Steve Jobs (Danny Boyle, 2015)

7/10
I guess The Social Network set us on a path of movies showing us how clever jerks got to be really rich jerks as each global giant successively gets their entry into the canon (stay tuned this year for Michael Keaton as Ray Kroc! Who will play Colonel Sanders in his biopic in 2018?!). Aaron Sorkin scripted this one as he did The Social Network. The dialogue certainly crackles, thanks in no small part to Michael Fassbender and Kate Winslet who are both terrific, but it does veer into portentousness at times, with characters in the heat of an argument delivering clunky lines that are heavy-handedly meant to be interpreted as a metaphor for the scene as a whole.
The three product launch sequences that make up the movie are impressively mounted, although each feels more rote than the last - the movie has Jobs commenting on this repetitiveness in an attempt at self-awareness ("I feel like before every product launch people get drunk and tell me what they really think about me") but it doesn't make it feel less paint-by-numbers.
Like Moneyball, another Sorkin adaptation, there seems to be a fear of getting too technical - there with baseball stats, here with computer specs. Any technical sequence is immediately followed up with a hammy father-daughter scene as if to scramble to pull the viewer back in but frankly, as in Moneyball, I found the technical stuff way more interesting than the Hollywood schmaltz.
Overall it's a decent movie, the acting is the strength by far and the writing is solidly in second. I'm just not sure what all we were supposed to glean by sitting through it. We already knew that Sorkin could write and Fassbender could act and Boyle could direct and Jobs was a jerk who took more credit than he deserved.

Lo and Behold, Reveries of the Connected World (Werner Herzog, 2016)

7/10
Werner Herzog's latest documentary is "about" the internet, in loose terms. As you might expect from a Herzog documentary it departs from a chronological telling of the history of the internet very quickly and instead focuses on the people telling the stories along the way. The film is divided into 10 chapters, although sometimes interview subjects bleed over into other segments. It focuses on pioneers of the internet, world famous hackers, people allergic to radio waves, young adults battling internet addictions, Elon Musk, MRI technicians, a family harassed in a most despicable fashion by internet trolls, and so on. Herzog narrates and asks questions on-camera with his usual mix of detached wonder and dark humor - Herzog's description of the university where the internet was born refers first and foremost to its "repulsive hallways".
There aren't too many great shakes to be had (or history lessons either) but Herzog pokes and prods his subjects in an endearing fashion, and content-wise there's certainly enough to chew on with all the questions inherent to the subject matter. But I wonder if this wouldn't have worked better not as a film but as a series of 10 episodes on a format like Netflix where each subject and topic was allowed more in-depth exploration.

Carol (Todd Haynes, 2015)

7/10
I find myself saying the same thing for a lot of these Oscar pix from the last year - fine, well-acted, nothing offensively horrible, nothing very memorable either. Cate Blanchett is immaculate and Rooney Mara is very good too. It is directed, ah, adroitly and I have no complaints.

The Danish Girl (Tom Hooper, 2015)

7/10
The cynic in me says that this was a movie that was made not because it was great material for this movie, but because it was 2015 and somebody had to make a movie about a pioneering transgender woman. So that's all well and good. I wasn't cynical enough to hate it - it's perfectly fine. The costumes and sets and cinematography are lavish and gorgeous. Eddie Redmayne and Alicia Vikander turn in two fine performances but their chemistry is the real stand-out. The movie goes through the paces without too many dips and turns, although it ends very abruptly. Thankfully much of the focus is on the main characters' response to Einar Werner's struggle, and not a boring exercise in "what will society think", save for a rote scene of Einer (as Lili) getting beat up. I wouldn't say it rises too far above its claim to being Oscar bait, but it's not the worst offender I've ever seen.

