.

So, in haste, I give you my Top Ten picks of 2018. As usual, there are caveats. I confess that half of this year's eight Best Picture nominees have thus far escaped my viewing. This is - again, as usual - intentional: Specifically, no one who has seen The Favourite has been able to convince me I shouldn't miss it; the reports on A Star is Born, though more positive, still left me willing to leave it for later; while I do plan to see Bohemian Rhapsody one of these days, I don't expect to see it as a film worthy of serious consideration; and I actually have no idea what Vice is about, but I'm pretty sure it's not my kind of movie (and if that attitude undermines my credibility or offends anyone, I sincerely apologize).

Of the four remaining BP nominees, I do include two of them on my list (see below). As for the other two: We started to watch Black Panther at home, but the dialogue was so badly written I had to leave the room after 10 minutes (my wife enjoyed it, however); and BlackKklansman is a pretty good Spike Lee movie with the usual Spike Lee faults (i.e rather preachy and 15 minutes too long), but it's way overrated and, by my reckoning, only the third best film of its genre that I saw in 2018 (the genre being African American-made movies with political or social messages). Spike can do better (and has on many occasions).

So, here's my list:

1. A tie (unprecedented in this blog): Shoplifters and Roma - I previously wrote about Roma, in the context of its brilliant cinematography and how it relates to the work of pioneering Mexican photographer Manuel Alvarez Bravo. So much has already been written about this film, that I will simply say this: It deserves to win the Oscar for Best Picture and probably will. Given that both Roma and Shoplifters are among the Best Foreign Language Film nominees, I just hope the Academy will leave Roma out of that race and award the statuette to Shoplifters, which is a deeply affecting slice of Japanese life at the margins, beautifully photographed and superbly acted. And, speaking of Oscar-nominated foreign films, today I will spend three hours in the theater soaking up the German entry, Never Look Away, following my usual Oscar-day tradition to see a movie rather than watch the awards show.
2. see above
3. Leave No Trace - A brilliantly quiet film based on the true story of a PTSD veteran raising his young daughter in the woods near Portland, Oregon.
4. Green Book - Again, much has been written about this one, not all of it in praise. I didn't worry about whether the film had an appropriate point of view in terms of racial stereotyping - I just enjoyed the ride, as did its main characters. The acting, cinematography, and storytelling are all first-rate, and the story it tells is fascinating.

5. Blindspotting - The most underrated movie of the year, and I have no idea why it's been overlooked. With a strong original story, which is a neat twist on the interracial buddy drama, this film has many layers addressing criminal justice, gentrification, and race relations - along with really great music.
6. Three Identical Strangers - Talk about fascinating stories! This documentary sucks you in and explodes right before your eyes. An absolutely compelling film.
7. Cold War - This gorgeously photographed and scored period piece is so sad that it's pretty hard to love. But also hard to dismiss. In Polish, French, and several other languages, it's yet another Best Foreign Language Film contender.
8. Can You Ever Forgive Me? - Many have commented on Melissa McCarthy's star turn in this quirky biopic about has-been-author-turned-criminal-forger Lee Israel. She and her co-star, Richard E. Grant, both received well-earned acting nominations for their exquisitely entertaining portrayals of an extremely unlikely pair of co-conspirators. 
9. Juliet, Naked - Another somewhat overlooked film this year, its title misleads a bit - it's actually about a stripped-down recording of a hit rock album that helps to pull a depressed musician off the edge and back into the limelight. Ethan Hawke and Rose Byrne give this rom-com some real life.
10. Sorry to Bother You - Noted as a strong first feature by writer-director Boots Riley, it also features an irresistible breakout performance by Tessa Thompson as an off-the-wall performance artist. Part of an intriguing current wave of Black science fiction, this film bothered rightly and well.

Update, 3/11/19: I recently caught another very good 2018 release (on video at home), and would have placed it somewhere in my Top Ten, let's say tied for 9th place, had I seen it in time for this list. It's Bo Burnham's debut feature, Eighth Grade, which offers a glimpse into the interior life of a 13-year-old girl who's trying to figure out how to grow up and find her place in a world dominated by social media. Burnham's script is astute, poignant and quite funny, and his star, Elsie Fisher is a full-on revelation.

