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Fuck it, I'm doing a top films of 2019 thread, now that they're no longer the rage. It's bloody long, but I wanted to give some shine to the many underseen or as-yet-unreleased festival titles that I loved across a very busy year. Get yer mutin' finger ready!
40. THE BURIAL OF KOJO: Magic realism often gives me acid reflux. Not so Blitz Bazawule's captivating debut. variety.com/2019/film/revi…
39. I WAS AT HOME BUT...: 11 months later I am no closer to working through Angela Schanelec's Berlinale enigma, but it says a great deal that I'm still trying.
bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/s…
38. THE WILD GOOSE LAKE: I've made Asian neo-noir a bit of a hobby recently, and Diao Yinan's is, at the very least, one of the most catch-your breath beautiful I've seen. variety.com/2019/film/revi…
37. TO THE ENDS OF THE EARTH: Had all but written off Kiyoshi Kurosawa then he goes and makes this wonderful, seriocomic, low-key culture-clash drama about a Japanese TV reporter in Uzbekistan. variety.com/2019/film/revi…
36. ONCE UPON A TIME... IN HOLLYWOOD: Still cannot forgive the last-minute swerve into ugliness (before the swerve back into grace), but my affection for the sundown LA of Tarantino's imagination before that just about outweighs it. Just about. bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/s…
35. NINA WU: Hm, a Cannes film about Weinsteinish abuse next to Tarantino? There are no coincidences. But Midi Z and star/writer Wu Kexi's psych thriller has more under the hood. A hard, messy, brave film that leapfrogs past an easy "solidarity!" resolve. variety.com/2019/film/revi…
34. BLACK MOTHER: Feverish and fragmentary, it's uncanny how immersive Khalik Allah's doc becomes, an impression of Jamaica both abstract and visceral. variety.com/2019/film/revi…
33. SOPHIA ANTIPOLIS: Virgil Vernier's vision of contemporary dystopia imparts a chill that hasn't yet quite left my bones. variety.com/2019/film/revi…
32. PROXIMA: I never got to write about Alice Winocour's wonderful Space Mom movie–so very much my bag–but we did give it an hon mention in the TIFF Platform competition. Whet your appetite with his great fest review from @johnnys_panic for LWL: lwlies.com/festivals/prox…
31. THE PLAGIARISTS: Even if Peter Parlow's micro-budget macro-smart indie had *only* got me to finally read Karl Ove Knausgård, I would be indebted to it. But it's also funny, provocative and, contrary to title, wholly original. variety.com/2019/film/revi…
30. NOVA LITUANIA: Karolis Kaupinis' beautifully droll B/W tale of a prewar Lithuanian geographer trying to save his country, while unaware of the allegory happening in his own apartment.
variety.com/2019/film/revi…
29. ANNE AT 13,000 FT: Our other TIFF Platform runner-up (see PROXIMA) Kazik Radwanski's film bears comparison to UNCUT GEMS for sheer psychological discomfort and an equally dazzling central perf from Deragh Campbell. Here's the great @wendyide: screendaily.com/reviews/anne-a…
28. SO LONG MY SON: Wang Jingchun gives one of my personal 2019 Best Actor performances in Wang Xiaoshui's one-child-policy heartbreaker. You. Will. Cry.
variety.com/2019/film/revi…
27. BRUCE LEE AND THE OUTLAW: My awesome jury at the inaugural IceDocs–a blessed experience in a blessed year–gave top honours to Joost Vandebrug's wrenching and remarkable work. I didn't write about it, but @LucyMangan did, beautifully. theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2…
26. BAIT: Mark Jenkin's 16mm wonder is still punching way above its weight (up against 1917 in the BAFTA British Film category!) Gorgeous, scratchy story of Cornish gentrification–I liked it so much I wrote an essay for the Blu-ray.
variety.com/2019/film/revi…
25. WISDOM TOOTH: Liang Ming's debut is my find of @iffamacao 2019, and also my pick of a thriving crop of challenging and creative Chinese coming-of-agers that includes BETTER DAYS and MOSAIC PORTRAIT.
variety.com/2019/film/revi…
24. UNCUT GEMS: Honestly my most uncomfortable viewing experience of the year, yet so singular I couldn't not love it too, especially given it lands on the Best Ending of 2019. Here's diamond @JustinCChang on typically sparkling form: latimes.com/entertainment-…
23. A DARK-DARK MAN: The title doesn't lie, Adilkhan Yerzhanov's crime thriller procedural about Kazakh police corruption and perversion in is *dark.* Naturally, I adore it. variety.com/2019/film/revi…
22. EMA: I still can't wholly make up my mind about Pablo Larraín's latest, but my least favourite of his films is still miles ahead of almost everyone else's. I guess I love it far less than I love that he did it. But I *really* love that he did it. bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/s…
21. SELFIE: Agostino Ferrente's tiny little doc about two Neapolitan teens burst my withered, blackened heart wide open. variety.com/2019/film/revi…
20. LITTLE WOMEN: Never a fan of Alcott's novel, nor previous adaptations, yet here we are. Job done, Gerwig! Here's @KatieWalshstx's joyous identification of its real love story: the passion of a creative woman for the book (or movie) she's writing. chicagotribune.com/sns-tns-bc-lit…
19. ZIZOTEK: Vardis Marinakis' stunning, subtle story of an abandoned boy is edged with the surreal yet more unshakeably weird, insightful and melancholic than any dream.
