October Review Recaps: ‘First Man,’ ‘A Star is Born,’ ‘Halloween’ and More

At the start of this month, I started a new job at TheWrap. In nearly two years of working there, I’ve been promoted to the position of a Film Reporter.

I’m here to tell you now that this is a good thing. I’m genuinely happy, and I appreciate all the support I’ve already received, not just from family and friends, but also from my new film team.

But here’s what it does mean: I’m a reporter, not a critic. So formal reviews, even for this website, are mostly out of the question when it means publicists are paying attention to what I’m writing, tweeting and saying, and how that influences my ability to get calls back and break stories quickly.

Frankly though, it’s been months since I’ve been able to sit down and write a review or reaction for every new film I see in the same way I was when I was in college. I spend a full day writing at work, and then I come home and want to do not that.

But I still have thoughts on these movies. Lots of them. And I don’t want to lose that critical faculty and quickly forget the opinions I’ve had on some of my favorite (and least favorite) films of the year.

With that said, I’ll instead be writing these capsules moving forward, with hopefully some semi-regularity. It’s Awards Season, so that means a busy time for movies.

Also, be sure to check out all my reporting and other writing for TheWrap here. And keep listening to my podcast, The News Reel, which you can now find on iTunes and Spotify as well as on CutPrintFilm.com.

Beautiful Boy – 2 stars

“Relapse is a part of recovery.” That line may be total pseudo-science, but it’s repeated often in Felix Van Groeningen’s “Beautiful Boy.” His film is less a narrative and more an excruciating two hours of the vicious cycle of the highs and lows of a teenage drug addict. The film doesn’t just milk the massive gulf between the teen’s good moments and bad; it acts as though this sort of storytelling should be expected.

The blissful soundtrack and brightly lit, explicit shots of drug use end up romanticizing the worst moments and making the lighter ones cloying and manipulative. Steve Carell is natural enough to feel like he’s never reciting dialogue, but he’s stuck constantly talking to his son in a state of worry or concern. And Timothee Chalamet is a brilliant actor, but Van Groeningen has him going full-on James Dean with his constant facial ticks and fidgeting.

“Beautiful Boy” doesn’t really try to understand addiction, but it does recognize that even with a strong support system and people who care deeply, addiction can still affect anyone. No matter what help this father gets for his son, his son inevitably falls off the wagon with barely a trigger. That’s a dreary message in a movie that already wants you to feel helpless.

American Animals – 3.5 stars

“American Animals” combines the best parts of every cult classic of the last 20-odd years. It nods to everything from Tarantino to “The Dark Knight” to “Ocean’s 11,” and yet it’s most compelling touchstone may be Richard Linklater. Not unlike “Bernie,” director Bart Layton’s film is a hybrid live-action and documentary, combining a traditional heist movie narrative with interviews of the real people who tried to rob a library of some priceless, rare books. The interviews provide an extra dimension of emotional tension, with Layton suggesting that the real people dictating the story we’re watching may be unreliable narrators.

To some degree, “American Animals” is spread a little thin. And it’s not just the many movie references. Layton addresses class dynamics, lost adolescence and how our memory can’t always be trusted. But Layton keeps the early scenes so invigorating, funny and entertaining that it’s all the more effective when the stakes get real and the rug is pulled out from underneath.

Halloween (2018) – 3 stars

Could it be that the new “Halloween” is just a little too polished? David Gordon Green’s film is about as well made of a slasher movie as you could ask for. It’s a smart sequel and reunion to John Carpenter’s “Halloween” that erases the lore of the previous sequels while frequently echoing the original. And in the final showdown between Michael Myers and Laurie Strode, it inverts the predator and prey dynamic and refuses to make Laurie the victim or the final girl.

But this is still a B-movie with A-movie production values. It’s calculated and precise where it should be ragged and spontaneous. Even Carpenter’s theme, here beefed up and modernized by Carpenter himself, feels grand and smoothed out rather than light and anxiety inducing. That’s the x-factor that makes Carpenter’s original so masterful. And I can do without the dumb podcasters just waiting to get themselves killed.

