Summer is here! In the past, this would have meant heading to the multiplex to watch the summer’s big blockbusters. In the more unstable cinematic climate we find ourselves in right now, that could simply mean more of the same: staying at home more, in the air conditioning, watching what’s being broadcast. But the middle of the year is also a good time to reflect on previous months’ releases and catch up on some you may have missed. Below are seven of the best harbingers of hope for the remaining months of this movie year.
The fallen guy
This action comedy directed by longtime stuntman David Leitch may “underperform,” in the parlance of box office experts, but that’s no reason to write it off. The fallen guy is an ode to the stuntmen who drive cars at death-defying speeds, fall from dizzying heights and are set on fire, all in the service of cinematic fantasy. But its biggest selling point is its leading pair, Ryan Gosling as a once-arrogant stuntman struggling to make a comeback, and Emily Blunt as the rookie director he’s trying to date. Together, these two are the opposite of a car crash, a romantic comedy duo whose effervescence keeps even this sometimes painful film afloat. Charm is in short supply in cinema these days, but Gosling and Blunt give us every reason to believe in it.
See more information: Watch the classic stunts that inspired the action in The fallen guy
Robot Dreams
In this cute animated parable of love and friendship set in 1980s New York, a lonely dog orders a robot pen pal and his life changes. The two walk through the city, and although Dog has seen it all, Robot observes each scene with new eyes. This fantasy New York is populated by anthropomorphized animals – yaks in business suits, gazelles in dresses and lipstick – and for Dog and Robot, everything from a subway-drumming octopus to a morning of roller-skating in Central Park is a source of treat. . But a day at the beach brings bad news for a being made mostly of metal, and Dog and Robot are tragically separated; As they try to find their way back to each other, their story becomes a complex reflection on the nature of goodbyes and new beginnings. In adapting Sara Varon’s comic book of the same name, Spanish director Pablo Berger has made a film that feels, in the best way, like the last day of summer: radiant, bittersweet, suffused with memories in the making.
Dog Man
In a career spanning nearly 40 years, French filmmaker Luc Besson specialized in fantastic flights of fancy and shocking violence. But his Dog Man It is an extremely tender and surprising film. Caleb Landry Jones’ Douglas is a wounded human being, a survivor of childhood abuse, who lives primarily in a wheelchair and finds solace living with his community of dogs. But his life isn’t sad: he enjoys the company of his four-legged friends and his one-night-a-week job as a performer in a drag bar. When he runs afoul of bad guys, his dogs protect him: rest assured, nothing bad happens to the canine characters in this film, but the bad humans aren’t so lucky. This is the perfect movie for those days when you’re convinced that dogs are better than people – even though that happens every day.
The Chimera
In Alice Rohrwacher The Chimera, Set in rural Tuscany circa 1980, Josh O’Connor plays Arthur, an Englishman trapped in an Italian reverie. He is a grave robber in love with relics of the past, but he is also mourning a lost love, a woman named Beniamina, who disappeared from his life under circumstances that are never explained. Beniamina’s elderly and slightly confused mother, Flora (played, wonderfully, by Isabella Rossellini), insists that she will return, but Arthur knows better; he is tormented by visions of his girlfriend, longing to join her, wherever he wants her to be. Rohrwacher is a confident filmmaker and directs this dream of making a film with the same steadiness as a kite in a strong breeze. It’s the kind of movie you wake up from, not one you simply watch.
Read the full review
Totem
Seven-year-old Sol (Naíma Sentíes) is looking forward to her father Tona’s (Mateo Garcia) elaborate birthday party, which will be held at her grandfather’s house. She and her mother, Lúcia (Iazua Larios), prepared a little performance, a surprise for her father, involving a rainbow clown wig and a feat of operatic dubbing. But when she arrives home, the extended family, busy with preparations, has little time for her, and she is told she cannot see her father. The reality is that Tona is dying of cancer, and although Sol knows he is very sick, this is the first time she has actually had to reckon with his inevitable death. This can do Totem It sounds depressing, but in the hands of director Lila Avilés it isn’t: what do grief and loss mean for children? As adults, we can’t really know, but Totem offers a promise of light beyond the sadness of loss, for young and old alike.
Read the full review
Kidnapped: The Abduction of Edgardo Mortara
Italian director Marco Bellocchio (Fists in Pockets, The Traitor) is 84 years old, but his films are more vital and muscular than those of many filmmakers half his age. With Kidnapped, it tells the true story of Edgardo Mortara, a six-year-old Jewish boy who, at the behest of Pope Pius IX, was taken from his family in Bologna in 1858 and taken to be indoctrinated into Catholicism. His parents (played by Fausto Russo Alesi and Barbara Ronchi) try desperately to get Edgardo back, but to no avail: he has become a pawn of a zealous, anti-Semitic pope who clings to his declining power. Bellocchio’s main target is the hypocrisy of the Catholic Church, but the film also works as a straightforward melodrama: Edgardo, played as a young man by Enea Sala and as a young man by Leonardo Maltese, is a figure so trapped in a nightmare that he eventually succumbs to that. His story, in the hands of a master, is both convincing and chilling.
Hitman
Glen Powell plays mild-mannered college professor Gary Johnson, a guy who makes extra money posing as a hit man for the New Orleans Police Department: he meets with bad actors in hopes of hiring their services; when they reveal their intentions, the police move forward with handcuffs. Gary loves this hustle, happily donning whatever disguise or personality necessary to get the job done. Then he falls in love with Maddy (Adria Arjona), an unhappily married woman who approaches him about killing her husband. He dissuades her and they fall in love – but that’s just the beginning of their problems. Richard Linklater directs this sexy adventure with good humor. And Powell, sexy and mischievous, is a great casual matinee idol, whether you discover her charms on the big or small screen.
See more information: The True Story of the Fake Hired Assassin Behind Richard Linklater Hitman
This story originally appeared on Time.com read the full story
