Best Picture 2019: Part II

Green Book

Racism is bad, buddy road movies are good, and few show that better than Green Book. In many senses, it's too formulaic and adheres to too many stereotypical scenarios and characters but the chemistry onscreen is electric. Mortensen and Ali are both on brilliant form and it is the way they work together that really lends Green Book its success.

Green Book manages to be powerful in the issues it portrays but also funny and heartwarming. That may seem like it would undermine the severity of racism but it actually emphasises the contrast in the way successful African Americans were (and are) treated. The film has been riddled with some scandals - some more scandalous than others - but that shouldn't detract you from the fact that this is a good, mostly well crafted, film. That being said, its biggest weakness is not anything that happens on screen, but rather that none of that is hugely memorable. There's nothing bold here and it causes Green Book to slowly fade into a cinematic mist of similarly well-intentioned but safe film-making.

Roma

A cinematic love letter, in part to Cuarón's home country of Mexico, and in part to the language of film making. An emotive, powerful piece of cinema that never drifts through life, but purposefully captures the unfolding events of a young maid's life.

Roma has everything one could ask for (except colour, I suppose). Its shot in beautifully crisp black and white (rivalled only by this year's Cold War), holding its gaze and refusing to cut away. The camera pans with characters as they navigate relationships with one another, balancing employment and class. Cuarón isn't afraid to let things sit for a moment, allowing the audience to fully absorb everything in front of them. Similarly, he introduces details that seem small or insignificant and grows them into a full and powerful climax without the need for constant action, CGI magic, or big names to make it captivating. This love letter is written to ask its lover, the viewers, to come home and remember what made them fall in love with cinema to begin with.

The Favourite

What happens when you take a director known for a film about single people being turned into animals and have them direct a period piece about a 1700s queen and the ladies in her court? You get The Favourite; a daring and dizzying display of regal ridiculousness captured with whip pans and a fish-eye lens.

The Favourite boasts stunning performance from its three leading ladies, Emma Stone, Rachel Weisz, and Olivia Coleman. They are all devilish and controlling but also weak at times which opens up opportunities for power struggles to emerge, and these struggles are the backbone of the narrative. This is a weird world of duck and lobster racing, of sapphic love-making, and of rotten fruit throwing Torys but its absurdity never feels out of place or unneeded. This is the world Lanthimos has created in order to tell this story, this foul-mouthed reality is not so different from our own and it is the best reality to tell this story.

Blackklansman

Blacksploitation films may have faded out of popular culture (and probably for good reasons) but if there were one man to play with the genre, it would be Spike Lee. The veteran director is back with a fun recreation of a completely bizarre police case.

The concept alone, a black man infiltrating the Ku Klux Klan, seems ridiculous but there is a reality here Lee wants to present. From the moment the screen flicks into life, you can feel Lee's purposeful hand guiding the viewer, using cinema as a point of focus. Scenes from Gone With The Wind and Birth of a Nation grace the screen before anything happens, putting the slave-driving South (particularly that glorified in celluloid) in the audience's mind immediately. The rest of the story is fun, dramatic, and well performed but don't let the light tone and historic setting fool you. Lee closes as purposefully as he opens, jumping forward to the present and showing the viewer cars ploughing through crowds of black protestors, reminding us that racism is not dead and in fact, racism still kills.

Mary Poppins Returns

With franchises and sequels taking over the cinematic landscape and being green lit before their predecessor has even left the cinema, it’s a breath of fresh air to have a sequel that waited for its time. Whilst author P. L. Travers dismissed the original Mary Poppins, there’s no denying it is a classic, a family favourite, and was revolutionary in its day for combining animation and live action. It was begging for a sequel, as were its producers. But for over 50 years, despite plenty of efforts nothing came... until now.

Mary Poppins Returns is set 25 years after its original, featuring Jane and Michael Banks as adults in the midst of a family crisis and the bank wanting to repossess the Banks' family home. Michael, whose wife has recently passed away, has three children that he needs to look out for and no money with which to do it, but he has some shares in the bank which would pay off his debt. If only he knew where his father left them. With the Banks children, and their children, in trouble, Mary swoops in on a breeze and cryptically promised to stay until the door opens.

