The Edge of Seventeen – A Bittersweet and Sarcastic Exploration of Teenage Self-Discovery

In her directorial debut, Kelly Fremon Craig has nailed the awkward world of teenage angst in The Edge of Seventeen.  Starring Academy Award Nominee Hailee Steinfeld, this coming-of-age film showcases some incredible acting talent, a real command of language, a distinctive comedic voice, and strong plotting elements.  Though that peculiar brand of teenage ennui is apparent, there is an undeniable emotion and heart at the core of this story.  Sometimes sad and angry, other times exalted and jubilant – and then right back to sad and angry, The Edge of Seventeen belongs right beside the classic coming-of-age films for portraying the challenge of growing up with practically perfect execution.

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“Nocturnal Animals”: a Story-within-a-Story of Weakness and Betrayal

Nocturnal Animals is fashion designer Tom Ford’s second feature film as both writer and director, and once again he has delivered a nuanced film full of emotion, sadness, and intrigue.  Starring Amy Adams and Jake Gyllenhaal, the film is a peculiar mixture of crime thriller and relationship melodrama, married through an inventive “story-within-a-story” structural device:   the main character reads a manuscript of her ex-husband’s novel, and the film’s narrative ping-pongs between the real world and the world of the novel.  As the procedural story unravels in the novel, we learn more about the relationship between these two characters in multiple flashbacks.

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“Manchester by the Sea” Devastates through Inescapable Tragedy

“But there are dreams that cannot be, and there are storms we cannot weather”

— Fantine, Les Miserables

Kenneth Lonergan’s Manchester by the Sea is a gut-punch of a film dressed up in the doldrums of everyday life.  On the surface, the plot is universal and relatable:  a man returns back to his hometown on account of the sudden death of his older brother, and must make the arrangements and look after his nephew in the aftermath.  There is surprising wit and humor in the story, heavily sarcastic and ball-busting, and it helps to offset at least some of the sadness.  Because a darker and sadder mystery bubbles up through off-hand comments, whispers, and flashbacks.  This non-linear storytelling method is used intelligently and sparingly, and suffices to wrench maximal emotional devastation from the audience.  The result is a wonderful but sad film that can count itself as one of the best of the year.

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The Tell-All Trailer Ruins Robert Zemeckis’s Lukewarm “Allied”

Sometime in the near future, someone is going to stumble upon Allied in a Redbox or on a premium cable channel, have no idea what it is about, and end up liking the movie just fine.  Brad Pitt and Marion Cotillard turn in reasonable performances, there is a surprising amount of detail to the plotting, and the ending is reasonable (if a little slap-dash; endings are hard).  Unfortunately, this movie is absolutely ruined by its trailer.  Of course, explaining why means delving into some pretty serious spoilers myself, which will also ruin the movie, but Allied isn’t so great to begin with, so it is no real crime there.  In fact, I can think of at least two spy movies starring Brad Pitt that are better than Allied (Spy Game and Inglourious Basterds; and yes it is).

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“Loving” is a Restrained and Triumphant Challenge of True Institutional Racism

In Loving, Writer-director Jeff Nichols expertly relays the real-life story of Mildred and Richard Loving, the couple who were prosecuted under Virginia’s interracial marriage laws which and led to the watershed case in the Supreme Court Loving v. Virginia in 1967.  In a story fraught with such racial tensions and the potential for ugly subject matter, the major triumph of Nichols’s film is in how it remains reserved and above any kind of melodrama.  There is a patient, quiet quality to this story, and Nichols and his actors positively revel in it.  From the tone and themes of the film, to the pacing and muted performances, Loving takes its cue from the seriousness and maturity of its eponymous main characters.  The result is a grown-up historical drama revealing the more subtle horrors of institutional racism and the power that love and freedom have to combat it.

