Behold! The list of all Muriel Award winners, 2006 through 2020!
Golden Muriel Award for Best Film
Before Midnight (2013)
Boyhood (2014)
The Departed (2006)
First Cow (2020)
First Reformed (2018)
Holy Motors (2012)
Inglourious Basterds (2009)
Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)
No Country For Old Men (2007)
Parasite (2019)
Paterson (2016)
Phantom Thread (2017)
The Social Network (2010)
The Tree of Life (2011)
WALL*E (2008)
Best Lead Performance [separate awards given by gender before 2017]
Casey Affleck - Manchester By The Sea (2016)
Sacha Baron Cohen - Borat (2006)
Juliette Binoche - Certified Copy (2011)
Daniel Day-Lewis - Phantom Thread (2017)
Daniel Day-Lewis - There Will Be Blood (2007)
Jesse Eisenberg - The Social Network (2010)
Chiwetel Ejiofor - 12 Years a Slave (2013)
Adèle Exarchopoulos - Blue Is the Warmest Color (2013)
Ralph Fiennes - The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014)
Anne Hathaway - Rachel Getting Married (2008)
Ethan Hawke - First Reformed (2018)
Isabelle Huppert - Elle (2016)
Scarlett Johansson - Under the Skin (2014)
Michael B. Jordan - Creed (2015)
Denis Lavant - Holy Motors (2012)
Delroy Lindo - Da 5 Bloods (2020)
Rooney Mara - Carol (2015)
Helen Mirren - The Queen (2006)
Lupita Nyong'o - Us (2019)
Jeremy Renner - The Hurt Locker (2009)
Mickey Rourke - The Wrestler (2008)
Michael Shannon - Take Shelter (2011)
Hailee Steinfeld - True Grit (2010)
Tilda Swinton - Julia (2009)
Carice van Houten - Black Book (2007)
Rachel Weisz - The Deep Blue Sea (2012)
Best Supporting Performance [separate awards given by gender before 2017]
Amy Adams - The Master (2012)
Mahershala Ali - Moonlight (2016)
Patricia Arquette - Boyhood (2014)
Maria Bakalova - Borat Subsequent Moviefilm (2020
Javier Bardem - No Country For Old Men (2007)
Adriana Barraza - Babel (2006)
Cate Blanchett - I'm Not There (2007)
Albert Brooks - Drive (2011)
Rosemarie DeWitt - Rachel Getting Married (2008)
Vera Farmiga - Up in the Air (2009)
James Franco - Spring Breakers (2013)
Greta Gerwig - Greenberg (2010)
Lily Gladstone - Certain Women (2016)
John Hawkes - Winter's Bone (2010)
Philip Seymour Hoffman - The Master (2012)
Regina King - If Beale Street Could Talk (2018)
Heath Ledger - The Dark Knight (2008)
Melissa McCarthy - Bridesmaids (2011)
Laurie Metcalf - Lady Bird (2017)
Lupita Nyong'o - 12 Years a Slave (2013)
Joe Pesci - The Irishman (2019)
J.K. Simmons - Whiplash (2014)
Sylvester Stallone - Creed (2015)
Kristen Stewart - Clouds of Sils Maria (2015)
Mark Wahlberg - The Departed (2006)
Christoph Waltz - Inglourious Basterds (2009)
Best Direction
Paul Thomas Anderson - Phantom Thread (2017)
Paul Thomas Anderson - There Will Be Blood (2007)
Bong Joon-ho - Parasite (2019)
Léos Carax - Holy Motors (2012)
Alfonso Cuarón - Children of Men (2006)
Alfonso Cuarón - Roma (2018)
Jonathan Demme - Rachel Getting Married (2008)
David Fincher - The Social Network (2010)
Jonathan Glazer - Under the Skin (2014)
Barry Jenkins - Moonlight (2016)
Terrence Malick - The Tree of Life (2011)
George Miller - Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)
Kelly Reichardt - First Cow (2020)
Martin Scorsese - The Wolf of Wall Street (2013)
Quentin Tarantino - Inglourious Basterds (2009)
Best Documentary
The Act of Killing (2013)
Apollo 11 (2019)
Faces Places (2017)
Life Itself (2014)
The Look of Silence (2015)
Minding the Gap (2018)
O.J. Made in America (2016)
Time (2020)
Best Cinematic Moment
Atomic Blonde - stairwell fight (2017)
Children of Men - Battle of Bexhill (2006)
