Posts mit dem Label Top 10 List werden angezeigt. Alle Posts anzeigen
Posts mit dem Label Top 10 List werden angezeigt. Alle Posts anzeigen
Samstag, 3. Januar 2015
Donnerstag, 1. Januar 2015
My Top 10 Movies of 2014
Honorable Mentions (cinematic highlights from movies that did NOT make it to the top of my list):
The cinematography of "Enemy" / "野火 (Fires on the Plain)" / "'71"
The character design of Baymax from "Big Hero 6" / Paddington from "Paddington"
The film music of "Die geliebten Schwestern (The Beloved Sisters)" / "The Cut" / "Men, Women & Children"
The visual effects of "Dawn of the Planet of the Apes"
The on-screen couple Shailene Woodley & Ansel Elgort in "The Fault in Our Stars" / Ghilherme Lobo & Fabio Audi in "Hoje Eu Quero Voltar Sozinho (The Way He Looks)" / Jim Broadbent & Lindsay Duncan in "Le Week-End"
The musical number "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now" from "The Skeleton Twins" / "Diamonds" from "Bande de filles (Girlhood)" / "Walking on Sunshine" from "Camille redouble (Camille Rewinds)"
The performance by Marion Cotillard as Sandra in "Deux jours, une nuit (Two Days, One Night)"
The on-screen duo Juliette Binoche & Kristen Stewart in "Clouds of Sils Maria" / Judi Dench & Steve Coogan in "Philomena"
The art direction of "黃金時代 (The Golden Era)" / "Under the Skin" / "En duva satt på en gren och funderade på tillvaron (A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence)"
The screenplay of "殯棺 (The Coffin in the Mountain)" / "Il capitale umano (Human Capital)"
The ensemble cast of "Pride"
The action choreography of "Captain America: The Winter Soldier" / "용의자 (The Suspect)"
Runners-up (all-around solid movies just missing my top 10), in alphabetical order:
1. 10.000 Km
2. 白日焰火 (Black Coal, Thin Ice)
3. Foxcatcher
4. The Grand Budapest Hotel
5. Her
6. Ida
7. The Lego Movie
8. Nightcrawler
9. Nymphomaniac: Vol. II
10. X-Men: Days of Future Past
And finally, the cream of the crop- out of the 230 movies I saw in 2014 (a personal record!), these are my favorite 10, in alphabetical order:
1. 12 Years a Slave (dir. Steve McQueen)
Looking classically beautiful while exposing the ugliest manifestation of human nature imaginable, this account of a man's journey through hell is a mercilessly immersive experience as well as a devastatingly powerful reminder of what atrocities we're capable of when blinded by hate and bigotry. British director Steve McQueen convincingly recreates an idyllic America sweltering with fear and abuse, smelling like blood and hopelessness. In dignifying the torture scenes with reverent, violent honesty and a complete lack of reservation, every lash feels palpable, painfully necessary. His outstanding cast of actors, be it the warmly emotive Chiwetel Ejiofor, the nakedly truthful Lupita Nyong'o or the frightfully serene Michael Fassbender, gives the oppression temperature and puts the tremor in every plea. The detailed, considered production and costume design caught in cinematographer Sean Bobbitt's wondrously lit frames is not just a sight to behold but envelopes you further in a world of textured, wounded memories.
2. Begin Again (dir. John Carney)
Somewhat unrealistic in its bumps-free development and unchallenged resolution, this almost-romance by Irish writer/director John Carney nevertheless captures the collision between two lost stars and its momentary splendor with such uncanny precision it transcends language and feels purely intuitive, melodic. And it's not just that the movie's soundtrack features an intoxicating mix of winning tunes as well as drop-dead gorgeous original compositions by Gregg Alexander, it's how the songs are used here as an integral part of storytelling that reveals a fundamental understanding of music's transporting, uniting, healing power and truly wows. Keira Knightley is a vision of tearful realizations and uncertain emotions; the perfectly cast Mark Ruffalo brings so much humanity to a potential douchebag character it's entirely magnetizing. The scenes of them entering Times Square joined by their private playlists or wordlessly parting ways are things of such beauty they leave you elated, stricken and, from an even deeper place, just thankful.
3. Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) (dir. Alejandro González Iñárritu)
Bracing, ballsy, hypnotically fluid and unstoppably kinetic, this comedic drama about a washed-up superhero actor waging a comeback on Broadway is a virtuoso dance between the realms of reality and fantasy. Mexican writer/director Alejandro González Iñárritu proves he's a master of precision, balancing so many elements in dangerously long, unedited takes it's as breathtaking to watch as a tightrope walker's performance at perilous heights. The cast led by a luminously weary, conflicted Michael Keaton is a true ensemble, with all the pieces complementing, challenging one another in a symphony of ideas and personalities. Emmanuel Lubezki's camera works miracles again as it takes on the confined but volatile terrain of the theater. Explosive on stage and even more alive behind the curtain, all the craziness is captured in a heady parade of impressions astonishing in its fluency. Providing the sonic backdrop and completing the psychic landscape of a haunted man is Antonio Sanchez's exciting drum score, each beat a tease, a taunt, a toast.
4. Kreuzweg (Stations of the Cross) (dir. Dietrich Brüggemann)
Turns out there's no better way to explore religious fundamentalism in film than going back to the fundamentals. 14 near-static scenes representing the 14 stations Jesus made carrying the cross to crucifixion are all there is in this formally strict, ideally radical drama about a teenage girl ready to die for her beliefs. Instead of falling prey to the restrictive stylistic demands, however, something utterly, unshakably and nastily pure arises. Brilliantly feeding narrative discipline into character and atmosphere building, German writer/director Dietrich Brüggemann manages to create a fable-like vacuum in which the disparity between moral absolutes and earthen compromises becomes so sharpened it gets silly, scary, or both. Stripped of all technical distractions to reveal an isolated observation of human behavior, this mini-masterpiece is not just cool-headed but often feels downright cold-hearted. It's so chill to the touch, in fact, you can hardly tell whether it's trying to conceal a crusader's frown or a satirist's smirk.
5. Le meraviglie (The Wonders) (dir. Alice Rohrwacher)
Family stories are hard to get right because it's such an extraordinary place of shared experiences and contradictory emotions. It's a delight, then, to see one that's so insightfully written, sensitively directed and cohesively performed. Italian helmer Alice Rohrwacher trains her tender gaze on an ordinary household from the countryside whose uneventful existence heats up upon the arrival of a splashy TV-crew. With an unerring ear for authenticity, previously unknown aspirations and latent generational differences are laid out in a script as moving as it is unaffected. Through colorful anecdotes both cheerful and melancholic, that maddening, embarrassing, ultimately nurturing and redeeming familial bond is vividly described. Maria Alexandra Lungu and Agnese Graziani make for a tremendous sister-duo, selling with aplomb the happy glow of innocence and its gradual replacement by a worldly weight. A few surrealist touches from the director add to the visual dazzle of the picture and further enhance its mystic pull.
6. Phoenix (dir. Christian Petzold)
A magical ending to a film counts for a lot. And when you conclude a story about identity/pretense by having Nina Hoss, the queen of regal ambivalence, sing a jazzy version of "Speak Low" before it all fades into a sunny blur, the effect is, quite simply, spellbinding. The premise on which German writer/director Christian Petzold operates here- guilt, denial and the meaning of self- is highly interesting if not always rock solid in practice, leading to icky patches with plausibility issues. But then again, this is a movie about the subjective nature of our being and how our mind plays tricks on us in shock or self-preservation. In that sense, the team in front and behind the camera aces it, creating incredibly fragile, unreliable figures caught in extreme, overwhelming circumstances. The cast that also includes Ronald Zehrfeld and Nina Kunzendorf, decked out in spiffy period costumes, is strong. Even more of a character is perhaps the tastefully rendered post-war Berlin: detached, deformed, but recklessly delectable.
