The number of films & series I watched this past month dwindled to its lowest level since March, for a range of reasons, not least my slow and steady recuperation, though an ultrasound late this month showed healing (thank the gods). The pandemic rages, classes have begun, online, I have new colleagues in the MFA program, a new (longstanding but with a new position) colleague in Africana Studies, Rutgers-Newark has a new Dean of the School of Arts and Sciences, and Rutgers University (all three campuses) has a new president, Jonathan Holloway (I served on the committees that selected all of them). Fingers crossed things will work out OK in all cases.
As for the movies:
The Future (a Miranda July film that didn't hit)
The Third Generation* (Fassbinder's take on radical left politics in West Germany)
Town Bloody Hall* (the deliciousness of seeing Norman Mailer getting his public comeuppance drums on like a tattoo)
Zama* (the original di Benedetto novel is brilliant and Lucrecia Martel's adaptation is superb)
Duck Soup* (an old favorite)
Lost in America* (an old fave)
Princess Cyd* (a queer coming of age film by Stephen Cone)
The Wise Kids* (the first Stephen Cone film I'd ever watched)
Bacurau (this was hyped but fell flat for me)
La Ciénaga* (one of the month's highlights)
Personal Problems, Part 2*
Imagine the Sound* (an old favorite)
Black Narcissus*
The Last Tree* (Shola Amoo's exploration of a young Black man from rural England who moves to London)
Residue* (Meriwa Gerima's version)
Dames
Wolf* (Ya'ke Smith's 2012 film)
Before I Do
