I really didn’t know what to make of “Avengers: Infinity War” when I walked out of the theater. It’s such a weird mess of a film, frequently incoherent and often absurd. At the same time, it’s hard to deny that the filmmakers tried. They tried to make its villain interesting; they tried to make the runtime largely entertaining; they tried to add some weight to a cinematic “universe” that has only come to seem lighter and less substantial with each installment. I’m not sure they fully succeeded in any of that, really, and it’s not just because the narrative of the film ends up, morally speaking, in some seriously questionable territory. It’s a just bizarre film that seems to defy any kind of appraisal. Given the massive box office receipts though you’ve probably already seen it yourself, along with millions of others. So what anyone thinks of it, including me, probably doesn’t matter in the slightest.
Another unexpected downside of “Infinity War” is that it seemed to put an unexpected amount of distance between John Krasinski’s unexpectedly satisfying “A Quiet Place,” which seemed like a late winter gem, and the summer movie season. Not that I relish all of the dreck that’s usually trotted out in the early part of the year, but if nothing else it’s a time for interesting if imperfect movies. “A Quiet Place” exemplifies that perfectly; a weird little horror movie that can boast its fair share of surprises, mostly in how deeply felt it is. Anyway, I watched it in mid-April but that was a long time ago; it’s May now and summer is well underway, at least at the movies.
Including those two, I saw a total of fifteen movies last month, and wrote at moderate length on a few of them, linked below.
- “The Raid 2” Technically impressive, narratively tedious.
- “Mudbound” A public service announcement that voiceovers are a very bad idea.
- “Bye Bye Birdie” I saw it out of historical curiosity. It basically killed my historical cat.
- “Justice League” An incoherent vision from minds who could care less. Read my review.
- “The Ballad of Lefty Brown” Meh.
- “My Secret World” The best—and only—documentary of the indie record label Sarah Records that will ever be made.
- “Ball of Fire” A masterpiece.
- “Vengeance” Awkward and silly.
- “A Quiet Place” As good as people say.
- “Alien: Covenant” Not a minute of this dumb movie feels at all surprising. Read my review.
- “The Zen Diaries of Garry Shandling” A wonderful gift.
- “The Color Wheel” Something special—and weird.
- “The Petrified Forest” Sort of like the secret origin of Humphrey Bogart.
- “MacGruber” A modern classic.
- “Avengers: Infinity War”
If you’re interested, here’s what I watched in March, February and January. You can also see my complete list of everything I watched in 2017 and follow along with my film diary over at letterboxd.com.
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