Best Movies of 2017The Usual Choices
Dunkirk (Christopher Nolan)
Call Me By Your Name (Guadagnino)
Get Out (Jordan Peele)
Phantom Thread (Paul Thomas Anderson)
The Shape of Water (Guillermo del Toro)
Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (Martin McDonagh)
But how about...
Logan (James Mangold)
This instantly sits alongside The Dark Knight and Spider-Man 2 in the annals of superhero movie greatness...and is better than either of them. Admittedly, non-fans probably won't be as rapturous about its merit, but then again, can only fans of Westerns recognise the quality of The Ox-Bow Incident, Unforgiven or Stagecoach? While I enjoy and admire Stan Lee & Jack Kirby's 1960's X-Men stories and was shocked and excited by Mark Millar's Old Man Logan graphic novel, this movie has little to do with either. This is wholly original, creatively staged, with a flawless use of the camera during fight scenes (i.e. it was held still so you can see everything as it happens) and primally-emotional in parts (fatherhood is a main theme). Hugh & Patrick portray their long-running characters for the last time, and have never been better, and young Dafne is stunning as Laura / X-23. Then, to top it off, the finale is a fanboy's ultimate heartbreak image. DC...pay attention...this is how you do dark.
...and what about...
It Comes at Night (Trey Edward Shults)
A killer plague is upon the land and Mum, Dad & teenage son hole up in a backwoods hut, prepared to do anything to stay alive. A survivalist's "I-told-you-so" Utopia, this movie jumps straight into the nightmare scenario (no time wasted on explanations or backstories) of putting your family above everybody else's...and the toll on your humanity that that cold determination demands. Apart from a couple of questionable scenes (a 17 year old's weird sex fantasy... was that really necessary?), there is no let-up in this, so every second of the 91 minute running time is spent on making you feel very, very nervous. This is mostly shot in medium and tight close-ups (which treble the paranoia and claustrophobic atmosphere) and succeeds in being my kinda horror movie: scary, plausible and very human.
...not to mention...
Wind River (Taylor Sheridan)
This starts as a Wallander style murder-mystery, but seems to lose interest in that, and becomes a straightforward manhunt instead. However, this isn't detrimental to the story...the focus is on character...people who make mistakes, try to survive the consequences, but are still able to display small kindnesses. While Jeremy Renner as the determined & highly-skilled US Fish & Wildlife agent and Elizabeth Olsen as the equally-determined but still-learning FBI agent are mighty fine in their roles (yes, yes, they're also Hawkeye and Wanda), the major role is played by the brutal landscape...the snowy mountains of Wyoming, filmed spectacularly. What raises the film's quality is the avoidance of a few hohum cliches: there is no sexual tension / coy romance between lead male & female + a woman takes charge & no one minds or turns it into a big deal + the various private lives are kept as backstories only. If you can cope with the abundant mumbling (why? chattering teeth?), you'll get involved with this story.
...and one personal unmentionable...
The Zookeeper's Wife (Niki Caro)
This is a Holocaust story which comes across as too slick and simple (the good people are very very good and the bad people are etc...where are all the inbetweenies?). Never has squalor looked so neat. Jessica Chastain puts on her best Sophie's Choice accent as the title character who helps her husband rescue Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto, and I wonder if poor Daniel Ruhl is sick to death of playing creepy Nazi bastards? Jessica's superpowers of elephant / camel / hippo-whispering are a bit much and all the beasts come across as passive housepets who regularly watch Skippy the Bush Kangaroo. While there are a couple of affecting scenes (the guaranteed tearjerker: little kids putting their arms up to be helped onto the carriages to Auschwitz), there aren't as many as there should be. Even the inhabitants of the ghetto look like they're quite well-fed and cared for as they step over the corpses lying in the street. Just wrong.
