-First Man - The Cost of Success

Hey everyone, I hope you're all having a great end to your 2018. I hope your year's wrapping up, the holidays are going well, you're looking forward to 2019. I thought I'd end the year by going over some of my favorite movies of 2018. Now this is by no means a hard, set-in-stone list. I am going to be doing a list of what I consider to be the best movies later in the year, but these are the movies that I enjoyed the most, the ones that I'm probably going to be returning to, or already have returned to, the ones that meant the most to me, and if you want intel into which videos are going to be coming out based on 2018's movies, this is a pretty good list to start because these are the movies that I liked the most. So, without any real order, these are the movies that meant the most to me, and the ones that I'll probably be returning to, and the first one is going to be Black Klansman. I'm a huge fan of Spike Lee. I feel like every film he does is thought-provoking, and at least to one extent or another, a little bit challenging, and that's ultimately what I'm looking for in a good movie. I feel like he's really saying something in every movie that he makes, and Black Klansman is certainly no exception to that. He really does a great job mixing stylistic elements with more traditional storytelling elements, and it's a really great job. One complaint that I see with a lot of his movies is that he kind of lets the style get the better of him, which is definitely a fair criticism, but ultimately that really wasn't a factor at all in this movie. I was legitimately wondering if he was not going to do like the escalators, not escalators, but like moving sidewalk shot that he's so famous for, but he definitely had that at the end, and anyway, big fan of his work. It definitely worked out well. I will say one small complaint with Black Klansman is that I felt that some parts of it were a little heavy-handed, but something that I really value in a movie is subtlety. I feel like if you can get a message across without just jamming it in the audience face, that is probably how to do it the best way, but ultimately it's an important message to get out, and did a great job selling its message. I definitely feel as though Black Klansman started a conversation. One thing that I really liked about the movie was how it presented the idea of pride in your culture and how far you can take it, and I feel like that's kind of been an idea found throughout a lot of his films. I feel like he really just explored that and just had a great way to show what he believed in, and I was very much impressed with how Black Klansman turned out. One of my favorite Spike Lee movies in a while, probably top five ever, so anyway, if you have not seen Black Klansman, by all means check it out. Spike Lee did it again. The next movie I wanted to talk about was First Man, so as far as I'm concerned, Damien Chazelle is one of the best filmmakers working today. The three major releases that he's done, Whiplash La La Land and First Man, may not be the best of those three, but it definitely is the most unique. I think it's really cool seeing the development of a young filmmaker going from two films that are certainly related, the ideas of dreams and ambition, obviously the big musical element, and then it's going in a completely new direction with the biopic, the historical side of it, and definitely exploring a very different character. You get the same drive as you saw in the other two films, but just taken in a completely different context, and I just love seeing a filmmaker explore something new. It's different, and it's cool seeing the development of Damien Chazelle as one of the best filmmakers out there today. I don't think anyone was saying that the first two movies just happened to be good, but the more that I see of him is really what makes me think that he's got such potential to just keep on improving. He can handle so many different genres and do it so well. I think first and foremost, what makes him so great is how great of a storyteller he is. Every movie that he makes asks questions. It does things in a unique way. I feel like the idea of the Astronaut movie, we've seen it before, but he definitely took a different approach to it and did it in a great way, and I'm definitely looking forward to talking about this movie. Don't quote me on this, but I believe it's going to be my first dissection of 2019, so I'm super excited for that. Yeah, I'm looking forward to talking about it and watching it again and really diving deep into it because as far as I'm concerned, it's one of the best movies of the year. The next movie I want to talk about is Widows, which as far as I'm concerned, it's absolutely fantastic. Steve McQueen is one of the best working directors today. He's made four movies so far with Hunger, Shame, 12 Years a Slave, and of course, the most recent one, Widows, and I've loved them all. I've talked about two in videos already. I'm definitely planning on talking about the other two sooner rather than later. Widows is absolutely fantastic. I like how much it says without saying anything at all. I don't want to give any specifics because it's a movie that's best if you just kind of go in not really knowing what to expect. Just go in, take it. The marketing and the trailer, it kind of paints it as a different movie than it is, but ultimately, that's exactly what the movie is. But I guess first and foremost and what is so great about this movie is just exactly that, how great of a movie it is. It's such a fascinating story and like I said, it says so much while saying so little. There are so many ideas that are brought up below the surface that aren't directly mentioned that'll definitely want to be explored when I make a video about this movie, but there's so much subtlety to it which like I said when discussing Black Clansmen, that is definitely something that I appreciate. It's a movie that I want to watch again. It's not playing anywhere near me anymore, which is kind of unfortunate. I was lucky enough to see it in theaters and it's a two and a half hour long movie, I think, and I got out of the theater and would have sworn it was an hour and a half long movie. It's just time flies, such great pacing, such great performances. You never quite know what's going to happen. You've got to feel when things are in the works, but yeah, absolutely fantastic and definitely one of the year's best movies. Moving on, Roma was absolutely fantastic. I feel like it's really cool how Netflix is changing the entire filmmaking and film watching environment. The fact that we're able to get movies that would not get a traditional theatrical