New Year's Binge: Blockbuster, Wednesday, Bad Sisters, Fleishman Is in Trouble

I am not a fan of New Year's Eve and believe the best way to celebrate this "holiday" is on the couch bingeing some great television. If you are similarly minded, this post is for you!

Blockbuster: If what you're seeking is a funny, half-hour, workplace sitcom in the style of Brooklyn Nine-Nine or Superstore, then this is the show for you. Randall Park stars as Timmy, a man who loves movies and runs the very last Blockbuster Video store on the planet. For many reasons, this is a losing proposition, but the man is determined to make this video rental store succeed and with his motley staff by his side, we can cheer him on in his hapless quest. Over the course of ten episodes, you will be able to watch the usual sitcom tropes unfold - troubles with corporate overlords, employees whose ambitions don't line up with their current jobs, and of course, some flickers of romance.

The best part of this show is the specificity of its jokes. There was one line about how if someone wanted to listen to The Fray, they should just watch an episode of Grey's Anatomy. This is a show that will probably make sense to 1% of the population, but I am in that 1% and I cackled like a loon. This show is a broad and hearty comedy, full of warmth like a nourishing stew, but one in a while there's a surprise ingredient that pops up out of nowhere. It's a great cast of people who are clearly having a fun time working together and playing off these scripts. Creator Vanessa Ramos was a writer on Brooklyn Nine-Nine so she brings that show's warm, gentle, familial tone to this workplace. And of course, what is the thing I find funniest about a show about the last Blockbuster store, a place we all went to rent videos if we needed to see movies or TV? It's streaming on Netflix.

Wednesday: If you don't want something too sweet and saccharine, then you need to be watching Wednesday. The brilliant Jenna Ortega stars as Wednesday Addams, the moody, death-obsessed, teenage daughter of the Addams Family, and in this show, she is shipped off to Nevermore Academy, a private boarding school for outcasts after she is expelled for her extreme behavior at the regular high school she was attending. This is where her parents went to school, and she is furious with them (Catherine Zeta-Jones and Luis Guzman play Morticia and Gomez, in a pitch-perfect piece of casting), but over the course of eight episodes we will get to see our heroine make her stamp on Nevermore and go from social pariah to the belle of the ball.

The main story arc involves a murder, so this show is a mash-up of genres as a horror mystery comedy, with lots of spooky and supernatural elements. But of course there are also many love interests to deal with and teenage hormones flying about the place. Wednesday's roommate, Enid (Emma Myers) is an exceedingly cheerful werewolf, and the school principal is played by the marvelous Gwendolen Christie, who certainly has her hands full trying to contain all these rebellious teens under her roof. Christina Ricci also stars as a teacher at the school, which is a beautiful bit of casting as she originally played Wednesday Addams in the 90s movies. While the show was created by Alfred Gough and Miles Millar, Tim Burton is an executive producer and directed four episodes, so the show also has that feel of a spooky and inventive Burton movie, with gorgeous production design, costumes, and plenty of gothic humor. It's a compelling and eye-popping watch, and while you may need to close your eyes at some scary bits, overall, it's a hell of a ride. 

Bad Sisters: If you want a black comedy mystery without actual horror, then this is the show you seek. Once I started, I voraciously ate up all ten episodes with a spoon. Set in Ireland, this is a remarkable mystery that opens with the funeral of John Paul "JP" Williams (Claes Bang, who I was shocked to learn was Danish!). John Paul was married to Grace (Anne-Marie Duff), who has four sisters, Eva (Sharon Horgan, who also developed this show with Dave Finkel and Brett Baer), Ursula (Eva Birthistle), Bibi (Sarah Greene), and Becka (Eve Hewson). The sisters are all very close, and as the show progresses, we discover just how close. Because it turns out that JP was a horrible and abusive man, and every single one of the sisters hated their brother-in-law. Until they finally decide that they should murder him.

