Since the last update I’ve been covering some film programs outside of the Seattle area, writing short reviews of a handful of films playing at the New York Asian Film Festival and Japan Cuts for InReview Online. I also made an index which includes some old and new longer reviews here for the NYAFF. There was a very cool Johnnie To series in SanFrancisco I made an index of older reviews for, and I proposed some alternate titles for Seattle’s too short but welcome nonetheless Hong Kong miniseries. And I have an index ready for the Old School Kung Fu Film Fest coming to New York in a couple of weeks.

Mid-year also passed since the last update, and as is tradition I listed a bunch of my favorite films of the year so far. Over at Seattle Screen Scene I reviewed Wu Jing’s Wolf Warrior 2, Louis Koo’s giant alien cat movie Meow, Ann Hui’s Our Time Will Come, DA Pennebaker’s Monterey Pop, Stevefat’s Weeds on Fire, and Wong Chun’s Mad World. Also over at Frame.land, I wrote about Samuel Fuller’s Merrill’s Marauders.

These are the movies I’ve watched and rewatched over the last few weeks and where they place on my year-by-year rankings.

Touchez pas au grisbi (Jacques Becker) – 17, 1954
Le trou (Jacques Becker) – 7, 1960
Merrill’s Marauders (Samuel Fuller) – 11, 1962
The TAMI Show (Steve Binder) – 12, 1964
Hong Kong Nocturne (Inoue Umetsugu) – 24, 1967

Monterey Pop (DA Pennebaker) – 12, 1968
Let It Be (Michael Lindsay-Hogg) – 4, 1970
The Beguiled (Don Siegel) – 14, 1971
The Black Tavern (Teddy Yip) – 18, 1972
Lady Whirlwind (Huang Feng) – 26, 1972

When Taekwando Strikes (Huang Feng) – 31, 1973
The Skyhawk (Walter Chung Chang-Hwa) – 39, 1974
Jumping Ash (Josephine Siao & Leong Po-Chih) – 18, 1976
A Grin Without a Cat (Chris Marker) – 5, 1977
Dirty Tiger, Crazy Frog (Karl Maka) – 33, 1978

Rock ‘n’ Roll High School (Allan Arkush) – 8, 1979
The Odd Couple (Lau Kar-wing) – 11, 1979
The Muppet Movie (James Frawley) – 14, 1979
The Young Master (Jackie Chan) – 9, 1980
The Victim (Sammo Hung) – 11, 1980

The Prodigal Son (Sammo Hung) – 8, 1981
Carry On Pickpocket (Sammo Hung) – 19, 1982
Jimi Plays Monterey (DA Pennebaker & Chris Hegedus) – 21, 1986
Millionaire’s Express (Sammo Hung) – 30, 1986
Broadcast News (James L. Brooks) – 1, 1987

Eastern Condors (Sammo Hung) – 10, 1987
Pedicab Driver (Sammo Hung) – 6, 1989
Skinny Tiger, Fatty Dragon (Lau Kar-wing) – 60, 1990
Beauty and the Beast (Gary Trousdale & Kirk Wise) – 46, 1991
Pandora’s Box (Adam Curtis) – 11, 1992
Moon Warriors (Sammo Hung) – 30, 1992

Blade of Fury (Sammo Hung) – 61, 1993
Don’t Give a Damn (Sammo Hung) – 57, 1995
The Watermelon Woman (Cheryl Dunye) – 16, 1996
Mr. Nice Guy (Sammo Hung) – 41, 1997
Beast Cops (Gordon Chan & Dante Lam) – 12, 1998

Something’s Gotta Give (Nancy Meyers) – 19, 2003
Infernal Affairs II (Andrew Lau & Alan Mak) – 23, 2003
Cinema Hong Kong (Ian Taylor) – 31, 2003
The Wrecking Crew! (Danny Tedesco) – 65, 2008
Hear My Train A-Comin’ (Bob Smeaton) – 71, 2013

Wolf Warriors (Wu Jing) – 111, 2015
The Edge of Seventeen (Kelly Fremon Craig) – 32, 2016
Wet Woman in the Wind (Akihiko Shiota) – 66, 2016
Over the Fence (Nobuhrio Yamashita) – 90, 2016
Mad World (Wong Chun) – 100, 2016

Blood of Youth (Yang Shu-peng) – 128, 2016
Someone to Talk To (Liu Yulin) – 138, 2016
Our Time Will Come (Ann Hui) – 4, 2017
Love and Goodbye and Hawaii (Shingo Matsumura) – 8, 2017
The Village of No Return (Chen Yu-hsun) – 10, 2017

Long Strange Trip (Amir Bar-Lev) – 21, 2017
Oh Hello: On Broadway (Michael John Warren & Alex Timbers) – 24, 2017
Duckweed (Han Han) – 25, 2017
Ingrid Goes West (Matt Spicer) – 26, 2017
The Tokyo Night Sky is Always the Densest Shade of Blue (Yuya Ishii) – 27, 2017

Meow (Benny Chan) – 30, 2017
Hengyoro (Gō Takemine) – 31, 2017
The Incredible Jessica James (James Strouse) – 32, 2017
Wolf Warrior 2 (Wu Jing) – 35, 2017

The Gangster’s Daughter (Chen Mei-juin) – 37, 2017
Extraordinary Mission (Alan Mak & Anthony Pun) – 40, 2017
Descendants 2 (Kenny Ortega) – 43, 2017
Despicable Me 3 (Pierre Coffin & Kyle Balda) – 44, 2017