THE TOP 10 BEST FILMS OF 2023..

 

As the Oscars loom and we are all still coming to terms with the many different sides of so many films, here are my selections:

1. OPPENHEIMER (directed by Christopher Nolan): 

it’s fitting that Christopher Nolan uses the opening minutes of Oppenheimer to evoke the myth of Prometheus, the legendary titan who stole fire from the Gods and gave it to humanity, only to suffer terrible consequences. Nolan’s film is, after all, adapted from Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin’s Pulitzer-winning biography American Prometheus. But there’s more to the allusion than a nod in the direction of the source material. For the filmmaker himself, the comparison to Prometheus is a warning of what we’re about to see, the announcement of a uniquely American tragedy that’s rooted in reality yet also mythic in scope and ambition. In other words, it’s Nolan calling his shot, swinging for the fences in ways that even he never has before. What follows is perhaps his most self-assured and passionate cinematic effort so far, a film so thunderous and heavy that it just might knock you through the back wall of the theater. (A.V, CLUB)

2. KILLERS OF THE FLOWER MOON (directed by Martin Scorsese): 

may not be a traditional gangster picture, but it's completely in tune with the stories of corrupt, violent men that Scorsese has explored for a half-century. And yet there’s also a sense of age in Scorsese’s work here, the feeling that he's using this horrifying true story to interrogate how we got to where we are a hundred years later. How did we allow blood to fertilize the soil of this country? Scorsese and Roth took a book that’s essentially about the formation of the F.B.I. by way of the investigation into the Osage murders and shifted the storytelling to a more personal perspective for both Mollie and Ernest. Through their story, the film doesn’t just present injustice but reveals how intrinsic it was to the formation of wealth and inequity in this country. It hums with commentary on how this nonchalant violence against people deemed lesser pervaded a century of horror. The references to the Tulsa Massacre and the KKK aren’t incidental. It's all part of the big picture—one of people who subjugate because it's so easy for them to do so. (EBERT.COM)

3. ANATOMY OF A FALL (directed by Justine Triet): 

persuasively suggests that every marriage is ultimately something of a mystery. The fact that Samuel is no longer alive to defend himself makes it even harder to determine who here is telling the truth. Even so, I couldn't help but gravitate toward Sandra's side. There's something refreshing about the cool pragmatism she shows in the face of Samuel's insecurity, the way she refuses to short-change her career or coddle her husband for his failures. I left admiring Sandra's steely resolve, while still wondering if that resolve might have led her to do the unthinkable. (NPR)

4. THE BOY AND THE HERON (directed by Hayao Miyazaki):  

it’s in its wilder, wandering second half that The Boy And The Heron really takes off, once the heron draws Mahito into a perilous fantasy realm bursting with boundless invention. The pair become an unlikely double act on an existential quest (there are thematic shades of Pan’s Labyrinth here) to save mothers both past and present — a journey towards emotional revelation, travelling not just through wondrous worlds (a ghoul-strewn seafaring town; a castle ruled by oversized birds; a plain overseen by an ancient wizard), but through the halls of Miyazaki’s whole career. The film’s dark and dangerous fantasy impulses hew close to Princess Mononoke; its hallucinatory coming-of-age allegory is in the Spirited Away vein; the breathtakingly adorable warawara are the cutest Ghibli creation since the Ponyo babies; the lushly overgrown kingdom is akin to Laputa; the anthropomorphic parakeets are rich in Totoro DNA. But for all the familiarity, it feels fearlessly new too, always moving in unexpected ways. (EMPIRE)

5. THE HOLDOVERS (directed by Alexander Payne): 

Hollywood has a long history of stories of “makeshift families that learn something,” but then why does “The Holdovers” feel so fresh? It’s probably because it’s been so long since one of these stories felt this true. Payne and his team recognize the clichés of this life lesson, but they embed them with truths that will always be timeless. Everyone has that unexpected friendship or even mentorship with someone who forever altered their direction in life. And everyone has that young person who has shocked them out of their stasis, either through revealing what they have become or failed to be. “The Holdovers” is a consistently smart, funny movie about people who are easy to root for and like the ones we know. Its greatest accomplishment is not how easy it is to see yourself in Paul, Angus, or Mary. It’s that you will in all three. (EBERT.COM)

6. TALK TO ME (directed by Danny & Michael Phillipou): 

Talk to Me's biggest scares aren’t the few scenes of violence, Mia’s ghoulish mother, or even Mia's nightmarish vision of undead bodies torturing Riley’s soul while he lies comatose in the hospital. The true horror is watching Mia, in her loneliness and desperation, fall victim to the voices telling her to hurt the ones who love and care for her. Blood and guts may exhilarate you, but the Philippous know that it's the secret wounds that keep you up at night. They gladly sink their embalmed hand into those sore spots and don't let go. (ESQUIRE)

