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haprilona · 7 months ago

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A Stranger of Paradise fanfic draft

I wrote this like two years ago and never managed to finish it, but having reread it recently, I figured I might share it if there's any SoP fans starving for fanfics.

It's written from Jed's point of view.

The steady hum of complex machinery and the subtle vibrating in the sterile air were both welcome and distressing sensations. They meant everything was working as it should, but at the same time they were constant reminders of what was powering the great underwater structure.

While most Lufenians paid little mind to electricity as long as its supply did not run out, Jed had always been more aware of its presence than most. Due to retaining little more than a handful of vague and fragmented memories from his youth, Jed couldn’t tell where his fear originated from. He had long speculated between a past trauma, a learned response or an experience of long-term stress involving electricity. His imagination would attempt to fill in the blanks while dreaming. Sometimes he would have nightmares of being strapped to a chair and struggling against tight bonds in vain. Electric shocks would cause his muscles to seize up and nerves to explode in pain. And always, just outside of his peripheral vision, there would be the shadow of a Lufenian scientist that he knew was silently monitoring him. And when Jed woke up from such nightmares in the gloaming hours, it was often accompanied by a throbbing migraine and an ache in his jaws from imagined rattling of teeth.

Other times the dreams were less intense, but no less upsetting. Such as being left unsupervised as a toddler and chewing on a live wire. Whatever the origin of his fear might have been, one theme seemed to prevail in his dreams; he was always on his own—abandoned.

When agent Jack Garland invited him to be part of the Stranger program, and to become a Warrior of Light, Jed had jumped at the opportunity. A world in need of heroes, where technology was at its infancy, and machines and electricity practically nonexistent. A paradise, by Jed’s standards.

There was a certain irony in the fact that the man with electrophobia had become as intimate with every nook and cranny of the Sunken Shrine as he was with the back of his hand. Despite not remembering, Jed knew he had spent countless lifetimes and just as many cycles guarding the crystal within as the Fiend of Water.

Breathing in the artificial air, Jed squared his shoulders and took a determined step forward. His footsteps were echoed by clicking of heels a mere step behind him. Having always been led by others—Jack and Ash, mostly—and staying out of the spotlight, Jed felt out of place taking point for a change. He glanced over his shoulder, instinctively expecting Ash to be herding him forward as the Fiend of Earth was wont to do when they moved as a group. Jack at the lead, Neon impatiently pressing on, Sophia following closely and providing sage commentary, himself further back and less eager to throw himself at the unknown while Ash ensured no-one caught them off-guard from behind.

But instead of the tall man’s reassuring frame, he was met with Sophia’s inquisitive grey eyes. Realising he was staring, Jed flashed her a quick, uneasy grin before turning his focus on the glass panels separating them from a shoal of fish passing by overhead. He could tell by the hue of blue that the sun had reached its zenith. While some might have felt uneasy at the thought of being surrounded by tonnes of seawater, Jed found it comforting. He likened it to being wrapped in a warm blanket—or being a chambered nautilus safe inside its shell. It was enough to help him ignore the otherworldly technology and give him a false sense of calm in a certain Stranger’s presence whose mere proximity never failed to make Jed jittery and cause his palms to sweat.

The Fiend of Wind had caught his attention the moment she had introduced herself at the top of the Flying Fortress. Jed couldn’t say for certainty what initially sparked the attraction. It could have been the way she carried herself, not quite like the royalty of Cornelia, yet with a certain grace she must have spent at least a decade perfecting. Unlike Neon who was full of fire and brimstone and moved with the unexpected suddenness of a striking serpent, Sophia was like an albatross gliding elegantly in a fair summer breeze, yet as deadly and terrible as the fiercest cyclone on the field of battle. She fit in easily with the rest of them with her charming wit and insightful wisdom. Even their brusque leader respected her highly, never cutting her off in spite of his notorious impatience and single-mindedness.

It wasn’t until Jed caught himself thinking how lovely Sophia looked with laugh lines that he realised just how bad he had it for the woman. He would crack as many lame jokes as he could just to see her painted lips curve in an amused smile. At first Jed figured his feelings would go away once he came to terms with just how far below her notice and status in terms of age and maturity he truly was. But when the persistent butterflies refused to leave his belly like the Lufenians-turned-bats refused to leave Astos in peace, Jed conceded and opted to brush the matter beneath a figurative rug and hope the others would pay it as little mind as they usually did when his thoughts and feelings were concerned.

He would silently admire the older woman from afar—or specifically, ten steps or so from behind—and long for things he knew would never be. Was Sophia’s hair as silky to the touch as it appeared? Would her painted lips leave a mark if Jed dared to press his own against hers? It was a good thing Jed was light on his feet and had quick reflexes; he had lost count of how many times he had nearly walked into Sophia’s back while zoned out in fantasyland. And if she turned around to give him a curious glance, Jed would suddenly find the sky or the tips of his boots fascinating and demanding his full attention.

In spite of vowing not to let his foolishness distract him from the mission, Jed would always make himself available to Sophia and find excuses to get physically close to her—a small, insignificant stolen touch here and there.

An obstacle on the path? Jed would suddenly become the epitome of a gentleman and help Sophia over it. (If Neon raised a brow and jabbed a finger in his side, demanding to know where her princess treatment was, Jed would lightly jest that he was merely respecting his elders.)

A malboro seedling found in the girls’ tent? Jed would take care of it. (It wasn’t the putrid breath of the adorable bundle of vines that caused him to flush deep red from the neck up, but the sight of Sophia in her smallclothes clinging to Neon at the furthest corner of the tent from where the seedling had made its bed.)

Neon snatching the last fruit from their rations? Jed would take a seat beside Sophia and give his portion to her. It was purely accidental if his thigh happened to press against hers and the tips of his fingers brushed the naked skin of her palm during the exchange. (If Ash found it odd that Jed, who used to shamelessly take the last piece of fruit cake—on the King’s table, no less—suddenly lost his sweet tooth, Jed would shrug and mumble something about losing his appetite after watching Jack soulburst a wolf.)

Sophia receiving a shallow wound during a fight while Jed was practically holding his guts from spilling out? He would still insist Sophia take the last potion. (If Jack called him an idiot, Jed would point out that Sophia was their most talented healer and could patch him up easily enough once her own wounds had been tended to.)

It was all harmless, really, and so routine by now, that none of them questioned it when Jed would go out of his way to please Sophia.

Jack had no time for such nonsense—Princess Sarah could attest as much—and kept his focus solely on the mission. Neon didn’t seem to have much experience or interest in entertaining such thoughts. Ash might have noticed the change in him since their group’s expansion, but most likely mistook Jed’s attentiveness as nothing more than admiration and hero-worship, similar to what he held for Jack.

Whether Sophia ever took notice of the way Jed behaved around her, he couldn’t tell. She was far too smart and far too perceptive not to, yet at the same time too kind and compassionate to put Jed on the spot. While Jack, Ash and even Neon would often make light of his skittishness—especially when his phobia was brought up—Sophia never joined in. She would politely ignore the matter and change the topic to something else. Perhaps Sophia pitied Jed and saw him for what he was; a foolish young man out of his debt.

“A beautiful yet unsettling view.”

Jed winced and stared dumbly at Sophia who had appeared beside him. Painfully long seconds ticked by as Jed internally panicked over the possibility that Sophia could read his face as easily as if it were an open tome.

“The sea”, she clarified.

“Oh.” Jed cleared his throat and rubbed the back of his neck. “What’s unsettling about it? It’s really nice with the sunlight glimmering on the surface.”

“Indeed, yet you cannot admire it from elsewhere. Were it not for this facility, it would be the last thing I see before suffocating.” Even if Jed hadn’t seen the quirky smile dancing on the edges of her lips, he would have recognised the glum words for Sophia’s characteristic dark humour. “It is the danger that adds to the beauty.”

“I guess.”

