The year in film
See which films our reviewers liked best in 2016
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elcome to the end of the reel. Now’s the time when a lot of serious movies emerge and terms like “critically acclaimed” and “tour de force performance” get thrown around like compliments on a new haircut. However, this year was special and offered an array of diverse, excellent stories.
I reached out to several members of the Oklahoma film community to see what their favorite movies were. It’s a great collection that spans a variety of tastes. These films have exited the theater but not our thoughts. Isn’t that what the best movies do? My favorite 2016 film was definitely gloomy, but there’s a lot of beauty and hope mixed in it, as well. I think you’ll see that throughout this list.
‘ONE MORE TIME WITH FEELING,’ Directed by Andrew Dominik
Screened for one night only in a handful of theaters throughout the state, “One More Time With Feeling” was a raw and rare movie event.
The Nick Cave concert documentary is as dark as the musician’s trademark suits and unyielding as his piercing eyes. Shot in 3-D and predominately in black and white, the movie intimately details both the recording process of his new album “Skeleton Tree” and the recent loss of his son Arthur, who fell off a cliff in 2015 under the influence of LSD.
In the film, Cave can be heard in a voiceover saying: “What happens when an event occurs that is so catastrophic that you just change. You change from the known person to an unknown person. So that when you look at yourself in the mirror, you recognize the person that you were but the person inside the skin is a different person.”
“One More Time With Feeling” is a well-crafted documentary of sadness and beauty. A small crew, which can be seen prepping between takes, carefully choreographs each song as if it were its own movie. Director Andrew Dominik (“The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford,” “Killing Them Softly”) also captures interviews with Cave and his wife that feel fleeting and fragile. It’s as if no amount of time or healing could remedy the difficulty of measuring loss.
Think of grief as a painting. It wouldn’t be broadly appealing or a simple work of art. Here, it’s a series of abstract scribbles that jaggedly fit together into something equally haunting and beautiful.
— Nathan Poppe
‘HELL OR HIGH WATER,’ Directed by David Mackenzie
Jeff Bridges has never been better than he is in “Hell or High Water” as a crusty Texas Ranger on the verge of retirement, given to good-natured needling at his Hispanic/American Indian partner, Alberto Parker (a superbly dry Gil Birmingham), as they hunt for a pair of bank-robbing brothers all over the flat and bleak western plains of the Lone Star state.
Chris Pine and especially a wild-eyed Ben Foster are also spot-on as a divorced father and his ex-con older brother, respectively, who are hitting small-town branches of the bank that’s about to foreclose on their family’s ranch. This modern-day Western from Scottish director David Mackenzie and screenwriter Taylor Sheridan (“Sicario,” “Sons of Anarchy”) is bound to be a watch-again classic, mainly for the fascinating —and sometimes humorous —relationships between the two rangers, and the two brothers. But it’s a mystery that top-billed Bridges is being classified as a “supporting” actor in this Cannes favorite, since he steals the movie. It’s the best thinking-person’s action film I’ve seen in years.
— Gene Triplett, For The Oklahoman
‘MOONLIGHT,’ Directed by Barry Jenkins
Although many films this year reminded me what makes movies so great, one film showed me that more greatness is on the way. “Moonlight,” which is based on the play “In Moonlight Black Boys Look Blue,” follows the story of a black youth named Chiron as he struggles to come to terms with his identity and his place in this world. The film is broken into three chapters at three stages of Chiron’s life: childhood, high school and adulthood.
Many coming-of-age tales seem to bend over backwards to keep their story relatable by keeping details vague and broad. “Moonlight” takes the opposite approach, and manages to find relatability through specificity by tapping into universal struggles through the example of one specific case. We may not have all shared this life experience, but we all struggle with finding our own identity, and general insecurities about how others view us.
This film cannot be talked about without mentioning the remarkable performances from all involved. Mahershala Ali, Ashton Sanders, Alex R. Hibbert and Naomie Harris are all on point, but its Trevante Rhodes’s third act performance that continues to haunt long after the credits have rolled. With gorgeous cinematography, perfect pacing, memorable performances and expert direction, “Moonlight” is a masterpiece.
