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weekendwarriorblog · 5 years

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WHAT TO WATCH THIS WEEKEND July 26, 2019 - ONCE UPON A TIME … IN HOLLYWOOD, SKIN

Gonna try to make this a lighter column this week since I’m still recovering from a combination of Comic-Con and the heat wave that struck New York last weekend.

Of course, the big movie of the weekend is Quentin Tarantino’s ONCE UPON A TIME IN… HOLLYWOOD (Sony), which has such an amazing concept and trailer and cast that I’m not sure what more I can say about it besides my review below. It does have an amazing cast led by Brad Pitt, Leonardo DiCaprio and Margot Robbie with an amazing supporting cast around them. Oh, just read the review…

My Once Upon a Time… Review

Plus you can read more about the movie’s box office prospects over at The Beat.

LIMITED RELEASES

The one limited release I do recommend is Guy Nattiv’s SKIN (A24/DirecTV), which premiered at the Toronto Film Festival last year and then played Tribeca earlier this year. It stars Jamie Bell as the heavily-tattooed Bryon “Babs” Widner, a violent white supremacist part of a Midwest group led by Vera Farmiga and Bill Camp. When Bryon meets a single mother of three girls played by Danielle Macdonald (Patti Cake$), he starts to realize that his dangerous violent and racist actions are destroying him, so he turns to Mike Colter as a FBI agent looking to turn white supremacists, to save him. Based on the true story of Bryon, who actually did try to get out of the white supremacist ring and had all his tattoos removed surgically. Nattiv is a really talented filmmaker, and if his name or the title of the movie sounds familiar, that’s because he won the Oscar for live action short earlier this year for a semi-related movie with the same title. More importantly, the film marks a career best for Bell, who just carries himself so differently that it’s hard to believe that it’s the same actor who played Bernie Taupin in Rocketman. I definitely recommend seeking this one out in select theaters and On Demand this Friday.

Also, I’ll have an interview with Jamie Bell over at The Beatlater this week and another one with director Guy Nattiv over at Next Best Picture very soon, as well.

There are a number of great docs to check out this week, but one definitely worth checking out is Avi Belkin’s MIKE WALLACE IS HERE (Magnolia), which looks at the controversial career of newsman and interviewer who helped make CBS’s “60 Minutes” one of the hottest news programs on television even while being persecuted for his “Gotcha” tactics with some of the great world leaders. This is a fantastic doc that’s assembled from a lot of archival footage of Wallace’s interview as well as a more recent conversation with his “60 Minutes” co-host Morly Safer.sIt opens at the Landmark at 57 Streetand Angelika in New York on Friday, as well as L.A. Landmark 12 and then expands to other citieson August 2.

Another doc that’s more cinema verité but still interesting is Ljubomir Stefanov & Tamara Kotevska’s HONEYLAND (NEON), which follows a woman named Hatidze, living in the mountains of Macedonia with her ailing mother who makes a living with beekeeping, a practice that runs into issue when a family moves in next door to her who threatens her livelihood. It opens at the Quad Cinemain New York

Now, we get to the movies I haven’t had a chance to see just yet…

I do want to see Waad al-Kateab and Edward Watts’s FOR SAMA (PBS Distribution), which trades Waad’s life through five years of the Aleppo uprising in Syria, as she falls in love, gets married and gives birth with the conflict around her. It’s told as a message to Waad’s daughter Sama.

Entertainment and The Comedy director Rick Alverson’s The Mountain (Kino Lorber/Vice Studios)starring Jeff Goldblum and Tye Sheridan opens at the IFC Center in New York and Landmark Nuart in L.A. Friday. Sheridan plays an introverted photographer in the ‘50s who joins a legendary lobotomist (Goldblum) on a tour to promote the doctor’s procedure, becoming enamored with a young woman played by Hannah Gross. The movie also stars Denis Lavant and Udo Kier, and I hope to check it out although I have not been a fan of Alverson’s work up until now.

Opening at New York’s Village East Friday and in L.A. at the Laemmle Music Hall is Benjamin Gilmour’s Jirga starring Sam Smith – no, not the singer – as an Australian soldier who returns to his village after being accused of war crimes, so he puts his life at the mercy of the village’s justice system, the Jirga.

James Longley’s documentary Angels are Made of Light (Grasshopper Films), opening at New York’s Film Forum Wednesday, follows three Afghan brothers in war-ton Kabul.