Goodbye to Language - double vision, take 1 (2014)
Holy Motors - intermission (2012)
Lovers Rock - "Silly Games" (2020)
Parasite - flood (2019)
Phoenix - "Speak Low" (2015)
A Star Is Born - Jack and Ally perform "Shallow" onstage (2018)
There Will Be Blood - Bowling for Eli (2007)
Toni Erdmann - "The Greatest Love of All" (2016)
Toy Story 3 - in the incinerator (2010)
The Tree of Life - creation sequence (2011)
Up - marriage montage (2009)
WALL*E - space dancing (2008)
The Wolf of Wall Street - Lemmon 714s
Best Screenplay
Before Midnight (2013)
Carol (2015)
The Departed (2006)
First Cow (2020)
First Reformed (2018)
Get Out (2017)
The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014)
Inglourious Basterds (2009)
Manchester By The Sea (2016)
Moonrise Kingdom (2012)
No Country For Old Men (2007)
Parasite (2019)
A Separation (2011)
The Social Network (2010)
Synecdoche, New York (2008)
Best Ensemble Performance
Da 5 Bloods (2020)
The Departed (2006)
The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014)
The Hateful Eight (2015)
Inglourious Basterds (2009)
Lady Bird (2017)
Moonlight (2016)
Moonrise Kingdom (2012)
No Country For Old Men (2007)
Parasite (2019)
Rachel Getting Married (2008)
The Social Network (2010)
Support the Girls (2018)
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011)
The Wolf of Wall Street (2013)
Best Cinematography
Antichrist (2009)
Blade Runner 2049 (2017)
Carol (2015)
Children of Men (2006)
The Dark Knight (2008)
Inside Llewyn Davis (2013)
The Lighthouse (2019)
Lovers Rock (2020)
The Master (2012)
Moonlight (2016)
Roma (2018)
There Will Be Blood (2007)
The Tree of Life (2011)
True Grit (2010)
Under the Skin (2014)
Best Music
The Dark Knight (2008)
Drive (2011)
Fantastic Mr Fox (2009)
The Hateful Eight (2015)
If Beale Street Could Talk (2018)
Inside Llewyn Davis (2013)
Jackie (2016)
Moonrise Kingdom (2012)
Phantom Thread (2017)
The Social Network (2010)
Soul (2020)
There Will Be Blood (2007)
Uncut Gems (2019)
Under the Skin (2014)
Best Editing
Boyhood (2014)
Da 5 Bloods (2020)
Dunkirk (2017)
Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)
Moonlight (2016)
The Other Side of the Wind (2018)
Parasite (2019)
The Social Network (2010)
The Tree of Life (2011)
The Wolf of Wall Street (2013)
Zero Dark Thirty (2012)
Outstanding Body of Work
Josh Brolin (2007)
Marion Cotillard (2014)
Leonardo DiCaprio (2010)
Robert Downey Jr (2008)
Michael Fassbender (2011)
Brian Tyree Henry (2018)
Isabelle Huppert (2016)
Jennifer Jason Leigh (2015)
Matthew McConaughey (2012, 2013)
Steve McQueen (2020)
Florence Pugh (2019)
Steven Soderbergh (2009)
Michael Stuhlbarg (2017)
Outstanding Cinematic Breakthrough
Ben Affleck - Gone Baby Gone (2007)
Radha Blank - The 40-Year-Old Version (2020)
Jessica Chastain - The Tree of Life, Take Shelter, The Help, The Debt, Coriolanus, Texas Killing Fields (2011)
Adèle Exarchopoulos - Blue Is the Warmest Color (2013)
Jennifer Hudson - Dreamgirls (2006)
Barry Jenkins - Moonlight (2016)
Rian Johnson - Brick (2006)
Jennifer Kent - The Babadook (2014)
Martin McDonagh - In Bruges (2008)
Jordan Peele - Get Out (2017)
Florence Pugh - Little Women, Midsommar, Fighting With My Family (2019)
Boots Riley - Sorry to Bother You (2018)
Hailee Steinfeld - True Grit (2010)
Alicia Vikander - Ex Machina, The Danish Girl, The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (2015)
Quvenzhané Wallis - Beasts of the Southern Wild (2012)
Christoph Waltz - Inglourious Basterds (2009)
Outstanding Youth Performance
Julia Butters - Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019)