Thomasin McKenzie and Ben Foster star in Leave No Trace

The Roma-Bravo connection

An image from Alfonso Cuaron's Netflix film Roma

It’s in black and white; it’s in Spanish and indigenous languages, with subtitles; it takes place in early 1970s Mexico; and it is being distributed by Netflix. Yet Alfonso Cuaron’s autobiographical Roma sits atop many critics’ lists of the best films of 2018 and, improbably but also certainly, it will be a serious contender at next year’s Oscars.

Threshold by Manuel Alvarez Bravo

My friend Dick, who saw the film at home, urged me to catch Roma on the big screen if I could – in order to better experience its outstanding cinematography – and I am passing that advice on to you. In my case, I didn’t really have a choice, as I don’t subscribe to Netflix or any other media service (not even cable TV), so I was especially pleasantly surprised to learn that I could go to the Spectrum in Albany and see it there (it's also showing at Images Cinema in Williamstown, Mass.).

The Daydream by Manuel Alvarez Bravo

Though I have avoided reading any reviews of Roma until after I post this commentary, there’s no doubt it has been extensively covered in all the publications that offer such content, so I won’t try to add to those assessments here. Rather, I wish to share my perception of the connection between the work of the great 20^th-century Mexican photographer Manuel Alvarez Bravo and the imagery seen throughout Cuaron’s movie.

Striking Worker Assassinated by Manuel Alvarez Bravo

It can’t be coincidence – Cuaron (who did his own cinematography on this project) clearly was emulating Bravo’s content and style. And, why not? The film takes place in Mexico City (with a few short side trips into the countryside), where Bravo plied his trade for a remarkably long time (he was active until his death at age 100 in 2002), and where he made pictures of everyday life with a surreal twist, a description that could apply to Roma as well.

Sparrow, Light by Manuel Alvarez Bravo

From the floor-washing shots that open the film to the nearly endless still held under its closing credits, and throughout the rest of Roma, I was reminded again and again of images from the Bravo catalog. I present some of those images here as examples for those who’ve seen the movie (or plan to see it); I think you’ll agree that there’s a strong relationship.

title unknown by Manuel Alvarez Bravo

So, why should we care? Well, for one thing, Bravo deserves to be better known. If the attention this film is getting could also expand his following, that would be good for his legacy and for the new fans he will acquire. Admittedly, I have a bias (don’t I always?) – when I began making black-and-white photographs in 1972, Bravo’s work in photo books was among my earliest influences. And it nicely stands the test of time, as Cuaron’s film underscores.

Dog Number 20 by Manuel Alvarez Bravo

But there’s more to all this than nostalgia for a simpler time. Indeed, Roma describes a time that was brutally complex. But perhaps it takes a simpler medium – slowly moving black-and-white – to help us understand the meaning of that time, and ours. I thank Cuaron for making this film, though it is painfully sad; and I thank him for revering and re-creating the subtly powerful style of Manuel Alvarez Bravo, one of the greatest photographers ever.

The Eclipse by Manuel Alvarez Bravo

The best films of 2017

Elizabeth Olson and Jeremy Renner star in Wind River

Here it is again - Oscar time. As I often do, I'm taking the opportunity to comment on some of the best films from 2017; however, as will become apparent in a few paragraphs, I feel I have reason to avoid prognosticating on what films or actors may win this year's statuettes.

First, a disclaimer: I have yet to see four of the nine Best Picture nominees. Those include at least three I plan to see when I can (The Shape of Water, Darkest Hour, and Call Me By Your Name), all of which come highly recommended. Would I pick one of those films as the best of the year? Possibly, though I don't expect that. For sure, though, I can't speculate on how the Academy will vote on Best Picture without seeing a bigger sample.

What I can say is that the Academy has definitely left out one of the year's best films due to politics, and that is Wind River, which unfortunately had a minor connection to the accused rapist Harvey Weinstein. Ironically, Wind River sends potent and well-crafted messages in support of women's rights, so to snub it even after the film's director and Native American producers excised the Weinstein name from their product is just plain wrongheaded.

Another film that is inexplicably absent from the Best Picture nominations is The Florida Project, which got one well-earned nod for Supporting Actor for the always-great Willem Dafoe - and that's it. Both Wind River and The Florida Project are in my Top Five, while the Best Picture nominated Lady Bird, The Post, and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri are not - so, screw the Academy. That said, those are all in my second five, so maybe I should be a little more tolerant. Oh, well, call me cranky.

