Non-fiction

Movies to See Right Now

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THEY SHALL NOT GROW OLD

Wow, I gotta say that the offerings in movie theaters this August/September are as unappealing as I can remember, even for this period of traditional cinematic doldrums. There are a couple of good indies that I’ve seen coming to art houses in mid-September, but that’s about it until October.

However, now is a good time to catch up on films from my list of Best Movies of 2019 – So Far. The Last Black Man in San Francisco, They Shall Not Grow Old, Amazing Grace and Booksmart are all available to be streamed.

OUT NOW

  • Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood is a Must See – one of Quentin Tarantino’s very, very best.
  • The family dramedy The Farewell is an audience-pleaser.
  • You can find, if you look hard enough, Jirga, an indie parable about atonement that was Australia’s submission to the Academy Awards.
  • Bay Area filmmaker John Maringouin’s inventive satire Ghostbox Cowboy, skewers white entitlement and sneaks a peek inside the shadiest corners of the Chinese boom economy. Ghostbox Cowboy earned a NY Times Critic’s Pick and can be streamed on Amazon (included with Prime).
  • Here’s my rant on the latest Olivier Assayas film, Non-Fiction.

ON VIDEO

My Stream of the Week is the cautionary documentary Jimmy Carter – about the American people asking for something that they didn’t warm to once they got it. To stream Jimmy Carter from iTunes, search for “Jimmy Carter” under TV Episodes (not under Movies). Jimmy Carter is also available on DVD from American Experience. 

ON TV

On September 10, Turner Classic Movies will be airing the 1940 version of Gaslight. Here is my essay on the movie versions of Gaslight and gaslighting as domestic violence, including a reference to the Film Noir Foundation’s fine podcast on the topic.

Ingrid Bergman and Charles Boyer in GASLIGHT

Movies to See Right Now

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Leonardo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt in ONCE UPON A TIME…IN HOLLYWOOD

Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood is a marvelously entertaining masterpiece. I’m just going to keep beating this drum until I run out of friends who haven’t seen it yet (including The Wife).

OUT NOW

  • Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood is a Must See – one of Quentin Tarantino’s very, very best.
  • The family dramedy The Farewell is an audience-pleaser.
  • You can find, if you look hard enough, Jirga, an indie parable about atonement that was Australia’s submission to the Academy Awards.
  • Here’s my rant on the latest Olivier Assayas film, Non-Fiction.

ON VIDEO

My Stream of the Week is The East, a smart and gripping thriller that explores both our response to corporate criminality and the unfamiliar world of anarchist collectives. The East is available on DVD from both Netflix and Redbox and streaming from Amazon, Vudu, iTunes, GooglePlay and other VOD outlets.

ON TV

Kirk Douglas in SPARTACUS

On August 31, Turner Classic Movies offers Kirk Douglas’ testosterone exploding across the screen in Spartacus, The Vikings and Gunfight at the OK Corral. The latter is the John Sturges 1957 version with Douglas and with Dennis Hopper as Billy Clanton; (I prefer the 1946 John Ford version of the same story – My Darling Clementine, with Henry Fonda, Victor Mature, Ward Bond, Walter Brennan and John Ireland.)

Kirk keeps his shirt on in OK Corral, but Spartacus and The Vikings are filled with shirtless virile charisma. There’s really nothing to The Vikings except action adventure (and a scary contact lens), but it’s been a guilty pleasure of mine since the first time it played on TV.

Kirk Douglas in THE VIKINGS

NON-FICTION: Olivier Assayas has wasted too many hours of my life

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Guillaume Canet (left) and Vincent Macaigne in NON-FICTION

I finally got around to watching writer-director Olivier Assayas’ Non-Fiction. I had been eager to see it because I generally find the French actor Vincent Macaigne hilarious, and I will pretty much watch Juliette Binoche in anything. My conclusion: Olivier Assayas has wasted too many hours of my life, and I am over his films.

Non-Fiction is a comedy of manners that revolves around the once-successful novelist Leonard, whose books are very lightly disguised re-tellings of his own sordid romantic life, and Leonard’s publisher Alain (Guillaume Canet). Alain is married to Selena (Juliette Binoche), an actress in TV cop shows. Everybody sleeps with somebody else’s partner, and everyone wrings their hands over e-books, audio books, blogs and the impending death of the book industry. That’s about it. None of it is engaging.

In 2006, Assayas, a veteran screenwriter, wrote and directed an okay segment (the one with Maggie Gyllenhaal as an actress pining for her drug dealer) in the delightful anthology Paris, je t’aime. He followed it in 2008 with the fine family drama Summer Hours. And then, in 2011, he did the excellent true crime mini-series Carlos. This was a promising start, and he developed a fan base of admiring critics.

But since then, Assayas has wasted brilliant performances by Binoche and Kristen Stewart in the Clouds of Sils Maria and Personal Shopper – two muddled messes that masquerade as cinema. And now, the off-putting Non-Fiction. I am over this guy.

SPOILER: There is one funny moment in Non-Fiction, which I shall now spoil for you, so you won’t need to watch the movie. In the last quarter of the film, the characters decide to publish an audio book read by a celebrity, and they aspire to get Juliette Binoche (who is, of course, in this scene playing her character). I’ll concede that this is a genuinely witty moment, if self-referential.

Non-Fiction is now streaming on Amazon and other platforms.