Caper Van Diem from Starship Troopers stars in Chris Helton’s Dead Water (Lionsgate/Saban Films) a man who invites a friend and his beautiful wife onto his new yacht so they can relax, which leads to a deadly game once they’re boarded by a modern-day pirate. It opens in select theaters and On Demand.

David Mahmoudieh’s See You Soon (Vertical) is a love story between a US soccer star with a career-threatening injury who has a romance with a Russian single mother.

Opening at the IFC Center in New York is Austrian filmmaker Marie Kreutzer’s psychological thriller The Ground Beneath My Feet (Strand Releasing) about a woman named Lola (Valerie Pachner, winner of the Maguery Prize), who is trying to succeed in the business world while having a secret relationship with her boss Elise and dealing with her older sister’s mental illness, which leads to a suicide attempt.

STREAMING AND CABLE

Karim Amer and Jehane Noujaim’s doc The Great Hack looks at the data company Cambridge Analytica and how it used social media to try to affect (successfully) the 2016 U.S. Presidential election. It streams on Netflix starting Wednesday

Netflix also has three new foreign films streaming this week:

Olivier Afonso’s Girls with Balls is a French horror-comedy about a women’s volleyball team who are terrorized by a group of hunters while stranded in the woods. Sebastian Schindel’s Spanish psychological thriller El Hijo (The Son)is about a 50-year-old painter who is getting ready to have a baby with his new wife until she becomes obsessed with the baby isolating him. From Spain comes Jorge M. Fontana’s Boiabout a chauffeur who drives two Chinese businessmen around Barcelona and getting caught up in an adventure with them.

Also, the 7thseason of Orange is the New Black – 7thSeason!? Man, I need to catch up – debuts on Friday.

I’m pretty excited thatThe Boys series is beginning on Amazon Prime on Friday, cause I generally like the work of Garth Ennis and artist Darick Robertson, even though I never got as into this Dynamite series as much as I should have.

REPERTORY

METROGRAPH (NYC):

Japanese actor Machiko Kyō, who passed away in May at the age of 95, gets a full-on retrospective running through August 1. I’ve seen Akira Kurosawa’s Rashomonand maybe a couple others but this is mostly focusing on her ‘50s work, including Ozu’s Floating Weeds, and I might have to try to check some of these out. Metrograph is also opening a restoration of Rob Nillson’s 1996 film Chalk, a drama centered around a pool hall with Nillson in person on Friday and Saturday nights. This week’s Late Nites at Metrograph is Pedro Almodovar’s excellent 1989 film Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!starring Antonio Banderas, whilePlaytime: Family Matinees is screening George Stevens’ 1953 Western Shane.

THE NEW BEVERLY (L.A.):

Well, it looks like Tarantino has decided to use his own theater to show Once Upon a Time in… Hollywood day and night through the end of the month and most of those shows are sold out so… The couple exceptions are Weds afternoon’s screening of the James Bond movie You Only Live Twice, the Weds. night George Hamilton double feature of Evel Knievel (1971) and Jack of Diamonds (1967), the weekend’s KIDDEE MATINEE of Herbie Fully Loaded (yes, the 2005 movie starring Lindsay Lohan) and then Martin Scorsese’s The Aviator(2004) on Monday afternoon.

FILM FORUM (NYC):

The Forum’s amazing Burt Lancaster retrospective continues this weekend with classics like The Sweet Smell of Success (1957) and From Here to Eternity (1953) on Friday, as well as Criss Cross (1949)on Saturday/Sunday and Luchino Visconti’s The Leopard (1963) on Sunday. Monday is a 1948 double feature of All My Sons &Sorry Wrong Number, while Tuesday is double features of The Crimson Pirate (1952) and Jacques Tournuer’s The Flame and the Arrow (1950). Also the restoration of Robert Siodmak’s The Killers (1946)has been extended for select screenings starting Friday.

EGYPTIAN THEATRE (LA):

On Thursday, this week’s installment of “Highballs and Screwballs” is His Girl Friday (1940) with Call Northside 777 (1948). On Friday, Helen Slater Jr. will be on hand for a double feature of Superman (1978) with Supergirl (1984). Saturday sees a six-film “Warner Bros. Horror/Sci-Fi Marathon” of House on Haunted Hill (1958), The Thing from Another World (1951), Tod Browning’s Freaks (1932),Them! (1954), The Haunting (1953) and Jacques Tourneur’s Cat People(1942) – some real classics in there.