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“Moonlight” is a Masterpiece of the Romantic Art School

Barry Jenkins’s film Moonlight is a Romantic masterpiece of the highest order.  It is a comprehensive exultation of self-discovery told in three sections, each detailing the events in the life of Chiron, a black gay boy growing up in the Liberty Square projects of Miami, Florida.  The three parts show Chiron at different ages:  as a young boy in part one (“Little”), a teenager in part two (“Chiron”), and a young man in part three (“Black”), and each version of Chiron is portrayed by a different actor.  Chiron’s life is full of hardship, as he is forced to deal with growing up poor, navigating the minefield of his mother’s drug abuse problem, and his burgeoning homosexuality.  The chapters of Moonlight add up to a magnificent and timeless whole:  a complex elucidation of a man and the choices he makes in effort to learn about himself, the world, and his place in it.

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“American Honey” – A Strong and Sweet Hybrid Stuffed with Singular Style

In American Honey, writer-director Andrea Arnold crafts a coming-of-age story about teenage wanderlust that practically feels like a documentary.  The film is a peculiar slice of life, both immersive and engrossing, and while watching it you feel as though you are just another member of the rag-tag crew.  The camerawork and a score driven by pop music enhance the realism of the film.  The story focuses around a group of young people who sell magazine subscriptions door-to-door.  Full of an ensemble cast of mostly non-actors, American Honey wanders through life with dubious morals, sexual and emotional exploration, and the pace of a buddy road trip movie – just with about a dozen buddies.

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Mira Nair’s “Queen of Katwe” is a Vibrant and Inspirational Metaphor

Disney’s Queen of Katwe appears to follow the standard formula of sports movie:  take an underdog (bonus points for a disadvantaged upbringing) and chart their rise to the top ranks until they overcome some snooty favorite.  Mira Nair’s film distinguishes itself through peerless acting, a vibrant but patient setting, and consistent application of its chosen sport as thematic metaphor.   The film focuses on a young, poor female chess prodigy from Uganda named Phiona Mutesi (Madina Nalwanga).  Throughout the story, chess is used as a mechanism for improvement and a way to escape her situation.  Ultimately, Queen of Katwe champions the intellect of individuals, and shows us a world where young girls and boys can apply that intellect to improve their lives.

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Oliver Stone’s Snowden Explores a Reticent Hero in an Age of Surveillance

Oliver Stone’s latest iconoclastic biopic, Snowden, is a stunning exploration of personal liberties, journalistic integrity, and demonization of the whistleblower.  Stone minces no words and makes his position clear:  for revealing the extent to which the US government was spying on its own citizenry at great personal risk, Edward Snowden is a hero.  Hence, Stone is primarily occupied with humanizing Snowden, and his casting of Joseph Gordon-Levitt is a step in the right direction.  The film also exploits a parallel narrative structure to simultaneously tell the story of his life and the few days when he provided classified information to journalists in a Hong Kong hotel room.  The result is a film which brilliantly characterizes Edward Snowden, his changing worldview, and the choices that made him infamous.

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Nate Parker’s “The Birth of a Nation” Seeks a Spiritual Deliverance from Racial Injustice

Nate Parker’s The Birth of a Nation is a remarkable piece of cinema, especially from a first-timer.  Parker controls this entire endeavor as writer, director, producer, and also stars as the slave Nat Turner.  This is a powerful but sad film, though there is a kernel of hope at its center that Parker tries to work from.  Based on a the real-life slave revolt led by Nat Turner in the early 1830s, the film offers incredible acting, but suffers slightly from narrative issues and some muddled thematic material.  Of course, Parker takes some poetic license with the actual history, and while some of these help the story, others are more egregious and unnecessary.  The most definitive aspect of the film is its profound spirituality, which Parker leans heavily on for dramatic justification of Turner’s rebellion, and also as the source of his leadership.  Indeed, this is a film about not only racial injustice, but spiritual deliverance.  Parker is sometimes lost with exactly where to focus the rebellious spirit, but these small mistakes cannot mar the overall poignancy of his message.

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