Top 10 Movies of 2019
A few words about he ten best from a year loaded with tested relationships, imaginary friends, and evil doppelgängers.
10: Doctor Sleep
Both a sequel and tribute to the 1980 pillar of psychological horror, Mike Flanagan’s Shining successor is a reverent companion to Kubrick’s classic. Made with comparable craft and compassion for the source material, the almost three-hour epilogue for the Torrance family gives one of the figurehead “scary stories” of our time an effective, emotional end.
9: Ad Astra
Part Blade Runner, part Interstellar, James Gray’s space saga certainly has all the right criteria to make for one of 2019’s great hidden gems. Brad Pitt offers a soft and many times silent performance that the movie lives on from start to close, with long-time Christopher Nolan cinematographer Hoyt van Hoytema earning second-team MVP honors for his chilling rendition of space.
8: John Wick Chapter 3: Parabellum
The third chapter in John Wick’s story of an assassin turned husband turned assassin again plays out like the cacophonous finale and simultaneous send-off for Keanu Reeves’ action hero career. That is, until the cliffhanger ending promises us *at least* one more entry in the boogeyman’s story. No matter if chapter four, five, or even someday six match this opera of action blow for blow, we can all say we knew what this newfound franchise could do at its biggest, baddest, best.
7: The Lighthouse
Robert Eggers’ The Lighthouse is a movie not like many other movies, in 2019 or any other year. Creepy to its core, with Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson channeling the loneliness, distrust, and seeping-in delusion for two of the year’s best performances. It’s a sea shanty ghost story with scares coming from something as unexpected as a cursed mermaid, or Dafoe’s captain with warning words about seagulls.
6: The Irishman
Whether or not it really serves as Martin Scorsese’s “goodbye” to the director’s chair, there’s something about The Irishman that feels like coming home (in as much that a movie about a hitman’s murderous rise through the ranks could feel like “home”). Robert De Niro, Al Pacino and Joe Pesci all paired together for the mob story to end all mob stories, for what may very well be their last rodeo, somehow lives up to the billing.
5: Little Women
In the arena of “modern” remakes, Greta Gerwig’s Little Women instantly anointed itself as one of the best upon release less than a week ago. Superbly performed, written and directed, it’s as complete of a package as any movie on this list hands down, with a confidently subtle “spin” on the story’s ending expertly woven in to make this version of Louisa May Alcott’s 150-year-old story definitively Gerwig’s own.
4: Avengers: Endgame
No movie out of this year or maybe the decade has likely received more hype, as well as “pre” or “post” attention than the Avengers “finale”. And much like the whole carefully-crafted cinematic universe that’s been spinning since President George W. Bush was still in office, Endgame feels meticulously carried out, deliriously epic, and impossibly great.
3: Jojo Rabbit
Another Marvel director going from an “infinity saga” installment to an anti-hate satire, Jojo Rabbit contains all the uniquely pleasant touches, recognizable humor and deliberate tone contained in any of Taika Waititi’s movies. In a way, this film manages to do more just by virtue of the touchy subject material, and the careful line it walks seemingly effortlessly.
2: Marriage Story
Dafoe and Pattinson, De Niro and Pacino, and finally, Driver and Johansson. Noah Baumbach’s painfully personal screenplay is brought to life by two actors who couldn’t have executed the source material any better if they tried. Marriage Story is simple in concept, but heart-rending in the way it plays out.
1: Us
Had it not been for the actual Twilight Zone reboot Jordan Peele got involved with in 2019, the former sketch actor’s sophomore feature Us would be the perfect encapsulation of the same brand of self-contained horror. A feature-length “episode” of one of Peele’s signature nightmares brought to life, Us will stick to my memory as my favorite movie of the year. From Lupita Nyong’o brilliantly playing two characters tethered together, to yet another original scary story conceived and completed in goosebump-giving fashion, there was nothing scarier, or better.
HONORABLE MENTIONS:
Crawl, The Peanut Butter Falcon, Ford v Ferrari, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Richard Jewell, A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, Mike Birbiglia’s “The New One”, The Farewell, Booksmart, Blinded by the Light
