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| Photo: Manfred Werner/Manfred Werner cc by-sa 4.0 |
There were many films to celebrate at home and in cinemas throughout 2020, despite the tremendous social and financial impact of COVID-19 on UK and international cinemagoing. A considerable number of these films came through regular streaming giants, such as Netflix and Amazon Prime, but new avenues were also paved with the success of Curzon Home Cinema and other smaller platforms whose popularity has soared since the beginning of the year. Streaming has allowed more new releases to be seen than ever, with independent feature films experiencing a renaissance in online distribution.
Listed below are my personal top 15 films of 2020.
15.
Saint Frances (dir. Alex Thompson)
The title of Alex Thompson’s debut directorial feature comes from one of its final scenes, where six-year-old Frances (Ramona Edith Williams) impersonates a priest, perched in a confessional, whilst listening to her nanny, Bridget (Kelly O’Sullivan). “I’m not an impressive person,” Bridget admits. “I don’t have a husband or kids or a fancy job.” They continue talking, and later Bridget realises this summer was probably the best of her life, although the events of the film might first make you think otherwise. Nothing is sensationalised or sentimental in Saint Frances, whose central character, Bridget, pivots between relationships, an unplanned pregnancy, and the vibrant spirit of Frances. Thirty-four and directionless, having found no use for her creative writing degree, she by chance manages to secure a job nannying the child of lesbian couple Maya and Annie (played by Charin Alvarex and Lily Mojekwu). Bridget’s journey through adulthood plays alongside her growing friendship with Frances – perhaps the lightest and best-observed aspect of the story – lending great warmth and empathy to the many pitfalls and missteps Bridget takes along the way.
Available to stream on Curzon Home Cinema.
14.
Falling (dir. Viggo Mortensen)
Viggo Mortensen shines in his memorable feature directorial debut, co-starring as John, a middle-aged, gay man who is attempting to rehabilitate his ageing father, Willis (Lance Henricksen), from upstate New York to sunny California. From the opening scene, where the faint sound of a piano convinces Willis the plane must have an “upstairs,” it is clear that his outbursts are signs of dementia. As husband to Gwen (Hannah Gross) and father to John and Sarah (Laura Linney), there are few redeeming elements to his character, which from John’s troubled childhood up until the present day remains both venomous and undignified, forever showing the cold shoulder to friends and family alike. Mortensen’s portrait of old age is strikingly unsympathetic and maybe even repetitive – drawn loosely from autobiographical elements – allowing few moments of reprieve from the resentment that consumes Willis. Henrickson (who outshines Mortenson and the rest of the cast) compels viewing as much as he repulses. Likewise, Falling also triumphs in its depiction of mental illness more so than other, similarly themed films from 2020: Sally Potter’s semi-autobiographical feature The Roads Not Taken, for example, intercuts the real and imagined memories of Leo (Javier Bardem) to a frustrating and less rewarding effect.
Available to stream on Curzon Home Cinema.
13.
Last and First Men (dir. Jóhann Jóhannsson)
Many will remember the late Icelandic composer Jóhann Jóhannsson for his soundtracks for Denis Villeneuve’s Prisoners (2013), Sicario (2015) and Arrival (2016), as well as James Marsh’s The Theory of Everything (2014). He also composes the score for his only directorial feature, Last and First Man, a 70-minute, monochromatic essay inspired by the final chapters of William Olaf Stapledon’s novel of the same name. A narrator (voiced by Tilda Swinton) drily remembers the evolutionary history of mankind, from past to distant future, whilst images of the Soviet-era, brutalist Spomeniks come and go on the screen. Jóhannsson’s sublime, electronic sounds effectively lend themselves to the strangeness of these monuments, whose original purpose of commemorating Communist resistance here transforms into otherworldly relics. Several critics have described Jóhannsson’s debut as a minor work of science fiction, but there is much to be valued and taken away from this beautifully realised and unusual experiment.
Available to stream on the BFI Player.
12.
