2023's Best Movies Already Streaming
Beyond BARBENHEIMER
My Instagram feed is starting to fill up with first-day-of-school pictures, which feels like the surest sign that summer is coming to a close. And unless you’re amped up for Blue Beetle or something, you’re probably feeling that summer is on the wane as well.
With each day, it seems as if there’s new information trickling out about a prestige release this fall. We’re starting to make the move into a new season: awards. It’s tempting to fall into the trap of thinking that all the year’s best movies come out closest to the end of the year, but I’ve found that’s become increasingly less true. (The most recent Best Picture winner dropped in March, after all!)
But just because a studio doesn’t want to bow a movie during the crowded fall corridor doesn’t mean it’s not worth your attention. In fact, sometimes these movies are even more pleasurable because they don’t come laden with the burden of expectation from their release date. I’ve rounded up ten such 2023 releases that are worth prioritizing ahead of the busy season ahead, though excluding a few movies that I think might show up on my top 10 list later.
You may notice a common thread here: if you read down to the “What I Wrote” section of the newsletter, these films have all been covered at some point. If you thought something seemed interesting but didn’t know when you could possibly see it … ahem!
Alcarrás, MUBI
“It was a big challenge—this idea of portraying the perspective where the main character was the family. We built the script with this idea of how the emotion of one character can affect [someone else] and so on. It’s a domino effect that happens a lot when you have many people sharing the same roof, basically. Someone gets angry, and then suddenly everyone is angry. They don’t even know why. This idea of passing the emotional baton was very important in terms of the camera.” — from my interview with writer/director Carla Simón
Asteroid City, Peacock Premium (and rental)
“I think one of the things that Wes is trying to say is remember these people. Know these people. Celebrate these people because they are the best of us. They’re not perfect, but they certainly represent the best of us […] There’s that aspiration toward, whether or not you understand the play, keep moving. Keep telling the story. Part of the story is these figures who were heroic in their artistry.” — from my interview with actor Jeffrey Wright
Bait, Hulu
“I start with [no sound], then I add. That’s what I really like about working in this way. If you’re working on a low budget with not much resources or time, normally by the time you get into the sound element of post-production, the starting point is mending stuff. You’re trying to remove an airplane off the soundtrack or the sound of a fridge. So, to start with silence is a great creative starting point. What deserves to be on the soundtrack? Because if it’s not there for a reason, then it doesn’t make it onto the soundtrack.” — interview with writer/director Mark Jenkin
How to Blow Up a Pipeline, rental (on Hulu 8/24)
“We recognized a need to go back in time more, but there was a question of how we do that without having one giant flashback in the middle of the film that kills the momentum. And then we had this notion to go divide it up by character and have this Reservoir Dogs-esque riff on it that would enable us to cover a lot more ground. But then, it also became a hook for increasing the suspense and drama of particular moments.” — interview with writer/director Daniel Goldhaber
Little Richard: I Am Everything, rental
“If you want to know what happens in the life of Little Richard, you could always just consult his Wikipedia page. It’s possible to reduce Little Richard: I Am Everything down to just that, but it doesn’t do the full experience justice. Drawing from archival footage as well as new interviews with contemporaries and subject matter experts, director Lisa Cortés paints a vivid portrait of not only who the man was but what he meant. This pioneer of rock and roll becomes a prism through which to view post-war America at its cultural zenith, be it through race, religion, region, or sexuality.” — from my Stream It or Skip It recommendation
Master Gardener, rental
"Master Gardener asks what happens after the climactic conclusions of many a Schrader film where his protagonists find the social and spiritual sanctification that they self-flagellate to receive. By the time the film introduces Joel Edgerton's titular horticulturist, he's already undergone a lifetime's worth of bad behavior from which he sought escape and penance. And yet one rebirth does not free him from repeating the cycle once more. Here, Schrader explores what happens when resurrection is not the end of a narrative but the beginning of another to riveting effect.” — from my /Film review
Rhino: Ukrainian Godfather, Tubi (free with ads)
“Any discussion of Rhino has to include its centerpiece “oner” shot, a magnificent work of artistry unrivaled by anything I’ve seen in years. This single take alone is worth the price of admission. In an era of flashy one-take shots meant to draw attention to its own athleticism, what director Oleh Sentsov pulls off with cinematographer Bogumil Godfrejow is a perfect marriage of story and style. The extended nature of the take doesn’t even blare its own merits at first, yet it slowly picks up momentum as the camera floats around Vova’s childhood home without cutting. It soon becomes evident that the camera is capturing vast expanses and ellipses of time rather than just a strictly linear progression. It’s only about eight minutes long, but it feels like an entire lifetime will pass … because it does.” — from my Stream It or Skip It recommendation
A Thousand and One, Peacock Premium (and rental)
“I see Black women as representing the soul of New York City, and there are so many common threads in the way that we’re pushed to go through our journey of life being more like everyone else, and the city goes through the same thing, trying to be a little bit more palatable, accessible, and suburbanized. Because of that, it’s lost the uniqueness that I feel it should hold onto. That’s what makes it special. I feel Black women like Inez need to hold on to what makes them special.” — interview with writer/director A.V. Rockwell
War Pony, rental
“Throughout the process of the movie, and all the corners and curves and turns and hills and everything, there was a spirit of War Pony. We periodically will mention the spirit of or energy around War Pony and how it’s pulling us in this or that direction. Because we followed those indigenous protocols and were intentional with how we were dealing with the crew and the actors, the energy has its own force and spiritual energy in the movie.” — from my interview with the creative team of War Pony
When You Finish Saving the World, rental
“I started writing When You Finish Saving the World as an audiobook from the spark of ‘What if I felt no connection to my newborn son?’ I started writing after I just had a child, and then I was projecting into the future and thinking if it was possible to not feel the connection that you’re supposed to feel. Then I took it several steps further and thought of this mother, who’s devoted her life to something that’s so important and wonderful and a child who’s completely gone the other way. How would you not want to parent another child who’s interested in the things that you’re interested in?” — from my interview with writer/director Jesse Eisenberg
You can always keep up with my film-watching in real-time on the app Letterboxd. I’ve also compiled every movie I’ve ever recommended through this newsletter via a list on the platform as well.
This has been great music for me to disassociate this week.
If you’ve been following the online discussion around Oppenheimer, you might have seen some heated debate around the merits of Christopher Nolan’s exclusion of the human impact from the bomb in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. “That’s an act of rigor, not erasure,” Justin Chang at the Los Angeles Times persuasively argues.
On the opposite end of the spectrum, here’s Sam Adams at Slate arguing for the value of the hack director.
If you want to read an article tailor-made to make me spontaneously combust, it would be this one.
I absolutely adored the Chilean documentary The Eternal Memory, which is a tender-hearted look at a love that can withstand the loss of personal and political memory. I loved digging into the film with director Maite Alberdi for Slant Magazine.
For Decider, I said skip it to The Murderer as well as Today We’ll Talk About That Day on Netflix.
Subscribers also got this profile of director Julian Higgins, whose debut feature God’s Country is now on Hulu.
Director Julian Higgins Means Business
Picture a stereotypical, capital-G “Great” movie director in your head. Maybe recency bias has you thinking it’s someone like Christopher Nolan (or perhaps Greta Gerwig), but it’s safe to say this person is exacting, precise, and widely lauded as a visionary.
You can keep track of all the freelance writing I’ve done this year through this list on Letterboxd.
Subscribers, another fun theatrical experience breakdown is coming your way over the weekend!
Yours in service and cinema,
Marshall