Firstly, if you’re reading this as part of a “blind person sees for the first time with new bionic eyes” video, I’m so sorry, and if you’ve suddenly come to duck-and-covering under your school desk clutching an open Chromebook while Mariah Carey and Ariana Grande have a whistle tone competition over the PA system, let me kindly direct you to the About page.
Well the end of the world—excuse me, the end of 2020 is coming into view as we crest the early-December hill, which means, as a new year approaches, we’ve entered the cycle of important acts of reflection that serve to usher in this arbitrarily delineated newness on the horizon. This of course includes such performances of annual accountability as reviewing what music we’ve played for ourselves in the last eleven months while presumably just staring out windows as the seasons change without us, the sun-baby of Teletubbie fame now consumed by colicky wailing from its neglected sky-ball (according to Spotify Wrapped, my top artist was again Vengaboys!). This time of year also means that the holidays are just around the corner (have always been curious about this “corner,” and why it feels so metrocentric and/or inherently menacing), so naturally I sat my family down to watch Todd Hayne’s 2015 adaptive melodramatic masterpiece, Carol, and was graced by an early Christmas miracle which was my dad’s looking over at me and saying the words every son wants to hear: “If you wake up and Sarah Paulson is sitting in your room, something’s wrong.” Blessings.
Colombiana
dir. Olivier Megaton, 2011
Watched this on TV in my basement when times were simpler and Zoe Saldana was doing action as well as sci-fi blockbusters. Little did I know, less than a decade later, I would find myself in Bogotá and not think of this movie once.
The Color of Pomegranates
dir. Sergei Parajanov, 1969
Time and time again this film shows up on “most beautiful films ever” lists and they are all correct. Ask me to deconstruct any of the tableaus and I will, as they say, plead the fifth, but artfully, like our languages could never coalesce and we are kin through silence. [Closes journal, folds glasses, and returns to seat through a sea of thunderous snapping.]
Columbus
dir. Kogonada, 2017
Watched this on a late winter Saturday morning alone in my childhood home in 2018 a few days before an MFA program interview, which is a recipe for this film hitting so hard that I felt like it knocked me loose and now I’m still .0025 seconds behind the rest of the world, if that is relatable at all for anyone.
Had another little viewing of this in late winter of this year before I knew what a coronavirus was, and after watching, the world seemed a place of untapped possibility. :’)
Comet
dir. Sam Esmail, 2014
Got around to seeing this once I was already two seasons into watching Mr. Robot and was wrong to think these two things would be similar.
Something cosmic that happens is that this film, for whatever reason, comes up every time I talk to someone about movies more than one time, even though I don’t really remember much of it. I want to say it’s like (500) Days of Summer but better, but I will not be going on the record with this.
Coming Forth By Day
dir. Hala Lotfy, 2012
Saw this at the Flaherty when I went to that, and I loved it. Wish I could remember it more, unlike all the other films I write about on here, which I can recall with immaculate precision.
Comrades: Almost a Love Story
dir. Peter Chan, 1996
I was shown this in a film course on global cinema and I wish I could tell you the political inflections of this film as they relate to Hong Kong in the 90s, I truly do, but all I can envision is Maggie Cheung looking at a Mickey Mouse back tattoo (capitalism/globalism iconography… ok it’s coming back to me…).
Contempt
dir. Jean-Luc Godard, 1963
There was some serendipitous overlap between this film-within-a-film’s spin on The Odyssey (what do you mean Florence Welch didn’t pioneer this as a project title?) and something I had just read at the time I was watching, but I of course don’t remember what it was, even though this occurred in July of this year (which might as well be Ancient Greece or 1960s Capri).
Cool Hand Luke
dir. Stuart Rosenberg, 1967
My AP Literature teacher (almost wrote “professor” because I am a cripplingly inured automaton) showed this movie in his class for reasons that have since “slipped away like a bottle of wine,” per a distinguished writer in her own right (wordplay, on top of everything else).
I remember the scene where Paul Newman eats 50 hard-boiled eggs because that’s not something one is permitted to forget.
Corpus Christi
dir. Jan Komasa, 2019
Watched this on the same day that Sufjan released The Ascension as if my confirmed catholic soul had not said “oof!” enough that day.
For a time, in my younger years, my mom was trying to incite me to join the priesthood (we’re reading into it), and for what it’s worth I think I could have been a good one (barring the sodomy!).
Cowboys & Aliens
dir. Jon Favreau, 2011
I definitely crushed on Olivia Wilde in high school in a way that I like to believe was earnest. And when her character on House, M.D. was revealed to be bisexual? Well, that was a confrontation.
The Crazies
dir. Breck Eisner, 2010
Have not seen the original, but I have watched this on TV in my mom’s basement while “working out” in the home gym. I want to say Liv Tyler is in this with the Panabaker sister who was in Sky High?*
*Liv Tyler is not at all in this, but Danielle Panabaker was, and is in Sky High, too. Her sister, Kay, is listed as “an American zoologist and former actress” which will be, by the time this is posted, my bio on Twitter.
Crazy Rich Asians
dir. Jon M. Chu, 2018
I remember I was walking around Destiny USA (mall in Syracuse, but also perhaps title of Hustlers sequel?) when I heard that Constance Wu was ungrateful/mean, or something. Not everyone can say this.
Crazy, Stupid, Love
dirs. Glenn Ficarra, John Requa, 2011
Made a whole little video about the word “crazy” that was only 55% in jest, so I’m not going to get into it here.