Brian Gleeson (who I just discovered is son of Brendan and brother to Domhnall! Yay Irish actors!) and Daryl McCormack (who earlier this year starred in the amazing Good Luck To You, Leo Grande) also star as Tom and his half-brother Matt, who run the insurance company that would have to pay out JP's life insurance policy. While his death has been ruled an accident, the brothers have reasons of their own to not want to pay out the claim, so they start investigating for possible foul play. Which means that this show takes place in flashbacks where we track what the sisters may have been scheming, and then we see the present day investigation where everyone is freaking out about getting discovered. This whole time you have no idea how JP died, whether or not he was actually murdered, and if so, which sister(s) did it. It's such a brilliantly inventive, funny, and captivating script, and the conclusion is rich and satisfying and ties up all loose ends. The tone is dark but hysterical and these actors do a brilliant job of bringing their characters to life and making you root for them every step of the way. You will not be able to stop until you see how it all ends, and then you'll be desperately hoping that someone else dies so we get another season of watching the Garvey sisters and their shenanigans. 

Fleishman Is in Trouble: I loved Taffy Brodesser-Akner's 2019 novel, so I was very excited to learn she had adapted it into a miniseries for FX. Starring Jesse Eisenberg as Toby Fleishman, Claire Danes as his ex-wife Rachel, and Lizzy Caplan as Toby's college friend Libby, who also serves as the omniscient narrator of the series, this is a show about middle-age, marriage, gender norms, and just how self-absorbed human beings can be when beset by their problems. 

It's hard to say much about this show without giving away vast swathes of plot so I won't even try. Instead, I'll just exhort you to go along for the ride. These actors are doing some incredible work, and Brodesser-Akner has written impeccable scripts that fully capture the spirit of her novel. This is a brilliant translation of page to screen and there are stunning visuals and narrative devices to keep the story engaging, and twisty, and surprising. The first half is very focused on Toby's perspective of his divorce and subsequent dating life, but oh boy, just wait until things turns around and you get to hear what Rachel and Libby have been going through. This show perfectly captures how you should never just listen to one person's side of the story when trying to determine what went wrong with a relationship and also gets at the very different experiences men and women can have on either side of coupledom. It's a wonderfully executed show, and a beautiful portrait of the joys and pitfalls of human existence. And since it's all set in New York, I had many moments of pointing at the screen and saying "I know that street!" This is not a show for everyone, and many will moan that it's just about a bunch of rich, white, privileged assholes who don't have real problems. So if you can't stand that sort of thing, stay away. But as a psychological study and examination of the patriarchy, this is an incisive and riveting piece of television, and I fell for it hook, line, and sinker. 

Oscar Hopefuls: Babylon & The Whale

It's that time of the year when all the Oscar movies are out in earnest and the awards chatter is at fever pitch. So over Christmas break, I took a gander at two high-profile pieces of Oscar bait and...oof. 

Babylon: Written and directed by Damien Chazelle, this movie is a quintessential ode to Hollywood, a love letter to the movies that is meant to tug at the heartstrings of sympathetic Oscar voters who love nothing more than to fete their own profession. As soon I saw this film was three hours long, I knew that I might be in for a rough ride and I was sad to discover I was right.

The movie follows a bunch of characters involved in the movies from the height of silent cinema to the birth of the talkies. The first half is the best part of this movie - that's when you simply get a frenetic, chaotic, music video-esque introduction to the world of Hollywood and its gaudy hedonistic excesses. There's a massive scene set at a party/bacchanal at a producer's mansion, and the technical wizardry and choreography required to stage those shots are truly staggering. And then there is an extended scene once the switch to talkies is imminent, where we get a bunch of filmmakers trying to deal with how to make a talking picture. I burst out laughing at one point and couldn't stop giggling for a minute as an increasingly irate director lost his mind about all the various technicalities that kept screwing up his shot. 

