Hi team,
It's that glorious time of the year (which sometimes occurs in February) where we look back on the previous year of films! I'm looking forward to reflecting on the movies I watched last year.
Without further ado, I present:
The PsychoCinematic Year in Movies
2021 Edition
1. Safety Not Guaranteed (4)
2. Drinking Buddies (1)
3. The Gentlemen (4)
4. The Trial of the Chicago 7 (4.5)
7. Emma. (2)
8. Stranger than Fiction (4)***
9. Framing Britney Spears (4)
10. The Two Killings of Sam Cooke (4)
12. Roman Holiday (4)
13. I Care A Lot (1)
15. Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom (5)
16. The Vast of Night (3.5)
17. Class Action Park (2)
19. The Last Blockbuster (4)
21. She’s Gotta Have It (5)
22. Betting On Zero (3)
23. The Lovebirds (3)
24. Being Canadian (2)
25. 21 Jump Street (4)***
27. Meet the Parents (3)***
28. Four Weddings and a Funeral (3.5)
29. Hamlet 2 (2)
30. Knocked Up (2.5)***
31. The Forty-Year-Old Version (4)
32. Meet the Fockers (3)***
34. Rounders (2)
35. The People vs Larry Flynt (3)
36. The Hangover (4)***
37. Breathless (4)***
38. Bob Ross: Happy Accidents, Betrayal & Greed (3)**
39. Black Narcissus (3.5)
40. Cars (2)
41. The Nun (1)
42. Badlands (2)
43. Annabelle: Creation (2)
44. Winchester (4)
45. Annabelle (1)
46. The Addams Family (3)
48. The Eyes of Tammy Faye (4)
49. Dune (4.5)
50. Love Hard (3)
51. Office Christmas Party (3.5)
52. Deck the Halls (2)
53. Klaus (5)
54. Matrix Resurrections (2)
A quick reminder of the meaning behind the various annotations used throughout the list:
* = got nauseated
** = fell asleep
*** = rewatch
Thankfully, I didn't watch any movies last year that required the notation resulting from making me queasy. I definitely took ample advantage of my accommodation from recent years that allows me to count movies I've seen before.
As you can see, as a stark contrast to last year's list that came within a hair's breadth of being 100 movies long, I only ever so slightly exceeded my annual 52 movies goal in 2021. While I don't love that I cut it so close last year, on the other hand I was overall pretty consistent in watching about a movie a week throughout the year, which seems like evidence of a fairly bankable, consistent approach to doing something I enjoy.
Another thing that strikes me is the relatively slim pickings for favorite movie of the year, which bums me out and confuses me, especially when the list of highly rated movies last year was exceptionally long. I'm not sure what led to so many middling ratings on last year's list. It could be that my overall dulled emotional state suppressed my otherwise at times generous ratings. It's possible, for similar reasons, that I simply wasn't up for the kinds of movies I tend to rate highly because those movies often earn their 5/5 at least in part by being emotionally evocative, and I tended instead to watch movies that would be fine but not terribly emotionally stimulating--a thing I have a history of doing. It's possible that last year was just a weird year for movies, and that the bait I took from various streaming service algorithms wasn't that great.
The fact that several of the highest rated movies are films I'd watched before only adds to my concern. Was I letting myself lapse into a movie "safe zone" in which most of the good movies I watched were known quantities because I didn't feel like I could tolerate anything new and potentially emotionally challenging? I don't like that possibility at all.
Thankfully, watching "The French Dispatch" (2021) at the beginning of this year may have been a corrective example to this possible trend, hopefully setting the precedent that my viewing selections this year are braver and more illustrative of my resilience (and that resilience actually exists, largely because I consistently work to maintain it).
With all that in mind, let's transition into the first major consideration of this retrospective: my least favorite film of last year.
