"Uncut Gems"

 ☆☆☆½ 

It's often loud, overbearing and hyperactive, but just as frequently Uncut Gems is audacious, creative, involving and suspenseful. The real question is whether the good qualities outweigh the difficult ones, and to answer that requires looking at the movie's last 30 or so minutes, which are magnificent.

Does that final stretch justify the uncomfortable, often confusing, jumble that precedes it? Maybe. Directors Josh and Benny Safdie take a layered, complex approach to telling what could be a simple story. Their Robert-Altman-meets-Martin-Scorsese approach demands attention -- the story develops on the sides of the frames and finally coalesces toward the center, and there is almost never a moment when the movie is capable of slowing down. It's no wonder people get exhausted to the point of leaving the theater or falling asleep: Uncut Gems requires active effort in the same way as talking to  a hyperactive 3-year-old.

The story sometimes defies credulity. None of it would happen but for one stupid, in-the-moment decision that jeweler Howard Ratner (Adam Sandler) makes, and some other unlikely scenarios ask that you just ignore them. That's easy to do in a film that won't slow down, that screams almost every line of dialogue. This is how these characters live their lives, flailing about in the hope that no one will notice their desperate moves. The story involves Howard's fixation on a large, uncut set of opals, and his obsession with gambling, and everything leads up to inventive, tense filmmaking backed by a love-it-or-hate-it score (I loved it) and played by a cast that is perfectly unlikeable.

There's no one to root for in Uncut Gems, no one to pin your hopes on, nothing at all to like about these people, the way they live, or their cheap obsession with material wealth -- but if you're going to make a movie like this, you might as well go all the way. The Safdie Brothers go all the way with Uncut Gems ... and then they go a little further.



Viewed Jan. 10, 2020 -- AMC Universal

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2019: The Deplorables

There were some genuine cinematic wonders in 2019 -- and some real big-screen blunders. When things got bad this year, they got really, really bad.

How bad?  Read on for my list of the five worst movie experiences I had in 2019:

 5:  The Wandering Earth  

One of China's biggest movies in history was also one of the year's highest-grossing films worldwide -- but in America, it was all but non-existent. (Netflix bought the title, proving that Netflix is, if nothing else, a black hole for most content that appears on its platform.) Compared with other films on this list, it's at least inoffensive, except perhaps in its godawful subtitles, which (at least in the theatrical version I saw) were hilariously filled with malapropisms and misspellings, and had all male characters refer to each other as "bros" with alarming frequency. The story is completely non-sensical – the sun is exploding, so the Earth has been converted into a moving spaceship destined to wander the galaxy until it can find a new home – and the digital effects are largely atrocious. The Wandering Earth proves that Americans have no lock on bad filmmaking, and this one is bad alrigh; it's terrible, in fact, but at the very, very least, it's inoffensively so.

 4:  Bird Box  

The only saving grace on this stinker is that it wasn't in movie theaters, relegated instead to Netflix, which made big noise about how many people watched it. But people can be fools, as anyone who saw this dreck can attest. Somehow, it stars Sandra Bullock and lots of other recognizable actors in a craptacular story about people who do a very, very stupid thing to react to a situation that has dozens of other more probable solutions. Stupid in concept, cheap in execution, and unbearable to watch. My original rating was 2½ stars. My New Year's resolution is to be more honest about ratings. It's a terrible film. Shut your eyes, indeed.

 3:  Ma  

I was likewise stupidly lenient about Ma, which did get a theatrical release, which only proves that there is no accounting for taste. Oscar winner Octavia Spencer, who is generally an intelligent and interesting actor, stars along with Oscar winner Allison Janney and Oscar nominee Juliette Lewis, and Ma is the sort of movie that makes you wonder if these successful, acclaimed performers actually read the script first. These fine actresses appear in a movie that presents women in such a vile light it's shocking. In Ma's world, women over 40 are shrewish, sexually repressed and ugly, existing only to torture others and harbor jealousy over their past lives. Ma is divertingly entertaining in the moment, and squalid and depressing in hindsight.

