2019 in review

Insert self-deprecating comment about how often I don’t update this blog here, and now we can get on with things.

I described 2018 as an odd one, and 2019 was even more so. I spent a large chunk of it unemployed from my day job, and my attempts to get paid writing work culminated in making £7.75 for a handful of product descriptions.

So, where does that leave your friendly neighbourhood film blogger going into 2020?

Well the numbers were certainly an improvement on last year, with 150 films watched overall.

That breaks down to: 43 new cinema releases 60 non cinema releases but new to me 47 re-watches

Of those new, but not cinema, watches, major highlights had to be Nightcrawler, Misery, In Bruges, The Invitation, and Grave of the Fireflies, one of the most beautiful movies I have no intention of watching again any time soon.

But as for cinema releases, even with 43 under my belt, looking at the films I saw it all feels a little lacking. Sure, that’s a darn sight few more films seen than Jack and Jill Multiplex, but overall it feels like an exam with “COULD DO BETTER, SEE ME AFTER SCHOOL” written in red pen at the top. Maybe that’s because of missing out on a few big films that dominated a lot of the film conversation. The Farewell is one I was massively looking forward to but never saw it at the time for personal reasons, and I didn’t see Eighth Grade, The Irishman, The Souvenir, If Beale Street Could Talk, Marriage Story, and others.

I also had a slight horror existential crisis when I saw Us and Pet Sematary in the same week and didn’t have an immediate strong positive reaction to either of them. I was worried about horror burnout and the possibility of losing my horror love and mojo. On reflection now in the case of the former I think I need a re-watch that is unclouded by preoccupation with the film’s twist, and as for the latter despite a couple of interesting story choices I just plain prefer the book and the 1989 version, veering into camp though it does sometimes.

Now it’s time for the main event, don’t you think?

10. Can You Ever Forgive Me?

Or, as I like to call it; Be Gay Do Crime: The Movie. A fascinating look at the real-life case of a down on her luck writer who forged letter by famous literary figures and sold them. A criticism of the snobbery and superficiality of the literary elite? A buddy crime caper? A depressing look at how passion and talent sometimes aren’t enough to make it in an industry (Sarah you’re projecting again)? You decide, but however you see the film it had Melissa McCarthy and Richard E Grant playing some of the most likeable arseholes you’ll see on film this year. It also cements the fact that I really need to watch Marielle Heller’s previous directorial effort Diary of a Teenage Girl and see A Beautiful Day in the Neighbourhood when it comes out, despite having no knowledge or feelings about Mr Rogers (sorry America).

9. Godzilla: King of the Monsters

SCREW THE HATERS, I LOVED IT!

Okay, fine, I get that this isn’t the most well-received movie of the year, but it gave me exactly what I wanted out of it, so surely that’s something to be celebrated? Godzilla movies have this flexible ability to be both meaningful allegories about society through the lens of giant monster destruction, the original 1954 movie and 2011’s Shin Godzilla being great examples of this, and also utterly bonkers shenanigans, like Ebirah: Horror of the Deep or Godzilla vs Megalon. Both have their place, and I think director Michael Doherty understands this pretty well. Getting to see the likes of Ghidorah, Mothra, and even Rodan, on this kind of a scale in this kind of detail was amazing, Bear McCreary’s work with Akira Ifukube’s original Godzilla score is brilliant, and Ken Watanabe has one of my favourite moments in any kaiju movie. Call me crazy if you want, but I’d rather bow down to the king.

8. Captain Marvel

Finally. A female led superhero movie for Marvel and its bags of fun, with great set pieces and creative visuals. It also doesn’t fall into the same patterns that so many other first Marvel solo films do and what they do with the Skrulls is surprising from what a lot of audiences may have been expecting and makes for a great central theme of war. Ben Mendelsohn especially is a delight to watch (although really we should have known things weren’t as they appeared with the Skrulls when he was playing it quirky rather than full-sinister) and Brie Larson is a very compelling lead as a character trying to wrestle with conflicting facets of her identity. I didn’t even mind the CGI de-aging on Samuel L Jackson. It’s not anything ground-breaking for cinema, but its consistently enjoyable.

7. Avengers: Endgame

Wooo, Marvel back to back! After the gut punch that was Infinity War, this somehow managed to go even further. We got to see more great character stuff, the fights were intense, and whilst there are a few things I have a love-hate relationship with, like Fat Thor (on one hand we see a hero having a breakdown and go through some serious emotional difficulties but at the end of it HE’S STILL WORTHY, but on the other hand lots of easy fat jokes), but it felt like a firm closing of the book to this saga of the Marvel Cinematic Universe that started with Iron Man in 2008 while still leaving room for growth in the future. I saw this in a midnight double feature with Infinity War and it was one of the most fun cinema experiences of the year.

