The King's Man (2021)

Score: 3.5 / 5

This series is so very strange. Back when The Secret Service launched in 2014, it seemed that Matthew Vaughn just wanted to make a silly, vulgar James Bond movie for a new age. And that's fine, just like the first two films. Wild and wacky, they stop just shy of full camp due to the earnestness with which they lean into their action sequences (not to say that Elton John flirting with Colin Firth after kicking ass in a parrot costume in The Golden Circle isn't camp). Overplotted and overwritten, they toy with larger ideas to validate their often cringey comedy moments, which makes for solid entertainment if not always anything more. And you can hardly fault the series for its considerable body count, which often includes main cast members.

The King's Man, the prequel origin story of the Kingsmen organization, is much more tame than the two that came before. Perhaps this is due to its setting, on the brink of war in 1914, when much of the smash-bang, gadget-driven action of the modern installments by definition can't happen. This one is much more of a spy movie, concerned with actual historical characters and events and the political games that led to open war. 

Ralph Fiennes (who finally proves his mettle at the kind of Bond character he could have played so well) plays the protagonist, Orlando Oxford, a VC-decorated former army officer and now sworn pacifist. Having lost his wife in the Boer War, Oxford has become more reclusive, determined to protect his son Conrad (Harris Dickinson) at all costs. Covertly, he has recruited two of his household servants (the excellently cast Djimon Hounsou and Gemma Arterton) to help him start his own spy network, hoping to head off unnecessary conflicts before they erupt. Oxford mentions more than once that they are able to hide in plain sight as servants ignored by the privileged. He, however, is an important advisor to King George (Tom Hollander, who deliciously also plays Kaiser Wilhelm and Czar Nicholas) in the time leading up to the Great War, and so hiding is not an option for him.

After setting itself up as a measured commentary on colonialism and pacifism, the film does inevitably turn toward violence, and it's not as classy as one might have hoped. A primary delight in the first film was seeing Colin Firth's character go from dapper gentleman to bloodthirsty maniac. Here, Fiennes is more restrained, which is great, but the film itself is about as bonkers as ever. To try and prevent Russia from leaving the war and opening the Western Front, the team journeys to Russia to stop Rasputin (an almost unrecognizable Rhys Ifans). The mad monk is working for the mysterious Shepherd (a sort of Moriarty or Blofeld figure), who is orchestrating the world war. Oxford's confrontation of Rasputin is an amazing sequence that blends actual history with bizarre action fantasy -- and a particularly uncomfortable scene in which Rasputin heals Oxford's leg wound by licking it -- and is a highlight of the film.

I found myself wondering more than once if this was initially conceived as a standalone WWI film before Vaughn co-opted or pirated it and then shoehorned it into his burgeoning and unlikely franchise. Some of the spy stuff and most of the war stuff is really solid filmmaking, with another excellent sequence taking place in a no-man's land hellish field of mud and blood; it reminded me of Wonder Woman and 1917 perhaps more than it deserved. But because of its greater emotional intelligence and slightly more accessible tone, The King's Man might be my favorite of this franchise yet. 

Minari (2021)

Score: 4 / 5

A Korean-American family moves from California to rural Arkansas in the hopes of setting up a home and farm of their own. The young father Jacob (Steven Yeun) and mother Monica (Han Ye-ri) work in a chicken farm/factory, identifying and separating chicks by sex. Their two children are Anne, a serious and more mature girl (Noel Kate Cho), and David, a more rambunctious six-year-old (Alan Kim). They are incredibly isolated, of course culturally but also geographically. The opening shots are of vast, green fields and a wide open sky. The world would seem to be theirs for the taking!

Autobiographical films like this -- especially ones about immigrant families -- can often be cloyingly sentimental, even to the point of opacity. It was my central problem with Roma, which often felt like we were being forced to watch the director thumb through old photo albums. Thankfully, this year's Belfast avoided that problem, and so does Minari. Writer and director Lee Isaac Chung clearly has a personal story to tell, but he knows how to make it accessible for others, even thoroughly entertaining. For a movie ostensibly about the American dream, culture clash, and difficult discussions of assimilation, Minari is also about intergenerational family relations and growing up in a strange new world.

Much like the sweeping cinematography that captures the beauty -- and dangers -- of life on the plains, the actors are also often wordless. When they do speak, it's a mixture of English and Korean, though mostly the latter. But in between, they work hard to tell a bountiful story. Jacob has clearly been practicing his American masculinity -isms, including his John Wayne shuffle and the cigarettes in his chest pocket. Monica comes from a higher social class and is now foundering in this rougher country life; she seems to want to head back to the cities, and maybe even back to Korea. They argue often over their vision for the farm and for their lives; they have differing parental techniques, and seem to have different goals in mind, especially regarding their children assimilating to the local community. One of the funniest scenes in the film comes when they visit a local church, where the reactions of the locals are at once horrifyingly problematic and hilariously honest.

