My top 10 films of 2019

So with the Oscars on tonight, I thought I would give you my top ten movies of 2019. I haven't seen everything (obviously) but I have watched a lot. Here we go:
1) Dragged Across Concrete
2) Uncut Gems
3) Parasite
4) Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker
5) The Grizzlies
6) Crawl
7) Midsommar
8) Ford V Ferrari
9) The Peanut Butter Falcon
10) Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

Honorable mentions go to: Touch Me Not, Just Mercy, Dark Waters, The Report, Between Two Ferns, Brittany Runs a Marathon, Pattleton, Doctor Sleep, Us, Dolemite is My Name, The Art of Self-Defense, Skin, and The Dead Don't Die

Worst films of 2019:
1917 - technically brilliant and the first 30 minutes are riveting, after that, it's all downhill with no character development. Not why I go to the movies.

The Irishman - the biggest disappointment of the year. An hour too long and the backwards aging looks strange to say the least. If you want to see aging backwards, go watch Terminator: Dark Fate.

Murder Mystery - Adam Sandler is in one of the best films of the year (Uncut Gems), he is also in one of the worst. Go watch Knives Out if you want a murder mystery.

Her Smell - I turned it off after the 30 minutes. Go watch Vox Lux instead

Rainy Day in New York - Woody Allen is completely out of touch with how young people speak and think. I gave up after 30 minutes.

High Life - Robert Pattinson stars in this arty space turd. Terrible.

Guilty Pleasures I'm admitting to:
Rambo: Last Blood - There is no reason for this movie to exist however I found it far more entertaining than The Irishman.

Terminator: Dark Fate - I've enjoyed almost all of the Terminator films and this in no exception. I had fun and I admit it.

Color Out of Space - Nic Cage drinking lama milk and acting off his nut in this completely zany John Carpenter's The Thing ripoff. Completely bananas but gosh darn it, I enjoyed myself.

Don't F**k with Cats: Hunting an Internet Killer

Well this is about a dark as it gets. Warning!, before reading on, this might be one of the most disturbing documentaries I've ever watched. It's also one of the most fascinating things I have ever seen. What is it all about? It's about Canadian murderer Luka Magnotta. Remember this asshole? He killed Jun Lin, a Chinese student. Magnotta then dismembered Lin's body and mailed pieces of him all over Canada. This is gruesome stuff. This three part Netflix documentary is about the online hunting Luka Magnotta. His disturbing quest for fame led him to post his torture and killing of kittens online. Posting videos of killing kittens, well that pissed a lot of people off. It pissed off Deanna Thompson and John Green to the extreme, where they made it their life's work to go and catch this guy.Hence the title, "Don't F**k with Cats." These two are the main focus of the documentary.Deanna Thompson is one smart lady and John Green is one smart guy. They devoted almost all of their spare time to dissecting Magnotta's videos, frame by sick and twisted frame, in order to catch him. What makes this documentary so fascinating is how they go about their research and their passion for doing it. It's disheartening to know people like Magnotta exist, but it's highly comforting to know that there are people like Deanna and John out there too. If you are into true crime, it doesn't get more interesting than this. Catch it on Netflix.

Just Mercy

If you don't know Michael B. Jordan, you should. He is that young man who plays young Adonis Creed in Creed. I first saw him in Parenthood and thought he was marvelous. Well here he is again, playing real life lawyer, Bryan Stevenson. Bryan Stevenson graduated from Harvard and decided to do something important with his law degree, namely go help some folks sitting on death row.
We have seen variations on this movie before, The Hurricane, Rectify (one of my favourite TV shows of all time), Dead Man Walking, The Green Mile, etc. So why do we need another wrongly accused/jail house story? Because they keep putting innocent people to death, that's why! Jamie Foxx plays Walter McMillian, the man falsely convicted of killing a young white girl. Foxx and Jordan play their parts well, but it's the supporting role of jailhouse snitch, played by actor Tim Blake Nelson, that made this movie truly special. He is great in this role and you can't take your eyes off of him when he's on the screen. At the end of the film, there is a message that for every nine people put to death, one person has been exonerated. That's a staggering statistic. This movie is about racism, injustice, and the spirit to keep fighting a system which at its core is morally bankrupt and in deep need of change. The US needs this film more than ever. Catch it in theatres now or on streaming services shortly.

Cheer

When someone says "cheerleader" most people still think of those girls on the sidelines of football games with pompoms, short skirts, kicking their legs high in the air. Fair enough, that's how this whole business started. However cheerleading has grown into it's own competitive sport. If you combined the best of gymnastics tumbling, Cirque du Soleil stunting, Broadway dance, and dressed all the girls like they were in a JonBenét Ramsey beauty pageant and dressed all the boys like they were figure skaters, you have contemporary cheerleading. My daughter has been doing competitive cheerleading for seven years now. I know this world well; she has been a flyer, a tumbler, a back spot, and a front spot. I'm well aware of the stinky sneaker smell of the gym, the relentless practices, the conditioning, the tumbling, the fake eyelashes, the hairspray, the concussions, the broken toes, the broken fingers, and the sprained ankles. We have done our time at C.H.E.O. She does what is known as club or all star cheer and this year her team is going to Worlds. It's one of the highest ranking competitive cheerleading competitions in, well, the world. The equivalent level for college cheerleading is the NCA & NDA Collegiate National Championship, which happens every year in Daytona Beach, Florida. This is cheerleading at the college level. The best cheerleading college in the US is Navarro College in Corsicana, Texas. It is the focus of Netflix's documentary, Cheer. The documentary focuses on Navarro's team leading up to the big competition in Daytona. It's six part series, each about an hour and the lens stays tightly focused on about eight kids and their coach, Monica Aldama. The woman is a machine. This series brought me to tears a few times as some on the kids' stories are heartbreaking. This series is about cheerleading, but what makes it great is the focus it puts on Monica and these group of kids. Catch it on Netflix.

