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Past Lives (2023)

Nora: There is a word in Korean. In-Yun. It means "providence" or "fate". But it's specifically about relationships between people. I think it comes from Buddhism and reincarnation. It's an In-Yun if two strangers even walk by each other in the street and their clothes accidentally brush. Because it means there must have been something between them in their past lives. If two people get married, they say it's because there have been 8,000 layers of In-Yun over 8,000 lifetimes.

Happy 41st birthday to Greta Lee today! I loved
this movie very very very much. I would have nominated
all three actors for Oscars. (Especially Teo Yoo dammit.)

Strangers On Hulu

It might not have gotten any Oscar nominations and it might not have won any of the BAFTAs it was nominated for and it might not be getting a physical media release here in the U.S. but my favorite movie of 2023, Andrew Haigh's All of Us Strangers, doesn't need any of that because it's already a goddamned classic and it will outlive and outshine 95% of anything else made in 2023. And at least we can watch it on Hulu now -- it just hit the streamer today. So go watch it, and then leave it playing on repeat in the background of your life so somebody will notice there's interest and maybe we can at least change the "no physical media" thing. (Come to the rescue, Criterion!) That's the only one I really care about. Whatever -- I'm used to it taking time for my beloveds to find their place in the world. I made my peace with it long, long ago! Just go watch the movie, and then read my review, and then we can cry and cry more together over the beauty and the heartbreak of Haigh's making. 

 

MNPP's 20 Favorite Films of 2023

Since I leave for Sundance in a couple of days -- have I mentioned that I'm going to Sundance enough yet? I'm going to Sundance! -- I have decided that it'll be the best for us all if I just go ahead and drop my favorite movies of 2023 list right now without a lot (or more, anyway) hemming and hawing on it. Lord knows I could put this off for a few more weeks as I try to get around to some outstanding movies, and rearrange this list every single day as my erratic mood shifts like the breeze, but I think I'll prefer to just not have this hanging over my head as I start reviewing 2024 films. 

Anyway as I've stated already I think last year was a marvel of a year for movies -- excellence abounded. And while I'm cool on several of the ones that seem to racking up a lot of the established awards out there (Barbie is fine and The Holdovers is mediocre at best) there's a lot to love even on the mainstream stages, and several movies in my Top 20 will probably have Oscar nominations come Oscar nomination time. Hell I even like the Nolan movie -- it's only a runner-up on my list and my least favorite thing about it (Robert Downey Jr.'s performance) seems to be the thing marching straight to Oscar gold, but since we're talking one of my least favorite, most overrated filmmakers, this is something!

Yadda yadda I've put off the list as long as I can with my rambling

so let's just do it. Here are my 20 favorite movies of 2023!

20. De Humani Corporis Fabrica

(dir. Lucien Castaing-Taylor & Verena Paravel) -- my review

19. La Chimera (dir. Alice Rohrwacher) -- my review

18. Showing Up (dir. Kelly Reichardt) -- my review

17. El Conde (dir. Pablo Larraín) -- my review

16. Passages (dir. Ira Sachs) -- my review

15. Godland (dir. Hlynur Pálmason)

14. Past Lives (dir. Celine Song) 

13. Rotting in the Sun (dir. Sebastián Silva) -- my review

12. Beau is Afraid (dir. Ari Aster) -- my review

11. Godzilla Minus One (dir. Takashi Yamazaki) -- my review

10. Killers of the Flower Moon (dir. Martin Scorsese) -- my review 

9. Asteroid City (dir. Wes Anderson) -- my review

8. May December (dir. Todd Haynes) -- my review

7. Poor Things (dir. Yorgos Lanthimos) -- my review

6. Saltburn (dir. Emerald Fennell) -- my review

5. Skinamarink (dir. Kyle Edward Ball) -- my review

4. Afire (dir. Christian Petzold) -- my review

3. The Eight Mountains

(dir. Felix van Groeningen & Charlotte Vandermeersch) -- my review

2. The Zone of Interest (dir. Jonathan Glazer) -- my review

1. All Of Us Strangers (dir. Andrew Haigh) - my review

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Runners-up: The Killer, Anatomy of a Fall, Oppenheimer, All Dirt Roads Taste of Salt, Eileen, A Thousand and One, Infinity Pool, You Hurt My Feelings, Silver Dollar Road, Will-o'-the-Wisp, Fallen Leaves, Full Time, Bottoms, Priscilla, Return To Seoul, Robot Dreams

The Former Year in Queer

I really didn't do much work over the holiday -- if you follow me on social media then you probably caught on that I spent the majority of my time going through the piles and piles of physical media that'd grown up around me and began the ongoing process of listing tons of stuff for sale on eBay -- but I did do one thing and it's a good important thing. I wrote up my list of favorite LGBTQ+ movies of 2023 for Pajiba -- click here and you can read that and it'll give you a good idea of where my head was at for the year since I haven't posted my actual Top 10 (or more likely 20) of the year yet. On that note I am 100% going to try and get that pounded out before I leave for Sundance in a couple of weeks, so stick around maybe.

