Recommendation | Good American cinema
Did American cinema once possess the courage to portray tragedy, moral ambiguity, and contradiction, or am I being nostalgic for a period that never existed?
In my opinion, contemporary American films (there must be exceptions, yet I haven't found them) have promising introductions, but collapse into a flattened intellectual-moral dichotomy - the virtuous protagonist, the unambiguous villain, the predictable redemption arc. And yes, I am aware that even the critique of this banality has become banal... Postmodernism, I suppose.
However, I am exhausted by narratives that reduce human existence to childlike dilemmas, wherein the “good” American inevitably overcomes evil through determination and sentimentality.
Recommend me films produced after 2010 that retain the technical brilliance of contemporary American cinematography, yet refuse this intellectual simplification. I am looking for works with genuine psychological depth, moral ambiguity, existential tension, and sophisticated storytelling. I want to enjoy an American film that treats human beings as we are jn reality - contradictory and tragic.
Thank you!