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Southeastern Film Critics Association Names Best Films of 2023

The 89 members of the Southeastern Film Critics Association (SEFCA) have named Oppenheimer as the best film of 2024 in their annual poll.

“2023 will be remembered by many as the year that featured the commercial, critical, and cultural phenomenon known as Barbenheimer,” says SEFCA Vice President Jim Farmer. But it was also a season that offered a stunning amount of high-quality films, with master filmmakers near the top of their games, fresher faces making strong impressions, and performers showing new dimensions. It was a pleasure to take in all that 2023 had to offer.”

Oppenheimer proved to be an overwhelming favorite with the critics, who awarded Christopher Nolan Best Director laurels. The entire acting ensemble was honored, Cillian Murphy earned Best Actor for his portrayal of the father of the atomic bomb, and Robert Downey Jr. won Best Supporting Actor. Hoyt Van Hoytema was recognized for Best Cinematography, and Ludwig Goransson for Best Score.

“This fall featured three big films from three grandmasters of cinema,” says SEFCA President Scott Phillips. “Martin Scorsese released Killers of the Flower Moon. Ridley Scott brought
Napoleon to the big screen and Michael Mann hits theaters next week with Ferrari. Despite this bumper crop from heavy-hitting auteurs, Christopher Nolan’s film from six months ago is walking away with eight SEFCA awards. Oppenheimer is a stunning cinematic achievement. Our members recognized that in July, and they are rewarding it in December.”

Here is the complete slate of 2023 awards from SEFCA:

Top 10 Films of 2023

  1. Oppenheimer
  2. Killers of the Flower Moon
  3. The Holdovers
  4. Past Lives
  5. Barbie
  6. Poor Things
  7. American Fiction
  8. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse
  9. Anatomy of a Fall
  10. The Zone of Interest

Best Actor

Cillian Murphy, Oppenheimer

Best Actress
Lily Gladstone, Killers of the Flower Moon

Best Supporting Actor
Robert Downey, Jr., Oppenheimer

Best Supporting Actress
Da’Vine Joy Randolph, The Holdovers

Best Ensemble
Oppenheimer

Best Director

Christopher Nolan, Oppenheimer

Best Original Screenplay
David Hemingson, The Holdovers

Best Adapted Screenplay
Christopher Nolan, Oppenheimer

Best Animated Film

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse

Best Documentary
Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie

Best Foreign-Language Film
Anatomy of a Fall

Best Cinematography
Hoyt Van Hoytema, Oppenheimer

Best Score
Ludwig Goransson, Oppenheimer

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Indie Memphis 2023: Lagueria Davis on Black Barbie

The story of Lagueria Davis’ timely documentary Black Barbie is actually a part of the film. It started almost a decade ago when she moved from Fort Worth, Texas, to Los Angeles. Looking to break into the business, she asked her aunt for a place to live. Actually, “My mom asked because I was too shy, since I only met her twice as a kid, and she didn’t know me as an adult,” the director says. “She said, ‘Yes, yes, you can stay with me.’ I was like, ‘I’m pretty independent person. I’ll be with you two to three months tops.’”

Her aunt was a doll collector, and longtime employee at toymaker Mattel. Davis didn’t play with dolls very much growing up, but she was captivated by her aunt’s story of how the Black version of the Barbie doll came to be. “I was just struck by how I didn’t know about Black Barbie, and I never even thought about Black Barbie, to be honest. It was a really eye-opening conversation with her, and I was struck with the sense of history having been lived. I don’t even know if this story would be something we would read in any text or history book. These are stories from front lines, from people who’ve lived it. It’s also people who look like me who are telling me these stories, not someone with a different gaze or perspective. … My aunt is kind of the key and Black Barbie, the door which we can unlock and open and walk in to talk about these greater themes of representation as it relates to Black women and Black girls in particular.” 

