#2,311: Arrival

To Be - ★★½☆☆
I was talking with a friend who remembered this existentially terrifying (and of course Canadian) cartoon he'd seen as a kid, and tracked it down for myself. It's a little bit long.

Special Delivery - ★★½☆☆
Another from the same animator as To Be, John Weldon. This one won the Oscar™ for best animated short. I don't love it, but it does seem like a more interesting time for the short film Oscars™. It's on YouTube.com here. 

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy - ★★★½☆
I'm pretty sure this was a rewatch, but I had no memory of what actually happens in this movie. It's like a puzzle box I can enjoy anew from start to finish each time I come back to it.

Arrival - ★★★★★
Great! I know we're just getting into the season*, but I wonder if this isn't my best picture pick. It's a nominee, at least, since sci-fi won't win it. As a generalization, I love it when a movie that is not a romance doesn't have a romance, and it's kind of clever how they get to have it both ways here. All the linguistic stuff really (ahem) speaks to me too. Fake etymology is one of my favorites of the fake sciences. Or, the fake humanities, I guess. I'm looking forward to having had seen it again some time. 

*Sorry, that must seem a little bit insane. The capsule reviews are usually done sort of close to when I saw the movie, but they print each week here four at a time. If I get too far ahead you end up seeing me speculate about awards season after it's over.  I can see how it would make more sense to publish in a timely fashion, or to post a new blog every time I rack up four movies, but... that's not what this is right now.

Also, like all movie reviewers, my star ratings are arbitrary and meaningless, and totally bendable by payola, if anyone's got some to spare.

#2,308: Dr. Strange

Hush - ★★★★☆
Solid! The characters make mistakes you can criticize them for, but let's see you do better. It's really fun that Maddy's deafness is always a kind of weapon against her tormentor - she can always ignore him.

The backstory of a ma-and-pop indie production is neat too.

Piper - ★★★☆☆
Of course it's pretty. 

Denial - ★★★★☆
I liked this a lot. All that high flying lawyering! There's just something great about watching people who are excellent at their jobs using their skills effectively in a struggle, instead of the skills themselves being the subject of the struggle. I guess I'm advocating for 'Man v. Man' over 'Man v. Self,' but it's why I like this movie better than last year's version, Woman in Gold.

Doctor Strange - ★★★½☆
Certainly a movie that deserves to be seen on the big screen. Really terrific VFX work in this. I'm also happy with how this movie both advanced the plot of the overarching MCU and stood almost entirely alone from the other films. It's an origin story, fine, whatever, but it's not about a man bumbling, because this Strange's real power isn't magic, it's his ambition to learn. Being good at learning, optimizing, is a terrific skill all on its own. Here's hoping the sequel isn't just going to be about losing all of that to a well-placed punch.

#2,304: Moonlight

Diani and Devine Meet the Apocalypse - ★★★★★
I've seen this movie countless times in the course of making it, but I'm logging a screening at the Mill Valley Film Festival, one of two festivals that premiered the movie within days of each other.

In my own, utterly biased opinion, this is the best feature I've worked on in any way. It's so nigh-on impossible to find a project that you can really believe in, and even if you do, the odds of it turning out good are so very slim. But here we are, and somehow, watching for the umpteenth time but for the first time with a full theater of mostly strangers, I still enjoyed watching the movie. It's a hard thing to explain to someone who hasn't run this particular gauntlet, but that never happens.

There're jokes, there're adorable pets, there's serious stuff that I think is great, and there's kind of a grim truth underneath it all that I can relate to. I mean, what if the world DID end tomorrow? Sure, the part where the world ends would be tough, but at least then if I don't "make it" in showbiz it's not really my fault, right?

It played great with the crowd and we even picked up an audience award. I hope you get to see it.

Where to Invade Next - ★★½☆☆
Starts off so goofy that you want to turn it off, but eventually it calms down until it gets so dull that you want to turn it off.

The Accountant - ★★★½☆
I liked this one. I was interested in the characters and the world, not least because of how they avoided a long heavy blast of exposition in the beginning. I thought that was great, so it's kind of a drag when they give it to you anyway later on. The third act is unsatisfying in the way that Luke Cage is unsatisfying - the world is too small.

ARQ - ★★½☆☆
Live, Die, Repeat.

Moonlight - ★★★★☆
When I'm watching stand-ups, especially open mic'ers, especially the bad ones, I always hold out this little hope that it's all just an act, and we're in the capable hands of someone who has thought their art through. It's virtually never the case, of course, but I am an optimist.

What I liked about this movie was that I had zero idea of what it was going in, and that the filmmakers seemed to know what they were doing. It's a little rough around the edges, it feels more indie and homemade than anything else I've seen lately, and it's not perfect, but it works, and maybe most importantly, it feels like the movie the filmmakers wanted to make.

Also, I always see the girl from Guardians of the Galaxy in the poster.

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#2,300: Tickled

Queen of Katwe - ★★★☆☆
Happily, Queen of Katwe is a movie with a family-friendly subject, not a kids movie about a kid who becomes a superstar.

It's a little bit too long, but interesting that they can do a climatic final chess match without explaining to the audience what's really going on in the game.

The Girl on the Train - ★★★☆☆
Better than I was led to believe by the film's reviewers, or indeed, the film's advertisers. The deliberately confusing opening did a lot to keep me interested and engaged. Sure, you can work out whodunnit before the movie tells you, but I can't remember the last time I caught a movie like this in the theater. Gone Girl seems like a lazy comparison.

Kung Fu Elliot - ★★½☆☆
The easy note is to call this Canadian Movie. Feels like it falls more on the mock-doc side of the fence, not least because some of the notes land so perfectly. But, as I often wonder in these situations, does it matter?

I might prefer a version that reveals the story as the filmmakers experienced it. It seems like a weird choice to combine journalism with a big, pull-the-rug-out-from-under-you reveal. I bet that's a big contributor to audiences feeling mistrustful of the film.

Tickled - ★½☆☆☆
Despite how much I heard about tickled, I was still shocked by how boring it is. 15 years ago it might've seemed fresh, but now it seems like nobody involved has ever used the internet before. This would've been better off as a 15-minute segment on Reply All.

#2,296: The Magnificent Seven

Sully - ★★★☆☆
Before the movie, I wondered if the film would start with the crash, or end with it. I was way off!

Most of this movie looks more like someone filmed the notes for a screenplay. Scenes in the beginning gave me that same 'clearly just actors on a stage' feeling as American Sniper. But it sticks the landing (ahem) like crazy, and that's all anyone's going to remember.

Captain America: The Winter Soldier - ★★★★★
Still my favorite entry in the MCU. Maybe because it feels as though it could somehow exist as a movie without the super powers. Some of the most memorable and character-driven action scenes in the MCU to boot. All the stars.

Captain America: Civil War - ★★★★☆
I still like this movie, but it feels like the actual Avengers 2. Which is a terrific movie to make, but a tiny shame that it comes at the expense of another movie that feels like The Winter Soldier. Although this movie is full of the Winter Soldier - don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

Also minus a point for that security camera thing. Just feels a little bit shoddy.

The Magnificent Seven - ★★½☆☆
I mean, nobody's going to a movie called The Mediocre Seven.

Come for the surprisingly long gun battles, stay for the Chris Pratt saying a joke at the ends of scenes he's not really in!  ...actually, this may be his best movie to date, for what that's worth.