FYI: IFC EOY
On Christmas Eve last year, conscious of 2019's close, I scribbled a best-of list in my trusty film log. You're lucky I didn't put the whole thing online, especially because some of it is so personal (as diary entries are), but re-reading it, I was surprised that some things are forever. I'm still super into lists, giddy from the discoveries and insight they offer, and I am still the type of person that sits down and listens to every song on Pitchfork's EOY round-up as a treat. I too remain sceptical of the best-of list's purpose and inherent narcissism, especially after reading Elena Gorfinkel's 'Against Lists'. So, those are a couple of things that didn't change in 2020. Everything else did, though.
It's odd to think about 2020 as a Year In Cinema, more for what was absent than what was there. So much was missing once the pandemic took hold of the familiar way films were marketed and premiered and I felt it. I can't say that I turned to movies this year to make things seem better — I just became more voracious at home, looking for ways to mainline that excitement I got from film culture IRL. One Sunday morning in 2019, I rolled into a screening of Olivier Assayas' cosy Non-Fiction (2018). I devoured a muffin and day-dreamed about living in each character's fantasy flat. Pretty good movie, not Assayas' best, have barely thought about it since. I'd give anything to have that experience back.
My favourite filmic experiences of 2020, for the most part, very different, but transformative nonetheless. This year-end list is just like all the others — a marker of a year spent, encompassing both Before Shit Hit The Fan and Afterwards. (Remember cinemas?) But I have to be honest and note what really moved me this year, whether it was from 2020 or 1982. Weirdly, films felt more alive to me this year. Maybe they do at the end of each year. At least we can mark this year through something other than death, political ineptitude, social failures and separations. In its purest form, the best-of list has always been that: a way to mark the passage of time, through things we care about. I hope the caring doesn't change at any point, in any year.
Losing Ground (dir. Kathleen Collins, 1982, USA)
The most important film I saw all year, if only for the fact it inspired me to write poetry. (No, you will not, and cannot, read it.) The only feature from writer-director Kathleen Collins, it follows the academic Sara (Seret Scott) and her fraying relationship with her artist husband (visionary director Bill Gunn, the most handsome man ever to wear an unbuttoned denim shirt). Sounds dramatic, but it's a film about how dramatic, life-altering shifts don't happen at the one time: life, like the emotions that drive us through it, runs hot and cold. I haven't seen another film that has succinctly captured how differently wired everyone's brains are, and how that balances out interpersonal relationships. I've written plenty about filmmakers that didn't get their flowers while they were here, and Collins sadly was one of them. At least Criterion is streaming this for all to see — I would fight tooth and nail for a UK Blu-Ray to exist. PS. Nicholas Forster is currently writing a bio of Bill Gunn, which I cannot wait for.
Annihilation (dir. Alex Garland, 2018, USA/UK)
Third time round, this time at London's Prince Charles Cinema. (Support the PCC if you can.) If you are aware of Alex Garland's sci-fi horror, you'll have noticed that it did not get a cinema release outside of the US, due to it bricking hard on release. After two viewings on Netflix, I pondered if there was much point in seeing Garland's vision on a far bigger screen: turns out, fuck yeah there are so many reasons. A great film at home turned into a truly upsetting experience in a darkened auditorium, queasy for reasons I can describe (a Mini DV video of exposed insides) and ones I cannot (Sonoya Mizuno dancing to ear-blasting Moderat samples). BONUS GARLAND OPINION: Devs was very good. I will follow Garland (and Jin Ha) to the ends of this earth.
Bliss (dir. Joe Begos, 2019, USA)
A truly disgusting drug-movie horror splurge that I can't wash off. Dora Madison Burge, formerly of the Dick Wolf Expanded Television Universe, is exceptional as a Los Angeleno artist that can't work without drugs. Imagine Gaspar Noe, but less dumb — yes, even after vampires get involved. Director Joe Begos is one to keep an eye on.
