5. Amy (2015)
I’m a diehard fan of Amy Winehouse, and when she passed, despite me being ten at the time, her death shook me. She’s been one of my favorite musicians for over a decade and her pop jazz style introduced me to so much more music in the world. I adore Amy Winehouse. The documentary Amy, which was distributed by A24 was pretty solid. We’re told a lot of old stories that the avid fan would know about Amy Winehouse, but I found it more interesting the way that her life was chronicled and told from the perspective of people from her life like producers and friends. Once you do hit the final forty five minutes, you should prepare the tissues.
4/5 Stars
4. sex, lies, and videotapes (1989)
Not only is sex, lies, and videotapes my favorite film from the hardest working man in Hollywood, Steven Soderbergh, I think it’s his best. It’s ominous tones with bubbling angst from all four main characters make you the viewer feel tense and on edge. While there aren’t true thriller aspects, it plays like one because you feel like you can’t take a breathe or look away due to what might ensue. It is bizarre to me that in the span of eight years, James Spader plays two of the horniest characters in film history with this role and then his role in Crash where he’s fucking cars. All-in-all, I said it before, but I think this is Soderbergh’s best film due to its layers and tense tone. It surely rivals Oceans 11.
4.5/5 Stars
3. Midnight Cowboy (1969)
Midnight Cowboy truly is a one-of-a-kind film. Why you may ask? Midnight Cowboy is the first and the only X-Rated film to win the Best Picture Award at the Oscars. John Schlesinger directed this Waldo Salt script with such grace and precision that, while the film is X-Rated and contains scenes that I found to be tough to watch, he never overdid it looking for shock. He wanted to tell an authentic story that flaunted the depressing life of prostitution and how friendships can come from anywhere. It was like a yin and yang dynamic where you feel sad for Joe Buck and Ratso because they’re in dispiriting situations, but you find an odd comfort in their unlikely friendship. When Ratso dies on the bus down to Florida in the arms of Buck, you feel gutted. You hope that these two, relatively good meaning individuals, get the happy ending they so deserve. While I find the ending to be masterful, I wish my Criterion DVD of Midnight Cowboy had a twenty minute alternate ending where we see Ratso and Joe Buck working normal jobs in Miami living a semi-normal life. That would’ve settled my stomach.
4.5/5 Stars
2. The Iron Claw (2023)
One of the best films of 2023 due to its layered approach of the Von Erich family is Sean Durkins, The Iron Claw. I think that it carries both the best line of the year when Kevin Von Erichs sons tell him “We’ll be your brothers, dad”, and the best needle drop of 2023 when Michael plays Tom Sawyer by Rush and we see Kerry turn to the camera and then it shows David, Kevin and Kerry walking about for the six-man tag team match. That gave me goosebumps to the point where I was hitting my dad on the arm with excitement. While most films that’d be about wrestling would approach it with the idea of “dudes rock” and show no character development, The Iron Claw starts a bit as “dudes rock”, but quickly transitions to “dudes don’t deserve this”. Ultimately, it’s the most tragic film of 2023 and one that’ll never not make me cry when I rewatch it and see Michael kill himself or David throwing up in the bathroom.
4.5/5 Stars
1. The Rules of Attraction (2002)
“A great numb feeling washes over me as I let go of the past and look forward to the future. Pretend to be a vampire. I don't really need to pretend, because it's who I am, an emotional vampire. I've just come to expect it. Vampires are real. That I was born this way. That I feed off of other people's real emotions. Search for this night's prey. Who will it be?”
Breaking News: I’ve begun to read more frequently. The first book, and one I’m currently working on is Bret Easton Ellis’ The Rules of Attraction. If the rest of the book is as good as this film, then I have my all time new favorite book. In the film, I found a lot to love. From this grungy yet snooty aesthetic of rich and spoiled kids using drugs and hooking up to the hypnotic music, I fell in love with the setting. I’m not sure I’d be cut out for that way of life in college, but I wouldn’t be opposed to living it for like a week. Then again, I’d probably go two days and have a panic attack and want to just go home. That’s beside the point though. I found the love triangle to work very well at the center of this film. A lot of times, a love triangle doesn’t work and can ruin a film. But Ellis and Roger Avary keep it as the main plot line and build a world of characters and events around this love triangle. That’s what makes it work so well.
5/5 Stars