The Sound of Silence

10 overlooked movies of 2019

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Luke Lorentzen’s MIDNIGHT FAMILY. Courtesy of SFFILM

I posted my traditional Top Ten list – Best Movies of 2019. Now here are some gems that you probably haven’t heard of.

  • Midnight Family. This gripping documentary takes us on ridealongs with an all-night ambulance crew in Mexico City. It’s even wilder than you may expect. Midnight Family is just finishing a brief theatrical release, and I expect it will be available to stream soon.
  • Light from Light. Three portraits of personal awakening are ingeniously embedded into what looks like a familiar haunted house movie. I’ll let you know when it’s streamable.
  • Sword of Trust. This is a wickedly funny comedy with an emotionally powerful personal story underneath it all. Great performances by Marc Maron and the film’s director Lynn Shelton. You can buy, but not yet rent, Sword of Trust. I’ll let you know when it’s available.
  • Auggie. In this superb indie, augmented reality glasses fulfill every need and insidiously trigger even more inner desires.  Stream from Amazon, iTunes and Vudu.
  • The Sound of Silence. Peter Sarsgaard stars in this novel and engrossing character study about obsession. Stream from Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.
  • Rojo. Set just before Argentina’s bloody coup in the 1970s, this moody, atmospheric film works as a slow-burn thriller. Stream from Amazon, iTunes and Vudu.
  • Mine 9. This race-against-the-clock rescue thriller is both a mine safety exposé and a mining procedural.  I’ll let you know when it’s available to stream.
  • Jirga. A man goes on a quest in this parable of atonement. The film was shot guerilla-style, under cover in wartorn, terrorist infested Afghanistan. Stream from Amazon, iTunes, Vudu and Redbox.
  • Making Montgomery Clift. This biodoc is an unexpectedly insightful and nuanced probe into the life of Montgomery Clift, and it explodes some of the lore that has shaped popular understanding of the movie star. Stream from Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, Google Play and Redbox.
  • Long Day’s Journey into Night. This brilliantly original film explores memory – a man obsessed with a doomed romance from twenty years ago plunges into a neo-noir underworld.  After a slow burn beginning, his search reaches its climax in a spectacular ONE-HOUR single shot. It can be streamed on Amazon, iTunes and Vudu.
  • Mr. Klein. This is actually a reissue of a 1976 film that almost nobody has seen in 43 years. Joseph Losey’s slowburn thriller is a searing critique of French collaboration with the Nazis. Mr. Klein stars Alain Delon as a predator trapped by his own obsession. It is not currently available on the major streaming platforms, nor can it be found on DVD, except for some bootlegs from Asia.

Yes, two of my Overlooked movies are also on my Best of 2019 list. I’ll let you know when you can stream the ones that aren’t yet available.

Marc Maron in SWORD OF TRUST

Movies to See Right Now

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Peter Sarsgaard in Michael Tyburski’s THE SOUND OF SILENCE. Courtesy of SFFILM

This week, I’ll be at the Mill Valley Film Festival: it’s an early look at the most prestigious movies of the year. Watch for my coverage of 63 Up, Jojo Rabbit, Frankie, Where’s My Roy Cohn? and Marriage Story. If you miss the big movies at the MVFF, you can at least stream some of the Best Movies of 2019 – So Far – The Last Black Man in San Francisco, They Shall Not Grow Old, Amazing Grace and Booksmart are all available to be streamed.

OUT NOW

  • Downtown Abbey is a satisfying wrap-up for fans of the beloved PBS series.
  • The Sound of Silence is an engrossing character study starring Peter Sarsgaard as a man confident in his obsession until… It’s had a limited run at San Jose’s 3Below, and you can stream it on Amazon, iTunes and Vudu.

ON VIDEO

My Stream of the Week is the evocative and thought-provoking German drama Western. Western can be streamed from Amazon (included with Prime), iTunes, YouTube and Google Play.

ON TV

On October 5, Turner Classic Movies will air the 1950 version of M, directed by Joseph Losey. This is a remake of Fritz Lang’s great 1931 M with Peter Lorre. The Losey version is not a masterpiece like the original, and I find it pretty odd. However, Los Angeles’ storied Bradbury Building, which has been in many a movie, was never been as gloriously revealed from basement to roof as in M. The Bradbury Building and the film as a whole benefit from the cinematography of Ernest Laszlo; Laszlo also shot D.O.A., The Well, The Steel Trap, Stalag 17, The Naked Jungle, Kiss Me Deadly and While the City Sleeps, before being Oscar-nominated eight times for more respectable, but lesser films. The cast is filled with film noir faves – Raymond Burr, Norman Lloyd, Howard Da Silva, Steve Brodie and Luther Adler.