We’re swiftly returned to the magical landscape of the original Poppins: talking umbrellas, bigger-on-the-inside carpets bags, animated adventures, but with lamplighters taking the place of the original chimney sweeps. However, herein lies the problem. In retreading the path walked by the original, Returns builds expectations without delivering. There are set-ups without conclusion, familiarly dodgy cockney accents, unnecessary romantic subplots, and perhaps most damningly, homage to the original without the heart. 

The film’s nostalgia overload feels less like a tribute to the old film (though there are small but excellent moments that do this) and more like a cardboard cut out of its former self, looking the part but lacking depth. Mary is less a mystical magical nanny, wanting to help the Banks family overcome their problems and more superhuman ready to overcome their problems for them in a rushed climax that almost makes a lot of what came before feel unneeded.

But it’s not all bad, hardly so. The film is headed up with a sharp, practically-perfect performance by Emily Blunt. It’s a different interpretation than Andrew’s original nanny but not a lesser. Blunt is sterner but naughtier, with a mocking sense of humour stemming from a genuine care for the children. She easily holds the film together with a charisma and charm to die for. With her are a superb supporting cast, particularly Ben Whishaw's barley-holding-it-together Michael, but also Emily Mortimer, Julie Walters, Colin Firth, Lin-Manual Miranda (cockney accent notwithstanding) and an all too short appearance by the great Dick Van Dyke.

And there is a solid story here too, somewhere beneath the loosely intertwined and forgettable songs. A touching tale of family, of growing up, of joy and love. If Mary Poppins Returns main goal was to make you smile and feel happy, it succeeds even if some elements are lacking. There are a couple of scenes that could have been left on the cutting room floor (an underwater non-adventure and a rushed topsy turvy sequence), but otherwise there's nothing too harmful here, but rather harmless fun. There's some stunning set pieces, genuine laughs, and a sense that this film was made with love. Some who love the original will be let down by an attempt to recreate the magic rather than make it anew, whilst others will be joyful that there's still magic in Hollywood at all. 

The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected)

New York is famously home to some wacky characters and cinema has often sought to capture that 'New York spirit' in the stories it tells. Film makers build personalities around the New York ethos - the stories of the quirky, rushed, community driven but isolated individuals that inhabit the famous city.

Noah Baumbach's Meyerowitz Stories is one such story.  It's the tale of a family headed by semi-successful sculptor Harold Meyerowitz (Dustin Hoffman) that comes together and falls apart on repeat for its near two-hour runtime. After a medical incident, Harold's two sons, Danny (Adam Sandler) and Matthew (Ben Stiller), and daughter Jean (Elizabeth Marvel), rally together to support each other and their father despite their estrangement from one another. But honouring your father isn't always as easy as it appears to be, especially when they're as neurotic as Harold. 

The Meyerowitz Stories is a fascinating exploration into the minds of the all the major players in a dysfunctional family jammed with exceptional performances. The film is broken into sections - handily titled or surmised with a title plaque like those you may see in a gallery - to give us greater insight into one character or situation at a time. We start with recently separated Danny as he desperately tries to park his car in busy Manhattan with his daughter Eliza (Grace Van Patten) in a comical sequence where the viewer is rammed into the car with the pair, the camera squeezed in between them, not just seeing their relationship but feeling it. Later we join Matthew, Harold's favourite son, who has escaped to LA and returned for lunch with his father, but no restaurant lives up to Harold's standards. We then have several shorter episodes, a group episode, a short Jean episode, and so on. 

Around the place, the film is being heralded as an Adam Sandler film, and whilst this is his best performance in years, this is not strictly true. This is a true ensemble piece and each performer brings something powerful and meaningful to the story. Dustin Hoffman's Harold is a genius creation; a grumpy, mumbling, artist who never quite peaked in his career and is almost allergic to other's success, at one point physically running from a former contemporary's show. He is the glue that holds the narrative together by pushing the family apart but there's something oddly endearing about him. Sandler and Stiller, alongside each other for the first time since Happy Gilmore, are brilliant as the half-brothers Danny and Matthew respectively. Their drastically different relationships with their father bringing much of the film's entertainment and conflict and their on-screen chemistry amplifying and exaggerating the comedy in their pain. Emma Thompson is also present as Maureen, an alcoholic Professor Trelawney type and Harold's fourth wife (who lovingly refers to him as The Dad).

