Official Competition

Movie people suck. They’re pretentious and vacuous, unabashed and flighty (kinda like this sentence!).

Well, maybe not all of ‘em, but certainly the ones we see in Official Competition. And that’s why this movie is SO MUCH FUN.

In this one, a rich old man funds the production of an artsy movie. He wants awards guaranteed (LOL), so he engages a decorated and eccentric director to help (further LOL). After a well-paced intro establishes all that, the bulk of what we watch is our director and her two lead actors preparing for their new project.

Lola, the free-spirited, genius director that she is, is overbearing. Repeat-that-word-five-times-in-five-different-ways overbearing. Félix gets paid so much he couldn’t care less. Iván, an actor’s actor who thinks the world of himself, puts up with the both of them for the love of his art. Or maybe for the opportunity to win another award.

Their rehearsals are cringe-worthy; each a crapshoot of who will be the most self-serious and antagonistic this time. Not only are their idiosyncracies somehow both silly and creative, the constant uncertainty of who’ll be normal this time adds to the hilarity (helping us identify with otherwise unsympathetic characters).

Smart story-structuring unveils the climax of our movie and their movie at just the right time. Sincere, subtle, and suspenseful when it needs to be, and observant, charming, and funny as all heck, Official Competition is the work of excellent moviemakers. These people don’t take their job too seriously, but they do seriously appreciate its virtues.

Um . . . let’s take a break?

The Art of Making It

Art, amirite? We all have our opinions. And this is why The Art of Making It is such an ambitious project.

It’s a documentary about the art world, but a story, too. Its underdogs are . . . the vast majority of artists alive today. They create (and sometimes go into massive debt to learn how to create) art because they cannot imagine doing otherwise. Many make no money from their passion, subsisting on unrelated jobs. The only way to better their situation seems to be when a rich, connected hand of a university/museum/gallery decides that this human is now worthy of making it money.

But maybe that’s a cynic’s view. In this one, we hear all sorts of opinions about the state of things. Artists and thinkers; curators, gallerists, and teachers share their thoughts. Sometimes contrasted in back-to-back scenes, any theoretical disagreement becomes for us a fun kind of cringe-worthy.

So do we care about any of this? And is watching this like doing philosophy homework? Well, art, like any other profession or expression, is a funnel for human thought. Without it the soup of our world would be less rich. As an exploration of whether that particular funnel might be clogging right now, this movie does us all a service.

As for watchability, you’ll find everything from light to heavy in this one; personal moments with sympathetic people, but so too ideas about history and the future of us all, often presented in a visually-engaging way. Interesting, patient, and informative, The Art of Making It is a work of art all its own.

shoutout to my main meme jerrygogosian — you da beast!

Old

Old does have its surprises, but the title tells you everything you need to know.

Step One: A family goes on vacation. They’re quirky and beautiful like their destination, a tropical, paradisal place. Hiccups pass as each member tries their best to enjoy this special moment. How sweet.

Step Two: Something terrible happens, destroying all good vibes and any hope of a return to normalcy. If you’re curious about what that could be, well, I won’t mention the title again.

There is a contrast of wonder and terror here. Smart! As aging may well be the scariest thing out there, the bulk of the movie is for us an uncomfortable, emotional experience. Kudos go to the concept-creator here—and the actors, who portray our fundamental fear at its most horrifyingly condensed.

Whether you’ll enjoy it all, though, will depend on your patience with the characters, and especially with the ending. Would you do what they do? Can you believe this is happening?

For most of the time, I thought yes. Brilliant camerawork—capturing one character frozen while the others are in motion, or, close-framed and obscuring but hinting at the objects of all these horrified gazes—had me begging for some resolution.

And then, alas, it came. And then, I felt a little older.

Another smartly-framed scene in which the camera stays put—increasing our increasingly-desperate curiosity.

Passing

Passing is rather like a windless snowfall: soft and gorgeous, gentle and consistent even as it buries you.

It was an experience so deceptively simple, so beautiful and disconcerting, that I am not sure how I feel about it. And though I believe there is no right way to do a movie, I think Passing is a movie done right.

Irene is our North Star here, reliably unchanging as the storm unfolds around her. Her typical day is spent in a state of nervous agitation: prepping for high society events, worrying, or napping. The moviemakers hint at both existential malaise and drugs as the culprits.

One day, she tries something different. And in this extraordinary time for her, she happens upon an old friend, Clare. The meeting changes their lives.

