Michael Ward on Sunday, January 03

THE BEST PERFORMANCES OF 2020

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“One of the things I love most about this life is that there’s no final goodbye. I’ve met hundreds of people out here, and they don’t ever say a final goodbye. They’ll just say, ‘I’ll see you down the road.’ And I do. I see them again. And I can be certain in my heart, ‘l see you again.’ - Bob Wells (as Bob) in Nomadland.

2020 was rough. COVID-19 humbled us and changed us forever. While it seems trivial to bridge a global pandemic to the movies we watch to be entertained and escape from the world for a while - well, that pleasure has likely been altered forever as well. Movie theaters largely shut down in 2020, when it became too dangerous to remain open. While more than 2,000 screens popped open by year’s end, theater chains AMC, Regal, and Cinemark, and thousands of small movie theaters, all suffered mightily.

Premium Video on Demand (PVOD) is now a thing. Streaming platforms are chock full of more new releases than ever before. Warner Bros. is now releasing their entire 2021 slate on to the HBO Max platform the same day they drop into conventional theaters. Wonder Woman 1984, Soul, Trolls World Tour and other films skipped theaters altogether and debuted for audiences in the comfort of their own homes.

Dozens of movies moved their release dates into 2021 and beyond, making it fair to ask just what movies are actually coming and when and where will we be able to see them. To keep track of movies is confusing, of that there is no doubt.

And yet, seemingly more movies were released than ever before. For my local film critics organization (The Seattle Film Critics Society), a record number of movies attained eligibility for voting consideration. Previous press-only film festivals went virtual to the general public. Makeshift streaming services emerged, known as Virtual Cinemas, where at-home viewing tickets were purchased in the hopes of funding and saving independent movie houses and small theater chains all around the country.

Access to movies has never been easier. And much like Bob Wells’ quote above from Chloé Zhao’s extraordinary film Nomadland, movies are not going anywhere. If anything, we will only have more of them as people use multiple different platforms and streaming services for distribution.

To celebrate the movies of 2020, we had to step out of our comfort zones a bit. We ventured out a bit and sampled some different fare. I, for one, found a lot to enjoy but recognize that with no blockbusters filling multiplexes and big name stars largely pushed aside for smaller, quieter, more intimate movies for the time being - lots of folks feel like there just weren’t any good movies in 2020.

That’s too bad. A lot of really great movies were released in 2020, some of which will roll out to you in the start of 2021, as the Oscar delay into April 2021 has slowed the release calendar of films eligible for competing for awards this year. And amid those really great movies came some stellar, truly memorable performances.

You certainly may have missed them, and that’s okay. Let me do that work for you.

While it seems strange to be celebrating movies as we continue living through the fog of COVID-19, as a film critic and writer my hope is that something I see can be of interest to you. That we can keep a community together that shares in the joy of storytelling, shared experiences, and watching actors, writers, directors, composers, and filmmakers reflect back to us the stories we have lived in our lives.

At the end of the day, the work is what connects with us.

Below are 20 performances that left a resounding impression upon me amid all the chaos of 2020. As I reflect on what got me through some difficult times, these artists will comprise much of what I carry forward with me for a long, long time. I have added an additional 15 Honorable Mentions to seek out and find. Believe me, I could have another 20 on top of that…easily.

Below: The Top 20 (in alphabetical order) will be presented with the words of the the artists themselves, or from those who had a hand in creating the stunning work they put out into the world. A slideshow will give you a glimpse at those Honorable 15.

Let’s dive in to the best that 2020 has to offer…and stay safe and healthy and take care of each other. Let’s all endeavor to see each other down the road real soon.

1. RIZ AHMED | Ruben | SOUND OF METAL

As the drummer of a punk/metal band, Ruben begins to experience intermittent hearing loss following his performances. A recovering addict who has used music to fuel years of sobriety, he learns his condition will only worsen. Relocating into a sober house for the deaf, Ruben’s hearing loss increases as a community attempts to nurture him into accepting the new realities he faces in his life.

“When you only get one or two shots of something, you’re not going in thinking about trying it this way and that way. You just have to go from the gut and be in the moment. We were also shooting chronologically, which helps us live through it. And also, the way that it was shot, we didn’t have a lot of takes, but there was an intimacy and an observational, almost documentary style to the way things were done that really helped us to live in it a bit more. Learning the drums is one thing, but spending seven months learning them and then having two takes to do the gig is another thing.” - Collider, December 9, 2020

“Ruben is someone…trying to construct his identity, as many of us do. He’s dying his hair blonde, he’s defining himself with all these tattoos on his body, and this is who he is. This guy, his life is music, he lives in an RV with his girlfriend, tours America, that’s what he does. So he has a clear but almost brittle sense of who he is, a very clear attempt to define himself. It was important to have that as a starting point. He’s someone who very much has ownership and construction of his identity. That’s important because by the end of the film the journey he’s going on is one of realizing that you can’t control anything in life, least of all who you are or who you think you are. We thought it was really important for there to be a visual transformation of the journey of the character that is almost a stripping back of some of these masks and armor to get back to a place of simplicity and nakedness and to the core of who Ruben is outside of his labels.” - National Board of Review, December 16, 2020

Sound of Metal is now available on Amazon Prime.

2. MARIA BAKALOVA | Tutar Sagdiyev | BORAT SUBSEQUENT MOVIEFILM

Controversial Kazakh journalist, Borat Sagdiyev, is summoned back to America to make amends with President Trump for embarrassing Kazakhstan 14 years before when he made his first film. During his departure, he learns of a 15-year-old daughter, Tutar, he never knew he had. Hiding away, she joins her father in America against his wishes.

