Alright folks, pile in, pile in. The film screenings were plentiful and excellent this week, as I watched classic crime dramas by Scorsese and Coppola, two Miyazaki masterpieces I’d never experienced, and finally got to Ari Aster’s terrific Midsommar. I’m frankly feeling pretty crime drama’d out at the moment; when looking for classic films that also won’t bore my housemates, I’ve apparently returned to “well, this one has guns in it” a few too many times, and will have to find other ways to keep my overstimulated housemates happy. But for now, please enjoy the fruits of my labor, as I run down a fresh and rewarding set of films in the Week in Review!

This week we streamed a pair of beloved crime epics, opening with the original The Godfather. The Godfather is one of those movies that often gets thrown around in conversations about the “best film ever,” but to be honest, my viewing experience was somewhat lopsided. Coppola is able to maintain a tight grip on a narrative of impressive scale, and his execution of every scene of violence manages to walk an incredible tightrope between visual grace and brutality. Additionally, the entire cast is phenomenal, with Marlon Brando in particular putting in a genuinely moving performance as a scion long past his prime, still trying to maintain his strength, dignity, and beloved family.

That said, a great deal of time in this film is dedicated to a style of “romance” that I’ve begun to see again and again in these sorts of Boys and their Toys films, wherein a central main character points at a woman, says “her, I’m marrying her,” and then proceeds to woo and marry her with basically no participation by the woman whatsoever. Obviously this one-sided power dynamic isn’t historically inaccurate at all, but it’s also not dramatically interesting, and as a “humanizing” element for the male characters, it actually seems to serve the opposite effect. Basically, I can totally understand why anyone would be exhausted or put off by the resounding male-ness of a movie like this, and though the film’s cinematographic form is beautiful, I ultimately found myself having trouble caring about a world that itself cared so little about not just women, but basically all the types of emotional expression that tend to interest me.

That issue was also fully on display in Casino, a straight pitch by Scorsese starring De Niro, Joe Pesci, and Sharon Stone. Stone acts her ass off in this film, but is doomed to forever occupy the role of a pretty bird De Niro saw in a window, and subsequently got tired of the moment he brought it home. This drama strikes true, but it’s exhausting – yeah, I understand, dudes who work in the mafia are absolutely vile to their wives. Far more exciting than Stone’s narrative (which again, was limited by the nature of her character as written, not her excellent performance) was Casino’s giddy love of the casino floor itself, and Scorsese’s ability to energetically cut across De Niro’s whole domain, illustrating all the glitz and all the surveillance of Vegas in action. De Niro and Pesci also have an effortless chemistry even when their characters are inches from killing each other, and are each one of those actors where the idea of “performance” seems insufficient to describe their full embodiment of their characters. All in all, Casino isn’t likely to stick with me, but it’s a robust crime drama with top shelf artists in all the key roles.

After watching two straight Boys Being Boys three hour epics, it was indescribably gratifying to then shift to Midsommar, a film all about the emotional cowardice and manipulation of power dynamics involved in just that behavior. As in his previous film Hereditary, Ari Aster is just as fascinated by the dynamics of human relationships and family as he is by unknowable horror, with the young heroine Dani’s fraying relationship with her awful boyfriend Christian providing just as much tension and anxiety as their Wicker Man-styled Swedish accommodations.

Midsommar’s first half largely holds back on the traditional horror altogether. With her family having recently died and her boyfriend clearly distancing herself, concepts like “Dani takes mushrooms in a foreign country and then is reminded of her parents while surrounded by strangers” are plenty horrifying on their own. Midsommar is equally effective in bringing Dani’s shifting feelings to life (all credit to the terrific Florence Pugh) and in visually and aurally conveying the sensation of a bad trip, or a moment of total shock. And when the horror hits, it really hits, gleefully pillaging Scandinavian ritual and folklore in order to create an alienating campground with violence ever bubbling under the surface, as if the audience were treading water in a featureless yet shark-infested sea. Hereditary had me somewhat worried that Midsommar would be an overwhelming gloomy experience, but it instead finds its horror in sunlight, while pitching new threats at such a consistent rate that its lengthy running time passes like nothing. Another top-shelf horror film by Ari Aster, and a confirmation he’s as essential to our new horror wave as Jordan Peele or Robert Eggers.

