The Third (and possibly annual but probably not because this was fucking exhausting) Dixon Movie Awards
I watched a handful of movies last year, and I decided to once again embark on the long, pointless journey of ranking them all and analyzing my favorites. At some point, the blatant absurdity of this endeavor will sink in, and I’ll stop doing it. Unlucky for you, today is not that day.
Every 2019 Movie I Saw, Ranked
1. For Sama
2. The Last Black Man in San Francisco
3. Waves
4. The Irishman
5. Woman at War
6. Ad Astra
7. A Hidden Life
8. Climax
9. Toy Story 4
10. Portrait of a Lady on Fire
11. Tito and the Birds
12. The Farewell
13. Ruben Brandt, Collector
14. Booksmart
15. Strange Negotiations
16. Marriage Story
17. Little Women
18. The Lighthouse
19. Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
20. Under the Silver Lake
21. Gaza Fights for Freedom
22. Amazing Grace
23. Pink Wall
24. Hail Satan?
25. The Gospel of Eureka
26. The Art of Self-Defense
27. American Factory
28. City of Joel
29. Long Shot
30. Aquarela
31. Pain and Glory
32. Leaving Neverland
33. Caballerango
34. Midsommar
35. One Cut of the Dead
36. High Life
37. Parasite
38. Colewell
39. Diane
40. Mickey and the Bear
41. Fantastic Fungi
42. Aniara
43. Uncut Gems
44. Birds of Passage
45. Owned: A Tale of Two Americas
46. Knock Down the House
47. Knives Out
48. The Amazing Johnathan Documentary
49. A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood
50. Paddleton
51. Giant Little Ones
52. Wild Nights with Emily
53. John Wick: Chapter 3 — Parabellum
54. Brittany Runs a Marathon
55. An Elephant Sitting Still
56. Transit
57. Slut in a Good Way
58. Hotel by the River
59. Life and Nothing More
60. Fyre
61. Running with Beto
62. Building the American Dream
63. The River and the Wall
64. One Child Nation
65. Always in Season
66. The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley
67. Cold Case Hammarskjold
68. The Nightingale
69. I Lost My Body
70. Sorry Angel
71. Little Monsters
72. The Day Shall Come
73. Charm City
74. Queen & Slim
75. Dark Waters
76. Just Mercy
77. The Report
78. Invisible Life
79. Island of the Hungry Ghosts
80. Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw
81. Captain Marvel
82. Black and Blue
83. Give Me Liberty
84. Knife + Heart
85. Girl on the Third Floor
86. Gloria Bell
87. Wild Rose
88. Fighting with my Family
89. Unicorn Store
90. Motherless Brooklyn
91. Atlantics
92. Official Secrets
93. The Gangster, the Cop, the Devil
94. Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark
95. The King
96. El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie
97. Hustlers
98. At the Drive-In
99. Homecoming
100. Apollo 11
101. Rolling Thunder Revue
102. Raise Hell: The Life & Times of Molly Ivins
103. Jim Allison: Breakthrough
104. Roll Red Roll
105. Burning Cane
106. Lucy in the Sky
107. Dolemite Is My Name
108. Us
109. Judy
110. Luce
111. Bunuel in the Labyrinth of the Turtles
112. Honey Boy
113. The Beach Bum
114. Ash Is Purest White
115. Monos
116. The Raft
117. What You Gonna Do When the World’s on Fire?
118. Ford v Ferrari
119. Greta
120. Shadow
121. 1917
122. Diamantino
123. Last Christmas
124. Where’d You Go, Bernadette?
125. Non-Fiction
126. Guava Island
127. Dragged Across Concrete
128. In Fabric
129. Where’s My Roy Cohn?
130. High Flying Bird
131. Cold Pursuit
132. A Score to Settle
133. Ready or Not
134. Black Christmas
135. Crawl
136. First Love
137. Anthropocene
138. Blow the Man Down
139. The Souvenir
140. The Third Wife
141. Sister Aimee
142. The Aeronauts
143. The Laundromat
144. The Weekend
145. Her Smell
146. Villains
147. Hagazussa
148. Also Starring Austin
149. Winter Flies
150. Little Woods
151. The Image Book
152. Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool
153. Primal
154. The Current War
155. Them That Follow
156. Honeyland
157. Grass
158. Arctic
159. The Perfection
160. Serenity
161. Grand Isle
