Nat’s Top 5 Movies of 2023

Was a wee quiet regarding movie reviewing this year – it’s been busy!  But ITop 5 Movies 2023 still managed to get to ‘Barbenheimer’ that took over the world there for a while.  All I can say is I’m glad I managed to source a pink hair accessory for the Barbie premiere.  It was a very pink affair.  And a surprisingly refreshing feminist message that did balance in the end.  But like everyone, I’ve never seen a film so blunt – ‘I’m a man without power, does that make me a woman?’

I was more drawn to the thriller genre this year – surprise, surprise, with Saltburn blowing away the cobwebs with its sharp wit and extravagance, but let’s start the list with a documentary that I still think about, particularly while watching the TV series, The Fall of the House of Usher with the documentary about Nan showing in the background to underline the correlation her story had with the series about the evils of pharma, meet photographer and activist, Nan Goldin:

  1. All the Beauty and the Bloodshed – GoMovieReviews

For me, I was captured by those slide shows, the people in the photos like characters in the movie of Nan’s life.

It’s a heavy story, but the telling is simple, measured and driven not by the production, but what felt like Nan herself.

  1. Cairo Conspiracy – GoMovieReviews

Thought-provoking, intriguing with moments of beauty – this is a balanced film that gets you thinking.

  1. John Wick: Chapter 4 – GoMovieReviews

If you’re already a fan of the John Wick franchise, Chapter 4 is obviously a must-see and in my opinion, as good as the previous JW3: the detail, the humour, the dogs, the camera work, those shots from above a seriously successful device to show more of the action…  Action at its very best.

  1. Oppenheimer – GoMovieReviews

Complicated, suspenseful, political, scientific and psychological.  It’s a lot.

But that raging fire and those blurred edges and uncertainty around Oppenheimer’s character to then reveal the truth of all those involved in the creation of the bomb added up to a sophisticated film that demanded full attention.

Somehow, Nolan has captured an aberration using Oppenheimer as a voice.  And that takes brilliance.

  1. Saltburn – GoMovieReviews

Inviting, surprising, edgy and a pleasure to watch, like a guilty indulgence – this is a movie that keeps me coming back to the cinema wanting more.

 

All the Beauty and the Bloodshed

GoMovieReviews Rating: ★★★★All the Beauty and the Bloodshed

Rated: R18+ (High impact sexualised imagery)

Directed by: Laura Poitras

Produced by: Laura Poitras, Nan Goldin, Howard Gertler, John Lyons, Yoni Golijov

Composer: Soundwalk Collective

Photography: Nan Goldin

Featuring: Nan Goldin

“Droll thing life is – – that mysterious arrangement of merciless logic for a futile purpose.  The most you can hope from it is some knowledge of yourself – – that comes too late – – a crop of inextinguishable regrets.”

‘Heart of Darkness’, by Joseph Conrad

Nan Goldin was born into, ‘the banality and grip of suburbia.’

After her sister, Barbara, was institutionalised by her parents, where Barbara eventually committed suicide, leaving behind in her notebook the quote from Joseph Conrad, written above, Nan began to understand what denial was.

Nan was also sent to an orphanage when her mother couldn’t cope.

It was the beginning of losing trust in herself and what that means.

All The Beauty And The Bloodshed is about Nan’s life, as an artist and world renowned photographer, and her activism as a founding member of P.A.I.N (Prescription Addiction Intervention Now); her mission to remove the Sackler family from the art world, for galleries to refuse their donations and to take their family name from the walls.

The Sackler family made their fortune from prescription drugs like Diazepine and later, OxyContin – a drug that provoked an opioid crisis and a drug Nan herself become addicted to after being prescribed OxyContin after surgery.  Like so many others.

Nan’s fight against the Sackler Family and their company, Purdue Pharma, becomes the cumulation of her life’s work and a focus of the documentary.

The documentary was filmed over two years as director Laura Poitras (Citizen Four (2014)) visited Nan at home.

The film is made up of voice over from Nan herself and the images her life’s work in slideshows.

An exhibit that repeats throughout the documentary is, ‘The Ballad of Sexual Dependency.’

Nan says, ‘The wrong things are kept private in society, and that destroys people.  All my work is about stigma, whether it’s suicide, mental illness, gender.’

The link back to her childhood and loss of her sister shown to be foundational in Nan’s work.

Her photographs are of her friends, her early work of drag queens in the early seventies, in Boston.  And that’s what really grabbed me about this film, her amazing work: the artistry in the blur, the highlights, the eyes and coy smile.  It’s like the very atmosphere is captured in a photograph.

Her vision is described in the film as her taking photos from, ‘our side.’

Because her people were the ones who only felt safe coming out at night.

But they didn’t feel like the marginalised, they thought everyone else was.

There’s parties and drugs and love.  Nan does anything to buy film.  And documents it all.

Set to the background of this provocative work is Nan describing her life, her fascinating and sometimes dark journey and she’s very candid, opening up about times in her life she’s never spoken about, like her time as a sex worker – ‘it’s very hard work’ – but feels now is the time.

It’s an emotive film.

There’s nothing flashy and there’s no layering over the focus of the film because Nan’s life is a powerful story.  There’s just more of her in the music, many songs her suggestion while also bringing NYC group Soundwalk Collective to create the score.

I found her powerful because she’s able to say, ‘I’m nervous.’

Nan has a tremor at times, but her voice remains measured because what she has to say is important.

The film shows a difficult upbringing, that essentially stole her voice that was then given back to her in the form of a camera, to capture her life, to give her a reason to be there.

And then, her art giving voice to others, to save lives.

For me, I was captured by those slide shows, the people in the photos like characters in the movie of Nan’s life.

It’s a heavy story, but the telling is simple, measured and driven not by the production, but what felt like Nan herself.

 

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