Megan's Top Ten Films of 2019
Martin Scorsese is right, it’s a perilous time for cinema. A single megacorporation dominates the box office with formulaic franchise installments while the space for the individual artist to create unique and subversive pieces of art shrinks. If cinema is to persist, we need uncompromising visionaries to guide us, to keep a mirror to our contemporary society, and to drive us out of our comfort zone. Thankfully in 2019, scores of talented filmmakers resisted the all- powerful manufacturer of content, delivering unique narratives that represent a vast collection of identities, themes, and aesthetics that are entirely their own vision.
It’s immensely satisfying to bring the decade to a close after a personal record year for consuming film. It was twelve months of discovery, and I’m inspired by how independent creators experimented and explored new ways of storytelling. My many honorable mentions for the year include quiet powerhouse Adopt a Highway, the dazzling carnage of John Wick 3: Parabellum, the uncanny feminist pastiche in Knives and Skin, and the quirky DIY gem The Planters. The documentary landscape alone was an embarrassment of riches, with the likes of Maiden, Stuffed, Apollo 11, Kifaru, and Memory: The Origins of Alien all bringing light to remarkable stories. While each deserves its moment of recognition, my picks exemplify an unmatched level of craft and innovation that I believe defined 2019.
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10. The Irishman
Completed after years in development hell, Scorsese’s mobster epic functions on two fronts: as a reflection on his past work as well as a speculative memoir of hitman Frank Sheeran (Robert De Niro). Covering decades of his involvement with organized crime, Scorsese sets Sheeran and his associates in a different light than previous leads in the gangster genre. Sheeran’s account of his time working for Jimmy Hoffa (Al Pacino) is woven in with conjectured history, proposing a believable answer to the late union activist’s mysterious fate. Scorsese’s talent is in full force as he peels off the bravado and glamor of the mob life to reveal its emptiness and regret. He takes the legendary De Niro, Pesci, and Pacino and imbues them with fascinating, visible mortality placing great emphasize on the brevity of life in the mob business. It’s a powerful study of what it’s like to grow old in that world, estranged from your actual family and committed to one that usually results in your early demise. Special recognition should be given to editor Thelma Schoonmaker, who nests flashbacks within flashbacks with deft coherence, and the visual effects team who enhance the film with de-aging CGI that isn’t distractingly uncanny..
It’s also a fascinating encounter with duration to land on Netflix, a platform that has built its empire on instant gratification and multitasking. Scorsese is challenging new audiences, inviting them to change their viewing practices and be immersed in a worthwhile experience.
9. Crawl
Sometimes all we need is a reminder that there’s more to art than slow burns and hyperrealism. Behold, my magnificent outlier. Produced by Sam Raimi and directed by French horror filmmaker Alexandre Aja, Crawl wastes no time setting up and executing exactly as advertised. Competitive swimmer Haley (Kaya Scodelario) finds her father (Barry Pepper) wounded in a crawlspace beneath her childhood home, and as a raging hurricane begins to flood in, the desperate pair are stalked by ravenous alligators. The clock never stops ticking as tensions mount, and all hopes of escape are violently dashed over and over. Aja expertly plays with the sense of impending dread by mixing it with just the faintest slivers of hope, and the the result is like a shot of adrenaline to the heart. Genuine and uncomplicated, the film loves its audience and wants nothing more than to delight and thrill them, doing so with a devastating natural disaster and plenty of gator death rolls. As far as sheer entertainment goes, it’s a hard concept to beat, and it’s without doubt the strongest creature feature to be unleashed in the past several years.
