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| Top: Josh and Benny Safdie, Uncut Gems Bottom: Vince Gilligan, El Camino; Martin Scorsese, The Irishman |
There's nothing wrong with a director going back to a tried and tested formula that suits their strengths, and really in the most basic sense that's what these four gentlemen have done with their respective films. There's a reason I'm talking about the following here as each director not only finds something new to offer this time around, they completely re-evaluate and turn in an entirely vivid, new experience for their films I'd never experienced from them before. Vince Gilligan returning to the biggest hit television series of all-time in El Camino gives one the opportunity to hone in on what Jesse Pinkman's been up to since we last saw him making his escape in the Breaking Bad finale. Which was a perfect ending in itself, but what Gilligan does here is craft the perfect epilogue to it. He explores what got Jesse into this situation and what will get him out of it, and creates such an affecting, tense portrait that narrows in on a contemplative exploration of Jesse, and the film works all the better for finding new ground to tread on instead of trying to recreate the Breaking Bad magic. The Safdie brothers Josh and Benny once again turning to a 'man on the ledge' genre to play with in Uncut Gems, presenting us with another dickhead to root for, this time around switching from Good Time's selfish, high-wire toxic Connie to the selfish, high-wire, toxic but altogether more wealthier Howard. We get a character who once again repeatedly puts himself in ridiculous situations, and through it the Safdies create, through all their technical excellences and conjuring up brilliant performances across the board, the unforgiving world of the New York diamond district where the character bounces off once fuckup after another repeatedly trying to find a way out, and making tension and anxiety over a frankly repulsive individual which is just remarkable. Martin Scorsese makes what might be his last go-around on the mobster genre ride in The Irishman. His decision to make a film about such a decidedly passive character and gradually hone in more and more on him as history unfolds across him is brilliant. Like Gilligan and the Safdies he presents us with a figure going through all sorts of situations that he's played around it before, and like them he presents his protagonist, Frank Sheeran, in an altogether different light, a nostalgic light that's gradually torn away as history catches up to him and he simply can't keep up with it. It's marvellous work from all three directors in conjuring up such compelling narratives, all essentially driven by presenting such a vivid, unforgettable wide scope and then fixating upon such compelling individuals.
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| Left: Terrence Malick, A Hidden. Life Right: Céline Sciamma, Portrait of a Lady on Fire; Lulu Wang, The Farewell |
Terrence Malick has spent the past few years directing glorified perfume adverts, so it's nice to see A Hidden Life as a return to form for him. It's by no means a perfect film, overlong and in need of a more concise edit, but what's there is often very strong and occasionally rather brilliant. Malick once again returns to what really is his greatest strength which is in capturing emotional intimacy in unlikely situations, and the film really excels the most when he allows us to really reflect on and absorb the power of the central relationship. Whether it's showing snippets of an early courtship, letting the camera linger on a husband's joyous return and his heartrending departure, and while there are scenes which come across as pointless navel gazing, particularly in the second half, there are just as many astonishing ones which capture the power of the true story. Meanwhile, Lulu Wang's direction for The Farewell is more understated yet no less powerful in its poignancy. She really does well to sidestep any pitfalls of the indie genre by balancing naturalism with the laughs and drama, and coheres them into a loving, yet observant and take on the family dramedy genre. What I particularly love is that she lets the performances flourish so much without trying to divert attention away from them, which is generally a problem I have with a lot of films, when she does undertake more overt stylistic choices it works, for example the 'funeral' scene or the family wedding montage, but my favourite moments are subtle touches like how she silently uses the camera to tell us the inner emotions of characters. And Céline Sciamma for Portrait of a Lady on Fire crafts an unforgettable immersive experience within a striking romance. Sciamma of course makes use of glorious cinematography and a strong screenplay to fashion such a compelling yet simple narrative, yet what I really have to commend is her restraint. Yes, there are amazing sequences like the titular 'on fire' scene which is just an astonishing piece of stylistic direction, but I really liked too how she allowed other scenes to play out with relative normalcy and calm, and never battering you over the head with the 'passion' between the two character but rather letting it be drawn out and slowly build up. And I keep mentioning it but that ending really is one of the most brilliant pieces of direction of the year.