The film Black Barbie traces the development of the dolls, from Barbie’s meteoric rise to the top of the toy box to the various experiments with racially diverse dolls, both successful and unsuccessful, by Mattel and other toy companies. Davis tracked down Kitty Black Perkins, a fashion designer who, after designing clothes for Barbie for years, finally convinced Mattel to allow her to design a Barbie with Black skin. “Why did it take 21 years? Because that’s what was happening.” 

At one point, Davis and her collaborators recreate a famous sociological experiment, which was cited in the landmark school desegregation case Brown vs. Board of Education, where children were asked their opinions of dolls with different shades of skin. “It was so fun. Our producer, Aaliyah Williams and our associate producer, Brianne Klugiewicz, they were the ones who set out to find the children. We shot it at a charter school in Los Angeles, and we put out a notice to them who then put out an APB, if you will, to other charter schools. We got submissions, and then I also put out a casting call, so to speak. And so, we got a few children from that pool of children. We worked with Dr. Amirah Saafir, who decided we should group them in threes with their peers. That makes them more comfortable, so they would be able to talk and play. We had the dolls there for them to interact with and not make it a forced choice situation, and we had a spectrum of children and dolls. Then it was just like, ‘Let’s make it conversational.’” 

In addition to setting toy history straight, Davis brings a wide variety of voices on the screen to discuss the impact Barbie has had on children, race, and femininity. “I thought it was really important to have several different voices, from academia to fanatics to people who didn’t particularly see her as progressive. … I just wanted a spectrum of voices and a spectrum of thought from people who were a part of the community, but could also speak to diversity of thought within that community, because it’s not a monolithic experience.” 

After working for years to create this unique documentary, Davis’ project got a big boost in interest this summer when Greta Gerwig’s Barbie unexpectedly became the biggest grossing film of the year. Black Barbie has now appeared in 75 film festivals, and was recently purchased for distribution by Shondaland and Netflix. “I felt like the story that we were laying out for Black Barbie, the doll, is very much parallel to the story of making Black Barbie, the documentary, and getting it out there. And it’s funny because I think my brain is kind of wired to connect dots.”  

Black Barbie screens in competition at the Indie Memphis Film Festival Saturday, October 28th, at noon at Playhouse on the Square. Individual tickets and passes are available at the Indie Memphis website.

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Now Playing in Memphis: Hauntings, Barbie, and Five Easy Pieces

One of the most popular attractions in Disneyland/World is the Haunted Mansion. Video doesn’t do it justice, and the previous attempt at adaptation didn’t go so well, either. New dad LaKeith Stanfield leads an all-star cast who will try to get it right this time.

The Barbenheimer phenomenon rolls on into its second weekend. The greatest double feature in movie history started out as a joke, but people keep coming because both Barbie and Oppenheimer are great films.

Barbie opens with a parody of The Dawn of Man, the wordless opening sequence from 2001: A Space Odyssey. On Saturday, you can see the real thing at the Time Warp Drive-In’s July edition, A Real Horrorshow: The Dark Visions of Stanley Kubrick. It’s a redo of one of the most popular programs in the Time Warp’s ten-year history. Here’s the fabled “3 Million Year cut” that Greta Gerwig appropriated with a wink.

The auteurist evening begins with The Shining, another of Kubrick’s films that has been endlessly parodied since its release in 1980. People have been trying to approach the sheer creepy power of this scene for the last 40 years, and no one has got it right yet.

Both The Shining and the third film of the evening, A Clockwork Orange, have been featured on my Never Seen It series — which I swear I’m going to get back to soon! The 1971 film is a pioneering work of dystopian sci fi, and features one of the greatest opening shots of all time.

On Thursday, August 3rd, Crosstown Theater’s film series presents Five Easy Pieces. The film by director Bob Rafelson cemented Jack Nicholson’s reputation as the best actor of his generation.

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Barbenheimer

It began as an internet joke. Barbie and Oppenheimer were both scheduled to open on July 21st. Wouldn’t it be weird to watch both of them back-to-back?

