Steven Rubio's Online Life

film fatales #222: the fits (anna rose holmer, 2015)

This is the eighteenth film I have watched in "My Letterboxd Season Challenge 2024-25", a "33-week-long community challenge" where "you must watch one previously unseen film that fits the criteria of the theme for the week." This is the 10th annual challenge, and my sixth time participating (previous years can be found at "2019-20", "2020-21", "2021-22", "2022-23", and 2023-24). Week 18 is called "American Neorealism Week":

One of the most famous movements in the history of film is Italian neorealism, which was a way for Italians to contend with the social and economic crises that led to WWII and Mussolini's fascism through movies. These films centered on poor or working-class people and were shot with low budgets, on location, and with non-professional actors. Hollywood, with its big studios, big budgets, and big movie stars is the exact opposite and so most American movies fail to tell the stories of the ordinary people living in the Unites States or Canada today. There are a few directors and movies that do focus on depicting poor and/or oppressed people without prejudice in their filmmaking, and shine a light on the real people that make up a large portion of the world and who reveal the vast disparities in quality of life and in the social and economic structures that play such a pivotal role on the people all around us.

This week's challenge is to watch a movie that could be classified as American neorealism. Here is a list from Keyser Soze to help out.

I think this challenge is a bit misleading. Italian neorealism existed, yes, and the above description is accurate enough. And if you treat all American movies as coming under the "Hollywood" umbrella, you will definitely find big studios, big budgets, and big movie stars. But there are more than a few "directors and movies" that "shine a light on the real people".

The Fits is as far from a big-budget Hollywood movie as you can get. It's reminiscent of the Italian neorealist movement. But I don't have problems finding movies like The Fits. Sure, it's not as easy as just turning up at the local multiplex to watch the latest Marvel movie. But you can find films like The Fits. I don't say this to brag, but only to make a point: there are 186 films on "Keyser Soze's" list above, and I've seen 76 of them. OK, I watch a lot of movies. But The Fits stands on its own, not as part of an emergent American neorealism but as a strong first feature film from a director working on a small budget with non-professional actors.

The Fits is an interesting slice-of-life drama with gentle fantasy elements. The title confused me at first ... I thought perhaps it referred to the outfits worn by the young dance troupe at the center of the story. Then, when individual troupers began having unexplained seizures, I thought the titular reference was to those "fits". And that's closer, but while there are indeed unexplained seizures in the movie, at the end, they remain unexplained, and the movie is the better for it. Writer/director Anna Rose Holmer isn't making an explicit horror film, nor as far as I can tell is she making a metaphor for adolescent young girls, the way something like Ginger Snaps does. (Among other things, Ginger Snaps is an explicit horror film, of course.)

Holmer extracts great things from her non-professional cast, most obviously the delightfully-named Royalty Hightower in the lead. Hightower has continued acting since making this film, and she has great promise. But that promise is already fulfilled in The Fits. She is in virtually every scene, and while she doesn't have a lot of dialogue, I feel like we got to know her character in some depth. It's a very low-key movie, and I admit I'd probably rather watch Ginger Snaps for the umpteenth time than revisit The Fits. But it's a solid film.

geezer cinema/film fatales #221: the last showgirl (gia coppola, 2024)

There's been some Oscar talk for Pamela Anderson's performance in the title role of this film, and that's understandable. Her career has been treated like a joke, and it's good to see her in a straightforward, serious movie. It's an opportunity she deserves.

I wish the movie itself was better. Gia Coppola goes low-key for a drama about an aged Las Vegas stage show, and while that might reflect the passing of the heyday of such shows, it makes for a drab movie. Getting to see Anderson stripped of much of what worked against her career is promising, but it's more entertaining to hear about it than to actually watch the movie. It's odd ... Anderson needed the chance to show what she could do with a quieter role, but the script doesn't help her much. Her Shelly is a stock figure, and The Last Showgirl recalls other movies, some better, some worse, but there are a lot of backstage dramas about time passing, and The Last Showgirl is never more than Just Another Entry in the genre. It's interesting in theory to see the ho-hum lives of the dazzling stars of the stage show (called "Le Razzle Dazzle"), but it largely falls flat.

