Film Log Sept-Dec 2021

 

With the compounding stressors of everyday life, I no longer have the ability to write a full review for every single film I watch. But part of the joy of this blog is keeping track of all of the media I have consumed and what my thoughts and joys are about them. From now forward I will provide periodic summaries for myself on my film consumption (television in a separate blog entry. Each of these were watched from about September forward, which was when I stopped being caught up with my full reviews.

 New in 2021

-The French Dispatch, 2021, R

The latest by Wes Anderson and likely my favorite film that I have watched in 2021! So rarely do I take the time to sit and watch a new piece of cinema that fully engages my attention and senses. Every frame is a painting, every short story in the film a metaphor, every second of the film a piece of art. And Timothee Chalamet so...

-Spiderman: No Way Home, 2021, PG-13

I have written a review on the original Tobey Maguire Spiderman trilogy and my death grip hold I have on my love for it. I was entirely motivated to watch this for the return of Tobey and was so thrilled to see him carry so much nostalgia for others as well. Warms my heart.

-Encanto, 2021, PG

The newest Disney film! I loved the timing of this because I just started learning Spanish and it was such a fun way to incorporate some new vocabulary. I would love to see this in Spanish. Lots of cultural messaging about multigenerational families and the conflict that can arise. Was a bit disappointed at the end because (spoilers) there is a lot of opportunity for things to easily return to the status quo. Root causes of the deep-seated family conflict were not quite uplifted.

 

Older Films Watched for the First Time

-30 Days of Night, 2007, R

This is supposed to be a horror movie and yet I cried more than I was scared. I just got super sad over the small-town vibes and losing everyone you have ever known. But yes, the vampires were the scariest I have ever seen in a film. Not sexy like Twilight. They're demonic and distorted and unsettling - I had to close my eyes through much of the film.

-The Conjuring, 2013, R

Another horror film in the spirit of this being right around Halloween. I have been warned so many times against watching The Conjuring because of how psychologically frightening it is. Was honestly unimpressed and not frightened. Perhaps because it's been almost a decade since the film came out and the types of scares felt so... cliche? Maybe I have seen the film parodied too many times without realizing it was a The Conjuring reference.

-Pan's Labyrinth, 2006, R

 I know that Guillermo del Toro is such a legendary director and Pan's Labyrinth is one of his most well-known films. I've always been curious to see the dark, twisted fantasy. But something about the storytelling was not engaging to me. I felt the same about his newer film The Shape of Water - it's an intriguing style, but I wasn't actually enjoying it as much as I would like to have while I was actually experiencing the film.

-Die Hard, 1988, R

This IS a Christmas movie and I indeed watched it on Christmas. I had never seen it all the way through, only watching clips here and there because it's one of my mom's all time favorites. The idea of outsmarting the invaders in a Christmas film strangely reminds me of Home Alone? Except with a lot more explosions and naked women.

 

Documentaries

-The Wisdom of Trauma, 2021, Dr. Gabor Mate

As you'll see with the rest of this list - there was a central theme to the documentaries during this time period. I was taking a class on substance use, abuse, and addiction. At the core of the class was this guy - Dr. Gabor Mate. He is changing my world. This was one of the best documentaries I have ever seen, and the accompanying book, In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts by the same person, stood at the center of my learning experience.

-Prohibition: A Nation of Drunkards, 2011, PBS

A really slow, boring, historical documentary on prohibition in the United States. You'd think it was made a lot longer ago than 2011. I only watched it because I had to.

-The Anonymous People, 2013, Kino Zorber

A little more of a contemporary documentary on those who experience addiction. However, it relies very heavily on the stigmatizing of other identities in order to uplift those with addictions. For examples, "not just poor people have addictions, rich celebrities have it too!" or "Not all addicts are homeless people!" like... putting down the marginalized even further and highlighting the privileged people who experience addiction. Was off put by it.

-Altered States: A History of Drug Use in America, 199, PBS

Once again, quite dull and boring and PBS-like. It had a lot of really solid information though on the history of drug use in America.

-Unnatural Causes: Place Matters, 2008, California Newsreel

My inner social worker is saying YES. It's about neighborhood, place, and community access as social determinants of health. How does the neighborhood one lives in influence their addiction and substance behaviors? And the whole thing focused on a Southeast Asian community in California. Loving the rare representation of that population because it's so familiar to me.

-Mama Coca's War: How the War on Drugs Impacts Latin America, 2007, German United Distributors

A documentary on the disproportionate effect of the War on Drugs in Latin America on native coca farmers. It's a population I have never even thought about, and as soon as it was mentioned, it was like, "Of course! Of course ecosystem damage, capitalism, US imperialism, neighborhood, oppression of agricultural, low-SES communities are all interconnected with the War on Drugs!" but I had never thought about it in that way. Native coca farmers economically rely on selling their coca. But with the invention of cocaine and the cocaine industry, coca has been demonized as the problem, and are religiously persecuted and their families destroyed. Coca farmers are using the plant safely and for the purpose of their local community. 

-A Wave of Compassion: Spirituality and the Recovering Addict, 2007, Walk-in Productions

A documentary on the role of spirituality in recovery, a topic which I find to be very fascinating specifically because I am an atheist myself and understand my personal bias against religion as a positive force. Unfortunately the documentary itself was not nearly as spiritual as I hoped it would be and was really just another documentary about recovery. I found talks with experts specifically talking back and forth about spirituality in recovery to have been much more helpful.

Films Rewatched

-Victor Frankenstein, 2015, PG-13

I love, love, love Daniel Radcliffe and watch everything he acts in. I have written my thoughts about this film before so might as well copy and paste some:

Of course Daniel Radcliffe somehow finds a way to be the main character of this movie, and the most unique character, but not Frankenstein himself. Make no mistake, this movie is called Victor Frankenstein, but it’s really about Igor’s life, which makes it a unique retelling. Igor really is the monster/creation of this movie. The real monster plays such a small part. So Igor deals with a lot of the existential questions that the monster of the book does. Is Frankenstein his God? How will he ever be accepted by society? Does he have the same human potential as everyone else? Is he his own self?  If the Creator “gave” him life, is he always in debt?

This film was TORN APART by critics, which I think is so unfair. The film had a lot more potential than it showed but that doesn’t make it a bad movie. The only problems I had with it were all post-production related, not conceptually related, or script, or dialogue, or anything like that. I didn’t like the way it was edited and some of the shots didn’t flow together. THAT SAID, conceptually the film was beautiful. The book and movie share almost no plot in common, but thematically there was such a beautiful balance between parallel and opposing ideas. The difference here is that while Igor is the “creation” of this movie, he is still his own human being, unlike the monster of the book. He always had a life, so Victor can’t take total credit. And in this movie, the monster that is created is nothing like the monster in the book because he has no soul. So in this movie, you CAN create life, but not through science. Only through friendship and opportunity. It’s very clever and underrated. What a shame.