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2017 FILM, from p.32
glory days of the New French Extremity. As an allegory about the price young women have to pay in order to grow up, it resonates in numerous ways. 7. “I hate myself :.)â€? (Joanna Arnow) Low-cost video cameras were supposed to be empower people without access to mainstream filmmaking channels: “I hate myself :.)â€? was the best example of this ethos in action I saw this year, but it took four years to find American distribution and then only played New York for a week. This intensely personal documentary shows Arnow’s attempts to find her voice as an artist and sexual being under the thumb of an awful boyfriend who embodies “hipster racismâ€? (his idea of a fun night out is going to open mic nights at Harlem comedy clubs and using slurs in front of AfricanAmericans). She succeeded, and this excellent film was the result. 8. “The Other Side of Hopeâ€? (Aki Kaurismäki) An old-school hipster encounters Muslim refugees and discovers that he likes them and can absorb them into his world with little difficulty. I could be describing either some of the characters in “The Other Side of Hopeâ€? or Kaurismäki himself. I can say that the political urgency of Europe’s refugee crisis and the rise of the far right have breathed new life into a Finnish filmmaker who seemed to be spending years pleasantly drifting. 9. “The Shape of Waterâ€? (Guillermo del Toro) A genre-bending fantasy that imagines a group of underdogs, including a gay man and a literal “monsterâ€? — having a sexual relationship with a human woman — facing off against a representative of violent authoritarianism, “The Shape of Waterâ€? has clear politics. Still, it’s too concerned with playing out the mechanics of its narrative and demonstrating Guillermo del Toro’s ability to create a stylized but believable version of the early ‘60s to sink into a rote woke allegory. It does represent a clear outsider’s perspective on America’s repressive potential, for all its echoes of “Creature From the Black Lagoonâ€? and
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even Clive Barker’s “Nightbreed.� 10. “Marjorie Prime� (Michael Almereyda) Almereyda’s documentary on “Blade Runner� and “Blade Runner 2049� co-screenwriter Hampton Fancher, “Escapes,� played the IFC Center for about a week last summer. His more commercially successful sci-fi feature “Marjorie Prime� is actually a more satisfying followup to the themes of “Blade Runner� than its official sequel. Adapting a play by out gay writer Jordan Harrison and restricting himself most of the time to one set and four actors, Almereyda creates a vision of the end of humanity and the rise of artificial intelligence, starting as a quasi-therapeutic assist to the elderly and widowed. Aged 86 when the film was shot, Lois Smith’s turn as a woman dealing badly with her impending mortality is the year’s acting revelation.
Runners-up: “Beach Rats� (Eliza Hittman), “Behemoth� (Zhao Liang), “City of Ghosts� (Matthew Heineman), “Colossal� (Nacho Vigalondo), “Columbus� (Kogonada), “Endless Poetry� (Alejandro Jodorowsky), “Ex Libris� (Frederick Wiseman), “The Florida Project� (Sean Baker), “mother!� (Darren Aronofsky), “Mudbound� (Dee Rees), “My Friend Dahmer� (Marc Meyers), “On the Beach At Night Alone� (Hong Sang-soo), “Phantom Thread’ (Paul Thomas Anderson), “A Quiet Passion� (Terence Davies), “The Untamed� (Amat Escalante), “The Woman Who Left� (Lav Diaz). Worst films: “Detroit� (Kathryn Bigelow), “Happy End� (Michael Haneke), “I, Tonya� (Craig Gillespie), “The Killing of a Sacred Deer� (Yorgos Lanthimos), “Slack Bay� (Bruno Dumont), “Song to Song� (Terrence Malick).
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Undistributed films that deserve a week-long New York run: “Empathy� (Jeffrey Dunn Rovinelli), “Gerald’s “Game� (Michael Flanagan), “In Perfect Health� (Anca Damian), “Japanese Girls Never Die � (Daigo Matsui), “The Road to Mandalay� (Midi-Z), “The Venerable W.� (Barbet Schroeder). Though “Gerald’s Game� played several festivals, it was produced by and for Netflix, where it is now streaming.
GayCityNews.nyc | December 21, 2017 – January 3, 2018
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