7. Snowpiercer (dir. Joon-ho Bong)
As ridiculously overblown as the statement might sound, this movie does have everything. It's a conceptual sci-fi adventure with dramatic tension, political undertone, comic- albeit creepy- relief, and some kick-ass action sequences. With staggering ambition and superior craftsmanship, Korean director Joon-ho Bong cooks up a smorgasbord of genres that goes down without a hiccup. Worlds of wildly contrasting styles and color schemes materialize through the rich, imaginative production design, allowing the surprises to keep coming whenever the next cabin door opens. The snappy editing is responsible for the pulsating, suspenseful rhythm and the fierce combat choreography sends additional sparks throughout the film. A diverse group of gifted actors makes sure all the lofty fantasies about a dystopian future remain firmly anchored in basic, relatable human needs. Among them Chris Evans and Jamie Bell hold their own but it's the chameleonic Tilda Swinton as the clownishly demonic Minister Mason that steals the show.
8. Плем'я (The Tribe) (dir. Miroslav Slaboshpitsky)
There are definitely places during this 130-min long, spoken dialogue-free film set within a school for the deaf and mute that could be tightened up a bit. The fatigue from repitition is not altogether avoided and that stupendously savage ending evokes more suspicions than it asks legitimate questions. However, there's no denying the sheer audacity and inventiveness intrinsic to the telling of this story. Ukranian first-time feature director Miroslav Slaboshpitsky is downright fearless both in terms of sticking to the exclusive use of sign language and tackling the subject of inherent evil. Aided by some superb, mutely suggestive camerawork, his every step forward feels fresh, raw, unpredictable. And although part of the plot is bound to get lost in the gesticulating, how most of the (largely lascivious) turns of events is communicated at all speaks volumes about the intelligence of the filmmaking as well as what dirty cognitive wiring we share as a species. Imperfect but stunningly new and intensely original, one of a kind.
9. Turist (Force Majeure) (dir. Ruben Östlund)
It's unlikely one would have been made to feel more uncomfortable by any other film this past year, or more compelled to laugh and then, upon realizing the inappropriateness of the urge, slightly shamed about one's schadenfreude toward the unfortunate situation portrayed. Unsparing and incisively observant, this story about the marital repercussions from an avalanche accident by Swedish writer/director Ruben Östlund is so relentlessly sharp it first cuts open the skin and then tears apart the scab again. In using the magnificent, secretly treacherous Alpine slopes as backdrop and dominant visual aid, the filmmaker blends unknowable natural elements with his dissection of modern masculinity and the result is striking in every sense. The two leads Johannes Kuhnke and Lisa Loven Kongsli are both terrific, mapping with great nuance the progression of their characters' mental state. Except for the vaguely metaphorical ending that's not necessarily a home-run, this is quite the rare gem that tickles and unsettles in equal measure.
10. Whiplash (dir. Damien Chazelle)
Rocking, sweating, bleeding, burning, this movie about the pedagogic relationship between a young jazz drummer and his band conductor that slowly descends into war is literally a tour de force. American writer/director Damien Chazelle is clearly driven by an indefatigable supply of passion when telling this story about expectation versus exploitation and that energy is felt throughout. Although many technical aspects of the film like editing or cinematography can feel a bit too unsubtle and inexpertly showy, the constant rush of hot blood that sends your head spinning and your feet stepping proves irresistibly winsome. Miles Teller impresses with a ruthlessly committed performance and J.K. Simmons, who commands the quiet menace, contemptuous rage and enigmatic motives of the dictator Fletcher, gives one of the year's most charismatic, repulsive, all-around fascinating on-screen creations. The final, drawn-out show-down between the two escalates to such dramatic heights it enters a blissfully trance-like territory that absolutely electrifies.