While the film is nominally a coming-of-age dramedy about young David, its importance and good humor hinges on our realization that all the characters are in fact learning right from wrong and the best ways to behave with each other. The kids might be less savvy, but the adults are awkward too. The family's new neighbor, played by Will Patton, is an evangelical farmer whose delightful eccentricities are as specific as they are surprising. And then there's Monica's mother Soon-ja (a magnificent and brave performance from Youn Yuh-jung) who travels from South Korea to help watch the children while Monica and Jacob work. We learn a lot about Monica from her, as she is used to a fast-paced and loose-lipped social life in a big city. David doesn't think a grandmother should use so much profanity or engage in practical jokes, and his efforts at resistance only bring the family closer together.

Well, at least to some extent. There is a somewhat sobering confrontation looming before all is finished, and at least one nasty shock. But Minari is an unflinchingly hopeful and sweet movie, determined to absorb even a hesitant viewer into its lush imaginings. It understands people uncommonly well, and Chung is content to let us sit with his characters in silence and in awkwardness, just to breathe with them and get to know them better. Then, when they do act out, we laugh knowingly and caringly rather than out of total surprise. 

City of Lies (2021)

Score: 2 / 5

It just feels like too little too late. Even if it hadn't been shelved for so long, it would have felt late had it been released in 2016 when it was shot. This is partly due to the news specials, documentaries, shows (Unsolved), and movies (All Eyez on Me) that have already covered so much of the same ground: the murders of Tupac Shakur and Christopher Wallace, The Notorious B.I.G. This movie doesn't add much to the conversation, but I suppose it could act as a reasonably diverting entering point for younger audiences. Unfortunately, it's also not interesting or entertaining enough to make much of a splash, no doubt further hindered by public opinion around its lead actor.

Much like the crime procedurals we're all familiar with by now, Brad Furman's City of Lies (he has also directed The Lincoln Lawyer and The Infiltrator) is arguably more interested in the detective than in the victim or even the mystery. We start with a grizzled Russell Poole (Johnny Depp), a disgraced former LAPD detective still musing over the case that was never solved, meeting with LA Times reporter Jack Jackson (Forest Whitaker). Most of the meat of this movie takes place during flashbacks, as Poole spins his yarn about the initial investigation into Biggie's murder and his actions that led to resigning and losing both his pension and his family.

These flashbacks flesh out a younger Poole as he is first summoned to investigate the fatal shooting of an off-duty Black cop by another white detective. He's pressured to be sensitive, given the LA climate of the decade with Rodney King's murder and the OJ Simpson trial. But evidence arises quickly that the murdered cop had Bloods affiliation; moreover, he was on the payroll of Suge Knight, the head of Death Row Records. It becomes clear that Knight is Poole's primary suspect, and the investigation launches. Its twists and turns lead Poole, burdened too by pressure from oversight, to the brink of a mental breakdown; the case, in his mind, can't be solved because to do so would bring down the entire LAPD. Too many high-level officials have their hands in dirty money and dangerous circles.

The frame story ends, notably, with similar tragedy. Poole, whose ongoing friendship with Biggie's mother Voletta Wallace has seemingly kept him afloat, is reinvigorated, even going to the LA Sheriff's office to reopen the investigation. But a sudden heart attack kills him in a poetically ironic twist. Jackson publishes an article lionizing Poole before resigning what he sees as a hypocritical system of injustice and corruption. After all, almost two decades had passed, and the murders were still officially unsolved. Their seemingly dual obsessions converge on solving the murder, which the titular city is determined to forget about, and they both fail, because ultimately even worthy men can't always beat the system. For a movie that could have had an axe to grind -- and should have, a la Zodiac, perhaps -- this one is just really sad.

Even for someone only marginally familiar with the case specifics, I found the film largely uninteresting, thanks to lackluster and even downright confused direction and writing. Over-written, contrived dialogue causes the actors to gargle on exposition and repeated phrases like "you're off this case" and "unless we're not meant to solve it." Depp is really solid in his role, but almost everyone else feels bewildered or at least phoning it in, and I suspect that big names like Whitaker and Shea Whigham only appear badly due to misdirection. This ineptitude exists on the scene level, but also for the whole picture, as shapeless storytelling blurs the lines between past and present without apparent desire to shed new light, make any argument, or even really honor the characters. It worked hard to appear to be a murder mystery before dovetailing as a police procedural and character study, and finally ends up like a watered down PSA about police corruption and unjust murderous police behavior against people of color. Maybe if the screenplay had chosen a style or focus that would have helped.

Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021)

Score: 4.5 / 5

One of the most exciting entries in the MCU -- amidst an unpredictable slew of new titles, too -- No Way Home is a triumphant third Spider-Man movie. That's a phrase we've never heard before. Jon Watts and his team have crafted what amounts to a DCEU Arrowverse major crossover event, a playful and endlessly entertaining mashup of heroes and villains who react to their circumstances in unpredictable ways. What could have been a logistical nightmare, with so many big names, big titles, and big expectations, is instead energetic, creative, and utterly joyous. That's all thanks to a brilliant screenplay and confident directing, although frankly, I found the editing in this movie bewildering more than once (and that's the only reason it's not scored 5). Until, that is, the final act, which is shockingly emotional.

Beginning immediately after the end of Far From Home, the story launches Peter Parker (Tom Holland) into the public sphere. People on the street know who he is now, and so does the government. Peter, his girlfriend MJ (Zendaya), his best friend Ned (Jacob Batalon), and Aunt May (Marisa Tomei), are brought in for questioning before their charges are dropped, thanks to some quick work by their lawyer. And this, within the first ten minutes of the film, is when I started crying, because lo and behold: Charlie Cox reprises his role as Matt Murdock. Thanks to this applause-generating cameo -- and the presence of Vincent D'Onofrio's Wilson Fisk in the Hawkeye miniseries -- it seems the MCU has reclaimed the rights to their characters from the Netflix shows.

Then there's some basic dramatic hoopla about the kids applying for university and getting denied from all (even MIT!) due to their notoriety. The story in earnest begins after Peter asks Dr. Strange to cast a spell and make the world forget that he is our friendly neighborhood webslinger. Interrupting the wizard's work, Peter fractures the spell by requesting exceptions for MJ, Ned, and Aunt May. It's more than a little annoying to me that Ned is such a central character in these movies, because I find him almost unbearable, but MJ and Aunt May each finally get some really golden scenes in this movie. Not long after the spell, we learn that his meddling somehow caused a rift in the multiverse, allowing other individuals who know Peter's secret identity to access this universe. Thus enters characters from previous iterations of Spider-Man in some of the best-handled retconning I've ever seen.

In what we all feared would simply be a casting gimmick, a huge cast of fan favorites appears spontaneously, wreaking havoc in their search for Spider-Man. The Lizard (Rhys Ifans) and Sandman (Thomas Haden Church) are quickly contained by Dr. Strange, and Peter confronts Doc Ock (Alfred Molina) and Electro (Jamie Foxx). Norman Osborn (Willem Dafoe), still wrestling with his split personality of the Green Goblin, makes friends with Aunt May, and works with Peter to rehabilitate the villains. They aim to help these characters rather than simply send them back to the moments of their deaths. It makes for several surprisingly funny sequences of the characters bantering and discussing how to be "fixed." It's not an overcrowding mess, but in fact buttresses this "Home" trilogy's central themes of belonging and integrity and comfort. It's also an effective way of finally allowing Holland's version of Spidey to mature and really grapple with his mantra, "with great power comes great responsibility."

And with the weight of these heroic decisions comes dire consequences. The filmmakers here know this, as they strive valiantly to honor the legacies of previous Spider-Men franchises while more or less correcting our cultural narrative around the intellectual property. Enter, as they do near the halfway point, two other Spider-Men in the form of Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield. What I thought would be cameo appearances are actually crucial plot and character points that carry through the end of the film. Their scenes are laugh-out-loud funny, often tear-jerking, and irresistibly welcome, and the writers clearly wanted to honor rather than rewrite their characters, especially in Garfield's case, who was unable to make a third outing as Spidey. One wonders, now, if Sony will attempt to capitalize on his re-entry for their growing efforts to continue pumping out darker Marvel titles. It helps that Venom will apparently now become a shared property, as told by the credits scenes in Venom: Let There Be Carnage and in this film.

tick, tick... BOOM! (2021)

Score: 3 / 5

One of my most anticipated movies of the year, tick, tick...Boom! is also one of the most disappointing to me. Not because it's "bad" in any dubious attempt at objectivity, but because, for this fan, it's not representative of the musical on which it is based. The show, which features three actors in total, perhaps isn't rich with cinematic possibility, I'll grant, but Lin-Manuel Miranda's directorial debut seems determined to make this a big-budget movie musical for the ages. And while some of his choices are inspired and inspiring, many more feel inflated with a profoundly off-putting sense of self-importance. Which might be appropriate, come to think on it, given its main character.

