HE’s #1 mantra: If a movie ends well, that’s half the ballgame. Let no one ever argue that Guillermo del Toro‘s Nightmare Alley (Searchlight, 12.17) doesn’t end well. It ends perfectly, in fact. It reiterates the basic film noir theme, which boils down to the main character fatalistically admitting that he’s doomed, and in fact has been doomed all along. He never had a chance, and his dark fate is so irrefutable that it’s funny.

Film noir basically says that none of us have a chance. Which we don’t if your definition of having a chance means escaping death. We’re all going to die. But if I had accepted this fatalistic, fuck-me doctrine when I was in my teens or 20s my life wouldn’t have worked out. So noirs are basically films with a bad attitude. They all say that noir protagonists are fucked and can’t “win” because they’re essentially self-destructive by way of some basic flaw or weakness, and that most of our dreams and schemes will never pan out.

Let no one say that Nightmare Alley hasn’t been masterfully composed — it’s all visually harmonized (the dp is Dan Laustsen) and exquisitely designed. Half of it radiates a rural travelling carnival vibe, the other half a snow-blanketed, pre-war urban (deco-moderne) gloom. And yet all of a piece…persistent and narcotizing and finally overwhelming.

HE to friend outside multiplex: “Yo…what are you seeing?”
Friend to HE: “Nightmare Alley. I’m a Guillermo fan, and I don’t care if it has no monsters.”
HE to friend: “I just saw it.”
Friend to HE: “And…?”
HE to friend: “Great cinematography and production design, lotsa gloom, good performances.”
Friend to HE: “But how is it?”
HE to friend: “You’re on your own, man. I’ll tell you this much — Bradley Cooper smokes 50 or 60 unfiltered cigarettes. Every damn scene he lights up, and it’s infuriating.”

When and if you watch Nightmare Alley (and I am recommending that you do) you need to accept from the get-go that Cooper’s Stan Carlisle is fucked — an asshole and a cruel hustler who’s determined to downswirl and self-destruct, and that how he manages to ruin his life as well as kill or maim those around him is just a matter of time, circumstance and opportunity.

But the ending, man…that ending is exquisite.

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Four kids get their groove on under the influence of Henri Rousseau. Except it’s not Rousseau’s brushstrokes as much as the jungle boogie percussion score. Basic idea: “Great post-impressionist art is a trip if…you know, you can also hear drums that make you want to dance.”

Imagine being the moron (Mark Zuckerberg?) who insisted that Rousseau’s bengal tiger had to channel Rod Serling by saying “this is the dimension of imagination.”

Why? Because the average young kid who might be into Zuckerberg’s Meta (which is what the spot is hyping) is presumably incapable of understanding that falling into the world of a painting starts from a place of silence, submission and meditation.

In other words, somebody actually said “the tiger has to say the word ‘imagination’ or else some younger viewers might think we’re talking about an immersive Rousseau installation somewhere, like the Van Gogh thing making the rounds.”

Issues-wise I’m closer to Vice-President Kamala Harris than any potential Republican opponent, of course, but I’m scared to death of her running with 81 year–old Joe Biden in ‘24. Because her approval numbers are quite low, and she seemingly has nowhere to go but down. She won’t enhance the ticket — that’s a given. In ‘20 she proved ineffective as a campaigner (whiny speaking voice, testy attitude now and then, dropped out before Iowa). She has to somehow go away — seriously.

I’m telling you right now that Paul Thomas Anderson’s Citizen Pizza is (a) HE-approved as far as it goes, (b) a well-crafted, moderately engaging ‘70s episodic with a really good ending, and (c) a highly eccentric choice for a 2021 Best Picture award.

Am I enraged that the National Board of Review picked it earlier today, and that they gave their Best Director award to PTA? Of course not — it’s fine, not a problem at all. But this was a very New York Film Critics Circle thing to do, guys. You can choose whatever and whomever you wish, but the Movie Godz are watching, and they know what you did.

World of Reel‘s Jordan Ruimy is persuaded that A24 is putting out vague, inconclusive signals about Joel Coen‘s The Tragedy of Macbeth:

…for my early-evening date with Guillermo del Toro‘s Nightmare Alley (which is getting raves for its cinematography and production design), and a little running around after, so I need to delay some of the posts I have planned. But in the meantime…

The night before last I had an excellent time re-watching Spike Lee‘s Inside Man, which is now 15 and 1/2 years old. One of my thoughts was “jeez, Denzel looks so young!” — he was around 51 or 52 during filming. No spring chicken, but much more buoyant looking compared to his 2021 constitution.

Anyway, the HE community needs to assemble a list of the best crime or heist films in which the “bad guys” get away with it**. The first of these would have to be Lewis Milestone and Frank Sinatra‘s Ocean’s 11 (’60) — no, they didn’t get to keep the money at the end but they weren’t caught or punished by the law, and were free to try again. Peter Yates‘ Robbery (’67), to some extent. Norman Jewison‘s The Thomas Crown Affair (’68), of course. Thieves get to keep the loot in Peter Yates‘ The Hot Rock (’71), and of course the cops never get wise.

