On the Top Ten of 2018

For nearly nine years, this blog has reviewed every new film I saw at the cinema and, in 2018, online streaming services too (although this mostly, if not wholly, means Netflix, who flexed their feature film muscles in serious ways). There have been occasional mentions of older films revisited or seen for the first time, or even a TV show, but these were never considered for end of year lists.

Without fanfare, for it hardly seems necessary for the, on average 18 readers, I am ending the blog with this, the best of 2018 (although I am grateful and surprised that it is read). Not because I believe cinema will reach such low depths that nothing will be worth watching, but simply because I cannot give all the writings the time I would like, as will be evident from reading them. Additionally, I simply see far less than I would like or used to, as life continually gets in the damn way.

A top 10 post seems an adequate way to end and my (almost) consistent negative thoughts on Marvel will be reserved only for my lucky friends down the pub from here on. So, this is the top ten of 2018 a list that, as always, is hard to create simply by looking at what did not make it in.

Netflix had a great run of features this year and David Mackenzie's Outlaw King was one of the first to impress. A stripped down historical epic that focused on character not battles. It was a welcome sight to see Spike Lee back with a mainstream release and while BlacKkKlansman wasn't a return to his best form, it was a solid piece of relevant cinema that, if we were judging endings alone, would be top of the list for that powerful gut punch that brought his 70s thriller into the present day. Steffano Sollima did something unexpected and made Sicario: Day of the Saldado as tense as the first. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse was the best of Marvel, but still a comic book film and Isle of Dogs was as intricate and lovely as Wes Anderson gets but slightly cold. Solo: A Star Wars Story and Ready Player One were as fun and nostalgic and forever watchable (for children of the 80s) as blockbusters get.

The list:

10. Private Life dir. Tamara Jenkins
9. They Shall Not Grow Old dir. Peter Jackson
8. Annihilation dir. Alex Garland
7. First Man dir. Damien Chazelle
6. Sorry to Bother You dir. Boots Riley
5. First Reformed dir. Paul Schrader
4. The Ballard of Buster Scruggs dir. Joel Coen & Ethan Coen
3. You Were Never Really Here dir. Lynne Ramsey
2. Cold War dir. Pawel Pawlikowski
1. Roma dir. Alfonso Cuarón

Many 'best of' lists this year have Roma at or near the top and maybe it seems predictable to do so here, but it is outstanding. A beautifully shot, affecting piece of work. If the list shows anything it is the changing distribution of cinema. Five of the ten were first screened online, either Netflix or iPlayer and only three were available at cinemas. An interesting year to go out on.

Bye.

On Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse

We're often told that this film or that film is unlike anything we've seen before and often it isn't. When it comes to Marvel films, the opposite is true; they are close to 90% what we've seen before, mostly from the same studio, just villains and heroes are changed. The new Spider-Man film might just be the best feature Marvel have released. It's certainly unlike anything we've seen before from the juggernaut studio.

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is the animated origin film with a twist. Proudly displaying the fingerprints of those who were also involved in 21 Jump Street (2012) and its sequel (2014) as well as The Lego Movie (2014), Spider-Verse is self-aware in a way you want a genre that has become tired and too serious to be. Just like those films just mentioned, Spider-Verse is immediately endearing because it is playful and smart and funny and, well, hard to dislike. Even if you dislike superhero films, it knows why and agrees with you. If you strip it down to its story, it's a fairly simple narrative, but plays each element well and knows how to get the most out of familiar family relationships.

What raises Spider-Verse to another level is the visual delivery (it is as close as you may have seen to a paper comic coming to life). The animation is spectacular, rendering New York with a kinetic energy. The backgrounds feel real, yet part of a superhero world and that they move in and out of focus (at first you may think you're watching a 3D film without the glasses), soon becomes part of the charm. The city here, or the way it has been animated, is as much a part of the film as Spider-Man is, which should be the case with all superhero films; they are products of their neighbourhoods/environments. The different animated styles for each of the different spider threads and the perfect voice cast are the cherries on top. Interesting things are often done with animation, especially as the technology develops, from Waltz with Bashir (2008) to Loving Vincent (2017), yet Spider-Verse still manages to feel like a new development.

