Let’s get this out of the way right at the top: Licorice Pizza is not about a pernicious pizzeria that tops their pies with the twisty black or red confection. Instead, the title of Paul Thomas Anderson’s latest masterwork refers to a defunct chain of record shops that circulated around southern California in the early 1970s. Though the film’s original title, Soggy Bottom, is referenced more explicitly in the film, Licorice Pizza is the kind of west coast callback that falls in line with the “if you know, you know” vibe that Anderson evokes through this expertly-made hangout movie. Sprinkled with facsimiles of Hollywood titans from William Holden to Lucille Ball, this is a trip through San Fernando Valley that feels too real to be entirely fictitious but magical enough to convince us that something ineffable really existed in that time and place.

Based loosely on the teenage exploits of film producer Gary Goetzman, Licorice Pizza stars Cooper Hoffman as Gary Valentine, a 15-year-old actor who always has his eyes on the next project before the current one is completed. He meets Alana (Alana Haim) while waiting in line to have his school picture taken and feels an immediate connection. It isn’t exactly love at first sight for Alana, who’s older and seemingly wiser than the cherubic but indefatigable Gary, but the two remain friends as they see what life has in store for them. Set across rolling hills of endless opportunity, Gary and Alana navigate entrepreneurship and emotional insecurity while well-known figures like the imprudent producer Jon Peters (Bradley Cooper) and up-and-coming politician Joel Wachs (Benny Safdie) pop in along the way.

Recalling both the off-kilter romanticism of Punch-Drunk Love and madcap episodic nature of the inscrutable but atmospheric Inherent Vice, Anderson once again casts a spell of winsome unpredictability more successfully than any other director working today. Refining the cinematography chops he established brilliantly in his previous Phantom Thread, he works this time with Michael Bauman to establish a lovely but lived-in look that mirrors the dust one might brush off their favorite LP before taking it for a spin. The camera often chases breathlessly after these young hopefuls as they search for their place in the Valley and in the world, like pinballs bouncing gleefully off the colorful bumpers that manifest before them.

Though the cast is filled out by veterans and familiar faces, the lead duo enters Licorice Pizza with no prior feature acting credits to their names. Hoffman, son of the late Anderson regular Philip Seymour Hoffman, gives Valentine a devious charm that works on nearly everyone but seems to stop short when Alana is at her most prickly. Haim, supported in the film by her real-life sisters and parents, presents the cynicism of a twentysomething unsatisfied with how her dreams fell short but still determined to seek out her watershed moment. Together, the two are absolutely electric, sporting a playful energy and seesaw repartee that makes the most of Anderson’s already lively screenplay. We don’t know how or when they’ll end up together but we know we’ll want to be there the moment it happens.

As it turns out, there are quite a number of vignettes that play out before that moment and I was completely taken with nearly all of them. Most of the asides and non-sequiturs follow Anderson’s idiosyncratic and indelible sense of humor. For instance, Gary and Alana meet with a casting director who interrupts Alana’s wayward interview by picking up a ringing phone and proceeds with a minute-long conversation in which she merely utters “no” three times with varying inflections before hanging up the receiver. There’s a hushed sequence with an out-of-gas moving truck floating down the Hollywood Hills that was more exhilarating than any car chase I’ve seen this year. Exuberant and eccentric, Licorice Pizza is a slice of life tale of two young souls who spin their wheels in every direction until they finally move in sync.

Score – 4.5/5

More movies to watch this weekend:
Streaming on Netflix is The Lost Daughter, a psychological drama starring Olivia Colman and Dakota Johnson about A woman who finds herself becoming obsessed with another woman and her daughter while on a summer holiday.
Continuing its run in theaters is A Journal for Jordan, a Denzel Washington-directed drama starring Michael B. Jordan and Chanté Adams about a fallen US Army Sergeant and the journal he left behind for his wife and son as a way of moving on without him.
Also still playing in theaters is American Underdog, a sports biopic starring Zachary Levi and Anna Paquin about the life and career of Super Bowl MVP and Hall of Fame quarterback Kurt Warner.