I’m trying to remember the backyard scene at the end, but it’s been supplanted by the awkward family barbecue from Miranda July’s The Future (2011), because apparently any backyard in the greater LA area is the same to me due to a rare congenital disorder called “East Coast native.”
Crimson Peak
dir. Guillermo del Toro, 2015
I remember watching this movie and thinking, “I am not going to remember this movie.” A self-fulfilling prophecy, perhaps, regarding a film that I have to assume had a prophecy or two of its own.
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
dir. David Fincher, 2008
Maybe next census we can forget about a citizenship question and switch gears to include one that just says “Do you know what a ‘Benjamin Button’ is?” Genuinely I would like to know this stat.
Cuties
dir. Maïmouna Doucouré, 2020
I hate that I am someone who was more motivated to watch this by the controversy surrounding it (unfounded, in my so so very humble opinion). Ultimately the critiques circulating based on a promotional image were the same critiques the film seemed set out to articulate, but whether or not it actualized these ontological intentions remained indeterminable to me by its final frames—ok taking off my Film Reviewer hat now, haha! [Removes velvet beret, which is drenched with sweat and maybe blood?]
Cyberbully
dir. Charles Binamé, 2011
Kay Panabaker’s final film role according to my homepage, IMDb! I don’t remember anything about this but I did watch it, I think via DVR.
Dallas Buyers Club
dir. Jean-Marc Vallée, 2013
Was this the AIDS story we need(ed)? Was Jared Leto the one for the role? Was Jennifer Garner in this or am I fever dreaming her into a white coat again?
Damsel
dirs. David Zellner, Nathan Zellner, 2018
A just-ok trope-subversion film that I turned on for Mia Wasikowska and kept on in hopes that Robert Pattinson might sing that “honeybun” song again, the same one that Terry Gross had the gall to play during his Fresh Air interview.
Dances with Wolves
dir. Kevin Costner, 1990
My AP Language teacher (did not almost write “professor” this time; my AI is developing self-awareness) played this film for us, and I don’t remember much of it, but I do remember that she had, on her desk, a lamp with a bulb that in all seriousness must have been 5 watts max (my friends and I named our dodgeball tournament team The 5-Watters in its honor). Once, she made a self-effacing joke about how sad and dangerous it is living alone and it did not land!
Dan in Real Life
dir. Peter Hedges, 2007
YouTubed the trailer to see if I actually watched this or not (I did), and had completely forgotten they still made narrated trailers in 2007—feeling old.
Another trailer discovery: Juliette Binoche. In this movie— feeling… young?
The Danish Girl
dir. Tom Hooper, 2015
Saw this in theaters with my mom, with whom I was doing some Christmas shopping, and when she asked if I wanted to see a movie I said, “Sure do you want to see the one about a transgender painter in early 20th century Denmark, or the one about lesbians in 1950s New York?” A few weeks later, I left her for London and with much to think about.
Various through lines already emerging this week (Panabakers, AP English teachers, watching movies in basement) one of which is cis white men winning Oscars for transforming into archetypal beautiful-but-tragic trans women characters, but I’m hoping it’s old hat by now (in this community of readers whom I love) to even broach why that is Not Great™—if this is something you’d never thought about before, watch Disclosure on Netflix, at literal least.
Daredevil
dir. Mark Steven Johnson, 2003
I remember my parents telling me I was too young to see this when it came out, and then when I finally did see it a few years later, I wish someone had told me I was too old—ideally, the opportune window to see this movie is less time than is its actual running time.
Darkest Hour
dir. Joe Wright, 2017
Watching this was the only time I ever thought about my visit to the Churchill War Rooms (a branch of the “Imperial War Museum,” I point out as I Fleabag-look into the camera).
Dark Shadows
dir. Tim Burton, 2012
Vehicle for Eva Green to perform levitative sex.
Date Night
dir. Shawn Levy, 2010
Laughed my little be-hind off at this straight-couple-accidentally-does-crime genre movie back in my heyday (kidding of course about the heyday bit). Mostly, I remember the outtakes (“bloopers,” if you will/must).
The DaVinci Code & Angels & Demons
dir. Ron Howard, 2006; 2009
I thought I’d only seen one of these, but in trying to determine which, I realized I’d conflated Paul Bettany’s self-flagellating monk with Ewan McGregor’s self-immolating priest, as we all on occasion have done.
The Day After Tomorrow
dir. Roland Emmerich, 2004
Pretty sure this movie includes at least one room being flooded and filled by water, which we know is a cinematic kink of mine, and based on my character arc, probably how I will die.
Daybreakers
dirs. Michael Spierig, Peter Spierig, 2009
I believe I watched this film about institutionalized vampirism (on TV in the basement) after school one day and thought it was “innovative.”
Deadfall
dir. Stefan Ruzowitzky, 2012
Last week, I forgot that this is also, first and foremost, a Thanksgiving movie, even though/especially because Kate Mara is involved in a snowmobile chase.
In 2013, I was singlehandedly running this movie’s marketing campaign (it was on Netflix) by fervently sitting people down to watch it with me, commending it for its grim tone and deep psychological currents, or something. I think I watched it with some friends in college while one of them was hosting a prospective student, who then went on to Colgate but would not say hi to me—wherever she is now, I hope she is happy.
PLEASE share your own experiences with any of this week’s films in a comment—I’ll include my favorite in next week’s email for my millions of beautiful fans* to enjoy.
*Data pending
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So many good ones this week!
James Franco and Mila Kunis’ fight in Date Night remains iconic.
Btw, Lay GaGa’s 911 music video is a homage to The Color of Pomegranates