162. The Man Who Killed Don Quixote
163. Star Wars: Episode IX — The Rise of Skywalker
164. Rattlesnake
165. Clemency
166. Bombshell
167. Richard Jewell
168. The Two Popes
169. Jojo Rabbit
170. Joker
171. Funan
172. Daniel Isn’t Real
173. See You Yesterday
174. Gemini Man
175. Late Night
176. The Intruder
177. The Dead Don’t Die
178. To Dust
179. Retablo
180. Zombieland: Double Tap
181. Good Boys
182. The Death of Dick Long
183. Frances Ferguson
184. Piercing
185. Native Son
186. Shazam!
187. Velvet Buzzsaw
188. Doctor Sleep
189. Everybody Knows
190. Echo in the Canyon
191. Kill Chain
192. Midway
193. The Hummingbird Project
194. The Peanut Butter Falcon
195. Wine Country
196. Nosotros Las Piedras
197. Body at Brighton Rock
198. Running with the Devil
199. The Lion King
200. Harriet
201. Avengers: End Game
202. The Mountain
203. Relaxer
204. Adopt a Highway
205. Cats
Best Picture: For Sama
I first saw this film at SXSW, and it destroyed me. I’ve never seen anything quite like it. A lot of great Syrian documentaries have come out in the past few years, but For Sama is different. Director Waad al-Kateab brings viewers into her most personal moments during the horrifying events of the Syrian revolution. She is a senior in college when Aleppo’s citizens begin protesting Bashar al-Assad’s tyrannical regime. Over the next five years, we see her fall in love, get married, and have a child while illegally filming Assad’s atrocities and posting them online. Waad and her husband Hamza, who runs the last operating hospital in the city, feel an obligation to stay in Aleppo and help their countrymen, but they also feel a parental desire to protect their baby daughter Sama.
These competing forces pull on Waad throughout the film as she speaks to Sama and tries to justify why she’s put her life at risk. These scenes are some of the most heart-breaking moments I’ve ever seen put on film. It’s rare for a movie to achieve this level of intimacy. The frequent juxtaposition of these tender moments with shots of hemorrhaging bomb victims fighting to survive is incredibly jarring, and it gives viewers a glimpse into the reality of Waad’s life in an active war zone.
For Sama is a beautiful love story, a harrowing war epic, and a scathing political critique combined into one astounding documentary. It’s the best film of the year. For Sama is streaming on Amazon Prime and is available for rent on most other streaming services.
Best Director: Joe Talbot — The Last Black Man in San Francisco
2019 is a frustrating time for a large portion of Americans. As the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, it has become increasingly difficult for low-income citizens to maintain their way of life. This righteous frustration has never been portrayed more beautifully than it has in The Last Black Man in San Francisco. Longtime friends Joe Talbot and Jimmie Fails developed the story based on Fails’ life and cast Fails to play himself in the lead role. It’s a deeply personal story of a black man priced out of his childhood home and his desperate efforts to regain a place among San Francisco’s middle class.
Talbot crafts a hypnotically poetic film that explores identity and its ties to family and location. Gentrification pushes Jimmie and his family out of the neighborhood where they’ve lived for generations, leaving him lost in an unfamiliar environment struggling to adapt. He only feels at peace at his old house where he is no longer welcome by the white couple that lives there.
Despite Jimmie’s struggles, he loves San Francisco. While riding the bus, he interrupts two women complaining about the city and says, “You don’t get to hate San Francisco… You don’t get to hate it unless you love it.” This scene really hit home for me as someone who’s lived in the rapidly gentrifying city of Austin, Texas for twelve years. I love it, and I hate it, and I hate when outsiders criticize it.