My Top 10 Films of 2017
 |
| "I told my dietician that I had to lose 10 pounds of fat fast, and this is what she recommended." |
#02 A Lucky (Lynch)
#03 A Dunkirk (Nolan)
#04 A Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (McDonagh)
#05 A- Wind River (Sheridan)
#06 A- Get Out (Peele)
#07 A- It Comes at Night (Shults)
#08 A- Chappaquiddick (Curran)
#09 A- The Shape of Water (del Toro)
#10 A- Sweet Country (Thornton)
Overflow: More A-/B+ Films
#11 A- I, Tonya (Gillespie)
#12 A- Baby Driver (Wright)
#13 A- Lady Bird (Gerwig)
#14 A- Call Me by Your Name (Guadagnino)
#15 A- Lean On Pete (Haigh)
#16 A- American Made (Liman)
#17 A- Wonder Wheel (Allen)
#18 B+ Paddington 2 (Paul King)
#19 B+ Kodachrome (Raso)
#20 B+ Darkest Hour (Wright)
#21 B+ The Big Sick (Showalter)
#22 B+ Logan Lucky (Soderbergh)
#23 B+ Wonder Woman (Jenkins)
#24 B+ The Death of Stalin (Iannucci)
#25 B+ Edie (Hunter)
#26 B+ The Party (Potter)
#27 B+ The Children Act (Eyre)
#28 B+ Spider-Man: Homecoming (Watts)
#29 B+ The Post (Spielberg)
#30 B+ Battle of the Sexes (Dayton; Faris)
Sorry, They Didn't Make It...
> B The Wife [stunning duo-performance but this wife ain't anybody's silent partner]
> B Alien: Covenant [a visual feast without a single surprise anywhere to be seen]
> B Viceroy's House [historically interesting but blighted by a blah Romeo & Juliet subplot]
> B The Florida Project [a car-crash mother + a feral child = kitchen-sink depression]
> B Blade Runner 2049 [asks the interesting question: Is reality necessary? and asks it for a very long time]
> B The Killing of a Sacred Deer [an Art film for people who are too happy]
> B Breathe [a slightly-bland story about a guy reduced to being a talking head]
> B Phantom Thread [a troubled love story that is more an S&M domination contest]
> B Thor: Ragnarok [aka Carry On Thor]
> B Wonder [facially-disfigured kid shows that he is courageous & friendly & able to make you cry]
> B Cargo [a Zombie Apocalypse entry which looks good but adds nothing particularly novel to the genre]
> B- West of Sunshine [Loser Dad + Sad Son = affecting film with too many lingering, poignant close ups]
> B- Beast [serial killer story where the motivations of the lead characters are frustratingly muddied]
> B- You Were Never Really Here [brutal and relentlessly unpleasant but just the thing for fans of The Punisher]
> B- Justice League [lots more smiling but yet another crap villain]
> B- All the Money in the World [a teenager gets his ear cut off and I didn't particularly care]
> B- Downsizing [a message film about modern life where the message has too many messages]
> B- Breath [nice surfing shots but ethically troubling]
> B- The Disaster Artist [I don't believe that "So Bad It's Good" is a valid reason for fandom]
> B- Final Portrait [a rather superficial look at the so-called artistic temperament aka What an Arsehole]
> B- Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 [tries to both replicate and deviate from #1 and largely muffs it]
> B- Jasper Jones [jumps into the plot before you care about anyone]
> C The Zookeeper's Wife [a WWII story about an elephant-whisperer and a pretty ghetto]
> C Murder on the Orient Express [the moustache did it]
> C It [BOO!]
"Ah!..Sweet Mystery of Life...": 2017 Films I Apparently Still Need to See
Beach Rats (Hittman); The Beguiled (Coppola); Brawl in Cell Block 99 (Zahler); Brigsby Bear (McCary); Columbus (Kogonada); Detroit (Bigelow); Dim the Fluorescents (Warth); A Ghost Story (Lowery); The Greatest Showman (Gracey); Hostiles (Cooper); I Don’t Feel at Home in This World Anymore (Blair); Ingrid Goes West (Spicer); Last Flag Flying (Linklater); Marjorie Prime (Almereyda); Mother! (Aronofsky); Mudbound (Rees); Novitiate (Betts); Our Souls at Night (Batra); Professor Marston and the Wonder Women (Robinson); Radio Mary (Walkow); Song to Song (Malick); Star Wars: The Last Jedi (Johnson); The Strange Ones (Radcliff; Wolkstein); Sweet Virginia (Dagg); Thoroughbreds (Finley)
Best Performances of 2017
Timothee Chalamet in Call Me by Your Name
Willem Dafoe in The Florida Project
Daniel Day-Lewis in Phantom Thread
Allison Janney in I,Tonya
Frances McDormand in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
Gary Oldman in Darkest Hour
Margot Robbie in I, Tonya
Sam Rockwell in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
But how about...