Fireball: Visitors from Darker Worlds (dir. Werner Herzog and Clive Oppenheimer)
After the middling documentaries of Lo and Behold: Reveries of the Connected World (2016) and Meeting Gorbachev (2018), the mad and wonderful Werner Herzog returns to form with his meteorite-inspired documentary Fireball: Visitors from Darker Worlds, co-directing with Cambridge professor Clive Oppenheimer. The pair globetrot between sites of impact, ranging from inconspicuous rooftops in Oslo, Norway – where micrometeorites are harvested from puddles of water – to the epic deserts of Australia and Antarctica, amongst others. The subject matter has always been peripheral and centre stage to Herzog’s documentaries, and much like his finest projects, Grizzly Man (2005) and Encounters at the End of the World (2007), the interviewees are often of more interest to the roving camera than the ostensible topic of the documentary. Herzog and Oppenheimer gather an array of fascinating characters whose lives have been inflected by the culture and tradition thrown up by the impact of meteorites. These visitors from darker worlds, Herzog and Oppenheimer suggest, are to what we owe both our life and imagination, our creation but also devastation.
Available to stream on Apple TV+.
11.
Queen & Slim (dir. Melina Matsoukas)
First-date lovers Queen (Jodie Turner-Smith) and Slim (Daniel Kaluuya) turn to the road as fugitives after the defensive shooting of a white police officer in Melina Matsoukas’ film of the same name. Young and black, their journey from Ohio through to New Orleans and Florida invites fire and fury in national news coverage, with their argument for innocence united with the cause of millions of black Americans. They are also brought together privately, and whilst long-haul passengers – with brief interludes at petrol stations and the house of Queen’s Uncle Earl (Bokeem Woodbine) – they find themselves falling in love. At heart, Matsoukas’ picture is a story of the road, of constant transit, sharing the genre with the likes of Arthur Penn’s Bonnie and Clyde (1967) or Terrence Malick’s Badlands (1973). Cinematographer Tat Radcliffe shoots the wide landscapes of Queen & Slim in warm and neon-soaked colours, recalling the late Robby Müller’s photography for Wim Wender’s ‘road movies’ The American Friend (1977) and Paris, Texas (1983). Queen & Slim is a small and timely epic.
Available to stream on multiple platforms.
10.
Little Joe (dir. Jessica Hausner)
Emily Beecham took the award for Best Actress from the 2019 Cannes Film Festival for her performance as Alice Woodward, the co-breeder of a scientifically engineered strain of flower called ‘Little Joe’ (after her teenage son). Questions about the plant circulate from the beginning: concerns over testing and its viability for distribution, but also the commercial value of its scent which is designed to make its owner happy. In vibrant red blossom, the intended calm of ‘Little Joe’ gradually changes the personality of those in the vicinity of its pollen (all except Woodward): the closeted presence of her colleague Chris (Ben Whishaw) gives way to unusual, predatory behaviour one evening in a pub. For others, the plant’s scent leaves them cold and emotionally blunted, recalling the hypnotic sedation of the plant offerings in Philip Kaufman’s Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978) remake. But unlike the grotesque appetite of Audrey II in Little Shop of Horrors (Frank Oz, 1986), ‘Little Joe’ works almost imperceptibly and leisurely, forcing Woodward to privately question her abilities as both mother and scientist. Little Joe might be one of the most unsettling films you watch this year.
Available to stream on the BFI Player.
9.
David Byrne’s American Utopia (dir. Spike Lee)
A snowy-haired David Byrne, his eleven-piece band, and Spike Lee’s fluid camerawork form the cast of this live recording of the Broadway performance American Utopia. And what an experience Byrne and Lee have created. Of course, much of the concert pays tribute to the musical highlights of Byrne’s former Talking Heads outfit – covering crowd-pleasers from ‘Talking Heads: 77’ and ‘Remain in Light,’ amongst others – but large sections are also concerned with present-day affairs. Occasionally, Byrne drops the song and guitar for small interludes of monologue, whimsically commenting on life, the universe and everything as he sees it. These gold nuggets are maybe some of the best parts of the performance. Lee carries the viewer along in solidarity with Byrne’s troupe, each of whom wears and carries their instruments, freely moving between aerial shots and physical intimacy on the Hudson Theatre stage. There are liveness and energy, in every sense, to this extraordinary concert feature, one which now feels increasingly remote from the limitations people now experience in the present day.