8. Marriage Story
Within the first several minutes of the film, we know exactly who Charlie (Adam Driver) and Nicole (Scarlett Johansson) are, and immediately we start to love them as much as they seem to love each other. Noah Baumbach’s latest is a tender and vivid portrait of two individuals spiraling into a bitter divorce. He handles the downfall of their love with such respect and specificity that it feels personally tragic while baring how demanding a divorce can be on emotional, financial, and interpersonal levels. It’s seeing people at their very worse not because they hate each other, but because they are vulnerable and desperate and their wants have outweighed their willingness to compromise any further. Baumbach’s image of love is pure, but it’s also how a person unconsciously changes themselves for someone else until they hardly recognize themselves. Through equally stellar performances by Driver and Johansson, we are given a painfully intimate view of love that can no longer hold together.
7. The Last Black Man in San Francisco
Jimmy Fails plays himself in a semi-autobiographical tale of his journey to reclaim his birthright: a Victorian mansion built by his grandfather. With the help of his closest friend Mont (Jonathan Majors), Fails crusades to keep the home from falling into disrepair, staring in through the dirty windows and dreaming of both the past and the future. Setting the bar sky high for a directorial debut, Joe Talbot paints the landscape of his and Fails’ San Francisco in a contemporary light that only lifelong inhabitants could capture. Together they convey an undying love for a city trying to deny its legacy and pushing its old identity away through divisive gentrification. At its core, Last Black Man is about our value of ‘home,’ and the many people, communities, places, and histories that can define it. Accompanying the nostalgic romanticism is Emile Mosseri’s tonally perfect score, easily my favorite of the year. Its orchestration and angelic vocals echo with an exuberance and melancholy that will crack your heart wide open.
Check out Greg Arietta’s tribute here.
6. Portrait of a Lady on Fire
Celine Sciamma’s third feature is a work of art that has escaped the frame to lodge itself in your soul. A female painter Marianne (Noémie Merlant) is brought to an isolated island to capture the image of an obstinate young lady (Adèle Haenel) without her knowledge. With all the restraint of a classical painter, Sciamma painstakingly illustrates the relationship’s ignition until it bursts into a roaring bonfire of emotion. It is the definition of the Female Gaze, understanding the complexities of its characters rather than objectifying them. For the first time, a colorful world only for women is made visible, captured with an intimacy so real it almost feels forbidden to look in on. The film also contemplates the difference between seeing and remembering through Marianne’s point of view. The result is achingly beautiful.
5. Uncut Gems
Hats off to the Safdies for building such an absorbing experience that for the first time in my life I cared about a game of basketball. For a moment I cared about it more than anything else.
The anxiety of Uncut Gems is overwhelming, ceaseless, and precisely calibrated. Rarely can a film elicit such a visceral reaction from me in the theater, thanks in no small part to leading performances from Adam Sandler and newcomer Julia Fox. Sandler’s role as Howard Ratner, a New York jeweler with a penchant for gambling, is so well lived-in he’s almost unrecognizable. Both he and the film itself are emphatically proud of what they are: Jews cemented in New York circa 2012. Howard is essentially betting it all on himself, leaping from one outlandish risk to the next for the thrill of it all. Every interconnected element of the scheme is hanging on by a thread, and it’s all one second away from crashing down around him. From the first moment we see him, we are caught with him in a tangled web of deceit and chance by his own making. Sandler makes him unforgettable, from how he looks and speaks to how far he is willing to go to win. The danger is palpable and enduring it is to understand how good it feels to Howard.
4. The Lighthouse
Perhaps one of the most unique cinematic experiences of the year, The Lighthouse feels as though it was stolen directly out of the 19th century. Robert Egger’s dogged commitment to building atmosphere through precise production design and filmic style is simply unparalleled, and the result is a piece completely dislocated from the contemporary. Its expressionist visuals, unfathomable dialogue, and internal mind games verge on hostile toward the modern viewer. Yet the ‘too much to process’ is all a part of the charm. Smothered in superstition and allegory, it is ripe for endless analysis and discussion. It’s also a masterclass in acting with Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattison at the top of their game, both without a shred of ego, completely unpredictable, and utterly beguiling.
