June 20, 202406:00
Hear
From Godzilla to Guillermo Coppola, the universe of stories and characters on the screen in this already completed first half of 2024 contains multitudes. From the vignette of manners that portrays, based on a prodigal son, the depths of national passions and idiosyncrasies, to a fable of monsters in which the victims are counted among humans and dinosaurs disturbed from their eternal sleep by the nuclear nightmare, cinema and streaming provided a considerable number of pearls that may have gone unnoticed among the cataract of titles that renew billboards and catalogs weekly. Below, five series and five movies that our critics are betting we’ll still be talking about at the end of the year.
Hacks. Series with several seasons under their belt usually reach a critical moment in which their narrative arc must include the resolution of some of the conflicts if they do not want to become repetitive and derivative. The challenge is, of course, to move forward without losing the elements that made it successful in the first place. That complicated task is what the third season of Hacks performs with ease. In the nine episodes released this year, the story of comedian Deborah Vance (Jean Smart) and her young screenwriter Ava Daniels (Hannah Einbinder) not only shows the changes of the central characters and how their bond has progressed since the beginning of the series but which is also in charge of proposing the new scenario in which they will have to move as the driver of a late night show and its main scriptwriter, respectively. All while Smart and Einbinder do wonders with the verbal duels between their characters, more than starting line lists to face what is coming. Three seasons. Available in Max.
Shogun. This miniseries – it still is even though there is talk of a possible second season – manages to be excellent in each of the artistic areas that comprise it. It is a production that once again takes as its starting point James Clavell’s novel about medieval Japan – which had already had a television adaptation in the 80s – to take care of exalting the best aspects of the original material and including the point view of the Japanese characters that was missing in the old version starring Richard Chamberlain. With a cast of local performers who support the development of the plot full of palace intrigues, drama and complex links, Shogun It also contains a complex look at cultural differences and Western ethnocentrism that resonates from the fictitious 17th century of feudal Japan to the present. And to complete the circle, the miniseries combines all its depth with scenes of action and romance that transform it into a must-see epic. A season. Available on Disney+
Mr and Mrs Smith. The idea of taking a successful film to transform it into a series that can take advantage of public recognition and thus distinguish itself from the pile of television fictions that streaming platforms launch on repeat is not particularly original or novel. However, the fact that the series resulting from the experiment is a funny and intense international and romantic adventure, with a couple of characters as peculiar as they are interesting, is a rarity in the current panorama. From Doug Liman’s film released in 2005 that imagined Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie as a couple of hitmen working for rival agencies, the talented Donald Glover (atlanta), built something different: a plot full of intrigue, sensuality and humor that he himself – along with the actress Maya Erskine – is in charge of interpreting. A season. Available on Prime Video.
baby reindeer. Every so often a series appears that emotionally shakes viewers with such force that its impact expands beyond fiction. Since its premiere in early April, this semi-autobiographical series captured the public’s attention with its peculiar combination of drama, police and reflections on mental health issues as disturbing as they were exceptionally interpreted by Richard Gadd (creator of the series) and Jessica Gunning. Gadd, a renowned Scottish playwright and actor, adapted his stage show based on his experience as the object of a woman’s harassment and sexual abuse in a TV program that makes tension and discomfort its main driving force. As had happened before with unorthodox, Queen’s Gambit and The squid gameglobal successes of the platform during the pandemic, baby reindeer struck a chord with viewers around the world. A season. Available on Netflix
Coppola, the representative. Ariel Winograd, the best comedy director that the Argentine audiovisual world has today, understood perfectly that Guillermo Cóppola’s life could only be told as a game. And he started from that letter and that spirit to make, in the best recent Argentine miniseries, a great period painting of Argentine society. Throughout six episodes, two decades pass in the life of the country and of a fascinating and contradictory figure, portrayed in his time of glory and in his darkest moments, always in the shadow of Diego Maradona, who is present even if we never see him. . This story full of visual, aesthetic and narrative findings, a mix of customs, police chronicles and pop culture, basically tells us that there is no single way to understand Coppola, and by extension our own idiosyncrasy. That is why each episode is different from the others, but seen as a whole they maintain a rare coherence, also expressed through the virtuoso personification of Juan Minujín. A season. Available on Star+.