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| Alejandro Landes, Monos Robert Eggers, The Lighthouse; Sam Mendes, 1917 |
Then you have directorial efforts which really go for the grand, epic, daring scope of capturing very specific atmospheres. In this regard, Alejandro Landes' work on Monos does a terrific job of capturing a consistently unnerving tone. You get pulled into this claustrophobic, hellish little world of child soldiers and the film never really lets go over its duration, and I really dug how Landes keeps these figures at a certain distance from the rest of the world, the isolation which creates even more sense of this often surreal environment. The film is very loosely plotted and the actors while uniformly strong are all very much within the director's vision which is the domineering aspect of the film. Landes runs with this disorientating mad experience and whether or not you like it, you got to admire it. Robert Eggers' The Lighthouse is also madness of an altogether different sort. It's honestly the kind of direction that gets the better the more I think about it, as Eggers does with the likes of Fritz Lang, Bergman, black and white horror cinema on the whole, what someone like Todd Phillips failed to do with Scorsese in Joker. In that the influence on his work is keenly felt, yet it is very much his own imprint on the genre rather than a blind copycat's pastiche. Everything about his direction from the aspect ratio, to the choice of lighting, however he got such brilliant performances out of his actors by often crazy means, every odd choice he makes is astonishing in how well it works. It's a true masterclass in Gothic filmmaking. Meanwhile, Sam Mendes takes a stab at the war genre with an approach like no other with 1917. Honestly, I'm not usually a Mendes fanboy, but this time round he really astonished me in crafting a war epic like no other. It's a virtuoso bit of filmmaking in combining everything - acting, score, CINEMATOGRAPHY, sound, vfx, screenplay - into such a tautly made immersion into the war zone. I love that Mendes is never singular in his intentions, there's variation with quieter moments, that make the primary purpose of a grand war action epic resonate beautifully without ever losing sight of the very personal story at its core. It's invigorating work that's frankly grown even more in my esteem with every re-watch.
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| Bong Joon Ho, Parasite Greta Gerwig, Little Women; Taika Waititi, Jojo Rabbit. |
Then we have the tricky balancing acts of the tones of these three films by three terrific auteurs. Taika Waititi strikes for the skies with Jojo Rabbit and in my opinion does a great job with it. Waititi's style as a director is particularly attuned to taking on a child's perspective, which he does so with such aplomb here once more. It is a different beast to Wilderpeople or Boy in terms of the subject matter he is dealing with here, and his choice to essentially maintain optimism and idealism in the face of the horrors in the margins is certainly a point of contention, but an approach that entirely worked for me in creating a humorous but also affecting coming-of-age tale with some standout moments like the shoes scenes which are unquestionably brilliant, and moreover his energy and life he brings to every scene is just superb too. Meanwhile, Greta Gerwig was horribly snubbed at the Oscars for her sterling work in Little Women. Her work here is for lack of a better word, wondrously wonderful. Taking her own unique spin of Gerwig-ness to material that doesn't immediately scream 'another adaptation' and making it her own. I have to commend Gerwig so much for really nailing what made Alcott's novel so great was how it is at once one of the most joyous and heartbreaking of stories, and Gerwig's choice to play with the structure and add in little touches of modernity without straying too far, retaining the essence of what made the novel great and adds in so much of her own style, and juggling the tones with som. particularly daring choices in that regard, creates such a fascinating take on the tale of four sisters. Then of course there's Bong Joon Ho and Parasite. What more can be said about the best directed film of the year, by far? First and foremost it's just an incredibly entertaining film. Just the way everything is presented, particularly those stunning montages, the individual musical choices, the brilliant ensemble staging that he's always been known to excel in. It is a film that is as funny as it is dramatically compelling, as thrilling as it is contemplative, and Bong knows when to hold back on one tone to emphasise the other and when to combine them. What goes beyond it just being a hugely entertaining film is how layered it is. It's no exaggeration to say that every frame of the film could be examined for finer details as to how Bong just adds so much more to reappraise in the story, making subsequent re-watches just as, if not even more, compelling.
Reel and Roll Awards Best Director 2019
Reel and Roll Awards Best Director 2019
- Bong Joon-ho, Parasite
- Sam Mendes, 1917
- Robert Eggers, The Lighthouse
- The Safdie Brothers, Uncut Gems
- Greta Gerwig, Little Women
- Martin Scorsese, The Irishman
- Céline Sciamma, Portrait of a Lady on Fire
- Taika Waititi, Jojo Rabbit
- Alejandro Landes, Monos
- Lulu Wang, The Farewell
- Terrence Malick, A Hidden Life
- Vince Gilligan, El Camino
- Rian Johnson, Knives Out
- Todd Douglas Miller, Apollo 11
- James Mangold, Ford v Ferrari
- Quentin Tarantino, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
- Joe and Anthony Russo, Avengers: Endgame
- Jordan Peele, Us
- Jan Komasa, Corpus Christi
- Noah Baumbach, Marriage Story
- Kleber Mendonça Filho and Juliano Dornelles, Bacurau
- Marielle Heller, A Beautiful Day in the Neighbourhood
- Dexter Fletcher, Rocketman
- Tom Harper, The Aeronauts
- Alma Har'el, Honey Boy
- Craig Brewer, Dolemite Is My Name
- Joe Talbot, The Last Black Man in San Francisco
- Jennifer Kent, The Nightingale
- Julius Onah, Luce
- Tom Harper, Wild Rose
- Pedro Almodóvar, Pain and Glory
- Lorene Scafaria, Hustlers
- Mati Diop, Atlantics
- Tyler Nilson and Michael Schwartz, The Peanut Butter Falcon
- Garret Price, Love, Antosha
- Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, Ready or Not
- Edward Norton, Motherless Brooklyn
- Josh Cooley, Toy Story 4
- Sergio Pablos, Klaus
- Joanna Hogg, The Souvenir
- Gene Stupnitsky, Good Boys
- Laure de Clermont-Tonerre, The Mustang
- Harry Wootliff, Only You
- Stephen Merchant, Fighting With My Family
- Olivia Wilde, Booksmart
- David F. Sandberg, Shazam!
- Dean DeBlois, How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World
- David Leitch, Hobbs & Shaw
- Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck, Captain Marvel
- Clint Eastwood, Richard Jewell
- David Michôd, The King
- Nahnatchka Khan, Always Be My Maybe
- Jim Jarmusch, The Dead Don't Die
- Kasi Lemmons, Harriet
- Fernando Meirelles, The Two Popes
- Ari Aster, Midsommar
- Michael Dougherty, Godzilla: King of the Monsters
- Destin Daniel Cretton, Just Mercy
- Trey Edward Shults, Waves
- Chad Stahelski, John Wick: Chapter 3
- Chanya Button, Vita and Virginia
- Abe Forsythe, Little Monsters
- James Gray, Ad Astra
- Kantemir Balagov, Beanpole
- Grant Sputore, I Am Mother
- J.C. Chandor, Triple Frontier
- Guy Ritchie, Aladdin
- Danny Boyle, Yesterday
- Christopher Landon, Happy Death Day 2U
- Rob Letterman, Detective Pikachu
- Jake Scott, American Woman
- Melina Matsoukas, Queen & Slim
- Anthony Maras, Hotel Mumbai
- Jay Roach, Bombshell
- Scott Z. Burns, The Report
- Jon Watts, Spider-Man: Far From Home
- Brian Kirk, 21 Bridges
- Jon Favreau, The Lion King
- Dan Gilroy, Velvet Buzzsaw
- Tim Burton, Dumbo
- Rupert Goold, Judy
- Steven Knight, Serenity
- Joe Berlinger, Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile
- Tate Taylor, Ma
- Todd Phillips, Joker
- Andy Muschietti, It Chapter Two
- Robert Rodriguez, Alita: Battle Angel
- Luc Besson, Anna
- J.J. Abrahams, Rise of the Skywalker
- Simon Kinberg, Dark Phoenix
- Karzan Kader, Trading Paint
- Fred Durst, The Fanatic
- Tom Hopper, Cats
- M. Night Shaymalan, Glass
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