As a companion piece to my Top Ten list, every year I write a post to discuss some of the other major films that got a lot of attention, in order to give some context to my own choices. I find that writing this type of analysis piece helpful when working out how I feel about my list and the year in film as a whole. It's also usually a lot of fun. Please note that I will not be writing about films listed among my honorable mentions, including "Tenet," "Da 5 Bloods," and "The Sound of Metal," which I've already written individual posts about anyway.
So, the pickings were much slimmer this year due to COVID, and I'm disappointed that many films I was looking forward to have been delayed. However, there were still plenty of films in the conversation, many of which inevitably fell a little short for me. Documentaries got a lot of attention this season, including "Time," which charts the life of a mother of six, whose husband is serving out a long prison sentence. It's a moving story, but I found many of its central arguments oddly framed, and never could shake the feeling that I was missing vital parts of the narrative. Then there's "Dick Johnson is Dead," a playful and often very funny film about the filmmaker dealing with the inevitable loss of her beloved father. And then, near the end, we find out that her ex-husband and *his* husband live next door to her, and I wondered why I wasn't watching *that* movie. "Crip Camp," "The Donut King," "Feels Good Man," and "The Truffle Hunters" were other docs I enjoyed this year that presented more typical looks at specific subjects.
I was surprised at the amount of support garnered by "Promising Young Woman," which I found very strong in certain aspects, but also kind of sketchy in others. It straddles a weird line between serious business and larger-than-life that I don't feel was reconciled very well. Another big favorite was "Lovers Rock," which never managed to work its spell on me. I was never much of a fan of parties or big crowds, being an incurable introvert, so the "Small Axe" film that I gravitated toward was "Mangrove." And speaking of trial movies, Probably my biggest disappointments this year were Aaron Sorkin's "Trial of the Chicago 7" and David Fincher's "Mank." I appreciate that "Chicago 7" is a dramatization, but Sorkin really pushed the dramatic license too far, inventing courtroom antics that came off as distasteful. As for "Mank," while I'm glad Fincher got to make a passion project, and it's good to see him trying a new genre, the film was a slog and Oldman was miscast. "One Night in Miami" was good… but not that good, while "Judas and the Black Messiah" never lived up to its excellent performances.
Where I really feel like I was the most out of step this year was with the genre films. "Palm Springs" is a lot of fun, and features what is probably Andy Samberg's best performance, but it's no "Groundhog's Day." It's smart and I enjoyed it thoroughly, but it's also very abrasive - too much so for my tastes. "The Vast of Night" is an experimental throwback to '50s media that felt consumed by its own conceits. The long monologues and longer tracking shots work as discrete pieces, but I found that they didn't cohere too well. It's nice to see Brandon Cronenberg getting back into the game with "Possessor Uncut," but the film was such a stream-of-consciousness that I had trouble parsing what was going on. "The Invisible Man" was very good, but the ending whiffed a bit. Meanwhile, "Relic" has a good ending going for it, but honestly not much else. The best horror film I saw this year was probably "Saint Maud."
I'm still catching up on foreign films, as I always am, but pickings feel much leaner this year, probably because of all the distribution turmoil. One notable title that hit me in completely the wrong way was "Martin Eden," which features a great performance from Luca Martinelli and a lot of railing against social conventions and politics that did absolutely nothing for me.
"American Utopia" and "Hamilton" were both a lot of fun, but I can't justify treating them as movies. I'm grateful that we got them this year though, to offset things like "The Prom."
Films that just missed the honorable mentions include "Never, Rarely, Sometimes, Always," "You Cannot Kill David Arquette," "Ma Rainey's Black Bottom," "First Cow," and "Soul." And "Bacurau" was on last year's list.
And that's my 2020 in film.
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