(on seeing the first Borat film after landing the role as Tutar): “That was when I realized it was going to be a sequel to a big, famous movie, I was extremely impressed and inspired. And I was a little bit scared, because he (Sacha Baron Cohen and his Borat character) is huge. I hadn’t spent that much time thinking about bigger movies. Most of the parts we (as Bulgarian actors) are given are like two lines as a prostitute, a hooker, or maybe a Russian mafia person who’s not even Bulgarian. I thought I should not dream of such things.” - Indiewire, December 1, 2020

“Sacha explained that Tutar should be as crazy as Borat, maybe even crazier. She should be completely disoriented — what is right, what is wrong — and through this journey, she should learn how to be a normal human. It’s a satirical movie, it’s over the top, but he got me thinking about what it would be like, living this life, even if it’s fake. He’d be like, would you be happy if people treated you this way — if the whole purpose of your life was to get married and live in a cage? It’s a movie of how a girl can grow up and should grow up. How people can treat you as not equal because you’re a woman and what kind of options you have.” - New York Times, November 11, 2020

(and filming that scene with a particular Mayor): “Yeah. I was nervous. My heart was racing. But Sacha was like, you should be nervous in this situation. So use your nerves. Convert them and accept them and they’re going to help you through everything. I saw everything that you saw. If you saw the movie, that’s our message. We want everybody to see the movie and judge for themselves.” - New York Times, November 11, 2020

Borat Subsequent Moviefilm is now available on Amazon Prime

3. CHADWICK BOSEMAN & VIOLA DAVIS | as Levee (Boseman) and Ma Rainey (Davis) | MA RAINEY’S BLACK BOTTOM

In Chadwick Boseman’s final performance, he stars alongside Viola Davis is this cinematic adaptation of August Wilson’s Tony-nominated stage play. On a hot, summer day in 1927 Chicago, blues singer Ma Rainey is late for a recording session. As her band rehearses, in preparation of her arrival, horn player Levee becomes increasingly brash and combative throughout the day with his bandmates.

Davis: “Everything attracted me to Ma Rainey, especially the idea that I didn’t feel I could play her. But she also really reminds me of the women I grew up with, all my aunties and relatives, the people who were bigger in stature whom I saw as so beautiful. They never questioned their worth. They had the full makeup, the earrings, the Afros, the wide-leg pants. In white American culture, the idea of classic beauty and confidence has always been associated with extreme thinness, but not in my culture. In the African-American culture, we are in command of our bodies. There’s an unapologetic way that we approach clothing. Even in the way Ma Rainey’s breasts were hanging out. At first I was like, ‘Should I pull my dress up and be more modest?’ But I had to channel Ma, and she wouldn’t do that. Neither did my relatives.” - InStyle, November 9, 2020

(Director George C. Wolfe (pictured above) on working with Boseman): “I think when you look at the number of film performances that he has, culminating in Ma Rainey, the range is extraordinary. He’s clearly an actor of extraordinary charisma and profound emotional depth and incredibly skilled. Working with him, working with the entire cast, it was an unbelievable joy. When I heard of his passing, I was just in a state of shock and sadness, and it wasn’t about revisiting [the past]. But every single thing that I feel about his work in the film, it’s a source of tremendous pride for me and a huge blessing because I, like the rest of the company, was working with a great artist. And that’s my memory—that’s what I’m holding on to. I’m holding on to the fact that we talked about working again together, and he sent me a script and I sent him a script and we talked about doing a play. So, the sadness that I feel is very deep and real, but on the other side of that is the pride and joy of his work.” - Observer, December 18, 2020

Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom is now available on Netflix.

4. GARRETT BRADLEY | as Director and Co-Producer | TIME

Sibil “Fox” Rich is a mother of six sons, fighting for the release of her incarcerated husband, Rob, for more than 20 years. Through a combination of present-day footage and 18 years of private home videos Fox recorded in documenting her family’s lives for Rob’s hopeful release, the phrase Time takes on a multi-layered significance in Garrett Bradley’s documentary film.

(on her process and incorporating Fox Rich’s personal videos into the film): “I’m not interested in entering somebody’s life and following every moment of their day, then taking that into the editing room and finding a story. I try actually to spend enough time with the person that I can anticipate what their days look like. I can even anticipate, to a certain extent, their lifestyle and physical movement in the room so that my camera just has to be in one place, and everything can unfold in front of it. There’s a certain static stillness and understanding in what’s to be anticipated in our current-day footage. All of that was completely thwarted going through the archives. It was texturally different, tonally different. So, trying to find a way to bring them together became the beginning of Fox and [me] really, truly collaborating with each other across space and time."

(on presenting the film in black-and-white): “Once we started getting into the archive…there were real formal and aesthetic challenges that were easily resolved by using black and white. It was really important to me that the film felt like a river, that it felt fluid and consistent, because we’re going back and forth between times, shifting through space. The textures and the materiality of the archive up against the slick clean zooms of the present day footage felt to me like they really worked against one another. I also thought that the music—which was Emahoy Tsegué-Maryam Guèbrou’s piano album that she recorded in 1964 to raise money for an orphanage in Ethiopia—was going to hold the film so much better if the visual element felt tight. Also, I think it is important to remember that black and white film used to be our only option. Then, color film became not an alternative but a standard. I guess, in my opinion, film is still too young for standards.” - Filmmaker, July 7, 2020

Time is now available on Amazon Prime

5. JOAQUÍN COCIÑA & CRISTÓBAL LEÓN | as Directors, Writers, Cinematographers, Art Directors, and Animators | THE WOLF HOUSE (LA CASA LOBO)

A young woman escapes from a dangerous religious sect, and is welcomed into a strange home inhabited by two pigs. Soon, the pigs become human, Maria’s sanctuary becomes a home to disorienting nightmares and experiences, and the proverbial “Wolf House” takes on a much more sinister and harrowing meaning. Utilizing stop-motion animation, where the film is literally constructed and deconstructed before our very eyes, The Wolf House is animation and storytelling unlike anything we have seen before.