The only person sympathetic to Jimmie’s plight is his best friend Mont, played magnificently by Jonathan Majors. The two men share a quiet, knowing friendship developed over decades of growing up together. Mont’s dream of becoming a playwright seems almost as unattainable as Jimmie’s dream of moving back into his old house, and both characters support each other to the end. Their dynamic is a beautiful representation of the unspoken bond that can only be formed between lifelong friends.
The film finishes with a thoughtful, ambiguous ending that conveys the nearly insurmountable odds faced by those attempting to climb America’s economic ladder. The system is far beyond repair, but Talbot finds the beauty in striving for the impossible. The Last Black Man in San Francisco is streaming on Amazon Prime and is available for rent on most other streaming services.
Honorable Mentions
Trey Edward Shults — Waves
Martin Scorsese — The Irishman
Benedikt Erlingsson — Woman at War
James Gray — Ad Astra
Terrence Malick — A Hidden Life
Gaspar Noe — Climax
Céline Sciamma — Portrait of a Lady on Fire
Waad Al-Khateab and Edward Watts — For Sama
Best Actress in a Leading Role: Taylor Russell — Waves
Best Actress is absolutely stacked this year as you can see by my obscenely long list of honorable mentions. Taylor Russell has been considered a supporting actress by the institutions that have nominated her, but, similar to Willem Dafoe in The Lighthouse and Brad Pitt in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, this is a classic case of category fraud. Russell is the clear lead of the film, and she delivers a devastating performance as a teenage girl sorting out her life after a family tragedy. This film knocked me on my ass, and I’ve struggled to translate my feelings for it into words. The scene of Russell and her father fishing and trying to reconnect is one of the most powerful of the year. Waves is available for purchase on most major streaming services.
Honorable Mentions
Halldóra Geirharðsdóttir — Woman at War
Karen Allen — Colewell
Mary Kay Place — Diane
Valerie Pachner — A Hidden Life
Scarlett Johansson — Marriage Story
Saoirse Ronan — Little Women
Florence Pugh — Midsommar
Awkwafina — The Farewell
Tatiana Maslany — Pink Wall
Camila Morrone — Mickey and the Bear
Lupita Nyong’o — Us
Noemie Merlant — Portrait of a Lady on Fire
Adele Haenel — Portrait of a Lady on Fire
Ana de Armas — Knives Out
Jillian Bell — Brittany Runs a Marathon
Best Supporting Actress: Shuzhen Zhao — The Farewell
Lulu Wang’s The Farewell is the thoughtful, touching story of a family mourning the likely death of its matriarch. Per Chinese tradition, they elect not to tell their grandmother that she has cancer out of fear that the resulting depression would accelerate her demise. Shuzhen Zhao’s Nai Nai is perhaps the most likable character in any movie this year. Her joy and zeal for life make her disease all the more tragic. She’s the perfect, loving grandmother everyone wishes they still had. The Farewell is available for rent on most major streaming services.
Honorable Mentions
Jennifer Lopez — Hustlers
Julia Butters — Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
Florence Pugh — Little Women
Penelope Cruz — Pain and Glory
Juliette Binoche — High Life
Renée Elise Goldsberry — Waves
Best Actor: Brad Pitt — Ad Astra
Pitt is receiving a lot of well-deserved praise for Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, but his role in Ad Astra is the performance of the year. Pitt’s Roy McBride is a decorated astronaut both literally and figuratively chasing the accolades of his pioneering father. He’s a distant, stoic hero forced to grapple with how this mentality has damaged his relationships and his emotional health. Pitt’s subtle transformation over the course of the film as his character slowly discovers the pointlessness of his life’s efforts is incredible to watch. Ad Astra is available for rent on most major streaming services.