QUAD CINEMA (NYC):

I got to watch three of the six movies in the “Fresh Meat: Giallo Restorations Part II” over the weekend and you can still see a few of them over the next couple days.

IFC CENTER (NYC)

Starting Friday and running through August 15, the IFC Center is running Abbas Kiorastami: A Retrospective (Janus Films), the most comprehensive retrospective of the late Iranian filmmaker with film critic Godfrey Chesire doing a few discussions of Kiorastami’s work including the World Premiere of a restoration of his “Koker Trilogy” AND the theater is offering special Ticket Packs, so you can plan on seeing multiple films in the series.

FILM OF LINCOLN CENTER (NYC):

This is Cinema Now: 21st Century Debuts continues through the end of the month with a number of highlights including Saturday night’s double feature of Jordan Peele’s Get Out and Jennifer Kent’s The Babadook. (Oddly, Ms. Kent’s second feature The Nightingaleopens next week!)

BAM CINEMATEK (NYC):

I’m going to try to write about BAM’s new series We Can’t Even: Millennials on Film without snickering or being snarky, mainly because I can’t believe it’s taken so long for one of these rep/arthouses to do something like this. Running from July 24 through August 6, the line-up is actually pretty impressive in terms of recent movies, ranging from Natalie Portman’s Vox Lux to the Oscar-winning Moonlight, Greta Gerwig’s Lady Bird, Sofia Coppola’s The Bling Ring, David Fincher’s The Social Network and much more.

Actually, my bud Jordan Hoffman wrote a story on this series for AM New York if you need any more convincing.

MUSEUM OF THE MOVING IMAGE (NYC):

Astoria’s premiere arthouses continues the series “Barbara Hammer: Superdyke” through the weekend, and they’re showing the Oscar-nominated animated film The Secret of the Kellsthrough the weekend. This weekend also is a series called “Verneuil Populaire: Vintage Thrillers from France’s Genre Maestro” which includes The Sicilian Clan (1969) on Friday, A Monkey in Winter (1962) and two more on Saturday, and The Burglars (1971) and Fear over the City (1975) on Sunday.

ROXY CINEMA (NYC)

Wednesday night is another screening of The Fearless Vampire Killers (1967), starring Roman Polanski and Sharon Tate – the film on which they met – plus Friday and Sunday, the Roxy is showing Valley of the Dolls (1967), also starring Tate. Could this be meant as a tie-in to Tarantino’s film? Could be…

LANDMARK THEATRES NUART (LA):

Friday’s midnight movie is Steven Spielberg’s Jurassic Park.

AEROin L.A. and MOMAin New York are both going through renovations.

Next week… Fast and Furious Presents: Hobbs and Shaw!

#WhatToWatchThisWeekend #Movies OnceUPonATimeInHollywood Skin

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chrisoncinema · 7 years

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The Year in Review: Top Ten Films of 2017

Well, we made it. We survived. Before getting into this list, I'd like to thank everyone who read, shared, or commented on one of my posts or videos this past year. It was a pretty monumental year for this blog and for my cinematic journey. I didn't go into 2017 with a plan to revive this blog but I'm happy I did. I ended up thinking about this very list for most of the year; giving me time to rediscover my love for movies and an excuse to watch way more movies than I otherwise would have. So let's get to the movies, shall we? This list is not a definitive, quantitative, or objective ranking of the films released this year. Rather, it is a rough sketch of the movies I enjoyed seeing the most. The movies that moved me, surprised me, or stuck with me. You can see my previous post for a listing of movies I missed and movies that didn't make it into my top ten. I hesitate to call these my ten "favorites" because, if you ask me in three months what my favorite movies from 2017 are, the list might look quite different. For today, though, I hope it provides something new, forgotten, or overlooked that you can take with you as we head into the new year. 10. It Comes At Night

In an apocalyptic near-future, a mixed-race family must protect their home and their health from foreign threats. Of all the horror movies I saw this year, It Comes at Night was the one I could never get out of my head. Whether director Trey Shults intended it or not, It Comes at Night became a meditation on many of the ills that plague America in 2017: from the failure of white saviors to a tribal and territorial fear of “the other.” What made the film feel special was its simplicity and focus. Shults was not interested in world-building or mythologizing. Without the visual formalism of The Killing of a Sacred Deer or the loaded narrative commentary found in Get Out and mother!, It Comes at Night is its own survival kit: stripped down to the bare essentials, without the fanfare or gloss of over-production. This is a movie with lace-up boots and dirt under its nails. A movie that, above all, feels like its about real characters who react uniquely to new conflicts and discoveries.