Smooth, Jed. You have such a way with words.

He was rewarded with a faint chuckle for his half-arsed effort. Emboldened by the positive reaction, Jed hurried to add: “The real danger is above the waves.”

Water on its own did not do much. But with the aid of winds, even the mightiest kingdom would fall under the force of a typhoon. Jed rather liked to think he and Sophia fit together nicely when it came to being Fiends and causing elemental havoc. His water and Neon’s fire would only snuff out and evaporate the other. He had more compatibility with Ash’s earth when it came to rotting the soils, but Ash preferred the company of his undead followers during Fiendish duties.

The redhead’s stomach did a somersault when Sophia’s smile widened. “A matter of perspective, then.”

They continued deeper into the Sunken Shrine. The surface of the water crystal had shown strange cracks which Jed didn’t know what to make of. Its light was dim, and given a century or two, it would darken entirely as per Jack’s plan to summon the real Warriors of Light. Jed worried he had done something wrong and brought the matter to his fellow Strangers’ attention. Sophia, being the most knowledgeable in such matters, had agreed to offer her help. On her own. No need to drag the others from their duties until Sophia had given her initial verdict.

It was a rare opportunity. Just the two of them in his domain. And yet Jed couldn’t even think of how to make the most out of it. He was so used to being able to admire the object of his fancy while she was unaware and trudging along in front of him.

“Putting the matter of the crystal’s condition aside, how have you been, Jed?”

Jed nearly lost his grip as they descended the ladder. He paused to glance up at Sophia in surprise and swallowed a curse when her heel crushed his fingers. The pain was enough to erase the upskirt view of the woman’s shapely bottom and legs clad in grey tights from his mind’s eye. “Err… Fine! You know, still coming to grips with the whole ‘ruler of the seas’-part. You’d think I’d be used to it by now.” What hadn’t taken any time getting used to was suddenly having the ability to breathe and see clearly underwater, which was hardly surprising considering one of the memories he retained was his love for swimming and diving. Jed sped up his descent to avoid having more fingers stepped on.

They reached the bottom of the ladders. There were no glass panels here, only concrete walls and metal platforms, dim green and red lighting and giant fans to cool down the machinery running the facility. The fine hair on his arms and neck stood up from the static electricity. Jed resisted the urge to fix his hair, knowing the result would make it look like a red-spined hedgehog. Even Sophia’s heavy locks with curled ends were reacting to it, but she seemed to be entirely unaware of the fact.

“I hear you have numerous followers among the aquatic monsters. I trust they keep you company?”

“Sure.”

The truth was that Jed was starved for human company. The monsters were intelligent enough to hold a conversation, but Jed never felt he could bare his soul to one or expect them to truly understand him. The sahagin went as far as worshipping him as their deity—a fact that caused Jed much unease. It was the Lufenians who wished to play God. He had no interest in such a title or role and was content to let the sea creatures continue on as they always had without his intervention. Sure, if he saw a creature in need, the Kraken would tend to his own and keep his subjects safe from any who dared to threaten them too close to his domain. Most territorial disputes came from between the sahagin and the merfolk who had attempted to reclaim the water crystal.

Sometimes, when the loneliness got unbearable, Jed would swim to the shore as Kraken and take on his human form to walk to a dingy pub in Onrac. He kept a low profile, dressed up as a local fisher and took decade-long pauses between each visit so as not to attract attention. The last thing he wanted was to become a local legend. ‘The man who drank from the fountain of youth’, or better yet, ‘the immortal merman’.

“I guess you’ve got plenty of company, too?”

“Indeed. To the point I sometimes have to shut myself in the Flying Fortress to be able to hear my own thoughts. Sirena has made it her mission to report to me the movements of every human civilisation under the sun down to the most mundane detail. I have been keeping watch on the development of mankind and for signs of Lufenian activity, you see, but Sirena has yet to grasp the concept of priorities.”

Figures Sophia would find a way to make the most out of their new life. Jed admired her for that—among other unnumbered qualities.

“I consider this a welcome holiday to get away from the creatures and reunite with a friend.”

A friend. Warmth settled in the pit of his belly. Jed considered the other Strangers his friends and family, yet it had never been stated so matter-of-factly, let alone out loud. It was one of the many taboos among them. No talking about the past (it was too painful), no heart-to-heart unless it was to motivate each other to press on (they had to stay strong), no talking about Jack’s relationship with Princess Sarah (they couldn’t afford to be selfish), no talking about what will happen to them after the world is saved from Lufenians (they were willing sacrifices for the future of all humanity) and so on and so forth.

“You’re welcome to stay as long as you’d like! Plenty of room even for six-headed dragonesses.” Jed grimaced internally at just how pathetic he sounded. He was making a right fool out of himself. Not that that was anything new.

“Gladly, considering the issue with the crystal is unlikely to be solved in a day.” The corners of Sophia’s eyes crinkled and her mouth twisted in a teasing manner. “And I would not object either way. I have missed exchanging thoughts with a fellow human. It is not easy to keep distance, yet had I not, I would not be able to deal with my guilty conscience.”

Jed knew exactly what Sophia meant by it. They all had blood on their hands. The dimming of the crystals had not been achieved without sacrifices. But as Jack kept reminding them, the end justifies the means. Jed was perfectly aware the merfolk were not merely upset over the loss of the water crystal. They needed it. Without its light, they would all eventually turn into seafoam and die. Jed never attempted to get to know the people he mingled amongst in Onrac for the simple reason he might someday kill them, whether directly or indirectly. A fishing boat torn apart when the Kraken emerged, the village attacked by a shoal of angry sahagin who had been driven out of their spawning grounds, a trading ship caught in a storm of his and Sophia’s making. Other villages built on less sturdy foundations had long since fallen beneath the tidal waves Jed raised with the help of Ash’s earthquakes in their early days as Fiends. All in the name of spreading darkness across the lands, to hasten the coming of the true Warriors of Light, and to beat the Lufenians at their own game.

#stranger of paradise #stranger of paradise fanfic #jed #sophia

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jomiddlemarch · 6 years ago

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Doubt truth to be a liar

“Hamlet?” Emma exclaimed but more quietly, entirely audible to Dr. Foster but not loud enough to draw back Mary’s attention to them both. Emma had modulated her tone purposefully, but it didn’t stop him from glancing towards Mary as she walked out of the sitting room the officers used in the evening. In the small lamplight, the sober color of her dress and its lack of ornament were attributes, focusing the eye on the gracefulness of her carriage, the ivory cameo her face made against the dark collar and her braided chestnut hair. Matron had come to fetch Mary in the midst of the lively conversation, for some task that could not wait another quarter-hour despite Dr. Foster’s argument.

“I’ll be back directly and I’m wholly certain you can continue disputing without me present,” Mary had said as she’d excused herself. “Perhaps I’ll find some others who wish to weigh in and bring them along with the rest of the apple tart and a fresh pot of tea when I’m done.”

“I’ll cede any point as long as you leave Hale out of it,” Dr. Foster had cried, mostly in jest.

“Heavens! If I only believed that were possible,” Mary had laughed as she left the room following Matron Brannan out. Before a real silence could take hold, broken only by the homely crackle of the fire in the hearth, Emma had spoken her disbelief.

“You’re surprised, I take it?” Dr. Foster said.

They’d been making the most of the rare lull in calamity, the wards half-empty, with a debate about Shakespeare. The Bard, Dr. Foster insisted on calling him in a jovial, mocking tone that Emma knew meant he was enjoying himself mightily, much as Dr. Hale might do with a roasted pork loin and a full bottle of port. It had been some time since Romeo and Juliethad been performed at Mansion House, but the memory of the theatrical remained vivid, Emma musing about whether they might encourage the smaller group of current patients to prepare a few scenes or monologues for their edifying entertainment. That was when Mary asked her which play was her favorite. Emma’s response, a robust defense of the historical plays, especiallyHenry V, had been met with challenges by both Dr. Foster and Mary. But Dr. Foster’s jabs were all kindly teasing at heart and Mary’s questions so cleverly put that Emma was allowed to explain how she thrilled at the St. Crispin’s Day speech. And how charmed she was by the gentle romancing of Katharine and the formerly brash Prince Hal. Dr. Foster had spoken about his own fondness for The Tempest, adroitly parrying Mary’s remarks that he must identity with Caliban until Emma interrupted.

