Three Good Films

I can't recall when three such exhilarating, well-crafted, and radically different  films appeared in the Oscar line-up as we have this year with Tar, Banshees of Inniserin, and Everything, Everywhere All at Once. I was reluctant to see two of three, but I'm glad I saw them. These brief remarks, which give little or nothing away, aren't reviews. 

They're merely encouragements.

Banshees succeeds by sticking to the logic of its unusual plot, though even more so, perhaps, on the strength of the major characters—our somewhat simple but often kind-hearted "hero," his erstwhile best friend, his sister, and the character I'm going to describe as the village idiot, a boy whose brilliant strangeness is essential to the success of the work. We feel we're in the presence of a Frank O'Conner short story that has not yet been written. It's a sad and humorous tale, set on a desolate island off the Irish coast. And you don't need to know anything more about it before you go.

Tar would be a successful film if it were merely a documentary look behind the scenes of an orchestra conductor's life, which it almost is—the ambition, the tensions among conflicting egos, the demands of the medium and of the wealthy donors who keep the art form afloat, interviews with the New Yorker, tony lunches with legendary musicians, now retired, discussions about the significance of Mahler's Fifth Symphony.  

But when we add to those elements the added interest of the conductor's private life, parsed out here and there to various minions and hangers-on and to the conductor's wife, who happens to be the orchestra concertmaster, things gets more complicated. 

Cate Blanchett deserves the attention she's been getting for her complex and riveting performance, but the look of the film, the framing of scenes, the sparkling light—in short, everything about it is brilliant and aesthetically satisfying. It has the resonance and depth of a good long novel. And there isn't a dull moment in it.

I know what you're going to say. "I hear that Tar isn't a very nice person." Well, perhaps not. Then again, neither was Citizen Kane ... Or Don Giovanni ... Or Travis Bickle.

Everything, Everywhere All at Once, on the other hand, is a glorious mess—zany, irreverent, violent, tender-hearted, and utterly joyous and implausible. It's a sci-fi Kung Fu film about tax evasion, the ins and outs of the multi-verse, and how difficult it can be to keep a failing business afloat while trying the raise a teenage daughter. Not all the scenes work, and there are one or two dull patches, but the good-natured tone of the film hardly wavers, even when the entire universe is about to be destroyed by a giant bagel. 

You could watch in on Showtime with a 30-day free trial. Why not?