The Ten Best Films of 2016: #3

Gavin Hood's engrossing "Eye in the Sky," from a brilliantly conceived and structured screenplay by Guy Hibbert, posits this premise: a British colonel (Helen Mirren) has been tracking Kenyan terrorists for five years. They've congregated at a compound in Nairobi to carry out a suicide bombing presently. Believing this development shifts her operation from capturing to killing the terrorists, Mirren instructs an American drone pilot (Aaron Paul) to drop his payload. Just as he's about to do so, a nine-year-old local girl enters the periphery of the compound, selling the bread her mother has baked to passersby. What Mirren had envisioned as a no-muss-no-fuss targeted attack will now require the approval of two countries' attorneys-general, foreign secretaries, and military officers - each of whom seems all too eager to "refer up" to a higher rung in the chain of command. 

Hibbert ratchets up the tension to the point of exquisite exasperation, giving each participant the opportunity to make his or her case, encompassing considerations from malleable collateral damage estimates to the relative political fallout from killing the young girl or allowing the bomber to leave the compound and possibly kill dozens of innocents. He also juggles an enormous cast of players, from Alan Rickman (in his last performance) as a lieutenant general who wants to take care of business and get back to his daughter to Barkhad Abdi as an intelligence operative who remotely controls a beetle-shaped camera to obtain video from inside the compound. I looked around the audience and saw men and especially women leaning in, completely immersed in the dilemma. With the clock continuing to tick and a decision coming to a head, you could hear groans of frustration as this or that official passed the buck. Here is one of the most captivating films of 2016.

The Ten Best Films of 2016: #4

Dennis Hauck’s “Too Late” is the coolest movie to come down the pike in ages. It bleeds cool. It’s the kind of movie you groove on the first couple times you see it, but even then you know it’s gonna be part of your collection – part of your life – forever.

John Hawkes – he of the just-battered-enough face – stars as Mel Sampson, an L.A. private dick who, as the movie opens, hears from Dorothy (Crystal Reed), a young woman he spent one night with three years ago. He told her to call him if she was ever in trouble, and she is. She saw some photos she shouldn’t have – of the owner of the strip club where she dances – and fears for her life. Rightly, as it turns out. I’d do you a disservice to relate any more of the plot, which reveals itself over five single-shot scenes – each 22 minutes in length – that Hauck assembles out of chronological order. One takes place atop Radio Hill across from Dodger Stadium, another at a home in the Hollywood Hills, a third at the aforementioned strip club and a bar down the street, the next at a drive-in theater outside of town, and the last at the Beverly Hilton.

Putting them together – linking all the internal self-references – lends itself to repeated viewings. So does Hauck’s vision of L.A., which is as incisive as any in memory. He gets what makes L.A. unique: the number of different cities it is at once – demographically, geographically, culturally – and Angelenos’ unique ability to navigate those intersections. He’s also written un-self-consciously crackerjack dialogue for Hawkes and a varied cast of actresses (most notably Dichen Lachman). You sit up in your seat when you hear dialogue this sharp; it satisfies the soul.

Hauck insisted on shooting “Too Late” on 35mm film, necessarily limiting its box-office prospects. (After one screening, he joked that for the video release, he’d come to your home with a projection reel.) Besides the rebellious coolness of the choice, it gives the movie a classic look. It’s from 2016, but not of it.

The Ten Best Films of 2016: #5

In Stéphane Brizé’s naturalistic, brilliantly perceptive “The Measure of a Man,” Thierry (Vincent Lindon), a laid-off factory worker, takes a job in security at a large supermarket, where he helps catch shoplifters and colleagues who fail to scan items or apply customers’ coupons to their own purchases. Lindon won Best Actor at Cannes last year, a savvy and sophisticated choice. Not in recent memory has a performance been so un-showy or an actor so seemingly unaware of the presence of the camera. The film may be French, but it couldn’t be more apposite to contemporary America.

The Ten Best Films of 2016: #6

I assign a film to the year in which it first plays a weeklong run in Los Angeles. Accordingly, a foreign Oscar nominee from one year that only comes to town theatrically the following year will appear, if anywhere, on the second year's list. Hence, in the sixth spot, Denmark's “A War,” from Tobias Lindholm, director of the thrilling “A Hijacking,” which put similarly themed same-year release “Captain Phillips” to shame. He reunites with co-lead Pilou Asbæk, who plays Claus Pedersen, a company commander on the ground in Afghanistan. After one of his men is killed while on a patrol, Claus undertakes regular patrols, even though commanders typically leave that duty to subordinates. Meanwhile, back home, his wife Maria (Tuva Novotny, first-rate) has her hands full with a daughter and two sons, the older of whom has begun acting out at school. (The child actors are terrific.) When Claus makes a decision in the heat of battle that saves a soldier’s life, his men exalt him as a hero, but the brass second-guess him and bring him home to face trial for the murder of Afghan civilians. The proceedings pit Søren Malling (the other co-lead of “A Hijacking) as Claus’ attorney against Charlotte Munck as the formidable judge advocate prosecuting him. Both actors are superb. “A War” is so intense that in each of its three fora – the war theater, the household awaiting Claus’ return, and the tribunal – there are scenes after which I had to exhale. It has that wonderful quality we saw in 2014’s “Force Majeure” of putting you in a series of ethical dilemmas and demanding to know what you would do in the moment. It’s the kind of movie you can see with friends and then talk about all through dinner. The first great film of 2016, chronologically: "A War."