The cinematography of "Enemy" / "野火 (Fires on the Plain)" / "'71"
The character design of Baymax from "Big Hero 6" / Paddington from "Paddington"
The film music of "Die geliebten Schwestern (The Beloved Sisters)" / "The Cut" / "Men, Women & Children"
The visual effects of "Dawn of the Planet of the Apes"
The on-screen couple Shailene Woodley & Ansel Elgort in "The Fault in Our Stars" / Ghilherme Lobo & Fabio Audi in "Hoje Eu Quero Voltar Sozinho (The Way He Looks)" / Jim Broadbent & Lindsay Duncan in "Le Week-End"
The musical number "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now" from "The Skeleton Twins" / "Diamonds" from "Bande de filles (Girlhood)" / "Walking on Sunshine" from "Camille redouble (Camille Rewinds)"
The performance by Marion Cotillard as Sandra in "Deux jours, une nuit (Two Days, One Night)"
The on-screen duo Juliette Binoche & Kristen Stewart in "Clouds of Sils Maria" / Judi Dench & Steve Coogan in "Philomena"
The art direction of "黃金時代 (The Golden Era)" / "Under the Skin" / "En duva satt på en gren och funderade på tillvaron (A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence)"
The screenplay of "殯棺 (The Coffin in the Mountain)" / "Il capitale umano (Human Capital)"
The ensemble cast of "Pride"
The action choreography of "Captain America: The Winter Soldier" / "용의자 (The Suspect)"
Runners-up (all-around solid movies just missing my top 10), in alphabetical order:
1. 10.000 Km
2. 白日焰火 (Black Coal, Thin Ice)
3. Foxcatcher
4. The Grand Budapest Hotel
5. Her
6. Ida
7. The Lego Movie
8. Nightcrawler
9. Nymphomaniac: Vol. II
10. X-Men: Days of Future Past
And finally, the cream of the crop- out of the 230 movies I saw in 2014 (a personal record!), these are my favorite 10, in alphabetical order:
1. 12 Years a Slave (dir. Steve McQueen)
Looking classically beautiful while exposing the ugliest manifestation of human nature imaginable, this account of a man's journey through hell is a mercilessly immersive experience as well as a devastatingly powerful reminder of what atrocities we're capable of when blinded by hate and bigotry. British director Steve McQueen convincingly recreates an idyllic America sweltering with fear and abuse, smelling like blood and hopelessness. In dignifying the torture scenes with reverent, violent honesty and a complete lack of reservation, every lash feels palpable, painfully necessary. His outstanding cast of actors, be it the warmly emotive Chiwetel Ejiofor, the nakedly truthful Lupita Nyong'o or the frightfully serene Michael Fassbender, gives the oppression temperature and puts the tremor in every plea. The detailed, considered production and costume design caught in cinematographer Sean Bobbitt's wondrously lit frames is not just a sight to behold but envelopes you further in a world of textured, wounded memories.
2. Begin Again (dir. John Carney)
Somewhat unrealistic in its bumps-free development and unchallenged resolution, this almost-romance by Irish writer/director John Carney nevertheless captures the collision between two lost stars and its momentary splendor with such uncanny precision it transcends language and feels purely intuitive, melodic. And it's not just that the movie's soundtrack features an intoxicating mix of winning tunes as well as drop-dead gorgeous original compositions by Gregg Alexander, it's how the songs are used here as an integral part of storytelling that reveals a fundamental understanding of music's transporting, uniting, healing power and truly wows. Keira Knightley is a vision of tearful realizations and uncertain emotions; the perfectly cast Mark Ruffalo brings so much humanity to a potential douchebag character it's entirely magnetizing. The scenes of them entering Times Square joined by their private playlists or wordlessly parting ways are things of such beauty they leave you elated, stricken and, from an even deeper place, just thankful.
3. Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) (dir. Alejandro González Iñárritu)
Bracing, ballsy, hypnotically fluid and unstoppably kinetic, this comedic drama about a washed-up superhero actor waging a comeback on Broadway is a virtuoso dance between the realms of reality and fantasy. Mexican writer/director Alejandro González Iñárritu proves he's a master of precision, balancing so many elements in dangerously long, unedited takes it's as breathtaking to watch as a tightrope walker's performance at perilous heights. The cast led by a luminously weary, conflicted Michael Keaton is a true ensemble, with all the pieces complementing, challenging one another in a symphony of ideas and personalities. Emmanuel Lubezki's camera works miracles again as it takes on the confined but volatile terrain of the theater. Explosive on stage and even more alive behind the curtain, all the craziness is captured in a heady parade of impressions astonishing in its fluency. Providing the sonic backdrop and completing the psychic landscape of a haunted man is Antonio Sanchez's exciting drum score, each beat a tease, a taunt, a toast.
