I usually like a tight and clever plot -- except when I don't.
The extreme example of not liking a tight and clever plot is any movie with spies. I don't really care who is double-crossing whom and why. I suppose spy thrillers often violate the rules of tightness in order to achieve the heights of "cleverness," but some people really go for that. I don't.
I do generally like it when something happens in the plot late in the movie to give me a little frisson of excitement, not necessarily a "twist," but something I wasn't expecting -- perhaps emotionally. But a lot of time, an emotional "twist" is more likely to be found in a movie where mood is what they're going for more than plot.
This is a roundabout way of telling you that I love a movie that is all about its mood -- but only when it's done well. A movie all about its mood that isn't done well is just an exercise in masturbation. But one that's done well ... *chef's kiss.*
What prompted the writing of this post was resuming my viewing of my previous #1s after a 39-day break to allow for my trip to America. My trip wasn't nearly that long, but I paused this project about a week before I left and it took a week after returning to unpause. I knew I wasn't going to watch any of these while I was gone, but interestingly, I could have. As it turned out, my dad and his wife suggested a viewing of Inside Out as one of our evening activities while we were in Maine with the kids -- and I watched it again even though I'd only just watched it for this project three weeks earlier. If only I'd known, I would have saved it.
It's not often you watch the same movie twice in a month, especially when it's your fifth or sixth time seeing the movie, but surprisingly, I was hit a tad harder by it this time than on the previous viewing. Maybe it was the company, with some people in the room -- including my sister -- seeing it for the first time. (Or it could have been the fact that my older son was in the room, and he's the same age as Riley, and he also just moved house in the past year, creating many of the emotions Riley experiences. I almost wrote a post about this very thing when I watched it back in early July.)
I contemplated watching a second movie for this project, one I hadn't just watched, on the plane, since Lost in Translation was among the Qantas offerings on our flight. But I was already watching one older movie for Audient Bollywood, so I just couldn't justify yielding a second spot to a movie that hadn't come out in 2022. (Though it would have been a great scenario to watch it, given that jet lag is a big theme of the movie.)
For a time last night, I wish I had, as I was unable to scare up Lost in Translation on any of my streaming services, despite my certainty it would be there. I was going to give up and shift to something else, and may have if I'd been able to find Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind on any of them either. Instead of searching up a third title, I asked myself "How lazy are you?" and just got out my old laptop to hook up to my TV via HDMI, so I could play my Region 1 DVD of Lost in Translation. It really only took about three minutes. I'm glad to know I'm not that lazy.
I still mightn't have written this post if I hadn't come across another movie I love that's all about its mood while doing some Flickcharting this morning. So here I am.
I decided not to come up with an entirely organic list -- that's a bit too much work for me this morning -- but rather to go down through that aforementioned Flickchart to identify the ten films I've ranked most highly that are about mood at the expense of plot. This is not to say they don't have any plot, just that the plot is there to support the mood -- at least as I experience the film.
Unsurprisingly, the mood for most of these films is "melancholy." That's really what you mean when you say "mood" without any other words to modify it.
Perhaps also unsurprisingly, these films tend to be supported by a very "moody" score or soundtrack, one that puts you in the contemplative space to appreciate what's going on with these characters.
Without any further ado, in the order they appear on my Flickchart ...
36. Lost in Translation (2003, Sofia Coppola) - It's a testament to Coppola's excellent musical taste that all the songs on this soundtrack strike an identical tone. As I was listening, and as an owner of the soundtrack, I kept saying "Oh yeah, this song. Wait I thought this song had already played." While that might sound like a backhanded compliment, it's actually a perfect realization of her attempt to establish a tone of melancholy and displacement, one that the movie plays out expertly. There's a disappointment while watching Lost in Translation that the "relationship" between Bob and Charlotte does not have a traditionally satisfying emotional arc, as it hits a bump in the road and ends in a place of minor disjuncture. But that's like actual life, in which connections rarely land solidly. Of course, the actual conclusion to their non-consummated romance hits it out of the park in terms of emotional satisfaction, and wouldn't you know it, there's the Jesus and Mary Chain's "Just Like Honey" to allow us to marinate in that moment.
76. My Neighbor Totoro (1988, Hayao Miyazaki) - I didn't say all my choices had to be melancholy. However, there's melancholy to be had indeed in this film, undercutting the wonder experienced by the children as they discover their new country home and all the various sprites and other magical creatures who lurk in its nooks and crannies, or in the forest just beyond. Let us not forget that weighing down these children's otherwise uncomplicated excitement and playfulness is the knowledge that their mother is sick, and they don't know for sure whether she will recover. My Neighbor Totoro never gets anywhere close to a story and I wouldn't have it any other way.
79. Spring Breakers (2013, Harmony Korine) - Many of my explanations about why I love Spring Breakers, given to incredulous listeners over the years, have never been able to fully encapsulate the special trance this movie places on me. First it captures FOMO perfectly. Then it captures the delirium of the best time of your life perfectly. Then it perfectly captures that feeling of when you've stayed at the party too long and things have started to go south -- also something depicted in Lost in Translation. But again it's the way this movie wraps you in its soundtrack -- particularly the ultimate in melancholy, "Ride Home" by Skrillex -- that leaves me staring off into the middle distance in reverie.