If that last scene sounds a bit like Singin' in the Rain to you, you're not wrong. I was very happy when I thought that maybe this movie would just be an R-rated version of that picture. However, the second half quickly fell apart and took more of an interest in the rise and fall of its various characters, who weren't all that interesting. The cast is spectacular, with the likes of Margot Robbie, Brad Pitt, and Jean Smart swanning about, doing their best old-timey Hollywood acts. But gosh, this script is over-the-top and ridiculous and completely swallows its own tail by the end.

Babylon is such a self-aggrandizing movie that is so besotted with itself - and perhaps that's a meta commentary on the lavish insanity of the self-involved people it is depicting. But no. I don't think it's that clever. This is a movie that wants to hammer home the message that movies are great, but ironically, it is terrible. Go for the production design, costumes, thumping score, and impeccable cinematography by Linus Sandgren. But if you're expecting a rousing and uplifting story, you're out of luck.

The Whale: Yes, Brendan Fraser does some fantastic acting in this movie and deserves an award. But I did not like this movie. The tone is icky and feels like it is trying to shame a person for being morbidly obese and turn it into a personal failing rather than a broader public health and societal failure. And I didn't realize the script by Samuel D. Hunter was based on his play, but it did then make sense why this movie is so claustrophobic and contained, where we sit in Charlie's apartment and watch people come in and out of his life and offer up snippets of his personal life to sort of explain why he is the way that he is, but never going very deep.

The movie tells the story of Charlie (Brendan Fraser), a morbidly obese man who is homebound and dependent on his friend, Liz (the wonderful Hong Chau), who is a nurse, to drop by and check in on him. She is extremely frustrated because he refuses to get health insurance and go to the hospital, but they are best friends and she cannot abandon him. When his angry teenage daughter, Ellie (Sadie Sink, who is having quite the year after her turn in Stranger Things) starts to visit him, that prompts more discussion of his past and what has now led him to his current state.

I simply couldn't get into this script or the dialogue. Everything felt so clunky and forced, and there was too much talk about how Charlie was "disgusting" and not fit for public consumption. Hollywood traditionally has such a phobia of fat people, and this movie feels like it's piling on to that narrative. Every time Charlie eats, it is sloppy and messy - that's unnecessary! Why must you show him wiping his hands on his clothes or smearing his face with grease? A person can be obese and still know how to chew their food and eat it neatly. If this movie had focused solely on an examination of Charlie's psyche and his emotions and the reasons he became the man he was, I could get behind it. But it became too much about "look at the fat guy." 

Fraser does a fantastic job of portraying the physicality of this role, and the strain and toll that all this excess weight does to a person's daily functioning. And then he also successfully gives this man a rich emotional inner life, grieving about his ex-partner, trying to foster a fragile connection with his child, joking around with his best friend. But director Darren Aronofsky doesn't let those moments live and breathe, always bringing us back to this fat suit and how gross this fat man is. I've had obese patients before and I know what barriers to care they face from health care providers who want them to take all the blame for their situation. Movies like this only further that narrative and make obesity seem like sort of carnival sideshow attraction. Fraser's performance is integral to ensuring that this man feels like a human being and not an animal (or...a whale, sigh), but with this script and direction, that's an uphill battle.

December Drama: Empire of Light, Bones and All, Pinocchio, Avatar: The Way of Water

December is proving to be a real grab bag of a month in terms of cinematic offerings. So strap right in for the following reviews about movies that feature drama, animation, fantasy, and some light cannibalism.

Empire of Light: I do not think this movie is objectively good, but my God it felt like it was engineered in a lab just for me. Set in 1980s England, it stars Olivia Colman (I'm already sold!), as Hilary, the duty manager at the Empire Cinema. We vaguely know that she has recently returned from hospitalization for a mental health condition, and she initially seems to be a rather quiet and lonely woman, diligently going about her day, but not getting much enjoyment out of anything. She is having an affair with her boss, played by Colin Firth (I am sold again!), but when a new young employee named Stephen (Michael Ward) is hired, sparks unexpectedly fly. 