“And you, Nurse Mary—what is your favorite?”

“Hamlet,” she said simply. Perhaps she would have gone on, but Matron appeared then with her sharp dark gaze fixed upon their animated trio and had beckoned Mary to leave.

“Did she truly mean it?” Emma asked. Would she have asked the same question to Mary herself—or was it only a question to ask someone else who made a study of the Head Nurse? Someone who regarded her with an unceasing interest, an undeniable affection?

“Have you ever known her to say something she doesn’t truly mean? To speak without utter, sincere conviction?” Dr. Foster replied. For a moment, Emma wasn’t sure if he was asking her or questioning himself, but then he grinned broadly and looked so much younger, it was as if another man sat beside her.

“No. But I would not have thought it would be her favorite, not of all the plays,” Emma said. “The comedies or The Merchant of Venice—she is our very own Portia, isn’t she?”

“Quite apt, Miss Green. Your governess is to be commended,” Dr. Foster said.

“It’s no thanks to her!” Emma retorted, thinking of sour Miss Ashworth, her endless injunctions against reading too long, too widely, her determination that embroidery was worth the whole of geometry and tatting the equal of Caesar’s Gallic Wars.

“Nurse Mary is very like Portia. But I understand why she chooses Hamlet,” Dr. Foster said.

“Because of its philosophy, you mean?” Emma said.

“Sein oder Nichtsein; das ist hier die Frage:/ Obs edler im Gemüt, die Pfeil und Schleudern/ Des wütenden Geschicks erdulden oder,/ Sich waffnend gegen eine See von Plagen,/ Durch Widerstand sie enden? Sterben - schlafen -/ Nichts weiter!” Dr. Foster recited. Emma could not judge the quality of his accent, but he was fluent and she was familiar enough with Hamlet’s soliloquy to recognize it. A bit of kindling caught as he was speaking, casting a clear golden light across the plans of his face, the glow reflecting in his dark eyes.

“The Schlegel translation. I don’t think I butchered it too badly,” Dr. Foster said. “She chooses Hamlet because it is not Nurse Mary who answers, but the Baroness von Olnhausen. Because there is nothing we hold more in affection than the memory of our lost beloved. Their loves become ours, so that we may keep them with us.”

“Oh,” Emma said, feeling out of her depth.

“You mustn’t say anything to her about it,” Dr. Foster said. “Not even how terrible my German is, no matter how tempted you are. It will trouble her, to know I—we spoke of it.”

“But it doesn’t trouble you? To know how she misses her husband?” Emma replied before she could stop herself.

“To know she is a woman and not a saint? No, that doesn’t trouble me—though I wonder at you, Miss Green, for bringing it up so baldly. I might almost think Nurse Mary asked the questions, not the belle of Alexandria,” Dr. Foster said, ending lightly though Emma thought she could not forget what he’d said first—and with such undisguised tenderness. No one could believe it of him, she thought, then corrected herself. Perhaps there was one who could. Who already did.

“I’d rather be Rosalind,” Emma said, pouting just a little, to remind them both of how they were meant to be talking. It was comfortable, to be flirting again with a man who understood what she was doing and how blithely.

“Yes, I can see that,” Dr. Foster said. “Though you’d never convince anyone you were Ganymede, even without your deadly hoopskirt.”

“Shall you never forget that?” Emma cried.

“No. Nor any of this, I suppose. Not matter how much I might want to,” he said.

“What you want is your dessert,” Mary interjected, having come back in without their notice, her arms full with a tray of apple tart, tea-cups, and a chipped tea-pot faintly traced with apricot roses. “‘The last taste of sweets is sweetest last.’”

“Richard II,” Emma declared, taking a bite of the tart.

“Well done, Emma,” Mary said. Dr. Foster nodded. The fire burned on, the least hungry of them all.

#mercy street #mercy street pbs #fanfiction #shakespeare #debate #emma green #mary phinney #jed foster #phoster #matron brannan #byron hale #gustav von olnhausen #schlegel translation #romance #didn't you always want to hear mary and emma debate shakespeare plays?#while jed makes a running commentary?#well here you go

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moosterrecords · 5 years ago

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Hanna-Barbera's Bingo, Fleegle, Snorky, and Drooper Star in an All-New Horror Movie

The Banana Splits Movie

��Available on Digital August 13th On Blu-rayTM Combo Pack and DVD August 27th

One banana, two banana, three banana, GORE! The cult-favorite animal rock-band from Hanna-Barbera’s 1968 The Banana Splits Adventure Hour variety program is back with a blood-spattered vengeance! Warner Bros. Home Entertainment brings you The Banana Splits Movie, an original feature-length film on Digital on August 13, and on Blu-ray Combo Pack and DVD on August 27, 2019. The movie is priced to own at $19.99 SRP for Digital, $24.98 SRP for Blu-ray Combo Pack ($34.97 in Canada), $19.98 SRP for the DVD ($24.99 in Canada). The Banana Splits Movie will offer a new take on the classic characters. The film follows a boy named Harley and his family as they go to a taping of The Banana Splits TV show, which is supposed to be a fun-filled birthday for young Harley. But things take an unexpected turn — and the body count quickly rises. Can Harley, his mom and their new pals safely escape? “Get nostalgic and horrified all at the same time while watching the trippy 60’s characters in this all-new tale about fear, power, and an oversized puppet rock-band,” said Mary Ellen Thomas, WBHE, Vice President, TV Marketing, Family & Animation. The Banana Splits Movie is a throwback to a fanatical children’s series with a horror-genre twist — and we can’t wait for the band to get back together for a new generation of fans!” The Banana Splits Movie stars Dani Kind (Wyonna Earp) as Beth, Finlay Wojtak-Hissong (The Kindness of Strangers) as Harley, Romeo Carere as Austin, Steve Lund (Street Legal, Schitt’s Creek) as Mitch, and Sara Canning (The Vampire Diaries, A Series of Unfortunate Events, War for the Planet of the Apes) as Rebecca. The beloved Bingo, Fleegle, Snorky and Drooper are voiced by Eric Bauza (Looney Tunes Cartoons, Woody Woodpecker, UniKitty!). The film is written by Jed Elinoff & Scott Thomas (Raven’s Home, My Super Psycho Sweet 16) and directed by Danishka Esterhazy (Level 16) with music by Patrick Stumph (Fall Out Boy, Gnome Alone). The movie is produced by Blue Ribbon Content in association with Warner Bros. Home Entertainment and SYFY. The Banana Splits Movie will make its broadcast debut on SYFY later this year. DVD SPECIAL FEATURES • Banana Splits: Behind the Horror DIGITAL AND BLU-RAY COMBO PACK SPECIAL FEATURES • Banana Splits: Behind the Horror • Terror on Set • Breaking News! The Banana Splits Massacre DIGITAL The Banana Splits Movie will be available to own on Digital. Digital purchase allows consumers to instantly stream and download all episodes to watch anywhere and anytime on their favorite devices. Digital movies and TV shows are available from various digital retailers including Amazon Video, iTunes, Google Play, Vudu and others. A Digital Copy is also included with the purchase of specially marked Blu-ray discs for redemption and cloud storage. BASICS Digital Release: August 13, 2019 Blu-ray/DVD Release: August 27, 2019 Order Due Date: July 23, 2019 Blu-ray and DVD Presented in 16x9 widescreen format Running Time: Feature: Approx. 86 min Enhanced Content: Approx. 15 min About Warner Bros. Home Entertainment Inc. Warner Bros. Home Entertainment (WBHE) brings together Warner Bros. Entertainment's home video, digital distribution and interactive entertainment businesses in order to maximize current and next-generation distribution scenarios. An industry leader since its inception, WBHE oversees the global distribution of content through packaged goods (Blu-ray Disc™ and DVD) and digital media in the form of electronic sell-through and video-on-demand via cable, satellite, online and mobile channels, and is a significant developer and publisher for console and online video game titles worldwide. WBHE distributes its product through third party retail partners and licensees. About SYFY SYFY is a global, multiplatform media brand that gives science fiction fans of all kinds a universe to call home. Celebrating the genre in all its forms, SYFY super-serves passionate fans with original science fiction, fantasy, paranormal and superhero programming, live event coverage and imaginative digital and social content. The brand is powered by SYFY WIRE (www.syfy.com), the premier portal for breaking genre news, insight and commentary. SYFY is a network of NBCUniversal, one of the world's leading media and entertainment companies. NBCUniversal is a subsidiary of Comcast Corporation. About Blue Ribbon Content Formed in 2014, Warner Bros. Television Group’s Blue Ribbon Content (BRC) develops and produces live-action series for digital platforms, tapping the creative talent already working at the Studio while also identifying opportunities for collaboration with new writers and producers. In addition to live-action programming, BRC produces animated content and also experiments with emerging platforms such as virtual reality. Live-action BRC programs include digital feature Daphne and Velma for Warner Bros. Home Entertainment, comedies Beerfest and JoJoHead for CW Seed, SpringHill Entertainment’s basketball documentary series Best Shot for YouTube Red and the following upcoming projects: the second season of the UNINTERRUPTED comedy Now We’re Talking, Golden Revenge, and the feature-length comedy Good Girls Get High. Animated BRC programs include Constantine: City of Demons and Freedom Fighters: The Ray for CW Seed, as well as Ginger Snaps for ABC Digital.