87. Once (2007, John Carney) - I wasn't at first sure if Once qualified, but it's certainly got the lack of plot. I mean, the characters don't even have names. This probably most closely approximates the missed but made connections between Bob and Charlotte in Translation, as a potential romance is considered but rebuffed, and we sense the profound effect these two have had on each other even though they may never see each other again. It's obvious that Glen Hansard's passionate, melancholy -- there's that word again -- music is the key to fueling this emotional journey, though we can't discount the contribution of Market Irglova, both as a singer and as Hansard's muse in its creation.
108. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (2007, Julian Schnabel) - Two thousand seven was a good year for making us feel more than think, though of course this got ranked with my 2008 films in the first year it was available outside France. Few things are more melancholy -- I'm going to stop calling attention to my use of this word -- than the concept of being trapped inside your brain with only a blinking eye to communicate with the world. Okay, maybe some people would call that terrifying more than melancholy. But there's something about how Schnabel depicts this condition for Jean-Dominique that effortlessly communicates his desire to grasp the beauty of life now that he is intimately acquainted with its fragility. And let's not forget the role music plays here, as there's an unforgettable sequence using U2's "Ultraviolet (Light My Way)" that might not sound memorable on the surface, but wallops you in context.
110. Ordet (1955, Carl Theodor Dreyer) - This might be a stretch and it might look like I'm desperate to prove to you that I like movies made before the year 2000, but there's no doubt that the spell cast on you by Ordet has little to do with its plot. This story of three sons of a devout Danish family, and their struggles with their faith, is the sort of thing that inspired a whole career of contemplation from the likes of Ingmar Bergman, some of whose films could end up appearing on this list. But I think it's really the quiet of their homestead, the rustling of its grass, that places you in this meditative space that carries through the whole picture, and prepares you for the high concept ending that it's best not to spoil.
134. Under the Skin (2013, Jonathan Glazer) - Scarlett Johansson makes her second appearance on this list with a film that basically has no plot at all. Well, it starts to develop something like a plot in its second half, but that's only in contrast to the first half, in which Johansson's alien cruises the streets of Glasgnow for new victims to lure into her black goo. If not for the eerie mood created by this film, it wouldn't have gotten under my skin (so to speak) and become my tenth favorite film of the last decade. But yes, there's melancholy here too -- just look at the expression on Johansson's face at the end and you will understand precisely what has been lost. (A nod to Micah Levy's score to put us in exactly the head space we need to be.)
160. A Ghost Story (2017, David Lowery) - Oh the melancholy! A ghost looks on quietly, helplessly, as the woman mourning him tries to recover from his loss ... and then looks in on the next 300 years or more of the occupants of this building, just for good measure. Daniel Hart's score and Dark Rooms' "I Get Overwhelmed" do tremendous work holding us there once Lowery's images, his square aspect ratio and the performances have brought us to this place. The existential ennui climaxes in a hugely satisfying final emotional payoff.
214. The Life Aquatic With Steve Zissou (2004, Wes Anderson) - I debated whether to include Bill Murray's appropriate second appearance on this list, since I think Anderson is always about mood over plot. But in the end, the thing that connects with me so much about possibly my favorite Anderson film is this blue space it finds and remains in. The decline of Zissou's life is embodied perfectly by the abandoned, overgrown hotel on that island in the middle of the film. And Seu Jorge's covers of David Bowie songs are an essential component to the narrative and character work Anderson is doing.
296. Code 46 (2003, Michael Winterbottom) - And finally at spot #10, we get to the film I came across while Flickcharting this morning that prompted me to write this post. There are some high concepts at the center of a love story between two characters in a sun-bleached Shanghai of the future, when only rich, connected people can live "inside" and everyone else is forging documents to try to escape the harsh conditions. Winterbottom draws a very specific portrait of a future where characters slip in and out of multiple languages while they speak. But it's a Lost in Translation sort of relationship that develops between the characters played by Tim Robbins and Samantha Morton, plot taking a backseat to moments infused with significance and scored by memorable songs like Freakpower's "Song No. 6" and Coldplay's "Warning Sign."
Some I bypassed in this top 300 that didn't quite fit my concept of this post, but could have if I'd squinted a bit:
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968, Stanley Kubrick) - 12th
Solaris (1972, Andrei Tarkovsky) - 146th
I also bypassed all my choices that I consider to be straight horror films, because the best horror films are all about creating a mood and that's a sort of different category of cinematic achievement.
Now that I've become more officially acquainted with this proclivity of mine by having written this post, I'll have to see if I'm more aware of movies presenting themselves to me as moods -- kind of like I immediately notice when a "wax stamp movie" presents itself to me. (Unfamiliar with that concept? See this post.)