Available to stream on multiple platforms.
8.
Small Axe: Red, White and Blue (dir. Steve McQueen)
There are immense strength and integrity to the centrepiece of Steve McQueen’s Small Axe quintet, particularly in the performance of John Boyega as Leroy Logan, the principled and ambitious black officer who attempted to reform the police force from within. Logan’s decision to join the force rests uneasily with his Jamaican family, especially his father – having recently experienced brutality from two white officers – before later extending to hostility from the community at large. Logan’s quest is heroic, in many ways, but as his father reminds him, “big change, it is a slow turning wheel,” and he can only do so much. Unlike the overpowering presence of the police in Mangrove, the first and longest episode in McQueen’s anthology, Logan’s career offers an internal perspective to the series. Elements of this narrative feel like the European cousin of Norman Jewison’s acclaimed In the Heat of the Night (1967), where black police detective Virgil Tibbs (Sidney Poitier) investigates a murder whilst exposed to small-town racism. In one particular scene, Logan’s isolated pursuit of a young man through a paper factory – having been abandoned by the force – parallels Tibbs’ ambush in a Mississippi warehouse. McQueen delivers something truly powerful with Red, White and Blue.
Available to stream on BBC iPlayer.
7.
I’m Thinking of Ending Things (dir. Charlie Kaufmann)
Charlie Kaufmann’s third directorial feature begins on the road during a long and cold blizzard. Jake (Jesse Plemons) is taking his new girlfriend (Jessie Buckley) – whose name slips uncertainly between Lucy, Louisa, Lucia, and Ames – to his Oklahoman farmhouse to meet his parents, played by Toni Collette and David Thewlis. They have little to talk about on the way, but as time passes, her internal thoughts circle the realisation that she’s “thinking of ending things,” either with Jake or possibly herself. These suppressed feelings of loneliness and despair culminate with their arrival, where the picture enters more familiar Kaufmann territory. Between rooms, Jake’s parents appear to get younger and older, confronting the woman with awkward and sometimes revelatory glimpses into this foreign environment. Buckley’s character embodies many of Kauffmann’s trademark anxieties, taking the baton from Philip Seymour Hoffmann’s existential director in Synecdoche, New York (2008) or the aimless, puppet couple in Anomalisa (2015). The surreal and often horrifying elements of Kauffman’s film do not hold the comedic strength of his earlier scripts, but for many viewers, there is much pleasure to be reaped from the ambiguities it offers.
Available to stream on Netflix.
6.
Uncut Gems (dir. Josh and Benny Safdie)
At the centre of the financial storm in Josh and Benny Safdie’s Uncut Gems is the Jewish-American jeweller Howard Ratner (Adam Sandler), addicted to gambling away his wealth and that of others. There is another centre to this film: a rare and uncut black opal extracted from the Welo mine in Northeast Africa. Ratner, burdened with a number of debts, smuggles the stone into his New York jewellery store, KHM, before loaning it to NBA basketball player Kevin Garnett (as himself) as a good-luck charm. From here, the narrative follows Ratner’s failed attempts to retrieve the stone, and the colossal personal and emotional fallout of his decisions. Uncut Gems is the Safdie brother’s sixth and most exciting feature to date, boasting a career-best performance from Adam Sandler, and proving (once again) that he can offer a mesmerising screen presence. There is no moment of pause or respite in this Shakespearian tragedy in miniature, but what an exhilarating ride it is.
Available to stream on Netflix.
5.
