Second watch.
I read it now more as a comedy, but really it’s an existential parable of the mythical American West. Kodi Smit-McPhee’s Jay is a young Scottish man, already having pursued his beloved Rose across the Atlantic, and most of the North American continent, when we first meet up with him (the reasons for this come soon enough, which impels the film immediately into its darkly comical realm of myth). Michael Fassbender’s Silas is a grim loner, prowling the…
Another John Carney film about the self-actualizing powers of music-making, Flora and Son stars Eve Hewson, Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Jack Reynor. It’s strictly average as a piece of film craft, but it’s fun, and funny and feel-good, and Hewson is great. She plays a single mom in Dublin, who finds a way to connect with her troubled son. She learns to play the guitar by taking lessons online from an extremely charismatic instructor in Los Angeles (JGL). This allows her…
Six-episode limited series on Prime.
Jenna Coleman plays Liv, or Olivia, or Olive, depending on who’s addressing her (a curious dynamic I hadn't considered until now). She and her husband Will are British transplants in NYC, pursuing his ambitious career. After Liv discovers that Will has been cheating on her with one of his hot blonde colleagues, he demonstrates all the necessary opprobrium and books a getaway to the southwest, a part of the US Liv has longed to visit.…
All of Akerman condensed into a single pristine hour. Michèle yearns for connection, but can’t pretend it will ever come easily to her. Defying all conventions and restraints, she presses out into the world, alone. Like so many Akerman protagonists, the more Michèle interacts with others, the more solitary she becomes. The simultaneous experiences of pain and happiness, of proximity and distance, of brightness and gloom, Akerman bestows on Michèle, played pitch-perfect by Circé Lethem. Other than Chantal herself, no…
I really do love the flat, static tableau style of Breillat’s visual composition. It resembles precisely the mental imagery of a young girl envisioning a faery tale (I imagine). As a feminist retelling of the old French yarn, the female characters are just as accountable for their own captivity as the blue-bearded ogre (played to forlorn perfection by Dominique Thomas), if not more so.
The women and girls condemn themselves and one another as sacrificial virgins, setting traps they then…
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