Elsie Fisher - Eighth Grade (2018)
Brooklynn Prince - The Florida Project (2017)
Talia Ryder - Never Rarely Sometimes Always (2020)
Best DVD Release
Blade Runner: The Final Cut [Warner] (2007)
Dazed and Confused [Criterion] (2006)
Best Web-based Criticism
A.V. Club (2010)
The House Next Door (2008)
The Man Who Viewed Too Much (2011)
Some Came Running (2009)
10th Anniversary Award
Boogie Nights (2007/1997)
Children of Men (2016/2006)
Dogville (2013/2003)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2014/2004)
Eyes Wide Shut (2009/1999)
In the Mood for Love (2010/2000)
Mulholland Dr. (2011/2001)
The New World (2015/2005)
Punch-Drunk Love (2012/2002)
Rushmore (2008/1998)
A Serious Man (2019/2009)
The Social Network (2020/2020)
WALL*E (2018/2008)
Zodiac (2017/2007)
25th Anniversary Award
Blade Runner (2007/1982)
Blue Velvet (2011/1986)
Brazil (2010/1985)
Dazed and Confused (2018/1993)
Die Hard (2013/1988)
Do the Right Thing (2014/1989)
Full Metal Jacket (2012/1987)
GoodFellas (2015/1990)
Heat (2020/1995)
The King of Comedy (2008/1983)
Pulp Fiction (2019/1994)
The Silence of the Lambs (2016/1991)
This Is Spinal Tap (2009/1984)
Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me (2017/1992)
50th Anniversary Award
2001: A Space Odyssey (2018/1968)
8 ½ (2013/1963)
The Conformist (2020/1970)
Dr. Strangelove (2014/1964)
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (2016/1966)
Lawrence of Arabia (2012/1962)
North by Northwest (2009/1959)
Point Blank (2017/1967)
Psycho (2010/1960)
Repulsion (2015/1965)
The Seventh Seal (2007/1957)
Vertigo (2008/1958)
The Wild Bunch (2019/1969)
Yojimbo (2011/1961)
And that's the ballgame, folks. I'll update the site… eventually. Vaya con dios, Muriel friends. Now let's have David Byrne and pals take us outta here!
Sunday, March 28, 2021
2020 Muriel Awards: And the Golden Muriel for Best Picture Goes to...
“Kelly Reichardt movies always starts with absences, voids, unknowns. A woman without a home or a past to which we have access. A lawyer without stability, a young woman without a social life, a woman without the love of her family. A western caravan with no past and no future. These are the terms on which maybe America’s greatest director not named Martin Scorsese stakes her vision. Behind you? A tantalizing unknown made of impatient body language and the wrinkles under eyes staring too hard into the distance. In front of you? Graves and a fog you can’t see through. First Cow, her latest western, starts with an empty map on either side of its hero. All around John Magaro’s Cookie is civilization. He’ll hear about the great Asian cities, the Northeast of America, London, Paris, but all he knows is the thin and treacherous path in front of him and for all it winds and dips and takes him to places he’s never seen, it’s a straight line to his grave, the second sight the film has to offer.
“Knowing our hero dies doesn’t, however, make it any harder to become heavily invested in his journey from where he meet him, unmoored in his life and in space and time, to his final resting place. Reichardt has drawn one of her best characters here, a man so gentle he can’t help but turn away from violence when he encounters it, and cower from it passively and silently when he himself is threatened by it. He is, in other words, too good for this world. And that makes him perfect for her world, a place of bumbling dreamers stalked by intense disappointment lurking behind every corner like a fox peering into a henhouse window.
