Evan D. Over a career now spanning 10 films and 15 years, Wes Anderson has built himself out to be the most idiosyncratic auteurs of this era. Directors like Fincher, Villeneuve and Nolan may have their own distinct, recognizable flourishes and style, but each of those men’s work bends to commercial whims in a way that Anderson simply does not seem to care about. Love him or hate him, Wes Anderson has built a filmography in his own image, on his own terms.
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Evan D. “Faces from my past return” croons Billie Eilish over the opening credits of No Time to Die in her signature haunting tone. Both lyric and singer feel wholly appropriate for a Bond (Daniel Craig) himself haunted by his past misadventures. Portraits of Judy Dench’s M overlook MI6, Vesper Lynd (Eva Green) continues to color the decisions of 007 and even Felix Leiter (Jeffrey Wright) reappears for one final mission. No Time to Die spends so much time unpacking the history of our longest tenured Bond, yet the film’s lasting legacy may be what it portends for the future of the franchise.
Evan D. When it won the Palme d’Or back in 2019, on the way to total awards season domination, Parasite began the process of dismantling popular perception of what an awards film could be. Decidedly genre yet nearly unclassifiable as a whole, Bong Joon-ho’s thrilling masterpiece was a far cry from the period drama or stuffy biopic that often garners attention late in the year. If the 2019 Palme d’Or winner blurred the once rigid lines of how we contextualize film genre, the 2021 winner completely blew them up.
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