For me, though, even if I could chat with a chimp in chimpanzee, converse in polar bear, curse in fluent kangaroo or answer with a boisterous, “of courserous!” if asked if I could speak rhinoceros, Dolittle still would have been one talk with the animals I’d rather have not engaged in.

Entries 50 thru 41 of my personal Top 50 Films 2010 – 2019. Did any of your favorites make the list?

1917 is magnificent.

This might not be Victor Hugo’s story, but that doesn’t mean Les Misérables doesn’t still bear the author’s imprint, the ending of this story a mixture of tragedy, compromise, disappointment and, yes, even hope that leaves many questions unanswered and the future for all involved painfully uncertain.

Thanks primarily to the cast I can’t hate on Like a Boss, but that doesn’t mean I found it worth recommending, either. It’s instantly forgettable, and by the end of January it will probably have slipped out of my mind completely.

Andrew Desmond’s feature-length narrative debut The Sonata is a literate, methodically paced throwback gothic thriller that plays a little like a Hammer production from the mid-to-late 1960s that would have starred Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee in the two primary male roles.

Underwater gets the job done. I liked it a lot. Heck, I’m likely to head to the theatre and see it again before January ends.

It is a pity that The Grudge goes so obnoxiously off the rails just as it’s building to a conclusion.

2019 has turned out to be a rather stupendous year for film.