Twelve movies

[Three sentences each. No spoilers.]

Tiny Shoulders: Rethinking Barbie (dir. Andrea Blaugrund Nevins, 2018). The story of Mattel’s Barbie, from origins and early success to Project Dawn, the 2016 transformation of the original doll into a gang of four: curvy, tall, petite, and original. What I found most interesting: the seriousness with which Mattel’s designers treat the evolution of this plastic signifier. Barbie is big, unironic business.

*

Un pequeño festival de Pedro Almodóvar

Matador (dir. Pedro Almodóvar, 1986). A melodrama, played straight, that approaches John Waters territory in its sheer lunacy. Bullfighting, sex, death, and psychic visions, in a black and red color scheme. Not nearly as good as The Skin I Live In, but stranger.

Law of Desire (dir. Pedro Almodóvar, 1987). A high-flying writer and director, his tangled relationships with two younger men, a transgender sister, and further tangles. The ancient Greeks and Romans would have understood this movie at once: the law of desire is to know no law. Desire destroys everything, even a beautiful Olympia manual typewriter.

*

Richard III (dir. Richard Loncraine, 1995). A condensed version of Shakespeare’s play, set in a 1930s fascist England, all red and black and brown. Ian McKellen is brilliant as Richard Gloucester, chatting with the camera as he schemes and murders his way to the top. Especially fun to watch this adaptation after the madness of two Almodóvar films.

*

Won’t You Be My Neighbor? (dir. Morgan Neville, 2018). A documentary about Fred Rogers that skirts some matters (among them, a deeply difficult childhood) but offers many surprises, including Rogers’s political affiliation, the meaning of “143,” and a 1968 Neighborhood storyline about King Friday’s wall. What comes as no surprise: Fred Rogers’s deep love and respect for children, with scene after scene that will reduce many viewers to tears. I wish that the PBS overlords would wake up and put Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood back on the air.

*

The Phone Call (dir. Mat Kirkby, 2013). A short film with Sally Hawkins as a crisis hotline worker and Jim Broadbent as the voice on the other end of the line. Great performances on and off camera — it’s easy to forget that the voice on the telephone is that of an actor. The ending — well, no, just watch.

*

Madame Bovary (dir. Sophie Barthes, 2014). Mia Wasikowska as Emma Bovary, married to a clueless husband, seeking solace in louche men and fancy drapes. There must be more than this provincial life! A painterly film (Vermeer, pretty obviously), but beautifully composed scenes give way to more erratic camerawork as Emma’s life spins out of control.

*

Walls of Sound: A Look Inside The House of Records (dir. David Gracon, 2012). A record store in Eugene, Oregon, its owner, its employees, and its customers, all of whom speak of it with affection (even if those employees have no health insurance). Established in 1972, The House of Records — and it’s really a house, with a former resident making an appearance — is still going strong in 2018. Word: if you have a local treasure to support, bookstore or record store, support it now, so that it will be there to enjoy your support tomorrow.

*

Dying to Know: Ram Dass & Timothy Leary (dir. Gay Dillingham, 2014). Ram Dass (formerly Richard Alpert) and Timothy Leary, ex-Harvard promulgators of psychedelics, meet not long before Leary’s death for one last conversation about life and death — or as Leary calls death, “the last taboo.” As if no one ever spoke of death before? Too much glibness and self-congratulation for my taste.

*

Film Stars Don’t Die in Liverpool (dir. Paul McGuigan, 2017). Annette Bening as the fading star Gloria Grahame, in love with a young Liverpudlian, actor Peter Tuner (Jamie Bell). The story arc is predictable, but Bening gives a great performance. Best watched with subtitles.

*

In the Realms of the Unreal: The Mystery of Henry Darger (dir. Jessica Yu, 2004). An excellent introduction to the life and work of Henry Darger, menial worker and outsider artist, with reminiscences from his landlord and neighbors. A particular strength of the film: the use of excerpts from Darger’s fiction to illuminate his life. A strange touch: ten-year-old Dakota Fanning as the film’s narrator.

*

Come Sunday (dir. Joshua Marston, 2018). Based on a This American Life episode about Carlton Pearson (Chiwetel Ejiofor), a charismatic African-American Pentecostal minister who begins to preach a doctrine of universal salvation, salvation even for backsliders, even for people who have never accepted Christ — at which point, all hell breaks loose. I would have appreciated more attention to the biblical texts at issue in Pearson’s challenge to his tradition’s accepted theology. With Martin Sheen as a disturbingly plausible Oral Roberts.

Related reading
All OCA film posts (Pinboard)