To be fair, Jonathan Larson's original show with the same title was, in fact, a musical monologue of sorts, and it is a dramatization of this which takes up a large portion of the film. Andrew Garfield, in Oscar-worthy form, enters the stage with panache and urgency in telling the autobiographical story much as Larson himself had in the early '90s. In his delivery, he talks about the incessant internal clock ticking as he's about to turn 30 and has nothing to show for it. He's been working for more than a decade as a waiter in a diner while concocting a sci-fi musical called Superbia, which is finally about to be workshopped for the first time. His hopes and aspirations -- he introduces himself at a party as "the future of musical theatre" -- are dangerously tied into his self-worth, so much so that he has no money to support his meager lifestyle. His best friend and roommate Michael is "moving on up to the east side," his girlfriend is trying to get a better job out of town, and his friends are dying of AIDS one by one, and while these things clearly wear on his mind and heart, Jon can't quite focus his attention on any of them.

Much like the whirlwind of Larson's mind, the film careens wildly between its scenes. Bizarre editing forces us to jump from Larson's musical monologue, where his narration teeters on the manic, to a more or less realistic version of events in his flat and the surrounding environs. The plot is less important in this project than theme, and so the film is essentially a character study of its protagonist/narrator, which allows some forgiveness for peripatetic storytelling. Garfield's Larson is a genius, frustrated at the annoyances of the everyday world that take away from his creative time. He is occasionally mentored by his idol, the late great Stephen Sondheim (Bradley Whitford and, in a voicemail, the man himself); he also writes odd little "jingles" during the day to help pass the time and entertain his friends. He also swims regularly at the YMCA, hosts parties for theatrical friends, and sabotages his own half-hearted attempts to earn real money at a potentially soul-sucking white collar job.

Miranda clearly understands the character and the real man -- he once played Larson onstage in this musical -- and he loads the film with countless references to other shows (especially Rent), other artists, and of course, the '90s. Turning the film into a consummate work of fan service, he puts in as many famous faces and cameos as he seemingly could, especially into the most meta musical number in the show, "Sunday," which features so many stars the actual meaning of the number is almost lost behind the limelight. And that's largely true of the film as a whole: Miranda channels Larson so well that the film's pretentious delivery feels neglectful of the things that really matter, cashing in on weepy sentimentality over marginalized people even as it hamstrings their efforts to be heard. Don't believe me? Check out that, after Michael reveals his diagnosis, his solo "Real Life" is limited in the film to him crying and gazing out a window as he repeats the four-word chorus and none of the actual song.

And then there's the film's weird push to act like a documentary, using what appears to be stock footage in a small frame to apparently dramatize Larson's young, brief life, and using the actors for voiceover narration, twice referencing his untimely death and often explicitly tying this work to Rent. It's possibly the most heavy-handed directing and writing I've seen all year, and it felt more overwhelming than entertaining.

Nightmare Alley (2021)

Score: 5 / 5

I'm embarrassed to admit I knew nothing of the William Lindsay Gresham novel on which this movie is based, nor on the 1947 film adaptation. But that perhaps made watching this Nightmare Alley the most darkly pleasurable cinematic experience this year. Despite gauging early on that this was no typical fare from writer/director Guillermo del Toro, whose work always seems to include elements of the supernatural to buttress his real aims of skewering wealth, the pious, nuclear families, and genre conventions, it became clear quickly that this is one of his best. There are no fairies or ghosts in this film, at least not literal ones; Nightmare Alley is his astonishing foray into film noir, a crime thriller dripping with style, hinging on plot, and toying with no small amount of irony.

While the ending initially surprised me, it shouldn't have. Without spoiling things, del Toro here crafts a parable about the cyclical nature of self-destructive behavior. Primarily interested in his antihero protagonist, Stan Carlisle (Bradley Cooper at his best), del Toro frames the film as a character study. Generally nonverbal, Stan leers his way through each scene with Macbeth's ambition glinting from his hungry eyes. Before he says any words at all, we've already seen him drag a corpse into view before setting a house on fire; fleeing the scene, he materializes in a circus circa 1930. Think AHS: Freak Show with a distinctly Gothic palette. Upon seeing the carnival "geek," a feral man who has been abused and dehumanized by the owner (Willem Dafoe) to sell more tickets, Stan gets the itch to make money with this traveling group.

Del Toro, by this point, has shown us a world rich only in desperation, selfishness, and violence. We're keenly aware that Stan's decisions -- mysterious as his criminal past is -- are entrapping him, and we suspect that he is a little masochistic. It's telling that, in walking through the circus before encountering the geek, the only attraction he enters is a giant devilish facade for a "fun house" themed after the circles of hell. It seems Stan knows he is destined for damnation. What he doesn't know, and what del Toro brilliantly highlights through production design, lighting and colors, and cinematography (the excellent Dan Laustsen), is that he is seeing his own future unfold before his eyes. The circus, much like the as-yet-unknown interiors of Stan's mind, is a downward spiral, one that will repeat and deteriorate until he is hopelessly enmeshed in a web of his own making.