Clare, apparently, is pretending to be white. And the husband has no idea.

The story and its themes unfold as Irene prepares for the latest society event, now with Clare once again in her life. What will happen next? Will Clare be found out? Will she implicate Irene? Above this underlying nervous energy are the many other layers of emotion, including, perhaps, romantic ones.

Simple but gorgeous motifs balance out all these weighty topics just as well as they complement them. Light passes through and bounces and refracts around every inch of the picture. Piano keys flit down our ear canals like cars outside the window, a recurring city refrain reminding us of time and place. Scenes transition just as softly as the movie begins and ends. A dissolution into nothing, or everything.

Sometimes, when a thing is done really well, you don’t notice it. This movie plays with that idea, in a serious way. I will not soon forget it.

The Electrical Life of Louis Wain

Louis was an odd cat, and this movie revels in it. What a unique and charming experience!

Our proper Victorian narrator hints at what it’ll be early on. While speaking the hard facts of Louis’s life, she makes sure to pepper in phrases like “positively geriatric” and “vomited immediately”. Think silly sprinkled over serious.

Most every other technical aspect of the movie builds this whimsical vibe, wobbling between the seemingly contradictory. When Louis navigates the world through oddjobs, for example, we are made to feel energy and not just concern. When he stares into the eyes of someone a beat longer than is polite, we sympathize just as much as we are discomfited. Even a detail as small as the flicker of a candle is put to use.

OK, so Louis and this movie are goofy, we get it. What else? Well, his curiosity is insatiable and directionless. And one day it lands on something new: Emily.

As governess to Louis’s many sisters, Emily knows and can teach the basics of human interaction. Even more intriguing is that Emily is more open-minded than others in Louis’s social class. (The first time we meet her she is sitting in a closed closet . . . )

As the two begin to see virtue in each other, Louis’s sketches for the local newspaper reach new levels of beautiful. What’s this feeling? This electricity? It seems to move him and her and so many people out there . . .

Whatever it is, it’s what makes the story so romantic. And heartbreaking.

The more I think about this movie, the more I’m a fan. Its casting and performances are super; its colors, inspired; its music, somehow capturing the simultaneously insane and inviting nature of our existence. Everything about this one is a celebration.

Don't Look Up

A comet is heading directly for Earth. Now what?

I’m not quite sure how to answer that question, but Don’t Look Up has me thinking. Although this witty satire is no horror movie, it is recognizable enough to be alarming.

It spotlights ridiculous, frustrating human behavior—yet remains silly and funny and entertaining. Somehow light; somehow tender.

The story begins with Kate, a PhD student. Her anti-establishment haircut is almost as loud as the rap escaping her headphones. She (like her generation?) is smart, capable, and a bit disillusioned with how disgusting and hypocritical people in power seem to be.

Then she discovers a comet. She does the math with her professor, Randall, and the answer is ice cold: The Earth doesn’t stand a chance.

At its simplest, Don’t Look Up is the story of these two (very different) people trying to warn others about impending danger. Though they’re imperfect—she a bit too cynical, he a bit too science-focused—they’re rational and well-meaning overall. And this is where the satire comes in.

Hardly anyone listens. From the classroom to the newsroom to the White House, the people who learn about the comet either shrug it off or look to exploit it for their own gain. We, like our heroes, begin to wonder how the people of the United States have devolved so. Will rationality not be enough to save the day? Will short-sighted self-interest really propel us into the future? Has it always?

One scene sums it all up. When Kate and Randall are waiting to deliver the news to the President, a military man charges them for snacks. We later learn that these snacks were free. Why did he do that? It’s kind of hilarious, kind of enraging. Kate cannot shake this meaningless greed out of her head, even though all of existence will be over soon.

This movie will undoubtedly polarize its viewers, each of whom might have a different perspective on interactions like that one. It lambasts the ethos of many Americans who believe, for example, that scare-tactics are purely power tools, or that profit is the next step in human evolution. But because Don’t Look Up raises important questions about self-education and the role of the individual in a complicated and dangerous world, and because it does so with humor, I can’t help but like it.

The Matrix Resurrections

Resurrections? I’m not sure anything died.

Something sure does stink, though.

You see, three Matrix movies preceded this one, and that trilogy stands as a monument in movie history. Its blend of ground-breaking visual effects, wild choreography, and intricate storytelling blasted philosophy off a dusty page and onto on our modern screens. It made questioning reality fun.