#IFTTT #Blogger #Moosterrecords #punkrock #punk

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aion-rsa · 4 years ago

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The Best Movies of 2020

https://ift.tt/34YpJ4d

Thank goodness that’s over, right?

To say 2020 was a challenging year is like announcing the Hindenburg had a rough landing. In a period that’s transformed how billions live their lives, there isn’t one person, family, business, or industry that wasn’t impacted significantly by upheaval. And that includes going to the movies.

Just 12 months ago, moviegoers were turning out by the millions to see their favorite space adventures in theaters. Now they’re watching them, and everything else, on streaming. It’s an astonishing journey we’ve detailed further here, but even if our relationship to how we experience films is changing, the fact remains cinema is as vital a form of escape and inspiration as ever. And even in 2020, as Hollywood studios largely abandoned multiplexes to fend for themselves, there also remained excellent motion pictures. Some were released on Netflix, some experimented with premium video on demand, and a rarified few still entered theaters.

Here’s 25 of them.

25. Host

This Zoom horror movie, completed from start to finish in 12 weeks during the middle of a pandemic, might be the movie that sums up 2020 better than any other. But it should also be noted that it’s genuinely very good. The feature debut of Rob Savage runs at just 57 minutes (how very 2020, as in any other year its halfway house runtime might have hurt the movie’s chances), and in that time it sees a group of friends attempt to carry out a séance over Zoom. However, something goes wrong (or is that right?) and a malign entity enters the call.

Performed by a group of women, and one man, who already know each other really well, it’s the easy shorthand of their friendship that elevates this and helps the audience to instantly care. Meanwhile it’s the ambition and inventiveness of Savage and writers Jed Shepherd and Gemma Hurley which increases the scale of this beyond a lockdown found footage movie and into territory where complicated stunt work was involved. First and foremost though, it’s scary. Like really scary. How very 2020. – Rosie Fletcher

24. Minari

There is currently a bit of controversy over the Golden Globes categorizing Lee Isaac Chung’s Minari as a “foreign language film.” If that stands, it will be a genuine shame, and a greater slight, for this is an all-American story. A semi-autobiographical reverie for its writer-director, Minari depicts a family of Korean-Americans who immigrated to the United States in the 1970s and are now trying to make it as farmers in rural Arkansas in the 1980s.

A beautiful ode to childhood, and both the hardships and joys of the immigrant experience, what’s most rewarding about Chung’s film is its quiet intelligence at working from first the perception of a child named David (Alan S. Kim), and then also from the vantage of his parents and their increasingly frayed marriage (a mutually raw Steven Yeun and Yeri Han). It even has a deep reservoir of understanding for the more complex sorrows of grandmother Soonja (Youn Yuh-jung). Minari is a sophisticated multigenerational snapshot of a distinct group of American lives, and it’s among the best films of the year, however you categorize it. – David Crow

23. Kajillionaire

Miranda July’s ethereal scammer dramedy carries the con-artist torch from Bong Joon-ho’s 2019 masterpiece, Parasite, and once again allows audiences to live vicariously through a scrappy family surviving on society’s margins. But unlike Bong’s Kims, Kajillionaire’s Dynes (Robert Jenkins and Debra Winger) are far from sympathetic; they’re poisoned by their warped take on the American Dream.

Evan Rachel Wood turns in one of 2020’s most stunning performances as their strange daughter, Old Dolio: fierce yet naïve, raised to regard all relationships as transactional and so utterly at a loss as to how to navigate her attraction to their new co-conspirator Melanie (Gina Rodriguez). Old Dolio’s roughness contrasts beautifully with the surreal wonder of July’s dreamy motifs—here, soap bubbles representing the fragility of a life that could change with one puncture.

No one could have predicted that this year would implode worse than a scam gone wrong, nor that even the most well-adjusted families would have to grapple with setting uncomfortable but life-saving boundaries with loved ones. Yet here we are, and somehow July’s hopeful story came to us at exactly the right time: We can delight in Old Dolio breaking toxic patterns, and the elder Dynes learning that letting go of something valuable can be more beneficial than squeezing the life out of it. – Natalie Zutter

22. The Assistant

One of the year’s most unassuming but devastating films is writer-director Kitty Green’s seamless foray from documentary (Casting JonBenet, Ukraine is Not a Brothel) into a classic “inspired by true events” feature. Those true events are the Harvey Weinstein scandal, as the film follows a day in the life of a low-level assistant (Julia Garner) in a prominent Hollywood executive’s New York City office. The Weinstein-like character is never directly seen, and Jane is one of many peons who sketch out the space around his considerable form, as they arrange his midday hotel reservations and restock his private stash of erectile dysfunction medication.

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Yet out of the whole office, Jane is both the most valuable and the least valued: first one in, last one out, she has devoted all of her waking hours to streamlining this powerful man’s day—which includes covering over his gravest sins with regard to the pretty, impressionable young women she ushers into his office.

Every phone conversation or behind-closed-doors meeting is intentionally muffled so that Jane herself can hardly hear it, let alone the audience. These murmuring pockets invite the viewer to fill in the blanks, imagining the worst possible scenario. The film never gets explicit, but Jane’s dawning realization and horror at her complicity is unsettling enough. Even more so when her attempts to flag this unimaginably inappropriate behavior get undermined by the self-protecting hierarchy of the company. The Assistant is more character portrait than anything else, and it treats its archetypal figure with more sympathy than her real-life counterparts might have earned, but its depiction of seemingly harmless eccentricities snowballing into an unconscionable abuse of power is a must-watch. – NZ

21. His House

This Netflix original horror movie took people by surprise when it landed on the service. The feature debut from Remi Weekes, His House is a clever, nuanced political movie that leans hard into horror tropes, working both as a commentary on the treatment of refugees in Britain and as a seriously frightening ghost story. Wunmi Mosaku (Lovecraft Country) and Sope Dirisu (Gangs of London) play a Sudanese couple who escape the violence of their own country only to find themselves hemmed in by the bureaucracy and judgement of the UK. Placed in a decrepit home that they can’t leave, they are haunted by spirits they brought with them while facing the nightmare of a country that pretends to care but barely sees them as people.