For being included in a list of great comedies but being in actuality not even remotely funny, being packed with pretty irredeemable AND boring people, and for woefully underutilizing Olivia Wilde:
Drinking Buddies (2013)
For portraying workers in elder care as evil early/mid-pandemic and then getting incomprehensibly confused about whether its main character was a villain or a hero:
I Care A Lot (2020)
For having no business being as boring and silly as it was given the rich opportunities
afforded by its premise:
The Nun (2018)
For being deeply unpleasant and tedious, and also for by its very existence insisting that there need to be multiple movies about a creepy doll in one scary movie franchise when, in fact, no there do not:
Annabelle (2014)
It's interesting to note that, like the highly rated movies of 2021, last year's field of truly awful movies is also somewhat smaller than usual. I guess there was an overall narrowing of my ratings at the extremes, and that's not all bad.
Honestly, I have just about equivalent feelings of hatred for each of these movies despite the fact that the reasons for my displeasure differ. However, one does rise to the top (or rather, sink to the bottom) because it is not only bad--with a messy and illogical plot and an incredibly unsatisfying ending--it is also harmful in its messaging.
My least favorite movie from 2021 was therefore:
I Care A Lot (2020)
Yeah that movie was just terrible.
And now, moving on to the good stuff!
The highest rated movies I watched last year were:
The Trial of the Chicago 7 (2020)
Booksmart (2019)***
The Big Short (2015)***
Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom (2020)
She’s Gotta Have It (1986)
22 Jump Street (2014)***
The Inventor: Out for Blood in Silicon Valley (2019)***
Dune (2021)
Klaus (2019)
While I really appreciate the films I rewatched and re-liked this year, it doesn't seem fair to put them in a positive double jeopardy situation when they've already been up for Favorite Movie of the Year contention in previous years. Therefore, while I continue to love "Booksmart" (2015), "The Big Short" (2015), "22 Jump Street" (2014), and "The Inventor" (2019), I am ruling them out of contention for this year.
That leaves us with another surprisingly narrow field of only five contenders.
While I think "The Trial of the Chicago 7" (2020) was a generally compelling retelling of an important chapter in American activist history, its 4.5 rating highlights that it had its imperfections, including unconscionably downgrading the abuses to which Bobby Seale was subjected by Judge Julius Hoffman and making some weirdly emotionally discordant soundtrack choices at its opening.
I thought "Dune" (2021) was excellent in most ways, including its gorgeous imagery, brooding soundtrack, and strong performances, but again its 4.5 rating means that it just barely misses the mark for consideration.
"Ma Rainey's Black Bottom" (2020) is a wonderful performance of August Wilson's play, featuring most memorably Chadwick Boseman in his final performance before his death but also a formidably transformed Viola Davis as the titular Ma Rainey. Boseman's final monologue as Levee Green overflows with the aching anguish of Boseman's impending death, imbuing Green's anticipation of a different kind of inevitable, crushing doom with ever more fragility and gutwrenching heartbreak. Despite the eternal risks inherent in translating a play to the screen, "Ma Rainey's" pulls off the transition gracefully. Frankly, during an era in which it's harder to access live theater, the fleeting moments that do feel stagey actually feel like a balm--what a gift to imagine being in the audience while these actors say Wilson's words.
2019's "Klaus" took me very pleasantly by surprise this past holiday season, to the point that it has prompted me to hopefully start writing a medley of holiday movies similar to my annual Halloween showcase. It is a beautiful, whimsical, poignant, and sincerely funny secular (though still appropriately magical as becoming the season) telling of the origins of Santa Claus.
And then we have "She's Gotta Have It" (1986). We already know I'm a sucker for Spike Lee movies, and this one readily falls into that trend. I am grateful to have watched this film this year. Its clear standing in the history of film excited the film studies part of my brain on top of being absolutely beautifully shot and packed with wonderful performances. To this day, the film strikes a pretty astonishing number of chords emotionally and intellectually: it was funny and sweet, but also challenging and troubling, all while exploring evergreen themes of women's sexuality, sexual empowerment, and hopes for lasting, empowering love. I spent a lot of time thinking about this film and appreciate the opportunity it gave me for in-the-moment enjoyment as well as after-the-fact reflection.
I hate to be somewhat predictable, but I think I've got to hand it to Mr. Lee again: My favorite film of 2021 was:
 |
| She's Gotta Have It (1986) |
{Heart}
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