2023 Media Roundup: Film

[sabotabby]

 Well, this will be quick and easy, as I only saw three new films this year, and one of them sucked. I don't know why I can mainline a million TV shows and not watch a single movie, but I think it's because I can only really sit still for an hour at a time. Anyway, the three whole movies I saw were:

El Conde: This is the one that sucked, unfortunately. You would think the premise was bulletproof: Pinochet is actually a vampire and gets dragged out of retirement even though he wants to die. That's ripe for political satire. This film has two problems. First, the characterization is muddled and so the satire is muddled. I think it wants to show some nuance and complexity and how fascism can appeal to even those who oppose it, plus the obvious vampirism = capitalism, but it ended up mired in pointless nihilism. Sometimes you have to be blatant in your satire. The other problem is that it's told almost entirely in voiceover narration. It's a stupid choice that's not justified once you realize who the voiceover is, which is also not a big twist. In some alternate timeline there is a good version of this.

Nimona: I liked this one quite a lot! I'm not a big cartoon fan, and I'm particularly not a fan of this particular cartoon style, but the story is good enough to overcome my aesthetic dislike. It's good for all the same reasons why the comic is good—it's a cute, subversive, queer fairy tale with memorable characters. My only issues were that I would prefer it if it were animated more like ND Stevenson's drawing style, because I like that more, and that I don't think the changes at the beginning work as well as the comic does. It's far more fun to discover Ballister Blackheart's backstory as Nimona does—this is one case where I think the story benefits from doing an obvious twist. It ends up softening the story quite a lot by not depicting any of Blackheart's villainy, though I guess that makes it more appropriate for the kiddies. I guess.

Cocaine Bear: Okay I can't believe I'm saying this but this ended up being the best movie I saw in 2023 because unlike the other two, it didn't have any flaws. It made us a promise—you get to see a bear on cocaine that kills a lot of people—and delivered exactly that. It's a massively self-aware film. It's hilarious. Sometimes all you want is to watch a bear that is higher than any living thing has ever gotten in existence eat a bunch of people and then try to get more cocaine. Unlike the other two it is an improvement over reality/the source material, as the actual story behind this is sad rather than funny.

I'll try to watch more movies next year. The key word is "try."

Comments

[ioplokon]

Have you seen Jayro Bustamante's La Llorona? I think that's a much smarter (and unsettling) film that combines supernatural horror + the horrors of dictatorship.

[sabotabby]

It sounds familiar enough that I think I've seen it?

I mean Guillermo Del Toro does this exact thing brilliantly in Pan's Labyrinth and the Devil's Backbone, which is what I assumed this was going to be. It is not.

[blogcutter]

I know I really enjoyed the Guillermo Del Toro exhibition I saw at AGO a number of years ago. I don't think I've actually seen any of his full-length films.

[sabotabby]

Whaaaaat? See those two in particular. His movies are strange in that he does things like Hellboy and Pacific Rim, which I think are pretty fun but not particularly brilliant or anything, and then apparently uses the money to fund weird magic realistic passion projects about the Spanish Civil War. I like his dumb movies a lot but his smart movies are incredible.

[dissectionist]

I loved Cocaine Bear, though my 2023 Best Comedy would have to go to Barbie. (I didn’t expect to love a Mattel film, but it’s amazing.) Cocaine Bear has some ridiculously funny dialogue and the attack scenes are *chef’s kiss*.

[sabotabby]

I haven't seen Barbie. It's one of those things that I was kind of interested in seeing and then there was hype and then I was like nah.

[dissectionist]

Oh no. Please watch it. Every single person in my family loved it and it really is fun.

[sabotabby]

I'll get to it eventually!

[greylock]

I recommend it. If I were a maker of lists, it'd be up there.,

[minoanmiss]

Cocaine Bear! surprisingly entertaining!

Sabs: the woman who would have been my MIL used to share jokes with me about being two of the five women in America who did not see Titanic. After she died I finally watched about half of it and it made it more amusing to remember all her jokes about it. I think Barbie may end up being the same way.

[sabotabby]

I watched it like 5 years after it came out and I laughed the whole way through and my friend, who thought it was very beautiful and sad, got mad that I thought it was a comedy.

[blogcutter]

I thought it was fun too!

[sabotabby]

Sometimes movies just need to be the thing that they are.

[flamingsword]

Since you and my husband seem to have a fair amount of media in common, maybe your tastes run the same? So try the movie Wrong (2012) on for size and see how you like their take on absurdist humor? And seconding the rec for Barbie, bc Ghost loved it, and we’re planning on watching it together this weekend or next.

[sabotabby]

Never heard of that but it sounds amazing.

[greylock]

Admittedly your list is small. but I enjoyed both of the ones I did see. Both Nimona and Cocaine Bear were *fun*.

[sabotabby]

Right??? which is sometimes the only thing a movie needs to be.

[greylock]

It's all anything needs to be. YYMV.
I only watched 160-odd movies this year, but those two were much better than many (and especially if you cut it down).

One I have seen mentioned that you must see (and, indeed, may have mentioned), is Polite Society. It's been on a lot of io9's best of lists, and - I guess came out a year ago?.
It is great fun.