— Okie filmmaker Jacob Leighton
Burns, For The Oklahoman
‘JACKIE,’ Directed by Pablo Larrain
“Jackie” is a mesmerizing masterpiece of biopic risk-taking. Beautifully rendered, it would fit on the walls of an art gallery as naturally as it would the screens of a cineplex, and is as penetrating as a Vulcan mind meld. Natalie Portman is transcendent (or, more accurately, transcendental) in a performance far more transformative than the mere affectations of look and voice. Director Pablo Larrain paints a psychological portrait over a biographical one, more pensive than narrative, with an eye for expressionism, not literalism. And he refuses to peddle in sentimentality.
His most daring choice is to avoid first-person voiceover. Somehow, Larrain and Portman achieve the same depth of understanding and revelation through cinematic techniques alone. Through image, tone, structure and sounds, but not thoughts, Larrain gets us inside Jackie’s id (as does composer Mica Levi’s lamenting score). Portman is the method-level avatar through which Larrain’s aesthetic comes alive, grieves and resonates.
A potent collaboration between director and actress, Jackie is a singular immersion into the fragile yet resilient psyche of an iconic figure in the immediate aftermath of an American tragedy. It lays bare a Jacqueline Kennedy shaken to her core, and we become shaken, as well.
— I Can’t Unsee That blogger Jeff
Huston, For The Oklahoman
‘CHEVALIER,’ Directed by Athina Rachel Tsangari
On a luxury yacht somewhere in the Aegean Sea, six friends compete to determine which one of them is “the best at everything.” The winner is entitled to the coveted Chevalier ring and an exulted sense of superiority. For the duration of what should have been a leisurely fishing vacation, the men initiate an increasingly Byzantine series of challenges in which every aspect of appearance, health and behavior —from cholesterol level, to culinary knowledge, to dancing ability —is assessed and graded. As the competition escalates, friendships are challenged, secret alliances are forged, and numerous embarrassing secrets are brought to light.
Directed by Athena Rachel Tsangari (“Attenberg”), “Chevalier” is a clear-eyed, timely satire of contemporary bourgeois masculinity and the data-driven cult of self-improvement. While the film’s high-concept, Bunuelian premise and gleefully absurd sense of humor find parallels in the work of of fellow Greek auteur, Yorgos Lanthimos (“Dogtooth,” “The Lobster”), “Chevalier” strikes a unique and impressive balance between broad comic satire and nuanced characterization. With elegant formal and stylistic economy, Tsangari deftly illuminates a hidden world of subtle slights, simmering resentments and barely-concealed insecurities that is unexpectedly profound and profoundly hilarious. “Chevalier” is available on Netflix.
— OKCMOA interim assistant curator of film and video Lisa K.
Broad, For The Oklahoman
‘CEMETERY OF SPLENDOR,’ Directed by Apichatpong Weerasethakul
Set in a remote corner of northeastern Thailand, “Cemetery of Splendor” focuses on the staff and patients of a makeshift hospital housing soldiers with a mysterious sleeping sickness. As the ailing abruptly slip in and out of consciousness, the narrative freely follows suit, moving between mundane observation, the fantastical appearance of ancient princesses, in disguise, and the sudden, spectacular presence of a giant floating amoeba. Waking life and dream, in other words, lose their special distinctiveness in “Cemetery of Splendor,” a surreal modern masterwork of slow cinema directed by Apichatpong Weerasethakul (or “Joe,” as he is affectionately — and mercifully — known to Americans).
“Cemetery of Splendor’s” loose storytelling structure and choice of subject lends itself perfectly to the filmmaker’s signature combination of ethnograph, kitsch, Eastern metaphysics, and Thai myth — not to mention to the ultra-modern and centuries-old spaces that coexist in the film, and together define one aspect of life in 21st century Southeast Asia. Contemporary reality is more darkly present in Apichatpong’s subtle references to his country’s 2014 military coup, a rare presentation of the political within the master’s work.
“Cemetery of Splendor” opened at the Oklahoma City Museum of Art in March and is currently available on Netflix.