Honorable Mentions
Leonardo DiCaprio — Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
Willem Dafoe — The Lighthouse
Robert Pattinson — The Lighthouse
Antonio Banderas — Pain and Glory
Robert De Niro — The Irishman
Adam Driver — Marriage Story
August Diehl — A Hidden Life
Brad Pitt — Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
Jay Duplass — Pink Wall
Ray Romano — Paddleton
Andrew Garfield — Under the Silver Lake
Jimmie Fails — The Last Black Man in San Francisco
Tom Hanks — Toy Story 4
Best Supporting Actor: Al Pacino — The Irishman
I’ve written a lot about The Irishman in recent months, but I haven’t talked about Al Pacino’s stellar performance as union boss Jimmy Hoffa. In a film starring three of the greatest actors of all time, Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci, and Al Pacino each turn in their best performance of the twenty-first century, but Pacino gives the film a manic energy that makes it impossible to look away when he’s on screen. In an otherwise tragic story, Pacino is fucking hilarious. His spat with Tony Pro and his argument about putting fish in the car are two of the funniest scenes of the year. At nearly eighty years old, I really hope this isn’t our last great Pacino performance, but if it is, it’s a hell of a way to go out. The Irishman is streaming on Netflix.
Honorable Mentions
Joe Pesci — The Irishman
Timothée Chalamet — Little Women
Alessandro Nivola — The Art of Self-Defense
Jonathan Majors — The Last Black Man in San Francisco
Aldis Hodge — Clemency
Tommy Lee Jones — Ad Astra
Tzi Ma — The Farewell
Sterling K. Brown — Waves
Lucas Hedges — Waves
Best Screenplay (Original or Adapted): Benedikt Erlingsson and Ólafur Egilsson — Woman at War
Woman at War is one of the best and most original films of the year. It wrestles with the inevitability of climate change and humanity’s powerlessness to overcome the governmental and economic interests conspiring to destroy us all. This concept is explored through the life of one middle-aged woman attempting to damage Iceland’s power grid in order to discourage foreign industrial investment while simultaneously adopting a child.
The film’s fatalistic subject matter sounds depressing, but it’s actually an uplifting movie. Erlingsson posits that the correct response to our impending doom is not to wallow in despair, but to find joy in the present while we still can. Woman at War is streaming on Hulu and is available for rent on most other streaming services.
Honorable Mentions
Steve Zaillian — The Irishman
Lulu Wang — The Farewell
Bong Joon-ho — Parasite
Joe Talbot, Jimmie Fails, and Rob Richert — The Last Black Man in San Francisco
Trey Edward Shults — Waves
Eduardo Benaim and Gustavo Steinberg — Tito and the Birds
Noah Baumbach — Marriage Story
James Gray and Ethan Gross — Ad Astra
Andrew Stanton and Stephany Folsom — Toy Story 4
Greta Gerwig — Little Women
Quentin Tarantino — Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
David Robert Mitchell — Under the Silver Lake
Tom Cullen — Pink Wall
Best Cinematography: Benoit Debie — Climax
Debie’s work in Climax might be the most impressive, immersive cinematography I’ve ever seen. The film begins with a beautiful single take of a professional dance group rehearsing for an upcoming tour. As they dance and celebrate after practice, they slowly realize that someone spiked the sangria with LSD. Then shit gets weird.
The camera work becomes increasingly disorienting as the dancers slip further into deranged insanity. It begins to tilt and rotate to make viewers feel like they’ve been drugged as well. Toward the end of the film, there’s an extended sequence shot entirely upside down. This might sound annoying or nauseating, but it works perfectly. Check out the trailer to see what I’m talking about.
Climax is streaming on Amazon Prime and is available for rent on most other streaming services.