Cociña (on the film’s groundbreaking stop-motion animation): We try to prove that [it] is actually simple. For me, [it] is a matter of focus and time. Of course, it seems difficult to spend more than five years on a single project, but for us [it] was actually a pleasant process. We try to show through the film that if you want to [do] animated or do any kind of art [it] is only a matter of focus. The film tells Maria’s story but also the material’s story. And in this journey we try hard to present the bones and flesh of the process so you can think, ‘maybe I can do the same; it does not look impossible.’

León: We had a lot of practice from all the short films we made previously. We try to keep it simple, and we try to turn our technical limitations into aesthetic qualities. We had a great time animating. Now that I haven’t animated much in the past two years, I miss it.”

León (discussing the inspiration for the film): The story of Colonia Dignidad is a very present story in our country. The colony played a central role in the recent history of Chile. This makes them different from other isolated and eccentric communities like the Amish or Menonites (sic). Colonia Dignidad was several things: a sect led by a semi-divine figure; a criminal organization that committed every conceivable crime (from tax evasion to pedophilia, through trafficking and weapons manufacturing); an intelligence agency that collaborated with the intelligence organizations of the Pinochet dictatorship; and finally a concentration camp for political prisoners also during the dictatorship. They disguised themselves as a welfare and social organization, and this was the image that we had of the colony as children who grew up in dictatorship. They even had a restaurant on the highway where I had lunch with my parents a couple of times on the way to vacation.”

Cociña: I do not know what people will think, but I am pretty sure that [it] is not a film that you will forget that easily. It kind of gets stuck to you, even if you do not want to.” - Hollywood Soapbox, May 14, 2020

The Wolf House is now available for rent or purchase on major VOD platforms and the KimStim Films Screening Room

6. SIDNEY FLANIGAN | as Autumn | NEVER RARELY SOMETIMES ALWAYS

Faced with an unintended pregnancy, and no support from anyone around her, a teenage girl ventures to New York City with her cousin for a trip that will forever change their lives.

(regarding their acting debut): “When I was reached out to by Eliza (Hittman, director)'s partner, Scott, who I met when I was about 14, at first I wasn't sure what it was about at all. He just texted saying, ‘Well, Eliza is making a film. And she's interested in you auditioning.’ At first, I just thought I was totally incapable. You know, I didn't think that I could be an actor and I was worried that I wouldn't be able to leave for two months. I was worried that, ‘Oh, I have a band, how would I pay my bills while I'm gone?’ And then I learned that I was able to pay my bills because [of it]. I didn't think I was capable of it and I ended up giving it a shot. I didn't want to miss out on that opportunity because I was afraid to take a risk. So I took it and I was very surprised when I got it. I read her script and saw that it was an abortion movie and I was like, ‘Oh, well that's really cool.’ And I was really impressed by how well [Eliza] had written it and I really wanted to be a part of that. So when I took on the opportunity and actually got it, it was like overwhelmingly cool.”

“I didn't necessarily do any kind of conventional research. I got the part and then things happened, and started real quick. It was a very quick film. It was a 27-day shoot. We had two days of rehearsal. Everything was so fast. And also not having been an actor in previous life, I just didn't have a conventional process. So I tried my best as a musician. I feel like I already have to find a certain emotional headspace in order to deliver a performance pertaining to each song and you take on a persona on stage. So I'd try my best to transfer that over to acting.

I just really hope that it gives them a realistic glimpse into what the [abortion] experience can be like and the woman's perspective of what the world is like with the hostility that there is from other men. And that it gives people a real look and so that they can maybe empathize and put themselves in other people's shoes.” - Harper’s Bazaar, April 3, 2020

Never Rarely Sometimes Always in now available on HBO Max.

7. THE CAST OF “HAMILTON: AN AMERICAN MUSICAL”

(pictured L-R): Jonathan Groff, Okieriete Onaodowan, Jon Rua, Leslie Odom Jr., Phillipa Soo, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Chris Jackson, Anthony Ramos
(not pictured): Daveed Diggs, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Jasmine Cephas Jones, Sydney James Harcourt, Thayne Jasperson, Ephraim Sykes

Lin-Manuel Miranda’s 11-time Tony Award-winning musical arrives in a cinematic presentation, with the original cast performing the story of Alexander Hamilton’s rise and fall in American political history.

(creator Lin-Manuel Miranda on Hamilton’s re-emergence in 2020): “I think once we got passed through the reality that the pandemic was sort of slowing business as usual, and then the larger conversation is … And I’m just speaking to my own corner of the world that is sort of theater, and New York theater is like, well, business is not business as usual. So, in this moment where we’re talking about systemic racism, systemic inequalities, how does that affect our corner of the world? And it certainly affects theater. The fact that Hamilton is the first successful hip-hop musical and hip-hop is 40 years old tells you everything you need to know about how late change comes to the very siloed, very white world of theater.

And so, those are the conversations we’re having within the Hamilton company, and within sort of the larger world of theater of, how do we return to a more equitable space? How do we return to a space where backstage is as diverse as our cast on stage, where our audiences are as diverse as our cast on stage? Because that’s the other thing, is one of the things I’m proudest of this movie is, it gives everyone the brag of, “I saw the original cast for seven bucks.” - American Songwriter, via Zane Lowe/Apple Music - June 2020

(Miranda on history and representation): “When you write a musical that brushes against sort of the origins of this country, it's always going to be relevant. The fights we had at the [country's] origin are the fights we're still having. I've always said that slavery is the original sin of this country. [Slavery] is in the third line of our show. It's a system in which every character in our show is complicit in some way or another. Hamilton - although he voiced anti-slavery beliefs - remained complicit in the system ... He didn't really do much about it after that. None of them did. None of them did enough.

