Best of 2023

   

1)     Killers of the Flower Moon                                       Martin Scorsese

2)     The Makanai: Cooking for the Maiko House        Hirokazu Kore-eda, et al

3)     The Boy and the Heron                                           Hayao Miyazaki

4)     Roald Dahl Anthology                                               Wes Anderson

5)     May December                                                         Todd Haynes

6)     The Zone of Interest                                                Jonathan Glazer

7)     Afire                                                                          Christian Petzold

8)     Tori and Lokita                                               Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne

9)     Scrapper                                                                    Charlotte Regan

10)   Fallen Leaves                                                            Aki Kaurismäki

Movies I Enjoyed

Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret, 

The Taste of Things, Perfect Days,

The Eight Mountains, La Nuit Du 12, 

Showing Up, American Fiction,

Poker Face, One Fine Morning,

Inside, Blood and Gold,

Ballerina, Barbie, 

Talk to Me, Anselm,

Return to Seoul, Godland, 

Personality Crisis: One Night Only, Eileen, 

Dungeons and Dragons, The Last Stop in Yuma County,

Neither Confirm Nor Deny, You Hurt My Feelings, 

Past Lives, The Royal Hotel,

Theater Camp, Air, 

Madeleine Collins, Rodeo,

John Wick 4, Sharper, The Pigeon Tunnel,

Pacifiction, Poor Things, The Lost King,

Sisu, Oppenheimer, 

M3gan, Wing Woman,

The Killer, Falcon Lake,

Ferrari, Emily, 

Copenhagen Cowboy, Anatomy of a Fall,

Dream Scenario, Enys Men,

When Evil Lurks, Guardians of the Galaxy 3,

The Beasts, Your Lucky Day, 

Paris Revoir, Smoke Sauna Sisterhood,

Godzilla Minus One, Abigail, 

Plane, Tell Me a Creepy Story, 

Blue Jean, El Conde,

Little Bone Lodge, Bottoms, 

Napoleon. Locked In,

Onyx the Fortuitous and the Talisman of Souls

Below the Mendoza Line

Meg 2: The Trench, The Iron Claw, 

Everything Went Fine, Priscilla, Dumb Money,

BlackBerry, Samson, 

Anyone But You, Butcher's Crossing,

Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, All of Us Strangers,

Full Time, Infinity Pool,

The Holdovers, Saltburn,

Marlowe, Maestro,

The Super Mario Movie, Magic Mike's Last Dance,

See How They Run, Passages,

Sound of Freedom, Adult Adoption, Reptile,

The Covenant, Master Gardener,

Cocaine Bear, 100 Years of Warner Brothers,

No Hard Feelings, Sanctuary, 

Gringa, American Meltdown,

Do Not Destroy: The Treasure of Foggy mountain.

Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre,

Knock at the Cabin, Please Baby Please,

Extraction 2, Suitable Flesh,

The Exorcist: Believer, The Blackening,

Nefarious, We Have A Ghost,

Ruby Baby , Champions,

Children of the Corn

                    

                                                         

 

The Heroic Trio and Executioners

The late Anita Mui, Michelle Yeoh, and Maggie Cheung in The Heroic Trio

Johnnie To's The Heroic Trio, from 1993, is a cartoonish action film done with style and aplomb. In Hong Kong, babies are being snatched to further the diabolic plot of the Evil Master who resides in a subterranean underworld. An invisible warrior (Ms. Yeoh) does his bidding until she is recruited to the light side by the other two members of the titular trio. The film alternates between manic action sequences, well choreographed by Siu-Tung Ching, and quiet interludes intended to illustrate the main character's back stories. The three lead actresses bring the required brio and tongue in chic facetiousness to the project. You end up rooting for them no matter how absurd the carnage. To's combination of light gore and goofy humor sometimes is an uneasy mix, but I was swept along by the sheer visual pleasure of this cheesy spectacle.

Audiences, especially in Asia, were, too, and a sequel was rushed into production and released a little over six months later. Executioners is set some five years in the future after a nuclear apocalypse. The heroic trio reunite to thwart the nefarious plans of a corrupt military officer and a corporate entity that controls Hong Kong's water supply. The violent put-down of a demonstration calls to mind the then recent events at Tiananmen Square. Executioners is a bit dour compared to its predecessor, but if you enjoy The Heroic Trio, you'll want to see the sequel. 

Mannequin (1937)

Spencer Tracy watches Joan Crawford's mannequin act

Frank Borzage's Mannequin, which premiered in Los Angeles at the end of 1937. is an adequate romantic melodrama. A vehicle for two of MGM biggest stars, Joan Crawford and Spencer Tracy, it was the only time these box-office titans were paired together. The well appointed Joseph L. Mankiewicz production boasts sequences that border on lavish, like a penthouse cocktail party and a fashion show, but other Cedric Gibbons sets are appropriately dusty and dilapidated. The opening sequence in which Joan Crawford, the sole breadwinner in her family of four, mounts the shaky and dark stairs of her tenement after a hard day on her feet at a sweat shop puts one in mind of the dispossessed milieu of Seventh Heaven or the Tracy starrer Man's Castle. While this picture is not up to those two, there is enough of Borzage's love of humanity and a certain soft romantic glow to make the viewer pleasantly lulled.

The main fault of Mannequin is its central romantic triangle. Crawford's character is so desperate to leave her Hester Street environs that she begs Eddy (the dull Alan Curtis) to marry her even though he is a self-professed heel, constantly losing money at crap games and the track. Tracy's character, a self-made shipping magnate, spies the two at their ramshackle wedding reception and treats them to champagne, sparking a pursuit of Crawford that lasts most of the movie. We know Eddy is a crumb from the get-go and Crawford's character somehow can't register that fact despite the repeated attempts of her wisecracking best friend, Beryl (a sharp Mary Philips). There is little heat between Crawford and Curtis. Partly this because Curtis has no zing, but also because Crawford is a little too old to be an ingenue. Things seem a bit warmer between Crawford and Tracy, who reportedly engaged in some hanky-panky between takes, but there is little for Tracy to do for much of the time. He looks awful, puffy and, despite the efforts of the MGM makeup department, prematurely aged. There are a couple of scenes of him addressing longshoreman, with terrific character bits from an uncredited Francis Ford, but usually he is stuck handing violet bouquets to Crawford.

This is very much a Joan Crawford picture with Tracy in support. Frank S. Nugent, in the New York Times, heralded the picture as a return to Crawford's "Queen of the Shopgirl" roots and praised her for her "regal" bearing. In the trailer for the film, MGM trumpeted that it was the "Joan Crawford's greatest picture in five years" (since Grand Hotel I guess), a curious endorsement which seems to admit that she had been in a box-office slump. Returns for Mannequin, however, were highly satisfactory. If the picture has not gained much currency over the years, it is because of its utter predictability. There is not much humor, save for Leo Gorcey, very effective as Crawford's shiftless and insolent brother. Ms. Crawford's outfits sometimes verge on the garish.

There are moments, though. Crawford surveying a shabby room. Tracy discarding an untimely bouquet. Crawford's mother telling her to get out of her marriage as Borzage frames Eddy and Crawford's Pa, two reprobates smoking by the fire. Most of the supporting cast is exemplary, including, besides those mentioned above, Paul Fix, Ralph Morgan, Oscar O'Shea, Elisabeth Risdon, and Blossom Rock. If you have read this far, despite my lukewarm feelings, you would probably enjoy this film.