Joseph Losey’s M

Movies to See Right Now

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OUT NOW

Peter Bogdanovich with Jesse Hawthorne Ficks at the Roxie

This Sunday, I was privileged to attend one of the year’s most stirring experiences of Bay Area cinema culture. The Roxie Theater screened two of director Peter Bogdanovich‘s films – the Oscar-winning The Last Picture Show (1971) and the hard-to-find Saint Jack (1979) – with the legendary Bogdanovich in attendance for two Q&A sessions. Speaking of The Last Picture Show, it’s a remarkable thing to watch a coming of age story about 18-year-olds when you are 18 and then again forty years later when you know stuff.

Check out the impressive program of the upcoming Mill Valley Film Festival: it’s an early look at the most prestigious movies of the year. If you miss the big movies at the MVFF, you can at least stream some of the Best Movies of 2019 – So Far – The Last Black Man in San Francisco, They Shall Not Grow Old, Amazing Grace and Booksmart are all available to be streamed.

OUT NOW

  • Downtown Abbey is a satisfying wrap-up for fans of the beloved PBS series.
  • Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood is a Must See – one of Quentin Tarantino’s very, very best.
  • The family dramedy The Farewell is an audience-pleaser.
  • The Sound of Silence is an engrossing character study starring Peter Sarsgaard as a man confident in his obsession until… It’s had a limited run at the San Francisco’s Presidio and San Jose’s 3Below, and you can stream it on Amazon, iTunes and Vudu.

ON VIDEO

My Stream of the Week is Werner Herzog’s mesmerizing and darkly funny documentary Grizzly Man. Grizzly Man is a superb film, which made my own list of Best Movies of the 21st Century (and Sophia Coppola’s, too) and my Best Movies of 2005. It can be streamed from Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play, and it’s available on DVD from Netflix.

ON TV

On September 30, Turner Classic Movies brings us The Best Years of Our Lives. It’s an exceptionally well-crafted, contemporary snapshot of post WW II American society adapting to the challenges of peacetime. Justifiably won seven Oscars. Still a great and moving film.

Harold Russell, Dana Andrews and Frederic March in THE BEST YEARS OF OUR LIVES

THE SOUND OF SILENCE: novel and engrossing

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Peter Sarsgaard in Michael Tyburski’s THE SOUND OF SILENCE. Courtesy of SFFILM

In the engrossing character study The Sound of Silence, Peter Lucian (Peter Sarsgaard) is obsessed with the musical tonality of the built environment.   Having assigned each area of Manhattan its own distinct musical key, Lucian prowls the city, tuning forks in hand, to map its sounds.

Lucian pays the bills as a house tuner, bringing well-heeled apartment-owners a kind of auditory feng shui.  Lucian is sought after to isolate the hum of a problem refrigerator or toaster that can make a living space depression-inducing.  He’s even been profiled in The New Yorker.

But we sense that Peter Lucian is a little too confident in his expertise.  He is disdainful of the corporate suits trying to monetize his discoveries.  “This is about universal constance, not commerce.”  In a mistake of hubris,  Lucian takes on a research assistant (Tony Revolori – Zero the bell boy in The Grand Budapest Hotel).   Lucian is jarred by corporate espionage, and starts to unravel when a respected scientist views him as a crank.  Can he recover?

Peter Sarsgaard is a marvelous choice to play a cool obsessive who seems, at time,  both blissfully above validation and desperate for it.  In spite of his handsome, regular features, Sargaard’s gift for uncanny stillness helps him play creepy.   Sarsgaard’s Lucian has the unintended capacity of reassuring other characters, but making then even more uncomfortable.

Rashida Jones plays Ellen, a Lucian client who is not just garden-variety neurotic, but has been  so rocked by a tragedy that she remains profoundly unsettled.   Jones is so talented as a comic actress, a voice artist, a documentarian and the writer of that rarest of things, a smart romantic comedy (Celeste and Jesse Forever).  Here, she shows her dramatic chops with a character who starts the movie adrift, but grows able to offer emotional safe harbor.