In the Heights (Miranda’s 2008 Tony Award winning musical) really came out of a result of seeing [and] writing what I saw as missing in the musical theater canon for Latinos. And so every time I write a piece of theater, I'm trying to get us on the board. And that continued with Hamilton, of, how can we write the parts that I didn't see existing?" - NPR, via Broadway World - June 30, 2020

Hamilton: An American Musical is now available on Disney+

8. KIRSTEN JOHNSON & DICK JOHNSON | as Director and Dad | DICK JOHNSON IS DEAD

Staging a number of fantastical ways in which your father may die does, at first blush, seem a bit morbid and bleak. Yet, in the hands of gifted director Kirsten Johnson, Dick Johnson is Dead is a beautiful celebration of life tenderly told through the lens of a daughter’s love of her father.

(Kirsten Johnson on the idea of the film): “One of the primary places this came from was the experience we had making my previous film Cameraperson and this wonderful editor I work with, Nels Bangerter. He placed a shot of my mother alive after a shot of her ashes in a box. And it so startled me, I really had the impression that she came back to life. It was like, ‘Oh, right, cinema can do this!’ And then, of course, I had a dream in which I saw an open casket and a man who wasn't my father sat up and said, ‘I'm Dick Johnson and I'm not dead yet.’ And it just clicked something in me, like, ‘Wait a minute! My time is running out with him.’

(filming Dick’s first ‘death’): “Ever since I was pretty little with my dad, we have kind of amazing conversations about all kinds of things. He was not particularly interested in being the center of things, but he was absolutely interested in doing something with me full time, spending time together, watching movies together, making something funny together. To see my 84-year-old father, like, laughing - but also just the vulnerability of him laying himself out at the bottom of the stairs because I had asked him to - both made me question the entire idea and also say, ' Woah, this is potent.'

(On her father’s dementia): “It's doing so many things to him. He is distilled to his essence, which I would say, he can call me multiple times in a day and simply say to me, ‘I'm just checking to see if you know that I love you.’ And that is who he has been in my entire life, just affirming that. All of these words are applicable. I do think the loss of his capacity to have an extended conversation, an analytic conversation — it's a profound loss for him and for me. But, every once in a while I can still come in with a question and he'll just go deep analytic and be right in there for the length of that question. So in some ways, it's taught me new ways to think and talk and interact with him.” - NPR’s Fresh Air, September 30, 2020

Dick Johnson Is Dead is now available on Netflix

9. VANESSA KIRBY | as Martha | PIECES OF A WOMAN

A married couple experience unspeakable sadness when a home birth ends in tragedy. Over the course of the following year, Martha struggles with the grief of loss, while she and husband Sean, as well as her mother, steady themselves for a legal action against their midwife.

(on the film’s opening 23-minute birth scene): “The actual filming of it was just exhilarating. It was the best film experience of my life. We did four takes the first day and two the second day. I think Kornél (Mundruczó, director) used the fourth one. It was like doing a play. Shia (LaBeouf, co-star) is also a real theater animal, so is Ellen (Burstyn, co-star), and we all understood what it would require. It was exciting setting up, preparing and then launching into it freefall. And then at the end…Out of it – taking a long time to come out of it – and then reset everything. We would blast music around the house and dance around the house just to clear what had happened. By the end of it, your psyche does know any different and you feel like you actually went through this.”

(on the significance of the role and the film): “The film felt so much bigger than any of us. This is a subject about neonatal death. The women I spoke [with] that had stillbirths and multiple miscarriages and it’s still a subject that’s really hard to talk about. The fact that you’re saying this conversation (awards prospects) is happening around this [film], that means so much to me. If that means that a few more people watch it or more conversations start happening, and that was everyone’s intention with it. The best moments of my working life was doing that birth. It’s hard to articulate. I’m unbelievably grateful and touched that it’s for this film. It’s my first lead role too and I knew I that was ready. I waited a long time. I watched other people do it and I absorbed everything and felt really ready.”

Pieces Of A Woman is in theaters where available, and debuts on Netflix on January 7, 2021

10. DELROY LINDO | as Paul | DA 5 BLOODS

Four African-American Vietnam veterans return to the country, decades later, to find the remains of their Squad Leader and a desire to find a buried treasure. Paul, with political views different than his military brothers, becomes the de facto leader of the group, Joined by Paul’s son, the veterans wrestle not only with the memories of their shared experiences, but with reflections on what it means to be a Black man in present-day America.

“This may seem like a very elementary thing to say, but in my mind it is not. I hope that they have an enhanced regard for these men in their humanity, because when I think about how we are presented in this film, and the dearth of stories through the lens of the black experience, what this film is doing in my mind is serving as a historical corrective.

So what I hope there is a an enhanced recognition of, as a result of seeing this film, is these men, their contributions, their courage and their love of America, and their love of country in context of the presentation of their humanity. Because a lack of recognition of our humanity is exactly the reason, one of the main reasons why the country is experiencing the turmoil that it is experiencing right now. So I hope in this film there's a recognition of: These men are human beings, courageous human beings, loving human beings. Certainly, problematical human beings with faults and foibles and pettinesses, but who also love deeply. Because I think of this film as a love story.”

(on Paul being a Trump supporter): “I didn't want to do it, but I said to Spike, why can't we make Paul, you know, an archconservative, an extreme conservative without going there? And he thought about it for a while. He called me back three days later and said he really needed Paul to be a Trumpite. And at that point, I read the script an additional two times, and I came to realize it's just one component of this man.

