10. “Passages”
You’ll need deep empathy and compassionate understanding to hang with Ira Sachs’ mercilessly candid “Passages,” a captivating and seductive drama and love triangle, though, in many ways, it’s about the self-destructive tendencies of a horribly selfish man. The absorbing film centers on the story of a filmmaker, Tomas (Franz Rogowski) and Martin (Ben Whishaw), a gay couple whose marriage is thrown into crisis when Tomas begins a passionate affair with Agathe (Adèle Exarchopoulos), a younger woman he meets after completing his latest film. Seemingly having tossed aside his marriage for a fling, the deeply insecure Tomas eventually ping pongs back between Martin and Agathe, often when things are going poorly or well, on the post-production and test screenings of his film, testing the boundaries of everyone like a petulant child. Suffice it to say, Tomas only makes things worse with both partners and leaves a brutally painful trail of wreckage in his confused wake. Uncomfortable, raw, and often ugly, “Passages” can be hard to watch, the way the unpredictable and volatile Tomas abuses the generosity, goodwill, and patience of these partners to an enraging degree. Still, Sachs’ movie is nuanced, profoundly human, and insightful; a complex and riveting look at the messiness of sex and love and the way people self-annihilate when utterly, tragically lost. [our review]– RP
9. “All Of Us Strangers”
Imagine returning to your childhood neighborhood and running into your father. A father who looks exactly as he did when he died 30 years ago. But he’s there, as is your mother, who also passed at the same time. That’s the key conceit that immediately makes Andrew Haigh’s mildly supernatural drama an unforgettable cinematic experience. A uniquely British incarnation of Taichi Yamada’s original novel, “Strangers” is the portrait of a man (Andrew Scott) whose malaise of inherent loneliness is interrupted by the return of the parents he lost as a child (Claire Foy, Jamie Bell) and an unexpected romance with a younger neighbor (Paul Mescal) in his desolate London apartment tower. Haigh’s startling achievement not only gives a voice not to adults who never got to say goodbye to those closest to them but to a whole generation of queer men whose fear of AIDS growing up convinced them they would never find true love. And no, we’re not crying; you’re crying (OK, maybe we are too). [our review]– GE.
8. “May December”
“But is it camp?” That question may pop into your brain while watching Todd Haynes’ latest melodramatic feast, but as with many of the director’s other works, “May December” succeeds on a number of different thematic levels. And, frankly, a lot of the credit needs to go to screenwriter Sammy Burch and two pitch-perfect performances from Julianne Moore and Natalie Portman. Elizabeth (Portman) is a B-level actress hoping her new indie movie centered on the scandalous Gracie (Moore) will propel her to the big time. Her in-person visit to Gracie’s Savannah, Georgia, home opens up old wounds regarding the tabloid teacher-student affair that occurred 23 years earlier. That student, Joe (Charles Melton), is now effectively an empty nester at 36 and somehow less grown-up than his 18-year-old son Charlie (Gabriel Chung). Haynes and Burch delightfully use Elizabeth to poke at Gracie, giving the audience unforeseen sympathy for Moore’s character. Or perhaps only Joe deserves sympathy. Or perhaps none of them. The result is an entertaining Rorschach test of a movie that makes you dream Haynes, Moore, and Portman reunite on screen sooner rather than later. [our review]– GE
7. “The Boy And The Heron”
Like Wim Wenders and Martin Scorsese on this list, the 82-year-old Hayao Miyazaki is proving some of his best work is still to come. Inspired by events in his own life, Miyazaki’s latest hand-drawn opus finds a young boy, Mahito, struggling with the death of his mother during a hospital fire in 1943. With WWII raging, his father sends him to the countryside where a mysterious grey heron – a speaking one, no less – begins to needle him that his mother is still alive. Eventually, he enters the mysterious tower on the family estate and is transported to a world of magic and physics-defying dimensions. Miyazaki’s greatest skill isn’t an imaginative mind that can fashion an animated tale to captivate children but his ability to pepper it with mature themes that resonate with adult viewers all over the world. In this case, a boy must grow up just enough to overcome his grief and foster a better world around him. And, yes, there is stunning animation and man-eating parakeets, too. [our review] – GE
6. “Barbie”
If “Barbie” isn’t the best film of the year (still debatable despite its placement on the list here), it still wins, hands down, the prize for the most cinematically subversive take of an iconic toy brand ever. Filmmaker Greta Gerwig’s remarkably ambitious, entertaining, and thoughtful film, co-written with Noah Baumbach, takes a toy brand once disparaged for being the zenith of plastic, consumerist shallowness and imbues it with soul and humor to be the unlikeliest film about an existential crisis. “Do you ever think about dying?” the excellent Margot Robbie asks, to needle-scratch WTF panic and confusion, forever altering the course of the movie. And thus sets off a funny, insightful, sly, and clever look at identity and everything Barbies and Kens represent to the world and themselves, with several identity crises along the way. “Barbie” is surely a frothy confection that’s gorgeous to look at and incredibly well-crafted—and jam-packed with ingeniously rabble-rousing cultural jokes— but its barbed social satire and philosophical musings about feminism, misogyny, patriarchy, equality, subjugation, and more are rooted in something much deeper than just a message movie. Ultimately, “Barbie” is a layered comedic and considered triumph about discovering who you truly are and loving the true beauty that comes from within us all. [our review] – RP