Small Axe: Lovers Rock (dir. Steve McQueen)
In the second chapter of Steve McQueen’s Small Axe anthology, he plays host to the most ecstatic and rapturous party of the year. Originally selected for the NYFF and London Film Festival, before later being broadcast on BBC One, Lovers Rock is the most ambitious episode of the series, whilst also the only fictional narrative. In 1980s west London, Martha (Amarah-Jae St. Aubyn) secretly meets with her friend Patty (Shaniqua Okwok), having both escaped to attend a local party in Ladbroke Grove. Their excitement and anticipation quickly melt into the foggy spaces of the townhouse, where steaming food, drugs and passions fuel the atmosphere of each moment. Throughout the night, Martha finds herself separated from Patty, having crossed paths with the figure of Franklyn (Michael Ward). Together, their mutual attraction and nocturnal freedoms are brought out in scenes of dance, and in the early hours of the following morning, they leave, making plans to reunite. These passionate encounters, inspired by the sounds of lover’s rock, reggae and soul, by traditions and ritual, erupt in real-time like multicolour fireworks. Lovers Rock is the peak of McQueen’s career behind the camera.
Available to stream on BBC iPlayer.
4.
Shirley (dir. Josephine Decker)
Shirley Jackson, the American mystery writer best known for her 1948 New Yorker short story “The Lottery,” is the fascinating subject of Josephine Decker’s latest picture. Adapted by Chicago playwright Sarah Gubbins from Susan Scarf Merrell’s semi-fictional biography, this recreated story is still much indebted to Shirley’s own literary output – teasing dark pleasures and undertones from every scene. Newlyweds Fred (Logan Lerman) and Rose Nesmer (Odessa Young) arrive at the door of Shirley (Elizabeth Moss) and her husband Stanley Hyman (Michael Stuhlbarg), hoping to stay whilst they look for somewhere more permanent to live. The couple prepares meals, washes stacks of dishes, but soon falls prey to the parasitic influence of the older couple, whose collapsing marriage finds renewed inspiration in destroying the innocence of the young couple. Moss is compelling to watch as the bed-ridden, morose Shirley, reimagined by Decker and Gubbins as both childless (untrue in real life) and quietly unstable – even daring Rose, in one scene, to eat a mushroom that might be deadly or benign. Shirley is one of Decker’s more commercial features in recent years, but it effectively demonstrates the non-linear hallmarks and moods which have come to define her style of filmmaking.
Available to stream on Curzon Home Cinema.
3.
Portrait of a Lady on Fire (dir. Céline Sciamma)
Céline Sciamma, whose filmography has never shied away from the female gaze, achieves her manifesto (in her own words) with Portrait of a Lady on Fire. This is cinema to be treasured and valued, in every sense, capturing the giddiness and rush of pleasure of experiencing first love. In the eighteenth-century, painter Marianne (Noémie Merlant) travels to an island in Brittany where she has been commissioned to produce a portrait of Héloïse (Adèle Haenel) for her future husband, a Milanese gentleman. Héloïse, resisting this nuptial arrangement, refuses to sit for her portrait, leaving Marianne no opportunity to study her subject. To better paint, Héloïse’s mother, the Countess (Valeria Golino), persuades Marianne to accompany her daughter on various coastal walks, before coming back to translate what she has seen into the marks and colours on her canvas. Gradually, the subtlety of their interactions gives way to friendship, before ripening into a careful, unspoken desire. Taking place over a week and a half, the film burns with the passion of looking – in one scene, Héloïse’s distracted stare even leads to her dress catching on fire. Sciamma also finds inspiration in the films of New Zealand director Jane Campion, particularly The Piano (1993) and The Portrait of a Lady (1996), whilst building from themes she has dramatized across her career (see an extended review here).
2.