Speaking of spidery predators, let's move on to a few other delightful characters. After learning the arts (and tricks) of mentalism from the circus fortune-tellers, Zeena (Toni Collette) and her partner Pete (David Straithairn) who use a clever code to read and cheat people, Stan desires power over the simple-minded masses. Courting another carny named Molly (Rooney Mara) as his lover and assistant, Stan leaves to make a name for himself as a traveling psychic. When things get a little boring or he's not raking in enough money, he starts offering "spook shows," meaning preying on the bereaved and suggesting ghosts of their loved ones mean to communicate. He was forbidden to do this by Zeena, who knew the emotional pain this can cause, and Molly is deeply uncomfortable with the practice too. But Stan, in Cooper's hands, uses his charm and panache just enough to make us doubt that he's a heartless, avaricious wolf in handsome skin. Could his daddy issues -- flashbacks reveal his boyish need for approval and his earnest hope to succeed at any cost -- be sincere, or did they create a black hole of sociopathy?

Enter Dr. Ritter (Cate Blanchett), a psychologist with no small amount of hatred for those who prey on the weak-minded, just as Stan reaches the height of "making it big" in Buffalo, New York. His high society aspirations -- and his disgusting new moustache -- are challenged publicly by the deep alto and satin-sleek woman of his dreams. From her introductory shot, we are keenly aware that she is a standard femme fatale. As written, she's a panther stalking the man she will destroy; in Blanchett's uncommonly intelligent and elegant style, she's a demon in curls and heels, knowingly disarming in her every movement and turn of phrase. As she lures Stan into her sanctum, she vampirically sucks him dry, romantically, sexually, cognitively; his masochistic tendencies make him feel drunk with power in these moments, but we know it's only a matter of time before the good doctor's fangs are bared. It's a masterful performance and one of the most exciting characters on screen this year.

Laustsen's lighting has the uncanny glow of timelessness, a youthful aura that is deeply unsettling as it de-ages its subjects. I'd kill to see this movie in black and white, if only to better appreciate the noir aspects: deep, opaque shadows, sets that feel more like prisons than offices or houses, shades that frame characters like bars on a cell or cages in a zoo. Then again, the gorgeous colors -- strong especially in gold and green hues, the colors of money -- add immensely to the toxic atmosphere and beguiling nightmarish aesthetic. The circular imagery is inherent too repeatedly, from the giant Ferris wheel over the circus to the funhouse tunnel Stan traverses to reach the geek, from the dark and narrow streets of Buffalo to Dr. Ritter's recording cylinders and even the deep hallways of her office building. Even some transitional editing uses old-fashioned iris out before a scene ends. And then, by its final tragic shot, the film suggests to us that we are not so removed from this waking nightmare as we might have hoped. Del Toro's craftsmanship here is one that will keep you thinking long after the credits have rolled; a nightmare indeed.

The Vigil (2021)

Score: 3 / 5

I always enjoy when the typical possession or exorcism movie trades its trappings from Catholicism to another religious tradition. To name a few favorites: The Babadook and Relic were more about developmental psychology, The Exorcism of Emily Rose was more ecumenical if not universal (much like The Soul Collector / 8: A South African Horror Story), The Wailing drew from Korean shamanism, Arabic spiritual horror reached Western audiences in Under the Shadow, and Jewish folklore provided the inspiration for The Possession in 2012. This last mention is key moving forward now, with the new title The Vigil also concerning Jewish mythology, though with a distinctly different focus.

Yakov (Dave Davis) is in trouble. Unemployed and recently having left his Orthodox Jewish community in Brooklyn, he founders for connection. Shy and meek, we gather that he has undergone some traumatic event, no doubt exacerbated by guilt or shame associated with his family, faith, and ethnicity. So when he is approached by an Orthodox acquaintance for a job, he takes it out of necessity, and we can see his psyche starting to fracture. The task, we learn from the film's opening text, is that of a "Shomer," a watchful guardian who is paid to sit near a dead body overnight. It's a tradition born from guarding the deceased against grave robbers or scavengers, but some traditions believe one's spirit remains near its body until the funeral.

Shortly after entering the house of recently deceased Rubin Litvak and his wife (a wonderful Lynn Cohen), Yakov feels ill at ease. Is he just tired, stressed, and desperate to make his ends meet? Or could the trauma experienced by Mr. Litvak -- a Holocaust survivor -- be somehow triggering Yakov's own trauma? It doesn't take long for us to learn this mysterious even may have had a part in him abandoning his faith community; and why does he keep hearing the disembodied voice of someone asking why he let them die? The Litvak house is very dark, and the filmmakers seem determined to make this a veritable haunted house, with some dark force moving in the shadows and toying with Yakov's sanity. But we're never quite allowed to know if it is all simply in his mind, shadowy manifestations of his guilt, or if there is indeed something more diabolical afoot.