7. SPIDER-MAN: ACROSS THE SPIDER-VERSE (directed by Joaquim dos Santos, Kemp Powers & Justin K. Thompson): 

building on the mash-up of animation styles that made Into the Spider-Verse so ridiculously vibrant and throwing in a multitude of new ones – stop-motion LEGO-mation, anyone? – this dizzying, dazzling sequel is the persuasive case for superhero movies than the played-out genre desperately needed. The Miles Morales version of Spidey, voiced again with a sense of wonderment and real soul by Shameik Moore, zooms across multiverses and meets several hundred parallel Spider-people in a personal quest with universal stakes. The gags and pop-culture references – delivered with trademark Lord and Miller irreverence – come so thick and fast, you’ll need several viewings to unpack them all. Which will not be a major burden with a movie this entertaining. (TIMEOUT)

8. ALL OF US STRANGERS (directed by Andrew Haigh): 

isn’t a work of horror or science fiction but its fantastical elements spur comparison with the queer uses of such genres. There’s a particularly rich seam of horror with more or less overt LGBTQ+ resonance. Frankenstein’s monster and his bride, the cat people, hosts of vampires, werewolves and a certain sort of serial killer: all have proven useful vessels for exploring the disturbing potency of difference, the queerly monstrous and the monstrously queer. If All of Us Strangers has genre connections, though, they are not to monsters but to ghosts and time travel, supernatural concepts linked by their capacity to enable intercourse with the past. (BFI)

9. POOR THINGS (directed by Yorgos Lanthimos): 

everything here is wonderfully bizarre, from the performances and dialogue to the production and costume design. And yet at its core, as is so often the case in the Greek auteur’s movies, “Poor Things” is about the awkwardness of forging a real human connection. We want to know each other and make ourselves known. The figure at the film’s center, Bella Baxter, seeks to achieve enlightenment, become her truest self, and establish enriching relationships with people who genuinely love her and don’t just want to control her. The nuts and bolts of this story may sound familiar: A young woman embarks on an odyssey of exploration and finds her identity was within her all along. The execution, however, is constantly astonishing. (EBERT.COM)

10. PAST LIVES (directed by Celine Song):

 Song takes her time in crafting a sense of subtle tension between her two main characters, creating contrasting spaces that take the viewer through a complex journey of fondness and reconnection. The small childhood neighborhood in Seoul has a dreamlike quality and seems to fit Hae Sung’s naive, yet truthful way of loving. On the other hand, Nora’s pragmatism and ambition are in tune with the hectic lifestyle of New York, a city in which her childhood friend feels like a fish out of water. Shabier Kirchner’s cinematography truly shines in the second part of Past Lives, casting NYC as a vividly textured backdrop that serves as a poignant companion to the inner turmoil of the main characters. (MEDIUM)

The Top 30 ALBUMS of 2023: Part Three (#1--10)...

 

Here is this year's finale:

1. JPEGMafia & Danny Brown SCARING THE HOES:  

produced by JPEGMAFIA entirely on a hardware sampler, the raw and rangy production character of Scaring The Hoes becomes its third power. Samples play a big role in many of the beats, with sped-up '80s R&B vocals meeting up with doomy synths and hectic breakbeats on opening track "Lean Beef Patty." Elsewhere, easily identifiable rap tracks get chopped and mangled into new, ugly forms. Kelis' ubiquitous 2003 hit "Milkshake" is rendered frazzled and frantic on the exhilarating "Fentanyl Tester," with her vocals chopped to bits and rearranged in rhythms that shift from banging drum'n'bass to a glitchy tech-house-style ending. Throughout, Brown and JPEGMAFIA contort their tracks like kids playing with Legos, running spirited gospel choirs through blown-out filters on "God Loves You" and mismatching subtle piano jazz and blustery drum breaks on the stop-start stumble of "Jack Harlow Combo Meal." For as defiantly anti-pop as Scaring the Hoes is, Brown and Peggy still achieve something unexpectedly catchy and captivating with these lawless creations. It's crowded, confusing, ridiculous music, but despite its scary intentions, the album's renegade production and impressive performances make it more exciting than frightening. (ALLMUSIC) 

 

2. Gaika DRIFT:

recorded in a secret vault under Truman Brewery in Brick Lane, accessible by invitation only and through multiple secure doors—Drift was a term used by Gaika to describe the movement and exchange of creative energy cultivated in this space by him and the artists who contributed to the record. Production assists from the likes of Kidä, avant-garde producer brbko and a host of classically trained musicians bring psychedelia and a bark that matches the bite promised by a talent pool as rich as this one. Letting go of the things that didn't serve him, emigrating to London and generally finding his place in the world as a man and musician are examples of what the term Drift also came to represent for Gaika—the currents of life and the directions in which they can carry us in. (RESIDENT ADVISOR) 

 

3. Danny Brown QUARANTA: 

whether Brown is ruminating on the consequences of gentrification on the stellar, Kassa Overall-featuring “Jenn’s Terrific Vacation” or discussing the lifelong impact of growing up in an underserved area alongside fellow Detroit rapper Bruiser Wolf on “Y.B.P.,” he demonstrates his keen perception and ability to translate the world he sees around him time and again. Quaranta is Danny Brown at his finest—and his most personal. It’s one of this year’s best albums: a no-skips project from an artist committed to stepping into the light and putting his best foot forward every day, despite the clouds that sometimes obscure the sun. “Probably never win a Grammy or chart on the charts / Should I still keep going or call it a day?” Brown raps on the meditative “Hanami,” a term borrowed from the traditional Japanese custom of appreciating the ephemeral beauty of cherry blossoms. For now, Danny Brown seems content to stop and smell the roses. It’s high time we give him his flowers. (PASTE MAGAZINE)  