Parasite (dir. Bong Joon-ho)
There was something incredibly significant about watching Bong Joon-ho’s Parasite in a fully-packed cinema in January – and more than unusual for a non-English-language drama – as well as its subsequent triumph at the Golden Globe Awards and 92nd Academy Awards. Parasite proved the Hollywood system could be overturned, if only momentarily, marking a cultural breakthrough for international and Korean cinema in this new decade. For Joon-ho, the titanic success of Parasite has seen fresh restorations and re-releases of his back-catalogue, including Barking Dogs Never Bite (2000) and his influential Memories of Murder (2003). Co-written by Joon-ho and Han Jin-won, the story begins with the poor Kim family, nested in the underbelly of Seoul, whose ill-fortunes are reversed with the opportunity of working for the more privileged, yet unsuspecting Park family. From here, they begin to infiltrate every element of the Park’s luxurious existence – the father Kim Ki-taek (Song Kang-ho) is hired to chauffeur Mr Park (Lee Sun-kyun), and later recommends his wife Chung-sook (Hang Hye-jin) for the open position of a housemaid. However, much like the modern architecture of the family house, there are hidden depths and shifting surfaces to the narrative of Parasite, where any moment the unexpected becomes reality. More than anything, Parasite is a perfect satire of class relations and co-dependencies, a home invasion that starts from within, before metamorphizing into the realms of Greek tragicomedy.
Available to stream on multiple platforms.
1.
Bacurau (dir. Kleber Mendonça Filho and Juliano Dornelles)
Few films in 2020 have felt as adventurous, provocative and exciting as Kleber Mendonça Filho and Juliano Dornelles’ near-future western Bacurau (named after a fictional quilombo settlement bordering the Serra Verde, Brazil). Having competed for the Palme d’Or at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival, and played in UK cinemas earlier in 2020, the film saw a short release window before cinemas closed during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Following the sudden death of the village matriarch (Lia de Itamaracá), a series of strange events besiege the people of Bacurau – without notice, the town vanishes from online maps, and UFO-shaped drones appear in the skies. Homecomer Teresa (Bárbara Colen) soon discovers a local dispute over water rights, with the river hoarded upstream by the mayor of Serra Verde, Tony Junior (Thardelly Lima) – a similar conspiracy to the Californian Water Wars in Roman Polanski’s Chinatown (1974). Shortly afterwards, an entire family is discovered dead, having been executed by a troupe of amateur, American soldiers, spearheaded by the German-American Michael (Udo Kier). This array of brilliant and sometimes ultraviolent encounters between the townspeople and modern-day cowboys pushes the feature into a brutal terrain, where scenes of horror and absurdity meet in the crossfire.
Indebted to a number of genres and cinematic styles, Bacurau presents a fizzing cocktail of Brazilian melodrama and the popular, Italian-style Westerns of Sergio Leone and Clint Eastwood. Filmed with Dornelles’ regular cinematographer Pedro Sotero, dusty colours combine with strange and wonderful images – of coffins overspilling with water as villagers’ thirst congeals with hallucinogenic drugs, and scenes of nightmarish retribution in battle. Bacurau is also concerned with community, as well as structures of colonial and political power which Brazilian cinema has come to review, such as Fernando Meirelles and Kátia Lund’s explosive City of God (2002). Splicing various influences and polemics together, the texture of Filho and Dornelles’ feature is rough and rowdy, resisting any immediate definition.
Other honourable mentions include: Leigh Whannell’s thrilling modernisation of H. G. Wells’ The Invisible Man, featuring another stellar performance by Elizabeth Moss this year; Anya Taylor-Joy as the title character in Autumn de Wilde’s comic adaptation of Jane Austen’s Emma.; The Twilight Zone-inspired horror Vivarium (Lorcan Finnegan); Robert Eggers’s second horror project The Lighthouse, featuring career-best performances by Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson; the latest feature of Palm d’Or-winning director Hirokazu Kore-eda, The Truth; Armando Iannucci’s personal take on Charles Dickens’ The Personal History of David Copperfield; Václav Marhoul’s brutal trip through post-Holocaust Europe, The Painted Bird (see an extended review here); the Oscar-nominated drama Les Misérables, directed with flair by Ladj Ly; three generations of haunting in Natalie Erika James’s Australian horror Relic; and finally, Spike Lee’s reclamation of the black experience in Vietnam, Da 5 Bloods.
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