The Economist had an excellent article a few months back contrasting this film which was a bit of a surprise hit to Asura, a hugely expensive failure. It talked about this as an indication of increasing social consciousness in China and that the authorities probably regretted approval this film for distribution as it helped fan the flames of dissatisfaction with rising medical costs. This film is inspired by real events but after a cursory check, it seems to me that so much has been fictionalized that it should be judged independently.

Each of director Noah Baumbach’s films so far has been incredibly rich and insightful treatises on life and this title is no different. This is even a much more ambitious and wide-ranging film than the other two we’ve watched and it features a quite different cast. Not all of its themes gel together perfectly but I would still quite happily call it brilliant.

Given his huge stature as a cultural icon, it’s a little hard to believe that James Dean only ever starred in three feature films. This one was his debut, a major project directed by Elia Kazan and partially based on a novel by John Steinbeck. It’s very obviously an adaptation of the Biblical story of Cain and Abel but as my wife notes, it’s also a story with strong Freudian overtones.

As you might expect, I first heard about this film back when the announcement for its remake this year was made. The talk on Broken Forum was mostly about how much they liked the original. Given that this version as a 93% rating on Rotten Tomatoes while the new one has only 63%, I feel pretty justified in choosing to watch this.

This is considered Abbas Kiarostami’s last film though it was first screened a year after his death and was more generally released only this year. As its title indicates, this is not a movie at all but an experimental film consisting of 24 scenes shot with a completely motionless camera. Humans are almost entirely absent and there is no dialogue. Yet Kiarostami proves that he is still able to tell a story with such minimal materials.

I decided that I wanted to watch this early on based on the strength of its trailer, something that pretty much never happens. Its take on the character of Miles Morales was pitch perfect and the quality of its animation is something rarely seen outside of Japanese productions. The fact that it also features a plethora of Spider-related characters never before seen on screen is just an extra bonus.

So this looks like the last of the films by River Phoenix that I will cover. He did appear in a number of other films before he died but it looks like they are all mediocre ones at best. This was directed by Gus Van Sant, and I have to confess that I haven’t watched any of his films before this, not even the very well-known Good Will Hunting. That is certainly a film that needs to be added to the list immediately.