Aesthetically, the film is moody, broody, and dark, but offers little novelty in the way of visuals or sound design. Thematically, the film is also moody, broody, and dark, but locked in its own mind and that of its introverted protagonist. Unlike The Ritual, which dealt with similar themes among a small group of characters (who could then verbalize these matters), here most of the emotional weight must be intuited. We get some help, but frankly it's uninspired: Yakov is literally "in the dark," searching for a light to guide him out, often in the form of him texting or Facetiming people during his long night's vigil. Then of course there's his therapist (Fred Melamed), not seen but heard over the phone, and Mr. Litvak himself, who recorded his ramblings about the demonic manifestations of guilt in the form of a "Mazzik."

It's all a nice atmospheric descent into one man's search for escape from trauma and a religious tradition, which is at once nothing new since The Exorcist but still pretty cool to see from a Jewish-American perspective. It's also not particularly scary -- more sad than anything -- and, worse, not particularly interesting. Mrs. Litvak is a bit wasted as a character, though thankfully the film didn't turn her dementia into anything demoniac, and the idea that the parasitic villain will simply transfer to Yakov makes the film, in the end, pretty nihilistic. Then again, The Vigil features, in its climax, what amounts to a Jewish Rambo, when Yakov wraps his tefillin around his arm and head to confront the demon and his guilt. The synthesizer music shifts us into an '80s nostalgic mindset, and faceless spirits push through the walls of the Litvak home like something out of Poltergeist or A Nightmare on Elm Street. It's easily the best scene in the film; too bad my mind was already starting to drift by that point.

West Side Story (2021)

Score: 5 / 5

This is exactly how it should always be done. This is a perfect movie musical and a perfect remake. Steven Spielberg reminds us, after about fifteen years of solid but typical movies, that he is a legend for a reason. I mean, I loved Bridge of Spies and The Post and especially Lincoln, but his last truly great movie for me was Munich in 2005. Interestingly, that same year he also did a remake, War of the Worlds, which at the time was, for me, also a nearly perfect remake. But West Side Story, an adaptation of the 1957 musical and, to a lesser extent, the 1961 classic film, is easily already in my top 5 of the director's long, storied filmography. It's also -- and forgive the possible heresy here -- a better film than the original. Which is saying a lot for a movie that swept the Oscars and is regularly still shown in high school music, theatre, and dance classes.

Some may decry the "need" for a remake, but after four years of a president who repeatedly denounced "shithole" countries and whose racist policies and remarks often targeted Latin American, Hispanic, and even Puerto Rican people, updated works like In the Heights and West Side Story are exactly the kinds of musicals we need for mass audiences. Plus, the original WSS film was very much filmed on large sound stages, as if we were meant to experience the theatrical production even more than its cinematic delivery. Spielberg keeps the impetus if not the vehicle. His new film is clearly a dynamic movie and meant to avoid comparison to a stage production (like the many produced in theatres around the world every year). And yet, he also avoids the frenetic editing, frenzied pacing, and overall overwhelming spectacle that has plagued most recent movie musicals; it's in vogue now, but Spielberg challenges us to experience a slower, more intimate, gritty reality much as if we are present with the characters in the same darkened auditorium. It's a riveting, engrossing experience.

As someone keenly fascinated by the adaptation process and effect, I'm going to focus now on that instead of a synopsis or anything else. Because, ultimately, this new movie is extremely faithful to the original. In fact, it occasionally felt like a shot-for-shot remake but with better cinematography (by the amazing Janusz Kaminski), updated choreography (by Justin Peck, who still honors the Jerome Robbins original), and effective, timely, and thoughtful dialogue (by the incomparable Tony Kushner). Not much has changed, but the bits that have changed make a lot more sense. They help the flow of the story by offering motivation, explanation, and background. In fact, with these ideas in mind, I'd compare it to Beauty and the Beast (2017) as an example of improving what needed help but simply polishing the rest. Shall we take a look?

We begin with Spielberg's historian side as we swoop around a wrecking ball and a pile of rubble that was once part of San Juan Hill; the camera eventually pulls over a sign declaring the site the future home of the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. For those who know its history, this was gentrification at its most blatant, pushing immigrant communities out of the district in the name of high-brow art and business for wealthy whites. Emerging from the rubble as dusty wretches, the gang of white Jets led by a surprisingly sensitive Riff (Mike Faist, surely soon to be a major star) take to the streets with the iconic dancing synonymous with the title. They're angry about their "turf" getting taken over "by people we don't like." Spielberg's iconographic shorthand reveals a lot in a short amount of time, as when one of the Jets removes a Puerto Rican business sign, revealing an old Irish business sign underneath.