A visual treat.

On The Shape of Water

Guillermo del Toro may never make another film as good as Pan's Labyrinth (2006). Many filmmakers don't even get close in the first place. The Shape of Water is a set in a world that is similar to Pan's Labyrinth in that it is set around an actual historical event and merges the real world with a dark fantasy. The monsters are real and the dangerous ones are human, not aquatic. It is a little too close to Pan's Labyrinth in what it sets out to do, although the story feels like it deserves to be told and in fact, The Shape of Water could almost be viewed as an extension of the world that del Toro established over a decade ago. In the military, scientific basement there are echoes of Hellboy (2004), as the amphibian man is a distant relative of Hellboy's Abe Sapien, whether purposeful or not. In the same way Tarantino's Vince Vega is meant to have familial connections to a character is Reservoir Dogs (1992). Its the same cinematic universe and this is where The Shape of Water falls; into del Toro's universe. Dark fairytales, which is how fairytales should be.

On Private Life

Netflix is flexing its muscles and a lot of the publicity this year has been taken up with Roma and The Ballard of Buster Scruggs, and rightly so as they’re both superb. Yet, sitting quietly on the streaming service is Private Life, a Noah Baumbach like, New York City drama about a couple in their early 40s trying for a baby. Written and directed by Tamara Jenkins, Private Life is a film that feels rooted in lived experience and, perhaps because of that, takes directions that are not predictable. Much like life. There are details that make the narrative, if not always the characters of settings, original. There are character types that will feel familiar, such as the young, educated college student who doesn’t yet know what she doesn’t know and the older relatives struggling with the knowledge they’ve outgrown a ‘scene’. Jenkins makes all this feel fresh and her mise en scene is alluring and authentic. Private Life is an excellent film.

On First Reformed

One of the finest screenwriters working, Paul Schrader returns to writing and directing with another detailed study of a broken man. Here the man is a priest struggling a crisis of faith that manifests itself as a sexual attraction and a growing anger at climate change. Ethan Hawke is outstanding as the quiet, troubled priest and his growing frustration is captured precisely by Schrader’s steady direction and quiet, rural locations. First Reformed is masterful and relevant, both in its study of a collapsing religious faith and the dangers of climate change. The performances are quiet but powerful. It is one of the year’s finest.

On Roma

Alfonso Cuaron’s Roma is a beautifully shot family drama that unfolds, slowly and quietly, but with devastating effect. Told with one of the home’s maids at the focus, Roma is not unlike the work of the great Japanese filmmaker Yasujiro Ozu, careful and considered and leaving you emotionally drained by the end. Cuaron moves away from the technical accomplishments of his last feature Gravity (2013) and, like Ozu, allows the story to unfold before us, carefully moving his camera in slow panning shots, perfectly framed long shots, mid shots and then back again to repeat. Movements are slow by cinema’s standards, but real to life. It may feel like there are many long takes, and at times there are some impressive shots, but perhaps it is more the consistency of the camera movements that make watching Roma much like watching life, natural. We observe and in the early stage of the film, feel detached. Yet the intricate detail in every scene is drawing us closer, perhaps more than we realise, to the lives of these characters. So, when the story takes its turns, whether they be pregnancy or political unrest, we are hooked, unable to look away and therefore completely vulnerable to the devastating and beautiful events of the final third.