I will say to you that that is part of the reason that I cast the vote that I cast, that Paul cast the votes that he cast. Now, let me just be clear what I'm saying, I am speaking as Paul. I struggle with a litany of betrayals and losses. One of the most significant betrayals is by the United States of America. When I came home from Vietnam after having volunteered - I was not drafted. I volunteered for three tours in Vietnam out of a love and sense of duty - coming back and being reviled and rejected constitutes for Paul a huge betrayal. Then there is the loss of my wife. Then there is the loss of my son - and by loss of my son, what I mean is our relationship, as you see in the film, is fractious. There's love there, but it's very, very fractious. And here comes this individual in 2015 who says, I can make it better. And Paul needs a win. I need to believe what this man is saying, and that is what causes Paul to become that MAGA hat-wearing person.” - NPR, via Weekend Edition - Saturday, June 13, 2020

Da 5 Bloods is now available on Netflix

11. ATSUKO MAEDA | as Yoko | TO THE ENDS OF THE EARTH

A reality television star, Yoko, journeys from Japan to Uzbekistan to film the latest episode of her travel series. On screen, her plucky, enthusiastic personality masks an introverted demeanor and Yoko secretly dreams of a different life. Left to her own devices in a place she’s never been, Yoko begins to envision her dreams becoming a new reality.

(director Kiyoshi Kurosawa on the casting of Maeda in the leading role): “I value her extraordinary acting ability and personality. Moreover, there’s a lot of overlap between the life she’s lived so far and Yoko’s role in the story. That was decisive. Maeda is an established actress now, but before that she was an idol singer, and since she was a teenager, she’s made a lot of effort to overcome many obstacles and get to the place she is now. Her strength of will and sense of isolation, which are rare for young Japanese actresses, come from such a background. There’s no better casting for Yoko.”

(on Maeda’s performance and her two musical numbers in the film): “For Yoko, who’s always tense, the song scenes are one of the few places where she can reveal her emotions. The first time is her fantasy, but the second time she really sings “Hymne a l’Amour” at the top of the mountain. What’s more, the second time she has accompaniment, and sings the full chorus in a single take. For me, such a scene isn’t documentary or drama, but a real cinematic moment. I think the wonder and pleasure of seeing something that normally is impossible overflows from such a scene. In fact, Maeda really sang in front of the camera, rather than lip-syncing to a prerecorded song. The audience hears what she really sang. It was an unimaginable challenge for her to sing “Hymne a l’Amour,” a song with intense intonation, without interruption on the mountaintop where the air is thin. We did 20 takes. Maeda was almost about to collapse when she finally sang it satisfyingly and got the okay.” - Slant, December 6, 2020

To The Ends Of The Earth is now available for viewing in Virtual Cinemas

12. FRANCES MCDORMAND & CHLOÉ ZHAO | as Co-Producer and Actor (McDormand) and as Director, Writer, Editor and Co-Producer (Zhao) | NOMADLAND

In the wake of the 2008 economic recession, Fern lives in her van, works seasonal jobs throughout the Far West, and absorbs into a modern-day nomadic community and lifestyle.

(Zhao): “The world is trying to divide us. In the past several months, we’ve all gone through a version of what Fern (Frances McDormand’s character) has felt - this feeling of great loss to a life that you used to have. It’s just this void you feel, the need to go back to normal, which leads to acceptance and how you can grow to ultimately feel OK with your place in the world. That’s what a lot of people need right now.

Everything happened very quickly because of what we wanted to capture, the seasons, and the scale of landscapes we were trying to get in the American west when it was actually doable. We went from high desert to low desert to the plains to the ocean. I tried to focus on the human experience and things that I feel go beyond political statements to be more universal - the loss of a loved one, searching for home. I keep thinking about my family back in China - how would they feel about a cowboy in South Dakota, or a woman in her 60s living in America? If I make it too specific to any issues, I know it’s going to create a barrier. They’d go, ‘That’s their problem.’” - Indiewire, September 8, 2020

(McDormand): “It was much more about honoring the process of a person’s life than a process of making a movie. It was successful because in one town, in Nebraska, I went to the local Target and I was offered employment. I was offered a form to fill out! I went back to Chloé and said: ‘It’s working!’ “I learnt to just sit still, keep my mouth shut and listen. The keeping still part I am not very good at, the listening part I have practiced for a long time. It was about hearing their story, not telling mine.

If you could say one consistent thing about what I have done over the last 38 years, it’s that I mostly played American female characters. Although Fern is probably going to be a bit of a punctuation - I am never going to play another American woman again! Both Mildred (her Oscar-winning role in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri) and Fern are in the same world, they come from a working-class background. I am from the working-class background too and here is this ‘what-if’ again. What if I hadn’t had the opportunity to go to college and to graduate school? What if I hadn’t had a chance to partner with a spouse who believed in my potential and helped me realize my dreams, what if I hadn’t met my son and became a fuller human being? What if I had looked in the mirror, unable to recognize myself as the women who are being represented in fashion magazines and movies? What if that had stopped me? That’s a lot of ‘what-ifs,’ but part of the American Dream I got to realize was working with people like Chloé Zhao.” - Variety, September 11, 2020

Nomadland had a one-week theatrical run in December 2020 and will be re-released February 19, 2021

13. STEVE MCQUEEN | as Director, Co-Writer, Co-Producer, Co-Editor | THE “SMALL AXE” ANTHOLOGY
MANGROVE | LOVERS ROCK | RED, WHITE & BLUE | ALEX WHEATLE | EDUCATION

In Steve McQueen’s five-film anthology, the writer/director explores individual stories from the West Indian immigrant experience in London in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. A mix of stories based on actual and fictionalized events, the “Small Axe” Anthology has earned unanimous praise.

“It was time, you know? It was one of those situations where stories I wanted to see, stories I wanted to hear were not projected, were not sort of given space within the canon of the British film narrative. And I needed to see these stories. I mean, the West Indian community have been so influential in the United Kingdom. But at the same time, we have not been represented correctly or acknowledged properly within film. And I just felt it was a bit of a crazy undertaking, the way of making five films. But in some ways, it was such a big hole that I needed to sort of attempt to fill it, at least.”