Then we're thrust in amongst the Sharks, a competing gang of Puerto Ricans, fighting to have a place in a city determined to ignore or kick them out. David Alvarez imbues his character Bernardo, the Shark leader, with fresh levels of urgent protectiveness, especially over his sister Maria (stunning new star Rachel Zegler) and girlfriend Anita (a brilliant Ariana DeBose). He has to be protective because Maria is coming of age and wants to meet boys; he forbids her to meet any gringos, but at the dance she meets her Romeo, a beautiful white boy named Tony (Ansel Elgort in his best performance yet). These characters are given more backstory and more rounded characterizations than their Oscar-winning counterparts (Bernardo and Anita, that is) in the original. 

Speaking of which. Tony lives in the basement of the store where he also works. But Doc, the kindly old white man of the original, is notably absent here though his name remains above the door. Instead, the store his owned by his widow, Valentina, a Puerto Rican woman played by the effervescent Rita Moreno, who won the Oscar as Anita in '61 and frankly could do so again this year. Of course Tony has changed his ways under her watchful care; how could he not? And then, near the end of the film, when this movie gives her the chance to sing "Somewhere," I openly wept. It's the single best thing this film could have done, and she nails it.

But the movie gets a lot of other things right, too. The context of "Something's Coming" is changed to be less about fate and more about Valentina's hopes for Tony's future. "Gee, Officer Krupke" is set in the precinct, allowing the boys to tear up the office they so despise. The showstopping number "America" gets pulled down off the nighttime rooftop after the dance and into the bright, sunlit streets the morning after. It's a rousing, vibrant number not unlike scenes of In the Heights earlier this year, and if there is one thing that really gets me going in any movie musical, it's a huge number on the streets. Much later, "I Feel Pretty" is put back into its original slot in the plot, immediately after the rumble resulting in the deaths of Riff and Bernardo, making Maria's naïve optimism unbearably ironic. At first I was angry that "Cool" was taken from Ice after the rumble, but now delivered by Tony to Riff before the rumble shows that he actually was trying to stop the impending fight and even broke faith with the Jets at the most crucial point (fun fact: the stage show also has this song before the rumble, but it's Riff calming everyone down while they wait in Doc's store).

These changes, for me, make the story more accessible, more realistic than the original. Everything else is essentially the same. It's endlessly faithful, to the point of improving what needed to be improved. There is a lot more spoken Spanish -- none of which is subtitled -- and a lot more urgency to the proceedings, even though the pace is as deliberate as it always was. Add sumptuous costumes, performers giving their all to the craft, and a team of pure geniuses behind the camera, and West Side Story isn't just one of the best movies this year. It's one of the best movie musicals ever made.

Supernova (2021)

Score: 2.5 / 5

Supernova is one of those movies that was inspired by a single brilliant idea, then fluffed up and fleshed out with a bunch of vague supporting details and scenes, but is ultimately saved by its stars. A quiet, somber look at aging love, this romance hits almost no points of novelty in a remarkably tame story. It has few, if any, aspirations to be profound, instead contentedly hovering between arthouse chic and Hallmark schlock. When it aims for your tear ducts -- and it does, several times -- even I (a crier in most movies anyway) felt more annoyed than touched by its heavy-handed blows. And yet, thanks to some of the most emotionally honest work I've ever seen from its leading men, this movie is more than worth a watch.

A campervan driving across the gorgeous English countryside carries two men, partners for twentysomething years. Sam (Colin Firth) drives while Tusker (Stanley Tucci) navigates, and the two lightheartedly bicker about the directions, about who gets to drive, about the music on the radio. Their sweet pooch lies behind them tranquilly. There is no exposition in this film, and very little history is shared of their relationship through dialogue. Rather, Firth and Tucci inject powerful weight into every interaction, so much so that the stilted dialogue tends to become more distracting than anything. The two men often react to each other wordlessly but slightly physically, as old partners who are probably more aware of each other's body language than their own. They can sense a shift in attitude, a mental block, emotional subtleties in an instant. It probably helps that the two actors are longtime friends in real life. Thankfully, writer/director Harry Macqueen seems to be aware of his own writerly inadequacies, and so most scenes are in fact silent.

It's clear there is a melancholia to these life partners, and it doesn't take long for us to see that Tusker is slowly slipping away into the abyss of early-onset dementia. He wanders, sometimes physically but mostly mentally, and he's keenly aware of his own shortcomings. Carrying the knowledge that his brain is failing, Tusker is retreating into himself, often remaining still and reflective in moments that would ordinarily call for a response or even an outburst. I was reminded of Still Alice a lot, though this film's beats are less unexpected and brutal, more sentimental and safe. Sam, on the other hand, dutifully and proactively attempts to care for him, but is having trouble finding the sweet spot of care over control. His every look at Tusker puts him on the verge of weeping, not because of the loss that is to come but because of the loss that is already happening. These are clearly not the same men who fell in love long ago, and it won't be long before neither of them knows the other anymore.