This is a movie about a frustrated middle-aged woman with serious mental health issues and a young Black man dealing with how Thatcher's Britain has empowered all manner of right-wing nationalists. They have an unexpected connection, but the societal forces around them and their own internal struggles constantly get in their way. But the setting of this love story is this movie theater, this decrepit, but once glorious palace that lets everyone escape for a few hours in their lives. Toby Jones plays the cinema's projectionist, and the scene where he teaches Stephen how to change the reels is magical. And then of course, there's the scene where Colman sits in a theatre by herself getting a private screening of Being There. I could watch that woman's face all day because that is the look on my face every time I am at the movies. At the end of the day, this is a movie about how life is hard, but at least we can always go to the cinema for a pick-me-up. Inject that message directly into my veins.

Pinocchio: I don’t know how 2022 became the Year of Pinocchio, but I’m over it. After the disastrous live action movie starring Tom Hanks, I was wary of going into this animated take co-directed by Guillermo del Toro and Mark Gustafson, from a script co-written by del Toro and Patrick McHale. It has gotten a lot of acclaim for the animation, so sure, go ahead and watch this movie because it is very pretty to look at. And Jiminy Cricket voiced by Ewan McGregor is a treat. But it‘s still the same damn story and I’m afraid my patience has been sorely tested by it this year.

The main update is that instead of the whole insane donkey and carnival sequence, we instead get a frightening look at “what if Pinocchio was drafted into a young fascist group, designed to help Mussolini create an army of Italian boys to defend the fatherland?” I don’t know about you, but I’ve had enough of war for this year, and could not be compelled to care. Again, people do seem to like this movie, so I fully acknowledge I didn’t watch it in the best frame of mind. If you are not burnt out on Pinocchio adaptations or have a true love of animation and del Toro’s storytelling, this could be the absolute perfect movie for you. But for me, at this point in 2022? No thanks.

Avatar: The Way of Water: Welp, this movie was exactly what I expected it to be. Visually spectacular, bloated, and ridiculous. It's probably going to make a bazillion dollars and I will have to watch the sequels for many years to come, but oh God I'm not pleased about it. The script is so cliched that there were multiple times the audience just laughed out loud at the silliness of a scene or a particular line of dialogue. Nothing happens in this movie that you can't predict, but of course the CGI is stunning. I watched it in IMAX 3D and it is mesmerizing and colorful and gorgeous, but did I need three hours of this? No. 

The movie picks back up on the alien plant of Pandora where the indigenous Na'vi people are yet again being threatened by colonizing humans. This time, they specifically want to kill Jake Scully (Sam Worthington) the human who decided to stay in his Na'vi avatar form and fell in love with Neytiri (Zoe Saldana) in the first movie. Now they have children, both biological and adopted, and we will watch them flee from the humans to a new clan of Na'vi called the Metkayina who have a bond with the sea. Here, they will learn the way of water, how to dive and form symbiotic relationships with marine animals, and then proceed to have innumerable battles with the evil, grasping humans. If you like water and fighting, you'll have a grand time. I like water, but I certainly don't like extended fight sequences, so my patience wore thin by the halfway mark. Overall, this movie is self-indulgent and mediocre, and while I'm glad that James Cameron has perfected this motion capture technology, it's time for us to put it to good use in movies that have truly interesting stories to tell.

Bones and All: Here’s my one-sentence review of this film: I was expecting it to be more of a romance but it is heavy on the cannibalism. Directed by Luca Guadagnino from a screenplay by David Kajganich that is an adaptation of Camille DeAngelis' novel, this is the story of Maren (Taylor Russell), a young woman who is a cannibal, who is abandoned by her father (Andre Holland) after he realizes he can no longer protect her. She decides to look for her mother, who is presumably a cannibal herself, and on the subsequent road trip, she runs into Lee (Timothy Chalamet), a fellow “Eater,” and they fall in love, as they finally feel like they’ve found a kindred spirit. Along the way they run into other cannibals (there are weirdly way more than you would think), and those encounters either propel the plot forward or further add to the questions of the ethics and morality of cannibalism and the “rules” each individual abides by to feel like they are living their life the right way.