On Sorry to Bother You

There is a line, delivered by Steven Yeun’s Squeeze in the final third of Boots Riley’s Sorry to Bother You that is revelatory, both about the film we are watching and the main issues facing the world today. In conversation with the now re-agitated Cassius Green, fresh with allegations of conspiracy and corruption, Squeeze tells him that if you come to people with a problem, but without a solution, people will learn to live with the problem. The clear message of the power of trade unions suggests this could be a veiled criticism of left or socialist movements across the world who are struggling to find a solution to populist movements advancing right that dismantle unions on the way. Or it could be a wakeup call to the audience. A quiet, but powerful reminder that a solution is coming, perhaps from the artistic left, which has, around the world, found a loud and powerful voice as politicians fall quiet. However it is read, Sorry to Bother You is loud and it is powerful and to look at its hashtag on Twitter, it is energising all who see it.

There are two main issues explored here, weaved into one very strong narrative. The first is that a growing number of companies control the means of production and distribution while lessening the powers of trade unions with the help of government, and the second is race in America. The former, the voice of the trade union, is a rare voice to hear on screens. In the UK, Brookside’s Bobby Grant gave us a strong representation of a trade union leader that reached a wide audience, but that was the 80s and soap opera now, despite focusing on the working classes, go quiet on the issue. Pride (2014) was a rare exception of a film that reached a large audience while offering positive union representations and there are others that come to mind, especially from the UK and especially Ken Loach. Yet, the truth is that unions feel a part of the past, which is why Sorry to Bother You is important. This is a film for right now and about right now. The Amazon style company, WorryFree, is buying slave labour. This just as The Guardian reveals a series of stories from inside Amazon that expose the brutal work conditions. The drink can labelled Soda or the convenience stall named, Food Shop. The lack of marketing pretension suggests the masses have been controlled, there is no need to lie to them anymore. Sorry to Bother You is not the past and not the present, but almost too perceptive to be the future. Its syndicalist message is welcome and hopefully heard. Power to the unions.

The second issue is race. The comedic hook of the film, a black man using a white man’s voice to advance, is an extension of a long struggle. From historic reports of black citizens having to stand aside to allow whites to pass, to recent reports of black job applicants changing their names to read more white and stand a better chance of being interviewed. Riley is entering into a dialogue that spans decades and while it is funny, it becomes purposely less funny as the film progresses and instead an indicator of Cassius’ growing exclusion from his community. Riley is highly aware of the imagery that is associated with racial protest in America. Armie Hammer’s Steve Lift lives in a mansion that, to Cassius becomes dangerous and labyrinthine like the Southern house in Get Out (2017) or the mansion in Teddy Perkins, an episode of Atlanta’s second series. These signs of white success trap their black visitors and in each instance these visitors have been promised something (a growing relationship, a famous jazz piano, a promotion) only to find the step up (or lift up) comes at a price. The price being white control. And, in each instance they escape, but not unchanged. The scene of Cassius, having been championed by his white boss as the savour of the company is reduced to rapping; his success, it would appear is dependent on his ‘playing’ to type. Again, this is funny, but it is also social commentary.

There is something of E. L. Doctorow’s The Book of Daniel (1971) in this film, especially when we consider Daniel’s parents, the radical father aware of all the problems, compared with the more practical mother. We find Cassius radical from the start and Detroit more pragmatic. Cassius is aware of too many problems to be happy, aware of still being fucked by both sides, a repetition of Doctorow’s book. The roles switch, but the theme of radicalism runs throughout as Detroit’s art takes a more central stage. Like Doctorow, Riley is examining the cracks in American society and their roots. The fears and prejudice may not be as explicit as they were; the racism not as verbally virulent (although Trump is working on changing this), but they exist and Riley use of practical effects to show the dismantling of the world is effective. There is a nod to Michel Gondry who is acknowledged with a pseudonymous credit as the director of a short animation, a director who specialises in the manifestation of existential crisis.

Gramsci wrote about society being ruled through force and consent. That hegemonic power was reinforced through the media (Cassius’ viral YouTube video). Sorry to Bother You explores the force and the consent and then takes aim to shatter them both. A syndicalist, counter-hegemonic piece of cinema screaming at you to wake up.

Power to the people (even the horse-people).