The genius of Mereyowitz is in its weighty screenplay. This is a puff pastry of a family narrative - it's layered. The dialogue flows but no one is listening to one another. It's almost like the audience are absorbing two conversations at once which is an extremely efficient way to build characters. We hear their life stories in a way that's completely self absorbed and yet somehow desperate for attention or affection, depending on who is speaking. It's that tension, those hidden desires, that bring the heart to the film. It's also a testament to what happens when you make funny people do something serious; you get something seriously funny. 

Whilst its final third loses its pacing somewhat, the editing of the sections becoming somewhat jarring, it more than makes up for it with its brilliant performances, witty writing, and touching dramedy. 

OJ: Made in America

Documentaries are some of the most under appreciated works of film out there. It’s not easy to take non-fiction subject matter, cram archival footage in, and jump between talking heads and make it is an engaging as any good thriller out there, but the best ones do just that. I’m not talking here about the ones with a charismatic guide to take us through what’s happening (like Super Size Me, Catfish or Fahrenheit 9/11), I’m specifically talking about those that let interviews and the events tell their own story (see Blackfish for one example). Today’s film is not only a record breaking, Oscar winning endeavour, it also tells the story of one of the biggest rise and falls in American history. This is OJ: Made in America.

We’ve all heard the name OJ Simpson, but do we all know who he is and what happened to him? OJ: Made in America details the the incredible rise and the even more spectacular fall of one of the most astonishing Americans to ever walk the planet. Following OJ from the ghettos of California, to the heights of the National Football League, to a prison jumpsuit in Nevada, the documentary clocks in at just under 8 hours but was sensibly separated into five meticulously structured parts. Focusing on his football career, his fame and fortune, his darker violent side, the trial of the century, and OJ’s life post trial respectively, the documentary breaks down the narrative of OJ’s life beyond the court room. Whilst other big players in popular culture are also focussing on the judicial phenomenon that was the trial (see American Crime Story: The People v OJ Simpson), OJ: Made in America paints a riveting bigger picture of racial injustice in the USA, of a harsh and violent LAPD, of the American justice system, and of our cultural obsession with celebrity status. It is more than a biopic, it is an analysis of a broken and divided society. 

Where OJ: Made in America really achieves is in the way it builds information to culminate in the biggest impact. Talking heads of friends, family, locals, jurors, and police officers amongst others are introduced with little to no context. Mark Fuhrman in interview, for example, offers comments on the Rodney King riots and Nicole Brown’s abuse calls before the documentary reveals his involvement in the case as a racially abusive liar, but it also gives him the opportunity to defend himself. Information is revealed when it is important to the story that director Ezra Edelman is trying to tell, like he is presenting the case in court himself. He allows all sides to have their say on the case and on OJ and the racial divide in America in general. It creates constant drama, suspense, and intrigue and even eight hours in you will want to keep going and hear more. 

Its more important for Edelman to tell the story of America than it is of OJ, thus the tagline for the feature: ‘Made in America’; that’s the real heart of the documentary. Whilst other documentaries on OJ have tried to critique the evidence or find alternative theories, Edelman explains how we ended up in that court room and how the country was so divided on the verdict. It’s painful to watch at times, refusing to shy away from the gruesome. It is the mark of a director who has something important to say. Whilst 13th made similar comments on the state of racial divide in America, OJ: Made in America isolates a specific example that the world is already aware of and bleeds every ounce of contextualising information it can out of it to drive home its point and focusing on such a renowned and particularly charming and popular figure in American culture adds to its appeal over the it’s more evangelical contemporaries. 

OJ: Made in America taps into the true-crime zeitgeist of Making a Murder and Serial but it is shocking in a different way. This documentary isn’t just exploring a potential wrong verdict. It’s very real; the issues it presents are those that our world knows and experiences still. It is not an isolated incident. One part sport movie, one part rising star story, one part race documentary, and one part crime thriller, OJ: Made in America is a rollercoaster and it may be uncomfortable at points but you won’t want to get off.