3. Booksmart
An early contender for the top of the year since its first screenings at SXSW, Olivia Wilde’s directorial debut revitalizes the well-tread teen comedy with clear feminist values. Kaitlin Dever and Beanie Feldstein take no prisoners with comedic wits beyond their years as best friends Molly and Amy. Even though they believe they are far more mature than the rest of their classmates, they agree to set out on an odyssey to partake in the ultimate high school party on the eve of their graduation. Through all its hilarity, Booksmart remains dedicated to its unique, multidimensional characters without making them the butt of the joke. Molly and Amy’s earnest and ambitious nature is familiar, as is their impulse to distance themselves from their peers in self-defense. Both must deal with their desire to be outstanding, meeting head on with their desire for connection with others, all mired in the constant crisis of being a teenager. As young women navigating an unfamiliar social landscape, their own sexuality, and the intimidating unknown of the future, they are infinitely relatable, and there’s nothing quite like staring up at the big screen and feeling seen. This one’s a bona fide classic that I will continue to revisit with fondness.
My full review can be read here.
2. Parasite
After all the hype coming out of Cannes, expectations were impossibly high for Parasite’s US reception, and yet, it exceeded all of it. Bong Joon-ho continues to make prestige-level filmmaking look easy while keeping it accessible to a global audience.
This isn’t Bong’s first story of bitter class struggle, but this one is more immediately recognizable than a dystopia like Snowpiercer. In this world we live in, as hard as you work, you’ll never cross that line. The ones on top will always be able to smell the poverty on you. Their privilege is inherently villainy, making them naive and callous. They have enough comfort and security to be blind to anything happening beyond their homes and even within their own walls. Enter the Kim family, with a plan to become the Park family’s help and ingratiate themselves into every aspect of the home. The opening act of the film is reminiscent of a heist film, where the coveted object is the Park’s social status. The Kims’ plot unfolds without complication; so smooth that it’s inevitable something will ruin it all and ultimately lead to a literal knock down drag out. That moment itself, however, is so impossible to anticipate that even Hitchcock’s jaw would drop. It’s daring, forceful artistry that will continue to be felt for years to come.
Give Greg Arietta’s full review a read.
1. Little Women
Greta Gerwig continues to be the best and brightest of her time. Honoring Louisa May Alcott’s source material, Gerwig brings into rich detail the story of Jo (Saorise Ronan), Meg (Emma Watson), Amy (Florence Pugh), and Beth (Eliza Scanlen) March as they grow up together. With a cast that could have been assembled solely for my gratification, it’s nonstop parade of talent and chemistry. And I haven’t even mentioned Laura Dern, Timothy Chalemet, or Meryl Streep yet. Gerwig takes great care to show the magical inner lives of the sisters with all of their internal desires, ambitions, and frustrations. The dynamic relationships between siblings can be hard to nail, but here they feel fully realized. Their petty squabbles and differences are just as real and important as their moments of harmony and friendship. Every scene between them is charged with an energy and tenderness that rings true.
Little Women makes a proud declaration of the value of femininity and all it encompasses. It acts as a timeless critique of women’s mobility in the world, and the limited roles they can chose to fill. The sisters are fully aware their talents and goals are held as separate from men, but also know they determine their own worth. Simultaneously, the men in their lives are also allowed to be sensitive, conflicted, and passionate. The March girls have the autonomy to write their own story, and choose to pursue what and who makes them happy. For a narrative told many times over, it feels genuine and new.
Gerwig’s auteurism isn’t limited to emotional capability, as the film is simultaneously a showcase of her technical mastery,uniting voice overs, nonlinear structure, and slow motion sequences without missing a beat. Her directorial ability is evident in her coordination of cinematography, score, costuming, and editing to all culminate in a masterfully cohesive work.
It’s the warmth and comfort of curling up before the fireplace with your loved ones, and the brightness of a fresh snow on Christmas morning. It’s sublime. And I’ll continue to marvel at it for years to come.