This movie creeped me the hell out and when I got home, I was exceedingly glad my dinner was meat-free. I’m not sure who the ideal audience is for this film - if you like romance, this movie has too much horror, but if you like horror, this movie has too much romance. It’s a real Catch-22. I found myself counting the minutes until it would be over because it would periodically drag and then suddenly get too gory. I can certainly give the director kudos for coming up with such a bizarre tone and filming it with such cinematic relish. And the cast is fantastic, with the supporting cast including brilliantly unnerving performances from people like Mark Rylance and Michael Stuhlbarg. But oh boy. I certainly did not eat this up with a spoon. 

Mistletoe Merriment: Spirited, Falling for Christmas, The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special

Are you listening to Christmas music all day long and need some new pop culture for your annual holiday rotation? Well, here are two films and a special designed to get you in the holiday spirit!

Spirited: This is a modern-day update of Dickens' A Christmas Carol, where Will Ferrell is the Ghost of Christmas Past, tasked with helping teach a lesson to Clint (Ryan Reynolds), a media consultant who seems to have no scruples whatsoever. As you can imagine, Reynolds and Ferrell are perfectly cast, the former being a peak douche until his heart finally starts to stir, while the latter brings some of that naivete of Buddy the Elf but has been tempered by seeing much more of the world and knowing just how horrid humans can be. 

No spoilers, but there's a fun twist about Ferrell's character's back story. And did I mention, this movie is a musical? The songs are by Pasek & Paul, so get ready for some witty and charming numbers that feel imbued with Broadway magic - I wouldn't be surprised if an actual stage adaptation is in the works because the whole film does feel like it could easily be turned into a Holiday Spectacular.

If you're in need of some Christmas spirit, you can't go wrong with adding this movie to the mix. It has the right blend of humor and heart, a dash of snark tempered by a soupcon of sentiment, and the overall tone manages to be light, frothy, and ultimately, gooey and Christmassy. It's too early to tell if this can become a classic, but it's certainly a good option in 2022 if you're in need of some holiday cheer.

Falling for Christmas: I don't do Hallmark or Lifetime Christmas movies. I tend to be a purist who sticks to the classics and known quantities during Christmas (like my beloved While You Were Sleeping, of course). But when I was told Lindsay Lohan was in a Netflix Christmas movie, I had to watch it. And let me tell you - it is not good, but damned if I didn't start putting my Christmas tree up halfway through the movie because I was overwhelmed by the spirit of the season.

Lohan stars as Sierra, an entitled rich girl whose father owns several ski resorts. She and her social media influencer boyfriend are staying at one of these resorts when she has an accident on a dangerous ski slope and falls (you get it? Falling for Christmas!), wakes up in a hospital, and, of course, has amnesia. Chord Overstreet plays Jake, the man who found her and brought her into the hospital. And luckily, he owns a local bed and breakfast, where he lives with his mother-in-law and young daughter (he's a widower, the sexiest category of Christmas movie leading man), so Sierra can recuperate there while the local police try to figure out who she might be.

It's all terribly predictable and full of cliches, but that's what you want from this kind of movie, right? Just grab a cup of hot chocolate, huddle into a flannel blanket, and settle in for a cozy romcom that also features some magic from a whimsical Santa. Merry Christmas everyone!

The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special: If your biggest gripe about Christmas is that it doesn’t feature any new Marvel movies, well, Disney+ has you covered with a 45-minute special featuring the main cast from Guardians of the Galaxy. Written and directed by James Gunn, be prepared for the same irreverent tone and comedy stylings as the movies, but with a lot of heart and holiday warmth.

I won’t get into the weeds as this is a short watch and you deserve to get a highly concentrated dose of merriment. Suffice to say, there are typical human-alien miscommunications and a delightful guest star who makes for a fun addition to the shenanigans. It’s cute, features some great songs, and is a quick way to get a holiday fix without absolutely wallowing in eggnog. If you’re not a complete Scrooge, but you like to only think about Christmas in brief spurts, this might be exactly the right dose of holiday pop culture for you. 