Harry Dean Stanton in Lucky
A story about an alone old man at the very fag-end of his life is obviously going to have some sort of emotional impact. But it takes a strong actor giving a strong performance to make it thought-provoking and significant...and that's our man Harry in this, his last role. Lucky is a miracle of longevity: a lifetime chainsmoker, never married, regular drinker of hard liquor, a little yoga and not much food (he likes milk). He lives in a dusty TexMex town and has a small circle of acquaintances who are more attached to him than he knows. Lucky has a fall...and suddenly, his routines (crossword; coffee in the same seat in the same cafe; game shows) are thrown into disarray, as he tries to come to grips with his rapidly-impending doom. And by the end of his philosophising, Lucky comes to one conclusion: Life's a piece of shit when you think of it...and then the man smiles. A performance for the ages.
...and what about...
Kristin Scott Thomas & Patricia Clarkson & Timothy Spall & Bruno Ganz & Cherry Jones & Emily Mortimer & Cillian Murphy in The Party
Now, yes, that is some cast. How could they possibly not be memorable? Well, quite easily actually...by being crap. Professional reputation does not guarantee chemistry, merely competence. In The Party (which should be addended with From Hell), a group of friends gets together to celebrate the host's success at work...and it quickly deteriorates into a bloodletting of secrets. Sex, Death, Politics, Birth, Murder, Betrayal, Lies, Finger Food...they're all here, spilling throughout the immaculately-furnished house. And this cast stirs it up into a dark comedic frenzy, whipping it into 71 minutes of OMG OMG OMG. Nobody shines because they all do. A masterclass of ensemble acting; a classic group performance; an All Star Cast disaster movie that is pretty terrific.
...not to mention...
Kate Winslet in Wonder Wheel
I've never entirely understood why American filmmakers regularly cast British actors in American roles...and demand an American accent. Time and again, I have been put off by a quintessential Brit (Michael Caine; Helen Mirren) trying to get their tongue around the Yankee twang...to the degree of scuttling the performance and sometimes, even the film. Kate's great success in this film is that I soon forgot her usual vocals (just like I do with Andrew Garfield and Tom Holland) and focussed on her character...and what a character. A lot of hoo-ha has been printed about the film being a mere stageplay and, while that would normally irk me too, Kate's performance blows away any qualms. This is one of the Woody-Allen-Dark movies, and Kate will make you believe that a person as decent and loving as her is capable of the most desperate and dire deed. As Norman Bates once said: "No one really runs away from anything. We're all in our private traps."
...and one personal unmentionable...
Kenneth Branagh in Murder on the Orient Express
As Hercule Poirot, Albert Finney had a curl-up moustache; Peter Ustinov had a twirl-out moustache; David Suchet had one that looked like a second grin...all three actors gave fine performances without drawing an over-amount of attention to the hairdo underneath their very noses. In Kenneth's rejig of the iconic Agatha Christie detective, it is the moustache which gives the performance...the man is merely going along for the ride. Heavily forested and dashing away from the philtrum in a desperate attempt to reach the ears, this moustache is clearly over-compensating for something. An inconsistent Belgian accent perhaps? Or maybe just an inability to be interesting?
