Viewing entries tagged
Thomasin McKenzie
In The Power of the Dog, New Zealand director Jane Campion has crafted a searing examination of masculinity and the societal expectations that come along with that word, all set against a stunning western landscape. When, in voiceover narration, a character asks in the opening seconds of the film, “For what kind of man would I be if I did not help my mother? If I did not save her,” he’s asking the central question of the film. What kind of men does our society produce, and why?
Leave it to the comedic genius behind movies like What We Do in the Shadows and Thor: Ragnarok – to date, the wackiest (and funniest) departure from the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s “house style” – to give us a Wes Anderson movie with Adolf Hitler as a supporting character. Apologies if that’s a bit reductive, but it’s too perfect a comparison not to make. Taika Waititi has established his own style and aesthetic in movies like Boy and Hunt for the Wilderpeople, but in Jojo Rabbit, the Anderson comparisons are apt.
With Leave No Trace, her first narrative feature film since 2010’s Winter’s Bone, director Debra Granik continues to focus on characters on the fringes of society. Granik is a filmmaker whose work is steeped in social realism. Winter’s Bone chronicled crushing poverty and the devastating effects of methamphetamine use in the rural Ozarks. In Leave No Trace, the focus is a veteran struggling with PTSD who is also trying to care for and raise his teenage daughter. Granik and her writing partner, Anne Rosellini, adapted Peter Rock’s 2009 novel My Abandonment for their film. The picture is a meditation on familial love, mental illness, and even the personal sacrifices we all make to be members of society. Granik imbues the film with a great deal of empathy, and her film features two of the best performances of 2018; one from a newcomer who shows talent beyond her years, and the other from an experienced actor turning in the best, most nuanced work of his career.