Sandler Wexler

Today's review is brought to you in anticipation of an exciting development of my life in film analysis. I will soon be releasing a video essay on the filmography of Adam Sandler and to celebrate and prepare you for this event, let's take a look at his most recent release. This is Sandy Wexler.

The titular Sandy (Adam Sandler) is a talent manager; not a talent agent though, he's quick to point out that the former means family. He has a small body of odd-job clients on the lowest rung of entertainment which he lies to constantly and a party of other celebrities inform us through faux-interviews about Sandy's other annoying habits. Despite having the appeal of a toad, Sandler manages to sign Courtney Clarke (Jennifer Hudson), a young singer who has that something special. As her talent is recognised and Sandy's affections for her grow, she begins to be drawn to the bigger agencies and the disappointment begins to affect Sandy's work and relationships.

Sandy Wexler is one of Sandler's completely unjustified now eight film deal. However, it is also the most complete. Don't misunderstand this, the film is heavily flawed, but after his last two dismal efforts (that is, The Ridiculous 6 and The Do-Over), Sandy Wexler almost seems good. It's by no means Sandler's best performance or even close, but it is consistent and oddly likeable. Despite all of Sandy's habits, he is strangely charming with Sandler fitting the role well. It gave purpose to his annoying voices, though at times they can grate. Oscar winner Hudson doesn't feel out of place here either and seems to draw out Sandler's better performance, similar to the way Jack Nicholson did in Anger Management. This being said, Sandy seems older than Sandler and Courtney feels younger than Hudson, creating a jarring and uncomfortable tension between the romantic leads. It never quite feels natural or professional - he is her manager after all.

Where Sandy Wexler falls down is primarily in every other aspect. It's length is completely unnecessary; there is not enough narrative to fill its two hour runtime, which leaves director Steven Brill cutting away to too many celebrity talking heads, and spending too much time with pointless side characters (do Nick Swanson's daredevil or Jackie Sandler's struggling actress add anything to the story arch at all?). Despite that extra length, the conclusion is entirely unsatisfactory and unrealistic. Throughout the second half of the movie, Sandy's career starts to plummet but after one nonsensical scene where he is literally a puppet for ventriloquist Ted Rafferty (Kevin James), everything suddenly turns around but without rhyme or reason. It's a little bit too neat and a huge let down. However, there are some redeeming factors. There are some excellent lighting choices and, perhaps an even rarer experience in a Sandler movie, some genuinely funny moments.

The stakes in Sandy Wexler are never quite high enough to make us care. Is the love story, Courtney's success, or the rest of Wexler Artist's careers the main focus on the story? What's Sandy's objective? It's clunky and messy, but endearing and charming. The support cast are predictably terrible, Rob Schneider is again playing the token foreigner, but Sandy has a heart it's not some lazy half-assed attempt at story-telling like Sadler's recent outings. It's the first time in years that Sandler is producing a story he seems to care about and while it is not a great success, it is a step in the right direction.

Banks

The West may may have calmed down since the days of old, but that doesn't mean its stopped being wild. The desert planes are still unforgiving and crime is still being fought by good officers of the law. This is Hell or High Water. 

The Howard brothers, ex-con Tanner (Ben Foster) and divorced father Toby (Chris Pine), need a quick pay day in order to save the old family ranch and what is quicker than holding up several banks at gun point. The inexperienced brothers begin a spree, hitting banks from several towns, but veteran cop Marcus Hamilton (Jeff Bridges) and his partner Alberto Parker (Gil Birmingham) are not far behind them. As well as the police, the gun friendly state inhabitants of the Texas do not take too kindly to thieves in their home town giving the brothers another challenge to face.

Hell or High Water's first and most powerful achievement is creating a level of sympathy for both the robbers and the law. The screen time is split relatively evenly between the two of them, making it difficult to form a bias towards one pair or the other and the brothers are not positioned as cruel or malicious, at least not from the outset; they want to protect their family and their home. This builds an interesting tension that shifts back and forth throughout the film, forcing the audience to switch their alliances time and again. It's engaging and exciting, creating a moral conflict that we, the audience, have to make our own minds up on.

