Half of a decade. That’s how long I’ve been writing about movies. I am celebrating my fifth anniversary of starting this website, and it feels like a huge accomplishment. Before I started, I had major doubts that I could ever do it. Now, I know I never want to quit. I feel so engaged with what I consider the greatest art form ever invented. And, in some infinitesimal way, I feel like I’m part of the conversation. Even though it’s sometimes a struggle to see and spend the time to write a contemplative piece about a different movie week in and week out, while also holding down a day-job and trying to be a supportive and engaged partner in my long-term, committed relationship, doing it makes me feel at peace. I am Jack’s sense of gratitude.
So, I’ll put the thanks up front this year. Endless thanks go to Rach, who puts up with the madness of the number of films I watch (231 for 2019, with a few weeks left to go!). And thanks to you, whoever you are, for reading this and my reviews. I appreciate your time and attention.
I was able to tease out a distinct theme in over half of the movies on my “best of” list this year. The theme is a grandness of scale. A lot of the movies on this list are telling big stories. Either the ambition of the characters or subjects is larger than life, as in number 5, or the cinematic scope of the filmmaker is immense, as in numbers 2, 3, and 4. Or, it’s a little bit of both, as in numbers 1 and 6.
Even the smaller films feel big and important in their own way (numbers 8 and 9).
This year brought some exciting events. I had the opportunity to have a sit down, face-to-face interview with the director of what turned out to be my number one film of the year. I’m pretty proud of how it turned out. You can find that interview here. I was also accepted as a member into the Online Film Critics Society, which will raise my profile among my fellow critics and readers alike.
I’ve posted 52 reviews this year. I know most professional critics review multiple films per week (sometimes several a day), so they would probably just smirk at my output, but, like I said above, day job, relationship, friendships, life. So, I’m going to take a much needed break for the last week-and-a-half of the year. I’ll be back at it on January 3rd with a review of the new and last film in this latest Star Wars trilogy, The Rise of Skywalker.
As always, I find myself lamenting all the films I still haven’t seen as of putting the below list together. I’ve heard nothing but good things about Marriage Story (including major Oscar buzz), but haven’t made time for it yet. I still haven’t caught up with Judy, which reportedly features the best performance of the year. I’m also still sitting over here needing to see The King, Hustlers, Uncut Gems, and probably my biggest regret and what I’m most interested in seeing at this moment, Portrait of a Lady on Fire.
Now, without further ado, please see below for my top ten of 2019:
*Note: Each movie title above the picture is a link that will take you to my review of that movie, with one exception. I didn't write a review of my number five.
10. The Farewell
Director LuLu Wang’s The Farewell is a small wonder of a movie. A story about confronting death and grief is at the same time funny, light, and heartwarming. The whole cast shines (especially Awkwafina), but it’s Zhao Shuzhen as the matriarch of the family, who everyone is desperate to keep in the dark about her own health, that really steals the show.
9. Midsommar
The thing I value most in the two Ari Astor films I’ve seen (and the only two he has made so far) is the sensation of being taken on a long, very strange trip. I use the word trip in the literal and metaphorical, drug-induced connotation. By the end of Midsommar, I felt like so much had happened since the opening scene, and that I might possibly be on acid. Astor is such a fascinating, meticulous filmmaker that I am prepared to go on whatever journey he wants to take.
8. Her Smell
Actress Elizabeth Moss is magnetic in Her Smell. The film takes a look at five different days that span years in the life of a destructive rock-and-roller and her desperate attempt to get clean after a decade of hard living. Director Alex Ross Perry’s tightly focused film is a master class in economical storytelling. Everything we need to know about Becky Something is given to us in brief snippets of dialog and the camera’s unflinching look at her abusive behavior. The unexpected grace notes towards the end of Her Smell are transcendent.
7. The Lighthouse
Much like with Ari Astor, I will go anywhere director Robert Eggers wants to take me. And where he goes in The Lighthouse is a far stranger place than I could have imagined. This is essentially a movie about two men going slowly insane. Set in the late 1890s, Eggers is exacting in his attention to period detail, both the look and the sound. Just as in his first film, The Witch, Eggers went to painstaking lengths to make the dialog as authentic as possible. The tableaux he creates with cinematographer Jarin Blaschke are strange and beautiful.
6. The Last Black Man in San Francisco
The story told in The Last Black Man in San Francisco is a messy, achingly human one. Nothing is simple here, like the characters’ love for a city that also treats them shabbily. But that makes the film all the richer of an experience for how complicated it is. The ethereal formalism of director Joe Talbot makes the movie a delicate, gorgeous wonder. It’s a rumination on gentrification, love, hate, and the stories we tell ourselves to make sense of the world.
5. Apollo 11
Not only is Apollo 11 the best documentary of 2019, it had to be in the mix for my top ten films of the year list. The footage is striking in it’s clarity. The editing makes for a soaring chronicle of one of humankind’s greatest achievements: setting foot on the moon. No talking heads. No narration. We simply get to experience a little of what it must have been like to be there, as the astronauts and engineers prepared for lift-off. We see what the crew of Apollo 11 saw as they made their sojourn. It’s a sweeping (and, frankly, much needed) reminder of the greatness that humanity is capable of when we set our minds to it.
4. The Irishman
This is Martin Scorsese the elder statesperson harnessing over a half-century worth of experience in the art form to give us storytelling of immense maturity and gravitas. The Irishman is by turns mournful, funny, suspenseful, and thoughtful. Come for the powerhouse trio of DeNiro, Pacino, and Pesci. Stay for the latter’s unbelievably restrained and understated menacing performance. Pesci has never been so good. Scorsese returns to the mobster genre and reminds us all why he’s the master.
3. Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood
And so we come to the movie that makes it onto my top ten list that I initially gave a 3.5 star review. Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood is in good company with Annihilation and Loving Vincent. Just like those films, time and reflection have made the movie grow in my estimation. The characters experiencing an end-of-career melancholy (perhaps like the movie’s director); the love letter to cinema plot; the evocation of a certain time and place in Hollywood’s past; that bonkers ending. All these things keep swirling in my head, making me desperate to revisit Tarantino’s penultimate (according to his own master plan, anyway) feature film .
2. 1917
1917 is pure technical mastery by its director Sam Mendes and cinematographer Roger Deakins. The continuous long-take structure could be called gimmicky, but in Mendes’s hands, it’s anything but. It’s a movie full of kinetic energy, drama, and suspense with plenty to say about the horrors of war.
1. Waves
I’m officially in the bag for Trey Edward Shults. Along with Sean Baker and Barry Jenkins, Shults is proving himself to be one of the most sensitive humanist filmmakers working today. His exploration of an American family’s struggles, joys, and tragedies is breathtakingly beautiful, heartbreaking, and wonderfully artistic. After seeing Waves, I thought to myself, “If this thing gets some box office legs, it could definitely be in the mix for an Oscar Best Picture nomination.” It doesn’t look like that’s going to happen. That’s why I want to scream from the rooftops to please seek out this picture. Watch it. Support it with your dollars. It’s so deserving of attention.
The rest of the best:
I’m going to do something a little different from years past. This is usually the space reserved for “honorable mentions.” I typically list a few of the movies that I hated to leave off and that were just short of making the top ten. This year, I want the list to run a little longer. This is my top 25. I’m not going to comment on them at all. I’ll just list them and link to my reviews, where available. If any of them grab your attention, check ‘em out: