Top Films of 2018: 5-1

5. Ms. 45 (1981), Abel Ferrara, Image
For some reason, I have watched too many of this sort of film recently. Revenge fantasy movies are a dime a dozen, but Abel Ferrara's film is better than most. It follows Thana, a mute seamstress, who takes revenge on her rapists. The film is highly stylized and the cinematography is spectacular for a low-budget grindhouse feature. Ferrara respects Thana for the most part and allows her to get her revenge in fairly unexpected ways. The film starts off with cascading violence (Thana is raped twice in the first ten minutes), and I expected a much sleazier picture, but Ferrara's attention to detail and the great performance by Zoe Tamerlis Lund, without any dialogue no less, redeems a picture that on paper could read like an eighty-minute exercise in sadism. The brisk pacing and running time no doubt help.

4. The Thin Man (1934), W.S. Van Dyke, MGM
The Thin Man is not a faithful adaptation of Dashiell Hammett's novel, but it is a true one, and that might be more important. Nick and Nora Charles seem like a real married couple because William Powell and Myrna Loy instill them with amazing chemistry that gives them energy and reality. The screenplay was also written by a married couple The story is pure screwball, starting as a missing person case and ending up a murder mystery. Nick is sly in his observations and Nora is witty. The dog Asta is cute, but he seldom helps solve anything. The mystery is solved at a dinner party where all the suspects are gathered. This film is a blueprint for others like it, but it inverts the form with style and grace.

3. My Friend Dahmer (2017), Marc Myers, FilmRise
I didn't want to put more than one film with a serial killer in my top list, but My Friend Dahmer was one of the more interesting films I watched this year. Ross Lynch is well cast as the awkward and malleable, young Dahmer. His friends are also cast well, and it is easy to understand their initial interest and later revulsion with the young Dahmer. Marc Myers' subtle direction instills the character with more empathy than he should probably have, while the performances walk a thin line between revulsion and humor. It is unsettling that Dahmer seems so normal until the very end.

2. Wings of Desire (1987), Wims Wender, Road Movies
Wings of Desire is a beautiful movie on many fronts -- direction, cinematography, acting, story -- you name it. Wims Wender is quickly becoming one of my favorite directors, and I'm sad that I did not check his stuff out sooner. I had always heard great stuff, but I never had the opportunity. Thanks to FilmStruck, I have been able to watch many movies I would not have otherwise. I am happy that Criterion will be debuting their channel shortly. The film is haunting, as well as beautiful, and the acting, from such luminaries as Bruno Ganz and Solveig Dommartin, adds an edge to a film that is already saturated with sadness. It tells the story of angels that comfort Berlin's citizens but also deals with the boundaries between humans and angels. Angels can understand and feel human pain and fall in love with their subjects, and the tension this creates reinforces a narrative that intimately addresses the fragility of human existence.

1. The Night of the Hunter (1955), Charles Laughton, United Artists

Robert Mitchum's performance as Harry Powell is revelatory. At times he is diabolically evil, while at others he is purely nihilistic. Either way, he is a sadistic character, who controls the screen. The other performances are wonderful, and Charles Laughton's subtle direction makes this one of the most disturbing films I have seen in a long time. Yet it is so watchable, it was hard to stop watching. I also have a hard time not loving a film where the main character has "love" and "hate" tattooed across the knuckles of his hands. The children in the film add to the credibility of a noir that stretches the boundaries. Harry Powell is a serial killer and con man who terrorizes a small town as he attempts to maintain control over his life and force his will upon others.

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