But I had another stray thought watching “Halloween.” Fox News wrote a remarkably stupid article pointing out that though Jamie Lee Curtis has supported sensible gun control in the past, she uses guns in this film. Breaking news! Movies are different than reality, and actors aren’t being hypocritical about their politics by, you know, acting. But this film almost endorses the idea of the hyper-prepared gun nut, that the only thing that can really protect you from a knife-wielding serial killer dead set on murdering your family is a gun. It’s notable that in Laurie’s entire arsenal of guns and booby traps, she doesn’t have any assault rifles, and I wonder if you were a right-wing gun advocate, would they think that “Halloween” is even “accurate?” When Laurie is watching as Michael is being transferred to a new prison, she sits in her car stroking the trigger to her handgun. But she hardly looks as though that weapon gives her any peace of mind. Maybe it’s refreshing that something like a slasher movie can have politics as murky as our actual reality.

First Man – 4 stars

When Neil Armstrong is asked why he wants to go into space, he replies, “It allows us to see things we should’ve seen a long time ago.” Damien Chazelle’s “First Man” forces us to view things from other perspectives, to recalibrate our idea of what heroism, masculinity and patriotism looks like. For each flight or training sequence that’s cold and horrifyingly tense, there’s a grounded scene that’s staged with other worldly elegance and even serenity.

From the exhilarating, breathlessly staged opening flight sequence, true moments of reprieve and emotion are few and far between in this film. Armstrong will get a fleeting glimpse of the world above the atmosphere in all its splendor before battling the terror of nearly bouncing out of orbit. Once on two feet, we see his daughter in his arms and then being put into the ground a frame later. Armstrong breaking down into tears is just about all the emotion we’ll see from him throughout the film, and it’s a testament to Ryan Gosling’s composure under immense pressure.

The “controversy” surrounding the film doesn’t deserve any further oxygen, but it is surprising to see how the Space Race was hardly a liberal pursuit. It was viewed as a waste of money and an elite endeavor to put “whitey on the moon,” as one protestor sings. And yet it all builds to that perfect moment when he’s finally made that one small step, one giant leap. It happens, and it’s for…what? What Chazelle finds so beautiful is that this mission was not done for any real purpose but to say it could be done and to change our point of view of what’s possible.

Can You Ever Forgive Me? – 3 ½ stars

The combination of Melissa McCarthy’s performance and the screenplay by Nicole Holofcener and Jeff Whitty in Marielle Heller’s film makes Lee Israel one of the most fully realized, intriguing characters of the year. In “Can You Ever Forgive Me?,” author Lee Israel is a struggling writer in early ‘90s New York, when book stores still thrived but all writers did not. And as a result, she turns to literary forgeries of letters from writers like Dorothy Parker and Noel Coward to make a living.

McCarthy doesn’t do many dramatic roles, yet it’s hard to imagine this character played by anyone else. She imbues the same gifted physicality and burst of blunt, bitterness to her character without totally masking her goodness. She and Richard E. Grant are brilliant as two would-be intellectuals who have a shared contempt for the snobby high society crowd despite both ostensibly once belonging to it. The film’s class dynamics deepen its themes about authenticity and truth and help provide the whole film a brisk, caustic wit, just as Dorothy Parker might’ve done.

A Star Is Born (2018) – 4 stars

“A Star is Born” is a formula that works. It’s not just the romantic story, it’s the full-throated emotion baked into every scene. And Bradley Cooper may have touched those nerves the best yet. I first knew Cooper’s “A Star Is Born” was great when he traces the outline of Lady Gaga’s nose, the film momentarily slowing to a sensuous crawl to drink in that romance and elegance. We see it again when they first belt “Shallow” or when Cooper drunkenly stumbles up the stage at the Grammys. Cooper shoots the whole thing with a gritty, handheld, close-up intimacy that makes the film feel modern, vital and sobering.

I wouldn’t call any of the four films in this series melodramatic, but they are grand in scope. They’re honest and they’re insightful about the industry that shapes stardom. “A Star is Born” has a way of working on you and tugging your heartstrings in just the right way until you’re immersed. We’re far from the shallow now.

The Old Man and the Gun – 3 stars

It’s probably been 10 years since we’ve been looking at Robert Redford as if he’s in his twilight years, or that he was finally giving his swan song performance. “The Old Man and the Gun” may really be it this time, and that would be just fine. This is a movie that embraces Redford’s grace and charm as part of its ethos. It’s light, jazzy and among the most calming and delightful heist films you’re likely to see.

It may even be a little too light. There’s something vaguely Trumpian in Redford’s portrayal of Forrest Tucker. “The Old Man and the Gun” is a throwback to a time when someone could lay their cards on the table, look you in the eyes, and screw you with a smile, as he does to every bank teller across the country. The difference is that at least Forrest is a gentleman when he screws you. Times maybe haven’t changed that much, but can’t we at least get back to this?