Some of the actors come out better than others. Jamie Lee Curtis gets to be the most ebullient ... if she hadn't already won one for Everything Everywhere All at Once, you'd say this was her Oscar bait. Younger actors like Kiernan Shipka, Brenda Song, and Billie Lourd don't stand out, and again, it's not their fault. The dialogue and plot aren't exactly All About Eve. The worst victim is Dave Bautista, who has often said he wants to be seen as a legitimate actor, not just a beefy ex-rassler. He sleeps through his role as the producer of the stage show, and the best I can say is that given the overall tone, he likely just delivered what was asked of him.

Reading the above, I can see I'm being too negative. The Last Showgirl is a decent movie with which to reintroduce Pamela Anderson, and it doesn't overstay its welcome (89 minutes). I was just disappointed, which in itself could be seen as a positive, since there was a time when I wouldn't have looked forward so eagerly to a Pamela Anderson movie.

film fatales #220: jane b. for agnès v. (agnès varda, 1988)

I'm taking on another challenge. This one is The Criterion Challenge 2025. It's the fifth annual, my first try. "There are 52 categories. The goal is to watch any Criterion released film based on the categories ... between 1/1/25-12/31/25." There is no specified order, so I'll watch them as I get to them. Today's category is "Watch a film from the Criterion Channel’s all time favorites lists".

I don't need a challenge to watch an Agnès Varda movie I haven't seen. This one is especially interesting, since I watched A Complete Unknown a few days ago. That one's a biopic, while Jane B. is an intriguing blend of genres. Letterboxd calls it a documentary, while the IMDB calls it a biography and fantasy and Wikipedia lists it among Varda's fiction films. Varda herself calls it "an imaginary biopic". Its premise comes from Jane Birkin, model, actor, singer, realizing she's turning 40 and Varda telling her that's a wonderful age and they should make a movie together about Birkin's life. But Varda didn't want to make the usual retrospective of Birkin's career, so she films Birkin in various period costumes enacting made-up movies, interspersed with interviews where the two women spontaneously (or not) talk about the career of the actress. It is never confusing, really ... what we see provides insight into actor and director. What confuses is the source for what we see. Because it's invented, but purports to tell the "truth" about Jane Birkin, we in the audience are on shaky ground. Real people turn up as "themselves", including Birkin's longtime partner Serge Gainsbourg, their daughter Charlotte, Varda's son, and Jean-Pierre Léaud (not to forget, Varda herself). The enacted scenes include Birkin and Laura Betti as versions of Laurel and Hardy, and Birkin as Calamity Jane and Joan of Arc (we watch as she burns). I suppose you could say Birkin plays "Jane Birkin" as well.

It's all full of Varda's impish humor, and I enjoyed watching it, although I'm not sure there are any larger points to be made. I've seen 8 movies by Varda now, and I've yet to see one I didn't like. Truth is, I bring up my love of her work every time I see a new one. You'd think by now I'd quit being surprised.

african-american directors series/film fatales #219: love & basketball (gina prince-bythewood, 2000)

Here I go again. I'm taking on another challenge. This one is The Criterion Challenge 2025. It's the fifth annual, my first try. "There are 52 categories. The goal is to watch any Criterion released film based on the categories ... between 1/1/25-12/31/25." There is no specified order, so I'll watch them as I get to them. The first category is "Watch a film from the CC40 Boxset."

This was an interesting way to begin the Challenge. The CC40 Boxset was produced by Criterion to celebrate their 40 years in the collection business, and features 40 films of all sorts. I had never seen Love & Basketball, but was definitely looking forward to it. It made Slate's New Black Film Canon, and is #493 on the They Shoot Pictures, Don't They list of the top 1000 films of the 21st century. I have liked the films I have seen from Gina Prince-Bythewood, especially The Woman King, and was happy to see her debut.

Love & Basketball is another strong film from the writer-director. It follows the life of two neighbors from childhood through adulthood. Both love basketball, but while one (Quincy, played by Omar Epps) has a fairly straightforward path, since he is male and his father is an NBA star, Monica (Sanaa Lathan) must fight both the social stigma of being a female athlete and the fewer potential options open to her when she becomes an adult. Prince-Bythewood efficiently blends both angles in the title. The love story and the sports story both land within the norms of their respective genres, but the even balance in the film benefits both, plus the title shows an additional angle, for the love is not just between the leads, but also between each of them and the sport.

