If Beale Street Could Talk
2018
Directed by Barry Jenkins
If Beale Street Could Talk, based on the 1974 novel of the same name by James Baldwin, is a romantic drama set in Harlem in the early 1970s. The film is a plodding follow-up to Barry Jenkins’ much more electric Moonlight (2016). If Beale Street Could Talk’s central weakness is that it is caught—lifeless—halfway between the screen and the page, burdened by overabundant narration and a dearth of visual energy.
Would not see.
Shadows
2017
Directed by Noa Aharoni
Shadows is a documentary about Holocaust survivors who abused their children. At 53 minutes, Shadows is depressing but manageable to watch.
Would see.
No Country for Old Men
2007
Directed by Joel and Ethan Coen
No Country for Old Men, based on the 2005 novel of the same name by Cormac McCarthy, is a crime thriller. Tense and philosophical, No Country for Old Men is among the Coen brothers’ best.
Must see.
The Gleaners and I
2000
Directed by Agnès Varda
The Gleaners and I is a documentary about gleaning. Agnès Varda connects the practice of gathering leftover crops from farmers’ fields to her own filmmaking. It is an interesting premise, but the film is disorganized and only intermittently entertaining.
Would not see.
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse
2018
Directed by Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, and Rodney Rothman
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, based on the Marvel Comics character Miles Morales (one of the characters known as Spider-Man), is a movie about Spider-Man (and Spider-People). The film cleverly situates itself as a meta-commentary—of a kind—on the ever-growing genre of superhero movies; the animation, incorporating multiple styles, is as impressive as anything else recently made with computers; and the central idea, deftly combining a sci-fi premise with a coming-of-age story, works well, but the film loses track of its own thematic premise part-way through, weighted down by plot mechanics and one-off jokes that outwear their welcome. The film, nonetheless, is an achievement.
Would see.
The Ballad of Buster Scruggs
2018
Directed by Joel and Ethan Coen
The Ballad of Buster Scruggs is an anthology film composed of six western vignettes. The opening vignette—a comedic musical—is uproarious and unexpected, but the rest of the film, while entertaining, fails to live up to the quality one expects from a Coen brothers movie. A tragic reversal of fortunes can be a satisfying ending to a full-length feature, but when vignettes barely establish their premise before rushing forth to their own sad ends, the joke begins to wear thin, and the movie veers toward nihilistic repetition.
Would see.
The Square
2017
Directed by Ruben Östlund
The Square is a satirical drama about an art museum curator. The Square suffers from a common problem: it wants to be seen as saying something important but it doesn’t actually have anything to say. It is an empty and pretentious movie.
Would not see.
Throne of Blood
1957
Directed by Akira Kurosawa
Throne of Blood, which follows the plot of William Shakespeare’s Macbeth, is a Japanese-language samurai film. Kurosawa adapts Shakespeare not to mindlessly repeat his words or to borrow literary seriousness, but to use Macbeth’s story and themes to craft his own masterpiece. Throne of Blood is the best film adaptation of Macbeth in any language.
Must see.
Killing Kasztner: The Jew who Dealt with the Nazis
2008
Directed by Gaylen Ross
Killing Kasztner: The Jew who Dealt with the Nazis is a documentary about Rudolf Kastner, a Jewish-Hungarian journalist who was both credited with helping Jews escape the Holocaust and accused of having been a Nazi collaborator. He was assassinated in 1957, after an Israeli court ruled that he had collaborated with the Nazis—a ruling that was later mostly overturned by the Supreme Court of Israel. Killing Kasztner is an interesting story artlessly told.
Would not see.
North by Northwest
1959
Directed by Alfred Hitchcock
North by Northwest is a thriller about mistaken identity. It is immensely entertaining.
Would see.
Micro Film Reviews 