Although Happy End never quite escapes from under the cloud of Michael Haneke’s previous films, its derivative narrative threads do eventually congeal into a greater point around the suppressed misery and hidden depravity of the bourgeoisie, chillingly hidden behind stoic expressions that only isolate them further from the rest of the world.
In bringing narrative tension to a classic Broadway revue of disconnected musical numbers, The Band Wagon lands as a boisterous examination of failure and success in the entertainment industry, rolling along with zeal while Vincente Minnelli’s exhilarating camerawork brings propulsive dimensions to that which unfolds onstage.
Jacques Tati’s bizarre, elaborate vision of Paris in Playtime is an intricately stacked construction of modernist architecture and comedic set pieces, sending up the soulless conformity of commercial society with a cinematic vision as monumentally ambitious as it is methodically delicate.
In drawing a series of parallels between humans and their primate cousins in Planet of the Apes, Franklin J. Schaffner exposes both our inherently primitive psychology and our unique propensity for self-destruction, though not without framing his anthropological questions within a richly constructed world of great mysteries and thrills.
Like a folk ballad that keeps returning to the same chorus, Inside Llewyn Davis moves in destitute cycles, as its titular character endlessly searches for musical success and self-sabotages relationships, forming the nomadic foundation of the Coen Brothers’ beautifully tactile portrait of adversity.
The constant struggle between one paroled prisoner’s moral compass and his desire to be seen as a moral person permeates A Hero with a provocative ethical ambiguity, and through Asghar Farhadi’s flair for searing realism and a wonderfully thorny screenplay, it sprouts a complex drama that sees a simple plan to regain honour veer off in unexpected directions.
It is in the intersection of heartfelt drama and sharply edited, thrill-seeking aerial jet sequences that Top Gun: Maverick takes flight, resolving the lingering threads of guilt from the original film with a sensational, breathtaking vigour that Joseph Kosinski delights in driving towards its adrenalising conclusion.
With the magnetic charisma of Tom Cruise and Tony Scott’s exhilarating aerial jet sequences, Top Gun stands as an admirable piece of action cinema, lifting the genre up to new heights and coasting along on its electrifying pacing.
More than simply establishing a language of visual storytelling, Abel Gance pioneers cinematic techniques in Napoleon that have not been touched since, punctuating every key beat in this dense, sprawling account of the historical leader’s rise to power with epic flourishes of artistic grandeur wholly unique to his own trailblazing intuitions.
In centring a shady gang of thieves known as Les Vampires that haunts Paris’ streets, Louis Feuillade crafts an epic crime serial that plays right into the pulpy sensationalism of their macabre characters, each one inhabiting their own compelling archetype within a thrilling narrative of hypnotised servants, cunning disguises, and secret poisons.
