95
Spectacular. What do we lose when we gain everything? How do our fantasies intertwine with reality? A wondrous journey of blooming romance, brutal, self-critical realizations, and moving images.
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All Quiet on the Western Front 2022
45
Definitely feels akin to 1917 in that the 'war is hell' subject-matter is also conveniently a sturdy platform to showcase technical proficiency. If Sam Mendes' attempt was a Call of Duty speed-run, this is a Battlefield campaign, loaded with bravura set-pieces and a screensaver digital clarity to the images. What's missing is the integral homefront layer to the novel's narrative of propaganda. We witness the gears of the wartime machine in the opening act, most explicitly shown in a…
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Green Room 2015
94
Feel just as strongly about this movie as I did when I first watched it. A vicious, nightmarish genre exercise, with a swift punk sensibility to the escalating tension. How the violence swarms in waves, how suffocating the entire situation feels etc. Great shit.
This was Corey's first pick on our new-ish weekly podcast, and it was a thrill to revisit together: anchor.fm/willandcorey
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Dont Look Back 1967
87
In this striking, mythic portrait of Bob Dylan in 1965, director D.A. Pennebaker captures the legend as he smokes 80 packs a day, goes on the offensive against a neverending stream of pull-quote journalists, and plays his sermons well into the night. Beautiful, wicked sharp, with every scene a radical development of the Dylan persona.
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Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow 2004
72
A dorky, pulpy mix of heightened adventure tropes and technical wizardry. Weird movie. It's aging like milk, but that's a key reason why I still love it. But it felt like a great film to debut with a new podcast. AnotherLook with Will (me) and Corey is an off-shoot of my YouTube channel and a weekly get-together where we trade-off hidden gems and nostalgic favorites. Anyways, if you have room for another film podcast in your rotation, give us a try.
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Millennium Mambo 2001
90
Fuck, that opening scene. Unreal. Like a live-wire to the head and the heart. I was immersed instantaneously. Hou's vignette structure really plays into Mambo's infinite scope. Vicky is looking back - on the disparate threads of the past, the vast array of memories that shaped her - but her present self is always aware that a way forward is possible, if not immediately accessible. An intricate jumble of fleeting moments. Freshly fallen snow and layers of cigarette smoke.
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Zabriskie Point 1970
92
""Kathy, I'm lost", I said, though I knew she was sleeping
I'm empty and aching and I don't know why
Counting the cars on the New Jersey Turnpike
They've all come to look for America"Antonioni didn't like what he found, so he decided to blow it up. Not a dream, or even a nightmare, but a vastness, an emptiness of the heart and soul. A sultry, furious netherworld of countercultural ennui and institutional suppression. Two of the prettiest…
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Sick 2022
75
This goes without saying, but Sick could've used the slapstick brutality of Wes Craven to push its slasher extremities over the edge. I miss that man. No matter, genre handyman John Hyams is more than capable of picking up the pieces and leaving his own killer sensibility on screen. Kevin Williamson and Katelyn Crabb's script may falter in fully exploring the anger and confusion of April 2020, but this movie is one long vicious suspense exercise, and it rules.…
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Skinamarink 2022
70
Ignore the Blair Witch comparisons. Beyond a few people with their backs turned to the camera, this is structural cinema possessing the multiplex under the guise of cursed YouTube playlists. A cinematic trojan horse if I ever saw one. If you're wondering why this has blown up on TikTok and twitter and basically everywhere, it'll make sense from the first heightened, distorted jump scare, but there's also a brutal sense of patience that is vital to its existence. Skinamarink…
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The Last of Sheila 1973
68
It figures that the one time that Anthony Perkins and Stephen Sondheim got together to write a screenplay, it resulted in a mystery as delightful and conniving as this. The Last of Sheila. Features a strong cynical tone, plenty of misdirection, and sunny vacation vibes. Wish it had a little more flare behind the camera, but Herbert Ross keeps the ship afloat.