Luca: Summer Loving, Glazed by the Past

Jeremy BeckReviews
A scene from Pixar's Luca

Luca is a shape-shifting sea monster, and Luca itself is something of a transformer. It is by turns (and sometimes all at once) a coming-of-age story, an underdog sports movie, an ode to canonical Italian cinema, and a heartfelt fable of tolerance. That it ably fulfills all of these roles without succumbing to chaos or incongruity is a testament to the dexterity of its storytelling and the fluidity of its construction. It doesn’t so much offer something for everyone as it provides everything for someones—namely, for those audiences who hunger for art that is simultaneously funny, kinetic, sweet, and affirming.

It is not—and with every new Pixar release, the conversation tends to focus on what it isn’t rather than what it is—terribly imaginative. Small in scale and gentle in heart, Luca lacks the bold ingenuity that has (ahem) animated some of the studio’s more impressive recent works: the metaphysical philosophizing of Soul, the existential angst of Toy Story 4, the triumphant razzle-dazzle of Incredibles 2, the anthropomorphized emotions of Inside Out. But not every Pixar picture can be expected to stretch or redefine an entire genre, and besides, lamenting Luca’s familiarity risks diminishing some of its considerable charm. Here is a playful, gorgeous, heart-warming adventure that tells its tender story with craft and conviction. That it occasionally resembles other movies seems a small price to pay. Read More

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In the Heights: Defend the Block

Jeremy BeckReviews
Anthony Ramos and Melissa Barrera in In the Heights

“96,000,” the undeniable centerpiece of Jon M. Chu’s In the Heights, is a dizzying, dazzling musical number, a vibrant and symphonic sequence that opens on a sunbaked street, parades through a crowded neighborhood, and eventually unites what feels like a cast of thousands in a luminous public pool. Yet as propulsive and audacious as it is, the moment the song made me gasp is almost invisible; early on, when rhapsodizing about (and exaggerating) his own talents, a graffiti artist invokes the name of Obi-Wan Kenobi and then—as if from thin air—pulls out a lightsaber.

Not really, of course; as gifted and ambitious as these residents of Washington Heights may be, they aren’t actual Jedi knights. Instead, Obi-Wan’s intergalactic weapon appears as a puff of greyish shadow only to just as suddenly vanish, along with other mentioned objects like a golf club and a sparkling diamond. It’s a mild visual flourish, but it embodies the spirit of creativity that makes this Broadway adaptation sing. In all likelihood, a point-and-shoot version of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s first stage hit would have been entertaining; hell, the Disney+ broadcast of Miranda’s Hamilton was largely delightful, and it was literally just footage from theatrical performances. But while In the Heights obviously can’t approach that masterpiece in terms of writing or depth, Chu’s big-screen vision is nonetheless a robust and imaginative work. And that’s because it’s unashamedly a movie musical—emphasis on “movie”. Read More

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A Quiet Place Part II: Hush Growing Children, Don’t Lose Your Nerve

Jeremy BeckReviews
Emily Blunt in A Quiet Place Part II

The traffic light works. That’s how we know, even before the appearance of a freighted title card (“Day 1”), that the opening scene takes place during the era has become colloquially known, during our collective struggle with COVID-19, as the Before Times. (Remember, even movies that were made before the pandemic are totally still about the pandemic.) So even though the small town’s main square seems oddly deserted, the signal’s automatic flickering from green to yellow to red instantly communicates an attitude of relative safety. Yet at the same time, the introduction’s formal composition—the smoothness of the camera, the emptiness of the streets, the chaotic footage glimpsed on a news broadcast—articulates an undeniable sense of Damoclean danger. The apocalypse may not have arrived yet, but it’s surely on the way.

This expertly staged opening sequence, which builds from needling anxiety to clammy tension before erupting into all-out mayhem, confirms John Krasinski’s considerable skill as a director. He’s only made a handful of features, but here he again evinces a talent for conveying information and atmosphere through canny visual details. When he supplies a simple shot of a timid boy wincing in panic as a fastball buzzes past him during a Little League game, he isn’t watching a sport; he’s defining a character. Read More

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Ranking Every Movie of 2020 (sort of)

Jeremy BeckFeatures
Ellie Chu in The Half of It; Amarah-Jae St Aubyn in Lovers Rock; Emily Blunt in Wild Mountain Thyme; Rachel Brosnahan in I'm Your Woman; Carrie Coon in The Nest

The headline says it all. Every year, in addition to publishing our list of the best movies of the past 12 months, MovieManifesto unveils an exhausting ranking of every release of that year. Except the ranking isn’t really a ranking, because that invites widespread ridicule (or maybe just my own nightmares); instead, we separate everything into 10 distinct tiers. In addition, as part of our ongoing efforts to serve the public, we append certain data to each title: its director, its respective ratings on Rotten Tomatoes on Metacritic, and—most valuably—where it’s currently streaming. This is our gift to you. You’re welcome.

Obligatory disclaimer: The tiers aren’t infallible, if I re-ranked things a month from now they’d look considerably different, appreciation of art isn’t a fixed object but shifts over time, blah blah. The point is, don’t take these rankings too seriously; do use them as an opportunity to search for intriguing films from 2020 that you might have missed. Read More

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The Best Movies of 2020

Jeremy BeckTop 10 Lists
Viktoria Miroshnichenko in Beanpole; Julia Garner in The Assistant; Elisabeth Moss in The Invisible Man; Saoirse Ronan in Ammonite; John David Washington in Tenet

In 2020, we stopped going to the movies, so the movies came to us.

It was, to say the least, a challenging year. In addition to spreading disease itself, the COVID-19 pandemic propagated innumerable strains of misinformation. Many of these were dangerous in terms of public health (“The cure can’t be worse than the disease!” “Are the vaccines actually killing people??”), but I naturally found myself drawn to (and repelled by) the specious argument that COVID was heralding the end of cinema as we know it. This wasn’t really a new outcry but was instead a mutation of an ancient form of doomsday prophesying, mingling contemporary scientific concerns with age-old fears. And so it was proclaimed: Theaters are dead. Streamers have won. The collective pleasure of piling into large auditoriums has been replaced by the lonely convenience of turning on your TV. Christopher Nolan’s next blockbuster will be automatically downloaded to your phone.

The consternation over the long-term viability of the theatrical experience isn’t entirely unfounded. After all, while fretting about declining box-office receipts—and lamenting the homogeneity of the Disneyfied movies that do dominate the market—is something of an annual pastime in critical circles, COVID really did shut down theaters for most of the year; many of them shuttered permanently. Even now, as vaccinations rise and the public cautiously returns to a pre-pandemic “normal” (some of us more cautiously than others), it’s fair to wonder whether theaters successfully weathered the storm, and whether viewers who grew accustomed to the homey perks of on-demand viewing might resist returning to the multiplex or the art house in large numbers. Read More

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