By the way, I'd say 2017 was a good year for movies but not a great one - none of these picks garnered my highest rating, though half of them came close. Why not? It's hard to pinpoint exactly, but when I recall a five-star movie - say Brokeback Mountain, or Spotlight - I find these offerings were slightly lacking in comparison.

And now for the list:

1. Phantom Thread - This has eked out my pick for best of the year because, despite being awkward and unresolved, it features excellent visuals, originality, and brilliant acting - not only by the incomparable Daniel Day-Lewis, but equally by his two female co-stars, Lesley Manville and Vicky Krieps. Manville and director Paul Thomas Anderson could win Oscars for this.
2. The Florida Project - Has all the characteristics cited above, with a double emphasis on originality. Few films manage to be so uplifting while exposing so much darkness. Very funny, when it isn't breaking your heart. The perfect antidote to Disney.
3. Loving Vincent - Speaking of darkness and light, this unique animated feature took 10 years to make and it was worth every minute. Comprised of 65,000 paintings, it tells the story of the year following Vincent Van Gogh's mystery-shrouded death by immersing us in his life-affirming art. Rightly nominated for best animated feature.
4. Wind River - Writer-director Taylor Sheridan knows how to craft a crime thriller, as he did last year with Hell or High Water (which he wrote but did not direct), and this one is set in a forbidding Western landscape, too. Grimly satisfying, I call it Winter's Bone meets Frozen River. Only an implausible extended shootout kept it from being my top pick of the year.
5. Dunkirk - Most films tell a story with dialogue, in combination with images and sound. Dunkirk relies almost entirely on the latter two elements to communicate a very vivid story of an unusual moment in a terrible war, and it nearly succeeds. Music plays a bigger role in this film than any actor did, but it doesn't feel melodramatic; rather, it is deeply experiential. And the visuals are spectacular.

The rest: I rated the following six films about equally, and so I present them in no particular order. A few got a lot of attention, whether fully deserved or not; some were perhaps undeservedly overlooked. 

Beatriz at Dinner stars Salma Hayek as a servile massage therapist who, during a very awkward dinner at a very rich client's house, suddenly finds her mojo. Some crackling dialogue follows, as do a few bizarre scenes within a set limited to the house and its environs.

The Post doesn't need much introduction. As a former newsroom staffer, I relished every moment of ink-stained nostalgia the film dished up, no matter how stagy. But it's Spielberg, and he always panders. Saved by Meryl Streep's masterful performance and, of course, a ripping great yarn.

Lady Bird is a small, character-driven drama featuring two terrific actresses who spar entertainingly as only a mother and teenage daughter can. Saoirse Ronan and Laurie Metcalf earned their Oscar nominations, and first-time director Greta Gerwig does herself proud. But, frankly, it's a touch forgettable.

The Big Sick also represents a directorial debut, and it is fresh and funny, even if underneath the bizarre stuff it is still a sticky romance. The young married couple whose life it's based on got a Best Original Screenplay nod for this one, and they are worthy of it.

Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri has to be my pick for most overrated movie of the year (possibly to be unseated by The Shape of Water - we'll see), even though it is actually quite good. In fact, it's my kind of movie, so I'm not biased against it - but I'm a little perplexed that it's winning so much attention, especially because that doesn't usually happen to my kind of movie. Could be I'm just wrong on this one!

Patti Cake$ is perhaps this year's most overlooked film. It tells the story of a trio of misfits who try to break into the local New Jersey rap scene, and actually convincingly pull it off - almost. A few touching stories are intertwined, with a killer soundtrack of originals and plenty of colorful imagery to go with them. Check it out, I promise you will enjoy.

Vicki Krieps and Daniel Day-Lewis star in Phantom Thread

Quick take on The Accountant

Anna Kendrick and Ben Affleck star in The Accountant

OK, so it didn't get the greatest reviews, and it's a Hollywood action thriller (not my thing), but I couldn't resist the topic, so I went to see The Accountant this weekend - and it was fun. Too violent, yes, with a plot full of holes, but entertaining and in some ways really well done. (BTW, if you're still wondering why this art reviewer couldn't resist the film's topic, see my profile.)

Ben Affleck stars as a sociopathic killing machine with autism, who also happens to be a CPA, and who - we learn gradually - operates according to his own moral code (just like all Hollywood sociopathic killing machines). But how often do you get to see a leading man with autism? (Pretty often, now that I think of it, considering Rain Man, A Beautiful Mind, Good Will Hunting, The Imitation Game ... .)

