The Filmic 5: End Of Year Nostalgia Edition
Your Weekly Film Superlatives By Critic and Film Scholar Jack Hanley
I. Film I Am Loving This Week
A DIFFERENT MAN (2024) Dir. Aaron Schimberg
Aaron Schimberg's A DIFFERENT MAN plays Kaufman by way of Kafka in a bleakly black-comedic examination of both the faces you are given... and the ones we fashion for ourselves. Anchored by brilliant turns from both Pearson and Stan, the film mostly succeeds in its audacious (if not scattershot) narrative setup—and despite its failure to stick the landing, it’s more than worth it for some genuinely laugh-out-loud moments of poignant absurdity. Between this and THE APPRENTICE, has any other actor had as great a year of body-horror brilliance as Sebastian Stan?
3 out of 5 stars
II. ANOTHER Film I Am Loving This Week!
MARIA (2024) Dir. Pablo Larraín
In a pleasantly surprising departure from his brilliant canon of "horror biopics"—featuring the reliable unraveling of powerful women in isolation (JACKIE, SPENCER)—Pablo Larraín leans heavily and unabashedly into fabulism for his subject's final days in MARIA.
Do not look for a traditional obituary here—Larraín subverts the typical biopic narrative in a glorious celebration of self-delusion not seen since Swanson's iconic staircase descent. The film is an operatic experiment of sorts, employing a bold visual language and lovingly layering fragments of memory, archival footage, and unreliable specters around a career-defining performance by Angelina Jolie as the great soprano Maria Callas. Ultimately, this is not about how we are remembered but rather how we wish to be.
Through a stylized indulgence in the subjectivity of memory and the inextricable duality of art as artifice, MARIA eschews the bizarre and grotesque realities of death in favor of a more romantic and constructed portrayal of subjective agency. After all, how would we wish to direct our final days? Larraín is bold- and generous- enough to grant Maria this final dignity, even at the expense of popular critique.
It is a glorious catharsis to witness this sumptuous unraveling into immortality. Like any great Puccini moment, it eschews reality and rationality in favor of love, romanticism, and beauty—a fitting swan song for perhaps our greatest diva.
4 out of 5 stars.
III. Article I Am Loving This Week
I am fortunate enough to call film critic, journalist, and disability activist Kristen Lopez my friend. In the spirit of "year end" lists, Kristen has just released her Best Films of 2024: Exploring Disability Representation Edition and it is- as always expected- amazing. Please check it out by clicking here!
You can also follow her unfairly brilliant cinematic and cultural takes at her website kristenklopez.com.
IV. Podcast I Am Loving This Week
Anyone that knows me well, knows of my love of two things- nostalgic Holiday cultural-ritualism and deconstructing cinema with my dear friend and co-conspirator (and host of the Yesteryear Ballyhoo Revue Film Podcast) Zach Eastman. In OUR house, it is NEVER officially Christmas until the Charles Mingus eggnog is chilling with ice-cream, Hans Gruber is reliably falling from Nakatomi Plaza, and A Charlie Brown Christmas burns brightly next to tree and hearth- as shown in this photo from our humble abode this year.
When not engaging with me in 5 plus hour deconstructions of Citizen Kane (not hyperbole) or joining me as a guest lecturer for my How To Watch A Movie film course, Zach hosts an AMAZING podcast surrounding his love of Hollywood's Golden Age.
In a rare exception, Zach dedicated his most recent episode to the Peanut's special that I love so much- it is a wonderful listen and you too can wax nostalgic with me by listening here! Love ya, Zach...thank you for this one. ;)
V. Moment I Am Crying Over This Week
With apologies to the Academy, NO ONE does a memoriam like our friends at Turner Classic Movies.
As this year comes to a close, let us all take a moment to remember the creatives, performers, and filmmakers we lost this year- and to celebrate the magic they so graciously left behind for us.
That's all for this week. Get out there and watch something LIFE-CHANGING to close out the year!
Jack Hanley is a Boulder-based film scholar, podcaster, and critic. He is a programmer with the Chicago Underground Film Festival and Boulder International Film Festival. He is one-half of Blindspotting: A Film Discovery Podcast and Flicker with Jack and Scott on YouTube. Find him at Kinophilia on Medium and at HanleyOnFilm.com