Judy: It's been a very
intriguing year for movies, with
some big filims getting a lot of
attention, smaller ones
searching for audiences, and
lingering questions about the
future of the theater
experience.
Jeffrey brown looks at the year
in film, for our arts and
culture series, canvas.
Jeffrey: So are audience is
returning to theaters.
And if so, what are they seeing
and what should they, we see?
I'm joined by two film critics
, Ann Hornaday of the Washington
post and Justin Chang of the los
Angeles times.
It's nice to see both of you.
Justin, I'll start with you.
Why don't you give us two or
three of your favorites of the
last year?
Justin: One of my favorite
movies this year is tar, which
is Todd fields, a brilliant
study of a fictional world
renowned classical conductor
played by cate Blanchett in one
of the great performances of her
career.
>> Time is the thing.
Time is the essential piece of
interpretation.
Justin: And even though some
have mistaken this for a biopic,
and it's not, she's a completely
fictional creation, the
character of Lydia tar, her
world is just so fully realized
that it feels more real than
some actual biopics.
It's just a brilliant,
mesmerizing film.
And another of my favorites is a
very different movie called
aftersun, which is a first
feature by a director named
Charlotte wells.
>> There's this feeling once you
leave wherever you are from that
you don't totally belong there
again.
Justin: It's a
semi-autobiographical drama
about, loosely based on an
incident that happened with her
and her father when they went on
vacation, when she was just a
pre-adolescent.
And it falls in line with quite
a few semi-autobiographical
films this year, like Steven
Spielberg's the fablemans, James
gray's armageddon time.
I mean, we're seeing something
where filmmakers are tapping
into their personal memories.
And this one, though, from a
previously unknown filmmaker, is
just so piercing and haunting.
It's one of the most moving
studies of a father daughter
relationship that I think I've
seen in recent memory.
Jeffrey: Ann Hornaday
Ann: My number one movie of the
year was top gun maverick.
Jeffrey: Top gun maverick.
Ann: You bet.
That was the movie that I had
the most fun.
I went in with lots of
skepticism.
I thought it was too late.
I thought it had taken too long.
I wasn't really necessarily a
huge fan of the first one.
Jeffrey: Many, many years after
the first one, right?
Ann: Many years after the fact.
Can Tom Cruise age gracefully in
this role?
And I was utterly disarmed
almost immediately.
Those elbows that had been
sharply out collapsed.
And and it was just so much fun
to see it.
And the audience was having such
a good time.
Jeffrey: And there's something
to be said for that these days,
right?
Ann: There's a lot to be said
for that.
So I cannot tell a lie, that is
number one.
One that I was a huge fan of and
I wish had been in theaters I so
I could have sent people to it
was good luck to you, Leo
grande.
It's a little chamber piece
starring Emma Thompson and a
newcomer named Daryl Mccormack.
And it's about a middle-aged
widow who wants to sort of
reignite her sex life.
And she hires a sex worker
played by Mr. Mccormack to help
her do that.
And it's a series of two hander
scenes in a hotel room, which
you would think would be deadly
dull and completely uncinematic.
But it is an absolutely charming
film.
Emma Thompson is at her best and
Daryl Mccormack absolutely holds
his own with her.
And I was quite taken with it.
Jeffrey: Justin, a lot of people
are coming to the movies for
some of these big ones, I want
to ask you about one of the
year-ender big ones that a lot
of people have been
anticipating, that's avatar,
right? The new avatar.
Justin: I really enjoyed the
first avatar and I was
completely transported by this
one, too.
It is very immersive.
The worldbuilding is
extraordinary.
You feel like you are swimming.
There were times when I wanted
it to just be a great underwater
hangout movie, you know, no
action.
But the action is great when it
kicks in and you go home happy
with the action.
But it's sort of this great,
list out, trippy documentary on
mushrooms experience that I
totally recommend.
Is it a perfect movie?
No, but to your question, Jeff,
I think that it's encouraging in
-- at a time when movies have
been so challenged by the covid
pandemic, yes, people have gone
back to movies.
But it's been a really tough
year at the box office,
especially for movies like tar,
and tar has made more money than
some.
I mean, the movies that Anne and
I write about week in, week out,
smaller movies they last a few
, weeks in theaters and then it
feels like they're gone or
they're on a streaming platform.
I've never worried more than
ever for the health of, you
know, the mid-budget adult
dramas, the American independent
films, international films,
Jeffrey: What do you think about
Hornaday?
Ann: I share Justin's concern,
and I think most of us have been
concerned about that, especially
that mid-budget adult drama that
has always been an endangered
species.
And now I feel like these short
theatrical releases are almost
ads for the stream.
You know, they're they're
building awareness for audiences
that have now become conditioned
to stay at home.
There has been an exception to
this recently, which is the
whale.
It's a theatrical adaptation
starring Brendan Fraser that
just broke box office records,
it tells us that it's the movie,
you know.
I mean, I think audiences will
come out to see something,
whether that's a huge big screen
blockbuster spectacle or, you
know, a smaller scale, smaller
canvas thing.
But it's going to be that
content.
Jeffrey: Let me just ask you
both one more question quickly,
just to take us out on a kind of
upnote here about a performance
that you love.
Ann you want to start that?
Ann: Well, you know, I will
mention a movie that I think
deserved a bigger theatrical
audience.
And that's she said, which is
about the New York Times
reporters who broke the Harvey
Weinstein story.
It is a really terrific
journalistic procedural, you
know, in that great tradition of
all the president's men and
spotlight.
But there's a performance at the
center of this movie by Samantha
Morton.
>> He played people.
He was a master manipulator.
Ann: It's a supporting
performance.
It's not one of the leads.
She's one of the women who was
affected and traumatized by her
interactions with Harvey
Weinstein.
And her scene changes the film.
It's a it's a fulcrum moment.
>> It's about the system and
protecting abuses.
Ann: And she dominates and
commands it in a way that is
just, it's just devastating.
Jeffrey: Justin Chang, one
performance?
Justin: I'm going to call some
attention, not that she
necessarily needs it, to
Michelle yeoh in everything
everywhere all at once.
>> It does not look good.
Justin: Michelle yeah gives a
wonderful performance in it.
And the movie is very much a
love letter to her, to her
career.
Her standing as one of our great
martial arts performers, one of
the great Asia's great action
stars.
But also just as a as a fabulous
actor, something that has not
been recognized as much as it
should be.
And I can't think of another
movie this year, save maybe tar
and cate Blanchett that just
calls on an actor to do so many
things.
And to make you believe her
doing all of them.
And so those two performances, I
think, are maybe on a different
level this year from most
everything else.
Jeffrey: All right, Justin Chang
of the Los Angeles times, Ann
Hornaday of the Washington post,
thank you very much.
Ann: Thank you.
Justin: Thank you so much.
Judy: I hope you were taking
notes, there's a lot to watch
there.