Thanksgiving Leftovers: Glass Onion & Strange World

If you didn't get caught up on these movies over Thanksgiving, it's not too late. Whether you're seeking a murder mystery or an animated climate change parable, there's something for everyone!

Glass Onion: Come on, if you watched Knives Out, you already know that there's no way Rian Johnson could make a bad movie. The man is one of the best writer-directors in the business and the fact that he has chosen to use his talents to take Daniel Craig, give him a ridiculous New Orleans accent as Detective Benoit Blanc, and deploy him with a cast of shadowy and mysterious people who all have motive and opportunity and need Benoit to solve a dastardly murder is the best thing that has ever happened for the world's holiday viewing options. If I could get a new Knives Out sequel every Thanksgiving for the rest of my life, I would be the happiest woman in the world.

It's a mystery so I can't spoil anything, not even who gets killed. All I'll say is that the cast, including folks like Edward Norton, Kate Hudson, Kathryn Hahn, Leslie Odom Jr., Dave Bautista, and Janelle Monae, are all sublime, playing heightened versions of classic whodunnit stereotypes and giving their best Clue impersonations (every time Hudson screamed, I was immediately reminded of Lesley Ann Warren). It's a twisty and devious little script that keeps doubling back on itself and throwing new information out there to muddy the waters, but it is also scrupulously fair and gives you all the information you need to solve this mystery yourself. But why would you want to when Benoit Blanc is on the case? I noticed the main clue right away but the film managed to distract me with many red herrings - Agatha Christie would be proud. 

This movie also boasts sublime production and costume design. Everything is taking placed on a beautiful sun-drenched Greek island which feels like a self-contained, bizarre, slightly unreal world. You're stepping into a mystery novel for two hours: it's a captivating delight from start to finish and you won't regret a second.

Strange World: If you're in need of a Fantasia-esque Disney experience, you've come to the right place. This is an animated movie with a lot of color and whimsy, and a not-so-subtle message about preserving our planet. It's perfect for young kids, but it's also fun as an adult because it's just so weird and wonderful to look at.

Jake Gyllenhaal voices Searcher, the son of the famous explorer Jaeger Clade (Dennis Quaid) who disappeared on an expedition many years ago. Searcher is now an adult with his own family, and he leads a very settled, stable life as a farmer, helping to grow Pando, the miracle plant that helps to power the world he lives in. But of course his son, Ethan (Jaboukie Young-White), is not content with being a farmer and is harboring ambitions to be an explorer like his grandfather. What follows is an expedition into a mysterious realm, because Searcher needs to figure out why the Pando plants are all dying. He teams up with a host of people, including his wife, Meridian (Gabrielle Union), and they all have a twisty adventure set in a gorgeous land brimming with weird creatures (many of which are destined to become fun squishy toys for Disney to market to young children). 

The third act reveal about what is happening to the plants is rather stunning, and this is a great example of inventive storytelling and visual artistry, with great voice acting all around. This is also a very diverse movie. Searcher and Meridian are an interracial couple, Ethan is gay, and their dog only has three legs but happily runs all over the place and joins in the shenanigans. Everyone is very accepting and casual about living their life as befits them and I hope animated movies continue to better reflect the world as it is. After all, when your movie is set in a world filled by weirdly colored blobs, it doesn't feel like there's any reason to insist all the humans be white. Directed by Don Hall and written by Qui Nguyen, this movie has been flying under the radar, but it's well worth a shot if you need something charming to watch this month.

Memoirs of a Director: Armageddon Time & The Fabelmans

Oscar season is upon us and as all the prestige movies roll into theaters, we have two semi-autobiographical films about the directors' childhoods. Both men are grappling with Jewish identity and families who don't fully support their artistic endeavors, but they still put their individual stamp on these films to make unique and compelling cinema.