David Mackenzie's neo-western is brilliant addition, and in many ways, extension to the genre. It's a classic cat and mouse chase with Jeff Bridges putting in a fantastic performance as Hamilton, always one step behind the brothers. But like any good chase, its full with twists and surprises with only a few moments that drag. The screenplay plays a heavy hand in this - it is full of wit and intelligence, building phenomenal characters but also creating tension and suspense for a showdown of a final act. That wit also comes out in moments of hilarity and slapstick, but that doesn't mean this isn't a serious film. Hell or High Water takes its craft very seriously, staying true to Western motifs without feeling dated. Like the Coen's No County for Old Men, Hell or High Water has brought a fresh feeling to the southern states.

Fresh, fun, and thrilling. David Mackenzie takes on Taylor Sheridan's screenplay and breathes magic into it. Its a wonderful film and crafted magnificently. This is a commitment of love to film and it shows.

Home

We all wanted to run away from home one time or another, but few of us attempted it. Even fewer of us did it accidentally. But what would happen if you got lost, ending up thousands of miles from your home and family? This is Lion.

Over 80,000 children are lost in India each year. A terrifying and shocking statistic but Lion just looks at one example. After young Saroo (Sunny Pawar) is separated from his brother Guddu (Abhishek Bharate) at a train station and ends up on a train travelling away from home, he becomes lost and alone. He remains calm and rides the waves of chance that take him from one temporary home to another before being flown out to Australia to be adopted by Sue (Nicole Kidman) and John (David Wenham). Jump forward 20 years where Saroo (now Dev Patel) has made a home and a family for himself, but whilst he has gained a family, back home his mother has lost one.

Lion takes on two adventures: one away from India, and one back. Despite an incredible performance from Patel - who is easily the best thing about the second act - the journey to find Saroo’s family is flawed. The pace drops completely, which is understandable considering most of Saroo’s searching is through scrolling on Google Earth, but there’s also awkward and under-explained tension between Saroo and his adoptive brother Mantosh (Divian Ladwa). However, the first act is a moving, beautifully shot journey into the unknown. Sunny Pawar is an exceptional young talent and displaying a huge range of emotion and skill despite his age.

At this point, one needs to return to Dev Patel's performance as a 20-something year old Saroo. From humble beginnings on Skins, Patel has come a long way. Despite the clunky execution of the second act, Patel does an incredible job with what director Garth Davis gives him to work with. This is easily his best work; it is captivating and powerful, overcoming the issues of an awkward transition into the present day. The other success of Lion is its cinematography. Throughout, this moving story is captured beautifully by the camera - the landscapes of India and Australia, both rural and urban, have hardly looked better. It captures the intention of each scene, causing disorientation for the audience when Saroo is panicked, or creating calm when things are more serene. 

Lion is an emotional film, but one that lacks a satisfying climax. For such a large build up, the resolution is underwhelming; a bit more time spend on the conclusion and a bit more time spend on developing relationships in the second act would have benefited the movie massively. But altogether, a warm and touching tale of one boy’s journey home.

Black

Drugs, race, homophobia. These are all powerful topics to approach in a film separately, let alone together. Is it ambition and bravery, of stupidity and foolishness? Let’s look to Moonlight to see.

One man’s life contains many stories; far too many to easily include in a two hour screenplay. That being said, Moonlight provides the cliff notes for its protagonist's journey from childhood to adult hood, with a pit-stop at the teenage years for good measure. Chiron (Alex R. Hibbert) is a young boy, bullied and excluded by the bigger boys at school. His mother (Naomi Harris) has fallen victim to a drug habit leaving Chiron to often fend for himself. However a drug dealer Juan (Mahershala Ali) and his girlfriend Teresa (Janelle Monáe) take him in when his home is not friendly, and treat him right. As Chiron (now Ashton Sanders) grows up, the bullying gets more severe, his sexuality and friendships become more confusing, and his life seems to spiral out of control. Eventually, we get to see where all of this gets him in the third act of the film.

Structured into three acts - Little, Chiron, and Black - Moonlight cleverly manages to essentially sew three shorts together to create a modern masterpiece. It doesn't have to show immediate relationship between actions and consequences, instead allowing them to play out over a lifetime giving the film a punchy pace, with nothing feeling unexplained or out of place. It also allows the film to build to multiple climaxes, one within each act, the most striking of which is in the middle episode - everything before builds to this point, everything after is a result of it. Director Barry Jenkins bombards the audience with visual information and it is glorious; it makes the film beautiful to watch as well providing extra detail about what is happening.

With stunning performances throughout, Moonlight allows a varied cast the opportunity to shine, with its lead played by three different actors - youngster Ashton Sanders playing the teenage Chiron is the standout of the three - but the best performances are in the supporting cast. Naomi Harris is at her very best in a hugely emotive role. It’s a role full of pain, and Harris doesn’t hold back. Mahershala Ali too, as Juan, is phenomenal. Though he is only present for the first act, his performance is easily the most memorable of the two hour runtime and his impact is lasting. Here, he solidifies his name as one of the go to actors in Hollywood.

Moonlight is a brilliantly and beautifully told story. It is proof that a film’s topic doesn’t have to be big and grand or based on some incredible story; a simple story told well is more powerful than powerful story executed poorly.

Awkward

Some things in life take you by surprise and turn everything upside down. It can complicate relationships, the way you communicate, and change who you are. And when that happens a few times, it can become overwhelming. This is Manchester by the Sea.

Lee Chandler (Casey Affleck) is the caretaker of a block of apartments where everyone treats him like dirt. He is an awkward guy, swearing at tenants and fighting in bars, struggling to really connect with anyone. So when his brother dies of heart complications, leaving behind a son, Patrick (Lucas Hedges), and a will listing Lee as his new guardian, it's no surprise that Lee finds it difficult to adjust to this new development. Conflicted by his new role in life which is trying to force him to relocate to Manchester from Boston, he and Patrick butt heads over how they see their lives progressing, but ultimately they are both trying to cope with grief in their own way.

Writer/ director Kenneth Lonergan has created an extraordinary piece of cinema here. It's understated and gentle in its approach but its narrative structure and pacing really pack a punch. We're introduced to Lee as a mystery figure - 'is that the Lee Chandler?' one character asks - and slowly Lonergan reveals the secret side of his protagonist, building up a story line in the present before flashing back to expose Lee's past with precise timing for maximum effect. This is assisted in no small part by remarkable, career defining performances by Casey Affleck and Lucas Hedges. Their on-screen chemistry (and this extends to the further cast also, but the two leads particularly) encapsulates Lonergan's screenplay, hitting every off beat pause and every awkward interruption. The camera lingers uncomfortably in the middle of broken dialogue and jarring conversations, or even moments of strained silence. It's painfully funny; we are the flies on the wall of Lee's life as he stumbles and stutters through it.

Manchester by the Sea is arguably flawless in its execution. Despite its hilarity, it is also desperately sad at points which helps to demonstrate Affleck's range but also adds variety to the film. his rows with his wife Randi, played incredibly by Michelle Williams, serve to show both Randi and Lee's darker sides, their hurtful sides. In less capable hands, it would suffer from tonal inconsistencies, but not here. In Lonergan's hands, this is where the film thrives, building on the changes in pacing and tone to allow for the greatest impact. The deeper the film goes, too, the better it gets - it never loses its way or tries to be more than it is. It is confident in itself, comfortable in its awkward, uncomfortable screenplay and performances. Despite having a socially disconnected, the film is driven by emotion and the passion is clear, even if it is understated. 

A well crafted screenplay, brought to life by its author and embodied by its cast. There are many moving parts in Manchester by the Sea and they are all committed to telling this story to the best of their abilities. The result is a marvellously moving, captivating and hilarious piece of cinema.

Aliens

Language underpins everything in our society. The very pillars of communication have formed over years of linguistics evolving from society to society. All of life has a way to communicate and if one could understand the language of other living things, who knows what lies in the future. This is Arrival.

When strange large extraterrestrial ships appear dotted around the globe as if by magic, it is up to the greatest minds in the world to make contact. There's theoretical physicist Ian Donnelly (Jeremy Renner), linguist Louise Banks (Amy Adams) and there's also the best in American brute force in army Colonel Weber (Forest Whitaker). Like twelve other ship landing (or more accurately, hovering) sites around the world, they team up to try to get the life onboard the vessels to answer one question - what is your purpose?

There has been a recent resurgence of quality science fiction films, taking a strong, socially applicable concept (see the need for fuel in Moon or the uninhabitability of Earth in Interstellar), a talented cast, and a director with a bold and cohesive vision. When these elements are combined, the film makers tap into a societal nerve and make something special. Arrival is no exception. In a world where military force is the first port of call when anything happens, Arrival poses a counter argument between brain and brawn, brilliantly represented in one scene where Louise analytically dissects the question the army want to ask, highlighting the necessity of patience and learning. Here, director Villeneuve proves his range and firmly establishes himself as the next big thing, following 2013's Prisoners and last year's Sicario.

Part of the beauty is no doubt in the cast. Once you can get around the notion that Renner is the coolest leading theoretical physicist ever, everything slots neatly into place. Whitaker is in familiar territory too as the authority figure and manages to be a good middle man between the academics and the military. But this is Amy Adams' film. Her performance is intelligent and emotional and is foundational to the film. We feel the fear in her nightmares, we share the joys in her success. It may feel to some like Merck Streep stole Adams' place on the Oscar ballot this year and Arrival (and last year's Nocturnal Animals) is evidence of her talent and her worthiness of further reward.

One part The Day The Earth Stood Still, one part Interstellar, one part E.T., Arrival encapsulates everything a good Sci-fi should. It also hops around back and forth in time through apparent flashbacks and memories, all of which serve to build the climax of the film, to finally reach understanding. It's complexity in the final third causes it to stumble occasionally or drag a little too long, but for the most part it's an exciting, fresh and innovative addition to science-fiction cinema and one that will no doubt provide inspiration to keep the trend of quality sci-fi on the rise.

Baseball

Baseball, racial tension, and garbage men; what do these things have in common? They are all heavily featured in Denzel Washington's fast talking, hard hitting, third directorial feature. This is Fences.

Life has been tough on Troy Maxson (Denzel Washington). He was once an aspiring pro baseball player but never made it due to his race, so he believes. He has a loving wife, Rose (Viola Davis) who supports him and guides him as he strives to support his family. He has a brother Gabriel (Mykelti Williamson) who has a mental disorder, an estranged son, Lyons (Russell Hornsby), who only comes by for money once a week, and a younger son, Cory (Jovan Adepo), who has the potential to be a pro football player. We see Troy juggle these relationships, but keeping up a wall, not letting anyone penetrate or get too close. But when you've seen life chew up people and spit them out, it's hard to share warmth and encouragement with your family when reality is not so kind.

There's no shortage of films about racial oppression at the Oscars this year (13th, Loving, Hidden Figures), but Fences is perhaps the most striking of them all. Its main narrative is one of family under pressure and beneath that is the undercurrent of a systematically racially bias society. This is also a film driven by powerful performances from every member of the cast. Denzel Washington is electrifying, rattling through his mini-monologues at a lightning fast pace and it is mesmerising. He is at his best here, fresh off an award winning run of Fences on Broadway with co-star Viola Davis, Washington delivers a monumental performance as Troy having been able to absorb the character during its time on stage. Davis too, in a supporting role here as the gentle housewife Rose, is on top form and this maybe her year to finally take the Oscar statuette home that she has deserved since The Help. Keeping up with her Broadway co-star and hitting every beat where he lets up his pace the film keeps moving and when those gaps in flow come, the audience notice. The leads' spectacular timing emphasise the narrative and power it forward.

This is film making. Stripped clear of unnecessary extras, Fences demonstrates what can be achieved when you combine a good screenplay with a talented director and an outstanding cast. There's no blockbuster special effects, no plethora of A-list names teaming up to fight a common evil, but what is onscreen is spell-binding. Washington's not only skilled in front the camera, but behind it too. He knows August Wilson's play like the back of his hand and his familiarity with it allows him to finely tune every element of his film adaptation to be the best that it can. Staged and blocked like a play, Washington's camera glides in and out of rooms in the small house, lingering rather than cutting, providing the feeling that we are often looking through that fourth wall. It is effective, allowing the actors to really get involved in their scene, together, without interruption or cutaway.

Washington's achievement is simply astounding. For only his third directorial feature, Fences is an accomplishment to behold. Simple and powerful with stellar performances all round. This is an intelligent piece of cinema that doesn't try to be showy. It uses its medium of film to do the basics of storytelling, but it does those basics phenomenally well.