Top 10 movies of 2019

Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

Quentin Tarantino's tenth film is his best work since 2009's "Inglourious Basterds." Maybe that has something to do with the story, where he uses his revisionist style to tackle the Tate murders, placing Brad Pitt's heroic stunt man Cliff Booth and Leonardo DiCaprio's overworked western star Rick Dalton in the path of the Manson family on that fateful night in 1969. Tarantino's script and direction is glowing with inspiration, as are all the actors' inputs. It's also because of the subject matter, an era of Hollywood that is a gold mine both for Tarantino and us regular movie buffs. His films used to be criticized for glorifying violence, but since "Inglourious Basterds" he's worked around that by making sure that all the (always exaggerated, sometimes comically over-the-top) violence in his films are only directed at people that deserve it, like nazis, slave owners and, now, filthy hippie murderers. Clever.  

The Irishman

Martin Scorsese's career is one of the most influential of the last fifty years, making him one of the most important film makers of the 20th century. His latest epic "The Irishman" is kind of a return to form for Scorsese, and also a perfect cap on decades of big time film making. A lot has been written about the role of women in "The Irishman," and the success or failure of the digital de-aging of the actors, but I find no flaws in either aspect. This is after all a story told exclusively by an unreliable narrator, the Irish mobster hit man Frank Sheeran, whose claim about killing Jimmy Hoffa has been a subject of dispute in real life. On some level, the whole film works like the ramblings of an old thug looking back on his life, the family he didn't understand, his history of violence that is sometimes believable, other times not. Robert De Niro and Al Pacino do the best work they've done in years, and "The Irishman" is above all a funny movie. Not a comedy, but Pacino plays Hoffa with gusto and subtle humor and De Niro's oafishness is often hilarious. But that's the greatness of Scorsese's mobster movies, just look at "Goodfellas," "Casino" and even "Mean Streets" - he's always allowed you as a viewer to have a good time in the company of his violent, reprehensible underworld characters. I believe that's a key to the success of those films.   

Uncut Gems

In 2017, I lauded Josh and Benny Safdie's gritty thriller "Good Time" as a masterpiece with its intense acting, its score and its visual style that was reminiscent of American movies from the 1970's. Well, I might as well have been talking about "Uncut Gems," a stressful, race-against-the-clock, sordid slice-of-life about a gambling addict's final days trying to retrieve a precious jewel while being hounded by debt collectors. Adam Sandler has proven before that he can act quite well dramatically, but what he does here isn't that far removed from a bizarre and kinda menacing sketch. "Uncut Gems" is uncomfortable viewing - painfully entertaining and endlessly fascinating.   

Knives Out

2019 was a good year for funny movies, as evidenced by the three funny movies on this list. You can tell that everyone involved in Rian Johnson whodunnit masterpiece "Knives Out" had a good time. It's a riveting film, thoroughly entertaining from start to finish, with a proper twist and a good example of how important a well-written screenplay is. If you got a script as good as this, that's really all you need. That's why every performance feels so inspired, same as every other part of the film making. And credit to Johnson for casting almost all of his actors against type, especially Daniel Craig, Chris Evans, Michael Shannon and Jamie Lee Curtis. Although ostensibly a parody of and homage to old school, Agatha Christie-like murder mysteries, "Knives Out" is also sneakily a very political film in what it has to say about immigrants in the Trump era.  

The Man Who Killed Don Quixote

If you aren't familiar with the facts, it's taken Terry Gilliam thirty years to realize his dream project. Finally, with the help of its star Adam Driver, the film was completed and released and it's better than I ever could have anticipated. It's wonderful to see how Gilliam-esque it is; the childish fantasy of "Time Bandits" and "The Adventures of Baron Munchausen" is in it, but it is also evidently made by a seventy-nine year old film maker, particularly in the way Driver's character is an obvious alter ego for Gilliam. For the first time, he has put himself into his movie, doesn't that finally earn him the sobriquet of auteur?

The Lighthouse

In "The Lighthouse," Robert Eggers brings the same meticulous attention to period detail and artistic sensibility that he did to his debut "The Witch" in 2015. So what we get is a visceral portrayal of cabin fever and 19th century insanity presented with stunning black and white cinematography, an unusual aspect ratio that emphasizes the weirdness and the claustrophobia, historically accurate and at times incredibly lyrical dialogue spoken by two actors acting their balls off, topped off with hallucinatory images and eery effects that are very gothic, very Edgar Allan Poe, very psychological and theatrical. All in all brilliant, with all the aspects you need to make a film of superb quality.  

