Loving Vincent (2017)

Loving Vincent is lovingly painted by over 100 artists in the style of Vincent Van Gogh in painstaking detail. You know how difficult that must've been? It is a mesmerizing movie. The rain and smoke are so beautifully rendered on the paintings with discernibly caked on brush strokes. The plot is a Rashomon-style piecing together of Van Gogh's final days before his suicide. But is it everyone's different version of the truth we're getting? Or is it actually just village gossip designed to throw us off? It's all speculative of course, but it's inspired by a the life and death of a troubled genius. In loving admiration.

Molly's Game (2017)

Aaron Sorkin's directorial debut is very Aaron Sorkin. It runs 140 minutes, and that's with Sorkin-speed speech. Acting in a Sorkin film requires skill. You must memorize your lines by heart so you can spit them back at rapid speed without thinking. That's acting. And it's never easy dialogue. It's brainy. There are unfamiliar words. You gotta become familiar with poker terms and American law. Even for a generally educated person, it can be a little difficult to follow at that pace. But that's what's so great about Aaron Sorkin. He doesn't talk down to you. He pulls you up. He's a smart guy that makes the audience keep up with him. The narrative structure in this movie is a little weird, with Chastain narrating her story in her book being read by her lawyer preparing for court. But it works. Jessica Chastain and Idris Elba are both great Sorkin-actors. Everything comes around full circle. Nothing is forgotten, everything is deliberate. I appreciate that Elba is cast as her lawyer, an smart and articulate and influential black man--the only black man in a story almost exclusively populated by powerful white men. It's tight writing about a strong female lead that doesn't require sex to tell an interesting and intense story. I have a feeling Sorkin will be doing more directing in the future.

St. Vincent (2014)

This was a pleasant surprise.  Aside from being funny, it was charming.  There is something that audience's love about unlikely relationships--this time between a schoolboy and his elderly curmudgeon of a neighbor.  And of course the setting is Brooklyn; where else would this happen?  It is not your typical Melissa McCarthy fare.  There is a serious and sentimental side to this comedy.  The cast is outstanding with Bill Murray in the lead in fine form.  The movie is predictable but that doesn't detract from the quality of the movie.