This would be the first of the DC films I’ve watched since Wonder Woman. I’d considered watching Aquaman but it seems to be all about the spectacle and special effects. I might have skipped this one as well but I rather like the idea of encouraging DC to go for more humor and ease up on the grimdark. Hopefully their whole stable of films will continue to improve now that Zach Snyder is firmly out of the picture.

This one percolated to the top of my lists due to its many rave reviews and the awards it won. But after only recently watching Sixteen Candles, it also makes for a fantastic counter-example of how get a film about an adolescent girl right, a claim made by no less an authority than Molly Ringwald herself. This director Bo Burnham’s directorial debut and it seems apropos to our times and this film that he first made his name as a YouTubber himself.

After two films directed by Jia Zhangke that stars his wife and muse Zhao Tao we already know what to expect and indeed this newest film is more of the same. Indeed the director even indulges in his usual obsessions with the Three Gorges Dam and UFOs even as he experiments with the theme of the well known underworld honor among thieves.

This has been on my to watch list ever since I saw A Quiet Passion which I continue to love. A documentary, essentially a love letter, made up of old newsreel footage about the city of Liverpool where director Terence Davies grew up, sounds very appealing. However documentaries are especially difficult to track down and it took me a long time to find an acceptable copy.

This film made some waves at the Oscars last year, notably clinching a nomination for Best Picture despite being not an American film at all. It was directed by Italian director Luca Guadagnino, there is dialogue in English, French, Italian and a sprinkle of German and it is set and filmed entirely in northern Italy. It’s also one of the most unashamedly positive, beautiful films I’ve ever seen with not the slightest touch of darkness in it and somehow it all work out perfectly.