The cast is filled with recognizable names who are fun to see when they were all 25 years younger than today: Alfre Woodard, Regina Hall, Harry Lennix, Dennis Haysbert, Gabrielle Union, Tyra Banks, Boris Kodjoe. But the film is rightfully carried by the two leads, who have good charisma, on their own and together. Lathan might be the most impressive, in that she had never played basketball before, yet is acceptably talented in the movie. (The IMDB gives a related anecdote. "Producer Spike Lee believed the female lead should have believable basketball skills. Gina Prince-Bythewood said in an interview 'I saw over 700 people for the part: actors, ballplayers, people who had never acted before in their life. It finally came down to Sanaa Lathan and Niesha Butler [a star player at Georgia Tech and 1999 Atlantic Coast Conference rookie of the year]. I put Sanaa with a basketball coach for two months and Niesha with an acting coach.'")

geezer cinema/film fatales #218: the outrun (nora fingscheidt, 2024)

It's easier to list the things that are good about The Outrun than it is to explain why it didn't quite make it for me, so I'll start there. And there really is nowhere to start other than with Saoirse Ronan. She's been nominated for four Oscars, and this should be her fifth, although I suspect she will fall short of winning once again. She has matched well in the past with Greta Gerwig, but she shines with other directors as well. She tends to be the best thing in any movie in which she appears, which is to say, she is better than her films (at least the ones not directed by Gerwig). Here she plays an alcoholic, Rona, which is always good for Oscar attention, and she finds interesting ways to make the character different from all the other alkies we've seen. She is convincingly an individual, not just a stereotype.

The setting is crucial and impressive ... director Nora Fingscheidt and cinematographer Yunus Roy Imer make great use of the Orkney Islands, an imposing location both inspiring and frightening (and thus a perfect place to work out one's alcoholism). The film is based on a memoir by Amy Liptrot, who worked on the picture and who knows the Islands well.

There is a bit of an inevitability to the narrative ... woman is an addict, she falls, she gets sober, she falls again. Fingscheidt addresses this with a non-chronological approach that simulates forward movement, but I found it more jarring than anything. It wasn't confusing, but neither did it seem necessary.

Having just seen Blitz, where Ronan's blonde hair stood out among a fairly drab-looking setting, it was interesting to see how in The Outrun, Ronan is often stripped of makeup, as if to emphasize how her drinking brings down whatever natural effervescence she might have. Rona frequently changes her hair color, and each time it marks her attempt to rescue that effervescence.

I can't find much in what I have written to explain why I wasn't overwhelmed by The Outrun. It's a worthy picture, about as good as the much different Blitz, but unlike her movies with Gerwig, I don't imagine returning to The Outrun for a taste of Saoirse Ronan. Don't get me wrong, though, she'll deserve that Oscar nomination.

2024 Movies Wrapup

Some lists from Letterboxd. First, the one you're most used to seeing at the end of the year, my ratings of the 2024 movies I've seen. These aren't particularly important coming from me because there are so many recent films I have yet to see. This list will continue to change, so depending on when you click on this link, the number of films will increase. The list also includes two movies Letterboxd considers 2023 movies, that seem to be eligible for Oscars this year (His Three Daughters and Hit Man). Anyway:

All Movies of 2024 I Have Seen

My top five as of this moment: Anora, Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, The Wild Robot, His Three Daughters, My Old Ass.

The next list highlights my favorite 2023 movies. I do this each year because by this time, I've seen a lot more than I had by last December.

Top 10 Movies of 2023 (#1 is Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse)

Geezer Cinema took a bit of a hit this year, between my broken ankle, my wife's cancer treatment, and her trip to Portugal and Italy. We still managed to see 36 Geezer movies in 2024. Here is the ongoing list of Geezer Cinema, which is now up to 257, dating back to July 9, 2019:

Geezer Cinema (best this year was Lone Star)

Finally, all of the movies I watched in 2024. I saw 183.