Past Lives. The first scene of this film written and directed by Celine Song, nominated for an Oscar for the original screenplay of the film, which is also her debut feature, shows the protagonists of the story from the point of view of the viewer who observes the interaction between the trio. consisting of Nora (Greta Lee), Hae Sung (Teo Yoo) and Arthur (John Magaro) trying to understand the nature of the bond that unites them. The narrative operation of going from the outside to the inside of the crossed relationships at the center of the story works like a perfect clockwork mechanism that moves the chronology of fiction forward and backward at the rhythm of the emotion that shapes it. The concept of predestined love, postponed feelings and the possibility of being reborn in the course of one’s own life experience appear reflected through sensitive dialogues, silences full of meaning and the looks of the three characters masterfully embodied by the protagonists. Available to rent/purchase on Google Play and Apple TV.
Those who stay. The Hollywood Academy was quite stingy with this film, which reached the Oscar with five nominations (one for best film) and only awarded the colossal Da’Vine Joy Randolph as best supporting actress, when it should have given similar recognition to Paul Giamatti , its unbeatable protagonist. The two of them, along with the promising Dominic Sessa, are the enormous interpreters of a great story about the art of recognition and healing some deep wounds that are kept in the soul, hidden under the façade of a Christmas story. We owe to the sensitivity of Alexander Payne that journey through the life of a group of people who accept certain defeats while sustaining with sufficient energy the almost heroic will of redemption. The film is also a journey towards the rediscovery of a type of cinema that was made in the 70s and knew how to approach the finest observation of human relationships with admirable naturalness. Available to rent at Flow.
Perfect days. After a few missteps, Wim Wenders returns to Japan with a contemporary story that preserves part of the simple and austere spirit of the characters of Yasujiro Ozu, the great filmmaker for whom his German colleague has professed deep admiration for decades. The protagonist of this story is a man who works cleaning public bathrooms and discovers the deep meaning of life (understood as service to others) in the exercise of an invariable routine that extends every day to other small pleasures, connected with literature. , music and observation of nature. The meaning of things (to put it with an expression familiar to Wenders’ cinematographic history) is visible in this kind and profound way of conceiving existence, while the protagonist’s past is revealed to us little by little with the same way of conceiving. see the world. Koji Yakusho, his protagonist, shows here that he is one of the best actors of the moment. Available on Mubi.
The boy and the heron. Although it was presented to the world as the work that marks his farewell to cinema, master Hayao Miyazaki shows us here that at 83 years old he still has a lot to say. With his lucidity intact, full awareness of the instruments that he used throughout his wonderful work as a creator of animated stories and the awareness that the time had come to start writing a kind of legacy, the director of Spirited Away invites us to take a journey as complex as it is fascinating that tries to be an answer to the great question of how to live. Miyazaki’s extraordinary craftsmanship mixes with references to the work of Lewis Carroll and Dante Alighieri and at the same time also connects with the autobiographical notes of his previous work, The wind rises. Pending its arrival on Netflix, it is not yet available on any streaming platform.
Godzilla Minus One. A streaming release that almost no one expected and appeared almost overnight partially compensated for the frustration of not being able to see on the big screen, as it deserved, this new chapter in a long history that identifies Japanese cinema and that only acquires its deepest meaning when it is connected directly to that identity. Instead of surrendering to the empty and noisy needs of the Hollywood machine, the new film of the greatest figure of the kaiju It actually works as a story with deep human connotations, in which much is said about the Japanese defeat in the war and the vindication of the honor of those who lost while facing an adversary that was a priori impossible to defeat. It moves, entertains and also astonishes thanks to extraordinary visual effects that more than deserved the Oscar won this year to the surprise of many. Available on Netflix.