Doctor Sleep

A sequel to the The Shining? Are you kidding me? It came out in 1980. Doctor Sleep was released in 2019. Quick math, that's 39 years later. I will say it again, are you kidding me?
I don't remember when I saw The Shining exactly, but I was a teenager and it scared the shit out of me. Between it and 2001: A Space Odyssey, I became a huge Stanley Kubrick fan. Stephen King apparently was not a fan. I never understood King's beef with Kubrick, because it was the greatest film based on his work until Misery came along and then The Shawshank Redemption. Anyway, if you are a fan of King's work or a fan of Kubrick's, Doctor Sleep might surprise you. It certainly did for me. What's it all about? Remember the little kid in The Shining, Dan Torrance, little Danny? Well he grew up and PTSDed into an alcoholic - his father tried to murder him and his mother with an axe, so it's understandable. Dan (Ewan McGregor) also has the gift of telepathy, although he calls it shining. There are a bunch of others out there like Dan where their powers merge into telekinesis. There is a bad bunch of them who go around like vampires and suck the shine out of others of their kind. They do this so they can live an extra long time. Does it sound ridiculous? Yes it does and it is. But here is the thing, it's really well crafted and it sucked me in. This film looks great and there are little homage bits to Kubrick all over the place, including some of the haunting musical score from the original. There are just so many wonderful visuals in this film. Anyway, back to the story. These vampire shiners, they sense a presence out there of a super powerful shiner, a young girl named Abra (Kyliegh Curran) and they want to eat her, consume her shine. Well Abra and Dan are friends as they have been communicating telepathically through Dan's chalkboard wall. I know, it's ridiculous, but I'm telling you, I got sucked in. Dan won't let them eat Abra and well I don't think I will tell you anymore. Doctor Sleep shines. Catch it on Streaming Services.

Brittany Runs a Marathon

So I think it would be reasonable to put Brittany Runs a Marathon into the category of a Rom-Com. However I'm not really sure that's were it belongs. What's it all about? It's about Brittany (Jillian Bell) who lives in New York and she is 27. She is a bit of a party animal. She is also out of shape, badly. She has always been the chubby girl and she doesn't like herself because of it. Brittany has a lot of body image issues and the film tackles these with a honesty that is refreshing. Amy Schumer did something similar in Trainwreck, but Brittany Runs a Marathon seems a lot less Hollywood. Anyway, after Brittany is told by her doctor that she needs to lose weight, she tries to join a gym but realizes she can't afford it; instead she dons a pair of Converse and takes up the frugal sport of jogging. Brittany and her skinny bitch roommate always make fun of Shannon, a woman who lives in their building who they believe has the perfect life. Turns out Shannon is going through more than a rough patch and invites Brittany to join her running club. A new friendship is forged and the goal of running the New York City marathon soon becomes their final quest. The romance aspect of the film comes from her fellow dog-house sitter; they share the job and end up squatting in this rich couple's apartment. It's all very amusing. This came out last summer and I finally got around to watching it. I'm so glad I did. Catch it on Amazon.

Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker

My relationship with Star Wars, like many people of my Gen-X generation, is a rather profound one. It may have shaped my moral compass. For sure it was one of the first films where I fell in love with all the characters. It was magical. And the toys! I collected all the cards, action fictions, posters, and books. It was schoolyard conversation. Star Wars was a huge chunk of my childhood. Return of the Jedi was released in 1983; I was thirteen years old. Then I grew up.

When The Phantom Menace was released in 1999, I was twenty nine. I had watched Pulp Fiction, Silence of the Lambs, Terminator 2, Seven, Jurassic Park, and Good Will Hunting. I was an adult (well my wife might disagree) watching adult movies. Star Wars was happy memory for me. So when I watched The Phantom Menace, not only was it boring, but it was designed for children. It wasn't how I wanted it or I remembered it. The fun seemed to be sucked out of it. And let me tell you, I wanted to love it. I wanted to love it so much and I didn't. I waited like everyone else for the next two films; saw them on opening day. They weren't much better. Fast forward to 2015 and I'm now forty five years old with two kids who I inflicted my love of the original films on. The Force Awakens was the film I had been waiting for since I was thirteen. I thought it was really good. Not great, but good. There was hope. Then The Last Jedi came out. It crushed my love of Star Wars all over again. I hated it. I was done with Star Wars for good. Thought about selling all my toys and moving on with my life.

I read the reviews on Rotten Tomatoes for The Rise of Skywalker and they were pretty awful. Many people told me, oh, if you didn't like the last one, you won't like this one. I put off going. I had always gone on opening day. I waited weeks before going to see it. I guess I was dreading putting the final nail into my Star Wars coffin. I took my son, who is now thirteen (the same age I was when I watched Return of the Jedi). We were two of four people in the theatre. The words came across the the screen, "A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away. . . " It pulled at my heart strings. I waited to be crushed. 

I'm very, very happy to report, The Rise of Skywalker is my favourite Star Wars film since Return of the Jedi. It has everything you want. It has the childhood fun I remember. It's nostalgic, it's fresh, it has magic. And it's got a new droid, Cone Head, or as I call him, Squeaky Wheel. This is the Star Wars film I've been waiting for, for thirty six years. My son loved it too. Go see it in theatres now.