Reprinted by permission of Whatzup

As well-regarded as Frank Herbert’s seminal 1965 novel Dune is, it’s had quite the journey making it to the big screen. First, there was a failed attempt in the mid-1970s by avant-garde auteur Alejandro Jodorowsky, whose efforts were documented in 2013’s Jodorowsky’s Dune. Then came the 1984 adaptation by then up-and-comer David Lynch, who has since disowned the film despite its small but fervent cult following. Now Denis Villeneuve, who earned his sci-fi credentials with Arrival and Blade Runner 2049, is up to translate Herbert’s expansive work to cinema and he proves that the third time’s a charm. Simply put, this is large scale science fiction done to perfection: wholly immersive, richly detailed and bursting with imagination. If you’ve been waiting to go back to the theaters, it’s difficult to imagine a better movie for which to return.

The year is 10191 and humans have populated throughout the universe. The ocean planet Caladan is governed by House Atreides, led by Duke Leto Atreides (Oscar Isaac) and his partner Lady Jessica (Rebecca Ferguson) with their heir Paul (Timothée Chalamet). By decree of the imperial emperor, Atreides is called to take over control of the desert planet Arrakis from House Harkonnen, led by the corpulent Baron Vladimir (Stellan Skarsgård). During their reign, Leto aims to make peace with the Fremen, a nomadic group of natives who vigorously protect the planet’s prized natural resource known as “spice”. After an ambush on Arrakis splits Paul and Jessica up from the rest of House Atreides, the two must navigate the treacherous deserts with the few resources they have at their disposal.

While Dune weaves in dense futuristic concepts, myriad new terminology and lots of different languages into its narrative, its primary tale is modeled after the hero’s journey popularized by Joseph Campbell. If you’ve seen The Matrix or the original Star Wars trilogy, this story template will feel familiar, even though Herbert’s novel pre-dated all of those movies. Villeneuve spices up this formula with a world that is overwhelming in its scope and exemplary in its specificity, a treat especially for those unfamiliar with Herbert’s work as I was before watching the film. There are times I allowed myself to tune out of the plot for a moment and surrender to the meticulously rendered images. For that reason, among others, this film should richly reward rewatches.

Villeneuve has assembled some talented casts in his previous films but he’s really outdone himself this time. The ensemble, which finds Villeneuve teaming up again with actors like Josh Brolin and Dave Bautista, features each actor and actress in a role that’s perfectly tailored to their skillset. For example, Charlotte Rampling is only in one scene but her chilling presence gives her limited time a memorable stamp. I can’t say I’ve entirely warmed up to Jason Momoa just yet but as a cocksure pilot named Duncan Idaho, he’s playing perfectly in his wheelhouse and makes the most of his swashbuckling screen time. As the leads, Chalamet and Ferguson get the most time to shine and both give lived-in performances that register on a deeply empathetic level.

Inexplicably, Warner Bros. has yet to officially greenlight a sequel, even though the movie is titled on-screen as Dune: Part One and it ends on a cliffhanger that explicitly sets up a larger battle to come. This is the same studio that waited to announce It Chapter Two only after It made beaucoup bucks at the box office, even though the first movie only told half of the story from the book that inspired both films. WB’s reticence in allowing Villeneuve to shoot both chapters at one time likely comes from the financial disappointment of Blade Runner 2049 but if that’s the case, why give him Dune in the first place? Even if Part Two takes longer to arrive than it would if things had been planned better, it’ll be more than worth the wait if the follow-up is as stellar as this opening salvo.

Score – 4.5/5

New movies coming to theaters this weekend:
Last Night in Soho, starring Thomasin McKenzie and Anya Taylor-Joy, is a psychological horror movie about a present-day fashion designer who is mysteriously able to enter the 1960s, where she encounters a dazzling aspiring singer.
Antlers, starring Keri Russell and Jesse Plemons, is a supernatural horror film about a middle-school teacher whose enigmatic student hides dark secrets that lead to terrifying encounters with a legendary ancestral creature who came before them.
My Hero Academia: World Heroes’ Mission, starring Daiki Yamashita and Nobuhiko Okamoto, is a superhero anime which follows a group of heroes as they try to stop a group of terrorists who are out to eliminate superpowers around the world.