My house also ran through the second half of The Legend of Korra, which I’m pleased to report was far, far more enjoyable than the first half. After two seasons that seemed to fundamentally misunderstand what made Avatar fun, season three at last returned to a structure resembling the original series’ globe-hopping adventures, as Korra and her companions traveled the world seeking new Airbenders. Not only did this quest, as well as the emergent conflict regarding a group of high-level benders, give season three far more of a sense of purpose and momentum, it also simply let the show explore more of Avatar’s fascinating world. And with the show’s regrettable love triangle shoved under the rug, the season is able to focus more on Avatar’s genuinely interesting emotional drama – like Korra’s doubts regarding her validity as an Avatar, or how the lingering shadow of characters like Toph and Aang affects the lives of their children and larger families.

Season four continues on this trend, building conflicts largely out the show’s existing variables, and embracing both Tenzen’s family and the Varrick/Zhu Li combo as core members of the Avatar cast. It’s still abundantly clear that Korra was written one season at a time (the show eventually just runs out of things for Mako to do, and largely writes him out entirely), and it never possesses the dramatic highlights, emotional weight, or coherent themes of its predecessor, but Korra’s last two seasons are still an altogether enjoyable pair of action cartoons.

I also watched Kiki’s Delivery Service, one of the few Miyazaki films I haven’t already seen, and one that immediately slots in among my absolute favorites. Kiki’s Delivery Service is one of those films that I’m already feeling sad I won’t get to watch again for the first time; it’s such a perfect articulation of so many things I love in anime, and it was just sitting there, an absolute affirmed classic, waiting for me to finally get to it. Every background and animation flourish of Kiki’s world is gorgeous, bringing to life a quasi-Mediterranean wonderland with details evoking San Francisco and Venice at once. Kiki’s world is one of the most beautiful articulations of one of my absolute favorite anime aesthetics, a style shared in some degree by shows like Haibane Renmei, Sound of the Sky, and Kino’s Journey.

Along with its beautiful art design, incredible backgrounds, and inviting world, Kiki’s Delivery Service is also a resounding demonstration of the limited necessity of concepts like plot or conflict. Though the overarching goal of “spend a year away from home as a witch” gives the film at least some sense of momentum, and though Kiki does indeed experience and overcome various struggles,  the film as a whole feels more like a day-to-day experience than a narrative conflict. Kiki’s life develops in stages, and sequences like Kiki’s visit to a woodland painter feel like their own life-affirming rewards, even as they gently push the narrative forward. Kiki’s Delivery Service consistently embodies the appeal of pure slice of life animation – in fact, one of my housemates even mentioned afterwards that he wanted to see more of this world, so I think we got ‘em, folks.

Kiki’s Delivery Service was swiftly followed by Porco Rosso, another Miyazaki film I’d never seen, and one of the most unusual films in his catalog. Porco Rosso is centered on a WWI ace pilot who has been mysteriously transformed into a humanoid pig – but the film isn’t really about the pig thing, and it’s treated more as a metaphor regarding his self-image than an active problem to be resolved. Instead, Porco Rosso focuses on much larger and more universal sentiments; Porco’s sense of survivor’s guilt, the freedom of the Adriatic Sea, and the encroaching sense of dread as Porco’s home country falls further and further into fascism.

While Porco Rosso’s real world setting and heavy themes make it feel more world-weary and adult-aimed than a lot of Miyazaki properties, the film balances its weighty material with farcical conflicts that felt almost reminiscent of Lupin adventures. There’s a band of rough-edged but soft-hearted pirates, and the role of “Traditional Miyazaki Heroine” is here assigned to Porco’s plucky new mechanic, who steals basically every scene she’s featured in. The end result is a film that feels perhaps the most personal out of any Miyazaki film I’ve seen; the reflections on war and technology less mediated by fantasy, the romance less idealized, and the fundamental discord of Miyazaki’s various interests lit in the starkest possible relief. It’s also really, really good, and presents an extremely specific world that feels as inviting as it is brimming with danger. Porco Rosso is a strange concept and a strange film, but I’m extremely happy it exists, and it also earns a high place in my Miyazaki rankings.