Unfriended (Leo Gabriadze, 2014)

7/10
I'll give this movie maybe a slightly higher score than it deserves just because I was suckered in by the central premise (gimmick if you prefer): a horror movie where the action takes place entirely on a computer screen, via Skype, Spotify, Gmail, Facebook, Chatroulette, etc. It delivered very cleverly on this premise and handled its central technology very well and believably. As a horror movie, I'm forced to admit it falls short in some areas. It's just not that scary, and for a while the movie dips into a little too much "teenage revenge drama" and neglects the scares for entirely for too long. So I enjoyed it, it moved along briskly (barely 75 minutes long too which is an ideal length for a movie like this) and it kept me entertained and engaged the entire time. No classic but a nice, clever little movie.

Clouds of Sils Maria (Olivier Assayas, 2014)

7/10
I will confess that I am a sucker for self-referential plots in movies. What I mean is, Kristen Stewart and Juliette Binoche are rehearsing a movie script in the Swiss alps and the movie frequently and cleverly blurs the lines between the script and their relationship. Even if, admittedly, I'm a little unclear as to the ends it achieved in this movie, I was still dazzled in a couple of scenes. The actresses are both great, especially Stewart (maybe because we expect it more from Binoche and less from her) and Chloe Grace Moretz was very good too. I probably couldn't explain this movie to you very well, but as far as a movie about an actress coming to terms with her aging self and faced with the threat of a younger generation (not at all a new concept in cinema by any means) I found it quite interesting.

Keanu (Peter Atencio, 2016)

7/10
Thought it was okay, not as laugh out loud funny as I would have hoped for but there are some good lines. I thought it poked good fun at the gangster movie cliches, but despite that the structure of the movie felt heavily borrowed from the 21 Jump Street remake - a comedy about two guys in a "fish out of water" scenario, one of them gets somewhat pulled into the lifestyle, they have to prove they're legit, etc. There's even scenes in both of them where they're made to ingest the drug at the center of the narrative. And the semi-ironic love for a pop star (George Michael here) reminded me of the Backstreet Boys in This is the End, and I feel like there's another example of this that's eluding me at the moment. So not terribly original I don't think, but entertaining enough.

Deadpool (Tim Miller, 2016)

7/10
This was not quite the "revolution in superhero movies" I feel like some people hyped it up to be. If you know a little about the Deadpool character going in there probably won't be anything here you wouldn't expect. Some of the jokes land (my absolute favorite being Deadpool's confusion as to whether he's being taken to see James McAvoy or Patrick Stewart when he's being hauled off to meet with Charles Xavier) and some of them, particularly the cruder ones, feel kinda high school-ish and cringey in their attempts to be "edgy".
I saw some people complaining about its obvious low budget, but that was one of its more endearing traits to me. I did find myself hoping for some cameos/crossovers from other Marvel characters just because it would have been fun to see Deadpool interact with them, but he had good enough chemistry with Colossus and Negasonic Teenage Warhead that it wasn't a major issue.
Overall I was entertained and not insulted, and I don't demand too much more out of comic book movies these days. More than anything I felt happy for Ryan Reynolds(strangely, as I have no strong feelings towards him one way or the other) for making a passion project work and pleasing as many people as it did.

88:88 (Isiah Medina, 2015)

7/10
Canadian filmmaker Isiah Medina's first feature 88:88 premiered at TIFF last year to some acclaim. It is much closer to experimental video art than anything else. Images flicker by in seconds, jump-cutting and bleeding into each other. The audio, a collection of whispered voiceovers, freestyle rapping, one-sided phone conversations, sound and music almost never matches what's seen onscreen. An obvious point of reference is latter-day Godard. Another is latter-day Malick, mostly due to the voiceovers. Robert Ashley may also be a distant antecedent.
The title refers to what's shown on electronic clocks after one's power has been cut and then restored. It would be wrong to say 88:88 is "about" being poor, but it's certainly a theme. I saw a tweet once that said something like "I'm first world poor - I use my iPhone or my laptop to check my online banking to see how broke I am". That's sort of a main idea here, where iPhones and weed take priority over heating bills.
Medina is a young guy and there is a "student film" vibe here but I don't mean that in a wholly negative sense. It's simply a film about many themes that a lot of college or university level students would spend a lot of time musing about - money, philosophy, skateboarding, girlfriends, parents, what to do with one's life. Some may scoff at a movie dealing with such first world problems (and the pretentious presentation to go along with it), but it's undoubtedly a film about themes that are real to Medina and his friends and many others his age. Visually it's fun to watch, there are some really great shots, and at 65 minutes it doesn't overstay its welcome.