Reprinted by permission of Whatzup

The opening film of this year’s Sundance Film Festival, which brought audiences to their feet when it screened on-site and virtually back in January, is now here to warm hearts the world over. Apple acquired distribution rights to CODA for $25 million, a record-setting price tag for a Sundance selection, two days after it premiered and I’m happy to report that the movie is worth every penny spent. Apple TV+ is a streaming service that has gotten off to a slow start since programming began in November of 2019 but crowd-pleasing content like Ted Lasso, the ongoing Schmigadoon! and this new entry could be a formidable way forward. Theoretically, the demand for feel-good streaming entertainment should be higher than ever and this indie gem has all the hallmarks of an endearing and enduring classic.

The film stars Emilia Jones as Ruby Rossi, a demure high school senior whose designation as a Child Of Deaf Adults gives the film its acronymous title. As the only hearing member of her Massachusetts-based family, she plays a crucial role in aiding the fishing business her father Frank (Troy Kotsur) started with little more than a schooner to his name. Ruby splits her time at school going out to sea with her father and her brother Leo (Daniel Durant), singing along to oldies while helping them bring in their fishing nets. Her burgeoning passion for music is recognized and emboldened by Ruby’s choir teacher Bernardo (Eugenio Derbez), whose proposition that Ruby consider music school puts her personal dreams at odds with her desire to keep her tight-knit, working-class family together.

Adapting from the French dramedy La Famille Bélier, writer/director Sian Heder has crafted an irresistible and utterly charming coming-of-age story packed with both achingly authentic and warmly funny moments. It’s a fair criticism to point out that the shape of CODA‘s narrative is not novel to the genre but for every story beat that may seem familiar, Heder adds a character detail or extra moment that gives her film its own unique signature. She isn’t interested in making saints out of her deaf characters; Leo playfully exchanges vulgarities with her sister in American Sign Language (ASL), while Ruby has to translate for her not-so-discreetly amorous parents during an uncomfortable doctor’s visit. These are full-featured and soulful characters who inspire empathy and affection from minute one.

Much of that is credit to the immensely talented cast, headed up by the phenomenal 19-year-old British actress Emilia Jones. As Ruby, she is CODA‘s magnetic center, carrying the weight of her family’s struggles and expectations of her while trying to find herself and realize her dreams in the process. It’s a breakout performance, affecting and pure with heaps of compassion baked in. Along with Marlee Matlin in addition to Troy Kotsur and Daniel Durant, the film features an exceptional trio of deaf actors who effortlessly flesh out characters usually relegated to the periphery with fantastically lived-in performances. Kudos to casting director Deborah Aquila for not just finding actors that “fit the bill” but matching each performer flawlessly with their respective roles.

Since a significant portion of the film is in ASL, CODA is to be the first film with “open” subtitles being displayed throughout for every member of the audience during its theatrical run. Whatever taboo may exist around American audiences being shown subtitles during an English-language film may be dissolving thanks to other movies like A Quiet Place and its recent sequel, which also feature extensive use of ASL. Personally, I prefer to watch as many films with subtitles as possible (regardless of language) and I hope the experience of viewing one in theaters will open audiences up to the possibilities it provides. As Parasite director Bong Joon Ho pointed in one of his Oscar speeches from last year, “once you overcome the one-inch tall barrier of subtitles, you will be introduced to so many more amazing films.” I’m happy to cite CODA as a prime example.

Score – 4.5/5

More new movies coming to theaters this weekend:
Free Guy, an action comedy starring Ryan Reynolds and Jodie Comer, follows a non-player character in an open world video game who becomes self-aware and decides to save the day.
Don’t Breathe 2, a horror thriller starring Stephen Lang and Madelyn Grace, fast forwards 11 years after the home invasion of the original film to find The Blind Man fending off more bandits.
Respect, a music biopic starring Jennifer Hudson and Forest Whitaker, details Aretha Franklin’s rise from choir singer in Detroit to the Queen of Soul while depicting her personal struggles along the way.

