THE 2014 HALFTIME REPORT

 

 

And now the halftime report.

 

With over half of 2014 now in the rear-view mirror, I think I’ve almost fully acclimated to the reality that most of the more interesting niche films, which will only play a week or so in Los Angeles, I’m going to have to catch up with on VOD services or on traditional (you know, like the dinosaurs, traditional) DVD and Blu-ray. This means, of course, that I’m usually about three months (or even further) behind my more on-top-of-it friends and neighbors in the film-going world.

 

But that’s okay, because what I’ve seen so far in 2014 has been, with a few notable exceptions which will be noted in a moment, less than inspiring—it’s hard to remember a year in which I’ve been so indifferent to the majority of mainstream movies I see advertised, and so compelled by tiny notices in the newspaper or online about movies that, even living here in Los Angeles, I’ll probably have to wait to see. (Life Itself awaits, while I’m still processing my mild disappointment with Snowpiercer and feeling kinda shruggy about the prospect of Dawn of the Planet of the Apes.)

 

Here, then, is just a brief peek at what’s floated my boat so far this year, happily noting that Boyhood, Venus in Fur and the documentaries Whitey: United States of America v. James J. Bulger and The Battered Bastards of Baseball are all now playing in theaters near me.

 

 

ONLY LOVERS LEFT ALIVE (Jim Jarmusch)

 

 

UNDER THE SKIN (Jonathan Glazer)

 



 

THE GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL  (Wes Anderson)

 

GODZILLA (Gareth Edwards)

 

LAND HO! (Martha Stephens, Aaron Katz)

 

 

MILIUS (Joey Figueroa, Zak Knutson)

 

THE IMMIGRANT (James Gray)

 

NON-STOP (Jaume Collet-Serra)

 

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