Soylent Green (Richard Fleischer, 1973)

7/10
The impact is diminished now that the final gutpunch of the movie has entered the pop culture lexicon, but dystopian atmosphere (7 years away from today!) is really well done. The city is hot and sweaty and pulses with a kind of malevolent, simmering fever. The casual misogyny is a little jarring and unexpected...but I guess that was the time (1973 I mean, not 2022). Fun enough to watch to flesh out my knowledge of pop culture movies but not essential I don't think.

Un Chien Andalou (Luis Bunuel, 1929)

7/10
What can you say? I've known about the famous eyeball-slicing scene since forever, never actually watched the full short (some 16 minutes). The ants coming out of the hole in the guy's hand was another well done illusion that I hadn't seen before. As far as what anything in it meant, ??????.

22 Jump Street (Phil Lord & Christopher Miller, 2014)

7/10
I don't think I ever reviewed 21 Jump Street here but I like it a lot, probably one of my favorite comedies of the last few years. It had the right amount of self-awareness about its silly premise, surprisingly good chemistry between Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum, and it was consistently funny.
The 2nd one has some good jokes but overall is a bit of a step down. It really overloads the self-awareness factor, constantly poking fun of its own existence as a sequel, but sometimes it's a bit too much - like yeah, we get it. Hill and Tatum are still good together but the movie reintroduces the same conflict from the first one, only flipped: now Tatum is the popular one and Hill is the one feeling brushed aside. It was funnier when they subverted expectations by doing the reverse in the first one, now the conflict feels forced and the scenario (Tatum becoming the football stud, Hill becoming the art school geek) is not nearly as clever.
Also the feeling of sequel-itis and the need to do everything bigger and better this time creeps in and the movie rushes through a lot of plotting (the central investigation, Tatum's rise as a football stud and his bromance with the quarterback, Hill dating the police chief's daughter, a last act spring break trip to Mexico). The movie boasts almost the exact same running time as its predecessor but somehow feels longer and weightier.
But all that said, anyone who liked 21 will probably not find anything to hate here. There's some good laughs but I just don't think I'll return to it as often as I've rewatched 21. The end credits gag reel where they go through a dozen scenarios for future Jump Street installments is a must-see, though.

Frozen (Chris Buck & Jennifer Lee, 2013)

7/10
I get the hype, it was a good movie. I can see why it was so endearing to everyone, particularly kids. In fact I thought it was aimed a lot more at kids than some of the bigger animated movies in recent years (not that I'm an aficionado). Toy Story 3 for example definitely seems to try to appeal to both kids and adults. Frozen was going purely for kids and hit the target dead-on. Anyway I didn't love it or anything but it was fun.

Children of Men (Alfonso Cuaron, 2006)

7/10
If you'd never seen Children of Men but only had to imagine it based on what you were told about it (the actors, a loose sketching of the plot, maybe the director), what you'd envision would be pretty much exactly the same as the final product. At least it was for me. I mean yeah it was good in just about all areas but didn't do anything particularly extraordinarily, although the initial concept and premise was intriguing. I don't normally care much for Clive Owen but he was a good fit here.
Speaking of extraordinary, the unbroken tracking shot at the climactic 'battle" scene is very impressive, but when the movie built up to an impressive trick of camerawork or direction instead of something that actually serves the story, it's hard not to feel like it's a bit showy and gimmicky. I mean yeah from a technical standpoint it was impressive but I feel like it was also there to make up for the fact that the movie didn't really have a whole lot to say in the end (or by the end) and this was just fancy window-dressing to obscure that fact.