Armageddon Time: Written and directed by James Gray, this film is a perfect snapshot of 1980 in the life of Paul (Banks Repeta), a sixth-grader growing up in Queens, New York. He loves to draw and dreams of being a famous comic book artist, but his dreamy nature means that he doesn't do particularly well in public school and keeps getting into trouble. He befriends a young Black boy, Johnny (Jaylin Webb), who has already been labelled a troublemaker by their teacher and most other adults; what follows is a story of the tenuous friendship between these two kids, and the many ways in which the system always fails Johnny while giving Paul multiple chances to succeed.

Paul's family life is portrayed by a who's who of actors, with Jeremy Strong playing his taciturn father, Irving, who is prone to bouts of violence and has a massive chip on his shoulder, and Anne Hathaway as his overwhelmed but ambitious mother, Esther.  All they want is for their sons to succeed in life and have a better life than they did, and they have the support of Esther's father, Aaron, played with overwhelming kindness and generosity by Anthony Hopkins. Aaron is the only family member who truly sees Paul and his dreams, and he encourages him to be the best person he can be. But as the movie proceeds, it becomes clear that even his grandfather's support is somewhat rhetorical and will always take a backseat to the practical considerations of ensuring Paul can have a better life.

This movie imbues every character with nuance, never painting anyone as an abject villain (well, except for cops and teachers, who very literally divide the world into black and white). Instead, there are many grey areas to navigate here, and Paul quickly comes to learn that having the best of intentions still cannot translate to the best actions and outcomes. It's a somewhat heartbreaking tale, but there's also a great deal of hope in it. And the fact that we know this is semi-autobiographical means that I left the theater with a sense that here was a man who, like that little boy, is still trying to do the right thing. It's up to you as the audience member to decide whether or not he succeeds. 

The Fabelmans: Directed by Steven Spielberg, who co-wrote the screenplay with Tony Kushner, this is the story of Sammy Fabelman, a young Jewish boy in the 1950s who we follow as a young boy to his first years in college as his family moves from New Jersey, to Phoenix, to California in service of his father's job. His parents, Burt and Mitzi, are played by the wonderful Paul Dano and Michelle Williams, and while they are both very loving, they take different tacks in supporting Sammy's burgeoning love for film and cinema. His father, an engineering genius who is the family's breadwinner, wants his son to be sensible, and stable, and go to college instead of indulging in this "hobby." While his mother, a woman who could have been a concert pianist but instead chose the traditional path and became a housewife, encourages him to be an artist and follow his dreams.

This is a movie about the push and pull between art and responsibility, the outsize influence our families have in shaping our lives when we are younger, and the turbulence and turmoil of adolescence. There's a lot of family drama (and at times comedy) here, but I found myself unmoved by those emotional machinations. There is a lot of attention paid to how Sam's movies make the people around him feel, but for me, this movie was such a piece of technical brilliance that I found myself simply captivated by its story about filmmaking, and couldn't be bothered about the humans.

There are long, loving scenes of spooling and unspooling and splicing film, making cuts and edits, finding the right piece of music to score, indulging in different genres, finding novel techniques to achieve special effects, coaching your actors to get just the right emotion. It's a master class in directing - you're watching the novice Sammy learn how to direct, but because Spielberg is directing this movie, you're benefitting from the fact that he is now this incredible, seasoned director who knows exactly how to tell this story about his younger self. There are scenes where he simply lingers on Michelle Williams' face as she watches a film, or shows how the pulse in someone's neck slowly fades away, or suddenly veers into an homage to West Side Story in the movie's final act when Sammy becomes a high schooler. It's almost Inception-esque, with films within films, and directing within directing.

The final shot of this movie made me laugh. That's all I'll say. But as far as I'm concerned, it is the most memorable and classic way to end this film - that one shot captures everything I've said about the winking, meta nature of the script, and serves as a reminder of how lucky we are to still have Steven Spielberg directing movies.