The Matrix Resurrections tries to do the same. Unfortunately, it relies too much on what’s been done before without adding anything meaningful.

This one starts with our saviors, Neo and Trinity, living obliviously amongst their sheep. Just a mom at work and a video game coder going through the motions. How did this happen?

Neo’s therapy sessions and psychotic visions enlighten us. He has put so much of his hopes and fears into his popular video game (called The Matrix) that he now can’t distinguish his memories from game sequences.

Much of the movie passes by before we learn why. And much of that is filled with clips and characters from the original trilogy. Not only are these callbacks overkill for those who don’t know the backstory, they are jarring for anyone who does. They’re reminders that what we’re witnessing pales in comparison to the original stuff.

So Neo is unsure about his reality; Neo is awakened; Neo must fight machines; the odds seem awful. We’ve seen this all before, folks. Having watched The Matrix Resurrections, I now feel like I’ve met the lazy, insecure child of one of my heroes. There is something recognizable in it, but nothing that grips me.

All that said, kudos must go to many of the moviemakers on this one; the production and set design, the special effects, and the camerawork especially drew us in even as the writing worked so hard to take us out.

Spider-Man: No Way Home

It’s way deep down, I think. The one, irreducible reason why we watch movies. We want to feel again how we felt that very first time, when something on a screen had us thinking, just, WOW.

Sometimes I think chasing that sensation is useless. And then a movie like Spider-Man: No Way Home comes along and I have hope again. Just, WOW.

I’ll get to the story in ten seconds, but at the risk of overstating things, it’s hard to understate how well written, produced, and acted this movie was. The action/adventure/thrills are entertaining, yes; but more importantly, they are held together by the strands of a believable coming-of-age story. In this one, empathy and love don’t always make things easier. Characters—both good and bad—have nuanced internal struggles. This is a superhero movie, matured.

Peter Parker therefore struggles for much of it. This good-natured, rather jacked teen is trying to figure out how to best live in a world that villainizes his superhero alter ego, Spider-Man. His loved ones (Aunt May, girlfriend MJ, friend Ned) usually keep him grounded, but he’s tired of the dramas of his life hurting theirs. So he asks an older, wiser fellow superhero, Dr. Strange, for help. Oh child, how the problems do follow.

If you ever have the chance, I would recommend not pulling on a loose string in the fabric of space and time. To share any other plot points with you would be to spoil (several, wonderful) WOW moments, but it’s sufficient to say that this movie is as fun and funny as it is surprising and deep. Truly a blockbuster.

Sure, you’ll enjoy the story far more if you’re a fan of comic books, previous Marvel or Spider-Man movies. But I wouldn’t consider myself much of either, and boy—no, man—have I been trapped in this web. I am so happy about it.

Joyce Carol Oates: A Body in the Service of Mind

I remember most her eyes. Those big, almost perfect circles vacuuming it all in like her life depended on it. Sometimes they’d widen and it felt like she was pleading with me. But that one time, when they closed and she giggled . . . I felt, I saw pure joy.

This is no infant I speak of. This is one of the United States’ most celebrated and prolific writers, decades into life. This is Joyce Carol Oates.

Simply mesmerizing she is. How she talks, what she has to say. The moviemakers know it and so feature Joyce and just Joyce. We sit with her in her sanctuary, the writing room. The place where she spends ten hours a day.

Then the comfortable, soft silence is broken by a question. How did a household without books or high school diplomas produce you? Joyce answers, words flow and eyes dart. I swear you can hear her mind whirring.

Though she has written millions of words over the years, none of her story is stale. Each question for her becomes a terribly interesting response for us. Riots in Detroit. Beatings and murder at home. Misery, mystery, yearning.

The voice-over language captures it all so beautifully. Of course it does. These are the words of Joyce by way of one of her characters, from one of her novels. Whatever we just learned about her life, one of her creations has experienced something similar. This blending of history, fiction, and memory is as much a respectful homage as it is a powerful moviemaking technique. Thank goodness director Stig Björkman persisted for years asking to document his friend.

And so, watching Joyce Carol Oates: A Body in the Service of Mind feels like getting away with something. Humble genius has sat down with us, so that we may know it. But such genius can only carry its shield of articulation for so long; at a certain point it melts under the weight of deepest emotion. And it is in these precious few moments of complete vulnerability that the true treasure of this movie is revealed.

Objects

Have you ever taken a shell from the beach?