Reprinted by permission of Whatzup

Nicolas Cage. Since sneaking on-screen as Brad’s Bud in Fast Times at Ridgemont High almost 40 years ago, he’s forged an ironclad foothold in our pop culture consciousness with over 100 film roles to his name. Over the past 3 years, he’s appeared in 10 direct-to-VOD movies, almost all of which I’ve seen and are admittedly terrible. But Cage is an actor that knows when certain projects are worthy of his best and the new indie drama Pig is one of the defining examples of his career. When the film’s trailer was released last month, depicting it as a revenge movie in which Cage’s character seems to go on a rampage looking for his lost pig, the internet was understandably alit with choruses of John Oink and Bacon as a swine-based swap for Taken. But those coming into this expecting Cage to ham it up will hopefully be delighted to have an entirely different kind of meal served to them.

Cage stars as Rob, a reclusive forager living in the vast Oregonian woods with an affectionate and intelligent truffle-hunting pig always by his side. One of Rob’s only visitors is Amir (Alex Wolff), a Portland-based purchaser who drops by once a week to buy the in-demand truffles and sell them to the city’s most competitive chefs. The value of such a potentially profitable pig is realized when Rob’s prized pet is stolen from him one night, prompting him to pair with the now disadvantaged Amir to track down the pig-nappers and punish them for their crimes. The journey into Rob’s former hometown does indeed unveil a specific set of skills that he possesses but they aren’t as bloodthirsty and violent as the narrative might suggest.

As much as the marketing of Pig painted it to have the singular focus of a traditional revenge movie, the movie is not only about much more than one thing but it’s also incredibly wise about the other topics it chooses to invoke. For one, it’s a melancholic but relentlessly optimistic portrait of broken men blindly scouring the world for power and purpose in the absence of women for whom they’ve cared. It’s a sensitive examination of toxic masculinity that doesn’t resort to having female characters chew male characters out about their indiscretions. Watching these men flail about as they try to put themselves back together is more painful than the fury behind any scornful words that could be uttered at them.

In the film’s meditation on man’s place in nature amid the creeping forces of commerce and capitalism, Pig reminded more of last year’s quietly moving First Cow than your typical Liam Neeson-starring vengeance tale. “There’s nothing for you here anymore,” a suspect laments to Rob, “There’s nothing here for most of us. You don’t keep a grip on it, that’s pretty much it.” These lines have an extra layer of shattering context given the social unrest that has pervaded Portland as of late but even taken on a more broad level, they speak to a sense of identity that urban living promises to the young and idealistic but naturally can’t fulfill for everybody. More than anything else, the movie beautifully explores past lives, future selves and the mess we create in between.

An actor who is frequently charged with “over-acting”, Cage proves once again after his wordless Willy’s Wonderland performance from earlier this year that his best version of more is less. His Rob is a character who seems to be hovering above these characters and this story, not in an arrogant or dismissive way but in a way that suggests an ethereal sense of empathy. He listens, and listens intensely, and when he speaks, he chooses the fewest amount of words for the highest level of emotional impact. It’s calm and controlled work but not self-consciously so and quite simply, it’s one of the very best performances of his career. Sensitive and smart, Pig is a hidden gem that will reward adventurous moviegoers who choose it from the menu of uninspired selections that are being offered up weekly both at home and in theaters.

Score – 4.5/5

More new movies coming this weekend:
Playing in theaters and on HBO Max is Space Jam: A New Legacy, a sports comedy starring LeBron James and Don Cheadle which finds another basketball icon getting sucked into an animated world to play a high-stakes game of hoops.
Playing in theaters and available to rent digitally is Die In A Gunfight, a stylized update of Romeo and Juliet starring Diego Boneta and Alexandra Daddario which finds a pair of star-crossed lovers flanked by a jealous ex-boyfriend and two rival families.
Streaming on Netflix is Gunpowder Milkshake, an action thriller starring Karen Gillan and Lena Headey about a mother and daughter assassin duo out to protect an 8-year-old girl caught in the middle of a gang war.