release, or at least not a big one today like Black and White, this would not be an option today. We're able to see, we're able to watch, and we're able to all appreciate great movies because of online streaming services. Now whatever ethical problems you want to get into with them, I don't really care because at the end of the day they're presenting great movies to us and that's ultimately all that I care about. Roma is no exception. Alfonso Cuaron has definitely proven himself to be a great filmmaker. Truth be told, I was never too big on gravity. I feel like in a lot of ways the storytelling and stylistic choices took over a lot of the fundamental story itself. So anyway, without getting into that, Roma definitely did suffer from that. A fantastic story and the way that it was presented was excellent. I think it's pretty cool how the big, large-scale, blockbuster side of gravity, as opposed to a much smaller, independent, shows off his range, which is something that I mentioned quite a bit and something that I definitely value when it comes to great filmmakers. It really shows exactly what you want to see from a filmmaker. Someone who's able to take any type of story and tell it in a fantastic way. There's so much to love about this movie and it's only been out for a few weeks now, or maybe even less than that, but I've already gone back and watched it twice and will definitely be watching it more in the future. It's just a great movie and definitely one that you should watch and support. If you're someone who wants more independent films, watch it on Netflix. I think that all that metadata gets recorded and hopefully we get more great movies on Netflix, just because this is definitely one that is worth watching. But what is probably my favorite With a U film of the year is actually The Favourite. It's a movie that made me appreciate Lathimos' previous films, even though I already really love them. I feel like, and this is not unique to The Favourite, I feel like with every new film of his that I watch, I feel like I understand what he's been trying to say in his older movies even more. I feel like the older movies help propel his current movies, which is super unique. I feel like just the more that we see of him, the more that we see of his vision, the more that we see of his style, just the more that becomes clear. Just what he's trying to do and exactly how he's doing it, because he's doing it incredibly well. The Favourite, there's so much to love about this movie. It's funny. At the same time, it tells an excellent story. It never lets the humor get into the way of storytelling, because in a lot of ways, it's such an absurd story in the way that it's told is in an absurd light, so it helps complement and build off of one another. At the same time, I never felt like the story suffered because of the humor. In fact, quite the opposite. I feel like what separates good comedies and bad comedies is incorporating humor into the story, and Lathimos does that quite possibly better than any filmmaker working today. The Favourite might be his best film so far. I do want to go back and revisit some of his older films, just because, like I said, it all helps build onto one another and changes my understanding of what he is doing based off of the information that I've seen. I'm definitely looking forward to revisiting his older movies because I've seen a new one. It's just so cool that these are the movies that are being made by such a great filmmaker. His work is unique. Like I said earlier, challenging and thought-provoking are definitely two words that have been thrown out a lot in this video because they mean a lot to me in his films, and this is definitely no exception to that. It's a movie that makes me want to revisit it, to watch the ever-changing relationships of the characters and ultimately how we as the audience view them, because that's ultimately what this movie is about. It's essentially three major character studies with a lot of side character studies going on in the background and watching the ever-changing relationships and the shifts of power. If you saw my Godfather video, which I released on Saturday, you would have seen how it's ultimately about the control of power, and that's exactly what The Favourite is about. It's about the ever-changing relationship of power and how that impacts relationships and individuals and what they strive for and intention and obstacle. In every good storytelling device that I look for and that I find challenging in films is in The Favourite, and it's one that I absolutely love. So if you have not seen The Favourite, go out and support it. Pretty much all these movies have been on the smaller scale. No $100 million blockbusters in this list, but going out and supporting these smaller movies is definitely the best way to get more movies like this made, which I think we all want because these movies are a ton of fun. They're excellent, some of the best and most thought-provoking works of the year, and if you have any interest like I do in these movies, which I assume you do because these are the movies that I like talking about on the YouTube channel, so definitely go over, go to your local theater, pay a couple, like $9 for a daytime showing, there probably won't be a whole lot of people in it, and go out and support these great movies. They're in theaters now, and I'm definitely a firm believer that a theatrical watch is the best way to watch most of these movies. Even the non-big blockbusters, the theatrical releases are oftentimes the best way to watch these movies, and they're in theaters now, at least a lot of them are, so go out there, support them, and hopefully you'll enjoy a movie as much as I enjoyed them. So overall I thought 2018 was a pretty good year for movies. I kind of slipped during a lot of the summer months when I wasn't really available to watch a ton of movies, but I've been doing catch-up. I'm definitely, like I said earlier, planning on doing a very official ranking list where I go back, revisit every movie that I can, get my hands on the big ones, the small ones, and everything in between, and I'm definitely looking forward to putting out a best of the year list sometime during next year. So anyway, look forward to that. Thank you all for your support during 2018. I'm looking forward to 2019. I think it's going to be great for the channel, and thank you for watching. I'm looking forward to 2019, and be sure to comment your favorite movies of 2018. I'd love to have a discussion down in the comments below. It's something that I love doing, and would love to get going on this one. So anyway, thank you all so much for your support, like I said, and thank you for watching.