Hacker Cinema
First Reformed
2018 · Film · 113 min
Directed by Paul Schrader
A pastor of a small church in upstate New York starts to spiral out of control after a soul-shaking encounter with an unstable environmental activist and his pregnant wife.
4 positive1 neutralfrom 5 commenters
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5 comments on Hacker News
So personally I like films that makes me feel something without that feeling being explicitly forced upon me. This is an incredible thing to achieve that only a select few directors can do. Not “baiting” the viewers into emotions but also not being cold at the same time. Just by showing and how do they show it. Like the case of “a picture is worth a thousand words”. It’s a razor thin line but that makes these films I enjoy special and sincere.
(I'll only mentions stuff from the 21st century because otherwise I'd sit here for days)
I love japanese cinema so I'm very biased towards films from there.
- The Taste of Tea (2004) from Katsuhito Ishii
- Nobody Knows (2004) from Hirokazu Kore-eda
- Tony Takitani (2004) from Jun Ichikawa
- Memories of Matsuko (2006) from Tetsuya Nakashima
- Departures (2008) from Yojiro Takita
- Still Walking (2008) from Hirokazu Kore-eda
- Tokyo Sonata (2008) from Kiyoshi Kurosawa
- One Million Yen Girl (2008) from Yuki Tanada
- Haru’s Journey (2010) from Masahiro Kobayashi
- Story of Yonosuke (2013) from Shuichi Okita
- Shoplifters (2018) from Hirokazu Kore-eda
- Drive My Car (2021) from Ryūsuke Hamaguchi
Two korean film I've really liked
- The Handmaiden (2016) from Park Chan-wook
- Pieta (2012) from Kim Ki-duk
A chinese film I've seen recently and it was pretty good
- Black Coal, Thin Ice (2014) from Diao Yi-nan
Iranian films are incredibly good and crazy what they could make despite the situation there
- A Separation (2011) from Asghar Farhadi
- Taxi (2015) from Jafar Panahi
- The Salesman (2016) from Asghar Farhadi
- There Is No Evil (2020) from Mohammad Rasoulof
- My Favourite Cake (2024) from Maryam Moghaddam and Behtash Sanaeeha
Some european films I've enjoyed
- Enter the Void (2009) from Gaspar Noé
- Leviathan (2014) from Andrey Zvyagintsev
- Alcarràs (2022) from Carla Simón
- Fallen Leaves (2023) from Aki Kaurismäki
And last but not least some actual Hollywood films that I think are pretty good
- The Tree of Life (2011) from Terrence Malick
- Cloud Atlas (2012) from Lilly Wachowski and Lana Wachowski
- First Reformed (2017) from Paul Schrader
- Nickel Boys (2024) from RaMell Ross
I dunno, 2015, I'm a little weak on this year: It Follows, Creed, Ex Machina, Max Max: Fury Road, Sicario, The Hateful 8. I'd watch those again with someone any time, and recommend all of them often. Several on my to-watch list most of which I expect to be good, like Queen of the Desert, While We're Young, Slow West, and The Overnight, just haven't made it to them yet. Not an exhaustive list, just gleaned from some titles I have at hand.
2016: Green Room, The Nice Guys, Hail Caesar!, The Neon Demon, Swiss Army Man, Hunt for the Wilder People, The VVitch, Train to Busan, Shin Godzilla, Moana (hey, I like this one), Arrival. Moonlight's on my to-watch and is supposed to be really good.
2017 (I've done OK on catching up with these!): The Lost City of Z, Dunkirk, Low Life, Good Time, Logan Lucky (absolutely slept on, kills it as a feel-good lightweight small-stakes heist movie), Blade Runner 2049, The Death of Stalin (I liked this less than a lot of folks, but given how widely-loved it was, I'm probably the idiot here), One Cut of the Dead, You Were Never Really Here. The Planet of the Apes movie from that year, plus Phantom Thread, and The Little Hours are to-watch for me and come highly recommended.
2018: Annihilation, Isle of Dogs, Upgrade, Sorry to Bother You, High Life, Eighth Grade, the Suspiria remake. To-watch that I expect to be good include Champion (Korean arm wrestling movie—there's another movie by the same name that year), First Reformed, BlacKkKLansman, The Favourite, The Wolf House, Climax, and some others.
2019: HUGE year for the particular (small) set I'm seeing on my list, including a ton to-watch but a bunch I've seen. Uncut Gems, The Lighthouse, Knives Out, Little Women, JoJo Rabbit, Ready or Not, Parasite, Midsommar, The Art of Self Defense, maybe Marriage Story (but if you've seen one Baumbach movie, you've kinda seen them all, and I'm not sure I'd put it above The Squid and the Whale). Midway's a well-above-average war movie and pairs great with Tora, Tora, Tora! as a crazy-long double feature in a really fun way. To-watch list is nuts and I really need to dedicate a month or so to filling out my watched-list for this year: First Cow, The Irishman, Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Bacurau, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, The Farewell, The Souvenir, Blow the Man Down, The Vast of Night, Her Smell, Funan.
It basically just keeps going like that, year after year, and I've barely even tried to dredge up good movies for most of those years, the bulk of it's just stuff that's risen to my attention one way or another, and I'm terrible at keeping up with foreign film especially. I also left off some that a lot of folks would probably include, like at least one Mission Impossible (aside from MI2, I think these are all pretty good action movies, though quality varies a bit) and Avengers: Endgame which, opinion on the rest of Marvel aside (I think it's mostly kinda lazy crap? But was basically entertained for most of them regardless, so I guess I can't complain too much) was a hell of an event. Also Black Panther, which everyone loved but I was pretty meh on (I hate the entire end fight, and it's looooong)
I share your experience and would like to make an unsolicited recommendation of a recent movie that's stuck with me more than anything else I've seen in the last few years: First Reformed. Give it a shot!
Watch the movie “first reformed”
Consider watching First Reformed. Great movie, and relevant.