Category: Film

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Laughing Matters: Key & Peele, “‘Gremlins 2’ Brainstorm

Dan Seeger

Sometimes comedy illuminates hard truths with a pointed urgency that other means can’t quite achieve. Sometimes comedy is just funny. This series of posts is mostly about the former instances, but the latter is valuable, too. I am sharing this today because at the moment I find something highly appealing about Jordan Peele — excuse me, I mean Star Magic Jackson, Jr. — engaging in a freewheeling brainstorming session for a movie, celebrating narrative elements that shouldn’t quite work but somehow do. As if, say, someone pitched a cross between Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner and The Stepford Wives that was … Continue reading Laughing Matters: Key & Peele, “‘Gremlins 2’ Brainstorm

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La La Lapse: The Do-Over Oscars

Dan Seeger

  Going into last night’s Academy Awards ceremony, I thought there was a good chance we’d all see something historic. But I surely never believed I would anything like that in my lifetime of devoted Oscar-watching. By now, even those who went to bed early know about the unprecedented blunder that saw an incorrect winner announced for the night’s biggest prize. After pulling the card that was supposed to have the Best Picture winner printed on it, presenter Warren Beatty fumbled around in what initially seemed like schtick (Faye Dunaway, by his side, even playfully chastises him), double-checking the empty … Continue reading La La Lapse: The Do-Over Oscars

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From the Archive: My Ballot, 2006

Dan Seeger

The other day, I provide my list of the twenty performances from 2016 films that I would have submitted on an Oscar ballot had I been given the opportunity to do so. This is an exercise is wishcasting that I have been indulging in for an absurdly long time. In online platforms alone, it has been over ten years of offering my haughty views of which performers were most deserving of awards consideration in any given year. Since ten is a nice round number, I thought I’d drag out my anointed score of acting titans from the film year 2006, … Continue reading From the Archive: My Ballot, 2006

Film, Politics1 Comment

Twenty Performances, or The Folly of Working Without Annette

Dan Seeger

As per tradition, I follow my countdown of the top ten films of the year by turning my attention to the acting that most enthralled me while the previous calendar was still tacked to the wall. The guidelines I set for myself are simple: I draft up the version of a nominating ballot I would submit were I a member of the Academy’s Acting Branch, ranking the five performances in each category and forcing myself to be assiduously honest. That means setting my own sentimental preferences and occasionally ignoring the strategic category shifting that takes place. Both of those factor … Continue reading Twenty Performances, or The Folly of Working Without Annette

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Top Ten Movies of 2016 — Number One

Dan Seeger

There is tremendous beauty and pain to be found in Moonlight. Written and directed by Barry Jenkins (based on the Tarell Alvin McCraney play In Moonlight Black Boys Look Blue), the film drops in at three points in the life of Chiron (played as a boy by Alex Hibbert, as a teen by Ashton Sanders, and as an adult by Trevante Rhodes). The film probes into the challenge of coming to terms with one’s identity while operating in a fraught society that brutally rejects the version of self that’s emerging. Growing up is difficult enough without the added strain of … Continue reading Top Ten Movies of 2016 — Number One

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Top Ten Movies of 2016 — Number Two

Dan Seeger

I remember 1979, and I suspect that contributes mightily to my affection for 20th Century Women, written and directed by Mike Mills. I don’t mean to suggest that the film is some bland exercise in nudging nostalgia, resonating only because of echoes generated by its hollowed-out soul. This story of a young man (Jamie Fields) experiencing pivotal stretch of growing up while under the watchful eye of his mother (Annette Bening, plainly perfect) and feeling his personal shape change due the influence of a handful of other figures (including characters played by Elle Fanning, Greta Gerwig, and Billy Crudup) is built … Continue reading Top Ten Movies of 2016 — Number Two

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Baker, Black, Bloom and Stevens, Dieterle, Howard

Dan Seeger

Bright Lights: Starring Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds (Alexis Bloom and Fisher Stevens, 2016). This feather-light documentary is mostly valuable in its accidental ability to fulfill the the heartsick desire for affectionate remembrances of Carrie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds following their deaths in December, shockingly arriving with the crack dramatic timing of a veteran pair of performers. Directors Alexis Bloom and Fisher Stevens occasional approach insightful examination of the scalding heat endured by those helplessly drawn to the spotlight, but their hearts don’t really seem invested in probing too far into darker corners. The film might have only a modest purpose, … Continue reading Baker, Black, Bloom and Stevens, Dieterle, Howard

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Top Ten Movies of 2016 — Number Three

Dan Seeger

I think Colin Farrell is exceptional across the entirety of Yorgos Lanthimos’s The Lobster, but I have a clear favorite moment. In dire circumstances while roaming the woods outside of the compound where he’s been staying through much of the film, Farrell’s character, David, encounters a newly disgruntled acquaintance (John C. Reilly). Farrell meets the animosity with a desperate attempt to once again ingratiate himself to the person, delivering compliments and reassurances with a stilted calm. It’s a single scene, but it encompasses so much of what I adore about The Lobster: a genial off-filter quality and unhinged creativity that … Continue reading Top Ten Movies of 2016 — Number Three

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Top Ten Movies of 2016 — Number Four

Dan Seeger

It is a pleasing irony that the year’s most accomplished film that looks to otherworldly being to drive its story is so beautifully, wisely attuned to humanity. Arrival is centered on visitors from across the universe who park their skipping stone spaceships in a perpetual hover a few stories about the terra firma of Earth, but the primary commitment is to the people who struggle through daunting communication barriers to understand the planet’s new acquaintances. As linguist Louise Banks, Amy Adams gives one of those performances that perhaps only she can: grounded deeply in qualities that are equal parts charisma, approachability, … Continue reading Top Ten Movies of 2016 — Number Four

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Top Ten Movies of 2016 — Number Five

Dan Seeger

At this point in the life cycle of Damien Chazelle’s La La Land — a winding excursion from celebration to backlash to the backlash’s backlash to the backlash’s backlash’s backlash and points beyond — it’s almost impossible to write about this modern musical without ending up with an insufferable think piece. So I’m going to lean into it. As the signature films of 2016 are bandied about, few feel more detached from our current perilous moment as La La Land. There are no shadows of social and political preoccupations to found in the story of young cultural artists falling in … Continue reading Top Ten Movies of 2016 — Number Five