What are the other big titles in this realm?

** Not Rififi, not Topkapi…a lot of gangs got busted or went home empty-handed in the ’50s and early ’60s.

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What will it take for a tough governmental prosecution of the most rancid and malevolent political criminal of the 21st Century for inciting the 1.6.21 insurrection? Do laws mean anything at all? The Constitution absolutely requires punishment for what Donald J. Trump did, and yet 11 months later he seems to be skating and cruising and shuffling around. My presumption is that the Justice department hasn’t indicted Trump because Joe Biden and Merrick Garland fear an angry bumblefuck earthquake reaction. Which would make them cowards, of course, if that was their actual thinking. Is it?

The National Board of Review will announce its film awards soon (i.e., this morning), and then tomorrow (Friday, 12.3) the eccentric New York Film Critics Circle will announce their own. By this I mean you can pretty much count on two or three of the NYFCC’s major-category awards being a little fruit-loopy — i.e., far more concerned with pushing the necessary progressive political buttons (gender-wise, ethnic-wise, LGBTQ-wise) than adhering to what some of us might call classic or broad-based quality standards.

11:20 am prediction: The NBR will almost certainly gives its Best Picture award to Steven Spielberg‘s West Side Story — the tide right now is simply too strong to resist, especially with the recent passing of WSS lyricist Stephen Sondheim.

11:35 am prediction: It’s conceivable that the the woke-minded NYFCC could also wind up saluting the Spielberg (which caters to woke sensibilities), but today’s NYFCC** almost always prefers to endorse identity politics over general craft and emotionality so who knows? The Power of the Dog‘s Jane Campion will win their Best Director trophy, of course, but a significant percentage will want Dog to win Best Picture also. On the other hand I wouldn’t put it past them to give their Best Picture award to Maggie Gyllenhaal‘s The Lost Daughter. I really wouldn’t. Or even Licorice Pizza.

The NYFCC loves to pick winners from a fickle, highly oddball perspective. This has been indicated a few times over recent years. For decades an occasionally offbeat NYFCC trophy signified something highly valued — a fully considered saluting of a worthy achievement by serious pros. But today’s NYFCC brand is something else. It used to be that the Los Angeles Film Critics Association was the loopiest, most against-the-grain award-giving group in the nation — the NYFCC has now overtaken them in this regard, and without halting their voting for a one-hour food break. In the realm of film critic awards-givers, the NYFCC has become Woke Central. If winning a NYFCC award used to signify serious cred, today’s NYFCC winners have an asterisk by their names.

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…and then weigh in right here with insta-thoughts, considered reactions, Oscar chances, etc.

The Power of the Dog (Netflix, 12.1) is a chilly and perverse cattle–ranch drama that insists over and over that it’s a very bad thing for toxic males to suppress their homosexuality. (HE agrees.) Jane Campion is a top-tier filmmaker and there’s no disputing that this is a quality-level effort, but Dog‘s milieu is grim and stifling and melancholy, like the dark side of the moon.

Yes, Benedict Cumberbatch is excellent as the enraged and closeted Phil — a variation on Daniel Day Lewis‘s “Bill the Butcher” in Gangs of New York or “Daniel Plainview” in There Will Be Blood. The older-looking Kirsten Dunst, 39, delivers the second best performance. The fleshy, rotund, moon-faced Jesse Plemons plays Cumberbatch’s gentler, kinder brother. And don’t overlook Kodi-Smith McPhee as Dunst’s delicate teenaged son.

Campion’s film is an interesting, respectable smarthouse effort. Intelligent, solemn, very well acted (especially by Cumberbatch)…an at times fascinating period drama. More than a bit doleful, somewhat irksome at times but altogether first-rate.

No fist fights, no gunshots, etc. And clearly the work of a gifted filmmaker. But it wasn’t for me. I knew that within minutes.

Cumberbatch is really quite the self-torturing closet case, but he and Jesse Plemons are cast as brothers, and there’s really no way to believe this. They’re both red-haired (Plemons is more of a lighter carrot shade) but there the vague resemblance ends. The common genetic heritage simply isn’t there. Was one adopted?

As the film begins the Burbank brothers (Phil and George) share a bedroom in their mansion-sized home…curious.

Plemons is bulkier than Phillip Seymour Hoffman in The Master and slightly less ample than John Candy in Planes, Trains & Automobiles. He’s playing a wealthy cattle broker, but there’s no believing that plump Plemons could be part of any aspect of the cattle business. The trust factor goes right out the window.

The older-looking Kirsten Dunst, 39, delivers the second best performance, right after Cumberbatch.

To me watching this felt like work; it made me feel vaguely trapped. I walked out scratching my head and muttering “what?” I wrote three friends who’ve seen it to try and clarify a third-act plot element.

The Manhattan cool kidz are catching Guillermo del Toro‘s Nightmare Alley this evening at Alice Tully Hall, but HE won’t have a looksee until tomorrow evening…sorry.