Happy Strangers Holiday

Since All of Us Strangers is finally hitting theaters tomorrow (look for theaters and dates here) and I'm heading off for the holidays (MNPP will be closed up until January 2nd... although pay attention to my socials cuz I do have some other stuff dropping) so who knows when I will get around to officially posting anything like a Top 10 here, I'm just gonna come right out and spoil that (not that this will surprise anybody who's been paying attention) -- Andrew Haigh's All of Us Strangers is my favorite movie of 2023. You're number one, baby! Here's my review from September -- I've seen a lot of other movies since then, a lot of fantastic other movies, but nothing's come along to move this gorgeous sad thing from that top spot.  So go watch my boys (and girl) break your heart the minute you can, is my point! And come back here to tell me your thoughts -- leave comments on anything you see. I love to hear from my babies! And I'll see y'all in 2024 with plenty more nonsense...

The Past Lives Boys

Not sure how I missed this all day but earlier at The New York Times our pal Kyle talked to the men of Celine Song's wonderful film Past Lives, John Magaro and Teo Yoo, and if you've seen the movie go read it right now. (And if you haven't seen the movie go watch the movie right now and then go read the interview.) I got halfway through and now I just want to watch Past Lives again. They're both wonderful and I've loved Magaro since First Cow but I would kill in particular for Teo Yoo to score a Best Supporting Actor nomination -- his performance absolutely devastated me. One of my top most favorites of the year.

Please tell me that people are talking about Teo Yoo for all of the awards — he is so damn good in this pic.twitter.com/MSE1KgwfZM

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) August 27, 2023

All of Us Critics Choice Nominations

It's my first year as a member of the Critics Choice Association (y'all know how I feel about awards for art!) and so it's my duty to report on the nominations for the movies of the year 2023, which were just announced this morning. As happens every time I've voted in a large organization all of my weird votes were sucked into a black hole and the list of nominations looks like everybody else's lists of nominations, sigh. (How All of Us Strangers only got one nomination, for Screenplay, I will never comprehend.) 

There are a few highlights though that I can glom onto. All of the Poor Things love, and Saltburn got a few. I love May December and Killers of the Flower Moon and Past Lives and Anatomy of a Fall so no complaints on those. Bottoms for Best Comedy! And I didn't even vote for it in this category but I love that Godzilla Minus One made it into Best Foreign Language Film (I did vote for its Visual Effects, where it did not get in). That said the movies I did not like -- Maestro and The Holdovers specifically -- and the movies I think are just okay -- Oppenheimer and Barbie and American Fiction -- are way overrepresented. 

Anyway all of this is typical -- Awards Season always evens out to groupthink and the year's oddities must subsist on the love of the human oddities who keep loving them, so we'll keep doing that together. And eventually once I feel like I've seen enough of the year's movies I'll dole out my own faves. But for now know the Critics Choice Awards will air at 7pm EST on The CW on January 14th, hosted by Chelsea Handler -- I'm not going in person this year because I'm going to Sundance the following week instead and one has to make choices and that's was mine for 2024! Now hit the jump to see the full slate of Critics Choice noms...

The Sounds of Miss Bella Baxter

I tried to hold off on collecting vinyl for as long as I possibly could because I know myself and I knew the habit would become as obsessive as my VHS to DVD to blu-ray to 4K journey has been. Alas I finally broke down a couple of years ago, and I've got just under 400 records now -- not the world's largest collection by any means but when actual living space is at such a premium, given that I live in a New York City apartment with another human being, well, all of this collecting is straining toward a breaking point. Thankfully that day is not today though, because Waxwork Records -- the best in the biz for those of us whose vinyl collecting tends toward the movie soundtrack genre -- has today put the soundtrack for Yorgos Lanthimos' new movie Poor Things onto pre-order on vinyl. Grab your copy here if you're so inclined -- I haven't really posted about vinyl releases much here (hence that preamble) so I don't even know if any of this interests any of you! But that's not a thing that's stopped me from rambling before and I'm not going to let it stop me today. 

Poor Things is coincidentally (I doubt it was a coincidence) hitting theaters today! It is very very good, one of Yorgos' best movies (which is saying a lot since I don't think the fellow has made a bad movie to date) -- here is my review from NYFF. Emma Stone gives probably my favorite female performance of the year? I haven't actually mapped that question out yet but I think that's true. Anyway the score from composer Jerskin Fendrix that's on the above-mentioned record is definitely one of my favorite scores of the year. And I'm not just saying that now -- I tweeted it weeks ago! I have receipts.

Also cannot believe the score for POOR THINGS is the first movie score that musician Jerskin Fendrix has ever made? It's bonkers good #poorthings

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) November 6, 2023