Toy Story 4

Who would have thought Pixar could ever surpass "Toy Story 3" back in 2010, both in terms of technique and story? Well, not me, that's for sure. But the latest, perhaps last, sequel's animation is truly jaw-dropping, to the point where I found myself occasionally forgetting that I was watching an animated movie. As befits the world of "Toy Story" it's got cute new characters, especially Forky, who only wants to be put in the trash where he thinks he belongs, plus the welcome return of Bo Peep, last seen in "Toy Story 2," in a surprising new action movie role. On top of all that, it's got the kinda fascinating villainess doll Gabby Gabby and her henchmen, a pair of sinister-looking ventriloquist dummies. All in all, "Toy Story 4" is not only an entertaining adventure for all the family, but also a moving and thought-provoking story about growing old and losing your relevance in a world that's changing fast.  

The Beach Bum

Matthew McConaughey stumbling around the beaches of Florida, often with a drink, spewing sex poetry, is the best stoner comedy since "The Big Lebowski." McConaughey's Moondog is a fascinating character - he's a representation of Buddhism in a way, particularly in his disinterest in wealth and materialism. Like in the way he inherits a fortune after his rich ex-wife's death and accidentally sets it on fire, all the while laughing his stoned ass off. But he's also got the assholishness and devil-may-care attitude of someone like Hunter S. Thompson. With "The Beach Bum," Harmony Korine shows a lighter, more comedic side than what we're used to (as does McConaughey), but it's just as avantgarde and weird as all of his previous films, and that turns out to be a winning combination of moods and concepts.

El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie

In 2019 we had several highly satisfying sequels to famous TV series. First there was "Deadwood: The Movie," then the "Downton Abbey" film, and then, quite unexpectedly, "Between Two Ferns: The Movie" on Netflix. But the best TV show-cum-film was "El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie," which served as an epilogue to the TV series that finished in 2013 and finished Jesse Pinkman's story in a very gripping and pleasantly justifying way. What Vince Gilligan has done to make it as good as it is is he's given the film as much attention and passion as he did with the series, so it feels like a proper part of "Breaking Bad," albeit one that is slightly more cinematic and conclusive. As a fan, I'm thankful Gilligan spent as long working on it as he did, perhaps that's the reason it feels so complete.

Avengers: Endgame

The follow-up to 2018's "Avengers: Infinity War" suffers from the same flaws as "Star Wars IX: The Rise of Skywalker," which is basically that it feels a bit rushed and not adequately thought through and worked out. Even with its three hour running time. But how can you summarize the year in film 2019 without including the finale of one of the biggest franchises and film series of the past ten years? What began back in 2012 with Joss Whedon's "The Avengers," although I think it began even further back with "Iron Man" in 2008, has now concluded, and what an epic conclusion! It's impossible not to shed tears at the death of Tony Stark, a really touching and superbly acted scene, particularly in the context of the character's sacrifice to bring back peace and all those that were lost in the previous film. The end of Captain America's story arc was equally touching. Maybe it isn't the best part of the twenty-some movies in the MCU, but it's a hell of a way to go.

Top 10 horror films of 2019

DOCTOR SLEEP

I've been praising Mike Flanagan for years now, at least since 2016's "Ouija: Origin of Evil", and I'm not about to stop with his wonderfully scary, heart-breakingly tragic and exquisitely beautiful adaptation of Stephen King's "Doctor Sleep." Both a great adaptation of King's novel and a great sequel to Stanley Kubrick's "The Shining." I especially admire Flanagan for not using visual effects to cast the film with digital renditions of the original cast from "The Shining," but simply using new actors who are vaguely similar. That to me says something about the film maker's respect for his audience. I have not seen the theatrical version of "Doctor Sleep"; my appreciation is based upon the 28 minutes longer director's cut. This is the version I recommend, and in my opinion even a single minute less of this masterpiece would diminish it.

IT CHAPTER TWO

2019 was a good year for Stephen King fans. Not only were we treated to the two films on this list, "It Chapter Two" and "Doctor Sleep," but there was a decent adaptation of "Pet Sematary" and Netflix presented an interesting Stephen King/Joe Hill adaptation called "In the Tall Grass." The second season of Hulu's Stephen King homage "Castle Rock" that premiered in October was even better than the first. The second part of "It" does not quite reach the level of the first part from 2017, however, but even though it is a little bit inferior, the story, the characters and the style of Andy Muschietti's vision is still a gift for us horror nerds. Also, one cannot but applaud the casting of James McAvoy, Jessica Chastain, Bill Hader and James Ransone (some of those casting choices were actually based on the wishes of the younger actors) as Bill, Beverly, Richie and Eddie respectively.

