Shutter Island (2010)

Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Ruffalo, Ben Kingsley
Director: Martin Scorsese
Country: USA
Genre: Thriller-ish.

At Shutter Island nothing is as it seems.

In his fourth collaboration with DiCaprio, Scorsese has pulled out one of his best performance, and crafted perhaps one of his most interesting films. Sure to infuriate some and delight others, Shutter Island is all about evoking a response out of the audience – participation. It’s a detective story about a detective, but the investigation isn’t the investigation that the detective is investigating. Or is it? It raises a lot of questions, and doesn’t take the audience for granted in finding the answers for themselves. Also, in a departure from his usual visual style, Scorsese has created one of his more luscious looking, albeit foreign feeling, films to date.

Little Children (2006)

Starring: Kate Winslet, Patrick Wilson, Jack Earl Haley
Director: Todd Field
Country: USA
Genre: Drama

“So lock up your daughter
And lock up your wife
Lock up your back door
And run for your life
The man is back in town”
T.N.T. by AC/DC

Quite often these dramas that seem like they could be potentially overbearing end up being surprisingly watchable. Little Children is more than just watchable though, it’s a really unique and well-crafted piece of filmmaking. Its cast is tremendous, even the grossly underused Jennifer Connolly. The narrative moves along at a quick pace with a spot on voice over giving the audience insight into the character’s simple lives and complex minds. With content as heavy as this, there’s a certain foreboding feeling going into it, but it explores it in such a way that it emerges through the character’s discoveries thus taking a lot of the preachy edge off. Jack Earl Haley is outstanding as a sex offender rereleased into a suburban neighborhood, (and a public swimming pool in one of the most uncomfortable underwater scenes since Jaws.) Little Children isn’t the lightest of movies, but damn is it good.

The Savages (2007)

Starring: Laura Linney, Philip Seymour Hoffman
Director: Tamara Jenkins
Country: USA
Genre: Independent, Dramedy

The Savages is the Citizen Kane of independent old age home dramedies.

Films that follow pseudo intellectual types are generally too high brow for their own good. There is something special about The Savages in that it shows two characters of high academia in a very realistic situation. Laura Linney and Philip Seymour Hoffman (in a pair of pitch-perfect performances,) play siblings dealing with the trials and tribulations of their mediocre lives who are forced to take care of their estranged father as he slips into dementia. The themes are ripe for a heavy-handed drama, but Jenkins manages to weave a thread of light comedy through the film, reminding us that no matter how bad things get, we need to be able to laugh at ourselves and situations otherwise we’d go insane. It has a wonderful perspective of old age and what we choose to prioritize in our lives.

Revolutionary Road (2008)

Starring: Kate Winslet, Leonardo DiCaprio
Director: Sam Mendes
Country: USA
Genre: Drama

There’s no place like home. There’s no place like home. There’s no place like home.

There’s an elephant in suburbia’s room that not many people acknowledge. The idea of being trapped in the facade of the American Dream isn’t anything new, but Mendes’s newest descent into the material is even more harrowing than his ‘99 effort American Beauty. Though it’s set in the 50s when women’s rights hadn’t yet been fully recognized, the film still rings completely relevant. DiCaprio and Winslet reunite to completely destroy the fantasy love story they created in Titanic, and they have such a strong chemistry, it’s hard not to believe their troublesome woes. Don’t go into this film lightly, as it’s not even just an attack on domestic life, but on all lives who have allowed their dreams to slip through their fingers. It’s not pretty.

Volver (2006)

Starring: Penélope Cruz, Carmen Maura, Lola Dueñas
Director: Pedro Almodóvar
Country: Spain
Genre: Foreign, Drama

To say Volver is good is like saying Americans kind of like pizza.

Volver evokes one of Hitchcock’s least seen films, The Trouble With Harry in both its subject matter and its tone, tiptoeing on dark humor, suspense, and human drama. In its first half, each plot point is revealed in a Hitchcockian manner, but in its second act it deviates from this form and very much matures into its own entity. To summarize Volver would never do it justice as its complexity is a huge part of its intrigue. Almodóvar brings another stupendous performance out of Cruz playing a mother trying to protect the innocence of her daughter, and a daughter trying to come to terms with her own troubled upbringing. The most surprising thing about Volver is the classical style in which the story is told, making it feel like it would fit in with classic American dramas of the 40s and 50s, if it weren’t for the exciting and vivid colors of the cinematography.

Little Miss Sunshine (2006)

Starring: The best ensemble ever.
Director: Jonathan Dayton & Valerie Faris
Country: USA
Genre: Comedy

Not to be confused with the writings of Roger Hargreaves, as I’m pretty confident there wasn’t a character with heroine addiction in the series.

It’s not easy being a dramedy. So few films can balance outrageous comedy with personal character drama and pull it off. If not done properly, this hybrid will end up somewhere not too funny and not too emotional. Little Miss Sunshine handles both extreme ends of the spectrum with so much care that it makes the extravagant humor hysterical and the quiet moments of self-realization heart-breaking. We follow this family of six on a road trip from New Mexico to California to allow their quirky young daughter compete in the Little Miss Sunshine pageant. Little do they know, it’ll be a trip both The Griswolds and Timothy Hutton would(n’t) envy.

Head-On (2004)

Starring: Sibel Kekilli, Birol Ünel
Director: Fatih Akin
Country: Germany, Turkey
Genre: Foreign, Romance

So many times I am surprised with the results of a foreign film, mostly due to its lack of marketing, or its often mis-marketing. Such is the case with this self-destructive post-punk love story: my only glimpse into it being the Ang Lee sensual drama looking poster that accompanied it. But man, this was more like Sid & Nancy than Sense & Sensibility. It’s a story of love with lots of rough edges. Two f#cked up people (a drunk and a suicidal slut) meeting in a f#cked up way (rehabilitation clinic) and get married pro forma. I think a big reason why this film effected me in such a heavy way was that I was expecting some sort of long and drawn out forbidden love tale about stolen kisses and gentle caresses… which in an odd way this film is, but it’s masked behind the anarchy of punk mentality, throwing care to the wind, and having no hesitancy of nose diving on the downward spiral of disintegration. This film is great for those explosive moments alone after ending a toxic relationship.