Anyway, I laughed at all the accounting jokes (reasonably accurately presented), felt compassion for the kids with autism (not too unlike my 6-year-old nephew), and grimaced from behind my fingers at all the shootings. Affleck does a heck of a job realistically presenting the low-affect of the man on the spectrum, a formidable challenge for any actor (i.e. to un-act), and Anna Kendrick is perfectly cast as the lovable geek who ultimately inspires a lot of the accountant's mayhem. Other stars include Jeffrey Tambor, John Lithgow, and J.K. Simmons.

The Accountant asks the question "Do you like puzzles?" and gives you two of them - first, a goodly number of plot twists purposely placed, and then the aforementioned holes that you can spend a few hours trying to fill in. Highly recommended to anyone in the profession, if only for the Crazy Eddie Antar reference. Or to folks who get off on brutal gunfights.

Add note: The Accountant's final scene is played over a song written and performed by local music hero Sean Rowe, and it's going to make him famous. You can check it out here.

Affleck's accountant files a tax return, and makes an emotional connection.

Post-Oscar comments

Jacob Tremblay, left, and Brie Larson star in Room.

This year I did not run a "best films" post before the Academy Awards because I hadn't seen enough of the contending movies (yet) to offer much in the way of useful commentary. Sorry about that!

But I did honor my personal tradition of going to see a nominated film on Oscar night by catching the early show of Room, which received four nominations, including Best Picture and Best Actress, and for which its star, Brie Larson, took home the golden statuette.

So I missed Chris Rock's opening monologue completely, which I understand did not disappoint in skewering the players on all sides of the black-artists-matter controversy. This discussion is far from over, but I'm glad at least this phase of it is behind us. Adding a lot of politics into a public process that is, still, primarily about two things - art and business - just doesn't really help. 

In the end, for whatever reason, ABC got lousy ratings (no thanks to me!), and several films, especially Mad Max: Fury Road got a boost to their bottom line. And that's what Oscar's really all about. 

Room is, in a word, harrowing. I assume the critics have been enthusiastic about the film (though I'm waiting to read reviews until after I've fully processed my own reactions), but I can see why it did not win Best Picture.

The film that did win Best Picture, Spotlight, remains my own pick as the best of 2015 (as noted here in early January), so it is gratifying to share in the surprise of its come-from-behind victory over The Revenant (which I still haven't had the strength to face). I loved two basic things about Spotlight - terrific ensemble acting and the perfect fulfillment of the old-fashioned simple formula for a great movie: A good story, well told.

I also loved the fact that Spotlight got the newsroom details right, which is the sort of thing that done wrong can very easily ruin even a really good movie for me. Having worked for years at a daily newspaper, I was anxiously scanning every scene in Spotlight for a wrong note - and it passed with a perfect grade.

Not so Room. This film also involves a depiction of journalism, as a sidebar to the main focus of the story, but with very significant impact on the arc of the film and all its characters.

What happens is that an apparently top professional television news interviewer is shown asking leading, accusatory, and inflammatory questions of the extremely fragile subject Ma, and the people supposedly there to protect her do nothing. To describe what happens next would be a spoiler, but suffice it to say things don't exactly get better for Ma.

I reacted to this scene like any audience member was supposed to - feeling angry at the bad media exploiter who used this poor young woman for ratings. Then I stepped back and realized it was the filmmaker actually doing the manipulating here - so I'll redirect that anger. I don't think this was a fair depiction of a working journalist or fair treatment of an audience that has allowed you to take them this far into the world you've created. Not OK.

Maybe this is the essential difference between working with a true story (as in Spotlight) and embarking on a dramatic foray into fiction. In the true story, the drama is what it is - you can try to present it in a ramped-up fashion or not, but you can't change the facts. And it will be the facts - the story - that ultimately convince the audience of the experience they are having. In the fictional Room, I found myself retreating from the story because it did not add up to seeming true. (There's also a throwaway performance by William H. Macy as Ma's father, who disappears with nary an explanation.)

Playing with the audience's emotions may create an effect - but, ultimately, it doesn't win them over. To accomplish that, I think you need to be better than the writer and director of Room have proven to be. As for Larson winning the Oscar - it was a brave performance by a very promising young actress. But I think Cate Blanchett was far better in Carol - and, no doubt, many others already agree.

Cate Blanchett, left, and Rooney Mara star in Carol.