Joel Edgerton, whose face I admittedly often forget, gives one of his best performances. His family, played by Carmen Ejogo and Kelvin Harrison Jr. (who were both new to me) were standouts, and small parts by Riley Keough and Christopher Abbott (two of the greatest actors in the indie scene, Keough especially) round out the great cast. Throughout the movie I was reminded of Alien, another horror film that takes place in a claustrophobic environment, where it is just as interesting to watch all the characters converse as it is to see them get attacked by a giant space bug. Many people were let down by the absence of a horror they thought was implied in the title “It Comes at Night.” But, like Alien, they’re missing the trees for the forest. This is a human drama. What makes the film horrifying is its plausibility. Hell? Other people. What comes at night? Darkness, paranoia, emptiness. It doesn’t get scarier than that.

9. The Death of Louis XIV

Moving even smaller in scale, The Death of Louis XIV is a sad, funny, beautiful chamber-piece starring the one and only Jean-Pierre Léaud. Truthfully, a big part of what makes the film so enjoyable is the meta-narrative trip that comes with this casting. Léaud began his career at age 14 starring in one of the most influential films of the French New Wave, Francois Truffaut’s The 400 Blows. He is, quite literally, French cinema royalty and, though Léaud himself is only 73, this feels like his great swan song. As always, Léaud manages to be both funny and tragic; equal parts ornery and charming.

The film's lofty title may not seem like the most exciting or accessible subject matter but, while stuffiness abounds, there is simply too much to enjoy in this film to pass up and I’m shocked that more people aren’t talking about it. The cinematography is some of the best this year: every single shot looks like a candlelit oil painting. The blacks are endless, the reds are velvety, and the golds are radiant. Is the movie slow? Yes, absolutely. But I, for one, enjoyed drinking with the King, scheming with his advisers, and laughing at each new, ridiculous wig that appears on screen.

8. Lady Bird

As with every new work that seems to be receiving undue or hyperbolic praise, I was highly skeptical of Lady Bird before finally seeing it. So let’s start with all the ways I was right. This is a coming-of-age story and it contains all the usual suspects: a fast-talking, strong-willed protagonist who still has a lot to learn about how the world actually works; parents who just want the best for the protagonist who have trouble communicating with her and with each other; a quirky best friend who is briefly tossed aside while the protagonist tries to be popular; and a concluding event that reminds the protagonist of some little piece of wisdom that was dropped along the way. Despite all of this narrative predictability, there’s something undeniable about Lady Bird. It works because of the characters that writer/director Greta Gerwig has crafted. An incredibly gifted, funny performer in her own right, Gerwig understands that no relationship is black and white. The best scenes feature Saoirse Ronan’s titular Lady Bird and her mother, played by Laurie Metcalf. Though their relationship is often contentious, at a moment’s notice the two act like the best of friends. They are too similar to be compatible and yet it is this resemblance that keeps them together. If that’s not an accurate, human depiction of mother-daughter relationships, I don’t know what is. In the end, Lady Bird is endearing, warm, and human – genuinely funny and genuinely moving. Gerwig didn’t reinvent the coming-of-age dramedy, but she came close to perfecting it.

7. After the Storm

If you enjoyed the familial drama of Lady Bird, I highly recommend watching the criminally ignored Japanese film After the Storm. The movie centers on a dead-beat, divorced dad trying to reconnect with his young son and ex-wife – well, kind of trying. The film’s lead, Hiroshi Abe, is basically Gob Bluth from Arrested Development: he’s lazy and selfish but is able to skate by on his charm, social flexibility, and a bit of self-deprecation. Like Lady Bird, After the Storm is full of complex, three-dimensional characters, tenuous family dynamics, and lived-in wisdom that never feels hacky. Hirokazu Kore-eda shoots the film without pretension, keeping a careful eye on the little details of everyday life. It doesn’t have the pep of an American dramedy so many viewers might find their minds starting to wander but, like 2016’s Paterson or Kore-eda’s predecessor Yasujiro Ozu, After the Storm has a lot to offer if you’re in a receptive mood. Pair with tea and a rainy day (a monsoon, if you’ve got it).

