Most Coveted Things from 2016 Films
Thursday, December 22, 2016 at 11:53AM 
Year in Review. Every afternoon, a new wrap-up. Today Murtada with a wish list...
What did you covet the most on the big or small screen this year? Was it a costume, a prop, or even a place or living thing? Here is my personal list in case you haven't yet completed your Christmas shopping.
Brad Pitt and Marion Cotillard’s white linen costumes in Allied
Brad Pitt and Marion Cotillard play a Canadian and a French spy respectively, who meet in Casablanca. They take an excursion to the desert outside the city right before completing their very dangerous assignment. They practise shooting with firearms, they bond, they fall in lust. All the while wearing gorgeous white linen on khakis. It must be the gorgeous desert. Or maybe the longing. Or could be just how breezy and stylish these linen costumes are.
Lunchboxes, records, and living things after the jump...
Adam Driver’s lunchbox in Paterson
Everyday Adam Driver as Paterson, a New Jersey bus driver and poet, has the same routine. He wakes up, showers, get dressed, packs up his lunch and leaves for work. The lunch is packed in a classic, green metal lunchbox and it’s his only companion at his lunch break, where he eats from it while composing poems. The lunchbox itself is not remarkable at all. However there’s something about how lovingly and carefully Driver handles it. It looks used but well maintained as if it’s always been handled with much love. It must be really special.
Sonia Braga’s record shelf in Aquarius
Clara, played by Braga, is fighting with all her might to hold on to the apartment that she’s lived in most of her life. At the center of the apartment is her records shelf. The majesty of that shelf. Full of records that tell us about the memories and the good times that Clara had. It’s a life that we know was well lived, even though the movie only gives us a glimpse of her past. That gorgeous shelf, and how she handles the records, is how we know. It’s easy to imagine all the fun, dancing and laughter that can be had playing these many records.
Lily Gladstone’s horse in Certain Women
Some seduce with humor. Some with gifts. How about a horse ride? That Lily Gladstone’s rancher appears out of nowhere with a horse at her crush’s, Kristen Stewart, workplace is such a surprise that it jolts both the audience and Stewart’s character. It’s a big gesture that shows us how big but also tender and tentative Gladstone’s feelings are. Then we savor the beautiful scene as they ride the horse together on a gorgeous cold Montana night, getting warm from each other. Who wouldn't want that?
Trevante Rhodes' grill in Moonlight
The grill is part of the armor Black (Rhodes) shields himself with. It comes along with the muscles, the posture, the swagger. So when he takes the grill off to eat, his vulnerability appears, poignant and palpable as he sits across from the one man who means so much to him. Plus he looks damn good wearing it.
Isabelle Huppert’s garden in Things To Come
This is more of a state of mind than the actual garden, which is only fleetingly shown. When we leave a place or a relationship, sometimes we miss them in strange specific ways. Like Huppert’s Natalie in Things to Come. In a pivotal scene with her soon to be ex-husband, she launches into a monologue about the many years she spent tending to the garden at his family’s summer house in Brittany instead of talking about their divorce. The garden and the time she spent tending to it is what she’ll miss. You feel the hurt, the regret but above all the love for that little place, for the years invested in that relationship that she thought would be forever. She reminds us of things left behind that become bigger for what they represent more than what they are.
What are some of things you desired most in 2016?
Year in Review
Grief and Letting Go...
The Ladies Who Lush
Biggest Foreign Hits of the Year
Sight & Sound's Top 20
John Waters Top 10
Highlights of the Blog by Month
Jan | 88th Oscars | March | April | May | June | July | Aug | Sept | Oct | November
Reader Comments (19)
Viggo's suit (Captain Fantastic), Huppert's home (Elle), Adams' home (Arrival), Ali's car (Moonlight), Gosling's club (La La Land)...
Florence's bathtub full of potato salad, tbh
The horse is beautiful. Most of the things I covet are wearable - Tilda's hats (Hail, Caesar!), Tilda's entire wardrobe (A Bigger Splash), Kristen's knitwear (Certain Women), Jessica's coats and haircut (Miss Sloane). They're not from films, but I would take Rebecca's blouses (Crazy Ex-Girlfriend), too.
Rooney Mara's boyfriend from LION.
If you're going there, Jose, then I want Redmayne's anatagonist from Fantastic Beasts. #atouchofgray
Lol Jose. I'm right there with you. Also Dev's hair in Lion.
Ben Mendelsohn's cape from Rogue One, Amy Adams' mansion in Nocturnal Animals, Viggo Mortensen's bus from Captain Fantastic, and Ralph Fiennes' wardrobe from A Bigger Splash.
Captain America's butt. Is that how this works?
@ paco
I'm not sure I entirely understand the nature of your coveting. ;-)
From this list I'll take Trevonte Rhodes, with or without the grill.
Amy Adams' houses in Arrival AND Nocturnal Animals. Those windows!
***SPOILERS***
Whatever came out of Jena Malone in The Neon Demon
Tilda's sunglasses and boy toy in A Bigger Splash.
Imo Huppert's performance in Things to Come is better than Elle.
The no nonsense waitress at the T-Bone Diner in Hell or High Water. I want her to come and sort my life out for me. And cook for me too.
Hmm, okay
--Those lights in Cemetery of Splendour
--The homes of Aquarius, Elle, Arrival or The Handmaiden
--The costume in Toni Erdmann
--The robotic camera/fly in Eye in the Sky
--The violin from Frantz
--Everything Pierre Ninny wore in Frantz
I'm with Paul Outlaw with Amy Adams' house in Arrival. Every time it popped up I was like "she CANNOT afford this sexy ass house".
Other than that, just give me Scarlet Witch's powers from Civil War and we're good.
Ez - I am terrified by this but appreciate your honesty
Ez really dropped the mic on this one. *claps*
I fell HARD for two things this year, Amy Adams' house in Arrival and Julianne Moore's wardrobe in Maggie's Plan.
Ok, Murtada, you can have the grill but I'll take the man wearing it.
Other things I want:
- A plate of Kevin's pollo a la plancha (Moonlight)
- Royalty Hightower's charisma/coordination (The Fits)
- Schoenaerts, Fiennes and the pool (A Bigger Splash)
- Every stitch of clothing (The Handmaiden)
- Kubo's Shamisen (Kubo and the Two Strings)
- The money (Don't Breathe)
Honorable Mention: Beyonce's "Hot Sauce" (Lemonade)