6. Ready or Not

The 100th film I saw in 2019, at the hallowed ground of FrightFest. A silly but sharp horror comedy of a bride marrying into a rich family of boardgame tycoons spends her wedding night being hunted as part of a satanic ritual. This movie is bonkers and I just adore it. It stars my beautiful wife Samara Weaving, and she makes for a great horror protagonist; doe eyed and innocent when she needs to be, and hardcore badass. The gore it outlandish, the laughs frequent (“brown haired niece, you continue to exist”), and the underlying satire about the upper classes, whilst not subtle, is pretty darn apt for our current time. It somehow manages to get even crazier in the third act, and gives you a good few “wait……WHAT?” moments. Then, when all the mayhem settles you leave with a big smile on your face.

5. Doctor Sleep

Anybody who knows me knows that I am not the biggest fan of Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining. Never have been since I saw it as a teen. It’s a brilliantly made film, don’t misunderstand me, but it has never held the same value for me that it has for other horror fans. It’s stylish, well-made, and moody, but never scary. It’s also not the best adaptation of King’s work because the book has a much more palpable sense of descending madness and horror. So my feelings about Doctor Sleep were fairly neutral, and then Mike Flanagan got involved. Oculus, Hush, The Haunting of Hill House, two-thirds of Ouija: Origin of Evil, Mike Flanagan has proven time and again that he knows horror to its core and also knows how to bring out emotional impact in it (although I’ve still not worked up the courage to watch Gerald’s Game) and I love what he does with that. And my faith was founded, because Doctor Sleep builds a bridge between Kubrick and King that is such a satisfying experience. Flanagan tells a story where Kubrick makes a mood piece, and the story of a grown-up Danny Torrance, played so well by Ewan McGregor, has such tragedy and sadness and horror in it. Major kudos has to be given to the design of the film as well, which leans on Kubrick where most effective, and seriously the recreation of The Overlook is amazing, and goes its own way where it needs. Add in a compelling villain in Rebecca Ferguson’s Rose the Hat (I want that hat) and you have a film that I can see myself returning to often, perhaps even in a double feature with its counterpart.

4. Booksmart

Teen movies have always been a bit of a mixed bag for me. A lot of the time they’re parades of gross out humour, or a quirky romance that I can only look on in envy of. Either way just not something I can connect to. Enter Booksmart, the tale of two nerdy girls who decide to get years worth of partying into one night, it’s the kind of thing that could have just ended up being Superbad with boobs, but instead is a look at internal judgments and prejudices, the way that people have hidden depths, and all while being sweet, funny, and really smart. It also gives us one of the best comedy characters in Billie Lourds as Gigi, she is the queen of all of us.

3. Midsommar

Hoo boy, from start to finish this is just an uncomfortable parade of unpleasantness, but it is just so well done. As someone who always yells “turn the bloody lights on” in overly dark horror movies, to have a movie so starkly bright and in the daylight was a great novelty. Toxic relationships, empathy, grief, Ari Aster knows how to make the most out of these themes like he did in Hereditary and like Hereditary it wouldn’t work as well without such a great central performance. You feel every single painful emotion that Florence Pugh’s Dani is going through, and her journey is to a place of cathartic release or one of even more emotional manipulation depending on how you look at it. And as for the bear? It’s a bear.

Now this is where Little Women WOULD be if I had seen it before the end of 2019, but I saw it a few days into 2020 and as surprising as it is I do have rules for this list.

2. Knives Out

Not sure that you could have set up a movie this year that had more Sarah Appeal. Murder mystery directed by Rian Johnson with a stellar cast that has clear influence from the Agatha Christie, particularly Albert Finney and Peter Ustinov Poirot movies, Murder by Death, and Gosford Park, and other movies I really enjoy. And unsurprisingly I loved it. A house of cards with each piece and character placed perfectly, and at the centre of it all is Daniel Craig as Benoit Blanc with this ridiculous but infinitely entertaining performance and Ana de Armas as the soul of the film Marta. It’s just so much fun and also has some great social commentary that never distracts from the murder. Donuts, donut holes, knitted jumpers, and a house “like a Clue(do) board”, I can easily see this being in my regular movie watching rotation.

1.One Cut of the Dead

My favourite film of 2019 which I saw in 2018. It was one of the movies from FrightFest that year that I absolutely had to see, only knowing that it was a movie about the crew of a zombie movie being attacked by zombies. It proved to be the film of the festival, and over a year later it still has such great impact. You just need to see this film, to explain to much would be to ruin it, which makes it so hard to recommend to people. The first act is an unbroken 37 minute take, and whilst funny you would be forgiven for thinking “okay, not sure I see the fuss” but it all turns around and by the end of the third act every payoff, even ones you didn’t initially realise has been set up, are done delightfully and make you want to start the movie from the beginning all over again. It is a love letter to filmmaking and all the chaos that entails and is funny throughout with proper explosive pit of your belly laughs. I do intend to write something about the later elements of the film in full and why it works so well, but for now I will simply say again just watch it.

So there we have it, my top films of 2019. Looking ahead I have mostly the same goals as last year of watching more, reading more, and writing more. Some films I am particularly looking forward to including Last Night in Soho, Godzilla vs Kong, Antlers, and A Quiet Place: Part 2. Whether any of them live up to that anticipation we will have to see.

Until then,

Happy Watching.