Counter-programming is a long tradition among film distributors. Whenever there’s a big “boy” movie, like The Dark Knight, someone with a “girl” movie, like Mamma Mia!, will schedule it for release the same weekend. The theory behind “Dark Mamma” (which really happened in 2008) is that maybe girlfriends and grandmas who are not into Batman can be scraped off of a family outing by the promise of something they would actually like.

By that logic, the hot pink good cheer of Barbie is the perfect foil for the dark, brooding Oppenheimer. No one expected the audience reaction to be “Let’s do both!” Maybe that’s because the studio execs’ conception of who their audiences are and what they want is deeply flawed and out-of-date.

On the surface, the two films couldn’t be more different. But there are a lot of parallels. Both Christopher Nolan and Greta Gerwig are writer/directors with exceptional track records. Both got essentially free rein to do what they wanted. In Nolan’s case, it was because Universal wanted to lure him away from Warner Bros. In Gerwig’s case, the film was greenlit just before the pandemic and Warner Bros.’ takeover by Discovery. In the chaos, executives focused on rescuing The Flash, and no one cared enough about “the girl movie” to interfere with Gerwig’s vision.

Both films are, relatively speaking, mid-budget. Nolan kept the ship tight at $100 million; Gerwig ended up spending $145 million. For comparison, Marvel films can’t even roll camera for less than $200 million, and Warner Bros. will lose $200 million on The Flash alone. Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny cost an eye-watering $295 million after Covid delays.

More unexpected parallels emerge on screen. Both main characters face a reckoning for what they brought into the world. In J. Robert Oppenheimer’s case, it’s the atomic bomb. In Barbie’s case, it’s unrealistic expectations of female perfection.

In her Memphis Flyer review of Barbie, Kailynn Johnson writes, “The idea of a doll visiting the real world and learning to adjust to a life that’s not so fantastic was always in the cards for Barbie — the 2000 movie Life-Size starring Tyra Banks walked so Gerwig could run with Barbie. As she is catcalled by construction workers in Venice Beach, Barbie realizes misogyny did not end with Supreme Court Barbie. She suffers an existential crisis when she realizes that her very brand is determined by an all-male team led by Mr. Mattel (Will Ferrell). … Gerwig uses Barbie to explore the nuances of feminism, but the film never feels too heavy or takes itself too seriously. She carefully sandwiches some of the deeper moments with satire. It helps that Mattel isn’t afraid to laugh at itself.”

Barbie may have benefitted from low expectations from those who were unfamiliar with Gerwig’s near-perfect filmography, but expectations couldn’t have been higher for Nolan, the inheritor of Stanley Kubrick’s “Very Serious Filmmaker” mantle. Big, complex, and messy, Oppenheimer doesn’t lack for ambition. I wrote in my review, “The Trinity bomb test, which comes about two hours into this three-hour epic, is a near-silent tour de force of fire and portent. The scientists’ queasy victory party, held in a cramped Los Alamos gymnasium, may be the best single scene Nolan has ever done. … If only the whole movie were that great.”

The weekend box office results exceeded everyone’s expectations. Barbie raked in $162 million domestically — the biggest opening haul of the year, and the biggest ever by a female director. Oppenheimer did $82 million, a stunning result for a talky three-hour movie about nuclear physics. Overall, it was the fourth-largest grossing weekend in film history.

Viewers who rolled their own Barbenheimer double feature on some internet dare to experience the most intense psychic whiplash possible found two well-made movies, each with their own voice and something to say. Instead of competition, these two films have lifted each other up and inspired real conversation. The tribal question of “which one is better?” has, so far, been secondary. (It’s Barbie, FWIW.)

In Hollywood, unexpected success is more upsetting than unexpected failure. The public’s embrace of original, creative, filmmaker-driven pictures over legacy franchises systematically drained of originality by cowardly executives is now undeniable. As the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes grind on, and the studios plot to break the creatives’ will, audiences have sent a clear message about who is necessary and who is expendable.