(on the overwhelming acclaim "Small Axe” has received): “I really am happy. But at the same time, there's a seriousness about the situation where it's about passing on the baton. That's what it's about. It's about encouraging the next generation of people. We are here to clear the path for the up-and-coming generation. And I think what they - what those young people did on the streets, marching around the world after the unfortunate death - well, murder - of George Floyd was tremendous. It was just tremendous. It gave me so much heart.”

(regarding the audience McQueen hoped to reach with the project): “Black people in the U.K. - that was my audience. And it's - what's happening, which is - I'm very, very, very touched by, is that families are watching "Small Axe." You know, grandmothers, daughters and their children are watching "Small Axe" on a Sunday. And they're getting together. They're looking at it. They're laughing. They're crying. They're embracing. And actually, afterwards, what I'm hearing is that people are sort of opening up and talking about their experiences of living in London during that period to their kids. And kids are asking questions - their grandchildren - and then having - talking about some of the experiences they had, having them. And so I'm very excited about that and, you know, what sort of - what can come from that. You know, that's what art can do sometimes.” - NPR, via All Things Considered - December 5, 2020

The “Small Axe” Anthology is now available on Amazon Prime

14. THE CAST OF “MINARI”
(pictured L-R): Ye-ri Han, Yuh-Jung Youn, Steven Yeun, Alan S. Kim, writer/director Lee Isaac Chung, Noel Cho
(not pictured): Will Patton

Set in the 1980s, a Korean-American family moves to a tiny Arkansas town to build a farm and pursue the American Dream. In Lee Isaac Chung’s semi-autobiographical story, with rifts developing between husband and wife, a surly grandmother arrives and upends the family household.

(Yeun): “Jacob (his character) has to hold a specific set of dualities which is both to be seen as the dominant force that is really kind of thinking of himself at times and also showing that he deeply loves his family. That was a really cool thing to go through. (He is) not only trying to leave a collective kind of system that he’s from in Korea, he’s further trying to leave another when he leaves California. So, he’s deeply searching or himself. I think he doesn’t have the tools to really understand who he is and how he can find who he is. I think for Jacob, his stubbornness is a character trait, it was a validation of his existence.”

(Chung, on the origins of Minari): “I started off my career thinking that I wanted to make films that aren’t about my life. Something shifted around 2014 around the time my daughter was born. I just wanted to tell a story that encapsulates a lot of things that I grew up with and a lot of things that I was thinking about presently in life as well. (I wrote memories down) from that time of my life, looking at it from the point of view of age my daughter is. So, looking at what was life back when I was in that range of five to seven years old. And a lot of funny things went in there like my dad taking us to this place in the middle of nowhere, plopping us on this land with a trailer home with no steps and him saying ‘this is your new home.’ I felt precious to do this and to have something I can show to my family, both of my parents in which they feel like they were seen and heard. And also, to my daughter, something I can leave behind for her that she can see where we come from.”

(Noel, on her working with her on-screen brother Alan S. Kim): “We kind of looked like brothers and sisters and did most things that brothers and sisters would do like fight and fight and fight some more. And then we would do practically the same-fight and fight and then watch TV some more.”

(Yeun): “I don’t know if I would have been able to approach this in the same truth if I didn’t have it in my own life. I think it was beyond even my story as a father. What was really cool to connect it to my own father and my father’s generation. I used to view my father as kind of a completely separate thing or idea or time.” - Goldderby, November 25, 2020

Minari received a one-week theatrical run in December and will be re-released on February 12, 2021

15. CAREY MULLIGAN & EMERALD FENNELL | as Co-Producer and Actor (Mulligan) and as Director, Writer, and Co-Producer (Fennell) | PROMISING YOUNG WOMAN

Leading a double life, Cassie is a 30-year-old barista who goes out to nightclubs on weekends, gets drunk, and goes home with a different guy each night. Things are not quite as they appear to be, however, and Cassie’s actions are driven by events from a past she simply cannot allow herself to leave behind.

(Fennell): “I have always been quite interested in morality tales. In terms of the way it was shot, there are lots of parts of it almost touching on Greek tragedy — Cassie as the avenging angel who comes and offers redemption or punishment. And it’s ultimately, for me, a film about forgiveness, but that people only get forgiveness if they admit wrongdoing. She’s called Cassandra as a kind of nod to the original Cassandra.

So the whole purpose of the movie is to say, look at these two paths in front of this promising young woman. One is just skipping through daisies and delicious, beautiful candy land. And one is hard and lonely and bleak. Who chooses the hard road? It’s a horrible road to choose. And isn’t it funny how frightening a character becomes — particularly a woman becomes — when they say, ‘Actually, I’m right. And so I’m going to keep going. Even when everyone else is bored. And even when everyone else is furious, I’m going to keep going.’

And that, without Carey, was impossible. Because Carey is so exceptionally gifted, it was only her who could have given this character that in my mind was, as you say, this kind of an allegorical person — to make it completely and utterly real.”

(Mulligan): “It’s important to me to never really care what the audience thinks. I think a lot of it was about just telling the truth. There’s these sorts of tropes that we see in films where people do really badass things, and then afterwards they sort of ride off into the sunset in celebration. And actually, the truth of most of what Cassie does is it wasn’t great — she probably feels terrible.

There’s a scene that’s in the trailer where Cassie loses her temper and smashes somebody’s car up. And instead of gleefully throwing the crowbar to the ground and walking off in her high heels, you see the terror of what’s come over her, and what’s allowed her to do that thing. Because it’s mad, and could get her arrested. There was such freedom, and a lot of the time Em would be encouraging me to go further and further. And I felt like I could do all of that, trusting her to make the right decision.” - Variety, December 2020

Promising Young Woman is now available in theaters where available, and will be released through Video on Demand the first quarter of 2021.