Reprinted by permission of Whatzup

Originally titled Connected and due to arrive in theaters last fall, the superb new animated comedy The Mitchells vs. the Machines is now available on Netflix for families everywhere to binge over and over again. Fortunately, it’s a movie packed with so many laughs and warm moments that rewatches will actually feel warranted and reward viewers with bits they may have missed the first or second time around. It comes courtesy of Sony Pictures Animation and Lord/Miller Productions, the same collaboration that yielded amazing results with Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse a few years ago. Like that film, Mitchells starts off with concepts and characters that feel very familiar but demonstrates a willingness early on to dig deeper with some exceptionally sharp writing and direction.

The titular family is, by their own admission, a bit of an odd bunch. There’s Katie (Abbi Jacobson), an aspiring film student who makes goofy but inspired movies starring her younger brother Aaron (Mike Rianda) and their derpy pug Monchi (“voiced” by celebrity pet Doug the Pug). Her mother Linda (Maya Rudolph) is supportive of their endeavors but her techno-resistant father Rick (Danny McBride) finds himself growing distant from his smartphone-addicted daughter, made worse after he accidentally totals her laptop. In a well-intentioned but blatantly impulsive act of repentance, he cancels Katie’s California-bound flight and packs up the family for one last cross-country road trip over orientation week. As bad luck would have it, their trek coincides with a robot uprising brought on by out-of-control virtual assistant PAL (Olivia Colman).

Rianda, who also serves as director and co-writer with Jeff Rowe, tackles well-worn subjects like reliance on glowing devices and “quirky” dysfunctional families through a completely fresh lens. Cross-generational attitudes about the prevalence of technology are often portrayed one-dimensionally in the media but The Mitchells vs. the Machines doesn’t settle for an easy conversation about it. Sure, Katie’s preference to live her life through a screen bothers her dad and Rick’s helplessness in navigating the internet embarrasses his daughter but the film seeks to bridge the gap with empathy between the two camps. The virtues and pitfalls of the natural world and the AI-driven technoscape are explored with a welcome amount of even-handedness and intelligence.

Of course, humor also helps solidify these bonds and this movie has enough gags to keep viewers of all ages laughing throughout. What family can’t relate to Rick’s plea that everyone put their phones down for 10 seconds of uninterrupted eye contact with one another, only to find that it’s more awkward and unnatural than it sounds? With references to works that range from the more recognizable The Dukes of Hazzard and Kill Bill to more niche picks like Portrait Of A Lady On Fire and They Live, there’s an unquestionable amount of inspiration behind the innumerable jokes. This is also one of the first films I’ve seen that manages to keep up the breakneck pace of Gen Z comedy, implementing TikTok rhythm and meme culture in a way that doesn’t feel condescending or contrived.

The stacked voice cast ties everything together, with Jacobson and McBride effortlessly selling the heartfelt father-daughter dynamic while scoring huge laughs along the way. SNL alum Fred Armisen and Beck Bennett are downright hilarious as a pair of defective robots who unwittingly guide the Mitchells, while Eric Andre finds himself in a rare straight man role as a foil to Colman’s exceedingly witty PAL. Chrissy Teigen and John Legend naturally play the picture-perfect Posey family next door, whose seemingly obvious fate is subverted in a nicely choreographed punchline. Set to a raucous and upbeat soundtrack that perfectly matches its idiosyncratic verve, The Mitchells vs. the Machines is wise and weird in all the best ways.

Score – 4.5/5

New movies coming this weekend:
Playing only in theaters is Spiral: From The Book of Saw, the ninth installment in the Saw horror series starring Chris Rock and Samuel L. Jackson about a new crew of detectives tasked with tracking down the Jigsaw Killer.
Also opening in theaters and streaming on HBO Max is Those Who Wish Me Dead, a neo-Western starring Angelina Jolie and Nicholas Hoult about a teenage murder witness who finds himself pursued by twin assassins in the Montana wilderness.
Premiering on Netflix is The Woman in the Window, a psychological thriller starring Amy Adams and Gary Oldman about an agoraphobic psychologist who suspects foul play when her across-the-street neighbor suddenly disappears.

