Star Wars, parts I-III

Yeah, OK, they're bad. You know what's good though? The art direction.

Mother

One of the best crime dramas I've ever seen. Korean directors don't play fair, and this one fucks expectations mercilessly. I never noticed how good the acting was. That's how good it was.

The Man From Nowhere

Over-the-top tale of revenge about a Chinese superagent in Korea. I'd call it Tarantino-esque if it weren't more likely that Tarantino is taking from guys like this director.

The Chaser

Decent crime flick. Lots of incongruous comedy amidst the gore. I dig the scrappy, low-budget finesse of a lot of these Korean productions. The unfamiliar storytelling conventions are also refreshingly disorienting. It's nice to really not know what's going to happen next. You're trained by Hollywood to know that the cute kid is going to be OK in the end. No such guarantees here.

Outrage

Killer opening sequence. Then immediately loses steam with a meandering plot involving yakuza killing each other in increasingly horrible and less interesting ways. Beat Takeshi does his twitchy-faced thug thing again. A borderline racist subplot featuring an African diplomat.

Thin Red Line

Visionary. I'm afraid of that word. Usually means a director is going to tilt at Stanley Kubrick and it's going to suck to be us. There's no other word for this one though. Moves with hypnotic fluidity between inner and outer reality. Every shot—especially in the first third—is like a Bible verse.

Nora Ephron

A narcissistic mediocrity. Her "classic" movies are moldy cheese. The quintessential well-connected east coaster, good only at PR and getting her famous friends to do shit for her.

Death of a Cyclist (1955)

A tense drama of love and ethics. Hitchcokian glamor and foxy Spanish people. Plus awesome clothes, modernist furniture, and Paul Klee paintings. Shit, why aren't I watching it again right now? I'd like someone to do a comparison of the mustaches here and the ones in Solo Sunny.

Black Swan

Loved it. Will never touch my cuticles again. The gritty backstage world of ballet--the cold, concrete hallways, and how ballerinas score the bottoms of their slippers, and stuff like that--was what made the freak show parts more freaky. People called it campy, but the characters make perfect sense together.

Social Network

Yes, it's great. The music, the acting, the script. How they made that shit interesting is a miracle.

Inception

I don't care if it makes sense if you think about it for about nine hours, or if the elevator bit was marginally cool. This movie is fucking STUPID. The goddamn bombastic music alone was enough to induce migraines. Juno woman is here, being boring.

Middle Men

"Wow, David Arquette does a GREAT Luke Wilson." Long silence while this terrible movie plays. Credits roll. "Oh, wait, that IS Luke Wilson!"

Art School Confidential

Pretty bad. OK, there is ONE funny bit: The cop who goes undercover as an art student and whose crude paintings of cars make him a star.

Solo Sunny (1980)

In the seventies, German men had some serious mustaches. This is the story of some of those mustaches, though the star is a bohemian nightclub singer who's part Nico, part Little Edie from Grey Gardens. Breezy, affectionate, sexy, sad, and perfect. A+.

Megamind

So fucking good. I think it bombed. I guess the public, like me, assumed it was something they'd already seen--a stale Incredibles do-over. It's not. The script is ridiculously tight and funny. Will Ferrell never better.

Man is Not a Bird (1965)

An impoverished Yugoslavian copper mining town is the stage for this freeform portrait of ... wait, come back! Yes, this is a hard sell. And it has hardly anything of a plot, but so much life that it flashes by effortlessly.

Pigs and Battleships (1962)

Dr. Strangelovian surrealism in post-war Tokyo, made by a young (at the time) former assistant to Ozu. A kiss-off to the proprieties of his elder. B+.

Tokyo Story (1953)

Scott Kuhlman told me to watch this. I didn't want to, though it's considered the masterpiece of director Yasujiro Ozu. A slow, stately build-up to heartbreak. Magnificent.

