Past Lives | Official Trailer HD | A24
As I've gotten older, I've come up with an extremely lazy formula for choosing my favorite movie, album, show, book, series, or whatever of the year: What I've talked about the most (positively). Wins. (I know, that's a fascinating equation. How did I come up with that?) That said, I was pleased that my AV Club colleagues thought this remarkable, moving film deserves the top spot for 2023. And Past Lives Yes, there's so much to talk about: There's Celine Song, who directs so sophisticatedly and builds narrative tensions in her script so naturally that you'd never guess that this was her first feature film. There's the story – childhood lovers stay in touch, years later as they move back and forth between Seoul and New York City, then don't, and then reconnect in the flesh – that's so specific, but carefully rendered so that it feels emotionally universal. There's this cast – Greta Lee and Teo Yoo as these friends and John Magaro as Lee's character's husband, all fantastic and in very different modes. There's cinematographer Shabier Kirchner, who, as a friend put it, “There's nothing better than 35-millimeter film.” There's the perfect, understated use of songs like Them and “Don't Look Back.” “You Know More Than I Know” by John Cale. And there's that inevitable farewell, filmed on a weekend night in the East Village, in which two people don't say what they would say in another script, and which somehow managed to deliver the biggest emotional shock of the year. [Tim Lowery]