2. The Last Duel, Ridley Scott
Traversing what divides us in spaces plagued by hateful rumor and mob justice, Hosoda discovers what can unearth and unite us in those same spaces. "Belle" is a story of protectors lost and found, true and false, based in both an unrelentingly stunning Kōchi and an authentically representational online world composed of prismatic rapture as if Paul Grimault filtered vaporwave through the heart of an archetypal Disney princess. This contemporary sci-fantasy variation's distinguishing key is its narrative device of logging in as an interpreted representation of your true self as opposed to the norm of starting from a zero of your own fabrication thence mediated by privilege. These elements and many more perfectly connect across layered story facets thematically impactful as Nobutaka Ike's gorgeously detailed backgrounds and rewarding as the devastatingly celebratory J-pop numbers.
It's too easy to call "The Last Duel" Ridley's "Rashōmon" or "Straw Dogs", so let's say it's Ben Affleck's "Becket", yeah? While Jodie Comer boldly embodies the will of woman in a society systematically discouraging it, Matt Damon and Adam Driver throw themselves into unrestrictedly unflattering portrayals of heavily armored male ego defaulting weight to their own pride and glory. As "Alexander" is to George W. Bush's first term, for example, the barbarous 14th Century law of the Hundred Years' War is presented as more familiar to the perversely zealous standards of today's religious Right than our centuries separated from the period would suggest. The solemnly Byzantine drama illustrating this apt conceit engages with every minute backed by promise of climactic clash, with the crucial realization being that - while no winner is certain until the bindingly visceral duel is at last decided - a truly victorious outcome was always in fact an impossibility.
No ideal adaptation exists, but one of the greatest scripts ever written has been treated well throughout cinema's history - Orson Welles' Eisenstein-esque opera, Akira Kurosawa's dense atmosphere, Roman Polanski's emboldened symbolism, Justin Kurzel's sensual meditation, even William Morrissette's cheeky spin, and now a solitary Coen's stark "The Tragedy of Macbeth" unites many such elements as anchored by Denzel Washington's mountainous achievement in tormented madness and paranoia. Never before has the screen more tangibly enjoyed this descent from humble honor to hollowed-out guilt, as Washington constantly finds extemporaneous expression behind monologue after notorious monologue while imbuing the signature dichotomy of brashness and vulnerability he's developed to perfection throughout his career. Both fresh and familiar casting otherwise reveals brilliance in Frances McDormand's chillingly sinister reading of Lady Macbeth, Stephen Root's hilarious rendering of a bit part forgivably swept from some renditions, and the compelling focus given to Alex Hassell's steely take on the duplicitously fair-weather Ross.
As year after year our steeped traditions in narrative cinema continue to navigate a world more exponentially advanced than it can seem to sustain, Hamaguchi's "Wheel of Fortune & Fantasy" delivers a triptych of truly modern stories more relatably present than just about anything out there trying to mirror what has become our day-to-day - so much so that for their utter contemporariness they almost feel alien in the company of their own art form - each more affecting than the last.
McCarthy's "Stillwater" finds destiny through a stifled journey of circumstance, then twists the kaleidoscope just enough to gradually enhance or reframe stakes in less expected places. As Matt Damon's thoroughly embodied simple man finds his goals shifting, the weight of what he's gained to lose is given to every next action or inaction from the smallest gesture to a taught stadium tailing sequence evoking Akira Kurosawa's "Stray Dog".
Even freed from the eventual context of Maggie Gyllenhaal's promisingly captured directorial debut, every last molecule in Olivia Colman's "The Lost Daughter" performance would be capable of accessing buried scars.
Atop the gift that is such complete documentation of a moment in modern myth and legend, through "Get Back" the story of the Beatles’ self-destruction is shown to in fact be one of incredible collaborative creation. It is impossible to not feel every bit of that infamous rooftop performance after navigating - and simply spending time with - the the varied nuances of the studio sessions.
Steeped in bygone, De Seta-adjacent Mediterranean maritime culture and animated with a Tartakovsky-esque integration of 2D stylings, Casarosa's “La Luna” successor “Luca” is Pixar's most instantly and thoroughly affecting since its prior departure into venturesome youth in the unforgettably seizing “Brave”. Yes, unquestionably being very “Call Me By Your Name” is its greatest quality, but a tale of children discovering themselves is not held back by a lack of overt romance.
Ebullient in its practical psychedelicism, the definitively "Austin Powers"-inspired "Barb & Star Go to Vista Del Mar" comically massacres those on its wavelength with quotable after quotable, as well as infectious musical numbers uproarious in their relished irreverence.
At times "The Suicide Squad" feels like the Harley Quinn movie with the least Harley Quinn, but Margot Robbie is doing her most nuanced stuff with the character yet while surrounded by borderline Alan Moore-esque morally grey weirdo outcasts in stylized peril whom we can care for and laugh with in equal measure. The fair hangout feel enjoys the same whimsical yet grounded heroes-in-tights gut punch Gunn established with “Super”, then grows so increasingly nutty it’s difficult not to have a good time repeatedly veering from tropes we’re conditioned to expect. It also figures the movie in which they fight a “Yo Gabba Gabba!” critter features a “don’t bite your friends” scene.
Complete 2021 rankings on Letterboxd (subject to change).
