Ryan Fleck and Anna Boden together wrote and directed four movies. They get very little attention but deserve more. Seeing their movies, I can understand why they don’t receive much recognition: they cloak themselves. There is nothing that makes their movies visually stand out at all. They affect a very mundane appearance. Critically acclaimed movies usually have some visual flare. I won’t pretend visuals don’t sway my opinion either. Andrei Tarkovsky has produced some of the most beautiful cinematic displays I’ve ever seen. It’s no coincidence that he is also my favorite director. Edgar Wright, my favorite working director, could not possibly separated from his high-octane cinematography and editing. Fleck and Boden films… well, there’s nothing especially eye-catching therein. That’s not to say they don’t have a unique style. What makes their films so enthralling is their expertise in characterization.
If there’s one thing you should want to look for when watching one of their films is their highly interesting, three-dimensional characters. Half Nelson, their first movie, is probably the best character study I’ve seen. Ryan Gosling does an exemplary job playing a drug-addicted school teacher. It is clear from their first movie that they are only interested in characters.
Their next film was Sugar, the study of a young adult in the Dominican Republic, Sugar, who tries to launch a career in professional baseball. Again, the movie is entirely an examination of Sugar’s mind state throughout his sports career. It is possibly the best sports movie I’ve seen.
Their third film, It’s Kind of a Funny Story, well, I think is the black sheep of the bunch. I didn’t find much to appreciate in it, so I’m just going to move on, pretending it doesn’t exist.
Their most recent film, which actually came out this year, is Mississippi Grind. This is once again entirely an examination of two characters: a gambling addict and a lone traveler as they go on a road trip together.
These movies are really quite humble in the fact that they don’t go out of their way to distinguish themselves. They really don’t, and I always get that feeling when I watch one of them. Something about their ordinariness makes me feel as if the movies are not of very high quality when I watch them, but the writing and emotional narratives have such a strong core that I am forced to really appreciate and enjoy what I am watching. They are unique directors in this vein; I’ve never had movies make me feel such contradictory feelings. But in the end these factors make the movies seem more down-to-earth and thus authentic. I think they really capture something of the human spirit, and I even see this in It’s Kind of a Funny Story, which makes me consider giving it another chance. And yeah, I know I said I would ignore that movie’s existence, so I guess I lied, and I don’t really regret it.
I highly recommend you check out one of those three movies if you ever get the chance because they are all underappreciated. Half Nelson and Mississippi Grind especially I really like.