Vincent wants to know. As writer, producer, cinematographer, and director of Objects, he’s trying to understand why some people cherish things and others don’t.

Like that famous journalist who fills his books with hunks of dead grass. Or that writer whose desk might as well be an archeological site. He finds keepers like these and asks them why they do what they do.

Their answers are vivid and touching, recounted with such conviction that it’s hard not to smile. By explaining to us—heck, just by their laying eyes on that ancient party favor or faucet handle—our subjects (re)live deep emotions of a lifetime.

Is this unhealthy attachment, or are the non-keepers out there the broken ones? The movie explores these ideas, too. Clips from popular downsizers and minimalists confront our keepers. But they don’t blink. Over time, their stories seem to present to us a picture of deep feelers—not hoarders or materialists.

It’s sweet stuff. And smart moviemaking maintains a nostalgic, whimsical vibe throughout. Flashbacks blend focus and dimensions because sharp here, fuzzy there is much like memory.

Objects will assuredly fade into nothingness someday, as all things do. How lucky I am for experiencing it first.

Boycott

Let’s pretend for a minute that Boycott isn’t for you. You’ve seen the trailer, read the reviews, and prefer not to watch.

It happens. And it’s usually not a problem. But now, let’s pretend that your decision to skip watching is against the law.

Sound ridiculous? You might be interested in Boycott after all. It’s about how anti-boycotting mechanisms are being written into law all across the United States.

And so this is the one where a Texan Muslim speech pathologist, a Scotch-Irish Arkansan redneck, and a Californian public servant walk into a courtroom. Though they seem to have little in common, they each value the freedom of speech. Rather than sign anything that included anti-Israeli-boycott language, they sued.

Hearing about these prohibitive laws is quite frankly shocking enough to keep our attention, but the moral rectitude of our three subjects is even more riveting. These are ordinary folk putting their livelihoods on the line.

We listen to their stories from the source while lawyers, think tank and advocacy group interviewees pepper in context. Apparently, boycotting has been around since the beginning of the country. So too religion and politics. And this is where the doc gets bogged down in bias.

Moviemaking techniques like fast editing and montages with ominous music set the tone that rights are being attacked. Hurting people (and thinkers who agree with them) are given the sole spotlight. Opponents receive minor screen time, and are either unprepared or not as thoughtful as the other interviewees. Even the pro-boycott experts—whose job it is to rely on reason rather than emotion to convince people—are exasperated when they try to summarize their opponents’ positions. The moviemakers of course made sure to justify this one-sidedness in the credits (by explaining that several people it had requested to interview declined to do so). None of these things alone is fatal, but put together in the manner that they were, they’re suspect.

An uneven hand does its cause no favors—even if that cause is just. By already having its mind made up on the issue, Boycott doesn’t allow its viewers to make up their own. It’s a head-scratchingly disappointing technique for a movie which otherwise heroizes people who think for themselves.

And yet all that said, Boycott is worth your watch. At worst the issues presented are real and compelling. And at best, these ideas (and lawsuits) might better the lives of people living all across the globe.

Dune

Tell me—what did you dream of last night?

For Paul, the answer never changes: a face bathed in warm light and swimming sands, whispering. Of what, we don’t know. But the dreams seem meaningful all the same.

Perhaps they’re just the byproduct of a little excitement; the Emperor has chosen Paul’s family to take over the desert planet called Arrakis, after all.

You’ll find out soon enough. And long before that, you’ll realize that this movie is magnificent. The worldbuilding is heart-stoppingly beautiful; the story, spicy. Polticial, religious, and romantic intrigue swirl around everything from persons to planets.

But brining things back down to Arrakis for a second, it’s quite popular. Scorching sun and monstrous sandworms won’t stop an endless caravan of colonizers; the sand here has spice, and spice fuels interstellar travel. Arrakis’s natives, the Fremen, are therefore forever subject to the whims of power-hungry outsiders looking to profit.

Paul’s Atreides family (from their own lush and oceanic planet) might be different. They sympathize with the plight of the Fremen and value their ways. But even so, when the Emperor asks you to do something, you do it.

So we follow the family’s journey in governing a new world—and we do so from Paul’s perspective. The smart young man with the dreams has a special aura about him. Likely inherited and cultivated by his mother, Jessica, who is as quiet as she is cunning. When the two spend time together speaking in all sorts of languages, it’s clear that in this universe of different things, they are yet still different . . .

