Lima

If I had to compare Adam Wingard's previous Godzilla vs. Kong and this one, I would compare it to a concert of Def Leppard vs a concert of the grindcore band Cannibal Corpse. I mean, sleek, a bit predictable, safe rock vs. totally unhinged wildness in the front row of the audience to the point of being health hazard. I've seen almost all Japanese Godzilla movies from the SHOWA and HENSEI era, and I can say with certainty that none of those 25 or so movies had the kind of insanity I saw here. Not even in Ishiro Honda or Jun Fukuda's films, which were made with a kind of judiciousness, a kind of safe kaiju mainstream, even if Godzilla and Kong were putting on wrestling holds, or in other works there that mixed in aliens, octopuses, monsters spawned from toxic waste, etc.. This movie was bonkers. The script looked like it was written by an 11 year old with an overactive imagination, with one absurdity after another, but it was all topped off with amazing fan-service. Human characters reduced to useless goons? Checked. Protector Mothra? Checked. A plot that gives no trace of elementary logic? Checked. The only thing missing was a baby godzilla with a little Japanese boy. I laughed in disbelief at what I was seeing the entire movie, but my similarly kaiju-fan buddy and I had a terrific time. At the same time, I felt sorry for the elderly couple in front of me who had to suffer terribly at this – the gentleman got up halfway through and went to sip beer in the cinema bar instead. I absolutely do not understand (and at the same time appreciate) that a Hollywood studio, which routinely makes financial calculations, predictions and audience surveys, gave such a budget for such a basically non-mainstream and also fan service for the insiders and knocked this insanity off Wingard. I’ll probably never want to see it again, but the unexpected feeling in the theater was priceless. KAIJU is still alive, dude!

I found the first one better, it was more tightly plotted and somehow more engaging, more thoughtful in its introduction to the fantasy world of Arrakis, I understood more the motives of each of the characters. And yet, even there, Denis Villeneuve didn't forget the visual magic - the arrival of Leto Atreides and his long flight in an ornithopter was so visually sexy. Even the Hans Zimmer music was more interesting to me in the first part. The second part is actually quite different in that respect, especially plot-wise in the second half, BUT .... then Denis unloaded some iconic scenes, from the first worm ride, to the black and white arena, to the frontal attack of the worms, with the seated fremen and their flapping scarves, and he had me in the palm of his hand again. The first part was food for the senses and the brain, the second one only for the senses, but you know, I'm a simple person, even Villeneuve pulling excellent visual ideas on me like Houdini pulls rabbits out of a hat is enough to make me happy. Only that Zimmer has been feeling bit tired in the last years and instead of his typical rumbling it wouldn't hurt to reach for some compositional melodic ideas again.

Such is the daily routine of a family of ordinary, decent citizens. They grow kohlrabi and carnations in the garden, keep the house in perfect order, pet the dog and frolic in the swimming pool, and all this is provided by the head of the family, who goes to work every day in an exemplary manner and who - by the way - is the director of the most monstrous concentration camp. He is, again by the way, at work dealing with, for example, the more efficient incineration of Jews in ovens, and does it with the same emotional involvement as when you and your wife are deciding what to buy for dinner at the supermarket. And behind the walls of this middle-class family's property, behind those ominous walls, is a human-scale Mordor where the most monstrous acts against humanity are taking place, and you feel an immense oppression thanks to the ingenious sound work and the ominous visual details in the distance, such as the smoke from the ovens, or from the locomotives bringing in more and more human fuel. The film doesn't shove down your throat horrific imagery about how monstrous the Holocaust is, it does it on a subliminal basis, working with your subconscious, and that actually makes it all the worse. It made me sick, but at the same time I bow down to Jonathan Glazer for this bold cinematic experiment that says more about us humans than you'd expect.

A perfect detective story, of the classic cut, with nothing lacking or redundant. There's a paranoid atmosphere, there's a chase of the killer in the dark alleys of Paris and it culminates in the interrogation "grilling" of the perpetrator, wich, by the way, is excellently filmed and edited. Jean Gabin was and always will be the best Maigret, combining passion and vivacity with stoic calm and charisma, and you can only watch in amazement to see which of his character layers he uses when interrogating suspects. Such a multi-layered police figure is not so common in the crime genre, and Gabin grasps it phenomenally. Perhaps the film lacks a major surprise moment, as the killer was clearly offering himself up from the halfway point, but I still enjoyed it to the max.