COLOR OUT OF SPACE

The degree of insanity, grotesqueness and weirdness that Richard Stanley's psychedelic body horror "Color out of Space" reaches truly does justice to H.P. Lovecraft's work. I'd like to think that if Lovecraft saw this, he would be very pleased with what Stanley has achieved, and that's largely due to the fact that the South African film maker, whose career took a nosedive after the failed attempt to make "The Island of Dr. Moreau" in 1996 (see the 2014 documentary "Lost Soul: The Doomed Journey of Richard Stanley's Island of Dr. Moreau") is a true visionary. He has not only delivered a suitably poetic and creepy interpretation of Lovecraft's story but also somehow managed to get a great performance out of Nicolas Cage, something of a rare achievement nowadays.

MIDSOMMAR

Ari Aster's new film follows quite closely on the success of "Hereditary," one of my favorite horror films ever made. "Midsommar" opens with the same kind of horror in relation to personal trauma and family tragedy as in "Hereditary," then it gradually evolves into a very different kind of film. "Midsommar" belongs to a category that is usually known as folk horror (although I would also classify it as psychedelic horror, and you could arguably call it a slasher), which includes the classic "The Wicker Man" from 1973 and "Apostle" from 2018. The common denominator is a sinister cult that practices human sacrifices, in this case in Sweden (although shot in Hungary) and with kind, smiling hippies, which makes the sociopathic violence even more freaky once it erupts. "Midsommar" is nightmarish in a quite different way from "Hereditary" and not as terrifying, yet it is no less of a gem, thanks to Aster's intuition when it comes to emotional horror, his direction, the wonderful acting and the beautiful cinematography.    

WOUNDS

Babak Anvari, who made a huge impact in 2016 with "Under the Shadow" about a creepy haunting in war-torn Iran, returned in 2019 with a scary movie that is almost greater than his debut. "Wounds" takes a look at insanity and frightening events surrounding a contagious obsession with holes, particularly open wounds. It's as weird as it sounds, blending psychological horror with body horror, two sub-categories that are arguably very closely related. With only two movies under his belt, Anvari is now someone to look out for.

THE LODGE

An interesting trivia about Veronika Franz's and Severin Fiala's psychological indie horror "The Lodge" is that it's a Hammer Films production. Personally, I didn't even know Hammer Films was still in production. Another interesting thing about it is that without any monsters, demons, ghosts or supernatural killers, it manages to be really creepy. Thanks to creepy music, a creepy doll's house, creepy unexplained things happening to emotionally vulnerable people in an isolated location. Yet another interesting thing about it is that the way it intersects grief, trauma and horror reminds me of Ari Aster's "Hereditary". Don't expect the usual horror entertainment full of jump scares and stuff. This is a serious movie, folks, with serious subject matters. We need that kind of stuff too.

SCARY STORIES TO TELL IN THE DARK

2019 was a very good year for horror movies, and André Øvredal's "Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark" has got it all! Truly a mixed bag of goodies for horror nuts - everything from scarecrows to haunted house to body horror to walking dead/vengeful spirits to spiders to a creepy insane asylum. Like all family-friendly horror movies it's also got a gang of nerdy kids fighting a supernatural entity. In today's climate, with "Stranger Things" and "It," that's a sure-fire way to success. I couldn't say how a movie with so many horror tropes works, but somehow it's wildly entertaining!

CHILD'S PLAY

Horror remakes are dodgy matters, and when it comes to such a classic character as Chucky, who was so immortalized by Brad Dourif in the whole film series from 1988 onwards, there's an even greater risk of sacrilege. Going in to this remake of "Child's Play," which also serves as a reboot of the film series, one is at first sceptic about how anyone could fill Dourif's shoes, but Mark Hamill does a pretty amazing job, which is no great surprise, he is a terrific voice actor after all. This version removes an essential part of the character, that of the doll being possessed by the evil spirit of a murderer. Here, Chucky is instead the result of a factory setting that has been tampered with, which gives the film a sci-fi edge and kind of a funny, interesting metaphor of our smartphone era. Whether we will get an entertaining and long-lasting series out of this remains to be seen, but I'm up for it.

GIRL ON THE THIRD FLOOR

A simple and effective haunted house movie - perhaps not the most original ever made, but like a lot of good indie horrors, the devil's in the details; creepy stains, rotten holes, wall sockets leaking obscenely, an oddly shaped ornament, a distorted door bell, a marble rolling down the stairs. And I wouldn't mind seeing CM Punk in a movie again, he has a certain way about him that at times reminds me of Bruce Campbell in the "Evil Dead" film series. 