6. Good Time

Good Time is a travelling carnival. It’s a fever-dream that feels familiar even though you never know exactly what you’re going to see. The music and lights are dizzying, the air is full of weed, sweat, and old cigarettes, and everyone is inexplicably dressed like it’s the 90s. Need I say more?

I didn’t know what to expect from Good Time having seen none of the Safdie Brothers’ earlier films, but I was intrigued by the trailer. The film did not disappoint. Beginning with a bank heist gone bad, Good Time is the story of two brothers played by Robert Pattinson and Benny Safdie. As many have noted, the film owes a lot to the 1970s cinema of Scorsese and Lumet but there’s an immediacy to the filming that feels unmistakably modern. Just when the gritty realism sinks in, the movie blasts into space thanks to a bold score from experimental producer Daniel Lopatin (aka Oneohtrix Point Never). It’s one of the best scores of the year, featuring a gut-wrenching, original song from Lopatin and Iggy Pop. The cinematography is equally manic: mid-winter greys mix with neon lights and vibrant reds. The Safdies keep their camera dangerously tight – detailing the desperation on a nearly-unrecognizable Robert Pattinson (and we’ll see him again before this list is over). Twilight? Never heard of it. You’re witnessing a movie star – a direct descendent of Pacino or De Niro. Good Time is grimy, thrilling, and occasionally very funny. Like all carnival rides, I went home feeling nauseous, head-pounding, and in need of a tetanus shot.

5. Columbus

Columbus is a movie so personal to me that I can barely talk about it objectively – I kind of feel like I made it (but I can assure you I did not). The first feature by video essayist Koganada, Columbus is a movie about love, loss, and architecture so genuine it makes (500) Days of Summer look like the sloppy, insincere mess that it is. The film’s success is largely due to its two leads: Haley Lu Richardson, who I had never seen before but fell in love with immediately, and John Cho who is now, unarguably, a leading man. The third star of the film is modern architecture by the likes of Eliel and Eero Saarinen, I.M. Pei, and SOM.

Without giving away too much, Richardson’s Casey is a student who meets Cho’s Jin, a visitor to Columbus, Indiana: architectural mecca of the Midwest. Many of you don’t (and couldn’t) know that I went to school to study architecture. I, like Jin, skeptically engaged with bright, young minds like Casey and questioned what architecture really meant to culture, to a city, and to me. Why does architecture matter? That’s a question I’m still answering but I can tell you this: we need spaces of reflection, communion, and discourse. The best architecture provides that. Columbus is the proof. I’m so pleased that this film has made a number of year-end lists. It’s a little film about a simple story and, like the best architecture, I look forward to exploring it again.

4. Nocturama

Nocturama is perplexing, modern, and gripping from the first minute. Nocturama is the story of a small group of French radicals who plan a coordinated attack on Paris. Nocturama asks a lot of questions – Who are these people? How did they meet? Why did they choose to become terrorists? – but if you’re looking for answers, look elsewhere.

What makes Nocturamaso exciting is the immediate immersion in the intricacies of the plot. There is no Ocean’s Eleven-style voiceover guiding you through the plan, no diatribe or manifesto to take in, just the cold, hard act. Bertrand Bonello’s ensemble piece is a commentary on luxury, privilege, and the rebellious naiveté of youth. It’s also impossibly cool: our anti-heroes smoke, dance, and listen to pop music. They’re kids – just like the ones on your street, in your school, at your mall – and that’s what makes the film so challenging, scary, and dangerous. It’s easy to characterize terrorism as a foreign offense. Nocturama doesn’t want to be easy but if you’re not careful, it might seduce you. Nocturama lights a fuse and dares you to enjoy the flames. Either way, your palms will be sweating.

3. The Lost City of Z

I’ve been critical of James Gray’s big, melodramatic films in the past but with his most recent work, I finally got it. The Lost City of Z stars Charlie Hunnam – in what is far-and-away his best performance – as Percy Fawcett, a 20th century explorer searching the Amazon for the titular city of Z. It’s hard to describe exactly why this film works so well. Like the old epics of David Lean, we follow Fawcett from his humble beginnings as a promising, young military officer, we learn and struggle with him, we return with him, after his numerous expeditions, to see his family growing and changing.

The Lost City of Z offers a whole lot to take in and it’s a testament to the editing that this 141 minute voyage moves along as breezily as it does while also never feeling rushed. What helps keep the story going is breathtaking camera work by cinematographer Darius Khondji and a great cast that includes Sienna Miller, Robert Pattinson, Tom Holland, and Ian McDiarmid. Films like this don’t feel like they should exist anymore – The Lost City of Z is sprawling and beautiful but also quite smart: evoking questions of colonialism, masculinity, and the personal price of one’s work. It’s not perfect, but it’s a rare gem in a field of plastic.