Barbenheimer (Barbie + Oppenheimer)
Now playing
Multiple locations

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Film Features Film/TV

Barbie

When it was announced that a Barbie movie was in the works, it’s safe to say that one of the questions that crossed everyone’s mind was “Why?”

Barbie’s dream universe has covered everything from nutcrackers to mermaid lore, and it seemed like Barbara Millicent Roberts was past her prime. The Y2K aesthetic only made room for Bratz dolls, and the meme-ification of American Girl dolls transformed them from status symbols to internet mainstays. Meanwhile, the opinion of feminist scholars who had long criticized Barbie for the outrageous beauty standards she perpetuated had gone mainstream. Girls still love their dolls, but Barbie’s star has burned out.

My interest was piqued when I heard Greta Gerwig would be tasked with telling Barbie’s story. The plot has been kept tightly under wraps, with rumors ranging from a Wizard of Oz-esque storyline to something like The Truman Show. Those rumors were not entirely wrong, but Barbie exists as its own film.

From the beginning, it’s evident that the film is a meta-narrative, which adds to the satirical charm. Helen Mirren narrates Barbie’s zeitgeist origin story in a 2001 Space Odyssey-themed sequence, in which she explains that the Barbie doll was created for girls to aspire to something other than motherhood. Barbie is aware of her existence in the world, and aware of the impact that she has had on society as a trailblazing role model for career-minded women. As Mirren notes in her narration, Barbie has solved all the problems of feminism and equality – or at least, that’s the lore in Barbieland.

Margot Robbie stars as the Stereotypical Barbie. She lives in Barbieland with an endless array of Barbie variants, such as Doctor Barbie (Hari Nef), Writer Barbie (Alexandra Shipp) and President Barbie (Issa Rae), who preside over this matriarchal democracy.

Many Barbies live in Barbieland. But only Margot Robbie’s Stereotypical Barbie has flat feet.

Then we meet the Kens, who are just as varied as the Barbies, only less cool. Ryan Gosling’s iteration of Barbie’s companion lists “beach” as his profession. But it’s not easy being a Ken. Mirren explains that while Barbie has a great day every day, Ken has a great day only if Barbie looks at him.

Barbie’s perpetual string of great days takes a turn for the worse when she brings one of her nightly blowout parties/soundstage musical numbers to a record-scratch halt when she blurts out, “Do you ever think about dying?” The next morning, she wakes up with bad breath, falls out of her dream house, and discovers that her feet have gone flat. Realizing that something is wrong, she pays a visit to Weird Barbie (Kate McKinnon), who explains that the only way for Barbie to restore her perfect tiptoe and avoid cellulite is to trade in her heels for Birkenstocks and take a trip to the real world. Since Ken only exists as an ornamental addition to Barbie’s iconography, he joins her on the journey to reality, where they make discoveries that pose an existential threat to Barbieland’s women-run utopia.

Good morning, Barbieland!

The idea of a doll visiting the real world and learning to adjust to a life that’s not so fantastic was always in the cards for Barbie – the 2000 movie Life Size starring Tyra Banks walked so Robbie could run with Barbie. As she is catcalled by construction workers in Venice Beach, Barbie realizes misogyny did not end with Supreme Court Barbie. She suffers an existential crisis when she realizes that her very brand is determined by an all-male team led by Mr. Mattel (Will Ferrell.)  

Gerwig uses Barbie to explore the nuances of feminism, but the film never feels too heavy or takes itself too seriously. It helps that Mattel isn’t afraid to laugh at itself, like the recurring joke where Midge (Emerald Fennell), a pregnant version of Barbie that was deeply unpopular with kids, is banished to Skipper’s Treehouse. Gerwig’s attention to detail and dedication to the source material not only satiates a longing for nostalgia, but also showcases her intentionality. Since no child ever made a doll take the stairs in her Dream House, these Barbies float through the air from bedroom to dream car. Gerwig makes that floaty feeling last.