Movies I Watched in 2024

The best films from that list, all of which I had seen before: Bonnie and Clyde, Bride of Frankenstein, Frankenstein, The Last Picture Show, Lone Star, The Night of the Hunter, Parasite, The Seventh Seal, Spartacus, Sweet Smell of Success, Thelma & Louise, Touch of Evil, Winter's Bone. Honorable mention to the best movie I watched for the first time in 2024, to The Tale of the Princess Kaguya. Letterboxd also now provides stats for individual lists, so I know I saw films from 35 countries in 14 languages.

film fatales #217: waitress (adrienne shelly, 2007)

This is the thirteenth film I have watched in "My Letterboxd Season Challenge 2024-25", a "33-week-long community challenge" where "you must watch one previously unseen film that fits the criteria of the theme for the week." This is the 10th annual challenge, and my sixth time participating (previous years can be found at "2019-20", "2020-21", "2021-22", "2022-23", and 2023-24). Week 13 is called "Movie Nom-noms Week":

Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you what you are.

- Aphorism IV, Physiologie du goût, by Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin

Even though film cannot convey two of food's most fundamental properties, taste and smell, there's still something powerfully appetizing about food in the movies. Food is the great unifier, one of the few things our biology requires, tying us together, no matter our language, gender, nationality, ancestry, or beliefs. And yet, food is a significant differentiator, highly specific to the culture from which we spring and further distilled by our distinctive, personal tastes. That contrast makes cuisine in cinema extra special: it's not just about vital sustenance but also about exploring community, identity, heritage, and artistry, subjects ideally suited to film and made even more memorable when viewed through the unique lens of food.

This week's challenge is to tuck into a title from Ian Casocot's Films in Celebration of Food [and Where to Watch Them]. Whether you pair it with good old popcorn or something more epicurean, you can't go wrong munching along to films with fare as enticing as this. C'est trop bon!

I admit I found the food angle in Waitress a bit unbelievable. It takes place in Joe's Pie Diner, and pie and coffee seems to be just about all they serve. The title character, Jenna (Keri Russell) is the primary pie maker, and by "primary" I mean she appears to be the only pie maker. And she waits tables. And they have lots of varieties of pies, including one she invents every day. I'm not a pie maker, but that seems like too much work for one person to do in a day.

It doesn't matter, of course, because Waitress is a delight. It will forever be known as the last film of Adrienne Shelly, an actress who moved into writing and directing (she does all of those things in Waitress, writing, directing, and co-starring). Shelly was murdered before the film's release. Since Waitress was a true blossoming of a fine multi-skilled talent, it is now remembered for the "What If?" angle.

This is unfair, because the film stands on its own ... it doesn't need our sympathy. Jenna finds herself pregnant at the beginning of the film. She is unhappy in her marriage, and she develops a serious crush on her married doctor (Nathan Fillion), which he returns. The events that follow could be standard, but Shelly, in her writing and in her directing of actors, makes each character believable without forcing them to act in the usual rom-com ways. It's not that there are plot twists, exactly, but the characters do act in unexpected (but realistic) ways.

Waitress snuck up on me. I expected something mildly pleasant, and was glad to find it surpassed my low expectations. And it lingers in the mind, so that I like it more now than I did when I watched it yesterday. Besides Russell, Fillion, and Shelly, the cast includes Cheryl Hines, Jeremy Sisto, and a delightful turn from Andy Griffith as the cranky owner of the pie diner.

geezer cinema/film fatales #216: my old ass (megan park, 2024)

Megan Park's feature debut as a writer-director was 2021's The Fallout, a very good film about which I wrote:

Park's directing debut is confident ... there are no signs of first-timers disease. She tells the story as she wants, gets the performances she wants, creates a believable world of high-schoolers, and even makes the adults seem true-to-life, neither ogres nor saints.... Park doesn't reach too far, which just adds to the powerful nature of what we see.

