When you begin watching Light of My Life, you might feel like you’ve seen this movie before, or at least a variation of it. If you are like me, you’ll feel like this is a mixture of The Road meets Leave No Trace meets A Quiet Place meets Children of Men. After reading several different reviews, many other critics have a similar sentiment. Somewhere in the not-too-distant future, we are in a post-apocalyptic world where something horrific has already happened, and we are left with inventive survivors who are left to pick up the pieces and make a semblance of their new lives. In these types of movies, we learn that what has happened to get us to this point will slowly be revealed throughout the movie, often through flashbacks, one of the tools used in this Casey Affleck-directed film.
Category Archives: 2019
Late Night (2019)
Nisha Ganatra (The High Note) tries a formula that’s been tried and true with a slightly different spin in Late Night. The Emma Thompson (Howard’s End, Sense and Sensibility) dramedy focuses on her career as an acclaimed late-night talk show host who might be on the tail end of her career after plummeting ratings in recent months/years. Flanked by an all-white male staff of writers, Katherine Newberry’s (Thompson) material has become predictably stale.
Harriet (2019)
Harriet Tubman. What a legendary American. We all studied her in elementary school and then again in high school. We know that she was born into slavery, escaped, and was an integral leader in the Underground Railroad that helped free slaves before the United States Civil War. Cynthia Erivo (Widows, Bad Times at the El Royale) pours her heart and soul into the title role and makes Kasi Lemmons’ (Eve’s Bayou, Talk to Me) Harriet a must-see for anyone over twelve. It is the first time Tubman’s story has been captured in biopic form. This film is so well told that it won’t need to be retold (in big production film form) for a long time. It’s one of the best history lessons you could hope to have on another person. It’s brutally honest. It doesn’t drag its feet. It’s entertaining. It brings to the big screen a real-life American hero who deserves all the fame and glory she is due. Harriet is a 2019 big, big win.
Parasite (2019)
It’s hard to classify or compare Bong Joon Ho’s (Snowpiercer, Okja) Parasite to any other movie I’ve ever seen. From the first frame until the last, it comes together as a unique film that reminded me of Get Out and A Quiet Place in the sense that you know you are seeing something extraordinary and something that you have no idea where it comes from or where it’s going. These three movies are entirely different but follow the same formula of capturing your audience in the first scene and never giving them a chance to spin out of the web you hope you are creating for them.
Joker (2019)
A movie that didn’t need to be made often will benefit from the doubt if that same movie pays due diligence and does the movie right. Those wondering why we need a Joker origin story when there is a perfect origin story in The Dark Knight (one of the 25 best movies ever made) should find some relief in knowing that the Christopher Nolan trilogy story will not be confused with Todd Phillips’ (War Dogs, Old School) Joker. This film never mentions the word Batman nor refers to anything related to, perhaps, the most iconic comic book franchise of all time other than references to Gotham City and a billionaire businessman named Thomas Wayne.