2. Personal Shopper

Personal Shopper was one of the most unique theater-going experiences for me in 2017. It was a Wednesday evening when I spontaneously decided to drive half an hour to the only theater showing Olivier Assayas’ latest film. It was playing in a single auditorium – and a small one at that. I arrived early, as I always do, and waited for the few other moviegoers to trickle in. But they never did. And so I was treated to a personal screening of one of my favorite movies of the year. A movie that, rather fittingly, serves as a meditation for loneliness, isolation, and the vulnerability of predation.

Personal Shopper stars Kristen Stewart as a self-proclaimed medium trying to make contact with her deceased twin brother. Less of a horror film and more a dramatic character study, if you were ever doubtful of Stewart’s acting chops, this film should convince you. I was completely transfixed by her performance. She, and I say this without a hint of irony, is our James Dean. Sporting a leather jacket and a cool, androgynous demeanor, Stewart’s Maureen Cartwright is everyone who has ever slouched with hands stuffed deep in their pockets, anyone whose hands have shaken from an unexpected text message, anyone who’s had the eerie feeling of being watched by someone just out of reach. Personal Shopper is all about atmosphere: chilling, evocative, and sensual. I suppose I understand how people looking for plot-points found this film messy and inaccessible. As for me, though, I’ll be chasing the specter of that first screening. Going to the movies is a kind of séance and I’m thankful to Olivier Assayas for showing us a visionary Kristen Stewart.

1. Dunkirk

I know it’s basically a cliché to even talk about Christopher Nolan at this point, but this is where we find ourselves. NOLAN. BROS. FOREVER. Christopher Nolan doesn’t just make films as if each one is the last he’ll make. He makes films as if they’re the last film that will ever be made. Dunkirk is an absolute spectacle and it is, by far, Nolan’s best work to date.

As I’ve discussed before, Nolan came to prominence at the same time I was discovering film. I was in awe of The Dark Knight and Inception when they came out, but by the time The Dark Knight Rises and Interstellar were released, my fan-boy-dom had faded. Interstellar is a very good but very flawed movie. It wants so badly to capture the humanity of early Spielberg and the grandeur of Kubrick but, sadly, fails to reach either. Still, the best decision Nolan ever made was swapping out his longtime cinematographer Wally Pfister for Hoyte Van Hoytema. Van Hoytema, who has done great work with the likes of Tomas Alfredson and Spike Jonze, brought a much needed flair for richness to Nolan’s pragmatic sensibilities. With Dunkirk, finally, there is a rich screenplay to match.

It seems Nolan actually listened to the critics who, for years, decried his overly-expositional dialogue and choppy editing. Dunkirk, not unlike Kubrick’s 2001 is pure visual storytelling. The difference is that Nolan was still determined to tell an intimate, human story and, calling upon the cinema gods from Murnau to Hitchcock, he did it.

There was no cinematic experience more breathtaking this year than seeing Dunkirk in IMAX. The sound design is so fierce and the score is so relentless it felt like a deep tissue massage for my brain. I left the theater after each successive viewing feeling invigorated in a way no film has affected me before. Nolan has always tried to make films that could capture the attention and imagination of any viewer (that’s why it was so important for this film to have a PG-13 rating) and he finally did it. The structural experimentation that Nolan was known for from the start is used here to turn the entire film into one of his signature, cross-cut sequences: one long, thrilling crescendo. And he did it all, God bless him, in under two hours.

Nolan-mainstays Tom Hardy and Cillian Murphy are as cool as they’ve ever been, and seasoned pros Mark Rylance and Kenneth Branagh bring much-needed warmth and pathos, but the film belongs to the new faces that Nolan introduces: Fionn Whitehead, Aneurin Barnard, Tom Glynn-Carney, Barry Keoghan, and, of course, Harry Styles. They are the young men who have history thrust upon them – dropped into a giant, dangerous world with the weight of a nation on their shoulders. And they fail. They fail their mission and, occasionally, they fail each other. They return home distraught, ashamed, and confused.

“All we did was survive,” they say.

“That’s enough.”

Perseverance is noble. Support is bravery. Survival is victory. That’s Dunkirk’s message. It’s the one we needed this year.

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