2013 Double Feature: Her / Don Jon / The Dissolve.

Samantha and Barbara are idealized, objectified versions of women based on the main characters’ tastes. In Don Jon, Gordon-Levitt’s Jon repeatedly calls Barbara the most perfect thing—note the “thing”—he’s ever seen, an evaluation based primarily on her physical resemblance to the women in the pornography he spends hours watching each day. In Her, Samantha is literally the ideal woman for Joaquin Phoenix’s sad-sack Theodore Twombly, an intuitive piece of technology that adapts to him, without him even realizing she’s doing it. She’s everything he wants, without him having to say, or even understand, what he wants.

Armageddon. Ebert summarized it correctly (“Here it is at last, the first 150-minute trailer.”), but I enjoyed it more than he did. Some terrible writing and comedy hasn’t aged well, but the melodrama and spectacle holds up. I’d totally forgotten about the hyper-idealized middle-America nostalgia in there.

Возвращение (The Return). First of all: just a ridiculously gorgeous and beautifully shot movie. I dig the desaturated blue-grey metallic finish to the whole thing. You can take the story as presented and see a good, moody, thoughtful mystery unfold… or you can put on your analytical hat and pull out plenty of theological/mythical/psychological/allegorical stuff. Either way, you win. Really enjoyed seeing a few scenes/shots mirrored at later points (a moment in bed is reprised in the rowboat; compare a shot of the brothers on the boat trip out with the one on the way back; etc.) If you’re looking for another amazing movie that revolves around two boys, mysterious boats, and a mysterious man, you have to see Mud.

The Hunter. Dang, I love this movie. (Previously.)

Her. I still like it! (Previously.)