“He meets his match in a host of men ejected from all those fancy places he hears about. The great cities of Europe and Asia have spat out Toby Jones’ voluptuous Chief Factor and Orion Lee’s enterprising and ironically named King-Lu. A king in name only, a king deposed, a man with a thousand ideas about how to get his kingdom back, and no capital and no idea how to make his dreams real. He’s like Cookie in that regard, which of course makes them perfect friends. Two dreamers, one who knows what every corner of the map hides, and one who only knows that out beyond what he can see with his own eyes lies some unknown fortune and vastness. Reichardt, the poet of claustrophobic majesty, knows that vastness is yet all that he sees. Her natural world teems with it, and it keeps everyone from straying too far from what we in the audience can make sense of. The world is theoretically limitless in her cinema, and the horizon is forbiddingly beautiful and wide, but the truth is her heroes never make it that far.
“First Cow is maybe her most concise work, thematically. Two guys think they can beat the system and can’t, and their failure is a foregone conclusion. And yet, there are the most surprises here. There’s the unexpected tenderness of Cookie’s nocturnal dialogue with the cow who may be his and King-Lu’s ticket out of the Pacific Northwest. There’s the glee of two Native American women finally left alone to talk when their husbands leave the room. There’s the sight of Robert Altman’s one-time mascot Rene Auberjonois festooned with a crow like death himself. There’s the easy rapport between our heroes, which lazily spreads across days, time happily lost to a good vibe and the joy of friendship. First Cow is just one of those little miracles we’ll thankfully always have. That we had to live without it all this time seems unthinkable, but that’s what Reichardt’s cinema is all about. Filling in those absences with feelings and sights that moments before had no name and no shape.”
Scout Tafoya is an author, filmmaker, critic and video essayist, creator of “The Unloved” on RogerEbert.com, the longest running series of video essays on the web. He’s the author of Cinemaphagy: On the Psychedelic Classical Form of Tobe Hooper, the director of several dozen feature films and he’s written for The LA Review or Books, The Village Voice, Film Comment and Nylon Magazine among others. He publishes new writing and videos several times a week at Patreon.com/honorszombie/.
Best Film - Top 25:
1. First Cow [179.5/16]
2. Lovers Rock [142/13]
3. David Byrne's American Utopia [114/10]
4. I'm Thinking of Ending Things [96/9]
5. Sound of Metal [86/8]
6. City Hall [85.5/7]
7. (tie) Da 5 Bloods [80/9]
7. (tie) Never Rarely Sometimes Always [80/9]
9. Nomadland [75/7]
10. Ma Rainey's Black Bottom [72/8]
11. Fourteen [71/9]
12. The Invisible Man [68/7]
13. Possessor [64.5/6]
14. Collective [61.5/6]
15. Martin Eden [59.5/6]
16. The Assistant [57/6]
17. Vitalina Varela [53.5/7]
18. (tie) Bacurau [53.5/5]
18. (tie) Beanpole [53.5/5]
20. Minari [53/7]
21. The Grand Bizarre [48/5]
22. Time [45/6]
23. (tie) Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets [44.5/4]
23. (tie) To the Ends of the Earth [44.5/4]
25. Soul [41/5]
2020 Muriel Awards: Best Picture Countdown, #2
“Rooted in the social and the sensual, Steve McQueen’s Lovers Rock got right to the heart of global unease with open arms and womblike bass, a liberating simmer for the pressure cooker of the newest Plague Year.
“The joy of human contact. The experience of a dance party where all the drama is in the streets outside, and in the yard, and in the socioeconomic structures looming above and behind everything. Where the scent of freshly-made curry mixes with Proustian dub and the smiles and sweat of your friends, loved ones, and strangers you’ve just met.
“Its premiere as the opening night film for the 2020 New York Film Festival was a perfect distillation of a moment: protests filled streets the world over, death rates were soaring, and the idea of joyful Black people gathering together was a subversive and inspirational one for everyone. Lovers Rock was a sensual riot of so many of the human experiences put on hold during the pandemic, understanding the liberation of simple and temporary pleasures. Because there’s always some external stress bearing down, elevating the stakes for every moment of happiness; menace always has a way of kicking at whichever leg you’re leaning on.
“The bass soothes, the walls sweat, and like the ostracized telepaths in Scanners, we find a moment of transcendent peace in the middle of the siege the outside world holds. It’s a perfect illustration of the specific becoming the universal to the open-minded viewer, and it captures perfectly the sorely missed magic of the communal gathering. ‘Silly Games’ and ‘Kunta Kinte Dub’ will find their way into your emotional playlists, with both songs attaining the kind of majestic sweep of liturgy, of ritual. Of all the films to emerge during the Covid era, none demands a post-vaccine theatrical screening like this one.”
