Archive | Feminist Matters

Melodrama, Distilled: ‘Julieta’

December 27, 2016 in Book Matters, Feminist Matters, Film Matters, Reviews

“Julieta,” Pedro Almodovar’s adaptation of the Alice Munro Runaway short stories “Chance,” “Soon,” and “Silence,” was meant to be his English-language debut. Instead, he rechristened the protagonist Julieta and swapped out Vancouver for Madrid, where he contrasted her quiet despair with the bright colors and patterns that are not only that city’s trademark but the Spanish writer/director’s trademark as well.

If at this point you are thinking, “Gosh, I didn’t know Almodovar had a new movie, let alone that he had adapted Alice Munro,” rest assured you are not the only one. Early festival circuit responses were so lukewarm that its regular theatrical release was buried, and it didn’t even make the Academy Award’s foreign-language short list. Certainly this film has not made any critical top-ten lists except my own. For while I agree with critics who claim this is “not Pedro’s best,” I happen to think his best film (“Todo Sobre Mi Madre”) is one of the best films ever made. “Julieta” is merely one of the best films of 2016. Continue Reading →

‘20th Century Women’ and Cinema Clubs

December 25, 2016 in Age Matters, Country Matters, Feminist Matters, Film Matters, Reviews

One of my favorite 2016 job was speaking at various cinema clubs throughout the Tristate Area, especially when they were screening films I dug. I especially adored “20th Century Women,” Mike Mill’s loosely autobiographical drama about his relationship with mom, sisters, and Southern California (in that order, basically). Here’s a transcript of a speech I gave about the film a few times.

I don’t know how many of you saw Beginners, which won Christopher Plummer a richly deserved Oscar, but that movie, which I adored, was based on director Mike Mills’ relationship with his father, who came out in his 70s after his wife, Mills’ mom, died of cancer.

This one is an autobiographical homage to Mills’ mother, and her matter-of-fact amusement grounds this film, giving it a depth that I hadn’t known I longed for in a director I already admired so much. Like the work of Wes Anderson and some other Generation X filmmakers, Mill’s films feel like a kaledescope or a collage or what younger people call “mix tapes.” Those droll photo stills–those quick montages of Jimmy Carter and red lipstick and punk rockers–make us feel like we’re pouring through a cool kid’s notebook or a terrific photo album, only for the whole country rather than a specific family. Continue Reading →