 

4. Avey Tare 7S:

Tare achieved something magical on 7s. The collection of music presented on the album changes with every listen, almost like watching a plant grow. The more your surrender yourself to the album’s intensity, the more you find solace in the hecticness. Tare toyed with the ideas of nostalgia and self-analyzation and filtered them through fuzzy guitar progressions and electronic elements that still feel human. Tare took a snapshot of his headspace and built an entire universe around it, swallowing every little moment and spitting out fully-realized breakthroughs that manifest themselves through dense arrangements and poetic lyricism. (GLIDE) 

 

5. Sufjan Stevens JAVELIN: 

like much of his defining work, Stevens wrote, recorded, and produced Javelin almost entirely alone, minus a few key appearances. Centering the devotional melodies and heart-tugging intimacy that characterized his early masterpieces, it’s the type of record, two decades into an artist’s career, that tends to be called a “return-to-form,” suggesting an embrace of his strengths and a diminished instinct to surprise or provoke. (PITCHFORK) 

 

6. Kali Uchis RED MOON IN VENUS: 

makes a case for allowing love’s every phase to wash over you like a powerful tarot reading. Uchis’ blissful melodies often call on the universe’s cosmic energies to deliver divine intervention and feeling. “See I’m praying God will send me an angel/Will the angels bring me back to you?” she coos over the smooth jazz-pop of “Blue.” In its shades of grief and desire, Red Moon in Venus asks us to feel the force of love’s power, whether for good or ill. One of its best moments, the gently spangled “Moonlight,” uses a principle of astrology—the moon as the center of inner emotional wisdom and divine femininity—as a space to relinquish love’s brutish gravity and give into the transcendence of possession. “I just wanna get high with my lover/Veo una muñeca cuando miro en el espejo kiss kiss,” she playfully asserts, more featherlight, liberated, and Cancer sun than ever. Kali Uchis’ music is a path towards a kind of spiritual enlightenment, but only if you open yourself to life’s most feminine energy. (PITCHFORK) 

 

 7. L’Rain I KILLED YOUR DOG: 

that appetite for fullness underlies the record’s restless motion. The prominent seams of instrumentation that course through these songs accent Cheek’s uppercase emotions, which span from resentment (“I Hate My Best Friends”) to loneliness (“New Year’s UnResolution”) to wonder (“Oh Wow, a Bird!”). The arrangements and mixing foreground the abundance of sounds being produced and manipulated, the emphasis underscoring both Cheek’s many collaborators and her multiplicity. Where past L’Rain music channeled the woozy fog of memory and the daunting haziness of the future, these songs take place in the chaos of real time. (PITCHFORK) 

 

8. Liv. e GIRL IN THE HALF PEARL: 

Liv.e cooks up so many ideas on Girl in the Half Pearl that it’s hard to wrap your mind around. But sink into it and the Los Angeles-based artist’s shapeshifting, mercurial sound reveals itself as the product of both careful construction and introspection, an honest portrayal of rebirth and inner turmoil that can never quite extricate the two. Melding alternative R&B, lo-fi hip-hop, and jazz into its soupy chaos, the record allows itself to get tangled up in complexity but never strays from its core ethos, using its experimentation to unbottle the difficult corners of heartbreak, grief, and insecurity. It’s rare for a record so sonically adventurous to sound like an internal monologue rather than a soundscape of indistinct personality. (OUR CULTURE MAG) 

 

9. Caroline Polacheck DESIRE, I WANT TO TURN INTO YOU:  

flourishes appear in one place, then echo in a new location—wings flapping, whistles beckoning, blades slicing, bells chiming. She opens Desire with her father’s warning to “watch your head, girl” and concludes with the image of a decapitated angel. But what really binds the album is the dynamism of Polachek’s vocals, the culmination of years of bel canto operatic training and the hunger to get it right. There is so much conviction in her delivery that ceding space to anyone else, even guest spots from Grimes and Dido, feels like a disservice: Within the span of one song, Polachek’s voice will smear like paint, swoop like a crane, and bubble like lava. (PITCHFORK) 

 

10. Mick Jenkins THE PATIENCE: 

flying under the radar, Mick Jenkins' The Patience is another dose of his sultry smooth yet wickedly concise bars that this time around deftly weave between his life and the bigger picture. Being able to produce a project populated with jazz instrumentals while unloading his pent up thoughts on everything from the state of rap to racial injustice is a classy combination, one that posits Jenkins as a unique voice with inimitable grace. His state-of-the-nation delivery manages to whip into a frenzy as easily as it relinquishes control, always giving an otherworldly exhale in either case. His stature is tall, his joy contagious, and his rage palpable - if Jenkins is out of anything it would appear to be patience. (THE LINE OF BEST FIT)