Michael Snydel

Michael Snydel Pro

Favorite films

  • A Confucian Confusion
  • Sans Soleil
  • The Round-Up
  • La Notte

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  • Mothra vs. Godzilla

    ★★½

  • Irish Wish

    ★½

  • Mea Culpa

    ★★

  • Sixty Minutes

    ★★★

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  • Blue Jean

    Blue Jean

    ★★

    Excerpted from my review for The Spool

    “A portrait of a closeted lesbian woman living in England during Margaret Thatcher’s oppressively homophobic 1980s reign, Georgia Oakley’s Blue Jean illustrates a unique paradox for a critic. How does one navigate criticizing a film’s self-imposed binaries while also accounting for the realities of a restrictive period, the gravity of the subject matter (and parallel current circumstances), and the differentiation of what is intended as cinematic affect and what constitutes clumsy filmmaking? 

    From the…

  • Solaris

    Solaris

    ★★★½

    Discussed on Discussed on Episode 15 of Intermission. with Dan Mecca.

    Here's how I contextualized this conversation in the description of the episode:

    "Coming off a disparate and largely consistent run of projects (including most recently, the stubbornly low-key backstage musical/relationship drama, Magic Mike’s Last Dance), Soderbergh was and remains an unpredictable filmmaker who’s as likely to knock out a four-quadrant-blockbuster as an obtusely rendered conspiracy thriller throwback like Kimi.

    Today’s conversation touches on Soderbergh’s ongoing fluency switching between different…

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  • Sixty Minutes

    Sixty Minutes

    ★★★

    Doesn’t really push the real-time action subgenre forward, but this is a good time. Sakraya is surprisingly convincing as the lead, the choreography is full of personality, and there’s at least half a dozen stunts that have the visceral crunch you want in these things.

  • The Kid Detective

    The Kid Detective

    ★★★

    I’m not sure all of this is convincing, but between Brody’s exceptionally crumbled performance and the backdrop of the small traumatized town, there’s an unshakable regret at the core of this film that feels so potent. Not sure if others have made the comparison, but Under the Silver Lake came to mind as a kindred cinematic spirit.

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  • Titane

    Titane

    ★★½

    Heavy metal petting.

    Really feel like I should have had a stronger positive or negative reaction to this given how hard it’s trying to make me feel something.

  • Licorice Pizza

    Licorice Pizza

    ★★★★

    “I doubt it, but we’ll see.”
    Hustle and Flow.

    A very rewarding continuation of Phantom Thread’s thematic concerns of partnerships vs. transactional dynamics. Toes difficult line of making these relationships literal without narrativizing them.

    PTA has long thrived in motion, but this feels crucially breathless to avoid preciousness or relationship signposting. Every passage feels dense in concept (just an endless string of schemes), but smartly blends together as a combination of youthful impulse, melancholic wanderlust, and gamesmanship. 

    On some level,…