Tidbits for 2016

Ellsworth Kelly in his studio in 2012 (photo stolen from the New York Times)

As 2016 yawns and stretches into existence, a few items on the local art scene have caught my attention:

1. The recent death at age 92 of Ellsworth Kelly. Almost universally regarded as a giant of 20th-century art, Kelly lived and worked in our region (Spencertown, Columbia County) for a great many years. I recall one encounter with the man, about 1984, when he stopped in to peruse my modest gallery on Washington Avenue in Albany. We knew he was a client of the hairstylist upstairs, but had never seen him. So, one day a middle-aged gentleman came in from the stairway area and looked around with what seemed to be a very practiced eye. I tried to engage him in conversation - no luck. Then I asked if we could place him on our mailing list (we did that with all visitors), but he demurred. When I more or less forced an introduction, he only gave one name: Kelly. I do recall that he did not seem impressed by what he saw, but neither did he seem disgusted. Personally, I love his work for its purity of form and color, and for its spirit of adventure. I also like the fact that Kelly was a supporter of local ventures, donating a print or two to be sold at Albany Institute fundraisers and employing local artists as assistants. He will be missed.

   

   an early Robert Mapplethorpe Polaroid self-portrait
   from the Jack Shear Collection

2. Jack Shear photography collection donated to the Tang Teaching Museum. Shear was Ellsworth Kelly's longtime partner, and on Feb. 6 the Tang will open an exhibition selected from 500 significant and historical photographs he recently donated. It's a very truncated who's-who of 20th-century photography (with a notably gay-centric twist) that is sure to draw a lot of viewers and perhaps a snippet of controversy. Remember when the political right wing went nuts because the NEA had supported an exhibition of Robert Mapplethorpe pictures in Philadelphia? This show will definitely make it clear we're over that.
   

   

   Mazing Cave - collage by Michael Oatman

3. This year The Hyde Collection will host the Annual Exhibition by Artists of the Mohawk-Hudson Region (popularly know as the Regional), and the judge will be a truly local artist for the first time in memory - Michael Oatman. Oatman, a professor at RPI, has shown regularly in prominent venues such as MASS MoCA and the Tang, as well as in New York City galleries for over a decade, so his credentials as a judge pass muster. Yet he also has regularly and recently participated in local juried shows such as the Regional and the Arts Center's Fence Show, which sets him apart from the typical Regional juror. This may bother some people, but I think it's appropriate - and a great choice of juror for this always intensely interesting local showcase.

   

   a photograph by Dan Burkholder

4. The Photography Regional, our other most closely watched local juried show, will be held much earlier than usual this year, as co-host Fulton Street Gallery in Troy has scheduling conflicts for the more usual late-springtime slot. According to a recent announcement from co-host The Photo Center of the Capital District in Troy, the show will open on Jan. 29 as a two-week salon with all entries hung at both locations; then the judge's pared-down selection will be presented more formally at Fulton Street beginning Feb 20. This year's judge is Dan Burkholder, a Palenville-based digital photographer known for lushly detailed and subtly colored imagery.
5. Beyond local: Oscar season is heating up, and I am struggling to catch all the films likely to gain lots of nominations. So far, the best film from 2015 that I've seen is Spotlight. I don't plan to catch the Star Wars film (sorry if you're a fan) - neither have I ever seen Titanic or Avatar, the other highest grossers of our time, so at least I am consistent. Am excited to see Carol as soon as possible, and have heard The Big Short is also very good, though I'm afraid it may give me unpleasant MBA-school flashbacks. More to come on the best films of 2015 in a later post ...

The movie Spotlight deserves special notice for the brilliant ensemble work of its cast.

The best films of 2014

Patricia Arquette and Ellar Coltrane in Boyhood

With the awards season in full swing, I'm ready to weigh in on my favorite films of the past year. 2014 was an excellent year for movies, and that shows in the truly tough-to-handicap Oscar races. Luckily, I have so far seen six of the eight Best Picture nominees, and they are all worth the time. I've missed American Sniper and Selma, but plan to see the former very soon. As for the latter, I'm just not that interested in a dramatic alteration of Civil Rights history, so I'm skipping it.

1. Boyhood - How anybody can not be completely blown away by the achievement of this 12-year project by Richard Linklater is beyond me. It's a drama about a kid growing up, in which all the actors actually age in real time through the course of the filming. More than that - it's a really great life story, beautifully performed. Patricia Arquette will win the Oscar for this one, and if Linklater doesn't, it's simply wrong.