Never Rarely Sometimes Always (dir. Eliza Hittman, 2020, USA/UK)
The way Eliza Hittman’s third feature impacted audiences felt directly affected by the 2020 of it all: festival hit at Sundance, released in cinemas to rave reviews, abruptly curtailed by you-know-what. Some narratives just aren’t meant to play out in this world, but Hittman’s film, about two teens visiting New York for an abortion, feels timeless. Regardless of its hot-button subject, its instantaneousness comes from understanding what it feels like to be a teenager, where the micro is macro and the macro so gigantic that it’s impossible to talk about.
Mary Is Happy, Mary Is Happy (dir. Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit, 2013, Thailand)
Back in June, YouTube’s We Are One online film festival made for an enjoyable experience, thanks to a grab-bag of features and shorts curated by almost every major film festival in the world. However, this was not a festival concerned with showcasing what, say, this year’s Cannes may have screened, looking to highlight past contributions instead. Venice offered Mary is Happy, Mary is Happy, which beat Janicza Bravo’s Zola (2020) to the punch as the first film adapted from a Twitter feed. Thai director Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit uses the feed of @marylony as inspiration for a coming-of-age story that pinballs across dreamstates, societal commentary, raucous comedy and inexplainable heartbreak. Tweets make for a magical framing device, and from it, he harnesses both the joys of young life and the possibilities of cinematic storytelling.
Parasite (dir. Bong Joon-ho, 2019, South Korea)
On Black Friday last year, I saw this in an empty cinema, buried somewhere in a Cape Town mall at 11:30 am, and felt very smug about it. But seeing it in a full room, right after its Oscar win for Best Picture, witnessing it connect with the London crowd, emphasised just how good Bong Joon-ho is at this shit. He’s a born entertainer, but he’s never pulling a punch or opting to make a scene ordinary for the audience’s satisfaction. Also, the perfect Tweets.
High and Low (dir. Akira Kurosawa, 1963, Japan)
All this time at home allowed for the ideal excuse to (a) complete Fire Emblem: Three Houses (b) read Fire Emblem fanfic and (c) watch Akira Kurosawa films — admittedly prompted by Criterion's celebrations for what would have been Toshiro Mifune’s hundredth birthday. Out of all I saw this year, High and Low has to be the high water-mark. For a filmmaker known for his historical epics, his evocations of post-war, modern day Japan sure were out of this world. A chamber play, a potboiler, an action film with barely any action. One of the best films to understand the power of framing: what you put in, what you leave out, how to place actors within the image and not make it look choreographed. And Mifune is phenomenal, a man of moral fortitude shrinking into himself in slow motion.
Uncut Gems (dir. Josh & Benny Safdie, 2019, USA)
Saw this in a little cinema in Catford with my fiancee (support Catford Mews if you can) and walked out, head blaring, feeling like I had seen some feat of alchemy take place. Everything about this haphazard, noisy, powerful work seems like it couldn’t have worked, and yet it does. I spent days awed by how the Safdies constructed meaning out of a May 26th 2012 meeting between the Boston Celtics and the Philadelphia 76ers, then added fifteen layers on top, yet made it purr. This isn’t a seamless film, but my lord, it’s never clunky. Take a bow, Ronald Bronstein and Benny Safdie — I will never wrap my mind around how you edited this behemoth.
The Young Master (dir. Jackie Chan, 1980, Hong Kong)
My favourite Jackie Chan movie I saw this year for the first time was Police Story (1985), a ridiculous comedy stunt show that had me wondering, why don’t we talk about Jackie Chan as a director? His second directorial job, The Young Master, has a sequence as OTT as Story’s peerless gunfight/car chase through a makeshift town: it’s the finale where he gets his ass beat for what feels like a lifetime. It’s a little boring at first, as Chan gets beaten up all the time, so much so that it helped define his underdog bonafides. But this one-sided beating goes on for so long, that it becomes truly hilarious and daring from the director-star. How selfless are you for your own film that you will take a remorseless beating? There’s a metaphor somewhere in there for what makes a good director.
