It takes me longer and longer every year to recover from four straight days of sleep deprivation, and that combined with the virus I managed to catch from one of my kids the day before I left pretty much knocked me out the last few days. None of that stopped me from seeing a ton of movies from Friday afternoon to Monday night, thankfully! This was a great festival, with both high peaks and a high floor, and featured some of the more memorable screening experiences I've had, in addition to the more superficial charms of getting to see several stars and directors I respect in person, including Adam Driver, Edward Norton, Greta Gerwig, Eddie Redmayne, Bong Joon-Ho, the Safdie Brothers, and Noah Baumbach, among many others.
I'll rank the 15 features I saw at Telluride this year below (not counting the disastrous attempt at watching a portion of Mark Cousins' documentary detailed above), and add some brief thoughts, as it might be a while before I'm able to write these up more comprehensively.
All-Time Greats: Before this year, I'd only seen one film at Telluride that leaped out to me as an immediate classic (
Roma), so to get to have two of maybe the top 10 best film-going experiences of my life in the same festival was quite literally overwhelming.
1.)
Portrait of a Lady on Fire (Sciamma) - I've already been about as effusive as possible about this film, so I'll just reiterate: it's fantastic in just about every way.
2.)
A Hidden Life (Malick) - If it doesn't quite meet the (for me, very high) bar of being Malick's best film, this is perhaps the most perfect example of the man's inimitable style and structure, expertly layering visual, musical, philosophical, and conceptual meaning into each moment in a way that can uniquely stimulate the emotional and intellectual sides of your brain simultaneously. I've found that reactions to his films, and even any given moment in any one film, can be so personal and dependent on one's background, interests, beliefs that I have no way of knowing whether my response to
A Hidden Life will end up being an outlier or not, but I was in or near tears for nearly the entire three-hour runtime, and by the time the credits ran had been emotionally broken down more thoroughly than I have been by any other piece of art in my life. Expressly interested in political concerns as never before, Malick is definitely continuing to stretch in new directions here even if the narrative is nowhere near as loose and experimental as in his other features this decade. If I have a minor complaint, it would be that Malick spends a bit too much time with August Diehl's Franz Jägerstätter in prison around the 2/3 mark, but that sequence may have as much resonance for others as his struggle in the first half to balance his deepest principles against his responsibility to his family had for me. I should also note that the typically stellar cinematography is somewhat of a departure from Malick's recent work with Lubezki, while still maintaining a clear connection to that style; there's a very brief shot near the end of children appearing in a window that might be my favorite of any I've ever seen in one of his films, which is absolutely a high bar to clear.
Very Good to Excellent Films: This is where this year's edition of the festival really stands out. The number of films with exceptional moments, stellar performances, deft screenplays, and seductive images began to get kind of absurd after a while — I couldn't possibly like this many films so much, could I?
3.)
Beanpole (Balagov) - I missed Balagov's debut feature
Tesnota at Telluride a few years ago, and I'm regretting that quite a bit now. I can always look forward to at least one beautiful yet crushingly depressing Russian or Eastern European drama at this festival, and this examination of two women navigating the difficulties and traumas of postwar Leningrad fit the bill perfectly. With his 24-year old cinematographer Kseniya Sereda, Balagov — who himself looks like he's not old enough to legally drink in the US — incorporates striking color into what is often a bleak, drab subgenre, with rich greens, enveloping reds, and — in one great sequence — cool blues serving the film both visually and on a thematic/character level. Co-star Vasilisa Perelygina's delivery of one of the film's final lines —
"It will heal us."
— is absolutely devastating.
4.)
Waves (Shults) - Absolutely stunning leap for Trey Edward Shults from
It Comes At Night, which I liked well enough, to the ambition and style of this film, a bifurcated drama on the dismantling and reconstitution of an American family under pressures internal and external, social and personal. Great performances all around, but while Kelvin Harrison Jr. will get a ton of attention for a flashier role and Sterling K. Brown will likely get an Oscar as a father whose faith in his own parenting and values are fundamentally shaken, I find myself thinking more of the quietly luminous work by Taylor Russell. The film is kinetic, vibrant, and awash in color, yet Shults takes the time necessary to soak in the details of these characters and their lives and avoids letting the plentiful stylizations overwhelm his core story. Most importantly, I can confirm that while only one Kanye track is used (though at least four by Frank Ocean!), it is well-chosen and placed for maximum impact.
5.)
Parasite (Bong) - I would criticize how blunt the satire here is if it weren't so enjoyable to watch play out, and if Bong wasn't clearly poking fun of himself with
several characters saying with varying degrees of irony about the childish scribblings of a supposed savant: "Very metaphorical..."
I agree with those in the main thread who can't quite get on board with the highest of the praise from Cannes, but there were enough sublime notes and surprises here to place this among Bong's best and among the best of the year; in particular, the
tragedy of the son's final fantasy of rescuing his father was remarkably poignant for being no less pointedly accusatory than the more blunt image of a river of shit flowing downhill from rich to poor.
6.)
Marriage Story (Baumbach) - Perhaps Baumbach's warmest, funniest, and most generous script is also packed with razors familiar to anyone who's had a serious relationship end badly, or even just anyone who has been married for more than a decade. While Baumbach tries hard to keep the film's depiction of divorce as even-handed as possible, Adam Driver is almost unavoidably privileged as the representative of Baumbach's personal experience with some of the more intense moments, and absolutely crushes them. The fear, failed communication, mistrust, and shame practically inherent in the situation come across beautifully, and Baumbach never over-indulges in dramatics or plot contrivances, instead marinating us in the complexities of disentangling two deeply connected lives. Also features the best Laura Dern performance in quite some time among a supporting cast packed with fine actors.