Honorable Mentions
Drew Daniels — Waves
Adam Newport-Berra — The Last Black Man in San Francisco
Viktor Kossakovsky — Aquarela
Jorg Widmer — A Hidden Life
Hoyte van Hoytema — Ad Astra
Bergsteinn Björgúlfsson — Woman at War
Jarin Blaschke — The Lighthouse
Claire Mathon — Portrait of a Lady on Fire
Rodrigo Prieto — The Irishman
Mike Gioulakis — Under the Silver Lake
Pawel Pogorzelski — Midsommar
Takeshi Sone — One Cut of the Dead
Juan Pablo Gonzalez — Caballerango
Best Score: Emile Mosseri — The Last Black Man in San Francisco
Emile Mosseri’s beautiful, melancholy score sets the perfect mood for this pensive analysis of identity in a gentrified community. It’s mostly orchestral with some operatic vocals that give the film an epic scale. Every track is sensational, but the song that gets me every time is an emotional rendition of San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair) sung by a street performer in the movie. I haven’t stopped listening to it since I first saw the film eight months ago. You can listen to it here.
Honorable Mentions
James Newton Howard — A Hidden Life
Max Richter — Ad Astra
Davíð Þór Jónsson — Woman at War
Alexandre Desplat — Little Women
Disasterpiece — Under the Silver Lake
Daniel Pemberton — Motherless Brooklyn
Mark Korven — The Lighthouse
Best Documentary Feature: For Sama
I don’t have much to add here that I haven’t already said. For Sama is an incredible viewing experience, and I can’t do it justice with this post. It needs to be seen. I will note that there are two versions of the film out there: an eighty-four minute cut that’s free to watch online and a ninety-six minute cut that you can watch on Amazon Prime or pay to rent on other services.
If you want to watch this movie, please watch the ninety-six minute version. I’ve seen both, and it’s far superior. I’m not sure why someone felt it necessary to cut anything from this movie. It aired on PBS earlier in the year, so maybe the eighty-four minute cut is the TV-friendly version, but I’m just speculating. The ninety-six minute cut is the version the director presented at SXSW, so that’s the version she wanted people to see.
Honorable Mentions
Strange Negotiations
Amazing Grace
Hail Satan?
The Gospel of Eureka
American Factory
City of Joel
Best Animated Film: Toy Story 4
I really didn’t want to give this to a Disney movie, but damn Toy Story 4 is good. Shoutout to Tito and the Birds and Ruben Brandt, Collector, which are a very close second and third in this category. I always roll my eyes when people say things like “Oh, but you’ll like this kids movie. It’s really for adults!” That statement is almost never true, and it usually just means the movie has a sex joke in it.
The latest Toy Story installment is actually a thoughtful adult drama about retirement and finding purpose in life. Tom Hanks is incredible as Woody, a toy coming to terms with the fact that his kid doesn’t care about him. It’s one of the saddest, most introspective films of the year, and it caught me completely off guard. It’s also hilarious and beautifully animated. Toy Story 4 is available for rent on most major streaming services, and is surprisingly unavailable on Disney Plus.
Honorable Mentions
Tito and the Birds
Ruben Brandt, Collector
Best Foreign Language Film: For Sama
It’s the best film of the year, and it’s in a foreign language. Therefore, it’s the year’s best foreign language film. Six of the top twelve films on my list are foreign language films. In the words of Bong Joon-ho, “Once you overcome the one-inch tall barrier of subtitles, you will be introduced to so many more amazing films.”
Honorable Mentions
Woman at War
Climax
Portrait of a Lady on Fire
Tito and the Birds
The Farewell
Pain and Glory
Caballerango
One Cut of the Dead
Parasite
Best Comedy: Booksmart
Olivia Wilde’s debut film is one of the funniest things I’ve seen in years. It’s like a funnier version of Superbad with female characters in the lead roles. It adds a new perspective to the traditional high school raunch-com, and it’s a complete joy throughout. Beanie Feldstein and Kaitlyn Dever are terrific. Booksmart is streaming on Hulu and is available for rent on most other streaming services.
Best Horror: Climax
Climax is the most fun, energetic film of 2019, and it’s batshit crazy in the best way. Witnessing the dancers’ descent into madness is both disturbing and incredibly entertaining. It’s one of the most unique films of the year, and it’s on Amazon Prime. You have Amazon Prime. Check it out.