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The performances across the board, including a supporting role from Matt Smith, soar, and the production design is unique, haunting, and at times very beautiful. This is a powerful first film from an exciting new voice, a must-watch for genre lovers, and a showcase for a strong, if not often told, social message that talks about culture, society, and gender. It’s about the demons we see and the ones we do not. – RF

20. Emma.

Jane Austen’s fourth novel, and the last published in her lifetime, has been filmed many times. But director Autumn de Wilde’s version is the best one, perhaps because she is the first woman to helm a straightforward adaptation. Leaning into Austen’s own designs for the book, where the author mused she would “take a heroine whom no one but myself will much like,” Emma. embraces the mischievous and sardonic side of Austen’s wit, and her heroine who was gifted with being “handsome, clever, and rich” from the word go.

Filmed with supreme confidence and a sumptuous color palette of bright pastels in brighter natural lighting, Emma. is vibrant and often veers cheerfully near screwball comedy. This approach is only buoyed by Anya Taylor-Joy, who began a strong year of work with this multifaceted and exceedingly rich portrait of Ms. Woodhouse, in the most magnanimous sense. She and her director searched for “questionable intent” in the material while still crafting a warm film that bubbles with life. It also enjoys a wonderful soundtrack thanks to a collection of actual 18th and 17th century English folk songs, and a puckish score by David Schweitzer and Isobel Waller-Bridge. – DC

19. The Father

Director and screenwriter Florian Zeller’s adaptation of his own stage play stars Anthony Hopkins as Anthony, an elderly English man suffering from the onset of dementia. Olivia Colman is his daughter Anne, who is planning a move to Paris to live with her partner, and is desperately trying to find a new caregiver for her father. People drift in and out of the narrative under different names, Anthony’s spacious apartment seems to change around him and time itself seems to bend before we realize we are seeing almost all the events from Anthony’s point of view—which means that none of what we see can truly be trusted.

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This makes what could have been a conventional drama about illness and memory into something brilliant and terribly heartbreaking, with Hopkins and Colman giving performances that are nothing short of titanic and Zeller’s cool, controlled direction making the emotional cost even more profound. The final scenes of this nearly perfect film will leave you devastated, even if this awful disease has never impacted your life personally. – Don Kaye

18. Sound of Metal

Sound of Metal gives us an up-close, immersive look at what it feels like to suddenly go deaf, and to realize that massive life changes don’t have to portend the end of what it means to live. Riz Ahmed is excellent as Ruben, a recovering drug addict who drums in a heavy metal duo alongside his girlfriend, singer/guitarist Lou (Olivia Cooke). The two tour the indie rock circuit in a beat-up but cozy RV that also serves as their home, but their gypsy lifestyle is upended when Ruben abruptly loses his hearing.

Director Darius Marder (who co-wrote the script with Abraham Marder) does not give into sentimentality even as Ruben moves through grief, loss, denial, anger, and self-pity, all the while clinging to the possibility that he may find a surgical way to restore his hearing. His journey also takes him to a home for deaf people in recovery (headed up by the marvelous Paul Raci, whose own real-life story involving deafness is remarkable), and eventually opens his heart and mind. The excellent sound design is the final touch on a captivating and highly original story. – DK

17. The Personal History of David Copperfield

After exposing the sheer absurdity of modern politics in films and series like In The Loop, The Death of Stalin, and Veep, Armando Iannucci found solace this year in creating this earnest, light, charming adaptation of Charles Dickens’ classic novel, David Copperfield. The film still tackles Dickens’ persistent themes of class, privilege, poverty, and human rights, although in far less scathing fashion than Iannucci is known for. Casting his project in colorblind fashion has also allowed the director to subtly modernize the piece while grounding it firmly in 1850s England.

Some of us may get a bit lost in the onrush of characters and events in this fast-paced film, as Iannucci breezes through a lot of the book’s events. But the story itself, and the multitude of vivid, colorful, oddball characters who are led by an enthusiastic Dev Patel as David, are so timeless and relevant to the human condition that only diehard loyalists to the original text may find something to grumble about. The rest of us can enjoy a delightful adaptation that we might not even know we needed. – DK

16. Bad Education

For his whole career, Hugh Jackman has been celebrated for his consummate showmanship. Whether it is as ambassador for a major superhero franchise or the song and dance man who can win Tonys at the same ceremony he’s hosting, his charm is irresistible. So imagine his delight when director Cory Finely presented him with Bad Education: the movie where his ability to ingratiate turns into something sinister and perfectly apt for the year it was released in.

Based on a 2004 New York Magazine article about the largest school embezzlement scandal in history, Bad Education plays like a dark comedy about American greed, as well as prologue for the 21st century hucksterism that was to come. Filmed with the same clinical nihilism found in Finley’s Thoroughbreds, this film is so much larger in its landscape of apathy of self-delusion. And at the center of it is Jackman’s affable Long Island school superintendent, a man who hides dark secrets and a bottomless pit of narcissism, both of which allow him to tell any lie that keeps him on top. Hence why watching his house of cards fall is pretty satisfying, especially these days. – DC

15. Small Axe

Steve McQueen’s latest effort, an anthology of short films set around Black communities in 1970s and ’80s Britain has been the source of some debate. Should these be looked at as individual films or can the work only be considered as a whole? We don’t have a satisfactory answer either, but Small Axe is as thoroughly compelling as the rest of McQueen’s work, and two films in particular, Mangrove and Lovers Rock are standouts.

Mangrove is the longest, most traditionally “feature length” entry in Small Axe. Gifted with urgent, authentic performances to tell the story of the Mangrove Nine, it’s also (like the rest of the films in the anthology) an effortlessly immersive recreation of its era, even as its subject matter resonates uncomfortably with today’s headlines. But while the other movies that comprise Small Axe are shorter than many features, they’re no less powerful. The immensely beautiful Lovers Rock, with its haunting reggae soundtrack and beautifully filmed party scenes, serves as a reminder of so much of what we’ve lost and taken for granted in this pandemic year, and the intimacy that can be found in crowds. It’s essential viewing, and both a snapshot of a moment in time and a reminder of something else we’ve lost to this pandemic year. – Mike Cecchini

14. Tenet (READERS’ CHOICE)

In a tumultuous year, no blockbuster has had quite as much controversy surrounding it as Christopher Nolan’s Tenet. The director was notoriously adamant that his film should be the one to lead moviegoers back to cinemas worldwide, a quixotic (some might say selfish) endeavor that might’ve undercut the ambition of a movie that blends the action and spectacle of the wildest James Bond movies with elements of time travel, quantum physics, and Nolan’s famed attention to detail.

But lost in all that controversy—and perhaps in its nigh-incomprehensible plot—is the fact that maybe, were the world not in the midst of a deadly pandemic, Nolan was right.

Perhaps more than any other blockbuster of the last year or more, Tenet was clearly designed with the cinematic experience in mind. Action set pieces, filmed in gorgeous locations that would be spectacular on their own, take on the quality of magic tricks as events and performances are “inverted” by the film’s central, mysterious technology.

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Even Nolan’s notorious penchant for emotionally distant main characters is undercut by performances from John David Washington and Robert Pattinson that bring this about as close to a buddy action movie two-hander as you’re ever likely to see from the director. Whether you ultimately view Tenet as a smarter-than-your-average thrill ride or a puzzle that can only be unlocked via repeated viewings, it still deserves, even demands, your full attention. – MC

13. One Night in Miami

Regina King has been in the business of making movies for nearly three decades. Who knew she could also be such an astonishing director? Yet with her first theatrical feature, she announces undiscovered talent in this sweltering, jubilant film that interrogates what life is like at the intersection of Black art and Black commerce in America.

With screenwriter Kemp Powers adapting his own stage play, One Night in Miami imagines a fictional account of an evening where Malcolm X (Kingsley Ben-Adir), Sam Cooke (Leslie Odom Jr.), Jim Brown (Aldis Hodge), and the man who would soon be Muhammad Ali (Eli Goree) walk into a 1964 motel room. Their conversations about the challenges of Black celebrity in a world that pulls them both toward the desperate need of social equity and the more comfortable appeal of white-friendly affability, is one that is still going on to this day. But it’s told here with bombastic performances and a visual flair that is so kinetic it overcomes the admittedly stagebound limitations of the film’s conceit. – DC

12. Soul

What does it mean to have soul? How do you feed it? Joe Gardner, the Jamie Foxx-voiced protagonist of Soul, thinks he has the answer in the keys of his music, but the beauty of this latest Pixar film is it lives within the ambiguous places that aren’t be so easily defined. As yet another sophisticated offering from co-director Pete Docter, who previously co-helmed Inside Out, Soul pushes Pixar back toward its ambitious best, finding a way to convey complex ideas in an adventure with universal appeal.

With dazzling animation that leans into abstract concepts about life, death, and a weird transient state between the two, the film asks big questions in a way a child can appreciate, if not fully understand. To be sure, it’s the rare kids’ movie that gingerly suggests there is happiness in the seeming pointlessness of existence. It also benefits from ascendant music by Trent Reznor, Atticus Ross, and Jon Batiste on the piano. In fact, realizing Nine Inch Nails penned one of the great Disney scores might be 2020’s most pleasant surprise. – DC

11. Saint Maud

The directorial debut of Rose Glass did the festival circuit in 2019 and was due to land in cinemas in the spring. Instead it was pushed back to October in the UK, mid-pandemic. So perhaps it didn’t get the fanfare it would have garnered in a normal year. Set in a rundown seaside town, the movie sees young palliative care nurse Maud (Morfydd Clark) become obsessed with her patient Amanda (Jennifer Ehle), who is dying of cancer. After a highly traumatic incident, Maud has found God—a God she believes talks directly to her and has made it Maud’s mission to save Amanda’s soul.

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A nightmarish horror of shifting perception, where bodies and minds are in conflict, this is a movie packed with indelible imagery, not least the devastating final scene. Ehle is excellent as the former dancer whose body is letting her down, but Clark is a revelation as the tiny, fierce Maud, all self-flagellation and buttoned up piety until she’s not. – RF

10. Nomadland

Utilizing both actors and real people, director Chloé Zhao (The Rider and Marvel’s upcoming Eternals) chronicles the lives of America’s “forgotten people” as they travel the West, searching for work, companionship, and community in the years following the Great Recession. A brilliant Frances McDormand stars as Fern, a woman in her mid-60s who lost her husband, her house, and her entire previous existence when the town she lived in—Empire, Nevada—vanished off the map following the closure of its sole factory.

Zhao’s film quietly flows from despair to optimism and back to despair again, all while the hardscrabble lives of its itinerant cast (many of them actual nomads) is foregrounded against stunning, if lonely, vistas from the American countryside. Nomadland shows us both the best and worst of America at once: the cruelty of a nation that refuses more and more to take care of its own, juxtaposed with the decency and compassion one can find on an individual basis. Whether the latter is enough to overcome the former is one of Nomadland’s haunting, unanswered questions. – DK

9. Wonder Woman 1984

A movie about flying and lying (even to one’s self), Wonder Woman 1984 came onto the pop culture scene at the very end of a very bad year. For many, the film’s muddled superhero logic and lackluster third act action scenes were enough to ruin the experience. For others, including many of us, the big budget earnestness of Diana Prince won the day. The film’s delights include charismatic performances from Pedro Pascal and Kristen Wiig as complex antagonists Maxwell Lord and Cheetah; a breathtaking Themyscira sequence; and Chris Pine pretending to ride an escalator for the first time.

Ultimately, however, Wonder Woman 1984 warrants a spot on this list due to its unexpected thematic priority. While many storytellers use a 1980s setting as an excuse to blast Blondie (fair enough), give the costume department free rein on shoulder pads (yes, please), or to harken back to an imagined simpler time (sure, whatever), director and co-writer Patty Jenkins uses it as a way to rewrite American history.

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If the 1980s was an era that saw economic policies shifting the power from government to Wall Street, then here is a superhero flick that goes back in time to imagine a different path forward, one in which America is able to avoid the path that prioritizes the few over the many. It’s a fantasy, sure—and one that is understandably too porous for some to enjoy—but it’s a particularly cathartic one for 2020. – Kayti Burt

8. Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom

Adapted from August Wilson’s play by director George C. Wolfe (and not quite able to escape its stage origins), Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom is set during a heated recording session by the title artist–one of the pioneering blues singers of the 1920s–and her touring band. As tensions rise between Ma (Viola Davis) and certain band members, plus Ma and the white men, who of course own the record label, the band members find themselves at odds over the music they’re making and much more.

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While Ma and the events of the story may be fictionalized, the issues that come up—race, religion, money, and art—are not just universal but as relevant as ever in terms of the Black experience in America. Davis is a supernova as Ma, and the rest of the supporting cast is just as terrific. Yet the spotlight undeniably belongs to the late Chadwick Boseman in his final screen appearance. As Levee, the trumpeter who wants to go solo, Boseman radiates rage, pain, and frustration in a performance as incendiary as it is tragic. – DK

7. Birds of Prey

Harley Quinn’s fabulous emancipation was just that—fabulous. As a fierce, funny, feminist ensemble piece with a quality cast that flipped on its head Harley’s dubious treatment at the hands of Mr. J in Suicide Squad, Harley herself, Margot Robbie, pitched the movie back in 2015. Birds of Prey shows a different side to Gotham City where a grubby underworld of people are trying to scratch together a living, and the only thing objectified in this female team-up is a bacon and egg sandwich (and what a sandwich it is).

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Working from a script by Christina Hodson, director Cathy Yan’s film has a totally different flavor from anything that had come before from the DCEU. R-Rated, rude, and colorful, the movie sees the whole of Gotham out to get Harley now that she’s no longer under the Joker’s protection. But a young pickpocket, a stolen diamond, and Ewan McGregor’s gangster bring together a mismatched bunch in a joyful slice of anarchy that hits exactly the right notes. Superhero movies don’t get much more fun than this. – RF

6. Mank

The authorship of Citizen Kane has divided critics and film scholars for generations. So you can almost sense the glee boiling up in David Fincher as Mank wades right into the middle of it with a stylized and exquisitely crafted love letter to Herman J. Mankiewicz—and proverbial middle finger toward Orson Welles. One sympathizes, as Mankiewicz (or “Mank”) has been an unsung figure in film history: a member of New York’s 1920s generation of literary writers and journalists who bought into the allure of easy money in Hollywood but never got the credit he deserved for selling his soul.

Well, Mank attempts to return it with interest. A film that basks in demolishing Old Hollywood nostalgia, even with its black and white photography and heightened melodramatic score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, Mank recalls the ugly side of yesteryear, and the greed that slaughtered talent, be it for money as embodied by Louis B. Mayer, or ego as personified by the film’s vision of Welles.

Yet its elegy for Mankiewicz—portrayed with delicious self-loathing by Gary Oldman—and his generation of forgotten writers is what makes the film unexpectedly warm for a Fincher joint. As does Mank’s relationship with Marion Davies, an also overlooked movie star given spirited reconsideration by Amanda Seyfried in one of the year’s best performances. – DC

5. Palm Springs

There must be something hypnotic about the banality of time loops, because to date the concept hasn’t produced a bad movie. Harold Ramis and Bill Murray’s Groundhog Day remains the paterfamilias, and prime original day, for the form. Yet that film’s many imitators have still pushed other filmmakers toward genuine inspiration. And that may have never been truer than for Palm Springs, a millennial reimagining of Groundhog’s exploration of a romance stuck on repeat—but with an ingenious added wrinkle.

Instead of one half a potential couple being oblivious to her role in a cyclical love story, both Nyles (Andy Samberg) and Sarah (Cristin Milioti) are keenly aware of their shared Sisyphean hell. Worse still, they’re also trapped at a lame wedding. The small addition has massive creative repercussions, with director Max Barbakow and company lightly critiquing the implicit ickiness in Ramis’ film, as well as providing an opportunity for a true two-hander film between Samberg and Milioti. It’s Samberg’s best work to date, but Milioti is the real revelation as the woman who is our eyes and ears into a circular existence that is both horrifying and pleasant, romantic and exhausting. Like the film as a whole, this is a delightful nightmare. – DC

4. Da 5 Bloods

Hollywood’s great reckoning with America’s involvement in the Vietnam War may never truly end. But few films have gotten to the human cost of the war that lingers long after soldiers came home quite as emotionally as Spike Lee’s Da 5 Bloods.

Alternately a heartfelt tale of friendship and identity amidst shared hardship and a raucous action movie, effortlessly connecting the dots between the racial politics of the Civil Rights era during the Vietnam War and the Black Lives Matter movement of today, Da 5 Bloods may be the most clear-sighted movie about the conflict ever made. The film’s emotional power is bolstered even further by a rousing Terence Blanchard score, as well as a significant chunk of Marvin Gaye’s era-defining masterpiece album, What’s Going On.

Even at 156 minutes, Da 5 Bloods never overstays its welcome. Despite an action heavy third act that may seem incongruous with some of the film’s weightier themes, its characters are so powerful, and the performances so unforgettable, that nothing is ever lost. And while each of the film’s five leads (not to mention Chadwick Boseman’s almost ethereal “Stormin’” Norman Holloway, seen only in flashback) are terrific, none are more haunting than Delroy Lindo’s manic, tortured turn as Paul, a soldier still bearing the scars of war, both foreign and domestic. – MC

3. Promising Young Woman

Carey Mulligan plays against type in this candy colored fable of an avenging angel who goes to nightclubs and pretends to be wasted in order to shame the men who try to take her home and take advantage. It’s an ultra modern take on the rape-revenge subgenre with a very female gaze. Mulligan’s Cassie is a delicate clothes horse with multicolored nails who works in a coffee shop and lives with her parents—her brand of revenge is specific, personal, and highly female.

Despite the dark subject matter, this is an unashamedly fun film (um, until it’s not) with a killer soundtrack. It’s the directorial debut of actor Emerald Fennell (most recently seen playing Camilla in The Crown), who also wrote the picture, and she reveals an extremely distinctive style. A starry supporting cast also deliver uniformly excellent performances, including Bo Burnham, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Adam Brodie, and Alfred Molina, which makes this feel big budget glossy.

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But it’s Mulligan’s movie. It’s impossible to take your eyes off her, and she owns the screen as a powerful warrior, a vulnerable soul, and a heroine for our times. – RF

2. The Invisible Man

A Blumhouse redo of a Universal classic from the bloke who wrote Saw, on paper this wouldn’t be an obvious contender for a year-end best list. But then The Invisible Man isn’t an obvious movie. As the last film many saw at the cinema before lockdown landed, The Invisible Man is an incredibly smart take on the H.G. Wells story, which focuses not on the scientist who creates the suit that makes him invisible, but the woman he uses it to terrorize.

He may be “the guy who wrote Saw,” but writer-director Leigh Whannell has proved himself incredibly adept at a certain kind of action/horror with this and Upgrade—both include thrilling sequences of people who aren’t in control of their own bodies. Here it’s Elisabeth Moss who is being stalked by her abusive ex-boyfriend. Whannell uses the conceit to great effect: It’s a movie about gaslighting, which has the audience scanning the peripheries of the scene at all times, keeping us on edge, just like Cece, and wrong footing us all the same.

Top notch performances and serious subject matter handled with panache make this a scary standout for any year. We can’t wait to see what Whannell does with The Wolfman… – RF

1. The Trial of the Chicago 7

“The whole world is watching.” That is the chant shouted throughout Aaron Sorkin’s second directorial effort, The Trial of the Chicago 7, and it echoes in our 2020 ears like the Ghost of Christmas Past. A little more than 50 years ago, the United States government put eight men on trial for protesting the Democratic National Convention—and the Vietnam War its presumptive nominee supported. This legal circus occurred even though the riot that broke out during the protests was started by the police. It would be understatement to note it all plays as eerily prescient today.

Beyond the loaded political subtexts though, the movie’s placement on this list reflects what happens when Sorkin’s screenplays achieve their greatest alchemy: With words being deployed in a courtroom as ruthlessly as batons were on a summer night in Chicago, each dialogue exchange in Chicago 7 is kinetic. The film defies the seemingly stagey quality of its legal setting, and not by just inserting flashbacks to a recreation of the 1968 riots (though they’re here too), but by turning verbose monologues into thrilling set pieces. Defense attorneys duel prosecutors; defendants defy a shockingly biased and corrupt judge; and believers in the system, like Sorkin himself, stare into the abyss of what happens when it fails.

All of these elements amplify the film’s vision of protestors from “the far left” running into the hard wall of mainstream resistance to change. It’s a showcase for Sorkin, his editor Alan Baumgarten, and the whole ensemble, particularly in one grueling sequence between Yahya Abdul-Mateen II as Bobby Seale and Frank Langella as Judge Julius Hoffman. The Trial of the Chicago 7 can be horrifying in places, and yet always engrossing. And most miraculously of all, it’s never cynical. That might be why it electrifies most at this moment. – DC

Other movies receiving balloted votes (in descending order): Relic, The News of the World, Uncle Frank, Never Always Sometimes, Class Action Park, Freaky, The Way Back, The Old Guard, Synchronic, The Devil All the Time, I’m Thinking of Ending Things, Enola Holmes, Shirley, Unpregnant, Wolfwalkers, Rebecca, On the Rocks, MLK/FBI, Scare Me, The Lodge, Happiest Season, I’m Your Woman, Bill & Ted 3, The Platform, Monsoon, Possessor, Ordinary Love, Miss Juneteenth, Athlete A, How to Build a Girl, The Vast of Night, What the Constitution Means to Me, Muscle, Calm the Horses, Color Out of Space, Eurovision, Another Round, Misbehaviour, The Boys in the Band, Borat 2, Extraction, Midnight Sky, Zappa, The Half of It, Greenland, 7500, Onward, The Wolf of Snow Hollow, The Nest, Bad Hair, Capone, Project Power, New Order, The Gentlemen, Lost Girls, The 40 Year-Old-Version.

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Supergirl - S5 E3 - Blurred Lines

I'm begrudgingly considering watching Batwoman, mainly because I'm OC'd and I'm watching the other DC-CW series, but God damn, I catch glimpse of it whenever I cue-up Supergirl and the DVR has recorded the last few minutes of the preceding Batwoman episode, and it's not inspiring me with any confidence. It apparently takes them 3 episodes to give her, her God damn hair - the hair we saw Batwoman sport nearly a year ago in the crossover, meaning at least part of this season is set in the relative past, presumably. But then we get this bullshit commentary about "the bat being back, but curvier and sexier," like fuck you. How the hell can you tell what this person looks in this suit? And so much for the urban legend angle. More importantly, how dumb is it that they have work so hard to come up with her name? Are we supposed to believe anyone was seriously considering calling her "Batchick"; while "Batwoman" flies under the radar? Moving on.... So at the end of the last episode, we see Billy-the-Kiss ass volunteering at a shelter; now he's hassling some guy at a night club about playing ball?

Of course Kelly gives random people she meets on the street unsolicited advice about their lives; because nothing makes someone more sympathetic than someone who likes to stick their nose into other people's business. And it seems this show has once again tricked me into walking into a double entendre. It's her job to listen to people? What is Kelly's job? She's so boring and last season seems like a lifetime ago, I have genuinely forgotten. Is she supposed to be a therapist or something? I suppose that explains her guiding J'Onn through this ordeal in the previous episode; I was wondering what made her qualified to do that, but it seems completely incongruent with the high tech coporate setting they've put her in. And Alex going from Kelly giving advice to her barista to being kidnapped by a shape shifter is a hell a segue. I have a feeling Alex has been waiting hours to find the right opportunity to bring that up; and it would seem she cracked under the pressure. "You don't want a world full of robots, you just want better people."

Oh.... Idiot Jed..... How does Brainy even function? Data was more adept at picking up behavioral cues. Wait, do people really like reading about death? I mean, I'll read the obits in my weekly hometown newspaper; I try to make it a point of at least paying respect to he recently deceased by reading their name and age at the time of death, but I'm don't go out of my way to scan for newspapers with a corpse on cover. Interesting aside, I was reading said newspaper just last night and noted how a local woman had died at the age of 44 - certainly a tragedy for a family to lose someone at such a fairly young age - and then I also saw that it noted her "husband of 30 years" and now I'm left wondering if one of those numbers was a typo or if this woman got married at 14..... So she hears Billy's heart beating fast and has to use her x-ray vision to confirm it? What else did she think it could have been? Okay, so Kelly is a Doctor. Yet the place she works doesn't remotely look like a hospital; and the staff don't look like medical staff. They (and the set) looks like they're trying to audition for a future JJ Abrams Star Trek film. So Kara is going all over the world to get lunch and coffee, but are any of these items going to still be hot by the time she gets back to the states? For that matter, how the hell does manage to carry all of this shit? I have a hard enough time carry my order from McDonald's from car the dozen or so yards into my house; especially if I have to also carry in anything else besides the bag of food and my drink. The couple of time I had my niece with me also got her something I absolutely asked the server at the drive-thru to put it all in one of those plastic bags they normally put salads in, because they have a handle - a fact I learned not because I have ever previously ordered a salad from McDonald's, but rather because I asked them if they had a bag with a handle they could put my order in to make it easier to carry and they responded, "you mean like a salad bag?" and I respond, "yeah, whatever." I'm just picturing Kara rigging up some sort of harness or something she can wear to help carry things around as she flies internationally; thumbing her nose at all of the customs agencies and international trade violations she's willfully causing. Also, now that Brainy has set it up so her suit materializes as soon as she takes the glasses off, shouldn't she get more clear of the doorway before doing that? That also raises the question of what happens when she just wants to lounge around without her glasses or is going to bed. Does she have to sleep in her suit now? Is it bonded to her skin? Is there a snooze button that allows her to take off her glasses and not activate the suit? What if she just needs to remove her glasses to get something out of her eye or to clean the glasses? Or those times like earlier in the episode when she just brings the glasses down just slightly to use her x-ray vision? What's the point of no return her glasses have to pass before the process starts? Can it be immediately reversed when she put the glasses back on; or is it something you have to wait until it's all the way done before you can go the other way? There are so many questions..... Seriously, Kara, Lena would be the only person interested in Lex's journals and there'd be no other constructive use for them other than therapeutic? Wait just a damn minute, she took her glasses all the way off to x-ray the dead body and didn't generate her suit. What the fuck? You lied to us Brainy. You lied and that can't be forgiven. What, the boy being called J'Onn might be J'Onn? Whodda thunk it? Although I suppose J'Onn might be a common name on Mars, like John, Jacob or Jingleheimer Schmidt. I can buy that children on Mars or other planets even might develop games similar to hide and seek; it's a basic concept that seems fairly plausible. What doesn't seem plausible is that children on Mars would play this game as humans. So in the last episode, J'Onn hit a wall in trying to recover his memories; and it was suggested that trying to use the Q-wave technology to go any deeper could do damage to J'Onn. Now this episode J'Onn barely has to try, with the help of a woman who isn't even a telepath. Kara can fly halfway across the world to get lunch for her and Lena, but forgets to put in an delivery order for dinner with Alex - come on Kara, strap on your harness and go get dinner, chop, chop! You know, if Terrible-Boss gets and more terrible, Kara could probably make bank moonlighting with GrubHub. Or start her own food delivery service - SupperGirl Should Brainiac have a clapper, as opposed to say, Alexa? Now that I think about it, why is Brainiac using his appearance filter when they're home alone or when he's sleeping for that matter? Surely these devices don't have an unlimited supply of power; and Brainiac shouldn't be concerned about his appearance in private. Guardian: "Yeah, I came prepared." With what, a glow stick? Seriously, is this supposed to be not-Spider-woman's not-Kryptonite? Did I miss a whole big schpiel about this alien thing have some special weakness? And why didn't Supergirl likewise come prepared? Also, who looped James into this? Was it Kara? "This device uses magnetic resonance to attract the heavy metals in their ink." You really could have just said "this device des magic" and it'd make about as much sense. Especially since it's not really ink, but rather some type of alien life form that only mimics the appearance of a tattoo. Are we supposed to be surprised that it was actually J'Onn who did the mind wipe? Like I mentioned with the last episode, I'm fairly certain he's wiped other people's minds without the permission; and we definitely know he's done it with their consent. In the last episode, Kelly was able to use her contact lenses to enter J'Onn's mind and interact with him in real time. Now it appears on a computer monitor and there's a time delay. In spite of this apparent de-evolution of the technological ability to merge one's mind with technology, this is still some next level shit that the characters just seem to be glossing over as no big deal. So if this...shadow... could kill bug-lady so easily, why even need her at all as an assassin? Was it for the plausible deniability of the target seeming to die of natural causes Is this going to turn out to be the Shadow Thief? Maybe Shade? I kind of hope it's not Shade. I know he (or sometimes she) has been a villain, but I kinda liked the run in the comics when he was an immortal good guy. Come on Brainiac, there's a fucking difference between "operating at 100%" and the fucking nuance of going overboard with things like food and poems. It's the sort of difference between being able to open a fucking door and ripping clear off the hinges; or holding someone's hand gently or crushing it. It's unrealistic to suggest that this quasi-organic-AI doesn't realize you can't go "full thrust" on every conceivable thing, because nothing in nature could function that way.�� And if he really needs things in those terms, then it's a matter of variable comprehension of where those critical thresholds are; because 100% maximum food consumption in a meal is not dozen whole pizzas. That is more than 100% of what one person can physically eat in one sitting and therefore should exceed his logical behavior. On the flip side, mazel tov when things turn physical and Brainiac brings this type of mindset to the bedroom....

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"You were right, I was too open and too trusting. It's all my fault." Fuck you Supergirl Writers, for trying to bring this back to the opening bit between Kelly and the random person she was offering advice to on the street. J'Onn's brother manipulated Kelly by appearing to her as someone she knew and had at least enough of a past history with as to have a photo of him in her home. Had he appeared as the street barista or was just walking along the street not even looking for Kelly when Kelly came along, randomly zapping people with Q waves to help make them feel better, whether they asked for that help or not, sure, that would be "her fault". But this was a sneaky fucking telepathic shape shifter was determined to get your to do what he wanted; and while admittedly it barely took him much effort to convince you, it was only because you were legitimately doing what would have been the right thing under any other normal circumstance. "For a friend like you, there are no boundaries." Alright, now the writers are just fucking with us with these two. So Kara evidently didn't just pop in and grabbed the books, but also the watch too; seems she decided that so long as she was committing a felony, she might as well get her money's worth - and I suppose that makes sense. Is stealing some journals and a watch worse than just stealing the journals and not the watch, if you've only had to break into the one place? Next we'll see that she just cleared out the whole evidence lock-up, because you never know when you might need something else that's being held in Federal custody, and that way she's only had to break the law once; anything after that is just curation.

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