Jason Shawhan has been writing about film since 1989, and professionally since 2000. Writer, painter, DJ, programmer, and media prophet, you can encourage his behavior at www.jasonshawhan.com and at The Nashville Scene, The AV Club, and on several podcasts.
2020 Muriel Awards: The Rest of the Winners
Alas, there wasn't time in a single weekend to announce all our 2020 awards with written pieces. Here are the remaining awards for this year.
Best Direction:
1. Kelly Reichardt - First Cow [80/12]
2. Steve McQueen - Lovers Rock [76/13]
3. Charlie Kaufman - I'm Thinking of Ending Things [48/7]
4. Chloé Zhao - Nomadland [46/7]
5. Pedro Costa - Vitalina Varela [38/6]
Best Screenplay:
1. I'm Thinking of Ending Things (screenplay by Charlie Kaufman, based on the novel by Iain Reid) [63/9]
2. First Cow (screenplay by Jonathan Raymond and Kelly Reichardt, based on the novel The Half Life) [55/8]
3. Fourteen (written by Dan Sallitt) [45/7]
4. Sound of Metal (story by Darius Marder and Derek Cianfrance; screenplay by Darius Marder and Abraham Marder) [44/7]
5. Never Rarely Sometimes Always (written by Eliza Hittman) [40/7]
Best Ensemble Performance:
1. Da 5 Bloods [83/15]
2. Ma Rainey's Black Bottom [70/10]
3. Mangrove [56/9]
4. Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets [53/8]
5. I'm Thinking of Ending Things [43/6]
Best Cinematography:
1. Lovers Rock (Shabier Kirchner) [73/11]
2. Vitalina Varela (Leonardo Simões) [62/8]
3. First Cow (Christopher Blauvelt) [59/11]
4. Nomadland (Joshua James Richards) [55/9]
5. I'm Thinking of Ending Things (Łukasz Żal) [42/7]
Best Editing:
1. Da 5 Bloods (Adam Gough) [64/9]
2. Time (Gabriel Rhodes) [49/7]
3. Nomadland (Chloé Zhao) [47/7]
4. City Hall (Frederick Wiseman) [44/6]
5. Tenet (Jennifer Lame) [39/7]
Best Music:
1. Soul (original music by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, jazz compositions and arrangements by Jon Batiste) [102/15]
2. Lovers Rock (music supervisors Ed Bailie and Abi Leland) [92/14]
3. Tenet (original music by Ludwig Göransson) [46/8]
4. Mank (original music by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross) [34/6]
5. (tie) David Byrne's American Utopia (original music by David Byrne) [29/5]
5. (tie) Minari (original music by Emile Mosseri) [29/5]
Outstanding Cinematic Breakthrough:
1. Radha Blank (actor/director/writer/producer - The 40-Year-Old Version) [72/12]
2. Andrew Patterson (director - The Vast of Night) [52/9]
3. Maria Bakalova (actor - Borat Subsequent Moviefilm) [47/7]
4. Sidney Flanigan (actor - Never Rarely Sometimes Always) [41/7]
5. Cooper Raiff (actor/director/writer/producer/editor - Shithouse) [28/4]
Outstanding Body of Work:
1. Steve McQueen (director/screenwriter - Small Axe) [137/19]
2. Chadwick Boseman (actor - Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, Da 5 Bloods) [118/20]
3. Spike Lee (director - David Byrne's American Utopia, Da 5 Bloods) [105/16]
4. (tie) Sacha Baron Cohen (actor - The Trial of the Chicago 7, Borat Subsequent Moviefilm) [49/9]
4. (tie) Elisabeth Moss (actor - The Invisible Man, Shirley) [49/9]
Best Youth Performance:
1. Talia Ryder - Never Rarely Sometimes Always [42/9]
2. Alan Kim - Minari [41/10]
3. Kenyah Sandy - Education [23/6]
4. (tie) Lucas Jaye - Driveways [14/3]
4. (tie) Sophia Lillis - Gretel & Hansel [14/3]
2020 Muriel Awards: Best Picture Countdown, #3
“When, on Saturday, November 7, 2020, all of the major news networks finally called the presidential election in favor of now-President Joe Biden, it was easy, in the moment, to celebrate what felt like the impending end of a terrible era: a presidency that had trafficked in fear-mongering, racism, and nationalism to lay bare America's long-standing social inequities and divide the country even further than it already was. But of course, Donald Trump wasn't about to go down without a fight, thus paving the way for the riot in Washington, D.C., on January 6, 2021, when a large crowd of his supporters stormed the Capitol in a last-ditch attempt to overturn free and fair election results that were in the process of being certified that day. If his recent appearance at the 2021 Conservative Political Action Conference is any indication, we're all going to be dealing with the fallout from Trump's disastrous presidency for much longer than many of us would prefer.