The introduction to Paul’s life and home—like the introduction to Arrakis, the other power players and their home planets—is a feast for the eyes. The moviemakers give us breathtakingly realistic and impressive vistas. Everything from the haze over an alien city down to the woodworking detail in a living room adds to the gravity of what we’re witnessing. This feels real. Real culture; real history; real lives at stake.

When the Atreides meet the Fremen, things do not go as smoothly as anyone would like. And complicating this is the Harkonnen, who the Emperor has chosen the Atreides to replace—and who are desperate to have their position back.

Dune is not action-packed, but boy is it an adventure. Rather like a dream that moves you, it is so real, so filled with things you recognize, and yet so very different from what you’ve experienced before.

Users

I was at a loss even as the credits ended. Users was a movie so beautiful and sad; its parts so basic but its whole so unique. Only some time later did I realize: This movie made me grateful that movies exist. It was a learning experience unlike any I have had.

Looking at the story one way, it’s nothing special. Not a story at all, in fact. Just a narrator thinking out loud about the world technology is creating for her child. Thoughts we’ve all had before.

But Momma’s musings—her questions and concerns—are not about what the next generation of cell phone might look like. She is thinking about the very core of human interaction with this container we call Earth. And she is speaking to us.

See these cold, uninviting spaces? This is life now. These iced shoeboxes are the new womb. In this factory we grow plants without soil or sunlight. All our memories and communications? Instantly accessible, everywhere, but kept on quarter-inch-thick cable surrounded by millions of gallons of murky green water at the bottom of the ocean. Good luck restarting.

In pondering what life might look like, our narrator (the director) takes the time to show us what life does look like. And in doing so she spotlights how technology has already changed the course of humanity. For example, thinking about a baby being raised by a computer without its mother’s touch is scary, but so too is a scene where hundreds of TV screens glow in the faces of airline passengers. The perspective out the window—the perspective from the miracle of flight—has become so commonplace that we ignore it. Comparisons like these are powerful and plenty.

The scenes are simple, usually static, rarely showing more than one thing to focus on at a time, and yet the movie is an overwhelming sensory experience. A masterclass in direction, editing, camera- and sound-work, music.

Sure, a minutes-long rainstorm of recycled motherboard chips will have you feeling bad about the excess of our world. But the moviemakers pass no judgement here; rather than illustrating our “forgotten” connection with nature, they remind us that it is multi-faceted and ever-changing. We pass from the warm electricity of a baby at its mother’s teat to a computer assuring its child at play in the forest that it is safe. (Computers do not forget.) Each scene is beautiful; each ultimately reminding us that we are just animals trying our best in the universe.

From beginning to end, the imagery is crisp, incisive, and breathtakingly gorgeous. Tides of life and breath, water and memory, geometry and physics take turns washing over us.

I won’t tell you to watch this before you die. If there’s anything to take away from it, it’s that watching the world around you is what’s important. But if you’d like to do that from a new perspective—or if you need a reminder of how to do so, or whether it’s even worth it—then you’ll want to add this experience to your bucket list.

Paper & Glue

Art is a racket. Unnecessary and ostentatious. When’s the last time it fed the hungry, housed the unhoused—heck, even changed a mind?

It’s easy to think this way with the world burning. Maybe even intuitive. But Paper & Glue will make you think twice about that.

A young JR sure wouldn’t have guessed it, though. Growing up in a French ghetto, he found that art did nothing for anyone. Even after taking things into his own hands—tagging his name around Paris to tell the world that yes, he had a place in it—nothing.

And yet years later, we meet JR as a world-famous artist—one who has directed a movie that spotlights the practical, positive impact which art can have. And the story is simply incredible.

JR walks up to dangerous, forgotten areas (a favela in Rio or a maximum-security prison in the United States, for example), asks the social outcasts who live there if he can photograph them, and then pastes giant posters of their black-and-white photos all over the area. These are massive exhibitions, using whole or even multiple buildings. And seeing their effect can bring you to tears.

When a widow sings; when a Swastika-faced inmate reaches across racial gang lines; when a child who walks through machine gun violence every day says that a picture makes him happy, it’s hard to deny that art changes lives. And because JR documents his projects along the way, we watch realtime photo and video reactions to it all. Normal people who usually deal with more pressing concerns now look at their lives in a different way. They are changed profoundly by these experiences.