When they reach their destination, we learn considerably more about what's going on, and it's a devastating revelation. Not for us so much -- we've seen this story before, most recently in Blackbird, but it's an important issue for people to consider -- as for the characters, who suddenly have to decide if their extraordinarily believable and honest love for each other is selfless or selfish. The relative doldrums of the first half of the movie are left behind when the friends and family show up, even though the movie still belongs to Sam and Tusker, and things gain speed and traction. But there is no real action in this movie; it's a character study, and a fairly maudlin one at that. But the discussions become more interesting and urgent. There's one amazing scene -- surely the inspiration for creating this film -- in particular when, over dinner, Tusker, who is a writer by profession, attempts to read a speech in honor of his life partner. When he is unable due to his dementia, Sam steps in to read it. It's the best writing in the film and a masterclass in acting, as Tusker externally beams over his own words about Sam and internally crumbling as the reality of his condition sets in. I can't praise the film for much (this kind of thing isn't really in my wheelhouse), but Tucci and Firth are firing on all fronts and it's a wonder to behold.

Don't Look Up (2021)

Score: 4.5 / 5

Adam McKay does it again with a surprise big-name, big-budget comedy right in the middle of awards season. I didn't like him before The Big Short, but that movie and Vice are two of my favorite topical comedies; perhaps they endear me to him because they both have cruel dark sides (actually, I'm not sure I personally consider Vice a comedy, but here we are). His biting satire in these feature films is finely tuned to be at once riveting, informative, absurd, and often bleak. So naturally, after tackling the housing crisis of 2007 and Dick Cheney's rise to power, he decided to tackle climate change. Seems doable, right?

Actually, in his hands, yes. Not because it's like the uncannily realistic analysis of history in his previous two films; some may argue this movie has more in common with Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt or even It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World than anything else. An enormous ensemble cast of A-listers assemble here to deliver a rollicking mess of comedy, a collage of vignettes meant to overwhelm our senses, assisted by breakneck editing that tosses in heavy amounts of seemingly random stock footage. McKay's screenplay, too, sometimes feels like an amalgamation of memes, sound bytes, and conspiracy headlines awash in wry clickbait humor. The film may be, generically, a political commentary on the climate change crisis, but in terms of scope, it is equally interested in social media, celebrity worship, technology and big business, political corruption, scientific sellout, and, yes, global warming. By its triumphant finale, it even reaches a level of existential contemplation on par with Samuel Beckett's work.

Leonardo DiCaprio leads as an unpretentious astronomy professor in Michigan whose PhD student (played by Jennifer Lawrence) discovers that a huge comet is flying directly toward Earth. Its size and movement indicate it will strike in approximately six months and cause an extinction event that could destroy all life on the planet. With their colleague (Rob Morgan), they quickly attempt to warn the White House of impending doom. But the president (Meryl Streep), a Trumpian woman who cares more about her appearance, re-election, and private life more than anything else, won't have it, and her son and Chief of Staff (Jonah Hill) tries to limit their access. To get the message out, they take to televised news, but the newscasters (Cate Blanchett and Tyler Perry) are more interested in lighthearted banter and viewing numbers than in news of disaster. 

In many ways a comedy of errors, the film's bleak attitude toward our cultural institutions of media, government, and celebrity would be tragically infuriating if not for the absurdist humor lacing each scene. Each new scandal or distraction is more enticing to the American public than bad news, specifically that of the death of our planet. It's telling that DiCaprio feels the need to go on shows like Sesame Street to scream "We're all going to die" when the news only makes fun of the crazy scientists. It doesn't take long for the scientists themselves, in moments like this, to become memes and sound bytes themselves, adding to the chaotic distraction that is social media. It's also telling that the frenetic editing of Don't Look Up increasingly leans into the annoyingly short attention spans cultivated by social media -- even cutting between scenes in the middle of characters' sentences -- implying that we (the audience) are as much a part of the problem as the ridiculous people we're watching. 

It has its odd moments, to be sure, and a couple really wacky inclusions. Mark Rylance pops in as a sort of senile cross between Elon Musk and Steve Jobs to try and save the world while making even more money. Timothée Chalamet shows up for a few scenes near the end, doing his usual grungy thing as a superficially precocious young adult, but he does help facilitate the surprisingly emotional climax of the film. And then there's the chillingly realistic shift in the final act, when the scientists finally attempt to harness all the tools of social media to their advantage by starting a new trend of #JustLookUp, before the president and other non-believers challenge it with the titular catchphrase, chanting "Don't Look Up" at rallies and branding their red hats with their new mantra. These only help make the texture of the film more fascinating politically even as we see the parallels with deniers of climate change. And while few moments have real depth to them -- often the film literally cuts away just as characters experience epiphanies or prepare to make meaningful declarations -- the scope here makes it all work. It might be a message movie, but it's got a lot of messages, like any quality SNL skit worth its time. And this one is far more than worth it.