Best of 2013: #8 Short Term 12

The first thing I noticed when I watched Short Term 12, the brilliant piece of indie-film work from director Destin Cretton, was that it is better than its premise.  Far better.

Movies like this always tend to devolve into a sort of schmaltzy after-school-specialness that overwhelms the senses and drowns out anything unique or particularly praiseworthy about the rest of the movie.  But, this movie doesn't do that, and it's a testament to the filmmaker -- not to mention a wonderful cast -- that it doesn't.

The movie is set in GoldDerby, a short-term care center for at-risk kids.  The supervisors of the center -- those spending the most time with the kids -- are a bunch of 20-somethings, really just kids themselves.  The lead supervisor is Grace (played by Brie Larson), who's hiding a long-term relationship with her co-worker Mason (John Gallagher Jr.).  Grace and Mason aren't doctors our counselors -- we learn that very early on -- they are just there to provide a safe supportive environment for the kids.  And, that's what they do, day in and day out.

The story runs on two separate tracks.  The first is just a sort of a slice-of-life track , demonstrating what life is like in a facility like this.  Cretton apparently worked in one of these places for a few years, and it shows.  The scenes inside GoldDerby all feel incredibly authentic, never glossed over, but also never exploited to make it seem disturbing or scary.

These scenes work because of the director's attention to detail.  We see them hand out the meds.  We watch them play games none of the kids really like.  We see the supervisors search rooms for contraband.  At every step, the audience if fully immersed in the life of these kids.

This track of the story also works because the kids are never caricatures or stereotypes of what you'd expect of kids in a group home -- they are fully realized characters.  Chief among them is Marcus, who writes rap songs to deal with the traumas of his youth and is stressed because he's about to turn 18 and age-out of the home. There's also Jayden, a cutter with attitude that masks deeper problems than what you see on the surface.  All of the kids have their moments and, like I said, it all works.

The second track of the story is an exploration of Grace's character.  As the story unfolds, we learn about the horrors of her childhood and how they're coming back to haunt her.  And, with Jayden's arrival at GoldDerby, she's remind of feelings she's tried to repress.  These same feelings keep her from having a full and healthy relationship with Mason, who, we learn, also had a troubled youth.

As I describe this, I'm' fully aware that Short Term 12 sounds like a generic message movie, but it's not.  Believe me.

At every point when the movie feels like it's headed down that road, Cretton's direction and story takes the audience elsewhere, somewhere deeper and more meaningful.  He's never heavy-handed, never selling out to sentiment or convention.  Even in the third act, when characters make some extreme decisions, Cretton never overplays his hand.

It's a masterful piece of filmmaking all the way around.  I can't wait to see what he does next.

It helps that he has Brie Larson in the lead role.  If you see a lot of movies, you've seen her around...but not like this.  This is a truly revelatory performance.  It's a low-key, slow-burn endeavor.  She's not chewing up any scenery or putting on a show.  But, she's aiming straight for your heart, and she hits it dead center.

It's shame that this movie wasn't marketed a little better.  If it were, Larson would definitely be in the Oscar conversation.

All in all, this is just a fantastic little film.  Indeed, it's the best movie no one saw in 2013.

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Best of 2013: Honorable Mentions

Well, it's that time of year again...pretty much my favorite time of year when it comes to the blog.  It's time for me to unveil my annual Top 10 list.

I have to say that 2013 was a fantastic year for movies.  So, making this list was particularly difficult.  In an average year, I'd say that there are two to three great movies released.  This year, there were at least eight or nine.  And, three bona fide masterpieces came out in 2013, an extreme rarity.

In fact, while I have my Top 10 list all figured out, I'm still not sure what movie will take the top spot.  I plan to post individual entries about each movie on my list, like I did in 2011.  I should be able to finish it all in about a week or so.  Hopefully, by then, I'll have it all figured out.

In any event, this is a different post entirely.  This is the post where I talk about the movies I really liked that didn't make the list.  Needless to say, there were a lot of those.  So, in the interest of brevity, I'm just going to throw out some titles of movies that I think people should see.

I'll start with a list of indie movies that few people saw but that I'd highly recommend:

The Spectacular Now
The Way Way Back (Actually...a lot of people saw this one)
Drinking Buddies
In a World
Kings of Summer
Frances Ha
Ain't Them Bodies Saints

I know I'm leaving some movies off that list.  Oh well.

I'll spare you the list of big-budget studio movies that I'd recommend and go straight to my REAL Honorable Mentions.  These are the movies that I just couldn't find room for on my Top 10 list, even though I wanted to include them.