“So while it's perhaps now easy, maybe even desirable, to dismiss David Byrne's American Utopia—Spike Lee's filmed version of David Byrne's hit Broadway concert—as an instant relic of a particularly tormented period in American history, as long as the social and political forces that allowed a Trump presidency to flourish in the first place remain, David Byrne's idiosyncratic yet wonderfully inclusive vision will continue to resonate. Certainly, nothing will bring back Michael Brown, Freddie Gray, George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and many other black lives lost to police violence, as Lee highlights during Byrne & company's stirring rendition of Janelle Monáe's ‘Hell You Talmbout.’ And as many majority-Republican states continue to try introduce ‘election reforms’ that are basically just fancy attempts at voter suppression, even Byrne's awkward interstitial lecture about America's right to vote will remain relevant.
“And of course, David Byrne's American Utopia will always be just a fireball of joy. Surely that is an experience that will never grow old, whatever period in history we're all in.”
Kenji Fujishima is a writer and editor based in New York City. He has previously written about film for publications including Village Voice, Slant Magazine, and Paste, and about theater for TheaterMania.
2020 Muriel Awards: Best Picture Countdown, #4
“Charlie Kaufman makes movies about death and the ways we try (and usually fail) to make our own meaning. While his screenplay for I’m Thinking of Ending Things is largely faithful, story-wise, to Ian Reid’s book, it’s also a perfect vehicle for his preoccupation with how we use art and pop culture to try to give our own lives context. Adaptation and Synecdoche, New York are about artists struggling to realize their (ultimately unfinished) vision, but I’m Thinking of Ending Things is a sadder variation on this theme. What starts as a story about a woman going to meet her boyfriend’s parents gradually reveals itself to be about a protagonist who never became the person they hoped to be, who can now only understand their own life through the language of songs from old musicals, overwrought movie monologues and other pop cultural ephemera that has lodged in their brain. As the character played by Jessie Buckley (quoting Wilde) puts it, ‘Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation.’
“As downbeat a subject as this is for a movie, I find that Kaufman – like Bradbury, or Vonnegut – hits a bittersweet spot for me. Though I don't have a lot in common with Buckley's or Jesse Plemons' characters, seeing these anxieties and morbid ruminations realized is paradoxically comforting, even if only because it means I’m a little less alone. After this one, I’m not sure Kaufman would want me to feel this way; oh well. And though the movie’s bleak, there’s also joy in its creation. There’s the playfulness of Kaufman’s writing (where a character can suddenly transform into Pauline Kael), how much the cast is clearly enjoying the freedom the material allows (Buckley, in particular, is a revelation and, along with Delroy Lindo, one of my favorite performances this year), and the possibility that, though the movie’s world is dark, a ballet could and will happen. That the movie has been divisive makes it feel more like it belongs to me, especially in a year where it resonated in ways Kaufman couldn’t have anticipated, when it often feels like we’re stuck in a car in the middle of nowhere, en route to an unknown, possibly sinister destination.”
Andrew Bemis is an actor and filmmaker. His most recent movie, Most Likely, premiered at the Boston LGBTQ film festival (more info at bang-films.com). He lives in New Hampshire with his family.
