The Girl on the Train

2010 in Movies: The Year of Adult Relationships

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This was the most welcome trend of 2010 – movies that centered on relationships between mature adults.  Hollywood tends to avoid such movies because teen audiences prefer not to imagine that their parents’ peers have thoughts of love and lust (let alone act on them).  And 2010 had films that understand that love doesn’t happen in a vacuum –  people may have pre-existing commitments and actions have consequences.

There was an all-too-rare second chance at love in The Secrets in Their Eyes.  There was the impulsive midlife lust of I Am Love and Leaving.  there was the affair that is NOT rekindled in The Girl on the Train.  We saw the depth and messiness of real marriages Fair Game, Rabbit Hole, Please Give and Another Year.

The year’s best romance was Mademoiselle Chambon. Finding one’s soul mate in middle age, when one may have serious commitments, can be heartbreaking.  Here, the two people are not looking for romance or even for a fling.  He is a happily married construction worker.  She is his son’s teacher.  They meet (not cute) and do not fall in love (or lust) at first sight. He is unexpectedly touched by something she does, and she is touched that he is touched.  Despite their wariness, they fall in love.

The lovers are beautifully acted by Vincent Lindon and Sandrine Kiberlaine in two of the very finest performances of the year.

2010 in Review: Foreign Films

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It was another year in which foreign cinema was essential.  Three of the nominees for the 2009  Best Foreign Language Oscar were released in the US this year:  Ajami (Israel/Palestine), A Prophet (France) and the Oscar winning The Secrets in Their Eyes (Argentina).   Those three made my list of Best Movies of 2010, along with Mademoiselle Chambon, The Girl on the Train, and The Ghost Writer from France, Carlos from France/Germany, Fish Tank from the UK, and The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo from Sweden.  If I couldn’t see foreign films, I wouldn’t have a Best Movie list.

France also gave us the Mesrine films.  Ireland offered Kisses.  Italy had the food-centric  I Am Love and Mid-August Lunch.  In a tremendous year for crime drama, the Aussies added Animal Kingdom and the Koreans contributed Mother. Police, Adjective was another bleak, cynical drama from Rumania.

Here’s the trailer for Kisses.

Taking Stock – The Best of 2010 So Far

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Well, we’re at the halfway point of the movie year – the summer movies are winding down, and the Oscar bait is still ahead of us in the autumn and holidays.  So it’s time to take stock of the year’s movies to date.  I now have ten movies on my list of Best Movies of 2010 – So Far. You can read my comments and watch the trailers on the Best Movies of 2010 – So Far page.

Better yet, you can see Toy Story 3 and Inception in the theater this week.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, A Prophet, The Girl on the Train, Fish Tank, The Ghost Writer and Sweetgrass are all available on DVD right now.  Sweetgrass is also available on Netflix streaming video.

The Secrets of Their Eyes will be available on DVD on September 21. The DVD release of my top film of the year so far, Winter’s Bone, is October 26.

Sweetgrass

Movies To See Right Now

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The “must see” films in theaters remain Winter’s Bone and Toy Story 3.  Winter’s Bone has been out for a while, so, if you haven’t seen it in a theater,  you’d better see it soon.  For trailers and other choices, see Movies to See Right Now.

It’s summer vacation, so I am letting people catch up with my most recent DVD recommendations:  Eight Men Out, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Girl on the Train, John Adams and The Deep End.   For the trailers and other DVD choices, see DVDs of the Week.

 

 

The Crying Game

 

 

Movies on TV include The Crying Game and Before Sunrise on IFC this month.  Freaks, Soylent Green and 12 Angry Men are coming up on TCM.

Tod Browning and his cast for Freaks

 

This Week's Movie Recommendations

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The “must see” films in theaters are Winter’s Bone and Toy Story 3.  For trailers and other choices, see Movies to See Right Now.

My DVD of the week is The Girl on the Train.  For the trailer and other DVD choices, see DVDs of the Week.

Orson Welles in The Third Man

 

Movies on TV include The Third Man, Blue Velvet and Cool Hand Luke.

DVD pick of the week: The Girl on the Train

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The Girl on the Train (La fille du RER) is an absorbing mother daughter drama set in the Paris suburbs.

The young woman  is  Emilie Dequenne, the Belgian actress who won the best actress award at Canne when she was only 17 in the Dardenne brothers’ Rosetta.  In contrast to Rosetta, she doesn’t play a force of nature, but a slacker bobbing through life on a tide of random influences.  She lives with her single mom (Catherine Deneuve), and they get along, despite the mother’s unwelcome tips on job hunting.

The daughter meets a guy, her life takes some resulting turns and then she makes a really bad choice.  The mom seeks out an old beau, now a celebrity attorney to help fix the situation.

I missed seeing this in the theater because the trailer emphasizes a faked hate crime (and I wasn’t eager to see a topical movie).  But the movie is not about the faked hate crime, which occurs late into the story.  The story is character driven.  The daughter drifts first part of the movie and is controlled by events until she finds herself in a desperate situation; she panics and sees the most stupid option as a solution.  The situation then forces the mother to re-open a chapter in her life that she had chosen to close – how far will she open the old door?

It’s on my list of Best Movies of 2010 So Far.

See the rest of my DVD recommendations.