Bacurau (dir. Kleber Mendonça Filho and Juliano Dornelles, 2019, Brazil/France)
Bacurau recently popped back into film Twitter conversations after Barack Obama called it one of his favourite films of the year — a move that many ardent leftists saw as intentionally ignoring the film’s contents. Kleber Mendonça Filho and Juliano Dornelles’ film can certainly be enjoyed as a scintillating goodies vs baddies tale dripping with style. Still, much like Parasite, leaves you energised with an anger to change the world. A passionate, fun, unforgettable watch, its howl against the fucking over of Brazil’s people especially furious after 2020.
Let the Fire Burn (dir. Jason Osder, 2013, USA)
I first heard about this film in 2013, when it ended up on Wesley Morris’ best of 2013 list, a time where streaming wasn’t quite where it was nowadays. (The rest can be read here. Wesley Morris is a terrific critic.) While you could imagine films like Let the Fire Burn nowadays being a strategic acquisition by a streaming platform, the most you could hope for was a two-week cinema cycle and a potential DVD release, which it didn’t receive. US distributors Kino Lorber made this film available for free, during the summer of anti-racism reading lists. (Complicated feelings.) It’s mighty, weaving through hours of archival footage to show the state-sponsored bombing of Black radical organisation MOVE in 1985. It has a clarity unlike many found-footage documentaries and a dread unlike anything else in fiction or non-fiction. In November, the Philadelphia City Council formally apologised for the bombing; MOVE did not accept the apology, and nor should they. Free Mumia.
Undine (dir. Christian Petzold, 2020, Germany/France)
Cheating a little bit, because this officially comes out in April. But it’d be silly for me to not state that Christian Petzold — diving into romantic fantasy here — is one of the best filmmakers alive this minute.
Chasing Dream (dir. Johnnie To, 2019, Hong Kong)
Briefly discussed in my very first newsletter. Long and short: protect Johnnie To by all means. A genius, linking historical runs across mainland and Hong Kong cinema markets, still finding ways to make the oddest, most uncompromising version of cineplex entertainment. The best running gag of the year, about being willing to die for your music.
Time (dir. Garrett Bradley, 2020, USA)
It makes me impossibly sad that a film this phenomenal will need to be searched for in the sheer glut of Amazon Prime’s library, so let this be another set of words on a screen begging you to see Garrett Bradley’s Time. A beautiful, personal portrait of the prison abolition movement, told with grace and patience and a lot of romance.
Suzaki Paradise - Red Light District (dir. Yûzô Kawashima, 1956, Japan)
MUBI’s online retrospective of Japanese director Yûzô Kawashima was great for me, because it introduced me to Michiyo Aratama. In Suzaki Paradise, Aratama plays a woman wanting more from life, so she ably switches into performance mode, portraying a giggly version of femininity to drunk salarymen. The effort Aratama can switch it on and off was astonishing to see, let alone how ahead of its time it was for Kawashima to showcase this dynamic without a prejudicial eye. (His most famous film, Sun in the Last Days of the Shogunate, is far more respectful about the community dynamics of sex workers than a bawdy 1957 comedy would have you expect.) Aratama is most likely known for her performances in the great Masaki Kobayashi’s films. Still, I would love more people to access this film if only to discover a truly great lead performance.
Tenet (dir. Christopher Nolan, 2020, USA/UK)
Finally: I was an idiot and broke all the Serious Nolan Film rules by laughing out loud (with my mask on, obviously). In Tenet’s third act, a particular explosion is so head-assed that it's actually inspiring in its stupidity. I guffawed and I never do that shit. Shout-out to my fiancee, who responded to me asking "who are the baddies?" with "no idea" in her sing-songy Russian. She’s helped my life function this year, and as weird as it was to stay at home, I really couldn’t think of anybody better to do it with.
Other important first watches: Mulholland Drive (dir. David Lynch, 2001, USA/France); Portrait of a Lady on Fire (dir. Céline Sciamma, 2019, France); House Party (dir. Reginald Hudlin, 1990, USA); Cure (dir. Kiyoshi Kurosawa, 1997, Japan); Dawn of the Dead (dir. George Romero, 1978, USA/Italy); Vagabond (dir. Agnès Varda, 1985, France); The Magnificent Ambersons (dir. Orson Welles, 1942, USA)