2020 Muriel Awards: Best Picture Countdown, #5
“The acute realization of hearing loss is wrought with shocking consternation as one sits in a booth where perfunctory queries are made to a patient reduced to guesswork. Hearing loss is largely an inevitable consequence of age and genetics but it could also be brought on by bad living choices or a profession that increases the odds of long-term or as in the case of Sound of Metal an all-too-speedy sensory breakdown negotiated by aural bombast. In the surprisingly unsentimental film, directed by Darius Marder and written by Marder (and his brother Abraham) a punk-metal drummer recovering from drug addiction lives in a time and age where there are some promising options. Initially Ruben defies the advice of an ear doctor who sensibly warns against further exposure to loud noises by staying the course on the performing circuit. His girlfriend and band-mate Lou who travels with him in a recreational trailer is fearful his newfound disability may reverse his sobriety so she helps to arrange a move to a remote rural shelter for recovering addicts who have also lost their hearing. The commune is run by recovering alcoholic Joe whose own ability to negotiate sound-waves was destroyed during the Vietnam War. At first Ruben refuses to come to terms with their edict that Lou cannot live there with him and that ultimately all he is seeking are cochlear implants which are not covered by insurance but are reachable after he later sells his possessions including the trailer. Lou persists in convincing Ruben to return to the shelter while she puts their relationship on hold by moving to her father's residence in Europe.
“Ruben readily becomes acclimated to his new group home and learns sign language. Joe encourages him to write and to be comfortable with silence, and Ruben administers drumming lessons to the young members. After Joe reveals that Ruben's tenure at the home was sponsored by a local church, he offers the brooding tenant a degree of permanence by taking on a job, but restless to his core Ruben is more interested in what Lou is doing and learns online she is experimenting with her own music. While awaiting the activation of his implants, made possible by the aforementioned pawning of his holdings, Ruben asks Joe for a loan so he can re-but his vehicle, but is denied by Joe who then asks that Ruben leave the home on the philosophy that deafness is not and should not be considered a handicap. The activation of the implants brings mixed results, though in view of the drummer's professional pedigree even less, since severe distortion connected with the end result of the procedure can never be satisfying. He flies to Belgium to move in with Lou and it greeted by the father who tells him he has had an about face in his feelings about his daughter's boyfriend since the bottom line is that he made Lou happy. Further realizations that hearing distortion will never allow him a real measure of sensory appreciation coax Ruben into leaving Lou, and some visualized meditative uncertainty.
“Sound of Metal contains some magisterial performances, especially from Riz Ahmed, whose raw, soulful and inward portrayal as the drummer who recalls ‘Ludwig Van’ will surely garner him an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor. His work here is sedately electrifying and fully disavows the Oscar bait cloying tendencies associated with portrayals that almost petition for sympathy from the viewer. Ahmed defiantly sustains the realism while triumphs over a final stretch of melodrama, accentuating a character who understandably holds to the false notion that eventually he he will regain all that he has lost. Of the film's other impressive turns, Paul Raci -who may also be named as a nominee for Supporting Actor- has received much-deserved critical praise as the group home's forlorn proprietor, a man whose experience with life's bad turns have given him a more accepting perspective, yet one who is steadfast in his commitment to the commune's purpose. Raci leaves a powerful impression as one who has gone through so much and won't buckle to psychologically debilitating perceptions. The film's sound design, fully in tune with its theme and title is extraordinarily impressive and the guarded writing really fits the material and the tone of the subject. Sound of Metal is one of the best and most emotionally resonating films of the year.”
In the words of Sam A. Juliano - “Creator and editor of "Wonders in the Dark" (wondersinthedark.wordpress.com) an arts site that debuted in 2007 and is now entering its 14th year of sustained activity. I have written hundreds of films, opera, theater and book reviews for the site and pandemic-constrictions aside I normally see in the neighborhood of 250 newly-released films a year. I own over 6,000 films and televisions shows in my home on DVD or blu ray and host an annual Oscar party that attracts about 50 to 60 people annually since 1977. I am a veteran 36 year teacher for English literature, creative writing and children's literature in my New Jersey hometown. I was the lead actor in two short films that were chosen to screen in the New York Film Festival, the BAM Brooklyn Academy of Music Festival, the Nighthawk Festival and the Montvale Film Festival the past two years. The films are "The Thing That Kills Me the Most" and "Best Picture." The latter is about our most recent Oscar party.
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