— OKCMOA director of curatorial affairs Michael J. Anderson, For
The Oklahoman
‘ARRIVAL,’ Directed by Denis Villeneuve
“Arrival” spends most of its running time on a problem that’s glossed over in many science fiction films —how exactly is humanity going to communicate with alien races who have biology, history and culture completely different from our own?
Amy Adams gives one of the best performances of her career as Louise Banks, a linguist called in to facilitate communication with extraterrestrials arriving on Earth. She’s recruited by Col. Weber (Forest Whitaker), who remembers her for some previous top-secret translation work. Once she arrives, she’s paired with quantum physicist Ian Donnelly (Jeremy Renner) to somehow build rapport with these aliens, housed on one of 12 giant pod-like ships that have appeared in disparate locations around the world.
The script, by Norman native Eric Heisserer, is based on the short story “Story of Your Life” by Ted Chiang. Denis Villeneuve (“Prisoners,” “Sicario”) directs with a thoughtfully paced manner that allows viewers to ponder, and attempt to code the film’s many visual cues and metaphors. Johann Johannsson’s film score expertly adds another dimension.
How does the way we communicate affect what we think about who we are? And how can we learn to understand those who communicate differently? Like some of the best science-fiction, “Arrival” may leave you with as many questions as answers.
— Matthew Price, The
Oklahoman
‘KUBO AND THE TWO STRINGS,’ Directed by Travis Knight
“If you must blink, do it now,” the young one-eyed Japanese hero Kubo (voice of Art Parkinson, “Game of Thrones”) cautions viewers in the opening moments of “Kubo and the Two Strings.”
Audiences will be hardpressed to find even an instant to close their eyes as the expansive animated fable takes them on an epic quest involving a towering sword-crowned skeleton, a sea of giant hypnotic eyes and the creepiest identical twins since the little girls in “The Shining.”
In an impressive year for animated filmmaking —every major studio released at least one animated effort, and Disney dropped the excellent offerings “Zootopia,” “Moana” and Pixar’s “Finding Dory” into theaters —the latest quirky adventure from Laika Entertainment introduced some of the most indelible cinematic images of 2016, from a massive ship crafted entirely of autumn leaves to an endearing half-man, half-beetle warrior.
Over the past decade, Laika has earned a reputation for doing things its own way: Not only is the Oregon boutique studio keeping the art of stopmotion moviemaking alive and pushing it forward with digital technology, but it also trusts children to handle the real-world darkness inherent in its fantastical tales. Many animated movies delve into subjects like family, grief and identity, but everywhere that most family-friendly movies zig, “Kubo and the Two Strings” manages to zag.
First-time director Travis Knight, Laika’s CEO, channels the likes of animation master Hayao Miyazaki, epic filmmaker David Lean and movie monster maker Ray Harryhausen in weaving the yarn of the quietly determined Kubo and his flight from his cold-blooded grandfather the Moon King (Ralph Fiennes). With each strum of his guitar-like shamisen, Kubo’s musical adventures serve as potent reminders of the power of memories, magic and storytelling.
— Brandy McDonnell,
The Oklahoman
‘SING STREET,’ Directed by John Carney
When is the last time you completely embarrassed yourself? Not the last time you were nervous, or slipped, or made a mistake. When is the last time you wanted something so badly, you blocked out everything else and just went for it? It’s probably been a while. And, that’s what makes the movie “Sing Street” so powerful.
“Sing Street” is the latest musical from Irish director John Carney. It tells the story of a bullied teenager who starts a band to get a girl and finds himself along the way.
Carney, who also directed “Begin Again” and the Oscar winner “Once,” is a master at grounding the musical genre in realism. While other musicals ask you to suspend your disbelief to watch characters dance on air, Carney invites you into the practice room to witness normal people raging and flailing until they discover their own voice. When they do, it’s pure magic.
This was a great year at the movies for intense dramas and dazzling science fiction. But “Sing Street” was the only film that nestled its way into my heart and stayed there, reminding me what it was like to be young, fearless and in love.
— DeadCenter artistic director and filmmaker Lance McDaniel,
For The Oklahoman