 2:  The Lion King  

What a sad, sad state of affairs this is. What have we come to when Disney, a company built on the promise of imagination can't think of anything new?  When the only thing it cares about is box-office dominance? Disney's The Lion King and Aladdin were both remarkably crass commentaries on the state of the film industry and current Disney management, though they were each extraordinarily successful. Aladdin managed to find a few moments of lightness and invention, and was eye-popping to look at, none of which could be said for the despairing dullness and duplication of The Lion King. It made sixteen bazillion dollars, which is a bleak assessment of the state of American consumerism. That aside, it's a terrible concept for a film, and it's terribly executed. It's a shot-for-shot -- sometimes frame-for-frame -- CGI remake of the original animated film that doesn't have an ounce of the original's heart or creativity. While the 1994 Lion King was never among my favorites, this film captures absolutely nothing of that film's liveliness. It's an animated version of Gus Van Sant's Psycho, which was at least bonkers in its audacity; this has no edge to it at all. It's flat, ugly, boring and laborious.

 1:  Joker  

It's a cheat. It's a scam. It's a fraud. Joker has absolutely nothing to say about societal ills or mental illness or the plight of the inner city – it exists only to wallow in its bleak, misanthropic, nihilistic world view and then try to pass it off as some form of entertainment. It can't even find its own cinematic vision. Director Todd Phillips thinks mimicking Scorsese is the same as being Scorsese, and rips off a '70s cinematic vibe without ever creating its own look, feel or perspectives. It's empty. It's soulless. There's not one redeeming element to it, particularly not Joaquin Phoenix's performance, which has nothing to it except show. There's no character here, no reason for this film to exist. It is, perhaps, the blockbuster for the our current political era: blustery, angry, mean-spirited, hostile, ill-tempered, loud, violent and ultimately entirely empty. Painfully, distressingly, sorrowfully devoid of anything at all.

2019: My 10 Favorites

The world seemed filled with vile unhappiness in 2019, yet on the movie screen something wonderful happened: Movies discovered a sense of compassion. There was also some sinister glee, but even in the bleak South Korean thriller Parasite, even in Rian Johnson's back-stabbing Knives Out, even in some of the mediocre blockbusters that filled the screen, there was an underlying sense of humanity.

Is this the cumulative effect of so much unpleasantness in life, or is it just happenstance. In any case, it made for an especially insightful and unusually uplifting year at the movies. Here are my favorite films of 2019:

  10: Knives Out  

It's been a long time since we've had an all-star, big-budget whodunit, at least a whipsmart one, which Kenneth Branagh's lumbering adaptation of Murder on the Orient Express was certainly not. Director Rian Johnson comes at us with a completely fresh mystery, and even if you come close to solving it before the final scenes, you'll still relish in the delight of the actors and the production itself, which is ravishing. It's also continually funny, without the sadistic sleaze of the vaguely similar Ready or Not. It's just gleeful. And wonderful.

  9: The Peanut Butter Falcon 

Who in their right mind would want to see a movie with this title? It sounds treacly sweet, like an after-school special with a hidden "inspirational" message – yet it turns out the film is anything but that. Part adventure, part fable, it's intoxicatingly satisfying, a movie about people with troubles who wish they could just run away ... and do. Yet under the waters of the big river on which they float is the grief and sorrow that is never far away because, it turns out, that's what life is. The Peanut Butter Falcon is indeed inspirational, but in the best possible way.

  8: Marriage Story 

It's raw and it's painful, but Marriage Story is ultimately filled with hope, a feeling of promise that isn't evident at first in this excruciatingly detailed examination of the modern process of divorce. Scarlett Johansson and Adam Driver are just right as a couple who never really went together, but tried anyway. The single most sorrowful aspect of Noah Baumbach's Woody Allen-esque movie isn't the subject matter but the fact that it's relegated to Netflix, which is kidnapping wonderful films and dumping them on to its streaming service as so much "content." This is a special film and deserved better.