The connection between Nic Pizzolatto and movies is not a hit parade, but in the series he has clearly found himself. Starting with the excellent The Killing and ending with this eight-hour treat, it's as if you're sitting in a fancy restaurant, eating premium caviar and topping it off with a 50-year-old Riesling. Surprisingly, it’s a bit, but really only a tiny bit, spoiled by Matthew McConaughey and its overacting in places,and an accent you don't trust so much, but script-wise it's flawless. The story spans many years, yet the character development of both detectives is believable and it builds up nicely in the end. The Louisiana setting explicitly invites some redneck nastiness, the locals are proper rednecks and the killer rightly murderous. And the way the script relativizes the line between good and evil at times is downright delightful.

I could have done without the last half-hour, where the loses its breath, but until then it's a riveting fresco, with an anti-war appeal at the very end, something much needed in these days of Putin's saber-rattling.

And the prize for the year's best acting trio goes to ... the chef, Paul Giamatti and his student. Alexander Payne is unique. He always picks a serious subject and wraps it in subtle and sometimes biting humor, and throws in an interesting point on top. The main thing here is how it is possible to humanise a grumpy and strict professor into an understanding and sensitive being without smacking of some cheap scriptwriting crutch. Giamatti absolutely shines in his role, reminiscent of Payne's best film to date, Sideways. There, Giamatti lived only for wine and everything related to it and women were rather on the fringes of his interests, here he lives only for his ancient Greece, for ancient history and women are again on the sidelines for him. Thanks his skill as an actor and his physiognomy, no one would be more suited to the role than the slightly chubby Paul – an Oscar nomination probably won't jingle from this, but it certainly should. And it's not just Paul, but the captain is back in full force after the botched Downsizing, proving why he's a star of independent filmmaking. Payne gently slides between the slightly depressing moods and the feel-good ones, and even though it ends the way it does, you get an awfully good feeling from it all.

Some people say that a film is as good as its villain, and, Pearl is a perfect example. Mia Goth is amazing, on a small space she can play a naive girl, a broken woman, a demon-ridden bitch and a total psychopath, she has all of that in her acting register. Her almost ten-minute confession at the end, filmed in one take, blew my mind. Moreover, it's all supported by a script that flows naturally, has a logical development and almost reaches the level of Phoenix's Joker in terms of psychology. And the visual games with the camera, the opening with classical music in the style of good old Hollywood! I'm just shocked that after the botched X, Ti West was able to create something like this. This is a little horror treat, made with love and art, aimed at film connoisseurs.

If I had to pick one pop culture event that took place before I was born that I wanted to experience, it would definitely be the first Woodstock, to soak up the atmosphere and the free community of those people. San Francisco in the late 1960s, rock music just freshly hatched from the egg and all the joys around, yeah, that's my thing :o)

One of the best music documentaries I've ever seen in my life. Narratively and visually elusive, as David Bowie himself was, free from the encyclopedic structure of the vast majority of similar works, and also full of life truths that I would chisel in stone. No, I'm still not a fan of Bowie's 1970s Ziggy Stardust phase, it doesn't appeal to me musically, and this film hasn't changed that (even Bowie himself questions that era of his in a few sentences), but I love his creative explosion in the 1990s. I love his music in the 1980s, especially the conceptual duo “1. Outside” and “Earthling”, and the jazz and light fusion electronica infused album “Black Tie White Noise”, one of his lesser works, but for me probably his best album ever. What I admire most about Bowie is that he was never satisfied with himself throughout his life, he was always searching, and that search was the meaning of life for him. He still had the flame of a true artist burning in him and his most commercially successful 1980s were paradoxically the least interesting in his eyes because, as he himself admitted, he was stagnant at the time. The urge to try new things, to break free from the security of a comfortable golden cage, this is what drives artists forward. Art must hurt, and Bowie knew it.