A Colt is My Passport (1967)

A world-weary Japanese hit man is on the run. Wanted to love it. Measured, tense, stylish, and full of motion at first, it becomes by the end ludicrous and boring.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part One

Excellent. It's not about plot, which is the same in every Harry Potter book and movie. It's impressionistic, a ribbon of adolescent moodiness. It out-Twilights Twilight. The characters turn out to be far more durable and likeable. They blatantly taunt the rival franchise with a scene of young people in hoodies running through the forest.

Twilight: Eclipse

Makes no sense because it has nowhere to go. The first two films pretty much wrapped up the love story. Bella in love was sexy. Bella dithering is irritating.

Funny People

The best movie I've seen all year. Adam Sandler is extraordinary. Everyone shits all over the last act--and, yes, it takes risks and it is long--but the only thing that keeps this movie from being Citizen Fucking Kane is Leslie Mann. Heartbreaking to think what Amy Adams (for example) could have done with that role. So good I had to stop the DVD multiple times and walk around my house punching the air going, "Holy shit! Holy shit! Holy shit!"

(Yes, it was an enhanced viewing, but I stand by my assessment.)

Avatar

So fucking stupid. I didn't really get all the raves about its spectacular beauty--it's about as beautiful as a Yes album cover. But the fantastical has never been put across with such fluidity, and I admit it effectively pounded me into submission. It was an astonishingly natural moment of romance when the big blue lady held the crippled marine in her arms and cried out in her Pandoran accent "My Jake!"

The Fire Within

A day in the life of a suicidal man, directed by Louis Malle (1963). For a person of a certain age, painfully real and clear. I'd like to see this as a double feature with Old Joy.

Drunken Angel

Kurosawa crime flick set in the slums of post-war Tokyo. Volcanic performance by Toshiro Mifune as a doomed gangster. Fucking great.

Ponyo

A lot of people couldn't stomach the saccharine cuteness and I get that. Also off-putting are the anime cliches, the incoherent plot, and the painfully pollyanna-ish ending. But along the way are moments as beautiful as anything you will ever see in any movie ever made. If Miyazaki is drunk on his own art, who can blame him?

Idiocracy

About thirty people told me, "It's not that great but you should see it." And that turned out to be exactly right. For all its silliness, the future world it depicts feels unexpectedly real. Would have been so much better without a stale, stupid recurring joke about a vengeful pimp.

Vodka Lemon

"Fellini in Armenia" is the back-of-the-box summary. Whimsical and bleak--who knew that combination was even possible?

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince

Loved it. The best Harry Potter so far. The problem with any Harry Potter movie is that there's too much plot and too many CGI set pieces. This one has a warm ease with the characters (which is why we all love this ridiculous story to begin with), and handles its expository duties with ingenious, fast-moving transitions.

The Triple Agent

Pre-WWII intrigue in Paris. It might be a little boring, but it's the most interesting boring film I've ever seen. Evasive as its protagonist. Terrific clothes. A painless way to finally understand the difference between White Russians and Red Russians.

Pan's Labyrinth

Ugh. Jesus Fuck, what a convoluted, overwrought pile of garbage. Did a 14-year old write this script? All the moral seriousness of a Nu Metal video, and about as dated, what with all its "freaky" imagery. Fuck this movie.

Enchanted

Other than the heinously cute little CGI mouse and tediously spectacular climax, there's not a damn thing wrong with this movie. So many great, witty little details. Amy Adams is a genius. The scene where she imposes her cartoon reality on Central Park is a masterpiece. Patrick Dempsey is adequate.

Juno

This fucking movie—with its absurd, paper-thin characters and simpering, pandering indie cutesiness smothered from one asshole to the other in the worst fucking precious toddler music that ever induced self-inflicted gunshot wounds—actually got me to watch right up to its just-follow-your-adorable-little-heart climax, when the DVD crapped out on me and I had to go online to read a synopsis because I still wanted to know what would happen to the baby.

The Bank Job

Good-not-great heist flick with great 70s British fashions.