I could say the same about My Old Ass, which features actors portraying believable teenagers and reasonable adults. But the tone of My Old Ass is different from its predecessor. The Fallout was about trauma, and while that topic sneaks in the backdoor at the end, My Old Ass is a more standard coming-of-age story. And where The Fallout was realistic enough to require a trigger warning at the beginning, My Old Ass drops a fantasy element into what is otherwise a straightforward account of the blossoming of a young woman. In My Old Ass, Elliott (a delightful Maisy Stella) does mushrooms and encounters her own self from 20 years into the future. That the older Elliott is played by Aubrey Plaza only adds to the enjoyment, although Plaza fans should note she is only a supporting actor here.

The time-travel angle doesn't always make sense, but Park explains it in such a way that we go along with it anyway. The obvious questions arise, as the previews make clear: if you could talk to yourself from a different age, what would you want to know, and what if you could change everything? What's nice is that, once again, Park doesn't reach too far ... the questions arise, but in the middle of a feel-good movie about youth. It's not too smarmy and it's not too serious until the end.

Park's background is interesting ... she's been a musician and an actor, and now she has two solid feature films to her credit. She is definitely someone to keep an eye on.

film fatales #215: the breaker upperers (madeleine sami and jackie van beek, 2018)

This is the fourth film I have watched in "My Letterboxd Season Challenge 2024-25", a "33-week-long community challenge" where "you must watch one previously unseen film that fits the criteria of the theme for the week." This is the 10th annual challenge, and my sixth time participating (previous years can be found at "2019-20", "2020-21", "2021-22", "2022-23", and 2023-24). Week 4 is called "Her Dark Material Week":

Are you familiar with Letterboxd user's hyper-specific lists? You know, the ones with weirdly-similar, surprisingly common details shared by two or three otherwise unrelated films? It's too bad there aren't enough options for an LSC weekly challenge. They're inspiring, though, so, in that vein, we'll cast our attention toward a list that goes a bit broader but still feels sufficiently focused. The first shared element for this week's challenge is that the movie be female-led (or the storyline at least female-driven.) Tipping the scales more equitably is something we're interested in here at LSC, and setting our sights on stories about women is a small but conscious step in that direction. Second, there's a twist! Forget light and frothy. Instead, we need something with an undercurrent of darkness, as there's nothing like a streak of controversy to keep things interesting. And, third, let there be LOLs! Laughing has myriad health benefits (it can increase your immune response, for one), and who couldn't be in better health?

Voila! Your challenge this week is to watch a title from Kevin MJ's The Best Female-Led Dark Comedy Films list. It might not carve out as meticulous a nano genre as some others, but it'll give us a wealth of options and hopefully prove as much fun!

Well, I was warned. The Breaker Upperers is a dark comedy, and I'm not a fan of modern comedies. Using the Letterboxd definition of comedies, I have given my highest rating to only two comedies in the 21st century. At some point (and I reached this point a long time ago) it is pointless for me to comment on modern comedies. Good ones, bad ones, they connect with me so rarely that I have nothing to say, and my evaluation is so biased that no one can learn anything from my opinion. So I'll say that The Breaker Upperers is refreshing in that it's a buddy movie about women, and Madeleine Sami and Jackie van Beek, who directed, wrote, and starred, are talented. And Lucy Lawless has a blink-and-you'll-miss it cameo.

african-american directors series/film fatales #214: alma's rainbow (ayoka chenzira, 1994)

Alma's Rainbow has an interesting history. It was the first feature for writer/director Ayoka Chenzira, who had made several shorts. It was self-funded by Chenzira, and featured a cast of unknowns ... heck, 30 years later, and I still didn't recognize anyone but Isaiah Washington, who had a small role. The talent behind the camera was impressive, including editor Lillian Benson, cinematographer Ronald K. Gray, and costume designer Sidney Kai Innis, all of them new to me. The film looks great, helped by a fairly recent 4k restoration.

It's a coming-of-age movie, and I love the title: Rainbow is the daughter of Alma. It's a slice of life, and it offers a lot of insight into the culture of African-American women. There is a confidence in the film making that makes the movie feel "real". The acting is solid ... there's pretty much nothing bad I can say about the movie. It doesn't jump out at you, nor is that Chenzira's intention. It's never boring, and something is always catching your eye. It's an indie film that succeeds. It was ignored at the time, and was barely distributed, but the restoration resulted in the film finally getting the attention it has always deserved. It is one of 75 films selected for Slate's New Black Film Canon.