This, together with smart storytelling and JR’s charmingly unassuming demeanor, make for an entertaining and reassuring watch. Before you say art can do no good, come take a look at this. It just might be art in its highest form.

Fear Street: Part Two - 1978

Do you study the roller coaster first, or just go for it? Isn’t the fun part getting thrown around in unexpected ways?

I think the same is true for movies. The less you know, the better. But Fear Street: Part Two - 1978 breaks that maxim; you’ll get a whole lot more out of this movie if you watch its prequel (Fear Street: Part One - 1999) first.

Duh, you’re thinking. And duh, I thought, while watching. How could I have expected more from this?

The story begins where the last one ended: Deena and her friends are plagued by an evil that they’re unsure how to defeat. So they go in search of their only hope, a woman who had encountered that same evil years ago and who seems to have survived unscathed. A good sign, right?

Not so fast, says the survivor. In a movie-long flashback, she recounts what happened to her sister and friends back at summer camp in 1978. Everything was normal until someone started acting funny. And then someone else . . .

What this movie series does right is to swell with angsty, frivolous teens. This gets us on edge—and distances us from the gravity of the situation when one of them is inevitably chopped to pieces. The story unfolds slowly but surely, and the production is of professional quality. But it’s all been done before.

The movie lives off of stale approaches: the summer camp horror, the catchy music played as ugly violence unfolds, the caricatures of people.

You’ll enjoy Fear Street: Part Two - 1978 if you’re looking for a movie solidly in your comfort zone. It has mystery, gore, and good versus evil. But because it offers nothing new, the ride has no thrills.

Fear Street: Part One - 1994

Shadyville offers no prospects . . . unless you count murder.

Deena—heck, everybody—knows this. Her small town has become a hopeless, confusing place where high schoolers make light of killers; notoriety is the closest thing to accomplishment that they can imagine. It’s almost like everyone knows, deep down, that this place has nothing for them but pain.

As Deena and her friends will soon find out, there’s a reason for that. And it’s more sinister than they ever could’ve imagined.

You’ll learn too . . . eventually. The first half of Fear Street: Part One - 1994 feels just as long as its title. While petty, unsympathetic teens vie for the most-unlikeable-human award, little else happens. That makes it hard to care about what’s going on.

But if you can sit through the nonsense, the second half will reward you with classically-inspired, professionally-produced slasher horror. Indeed, the story’s structure gets better with compounding interest: Each plot point ratchets up the entertainment value by several multiples—and as time passes, with increasing frequency.

It all begins with, well, I’ll let you take a guess. And this affects Deena especially hard now that her boo and confidant has moved to the idyllic, rival town of Sunnyvale. When teen angst puts Deena and her crew in a spooky situation, more than just human emotions are rattled. A mystery dating back years and fears is uncovered once again.

The movie is no masterpiece, but its blend of light and dark makes for a fun date night. Especially if you’re in the mood for a scare, you could do worse than to watch this flick.

Squid Game (오징어 게임)

How did you fare on the playground? Be honest with yourself.

OK, good. Now that you have an answer, it doesn’t matter. Squid Game will chew you up and spit you out regardless.

It’s a jarring, violent story—but one so inventive and compelling that you’ll see yourself in the characters even as you’re repulsed by them.

Gi-hun introduces us to it all ever so innocently. He appears to be a degenerate gambler like any other, stealing from his elderly mother here, letting down his daughter there. But then a strange thing happens.

The man is given an offer: play on a grand scale. Play a game that, with debts like yours, it would be foolish to turn down . . .

To those of us with impulse control, this would appear too good to be true. And it is.

After Gi-hun accepts, a complex mystery is presented. This game has severe rules, in a severe setting. And Gi-hun is not alone. Not at all alone.

Each episode illustrates a bit more about the game’s players and creators, but devilishly leaves us wanting more. And the game itself? Disturbingly compelling. Our playground pastimes, adultified. Nine episodes of binge-worthy, nail-biting entertainment await you.

The winner will take home a prize that does something to our animal brains. All of them. Even us viewers safely watching outside the screen know this is crazy; we know this is unfair and violent and impractical, and yet we ponder it anyway. Watch it anyway.

It’s the kind of show you desperately want to talk about with someone else. Not necessarily because it’s good, but because it taps into something universal, illustrating and examining our human strategies to this game of life.

I watched every episode of Squid Game like an addict: always high, never satisfied. Am I happy about it?