Lake City

Why go to the trouble of making an indie film if you're going to fill it with nothing but clichés? They even do the thing where the bad guy is about to shoot the good guy and then there's a shot and the bad guy slumps over dead to reveal the sheriff standing there with his barrel still smoking because he's arrived unseen just in time. Sissy Spacek is in it though. Weirdly, Dave Matthews is, too. He's not bad as a junior bad guy.

Whale Rider

The third time we watched it I cried at all the same parts.

The Dead Sleep Well

I wish Kurosawa had made more crime flicks. Love this shit. I get sick of samurais. Wait, I got the title wrong. I think it's actually called "The Bad Sleep Well." Anyway, it's brutal and told with fantastic gusto.

A Series of Unfortunate Events

Great art direction (if a little too CGIish) but too many set pieces for Jim Carrey and the other adult egomaniacs in this thing. The poor kids are supposed to be the goddamn stars. "The books are funnier," says Kaia, who would know.

Chun King Express

Two quirky, interlocking love stories tales that wander through a sensuous wonderland of Hong Kong textures. Gorgeous, confidently loopy cinematography.

My Architect

Everyone was telling me to see this for the longest time and I was like, "Some guy never knew his dad, who was an architect, boo fucking hoo. Then he made a film, big fucking deal." Then I saw it, and after I was done crying and being amazed, I was like, "Oh. OK. Shutting up now."

Joan of Arc (1928)

Pretty mind blowing. In the first half, the titles (taken from real historical transcripts of the trial) tell one story while the faces tell another. The second half is almost purely visual, with wild crowd scenes, upside-down camera angles, and billowing smoke. And yet it never wavers from its austerely economical style of storytelling.

This Mug

Could I love this mug any more? Only if it were even stupider and made even less sense, which is obviously not possible. My favorite features are the lines of raised doo-dads and the gold pin stripe, denoting fanciness and prestige.

Hiroshima Mon Amour

What a movie. Shit, no wonder it's a classic. It would almost be worth having another WWII if only we could have more glamorous existential romance like this. I used to live in Hiroshima and it was a kick to recognize some of the street scenes.

City of No Limits (En la ciudad sin límites)

A family melodrama. Or is it a thriller? It holds back from tipping its hand until the the end when it shows that it's been its own kind of story from the beginning. Featuring a cast of ridiculously good-looking Spanish people.

Take My Eyes

What could make your desire to see what the New York Times would probably call "a nuanced study of the dynamics of an abusive relationship" even more non-existent? How about if it was in Spanish? I know, I agree. Yet I've watched it twice, and might watch it again. Pictured above are the main character and her sister, whose relationship is as intense and vivid as the abusive marriage that's depicted from all angles. The redemptive power of art is a theme, but amazingly, it's not dopey at all.

Millk

In which I discover that it's possible to be deeply moved while simultaneously thinking, "Yet another bit of awkward exposition!"

Twenty Nine Palms

We humans are ruled by animal desires. If you don't believe that, just watch this couple roam the desert in a Hummer for no apparent reason. Various horrible things happen to them, culminating in the most horrible thing of all. The brutal purity of French director Whatshisname's vision does have an undeniable hypnotic power, even if this isn't exactly the kind of thing you'd want to see every day. Unless there's something wrong with you.

L'age D'or

Hilarious and shocking mixture of playfulness, absurdity, and cruelty from original-generation Surrealist and noted eyeball slicer Luis Buñuel. So much of what I thought originated with Fellini, Bergman, and/or Monty Python is seen here, way back in 1930.

Thesis

The best part of this would-be deconstruction of the slasher genre is the guy who plays the movie nerd/unlikely hero. He's terrific. Otherwise, what we've got here is a heavy-handed effort to "implicate the viewer." We hypocritically condemn what titillates us, etc. The plot involves snuff films and Spanish grad students who seem to have never heard of a "phone" or "calling the police."

A Snake of June

Exploration of the erotic inner lives of a Japanese couple, with pointlessly arty cinematography and an absurd, slow-motion plot. The breathless "secrets" it exposes (wow, the woman secretly likes to wear a short skirt) are not worth all the panting effort.