16. THE CAST OF “ONE NIGHT IN MIAMI…”
(pictured L-R): Leslie Odom Jr., Aldis Hodge, Kingsley Ben-Adir, Eli Goree

Adapted from Kemp Powers’ acclaimed stage play of the same name, One Night in Miami… imagines an evening where Malcolm X invites Jim Brown, Sam Cooke, and Cassius Clay to his Florida motel, following Clay’s improbable heavyweight championship boxing victory and prior to his changing his name to Muhammed Ali.

(director Regina King on her cast): “It was quite fantastic to be the fifth wheel. [The actors] knew the journey we were about to go on, that this was not a time to be doing any impersonations or caricatures. This could've gone south quickly, but they trusted me to guide them, or lure them back, or caution them from going to some places. They listened, understood that the nuanced moments are the ones that capture the audience's hearts and ears.” - Entertainment Weekly, December 2020

(co-writer and playwright Kemp Powers): “This isn’t about four impersonations. Not at all. It’s not about putting on a cute little Malcolm X costume, wearing some glasses and striking a pose to recreate a photo, you know what I mean? It’s not about any of that. It’s about this story we’re trying to tell. And these guys are vessels.” - The Root, September 11, 2020

(Director of Photography Tami Weiker on shooting the film): “The vast majority of the film takes place in one room, and we didn’t have much rehearsal time. The actors were coming from all over the place. Kingsley was in London, Leslie was in New York, and they also are incredibly busy men—they had other projects that they were coming and going from, so we didn’t really get them until a few days before the actual filming started to see it on its feet in this space. We had these daunting 15-page scenes that were wall-to-wall dialogue, and Regina, being an actor-director, really wanted to give the actors the freedom to move within the space and discover things, [so] we would do 15-minute-long takes. It was a little bit daunting at first. It’s very hard for the entire crew when there are no marks on the ground; the cameraperson had to remember, seven minutes in, they’re going to move to the bathroom. But we couldn’t imagine doing it any other way, and I think the actors really loved it also.” - Backstage, December 23, 2020

One Night In Miami… is now available in theaters and will premiere on Amazon Prime on January 15, 2021.

17. AUBREY PLAZA | as Allison | BLACK BEAR

Within a film split into two distinctive halves, a remote lake house provides a backdrop for Allison - at first a house guest who makes independent films and later a troubled actor disrupting the final day of a film shoot - who shakes up the lives of a man and woman intrinsically linked to her fiercely defiant demeanor.

At a remote lake house in the Adirondack Mountains, a couple entertains an out-of-town guest looking for inspiration in her filmmaking. The group quickly falls into a calculated game of desire, manipulation, and jealousy, unaware of how dangerously convoluted their lives will soon become in the filmmaker’s pursuit of a work of art, which blurs the boundaries between autobiography and invention.

“On a very, very basic level, every project that I’ve ever worked on I’ve worked with an acting coach, her name is Ivana Chubbuck. I’ve worked with her for ten years now. So I have a method of a process that I go through every time I work, but with this film I started exploring Jungian dream analyzation and creative work that’s kind of wrapped up in your dreams. Because Larry [director Lawrence Michael Levine] was inspired by a dream he had when he first wrote the script. When I read it, I sometimes describe it as ‘two nightmares interwoven in one mega nightmare.’ I thought it would be interesting to go into my unconscious mind and my dreams and explore in that way, and see what I could bring to the film.

(regarding her specific “homework” in preparing for the role of Allison): “I can conjure up lots of memories of being incredibly, unhealthily inebriated and intoxicated. I’m not proud of that, but I know what that feels like. And more than anything, I think for this movie in particular, it felt to me like the alcohol was this kind of acting out response to this situation with her husband. It became a symbol of her being like, “F**k you, I’m not going to listen to you anymore.” It’s this rebellious act, I think, that just gets to a point of total self-destruction. Do I know what that feels like? Yes I do. If you don’t know what it feels like, I don’t know! I’m sure you could still act. You could always follow Michael Caine advice of, actors that play drunk the good ones know that when you’re drunk you don’t want actors to know how drunk you are, so you don’t play drunk, you pretend that you’re not drunk. This is not a good example of that. Because everyone knew I was drunk! From the minute I showed up on set. But Michael Caine. What an icon!

But I think that the alcohol became a window through which she could unravel. Physically that was probably also the hardest part of the shoot for me. The amount of hours that I had to be acting wasted was so many hours, and all night shoots. My body was just breaking down, because I was constantly physicalizing this inebriation, just flinging my body like no sense left. I would go to my hotel room and just be covered in bruises and be like, “Oh, I’m just hurting myself.” So, it was pretty gnarly.” - RogerEbert.com, November 30, 2020

Black Bear is now available for rental or purchase on all major VOD platforms.

18. TRENT REZNOR & ATTICUS ROSS | as Composers for the films MANK and SOUL

Whether a metaphysical animated story about living one’s best life (Soul), or providing the backdrop to a black-and-white film about the events which led to the creation of iconic film Citizen Kane (Mank), Nine Inch Nails bandmates and collaborators, Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, composed two wildly different, but equally affecting scores for two of the year’s best reviewed films.