Reprinted by permission of Whatzup

Lee Isaac Chung’s Minari is about as heartfelt and pure as movies get. Adapting his childhood experiences growing up in mid-1980s rural Arkansas, Chung doesn’t merely recall the struggles that his Korean American family endured during that period but reconsiders them with a new sense of compassion and grace. The tender retelling of his upbringing as a first-generation immigrant is all the more compelling when you factor in that Chung was likely no more than ten years old when the events of the film took place. While Chung’s script is centered around his perspective as a child, he writes every character with sympathy and specificity, calling to mind the adage that children are often more insightful and perceptive than we perhaps give them credit for.

We meet the Yi family as they tail a moving truck in their station wagon, making their way to the modest mobile home where they will soon set down their roots. When the Yis arrive, the patriarch Jacob (Steven Yeun) exits the car first, seeing the untapped potential in the vast acres of farming land that lay before them. Much more tenuous is his wife Monica (Han Ye-ri), not nearly as thrilled with their surroundings and even more apprehensive of the hard work that will be necessary to make their exodus from California worthwhile. The young David (Alan Kim) and his older sister Anne (Noel Kate Cho) may be the most excited of all, ignoring the residence’s tacky, light brown interior paneling and instead choosing to note that their house has “wheels like a big car!”

Crops certainly don’t grow overnight, so Jacob and Monica take jobs at a nearby hatchery — the former is purported to be an “expert chicken sexer” by his new superior — until their yield increases. Mom and dad’s absence during the work day brings the need for Monica’s spritely mother Soon-ja (Youn Yuh-jung) to move in from Korea to watch over David and Anne. Kids being kids, the pair playfully talk behind their grandma’s back in English, all while trying to stay out of a level of trouble that would warrant a stick-whipping. Thanks to a neighboring war veteran Paul (Will Patton), Jacob is able to avoid some of the rookie mistakes associated with starting one’s own farm but still faces an array of pitfalls that put more pressure on his ability to provide for his clan.

The film’s title refers to a water plant whose seeds Soon-ja scatters at the base of a nearby river. Known to produce a vegetable that has myriad culinary uses, minari grows healthily and abundantly once it settles its roots and serves as a perfect metaphor for dogged optimism that Jacob holds for his family’s future in their new surroundings. Minari may not have a traditional antagonist but that doesn’t make the organic obstacles that occur any less challenging or the natural elements that inform the conflict any less brutal. It ultimately arrives at a truth about the immigrant experience that feels specific to this story but potentially applicable to so many others: that hardship and sacrifice may cost parents their personal lives in order for their children to build up better lives for themselves.

Bringing this salient point home is the transcendent ensemble acting, anchored by a soulful and zealous performance by Yeun as an obdurate father almost literally breaking his back for his family. Ye-ri is right there with him, taking a character who could play like a one-note nagging wife in the wrong hands but is instead given the dimension and depth that she deserves. Portraying the surrogate for the real-life Chung as a youngster, Alan Kim gives David a cherubic craftiness and sheepish introspection that make his work nothing short of winsome. Continuing a string of outstanding work in his young career as a film composer, Emile Mosseri lends a gorgeous musical score that aches with the possibility of unknown futures. Thoughtful and touching in equal measure, Minari is a family drama whose ability to generate empathy seems effortless.

Score – 4.5/5

Also new to streaming this weekend:
Streaming on HBO Max is Tom & Jerry, a live action/CGI comedy starring Chloë Grace Moretz and Michael Peña about the eternally feuding cat and mouse duo who wreak havoc on one of New York City’s most upscale hotels.
Debuting on Hulu is The United States vs. Billie Holiday, a biopic starring Andra Day and Trevante Rhodes about the legendary jazz singer and the drug addiction that tragically cut her life and career short.
Available to watch on Apple TV+ is The World’s a Little Blurry, a music documentary centered around the rising career of Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter Billie Eilish.