variety.com/2019/film/revi…
18. ÖNDÖG: If I'd to choose one image from the 100s of movies I watched in 2019... I'd refuse to. But the swaddled-up herdswoman delicately pissing on a pregnancy test in the middle of a Mongolian steppe in Wang Quan'an's superb film would cross my mind.
variety.com/2019/film/mark…
17. THE SOUVENIR: Was v late to Joanna Hogg's latest and reactions made me expect hardness, even cruelty perhaps. But it's amazingly compassionate, though drawn in lines so sharp they cut. My boo @GuyLodge, of course gets it, in this stunning review: variety.com/2019/film/revi…
16. MONSTERS: Marius Olteanu's tripartate study of a marriage built on love but also on a lie, is wise and kind and, in its middle section's awful Grindr date, pointedly hilarious. variety.com/2019/film/revi…
15. WE ARE LITTLE ZOMBIES: No, I still have not got the catchy theme song from Nagahisa Makoto's explosively inventive grief movie out of my head. variety.com/2019/film/revi…
14. REAL LOVE: I only saw Claire Burger's delightful domestic drama a year after it won 2018's Venice Days, but seek it out if you need reminding that there's good in the world, in the ordinariest of places. And protect Bouli Lanners at all costs.
variety.com/2019/film/revi…
13. HONEYLAND: "Macedonian bee-keeping documentary" is hardly an enticement, so try "allegorical Homeric epic shot like a Caravaggio" instead. And you're in luck: because I never wrote about it, you get linked to @AOScott's sublime review instead: nytimes.com/2019/07/25/mov…
12. VALLEY OF SOULS: Without wanting to get too cathedral-ly precious about it, some films do just make you want to quietly bow your head and pray, and Nicolás Rincón Gille's riveting, sorrowful debut is one such.
variety.com/2019/film/revi…
11. BALLOON: Pema Tseden is one of the most inventive and humane directors at work today, and this beautiful film is the best novel I've read all year.
variety.com/2019/film/revi…
10. THE FAREWELL: I made my first trip to China this year for a family reunion so I feel peculiarly qualified to tell you Lulu Wang's film gets literally everything right. And so delighted to link to my amazing mentee @debbie_zhou's killer piece on it! thesaturdaypaper.com.au/2019/09/07/lul…
9. BEANPOLE: Yep, still too soon. Still cratered by Kantemir Balagov's formally pristine, emotionally pulverizing second film.
variety.com/2019/film/mark…
8. THE IRISHMAN: From the first floaty hallway shot to the last, I couldn't get enough of Scorsese's mournful yet triumphant unpicking of the gangster mythos. Wish I'd got to review, but here's @szacharek being quite, quite brilliant instead: time.com/5688561/the-ir…
7. PARASITE: So grateful to Bong Joon-ho for making a Palme d'Or winner that you can actually recommend to *anyone.* Not only the smartest and most timely film of the year, it plays like goddamn gangbusters in any room. variety.com/2019/film/mark…
6. THE LIGHTHOUSE: Should pale death, with treble dread, make the ocean caves our bed, God who hears the surges roll, deign to save the suppliant soul.
What a magnificent bastard of a film.
theplaylist.net/lighthouse-can…
5. PORTRAIT OF A LADY ON FIRE: Left my Cannes screening with my hem burning and my finger holding page 28 of every book I've ever read. Sciamma's film is perfection, and so is this @thehighsign review: slate.com/culture/2019/1…
4. MARRIAGE STORY: You feel Baumbach's film so personally it'd be intrusive if it weren't so funny, wise and kind, to people sorting, oh so fucking relatably, through the wreckage to find little fragments of leftover love. @matt_cinephile's lovely rave: lwlies.com/reviews/marria…
3. MONOS: I don't think I've ever encountered a film with the same malarial feverishness as Alejandro Landes' wild and woozy waking nightmare. Fantastic. variety.com/2019/film/revi…
2. MARTIN EDEN: Pietro Marcello's restless, inventive, messy and sincere film was our (instantaneous and unanimous) winner from a ridiculously strong @TIFF_NET Platform competition. Really like this thoughtful piece from @departedaviator: stabroeknews.com/2019/09/18/fea…
My top 3 each reminded me there are still whole new ways of *doing film.* But my no. 1 did that hardest and with the most sinewy grace. 2019 gave me amazing movies, but only one renewed my faith in cinema to the point that I don't even care how pretentious that sounds. Drumroll:
1. SYNONYMS: I didn't get to write up Nadav Lapid's infuriating, glitchy masterpiece (feat. 2019's single best perf, from Tom Mercier, @ me all you like). And I'm almost glad–I wouldn't have come close to @ManohlaDargis' peerless words on it. Witness: nytimes.com/2019/10/24/mov…
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