ANNABELLE COMES HOME

Although not as great as 2017's "Annabelle: Creation," the third part in the film series about the world's creepiest possessed doll is still a pretty entertaining horror movie, with effective jump scares and some quite creepy ghosts. Who knew that this spin-off of "The Conjuring" was going to evolve into something almost on par with said horror film series by James Wan, particularly considering its inauspicious first outing, "Annabelle" from 2014. The best part of "Annabelle Comes Home" is that it takes place during one afternoon, which gives the film an immediate feeling of suspense that is proficiently sustained throughout.

   

 

Top 10 albums of 2019

RAMMSTEIN

Rammstein has been with me since I was seventeen years old, so when the music starts and Till Lindemann pipes up in that booming voice of his, I get goose bumps! Now, on their first album after a ten year gap, they are as great as they ever were. Tracks like "Deutschland," "Radio," and "Ausländer" are inspired and catchy songs, and there is a spark to the whole album that is like their early stuff. It's kind of like they've rebooted their original sound, the sound that made us fall for them in the first place.

NICK CAVE AND THE BAD SEEDS Ghosteen

There is a softness to the sorrowful songs on "Ghosteen," as though there's a need to hold back, a fear that too much emoting would have devastating consequences. Despite the pain, there is a lot of beauty there too, like Cave has creatively skipped the first couple of stages and gone straight for acceptance. His voice is tired, a little hoarse, but any fan worth their salt would consider it a privilege to be obliged to share his grief. 

LEONARD COHEN Thanks for the Dance

It feels like one had hardly gotten used to the idea that Leonard Cohen is no longer with us when the new album "Thanks for the Dance" dropped in November. But this is far from a rushed attempt to cash in on his memory. The album, which has been completed by Cohen's son Adam, doesn't feel like a serving of leftovers, but like a proper production. The music that accompanies Cohen's brittle voice is so soft that it is sometimes barely perceptible, but the real reason one comes to his music is the poetry, and the words are as strong, deep and beautiful as ever. 

EBONY STEEL BAND Pan-Machine

When you're a life long fan of Kraftwerk you can't help but be completely charmed by Ebony Steel Band's instrumental cover album, recorded using live instruments, mainly marimbas and steel drums, that give the German industrial synthpop quartet's music a decidedly Caribbean feel. I don't know how this album came about or why, but I love it, and that's enough for me! 

DAVE Psychodrama

I don't listen to hip hop much, but when a bloke like Dave raps, I can really get with it, for he doesn't just go "booty booty booty" and "money money money". Dave raps about social issues in an intelligent and authentic voice, as best exemplified by the moving track "Lesley," which ends with a passionate plea for women in abusive relationships to seek help. 

SWANS Leaving Meaning

Long and slow, but never boring - ninety minutes of apocalyptic intensity, "Leaving Meaning" builds suspense and maintains it, like a good film. At some points, it's like "Twin Peaks" in musical form, and at other times like Coil at their best. Hypnotic, testing the limits of poetic rock. The formidable old no-wave anti-pop Swan's fifteenth album is an album to be reckoned with!

KIM GORDON No Home Record

On her first ever release as a solo artist, Gordon's weird and marvellous little album contains nine tracks built on deep electronic beats, noisy post-punk and cool art rock accompanied by portentous and powerful half-sung lyrics. In other words, just the kind of avantgarde brilliance you could expect from a woman who spent thirty years of her artistic life as a leading member of Sonic Youth. 

ALA.NI Acca

This is perhaps the most underrated pop album of the year. British artist Ala.Ni's minimalist songs are arranged in an array of different styles, from conventional pop to jazz to R&B to doo-wop to show tunes to folk. Ala.Ni's cool vocals are gently accompanied by strings, sometimes an upright bass, even a saw on one track, but mainly by a capella scatting. The standout track, "Le Diplomate," featuring Iggy Pop, is incidentally the coolest thing he's done for years. 

KMFDM Paradise

During their 35 years, KMFDM has released a steady stream of new material and has re-invented themselves again and again. Small wonder then that they seem to be preoccupied with checking their rear-view mirror on their new album. There is nothing wrong with reminiscing a little when there is so much varied experience to look back upon. Tracks like the rap rock "K.M.F." and the dub-ish "Paradise" remind me of 1989's "UAIOE," whereas "WDYWB" and "Binge Boil & Blow" remind me of their 1997 masterpiece "Symbols," especially since the latter is a track by original member Raymond Watts, his first appearance on a KMFDM album in 16 years! 

BILLIE EILISH When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?

Adolescent singer/songwriter Billie Eilish has received a million music awards. Words like "genius" have been bandied about, but the proof is in the pudding. Once you've heard "Bad Guy," it's impossible to get it out of your head. "When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?" is basically just an indie pop album with some hip hop influences, but it is quite cool and the production has enough weirdness and humor in it to make it endearing.