There’s even a welcome appearance by Austin Pendleton as a Lucian mentor of uncertain reliability.  I’ve loved Pendleton since his turn in 1972’s What’s Up, Doc?. (Come to think of it, that movie had a musicologist obsessed with the inherent tonal qualities of igneous rocks.)

The Sound of Silence is the first feature for director and co-writer Michael Tyburski, and it’s a promising debut.  Despite using an understated color palette, Tyburski delivers some stirring cinema with his use of sound.  As Lucian looks over the city early in the morning, we hear a few musical notes, and then a full orchestra tuning up as the city awakens into its workday.  When Lucian takes Ellen for a drink, it is to the quietest possible venue – a club with a decibel level somewhere between a library and a morgue; afterwards, Lucian emerges into urban  cacophony.  When an academic treats him like a crackpot, we all hear ringing, not just Lucian.

As one would hope, the sound design of The Sound of Silence is remarkable, and the score works very well.  I saw it earlier this year at the San Francisco International Film Festival (SFFILM) and it’s playing at San Francisco’s Presidio and San Jose’s 3Below; you can stream it on Amazon, iTunes and Vudu.

THE SOUND OF SILENCE: novel and engrossing

by

Peter Sarsgaard in Michael Tyburski’s THE SOUND OF SILENCE, playing at the San Francisco International Film Festival April 10-23. Courtesy of SFFILM

In the engrossing character study The Sound of Silence, Peter Lucian (Peter Sarsgaard) is obsessed with the musical tonality of the built environment.   Having assigned each area of Manhattan its own distinct musical key, Lucian prowls the city, tuning forks in hand, to map its sounds.

Lucian pays the bills as a house tuner, bringing well-heeled apartment-owners a kind of auditory feng shui.  Lucian is sought after to isolate the hum of a problem refrigerator or toaster that can make a living space depression-inducing.  He’s even been profiled in The New Yorker.

But we sense that Peter Lucian is a little too confident in his expertise.  He is disdainful of the corporate suits trying to monetize his discoveries.  “This is about universal constance, not commerce.”  In a mistake of hubris,  Lucian takes on a research assistant (Tony Revolori – Zero the bell boy in The Grand Budapest Hotel).   Lucian is jarred by corporate espionage, and starts to unravel when a respected scientist views him as a crank.  Can he recover?

Peter Sarsgaard is a marvelous choice to play a cool obsessive who seems, at time,  both blissfully above validation and desperate for it.  In spite of his handsome, regular features, Sargaard’s gift for uncanny stillness helps him play creepy.   Sarsgaard’s Lucian has the unintended capacity of reassuring other characters, but making then even more uncomfortable.

Rashida Jones plays Ellen, a Lucian client who is not just garden-variety neurotic, but has been  so rocked by a tragedy that she remains profoundly unsettled.   Jones is so talented as a comic actress, a voice artist, a documentarian and the writer of that rarest of things, a smart romantic comedy (Celeste and Jess Forever).  Here, she shows her dramatic chops with a character who starts the movie adrift, but grows able to offer emotional safe harbor.

There’s even a welcome appearance by Austin Pendleton as a Lucian mentor of uncertain reliability.  I’ve loved Pendleton since his turn in 1972’s What’s Up, Doc?. (Come to think of it, that movie had a musicologist obsessed with the inherent tonal qualities of igneous rocks.)

The Sound of Silence is the first feature for director and co-writer Michael Tyburski, and it’s a promising debut.  Despite using an understated color palette, Tyburski delivers some stirring cinema with his use of sound.  As Lucian looks over the city early in the morning, we hear a few musical notes, and then a full orchestra tuning up as the city awakens into its workday.  When Lucian takes Ellen for a drink, it is to the quietest possible venue – a club with a decibel level somewhere between a library and a morgue; afterwards, Lucian emerges into urban  cacophony.  When an academic treats him like a crackpot, we all hear ringing, not just Lucian.

As one would hope, the sound design of The Sound of Silence is remarkable, and the score works very well.  The April 14 San Francisco International Film Festival (SFFILM Festival) screening is at the Dolby Cinema, which should be a real treat.

The Sound of Silence premiered at Sundance, has distribution through Sony Pictures, and screens twice at the 2019 SFFILM.