The Card Counter

That thing you don’t talk about. That thing that eats at you all the same; the one you won’t remember—but can’t forget. The worst thing that has ever happened to you.

Can you sit with it? Will you forgive?

The Card Counter recalls these painful themes. It’s a super-antihero movie that takes guts to watch. And it’s a masterpiece, one that you should watch as soon as you can.

But let’s keep it simple, silly. Like Bill. Even though he’s exceptionally good at cards, he makes sure not to win too much. The object of his game is maintaining a routine; traveling from city to city and casino to casino, counting cards each hand, each hour, each day, to pass the time. It keeps his mind off that thing . . .

As they say, though, game recognizes game. Bill is just too special to fly under the radar. When two very different people approach him for very different reasons, lives are changed forevermore.

That’s it. That’s all we need for a work that’ll go down in movie history as both brutally visceral and deeply tender.

As Bill’s routine continues with new shape, we learn more about his backstory: why he’s willing to spend his life as a gambling algorithm. The emotional masterpiece is revealed as the new acquaintances connect.

The care that was taken to create this movie is moving. Both the whole and its parts are exceptional, such that if I called any of them out, my list would probably just look like the movie’s end credits.

I am no expert. But I implore you: Please, go sit with The Card Counter, and learn.

The Father Who Moves Mountains (Tata mută munții)

What is it about those movies which we know are good—but that we still don’t like?

Take The Father Who Moves Mountains. It’s a stirring character study with an inescapable draw: Once his son goes missing on a mountain, Mircea does all he can to find him. We can’t help but root for a win here, and the suggestive title keeps our interest piqued.

This setup, though disconcerting, moves us. Mircea’s ex-wife; his current, pregnant wife; his son’s (also missing) girlfriend and her family; the rescue team—every one of these characters is in a limbo, and we feel for them.

Indeed, smart writing has given us a metaphor of what we all know and fear: parents can’t protect their children forever; people cannot protect themselves foralways; humans are smart and resourceful, but even their most capable cannot defeat nature’s long arc.

It sounds a downer, but our natural optimism keeps the story compelling. What might the latest search uncover? What sorts of tricks does Mircea have up his sleeve this time? And about that, who the heck is this guy anyway? What does he do when he’s not on a manhunt . . . or cheating on his wives?

This one-two punch of mortality and unsavory protagonist is actually refreshing. This is thoughtful construction which makes you think, and it’s what makes the movie good.

But it does not save the day. The movie remains a downer, and some of its other aspects frustrate in a far less constructive way. If you’re a woman in this story, you are mentioned only in relation to motherly duties; rarely discussed, rarely viewed, you’re just a pawn in a man’s storyline. Mircea’s power to move mountains (so to speak) is not explained or justified. And the ending, though successful in proving a point, feels more like a nail in a coffin than a satisfying resolution.

Vivo

Has your life gone the way you thought it would?

Or does it sometimes feel like you’re just a monkey, flailing around in a complicated world? Well, Vivo can relate with the latter.

OK, he’s a kinkajou, not a monkey. Irrelevant! What matters is that he can sing and dance! Along with friend Andres, he busks at the local plaza. Connection and fulfillment in sunny Havana, Cuba; what’s not to love?!

A letter. A letter written by someone from Andres’s past, asking him to travel all the way to the United States. The old man is ready for this, probably his last big adventure. But Vivo is not. His world was once big and scary, before he found meaning in Andres and his music, and he’s not ready to lose either.

But life happens, doesn’t it? Vivo finds himself journeying alone to Miami, and in doing so, re-learning what it means to engage with his surroundings.

It’s a sweet story, and very often funny. This world is colorful; its animation, in that sweet spot between campy and hyperrealistic. And though a cute, singing animal can do no wrong, Vivo’s friend-along-the-way Gabi, played by Ynairaly Simo, steals the show. Not only is her character (arc) adorable and instructive, Ynairaly’s performance hits high notes across the emotional spectrum.

Music, of course, rounds out the movie. The songwriting is recognizably modern (and recognizably Lin-Manuel Miranda), though rooted firmly in its Afro-Cuban inspiration.

Vivo’s earliest scenes may be on the nose, but that doesn’t bog it down. It’s an energetic, fun family movie—and one whose best parts, funnily enough, are its heavier scenes. When the music stops and the hard work of feeling begins, characters and audience alike have a chance to reflect.

So what if life doesn’t always go the way you thought it would? If it did, how could it ever be better than you had imagined?