Reprinted by permission of Whatzup

In her elegiac and emotionally captivating new movie Nomadland, director Chloé Zhao opens with a curious title card about a small city in Nevada named Empire. It’s a remote town so driven by a single industry that when the local sheetrock plant closes down in 2011 after 88 years in business, the entire town was evacuated and the zip code was literally abandoned not long afterwards. Among those displaced by the devastating closure is Fern (Frances McDormand), who doesn’t have much need to stay after the recent passing of her husband. She finds a new partner, of sorts, in a van she dubs Vanguard, which carries the remainder of her belongings that she hasn’t sold off or holed up in a storage unit. With jobs being scarce as a result of The Great Recession, Fern travels from one Southwest city to another, meeting other nomads like herself and adapting to their mutual lifestyle in the process.

What makes Zhao’s film so slyly remarkable is just how lived-in and genuine each aspect of her story feels as it unfolds before us. As in her previous work, the also excellent The Rider, she surrounds the protagonist with real-life figures playing modestly fictionalized versions of themselves. Among the challenges of creating a sprawling picture as this is, I would imagine it’s quite difficult to fill your movie with a bevy of non-actors but Zhao gets bonafide performances out of each and every one of them. Also serving as the film’s editor, Zhao has a brilliant instinct for how to cut conversations together where sentences may overlap but every word still registers and resonates. There’s a pace and rhythm to the dialogue in Nomadland that you just won’t see anywhere else.

Credit for the naturalistic exchanges also extends to McDormand, giving an understated performance that is necessarily more reactive and reflexive but no less compelling as a result. As a bereft wayfarer still acclimating to her changing circumstances, she reveals Fern’s empathetic nature while letting us in on her sadness little bits at a time. It’s a much different role than the one for which she most recently scored a Best Actress Oscar, the incendiary Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, which openly wore its anger and bitterness on its sleeve. McDormand suggests Fern could possess similar resentment but sublimates it into savvy survival skills and a sturdy work ethic that allows her to pick up hands-on labor nearly everywhere she goes, even while work is difficult for others to find.

Adapting from Jessica Bruder’s non-fiction book, whose subtitle Surviving America in the Twenty-First Century pitches it as a how-to guide, Zhao doesn’t graft a complex narrative onto Nomadland. A more pedestrian storyteller would have telegraphed a redemption arc or a series of inorganic obstacles for our heroine to overcome but Zhao knows that it’s more than enough for us to simply spend time with these nomads and hear them out. We learn about their way of life, from the Ten Commandments of Stealth Parking to bucket-based tips that I shouldn’t delve into here. While some were driven out of their homes, others choose the mobile lifestyle for their own reasons and just as they don’t judge one another, Zhao asks the same of us in the audience.

As the theatrical experience continues to experience setback after setback, there’s no movie I’ve seen in the last 12 months that made me wish I was watching it in a theater more than this one. While I might typically expect that sentiment to arise from an effects blockbuster rather than a $5 million awards drama, I’ll take the golden hour desert vistas captured by cinematographer Joshua James Richards over the fussed-over frames of a spandex superhero showdown any day. Hopefully sometime soon, I would love to see the images of this film illuminate the big screen when it’s safe to go back to our beleaguered multiplexes. A stunning meditation on transience and trauma, Nomadland is a patient and perceptive portrait of people who are rarely, if ever, given the chance to represent themselves in the movies.

Score – 4.5/5

Also new to streaming this weekend:
Debuting on Netflix is I Care A Lot, a dark comedy starring Rosamund Pike and Peter Dinklage about a woman who makes her living stealing from the elderly by deceiving judges into appointing her as their “legal guardian.”
Swooping in on Disney+ is Flora & Ulysses, a family superhero comedy starring Matilda Lawler and Danny Pudi about the adventures of a young girl and her adopted squirrel who has superpowers.
Available to digitally rent is Silk Road, a based-on-a-true-story thriller starring Jason Clarke and Nick Robinson about the tech mastermind behind Silk Road, a dark web page that sells narcotics, and the DEA agent tasked with taking him down.

Reprinted by permission of Whatzup