DISPATCH #4 (11/27-12/3): Sight, Sound, and Canon
All hail Queen Jeanne
First thing’s first: sorry for the delay. I ordinarily try to get this thing out on Monday, but, as I have said in this space before, I’m trying to cram in as many movies as I can prior to voting in the Boston Society of Film Critics and the Boston Online Film Critics’ Association. Be nice to the critic in your life this time of year; they’re trying, man.
Now, down to business. If you spend your waking hours anywhere within the contemporary spheres of Film Culture, you know the big film news of last week: the venerable British film magazine Sight and Sound published the results of its decennial poll of the Greatest Films of All Time, in which critics from around the world are asked to submit their top ten picks for the title. The poll is held in reverence among the cinephilic cognoscenti as the closest we can come to a definitive “canon,” and serves as a periodic temperature check on the slippery concept of “consensus.” And if the results of the most recent poll are to be believed, we’re burning up.
Most striking in the 2022 poll is the #1 slot, which went to neither Vertigo (which topped the list in 2012) nor Citizen Kane (which had previously held the title since 1962). Rather, in what has to count as the most dramatic turn in the list’s 70-year history, the new champion is Chantal Akerman’s slow-cinema landmark Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles. It is, to say the least, a bold choice; a far cry from the zippy, adventurous films by Hitchcock and Welles, Akerman’s film is an uncompromising work of feminist cinema, a three-and-a-half-hour chronicle of the day-to-day minutiae of a repressed widow (the great Delphine Seyrig), featuring long, unbroken shots of its title character peeling potatoes or running errands. It’s a towering work, deliberately difficult (in heft, if not necessarily in content), and as defiant a break from tradition as is likely possible. If the purpose of such a list is to inspire debate, it is perhaps an ideal choice.
But the ascent of Jeanne Dielman is indicative of the list’s most meaningful change. In the 2012 list contained only two films directed by women in the top 100, Jeanne Dielman (then at #35) and Claire Denis’ Beau Travail (which this year jumps from all the way from #78 to #7). This year there are 11, ranging from Agnes Varda’s beloved Cleo from 5 to 7 (#14) and Barbara Loden’s New-Hollywood classic Wanda (#48) to Maya Deren’s experimental flashbomb Meshes of the Afternoon (#16) and Vera Chytilova’s anarchic Daisies (#28). There are also several films by Black and African American filmmakers (Do the Right Thing, of course, but also Charles Burnett’s Killer of Sheep and Julie Dash’s Daughters of Dust), and four films– Get Out (#95), Parasite (#90), Moonlight (#60), and Portrait of a Lady on Fire (a stunning #30)-- from the last decade. The Sight & Sound list is an amalgamation of many disparate voices– more than 1600 this time around, more than any previous poll by magnitudes– but their message is clear: the canon needs a good shakeup.
Of course, there is no canon, not really; taste is subjective, and consensus tends to be fleeting (for contrast, check out the AFI’s 100 Years, 100 Movies list, which was last updated in 2008 and reads like an artifact from an entirely ancient form of cinephilia). But lists like Sight and Sound’s serve as a road map for those looking to expand their horizons, and in an age of rising incuriosity this is an increasingly invaluable service. Thousands will likely seek out Jeanne Dielman as a direct result of its placement on this list, and while it surely won’t be everyone’s cup of tea, it’s no exaggeration to say that a good number will have their lives changed. And if you don’t agree with its placement? See you in 2032.
WEEKLY ROUNDUP
Last week on the Hassle I reviewed A Couple, a rare narrative (more or less) from the prolific documentarian Frederick Wiseman, in which French actress Nathalie Boutefeu reads from the diaries and letters of Sophia Tolstoy in a series of verdant gardens. It’s a lovely film (even during its more emotionally brutal passages), every bit attuned to human nature as Wiseman’s non-fiction epics, and a perhaps inadvertent snapshot of life during the pandemic. It’s currently wrapping an exclusive week-long engagement at the Coolidge, but it will undoubtedly be available through Wiseman’s Zipporah Films soon.
I also reviewed Noah Baumbach’s new adaptation of Don DeLillo’s White Noise, which opened last week in select theaters before streaming on Netflix later this month. It’s an improbably lavish production for Baumbach and DeLillo alike, but, just as improbably, it works, thanks to a game cast (particularly Don Cheadle and the film’s child stars), an eye-popping color palette, and DeLillo’s infectious cynicism. As a bonus: I found room in my review for a two-paragraph digression on cult performance artist Brother Theodore!
Elsewhere on the site: Anna Hoang reviewed Benson & Moorhead’s quarantine-shot sci-fi whatzit Something in the Dirt (currently available on VOD)... Josh Polanski covered Netflix’s Norwegian creature feature Troll… and Kyle Amato took a look at Joanna Hogg’s dueling-Tildas spookshow The Eternal Daughter (bizarrely not screening anywhere in the Boston area, but available digitally and on demand).
RECENT VIEWS
I caught The Eternal Daughter myself, a modest but perfectly charming little yarn anchored on two predictably wonderful performances from Tilda Swinton. In a bit of serendipity, we watched it immediately after setting up our Christmas tree, which is probably the ideal setting; while not a holiday movie per se, it is in the classic UK tradition of the Ghost Story for Christmas.
In more traditional holiday viewing, I caught the Rankin-Bass Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer on its annual prime-time broadcast. Not much new to say about it, but something puzzling that only just occurred to me this go round: Why do all the reindeer live in caves?
In FYC viewing, I caught up with Park Chan-wook’s Decision to Leave, which frankly blew me away; I’m not sure what I was expecting, but it’s instantly one of my favorite films of the year. I also saw The Whale, which I will delve into in full when I review it next week, but for now I give it a hearty “Maaaaan, I dunno.”
Finally, I absent-mindedly caught the tail-end of The Last Jedi and the first half or so of The Rise of Skywalker on TV. The former holds up remarkably well, and the latter… doesn’t. I am happy to report, however, that The Last Jedi concludes satisfactorily enough to serve as a de facto series end, and that Skywalker is ultimately inessential from a narrative standpoint as well as a qualitative one. I would argue that, in a revised Machete Order, one can comfortably end the watch with Episode VIII.
Oscar Goff is the film editor and senior critic for Boston Hassle. You can find him on Twitter as @TheOscarGoff, on Mastodon at OscarGoff@newsie.social, on Hive as @TheOscarGoff, or at the movies with a large tub of popcorn.