  7: Rocketman 

If Rami Malek could win an Oscar as Freddie Mercury and Bohemian Rhapsody be taken seriously as an awards contender, how do you explain the fate of this vastly superior, exponentially more entertaining bio-fantasy and its incredible central performance by Taron Egerton? It's a firecracker of a movie, as befits a film about Elton John – and if much of it seems contrived, it probably is. Who cares? It's a joyous affirmation of everything the movies are about: big, bold and endlessly entertaining.

  6: Honey Boy 

If 2019 is remembered for anything cinematically, it might be the year Shia LaBeouf went from irritating former child star to a soulful, wise, compelling big-screen presence. He wrote and stars in Honey Boy, a movie about his own life, which sounds smugly self-satisfied, but isn't. Honey Boy is a harrowing and deeply affecting exploration of the complex love between a faltering father and his promising son. It's emotionally raw, and through its extreme specificity it finds a way to be relevant – and heartbreaking – to everyone.

  5: Booksmart 

It's almost achingly funny, but Booksmart is also achingly astute about the real pains and heartbreaks that come with being a teenager. Director Olivia Wilde's movie is cinematically playful and so perfectly modulated that it is able to balance silliness and pain on the thinnest of lines. One breathtaking sequence moves from broad comedy to intense sadness so effortlessly it's almost stunning. It feels both wonderfully stupid and totally real. Or maybe those are the same things.

  4: Parasite 

Carefully controlled, intricately designed, impeccably crafted and entirely sinister, Parasite is the work of a master filmmaker at the height of his skills. Bong Joon-ho has made a rarity: a thriller that actually knows how to thrill. The suspense at times is almost unbearable, and the surprises are both surprising and surprisingly delightful, in a twisted sort of way. Parasite invites repeat viewings, and dazzles with the kind of filmmaking flare that invites – and deserves – comparisons to Alfred Hitchcock, with a worldview that is equally bleak as that filmmaker's, filtered through a cinematic precision that is just as exciting to watch.

  3: Blinded by the Light 

Here is a movie to make you feel alive, a movie to leave you feeling less alone about loving whatever it is you happen to love. After watching it in August, I recommended it to a friend who was searching for a good comedy, who called me after seeing it and asked, "What about that was a comedy?" Come to think of it, Blinded by the Light – which is about a British boy who discovers an unknown passion for Bruce Springsteen's music – may not be designed for laughs, and it contains some moments of real anguish. Yet, director Gurinder Chada's film is suffused with something rare in movies: a love for life, even when that life is not at all what you hoped it would be.

  2: Apollo 11 

On television, this CNN documentary might seem straightforward and familiar, even though most of its footage has never been seen before. Start to finish, it's a thrilling and magnificently edited account of the Apollo 11 mission in July 1969, and every moment is captivating. But seen on the biggest screen possible, ideally in IMAX, Apollo 11 becomes something even more wondrous: a movie that thrusts you into a different time and leaves you wishing we could find such a sense of purpose and pride. An edited version, which I haven't seen, still plays in science centers, and even in truncated form, it's worth seeking out. Apollo 11 leaves you with a sense of genuine awe.

  1: Little Women 

Here is the film we need in such terrible, angry, hate-filled times. Writer-director Greta Gerwig's adaptation of Louisa May Alcott's much-loved novel finds a new and urgent sense of purpose, and has the desire to impart one quality above any other: kindness. In that, it is noble, but it goes much further – Little Women is sumptuously made, and so filled with a generous spirit of love for humanity that it almost hurts to see. With a screenplay that makes unexpected but entirely fluid jumps back and forth through time, Little Women deconstructs and reconstructs the familiar novel in ways that make it fresh and exciting, even while remaining entirely true. It is an exquisite example of how to adapt literature to the screen, but more than that, as you watch it you get the distinct sense you are discovering a film that will be hailed as a classic decades hence. It is the freshest, most fulfilling, most beautiful experience of 2019.