(Reznor, discussing Mank’s Big Bang-era, 1940s-style score): “During that time, we spent a lot of time really absorbing the music of the era, watching and kind of analyzing Bernard Herrmann scores, which was another point of reference. This is a companion piece to Citizen Kane. Perhaps it could feel inspired by dot dot dot … And when we actually sat down and started exchanging musical compositions, before we had any picture, the results surprised us. They sounded really good right off the bat. We believe in doing the thing that we can do, which is translate emotion into sound. And we’re just using a different tool to achieve that. If we thought about it that way, suddenly, it didn’t seem quite so impossible or intimidating. There’s plenty of time for revision. So, we initially sent David (Fincher, director) a batch of music early this year, probably in January (2020). It might have been February, maybe 90 minutes of stuff. It was kind of half-orchestra and half-big band arrangements. And a little bit of solo piano stuff. I can’t tell you how great it feels to receive that text in all caps: “I WANT TO USE IT ALL”. Because they were out shooting at the time. It really felt like validation that we’ll be able to pull this off. And then the real work began of actually scoring and getting into it.” - Consequence of Sound, December 17, 2020

(Ross, discussing Soul’s score): “There’s The Great Before, The Great Beyond, The Astral Plane, The You Seminar. Every place needed its own identity.”

(Reznor, discussing Soul): “Our first step is always to listen and really try to understand where the filmmakers are coming from: what they’re seeing, what they’re imagining. We spent a lot of time discussing how you’re supposed to feel when you’re first exposed to the ‘Soul’ world. Then we went back to our studio, which is filled with a variety of real, imagined and synthetic instruments, and spent the first chunk of time experimenting with different arrangements and different instruments and seeing what felt emotionally right to create the fabric of this world.” - Heroic Hollywood, October 9, 2020

Mank is now available on Netflix, with the soundtrack available on all major streaming platforms.
Soul is now available on Disney+, with the soundtrack available on all major streaming platforms.

19. ANDY SAMBERG | as Nyles | PALM SPRINGS

Attending a wedding in Palm Springs brings together Nyles, a nihilist, and Sarah, the maid-of-honor who feels disconnected from everyone and everything. While spending time together, a bizarre set of events lead to the two being caught in a time loop where they relive the same day again and again,

While stuck at a wedding in Palm Springs, Nyles (Andy Samberg) meets Sarah (Cristin Milioti), the maid of honor and family black sheep. After he rescues her from a disastrous toast, Sarah becomes drawn to Nyles and his offbeat nihilism. But when their impromptu tryst is thwarted by a surreal interruption, Sarah must join Nyles in embracing the idea that nothing really matters, and they begin wreaking spirited havoc on the wedding celebration.

“When you first meet him (Nyles, Samberg’s character), it feels to the viewer probably like he is the coolest guy ever. I don't know. Those are not my words, but he's in complete control. He somehow knows everything that's happening and is the master of of this world. And then the longer it goes on, the more you realize he's maybe so broken and so resigned to his situation that he's actually just given up. And there's something about that [which] I found really funny, but also very compelling in a dramatic way.

When I first read it and I talked to the writer, Andy Siara, we both talked a lot about how it's working in the space of the moment where you decided to take the leap. That can be a really terrifying thing to do for a lot of people, and we both felt like we were people that had done that and been rewarded for it and felt happy about it. And even in instances like Sarah (played by co-star Cristin Milioti) and Nyles, where they're both kind of really f***ed up people that have a lot of things to work out, it doesn't mean they don't deserve an opportunity to do that.

I feel like a lot of people in this world feel like they don't deserve love or deserve the chance to be in a relationship or to share that experience with people because they don't love themselves yet. The message, hopefully, from the movie is that is not the case.” - Screen Rant, July 9, 2020

Palm Springs is now available on Hulu

20. EVAN RACHEL WOOD | as Old Dolio | KAJILLIONAIRE

A family of con artists have worked their entire lives to prepare their adult daughter for success in the family trade, only to surprise her by bringing in a stranger to pull off their latest heist.

“She's very unique. It was very interesting to build a character that is completely removed from any sort of societal norm. If anything, that family looks down on anybody living on the grid, or somebody that they feel has been brainwashed into the lies of society. So, crafting a character that had no awareness of what was normal, what was healthy; no awareness of gender, no awareness of sexuality, has never danced; has barely received any kind of affection, physically or emotionally - what does that look like? How does that manifest?

That was one thing that Miranda (July, writer/director) and I worked on really closely together. The second I signed on, we started talking about the physicality and watching videos. I'd practice things over and over and over again; even just the way that I put my hair behind my ears had to be different. There were tells of mine that would give me away; my voice, my hands. And what is dancing look like from somebody who's never danced, and is trying it out for the first time? How and what do these things look like, and how do they manifest. So, it was fun to explore.

It was challenging, because part of acting is really relying on what feels natural to you and being as real as possible. Playing a character that was just completely different in every way was interesting.

One of the references in my mind for her was Edward Scissorhands. Because, again, he's been completely removed. He feels completely alien and foreign. He desperately wants to be seen and desperately wants connection, but he is terrified of it. And I just thought, that's Old Dolio. She's somebody that, like Edward Scissorhands, barely says anything throughout the film but is communicating so much and is breaking your heart at every turn.” - Screen Rant, October 6, 2020

Kajillionaire is now available on VOD on all major platforms.

AND 15 MORE PERFORMANCES WORTH SEEING FROM 2020

  • Ben Affleck | Jack | The Way Back

  • Kiera Allen | Chloe Sherman | Run

  • Nicole Beharie | Turquoise Jones | Miss Juneteenth

  • Haley Bennett | Hunter Conrad | Swallow

  • Radha Blank | Radha/RadhaMUSPrime | The Forty-Year-Old Version

  • Carrie Coon | Allison O’Hara | The Nest

  • Julia Garner | Jane | The Assistant

  • Anthony Hopkins, Olivia Colman | Anthony, Anne | The Father

  • Orion Lee | King-Lu | First Cow

  • Mads Mikkelsen | Martin | Another Round

  • Elisabeth Moss | Cecilia Kass | The Invisible Man

  • Bill Murray | Felix | On The Rocks

  • Kathryn Newton | Millie | Freaky

  • Jo Ellen Pellman | Emma Nolan | The Prom

  • Bill Ross IV & Turner Ross | as Directors, Producers, Cinematographers and Editor (Bill) | Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets