Favorite films

Recent reviews

• 

  Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind 2004

  ★★★★½ Rewatched 09 Feb 2024

  Last time I rewatched this I was in a horrible mood and it didn’t take. I don’t think I was in a good place to process its acute performances. There’s a risk of bouncing off the early-2000s tweeness of it all, too. 

  But Kaufman’s characters and all the actors - especially the supporting cast - bring a lot of texture and dimension to the surrounding story. And i found chemistry between the leads irresistible this time. Felt like I was 14 years old again, watching this in the theater with dewey-fresh eyes.

• 

  The Holdovers 2023

  ★★★½ Watched 14 Jan 2024

  The self-consciously retro aesthetics strike me as enough of a put on to be irritating, but the two leads are so strong that I was incredibly charmed by this. I’m not sure it amounts to much, but Giammati and Sessa are so good that I can’t really complain. Randolph’s part feels very underwritten, unfortunately. 

  I could see myself throwing this into the holiday rotation for the years when I want to avoid watching Tim Allen struggle to act.

Popular reviews

• 

  Tangerine 2015

  ★★★½ Watched 09 Jun 2023

  I think that Baker’s formal experimentations threaten to shatter the test tubes sometimes - in the early goings I wasn’t convinced by the iPhone cinematography, and I think sometimes he stretches the non-professional members of the cast a little too much. Ultimately, this won me over because Baker’s script is so funny and moving. Baker establishes his ability to balance incredibly tricky tonal shifts with a deft hand. My only major complaint is that pulling focus to a secondary protagonist…

• 

  Blast of Silence 1961

  ★★★★★ Watched 21 Dec 2022

  the herald of a new age