Best Sci-Fi: Ad Astra
Ad Astra is the most introspective and visually stunning movie of the year. A near perfect combination of Apocalypse Now and 2001: A Space Odyssey, it tells the story of a pensive, stoic man traveling to the outer solar system in search of his accomplished, enigmatic father. It examines workaholism and stoic masculinity and their negative effects on relationships and emotional health.
I love this movie. It spoke to me on a more personal level than anything I saw this year, but I’m the type of person who really needs to hear what the film has to say. As Pitt’s character states, I am too often “focused only on the essential, to the exclusion of all else,” oblivious to the fact that the essential is actually mundane, and the mundane is actually essential. I’m going to be thinking about this film for a long time. Ad Astra is available for rent on most major streaming services.
Best Action: John Wick: Chapter 3 — Parabellum
This was a bit of a weak year for action films. The laboriously titled John Wick: Chapter 3 — Parabellum checks in at #53 on my list this year. The action sequences are incredible, and Keanu Reeves is great, but I couldn’t give two shits about the bureaucratic machinations of the High Council of Assassins or whatever the hell it’s called. The franchise has veered away from the simplicity and absurdity that made it great: Keanu Reeves kills people in impressive fashion without any real reason for doing so. The strong action sequences make this a good movie, but damn, the plot is dumb. Any pause between fight scenes feels like an eternity. Maybe just fast forward through the talking. John Wick: Chapter 3 — Parabellum is streaming on HBO and is available for purchase on most other streaming services.
Best Romance: Portrait of a Lady on Fire
I might be too low on this movie. It received a limited release in New York and Los Angeles in December before getting a wide national release over Valentine’s weekend. I watched a screener at my apartment a few days ago, and it blew me away. I can’t wait to see it on the big screen next week.
Céline Sciamma’s new film is one of the most beautiful and tender movies of the year. It tells the story of a woman promised in an arranged marriage and the woman hired to paint her portrait for her future husband. As the two women spend time together, a forbidden love blossoms that can’t exist in the real world of eighteenth century France. It’s impeccably shot and beautifully acted, and it boasts the most powerful ending of any film this year. Go see it instead of whatever superhero movie is coming out in February.
Best Superhero Movie: Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw
Yes, it’s a superhero movie. There’s literally no rational argument that can refute this. It’s one of the weaker Fast & Furious films in recent memory, but superhero movies suck, and this was the best one this year. If you know me, you probably know that I love this franchise in spite of my hatred of Corona, which might be the worst beer ever brewed. The first hour of this movie is pretty terrible. It’s full of childish insults that sound like they were written by a six-year-old on a deadline. Once the petty name calling between the two lead characters is over, the movie gives the audience what it’s come to expect: pure, unadulterated chaos.
Jason Statham and The Rock are terrific as always, and the action sequences are obscene. There’s more green screen in this installment than in most Fast & Furious movies, but there’s still a shit ton of practical effects that continue to set this franchise apart from the rest. It’s rare to see a big studio movie actually blow shit up, and this franchise continues to do it with reckless abandon. If the insult humor was as strong as the action sequences, this would easily have made my top thirty. Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw is available for rent on most major streaming services.
Best Live Action Short Film: A Sister
A Sister tells the horrifying story of an assaulted, kidnapped woman calling the police under the guise of calling her sister. She’s riding in the car with her captor, so she’s unable to communicate freely with the phone operator, who is forced to divine the situation from the woman’s obscure comments. It’s a master class in building tension through mundane dialogue and divulging plot details only when absolutely necessary. A Sister is not currently available on streaming services, but it is part of the Oscar nominated live action shorts program currently in theaters.