The Ten Best Films of 2016: #7

Brad Furman's "The Infiltrator" has it all: a smorgasbord of suspense, action, riveting drama and laugh-out-loud comedy. Bryan Cranston cements his status as one of our more important working actors as Customs agent Bob Mazur, who's offered retirement but instead volunteers to go undercover as money launderer Bob Musella in an attempt to get close to Pablo Escobar. John Leguizamo plays Emir Ebreu, Mazur's rookie partner, who likes to fly by the seat of his pants. Their relationship echoes that of John Ashton and Judge Reinhold in the "Beverly Hills Cop" franchise: high praise indeed. After Mazur sends home a prostitute purchased for him by one of Escobar's men, citing a purported fiancée (he's long married, his wife Evelyn played by Juliet Aubrey), no-nonsense boss Bonni Tischler (Amy Ryan) assigns him one: equally green agent Kathy Ertz (Diane Kruger).

Together, they set out to and do become friends with Escobar's top lieutenant, Roberto Alcaino (Benjamin Bratt), and his wife Gloria (Elena Anaya). One false move at any time could spell a slow and painful death, a reality that heightens the tension to an exquisite peak. Meanwhile, Bob's aunt Vicky (Olympia Dukakis) wants to tag along with them and pose as a moneyed Miami matron for a lark. The supporting cast is uniformly first-rate - Kruger in particular is one to watch - but the movie belongs to Cranston, who has us on his side from the jump with an alive performance that brings out the wry comedy in the well-paced script penned (I was enchanted to learn) by the director's mother, Ellen Brown Furman. After Kruger plays a daring and unplanned gambit during a dinner with the Alcainos, Roberto compliments Bob on his bride-to-be. Cranston's subsequent line reading - he takes a moment to process what's just happened, then replies, "She's remarkable" - alone is worth the price of admission. Add to his work the atmospheric cinematography by Joshua Reis and original music by Chris Hajian and you have a movie that delights the eyes and ears and stirs the heart and mind.

The Ten Best Films of 2016: #8

Regular readers know what a premium I place on brevity and economy of storytelling, but occasionally a long runtime does lend heft and grandeur to a film. Such is the case with Andrea Arnold's 162-minute road epic "American Honey," featuring a career-best Shia LaBeouf and magnetic newcomer Sasha Lane, about life at the margins of America and the daily decision whether (and for how much) to sell oneself.

The Ten Best Films of 2016: #9

In thinking back on Gary Ross’ Civil War-set “Free State of Jones” I’m struck by how many things in it I hadn’t seen before. Gritty and anything but sedate, it’s not a standard war movie with carnage at its center, though there are relatively small battles at gruesomely close range. Ross uses the war as a backdrop to bring a fascinating slice of history blisteringly to life.

Matthew McConaughey – a couple years removed now from the incredible run (“Bernie,” “Killer Joe,” “Mud,” “Dallas Buyers Club,” others) that led me to pronounce him the most interesting working actor in Hollywood – plays Newton Knight, a medic for the Rebel army who leaves the battlefield to bring the body of his nephew, Daniel (“Mud’s” Jacob Lofland), home and finds himself accused of sedition. That this misapprehension precipitates Knight's becoming a folk hero of the anti-slavery movement is typical of the movie's offhandedness, a welcome change from the portentousness usually associated with its genre.

A friendly slave named Rachel (Gugu Mbatha-Raw of "Belle" and "Beyond the Lights") secretes Newton away across a mangrove swamp impassable by the Confederate cavalry. The sea-foam green of the swamp - its surface seemingly solid rather than liquid, so that Rachel and Newton appear to be rowing on the same material Scarlett Johansson encased her victims in in "Under the Skin" (2013) -  is perhaps the most memorable of hundreds of eye-popping visuals in the movie. Not since Tanya Hamilton's Black Panther remembrance "Night Catches Us" (2011) has a film been so vividly variegated. 

Without trying hard, Newton amasses a ragtag retinue of slaves and fellow farmers. Among the slaves is Moses (Mahershala Ali, here kicking off a career-making year), whom we meet wearing a hideous four-pronged neck shackle that's as uncomfortable and haunting a symbol of slavery as I've seen. (I spent several scenes unable to focus on anything else.) After emancipation, Moses will lead the drive to register the new freedmen to vote, culminating in a memorable scene in which dozens of black men are first turned away from the polls, then allowed to vote (albeit at gunpoint), only for all but two of their ballots to be switched from Republican to Democrat.

Among the many fresh and compelling aspects of "Free State of Jones" is its understanding of the role of women in the antebellum and postbellum South. Jill Jane Clements has a small but memorable role as Sally, a publican and unofficial liaison between Newton's band and the Confederate lieutenants and colonels after his hide. Mbatha-Raw delivers on her long-touted promise with a living performance that transcends the stereotype of slavely saintliness. Rachel and Newton grow ever more intimate during the movie, and a scene in which he takes her to a hotel and she stares at and, at length, dares to touch a pretty bed made up just for her is truly lovely. 

Keri Russell plays Newton's first wife, Serena. Late in the movie, the Confederate army has burned down Serena's house and Newton and Rachel let her stay with them. Each woman recognizes and accepts - wordlessly - her new status. On the front porch, Serena cossets Rachel's new baby. "You're the only one who's made him stop crying," Rachel smiles. The scene never descends into fireworks, but, far from a missed chance, to me its casualness and quietude was riveting.

I'm sad that the critics missed the boat so badly on "Free State of Jones." The diagnosis from some quarters of White Savior Syndrome is so facile and pissant as not to merit rebuttal. This is a true story of incautious courage by women and men, black and white. It is as beautiful and brutal to behold as Steve McQueen's deserving Oscar winner "12 Years a Slave," with which it would make a great double bill. Both have corn as yellow as the sun stuck in their teeth, and cotton stuck to their souls.