7.)
Uncut Gems (Safdie Bros.) - Both an extension and a refinement of the spiraling intensity and uncomfortable rawness of
Good Time, this sure-to-be-divisive rollercoaster features: delirious camera work; a pounding soundtrack; a manic yet dialed-in performance from Sandler; a stellar supporting cast with a great mix of established character actors like Lakeith Stanfield, unknowns like Julia Fox, real-life sports and music celebrities playing themselves (including a really enjoyable Kevin Garnett performance), and the Safdies' usual handful of non-professionals cast for their remarkable faces. The directors announce their ambitions and their sense of humor early on with a cosmic score, an unrelenting cacophony of diagetic sound, and soaring camerawork showcasing a narrative that begins across the world before
delving inside an opal and then literally entering Sandler's asshole.
A fun mainstream breakout for the Safdies that will almost certainly end up as a cult favorite of the next decade's worth of college students.
8.)
First Cow (Reichardt) - A warm portrait of male companionship, entrepreneurial spirit, and the precariousness of frontier life, Reichardt's latest is a little lighter and less meaty than some of her more recent films, but ends on such a perfect note (though one that seemed to confuse a not-insignificant number of those in my screening) that I couldn't help but vault it into this tier. Surprisingly dark in terms of lighting while being surprisingly charming and generous to its characters, I'll be excited to see this, one of my final two screenings, again under less exhausted circumstances.
Recommendable:
9.)
The Report (Burns) - Probably the most effective 'message' movie I've seen in quite some time. Scott Z. Burns manages to condense an absurd amount of information into a package that manages to be simultaneously dense, entertaining, and disturbing in a surprisingly bi-partisan manner. The script somehow finds room for some choice dialogue and makes space for supporting actors like Corey Stoll, Jon Hamm, Maura Tierney, and Annette Bening to do more than just exposition dump (though there is plenty of that). While certainly aimed at anti-torture liberals, I think many Democrats will be surprised to discover how the film casts doubt on the actions of many of their heroes over the past couple of decades. My most substantial complaint is that Driver's character isn't given quite enough shading or nuance to avoid coming off as a paragon of virtue, but overall this was surprisingly effective.
10.)
Diego Maradona (Kapadia) - As I wrote earlier, a remarkably engrossing look at the peak years of one of the best soccer players of all time, and yet another example of Kapadia's skill in compiling footage and voiceover to build a fast-paced, emotional narrative for what could have been a conventional sports doc.
11.)
The Assistant (Green) - A sharply pointed look at the environment that enables and excuses a Weinstein-esque abuser, Kitty Green's first narrative feature after documentaries like
Casting JonBenet is to be commended for its tight focus and unwillingness to give the audience the certainty, clarity, and consequences they might want. Julia Garner embodies the anxiety, ambition, and insecurity of her newly hired assistant who
witnesses clearly the corruptions and compromises of those in a powerful and toxic man's orbit, but because she isn't the target of her boss' most predatory impulses — "Don't worry, you're not his type..." — she never quite has the certainty she needs to push back against those gaslighting and obscuring his actions for their own benefit.
This was one of the buzzier titles toward the end of the festival, and I wouldn't be surprised to see it continue to garner outsize attention for its scale and lack of star power.
12.)
The Kingmaker (Greenfield) - Greenfield continues her examination of the banality and corruption of extreme wealth in this profile of Imelda Marcos, the notoriously extravagant former First Lady of the Philippines. Accountability — or the lack thereof — for one's choices was a recurring theme at this festival, and perhaps no film better illustrated the way a society unable or unwilling to hold its central figures responsible for their actions can fall victim to the same leeches they thought had been lanced decades before. With a scale and scope beyond
The Queen of Versailles and
Generation Wealth, Greenfield successfully illustrates how grasping and entitled those who justify the immense inequality that benefits them can be.
13.)
Motherless Brooklyn (Norton) - As I wrote above: not a great film, but certainly interesting enough to make catching some solid performances and craft work not too painful.
14.)
The Unbearable Lightness of Being (Kaufman) - I'd never seen this before, and I'd be curious to know if the notable softness of this restoration (completed in 2018 according to the notes) is reflective of the original prints. Anyway, Daniel Day-Lewis and Lena Olin are ridiculously sexy (that mirror scene...), but the film goes on for far too long past the point at which the arcs of the main triad are resolved. The Soviet Invasion of Prague is well-staged, both in what's staged for the film and in the insertion of Day-Lewis and Juliette Binoche into actual footage, and the drama works well enough until the point our central couple are driven out of Prague the second time. I was also extremely tired and fairly sick by the time this screened, so it's possible I'm being overly critical of the seemingly superfluous final half-hour.
Mediocre:
15.)
Lyrebird (Friedkin) - The only title I caught that I can't recommend, even this post-WWII drama about illicit art sales to the Nazis has a delightful Guy Pearce devouring the scenery and some better-than-it-deserves cinematography mimicking the style of some of the Dutch masters of the Renaissance. The real Achilles' heel here is the screenplay, which dumbs itself down to the level of a basic-cable TV movie instead of digging more effectively into its themes of artistic authenticity, the value of criticism, and the compromises necessary to survive in wartime; the climactic courtroom scene in particular is head-slappingly simple-minded.
The Square's Claes Bang is disappointingly little more than a stolid cipher, and
Phantom Thread's Vicky Krieps is given nothing of interest to do. Still, if you see fifteen films at a festival and a C+ crowdpleaser is the worst thing you see, both you and the curators have chosen wisely.
Biggest regrets:
The Climb, Coup 53, Family Romance LLC, Ford v Ferrari, Pain and Glory, The Two Popes, Verdict