Best Documentary Short Film: St. Louis Superman
St. Louis Superman is a moving profile of Bruce Franks, a black man in St. Louis who was inspired to become an activist and state representative after Michael Brown’s murder in 2014. It analyzes the struggles of young black men in a violent city and the fatigue experienced by those fighting for justice in a system designed to oppress them. Simultaneously inspiring and demoralizing, it shows what one determined individual can accomplish against all odds while questioning whether it’s possible to achieve adequate change in a corrupt system that’s uninterested in helping those who need it most. St. Louis Superman is not currently available on streaming services, but it is part of the Oscar nominated documentary shorts program currently in theaters.
Best Animated Short Film: Guaxuma
This is one of my favorite films of the year regardless of length. Not content to stick to a single animation style, Guaxuma employs stop motion, printed photographs, and amazingly detailed sand drawings to tell the story of director Nara Normande’s childhood growing up in a small Brazilian beach town with her best friend. It’s a beautiful meditation on friendship, memory, death, and the passage of time. You can watch Guaxuma for free right here.
Most Underrated Film: Tito and the Birds
Tito and the Birds is one of the most insightful films of the year. It analyzes how wealthy individuals utilize the media to spread fear to the masses, incapacitating common people like an infectious disease in order to keep themselves in power. The animation is stunning. The characters are hand-drawn in a fairly simplistic way, but the background of every frame is a vibrant oil painting. Tito and the Birds is streaming on Amazon Prime and is available for rent on most other streaming services.
Most Overrated Film: Joker
I’m sorry, this movie is awful. The only reason it’s not lower than #170 on my list is out of respect for Phoenix’s performance. This is a movie made by a bad director trying to copy his favorite films. There is not one single thing in this pile of garbage that wasn’t stripped straight from Taxi Driver, The King of Comedy, or Fight Club. It’s well beyond homage to the point of blatant plagiarism. If you liked this movie, I highly encourage you to check out these far better films. Todd Phillips clearly wants to be seen as an auteur like Scorsese or Fincher, but those directors possess something that he obviously does not: the capacity for original thought.
He makes it very clear that his movie is about mental health, and he constantly beats viewers over the head with that message as if he’s terrified that one person might not get what he’s trying to say. He treats the audience like complete idiots with no capacity for understanding subtlety, which makes the film feel like an extremely fucked up children’s movie. In the climactic scene, after dozens of obvious statements about the film’s meaning, Phoenix’s character asks the audience, “What do you get when you cross a mentally ill loner with a society that abandons him and treats him like trash?!” It’s incredibly condescending. Phillips needs to return to making fun comedies that don’t attempt to grapple with serious issues, but he won’t do that because he’s an asshole that thinks comedy is impossible in this day and age where minorities demand to be treated like human beings. Fuck that guy, and fuck this movie.
Worst Picture: Cats
I wrote about this abomination a few weeks ago, and I’m not eager to revisit that traumatic experience. It’s even worse than everyone says it is. If someone set out to make a movie for the sole purpose of driving the audience into a blind rage, they could not do better than Cats. The CIA probably commissioned it to use as an enhanced interrogation tactic. I’ve only seen it once, and I would give up everyone I’ve ever cared about to avoid seeing it again. Sorry, Mom.
Cats is somehow still showing in a handful of theaters. Alamo Drafthouse is hosting “rowdy screenings” in a shameful attempt to make people think it’s a fun movie. It is not. Do not watch it. I feel like you’re tempted to watch it. If you go see it and lose every last shred of faith you had left in humanity, that’s on you. I’ve done my civic duty.
Conclusion
I just ranked two hundred five movies and analyzed nineteen of them. You disagreed with something on my list, didn’t you? Post your dissent in the comments, and I’ll engage you in an intelligent, adult discussion in which I expose you as the tasteless, birdbrained simpleton that you are. Thank you for reading.
Michael Dixon is a professional accountant by day and an unprofessional movie watcher by night. He has slipped into a quick thirty-six hour coma in an attempt to get some much needed rest and regain whatever feeble grasp he had on reality before embarking on this ill-conceived project. He will not do your taxes. He lives in Austin, Texas with his lovely television and collection of fine whiskies. You can’t purchase his book anywhere because it doesn’t exist.
