Media I've consumed in 2019

January 06, 2020 at 11:00 PM | categories: movies, books, games | View Comments

One more year of this dumb list, and one more year spending way too much time figuring out how to make a post to this blog.

Books

I didn't read as many books as I'd like this year, but they were all pretty good. After watching the movie Wonderstruck (see below) and being impressed by the concept (half of the movie takes place in the 70's, and half takes place in the 20's, with the 20's portion being basically a silent movie), I saw it was based on a book with a similar concept. I had never read a Brian Selznick book and apparently this is kind of his schtick, but again, both the story and the storytelling of the book were impressive (the 70's half is entirely in prose, and the 20's half is entirely illustrations). It's definitely a kids/YA book, but if you're looking for something YA that isn't about wizards or dystopian murder societies, I highly recommend it.

Movies

I saw a ridiculous number of amazing movies this year, but my favorite goes to Parasite for walking the fine line between comedy, thriller, satire, and parable and being effective at all. It gets bonus points for being a laugh-out-loud comedy in a foreign language and yet it still translates.

I'd be remiss if I didn't also recommend a few other indie movies that are still totally approachable and everyone should see. The Florida Project tells an amazing, heartbreaking story about "the hidden homeless": a societal class I honestly didn't know existed until I saw the movie and apparently is all too real. I don't want to spoil anything, but the last camera shot in the movie had me literally ugly-crying. And if you just want to watch a really weird concept movie, A Ghost Story takes the ridiculous concept of Casey Afflect with a sheet over his head playing a ghost that silently watches over a house and treats it totally seriously. It's a meditation on time and grief and goes places that punch way above the weight of its concept. And it's a crime Rooney Mara didn't get a nomination for her performance in this, as the movie pretty much rests entirely on her soldiers, and the "pie eating" scene alone is a physical performance tour de force both emotionally and for the sheer mechanics of what she does over the course of a single take.

Games

As usual, I played a lot more games than this, but I'm only counting games I played all the way through (or at least hit the level cap in ESO). I have to give my favorite game of the year to Brothers if only because it's a 6 year old game that I already had spoiled and the ending still was effective and moved me. Possibly because I have a little brother.