Thanks to everyone who answered last week's open question about DVD coverage. We won't fuss too much about switching things up but we will do a little more than we are doing for the second and third wave audiences.
NEW DVD / BLURAY
This is your weekly reminder that Julianne Moore is now an Oscar winner! The film that finally did the job (in conjunction, of course, with goodwill from a dozen undeniable acting triumphs in her past) was Still Alice, a minimalist drama about a linguistics professor suffering from early on set Alzheimers which is now out on DVD and BluRay for you stragglers. Who still hasn't seen it? You owe it to Julie so, rectify. For those that did see it two questions:
- Which scene do you think cemented Julianne's Oscar traction or even her win?
- If it's different, what scene or moment do you still think about?
Also recommended: Germany's most recent Oscar submission Beloved Sisters didn't win much press or Oscar traction despite an actual theatrical release in the December glut but it will satisfy those of you that love a good costume drama and don't mind a long running time. It's about two sisters whose mother hopes for them to marry rich but they both fall in love with the same penniless poet. Perhaps they'll share him? Here's the complete review if you missed it.
Also new though good luck finding someone who recommends them: Mortdecai (Johnny Depp + Gwyneth Paltrow + moustaches?), Blackhat (Michael's review), The Cobbler (the scathing reviews were something of a surprise since writer/director Thomas McCarthy is usually beloved), and Taylor Lautner in Tracers (though I'm never going near one of those again post-Abduction)
Two recommended Instant Watches after the jump...
an early scene from Futuro Beach with your three principle characters
These are cherry-picked by us for you largely because they both prominently feature biking and its National Bike to Work Week (good christ we love our theme weeks -apologies!) and also because one of them is super easy to miss because it's so generically titled. Hint: its' not the first one.
FUTURO BEACH
One of the undeniable problems of festival coverage is that when you're tasked with writing up movies instantly and you're seeing a lot of them back-to-back sometimes the more elusive challenging ones get short-shrift in the instant evaluation process. My review of Karim Aïnouz's Futuro Beach, a movie about a Brazilian lifeguard, his brother, and a tourist from Germany, isn't quite as "thumbs way up" as I intended at the time. It's an unusually sexy film but its trifurcated plot -- it's basically a three-act -- which I found quite bulky and uneven at the time, plays a lot more gracefully in memory than in that moment. I think about the movie fairly often actually and its ending is evocative and beautifully judged. It won a short theatrical release this year but after a measly $20,000 at the US box office I hope it finds many new fans on Netflix Instant Watch. If you like LGBT cinema or the unique drama of cross-culture romances, you should definitely check it out. Futuro Beach stars Wagner Moura (who will be in Antoine Fuqua's all-star English language Magnificent Seven remake in 2017) and German star Clemens Schick (Casino Royale, The Dark Valley).
first time alone at a local pond
BOYS
Movie titles don't come more generic than that, do they? Since Netflix decided to move towards original content and streaming rather than being a DVD service they've had an increasingly poor quality of streaming options for mainstream cinema and high profile foreign films (both of which can cost a lot to license). Instead there is an ever-widening range of bad indies and cheap foreign flicks an B movies to skim through... it's kind of like the modern equivalent of direct-to-video discounts racks in Video stores back in the day. That's especially true of the frequently awful LGBT movies. Which is why it's always worth pointing out a good one. This 2014 film from the Netherlands is about two high school kids on a track team, one whose family is falling apart after the death of his mother, that fall in love. Their chief escape is hopping on their bikes and heading to a local pond to swim together. Since it's a Dutch movie and Northern Europeans (as well as Scandinavians) are, for whatever reason and comparatively speaking, super great at making coming-of-age films, you can bet that it's naturalistic and moving in direct proportion to how honest and no-frills it feels. It's a simple coming out story, observationally told, but at 77 minutes, it feels more wholly satisfying than a lot of films that are sweating much harder to make similar points about first love, self-acceptance, and making peace with your family situation, whatever it may be.
If you see any of these pictures, make sure to tell us what you think.