My 10 Favourite Performances of 2017
 |
| "Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in!" It's 2047, and Robert Downey Jr laments his inability to leave Marvel. |
#02 Glenn Close & Jonathan Pryce in The Wife
#03 Harry Dean Stanton in Lucky
#04 Timothee Chalamet in Call Me by Your Name
#05 Dafne Keen in Logan
#06 Hugh Jackman in Logan
#07 Kate Winslet in Wonder Wheel
#08 The ensemble cast of The Party
#09 Sheila Hancock in Edie
#10 Patrick Stewart in Logan
Overflow: More List-Worthy Performances
#11 Charlie Plummer in Lean On Pete
#12 The ensemble cast of The Death of Stalin
#13 Vicky Krieps in Phantom Thread
#14 Daniel Kaluuya in Get Out
#15 Hamilton Morris in Sweet Country
#16 Margot Robbie in I, Tonya
#17 Hugh Grant in Paddington 2
#18 Adam Driver in Logan Lucky
#19 Zoe Kazan in The Big Sick
#20 Sam Rockwell in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
#21 Saoirse Ronan in Lady Bird
#22 Hugo Weaving in Jasper Jones
#23 Lesley Manville in Phantom Thread
#24 Frances McDormand in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
#25 Gary Oldman in Darkest Hour
#26 Samson Coulter in Breath
#27 Juno Temple in Wonder Wheel
#28 The ensemble child cast of It
#29 Laurie Metcalf in Lady Bird
#30 Allison Janney in I, Tonya
#31 Jason Sudeikis & Ed Harris & Elizabeth Olsen in Kodachrome
#32 Tom Holland in Spider-Man: Homecoming
#33 Christopher Plummer in All the Money in the World
#34 Dave Bautista in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2
Sorry, They Didn't Make It...
> Willem Dafoe in The Florida Project [merely proves that he can play a good guy while everybody else is ghastly]
> Daniel Day-Lewis in Phantom Thread [the women push him around performance-wise]
> Woody Harrelson in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri [not much more than a nice cameo]
> Sally Hawkins in The Shape of Water [aka The Happy-Go-Lucky Girl Finally Shuts Up]
> Meryl Streep in The Post [she does a fine job...but Oscar nomination #21...how?]
And so...onto the annual awards (with a nod of appreciation to Danny Peary)...
The Alternate Oscars for 2017 are:
FILM of the YEAR
GOLD: Logan (James Mangold)
SILVER: Lucky (John Carroll Lynch)
BRONZE: Dunkirk (Christopher Nolan)
LEAD ACTOR: PERFORMANCE of the YEAR
GOLD: Harry Dean Stanton (Lucky)
SILVER: Timothee Chalamet (Call Me by Your Name)
BRONZE: Hugh Jackman (Logan)
LEAD ACTRESS: PERFORMANCE of the YEAR
GOLD: Emma Thompson (The Children Act)
SILVER: Kate Winslet (Wonder Wheel)
BRONZE: Sheila Hancock (Edie)
SUPPORTING ACTOR: PERFORMANCE of the YEAR
GOLD: Patrick Stewart (Logan)
SILVER: Hugh Grant (Paddington 2)
BRONZE: Adam Driver (Logan Lucky)
SUPPORTING ACTRESS: PERFORMANCE of the YEAR
GOLD: Zoe Kazan (The Big Sick)
SILVER: Juno Temple (Wonder Wheel)
BRONZE: Lesley Manville (Phantom Thread)
ENSEMBLE or PARTNERSHIP: PERFORMANCE of the YEAR
GOLD: Glenn Close & Jonathan Pryce (The Wife)
SILVER: Kristin Scott Thomas & Patricia Clarkson & Timothy Spall & Bruno Ganz & Cherry Jones & Emily Mortimer & Cillian Murphy (The Party)
BRONZE: Steve Buscemi & Simon Russell Beale & Paddy Considine & Rupert Friend & Jason Isaacs & Michael Palin & Andrea Riseborough & Jeffrey Tambor (The Death of Stalin)
JUVENILE: PERFORMANCE of the YEAR
GOLD: Dafne Keen (Logan)
SILVER: Charlie Plummer (Lean On Pete)
BRONZE: Samson Coulter (Breath)
The Alternate Razzies for 2017 are:
CRAP FILM of the YEAR
The Zookeeper's Wife (Niki Caro)
CRAP MALE PERFORMANCE of the YEAR
Kenneth Branagh (Murder on the Orient Express)
CRAP FEMALE PERFORMANCE of the YEAR
Katherine Waterston (Alien: Covenant)