Here they are, in alphabetical order:

Before Midnight

A fitting capstone to Richard Linklater's trilogy exploring modern love and romance.  If you've seen Before Sunrise and Before Sunset, you probably took the time to see this one as well.  If you haven't seen them, you should.  I wasn't fully on board with the first two films -- I enjoyed them, I just didn't go gaga over them like many people did.  However, I really liked this last film.  

Julie Delpy is absolutely superb in the movie.  And, Ethan Hawke continues to carve out an interesting niche for himself.  Definitely worth your time.

Captain Phillips

I actually reviewed this movie on the blog.  It's a wonderful piece of filmmaking, featuring what may very well be Tom Hanks finest performance to date.

In any almost other year, this would have easily made my Top 10.  This year, however, it just misses the cut. It was probably the hardest movie to keep off my list.

Iron Man 3

You should all know by now that I'm a sucker for comic book movies.  And, though I had hoped that Man of Steel would take the prize as Super Hero Movie of the Year, it fell short of my lofty expectations.  Luckily enough, Marvel injected some new life into its top franchise, most notably by putting director Shane Black.  The result was the best big-budget blockbuster of the summer.

You've all seen this movie already, so I won't say any more.

Prisoners

I was very surprised that I liked this movie as much as I did.  And, it held up the second time around.

Denis Villeneuve's crime drama was one of the most intense, gripping movie-going experiences I had in 2013.  It's also a showcase of some very fine acting.  Jake Gyllenhaal turns in what is easily the best performance of his career, playing a tortured cop determined to solve a child kidnapping.  Hugh Jackman is also fantastic as the father of one of the kidnapped children.

Prisoners could have easily been just another run-of-the-mill crime thriller.  And, I suppose, in many ways, that's what it is.  But, it's all in the execution.  With these actors, this director, and the brilliant cinematography by the great Roger Deakins, it comes together very, very nicely.

The Wolf of Wall Street

Martin Scorsese movies are like pizza: even when they're bad they're still pretty good.  Not that this movie is bad -- it just doesn't reach the same heights as other Martin Scorsese-Leonardo DiCaprio ventures.  It's a little too long -- just under three hours -- and, at times, it's a little too self-indulgent and gratuitous.  

Still, it's hilarious.  And, it has a myriad of great performances in it.  DiCaprio is in top form.  Jonah Hill is also very, very good.  The whole ensemble just does a great job.

There's definitely room for criticism with this film.  But, what it does well it does so well that it deserves a lot of praise.

Alright, there we have it.  There were a number of other films worth mentioning in 2013.  But, I don't want this to go on forever.

Next up -- hopefully in short order -- will be the post about Number 10 on my list.

My Secret Shames: Reservoir Dogs

I'll admit it, this is a strange movie for me not to have seen.  I'd long known that it was one of the most influential films of the 1990s.  It's been called the greatest independent film ever made and, of course, it was the movie that introduced the world to Quentin Tarantino.

But, it came out in 1992 when I was just 14 years old.  And, unless you were really plugged into industry buzz, you didn't really know that this movie existed until you saw Pulp Fiction, Tarantino's follow-up.  I didn't see that movie until 2000 or so, which meant that I basically missed the bus on seeing Reservoir Dogs in anything resembling a timely fashion.

So, in short, I never saw Reservoir Dogs because I was ignorant and never got around to it.  Sue me.

In Theaters: Safety Not Guaranteed ***

As I sit down to write this review, I'm stumped.  Perhaps its the shoulder surgery I had a few days after seeing this movie that has, at once, blocked my memory of it and rendered me too mushy in the head to write a cognizable review.  But, alas, today is the first day since my surgery I've been able to sit and comfortably type at a computer, so damned if I'm going to waste it.

In Theaters: Beasts of the Southern Wild ****

I recently took part in an email chain wherein we discussed the relative importance of world-building versus character development.  Needless to say, this discussion didn't reach a resolution as it would be impossible to come to a definitive conclusion on that point.  Now, having just looked over that chain of messages again, I realize that it wasn't much of a debate, just a few offhand musings.  Still, as I sat down to write a review of the latest indie-film sensation, Beasts of the Southern Wild, the idea of that conversation crept back into my mind.

What element is most important in storytelling, the characters being portrayed or the world they inhabit?  I won't be presumptuous enough to try to answer that question.  All I'll say is that, in this particular movie, they're of equal importance.

Writer-director Behn Zeitlin (you haven't heard of him, but you will) managed to create a world that is, at once, familiar and entirely unique.  And, in that world, he places two of strongest and most distinct characters depicted in recent film.  The result is, in my opinion, the best movie of 2012 so far.