Agata Trzebuchovska in Ida

2. Ida - Gorgeously shot in black and white, this Polish production was rightly nominated for Best Foreign Language Film. It is heartbreakingly beautiful, deep, original and refreshingly unresolved. Your local library probably has a copy you can borrow for free.

Michael Keaton in Birdman

3. Birdman - I expect this to win Best Picture, but who knows? From the opening credits, the solo improvisational drum soundtrack is just plain brilliant. The film's immersive shooting style draws you immediately into the has-been main character's desperation and never lets you go. Keaton has a shot at Best Actor, except the competition is brutal. I have one quibble with the movie, which is that I can't understand why they felt it necessary to tack on a blow-job for social media in the midst of an existential struggle. Sorry, the rest of this movie is just not so superficial as the message it pushes that you don't matter if you're not being re-tweeted, and that brought it down - unnecessarily, in my estimation.

4. The Imitation Game - This was the film that was recommended to me more than anything else this season, and it does not disappoint. Benedict Cumberbatch deserves the Oscar for  his highly nuanced portrayal of a conflicted gay autistic savant who paid as dearly for his sexual proclivities as for his OCD pursuit of a machine that can think. Keira Knightley is tolerable but not on the same level as her co-star. Daunting British accents for the hard-of-hearing; otherwise very enjoyable and extremely moving.

5. Force Majeure - A Swedish film shot in French Switzerland will never do well in the US market - however, this is exactly the sort of movie that shows what Europe does so much better than Hollywood (and apparently, always will). Force Majeure is a Hitchcockian thriller about a bad marriage that makes you very uncomfortable about life, civilization, humanity, and child-rearing without showing you anything shocking or truly negative. The actors in it are amazing. Borrow this one from the library, too.

6. The Grand Budapest Hotel - Super-quirky, especially when it goes (literally) off the rails into a sledding fantasy. Anything this original that gets an Oscar nod should stand very proud. Will not win, however.

Mark Ruffalo (center) and
Channing Tatum in Foxcatcher

7. Foxcatcher - Classic Indie film - quasi-major actors, a true story that's stranger than fiction, topics nobody thought they could be interested in (wrestling, disapproving mothers). Steve Carell's performance as nut-job billionaire John DuPont is career-making; Channing Tatum and Mark Ruffalo are terrific (as always). A real downer, but vividly great.

Jones and Redmayne in The Theory of Everything

8. The Theory of Everything - I'll admit, this one disappointed me, though it is still a very good movie. The problem is, it's about Stephen Hawking's first marriage - not about his work in physics. It's a romance. Which is fine, once you accept that it will not get cosmic in any real way. On the other hand, Eddie Redmayne (who is generally expected to win Best Actor) does bring the extremely fascinating younger Hawking startlingly back to life (the older Hawking is still with us), and Felicity Jones is completely irresistible as his first love, Jane.

9. Whiplash - Who knew music school could be like boot camp, only worse? I'm a huge fan of jazz drumming, but this is not the way to form a great artist. Another Indie-style film featuring terrific performances, especially by the Oscar-nominated and likely to win Best Supporting Actor J.K. Simmons as the brutal taskmaster.

10. Big Eyes - I have a bias in the case of this film, because it almost impossibly combines the three extremely disparate pursuits that are at the core of my three careers: art, newspapering, and fraud. The story of con man Walter Keane, as told by a gossip columnist nicely voiced by Danny Huston, is not shocking. Keane's fraudulent pose as the artist behind his wife's kitschy paintings is fairly well known now - but it is shocking to learn, via a tour-de-force, Oscar-nominated performance by Amy Adams, that Margaret Keane believed completely in her art as the true expression of her soul. An unexpected delight, with director Tim Burton's usual surreal flourishes.

Special Mention: The Lunchbox is a 2013 film out of Bollywood that was missing at last year's Oscars because India refused to nominate it. Still, it earned my top rating of four stars for its combination of charming romance and rare entry into the day-to-day life of working and middle-class Indians. The plot focuses around an unlikely glitch in the Six-Sigma perfection of India's system of "dabba wallas" - the largely illiterate deliverymen who transport millions of home-made lunches to office-bound workers' desks every day. The delivery error leads, naturally, to quite unexpected love. A must-see movie for anyone with a heart or an interest in everyday India.

Irrfan Khan in The Lunchbox