Finished CODA (all caps) - not a film I knew much about other than something about deaf people. But what a charmer it is - winning and funny and moving and with a lead performance that radiates right off the screen - Emilia Jones is the name and if there was any reality to the Oscars this nineteen year old would win best actress - best performance I've seen this year and she sings really well, too. And the director just tells the story so simply and effortlessly - Sian Heder is her name and I found her soooo much more talented than the woman who directed Nomadland. I laughed, I cried, I ate a caramel. The three actors who play her deaf family members are all deaf and what performances they give, especially Marlee Matlin. There's a wonderful moment during the singing of a duet in a school concert, where we're listening to the song and the audience attending the school concert is enjoying it - the deaf family of the hearing teen is there and they don't really know what they're singing up there - and it's a nice moment that's suddenly turned transcendent when the director takes the sound out right in the middle of the song and you experience it just as her parents and brother are. It's a great moment. Probably my favorite movie of the year now.
