2001: A Space Odyssey, Moon, Prometheus, The Martian, Interstellar, Life, First Man, Passengers, Solaris, Alien, Apollo 13, Gravity, it is not. Claire Denis (Chocolat, Friday Night) ambitiously ventured into outer space territory, a territory she had previously not explored, and found herself with a movie that was hard to appreciate, very difficult to enjoy, and left you with a million burning questions, most of which you would never care if they were ever answered or not. I give Denis credit for ambition, just as I gave Alex Garland credit for in Annihilation, a movie that if you enjoy, you might also enjoy High Life. But much like that movie, its plausibility was tossed out the window from the start, and its uneven semblance left you looking at your watch more than it did trying to find answers.
Category Archives: Drama
The Doors (1991)
Consistent with many of the most successful biopics about the greatest of American songwriters/bands (i.e., Walk the Line, Ray, Love & Mercy, La Bamba, What’s Love Got to Do With It, 8 Mile, Great Balls of Fire, Straight Outta Compton, Bohemian Rhapsody) in the last 30 years comes Oliver Stone’s (Platoon, Born on the Fourth of July) distant, unsteady, and unapologetic story of Jim Morrison and his band in the 1991 movie The Doors. Liked more by audiences than critics, the Val Kilmer (Top Gun, Heat) led movie takes us through the formation of the band in the early 1960s to Morrison’s mysterious 1971 death in a Paris bathtub at the age of 27. One of the founding members of the infamous 27 Club, Morrison was an energizing performer whose limit-pushing love of drugs and alcohol led to his early death.
The Mustang (2019)
Roman Coleman, the career-defining role that journeyman Matthias Schoenaerts (Rust and Bone, The Drop) has been waiting for, does not disappoint. Finally, the 42-year-old actor you’ve seen in the background here and there and everywhere gets his opportunity to truly lead a movie. As the hardened felon-turned-horse trainer proves, anything can happen to anyone, given the right circumstances. The Mustang is a brilliantly directed movie by first-time director Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre. Roman seems to desire to serve his time quickly and with as little human interaction as possible. He is nearly unrecognizable with his shaved head, as well as chiseled, tattooed body. But his problem with the latter leads to a longer than expected stay, and his explosive anger to go with that machine of a body suggests that he might not be going anywhere anytime soon.
Annihilation (2018)
It took me two watches, some 12 months apart from one another, for me to be able to say emphatically that Alex Garland’s (Ex Machina) Annihilation isn’t a great movie. While I appreciate its ingenuity and ambition, the overall execution, delivery, and continuity could not be overlooked. For as much as I was in awe of Garland’s 2015 directorial debut, Ex Machina, I was even more disappointed with Annihilation, a movie for me that came and went as it felt, broke its own rules, left me bored at times, and hoping for more, while knowing it was never going quite to deliver. With a critics’ score of 88% but an audience score of just 66%, I am comfortable saying that, after watching it twice, some artistry I was missing made this movie so likable by those who review movies for a living. I couldn’t help but remove myself from critic mode and, even after taking off that hat, couldn’t get behind Annihilation to come close to recommending it.
The Miseducation of Cameron Post (2018)
A much anticipated same-sex attraction/sexual attraction conversion therapy movie had been initially projected to earn multiple Oscar nominations. Unfortunately, the Lucas Hedges/Nicole Kidman/Joel Edgerton/Russell Crowe Boy Erased failed to live up to the hype. I had read the book earlier and hoped that the movie could capture the aspects of the novel I liked and take it to the next level. And despite decent Rotten Tomatoes critics and audience scores (81% and 72%), that didn’t happen for me.
But here we have this much less marketed movie in The Miseducation of Cameron Post with a much less recognized cast and a first-time director in Desiree Akhavan (Boy Erased was directed by Joel Edgerton, a pretty darn good actor turned director). Many didn’t see This lesser-known movie, earning less than $1 million domestically (compared to $7 million for Boy Erased, which could have been more successful). Still, it succeeded because of both its softness and its quietness. The movies were similar, and I’d like to know what Edgerton knew about Akhavan’s movie and vice versa. While Boy Erased underwhelmed (primarily due to my lofty expectations of it going in), something about it still made the movie more memorable than The Miseducation of Cameron Post. So, with that said, Boy Erased was better. Still, The Miseducation of Cameron Post was a more enjoyable movie that leaves you feeling more hopeful for those struggling with (and those not struggling with) same-sex attraction.