Kill Your Darlings (John Krokidas, 2013)

7/10
A movie about that time Lucien Carr, William Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac were sparking a literary revolution and oh yeah, Carr murdered a guy. The movie does a good job of portraying the development of both events in sidestep. It's helped along by good, credible performances, especially Daniel Radcliffe as Ginsberg and Dane DeHaan as Carr. The movie, thankfully, is not entirely reverential to the literary titans it portrays, showing them occasionally as the messy, unpleasant, pretentious, morally-confused kids they were.
First-time director John Krokidas does a very fine job, although he leans a bit too heavily on upbeat montages. They work okay when set to the hot jazz of the time, but when one is backed by TV on the Radio, well, why? Krokidas is careful to let the story to do the talking and directs pretty unobtrusively, maybe a little too unobtrusively but that's OK.

American Sniper (Clint Eastwood, 2014)

7/10
It was entertaining enough if unspectacular for the first 75% of the film, but I felt like things kind of fell apart with the remaining 25%. Notwithstanding Kyle's actual account of the events, I thought the movie wrapped up his fourth tour way too neatly - casting Mustafa as a recurring villain gave the story a weird, almost "video game" type feel. Like Kyle had to beat the "final boss" before feeling like he had accomplished what he had to and could finally head home.
The ending was also problematic. Since the case still isn't closed on Kyle's death, there was only so much the movie could do or say in depicting it and it had a weirdly rushed, anticlimactic feel. Couldn't we have waited a couple more years to see how the trial shakes out before committing his life to film? In any case, it was not hard to be moved by the tragic poignancy of a guy who lived his life to protect others only to be murdered by one of his own...on U.S. soil no less.
I'm gobsmacked that people have criticized the movie for glorifying war or blamed it for dehumanizing Iraqis or anything like that...I don't know how dumb you have to be to interpret this as a "pro-war" movie, come on. I was actually expecting the movie to be a lot more chest-thumpingly pro-America (based on what I'd heard) than it turned out to be.
In any case, the action was mostly very good, and Bradley Cooper was very good himself, but in comparing this to other recent war movies, it's a lot closer to The Hurt Locker (i.e. meh, not bad) than Zero Dark Thirty (i.e. great) for me.

Selma (Ava DuVernay, 2014)

7/10
Following The Theory of Everything and The Imitation Game in the "true stories told well" category this year is Selma, which was everything I thought it would be and little more and I could probably copy and paste my review from the Imitation Game in here and there wouldn't be much change. I liked Selma a little bit more as it was still more emotionally engaging than IT and its lead performance was much, much better but it's still not a movie that's particularly memorable or notable for any one reason. So I'll say what feels like something I've said a lot about the Best Picture finalists this year: well told, well acted, well scripted, well shot...nothing much else to say.

Close Encounters of the Third Kind (Steven Spielberg, 1977)

7/10
I never saw this one before so I recorded it off TV, it was good. Classic Spielberg really. Richard Dreyfuss was great and I really liked how Spielberg made it a family affair (in the beginning at least). He has (had? He doesn't do it so much anymore) such a knack for making even movies about aliens or sharks tie back to family relationships and whatnot. Nothing much to complain about, I enjoyed it.

Good Morning (Yasujiro Ozu, 1959)

7/10
An Ozu film involving a small community (neighborhood I guess) and their amusing internal politics, the central ones being the neighborhood's collective rent that went missing instead of being turned in, and two of the young boys refusing to speak until their parents buy them a TV. It is typical Ozu - charming and lightly humorous and a little poignant at times. I don't love any of Ozu's movies but they're all enjoyable on one level or another.

The Graduate (Mike Nichols, 1967)

7/10
I didn't love the movie but I enjoyed filling in the blanks in my on-going lessons in movie history. It's amazing how many things derive from or riff on or parody scenes from this movie. And why did this weird little movie have such a giant impact? I liked it but I think it was very much of its time. I also understand the soundtrack is part and parcel with the movie but wow I could have done with a lot less Simon & Garfunkel.