4. Kreuzweg (Stations of the Cross) (dir. Dietrich Brüggemann)
Turns out there's no better way to explore religious fundamentalism in film than going back to the fundamentals. 14 near-static scenes representing the 14 stations Jesus made carrying the cross to crucifixion are all there is in this formally strict, ideally radical drama about a teenage girl ready to die for her beliefs. Instead of falling prey to the restrictive stylistic demands, however, something utterly, unshakably and nastily pure arises. Brilliantly feeding narrative discipline into character and atmosphere building, German writer/director Dietrich Brüggemann manages to create a fable-like vacuum in which the disparity between moral absolutes and earthen compromises becomes so sharpened it gets silly, scary, or both. Stripped of all technical distractions to reveal an isolated observation of human behavior, this mini-masterpiece is not just cool-headed but often feels downright cold-hearted. It's so chill to the touch, in fact, you can hardly tell whether it's trying to conceal a crusader's frown or a satirist's smirk.
5. Le meraviglie (The Wonders) (dir. Alice Rohrwacher)
Family stories are hard to get right because it's such an extraordinary place of shared experiences and contradictory emotions. It's a delight, then, to see one that's so insightfully written, sensitively directed and cohesively performed. Italian helmer Alice Rohrwacher trains her tender gaze on an ordinary household from the countryside whose uneventful existence heats up upon the arrival of a splashy TV-crew. With an unerring ear for authenticity, previously unknown aspirations and latent generational differences are laid out in a script as moving as it is unaffected. Through colorful anecdotes both cheerful and melancholic, that maddening, embarrassing, ultimately nurturing and redeeming familial bond is vividly described. Maria Alexandra Lungu and Agnese Graziani make for a tremendous sister-duo, selling with aplomb the happy glow of innocence and its gradual replacement by a worldly weight. A few surrealist touches from the director add to the visual dazzle of the picture and further enhance its mystic pull.
6. Phoenix (dir. Christian Petzold)
A magical ending to a film counts for a lot. And when you conclude a story about identity/pretense by having Nina Hoss, the queen of regal ambivalence, sing a jazzy version of "Speak Low" before it all fades into a sunny blur, the effect is, quite simply, spellbinding. The premise on which German writer/director Christian Petzold operates here- guilt, denial and the meaning of self- is highly interesting if not always rock solid in practice, leading to icky patches with plausibility issues. But then again, this is a movie about the subjective nature of our being and how our mind plays tricks on us in shock or self-preservation. In that sense, the team in front and behind the camera aces it, creating incredibly fragile, unreliable figures caught in extreme, overwhelming circumstances. The cast that also includes Ronald Zehrfeld and Nina Kunzendorf, decked out in spiffy period costumes, is strong. Even more of a character is perhaps the tastefully rendered post-war Berlin: detached, deformed, but recklessly delectable.
7. Snowpiercer (dir. Joon-ho Bong)
As ridiculously overblown as the statement might sound, this movie does have everything. It's a conceptual sci-fi adventure with dramatic tension, political undertone, comic- albeit creepy- relief, and some kick-ass action sequences. With staggering ambition and superior craftsmanship, Korean director Joon-ho Bong cooks up a smorgasbord of genres that goes down without a hiccup. Worlds of wildly contrasting styles and color schemes materialize through the rich, imaginative production design, allowing the surprises to keep coming whenever the next cabin door opens. The snappy editing is responsible for the pulsating, suspenseful rhythm and the fierce combat choreography sends additional sparks throughout the film. A diverse group of gifted actors makes sure all the lofty fantasies about a dystopian future remain firmly anchored in basic, relatable human needs. Among them Chris Evans and Jamie Bell hold their own but it's the chameleonic Tilda Swinton as the clownishly demonic Minister Mason that steals the show.
8. Плем'я (The Tribe) (dir. Miroslav Slaboshpitsky)
There are definitely places during this 130-min long, spoken dialogue-free film set within a school for the deaf and mute that could be tightened up a bit. The fatigue from repitition is not altogether avoided and that stupendously savage ending evokes more suspicions than it asks legitimate questions. However, there's no denying the sheer audacity and inventiveness intrinsic to the telling of this story. Ukranian first-time feature director Miroslav Slaboshpitsky is downright fearless both in terms of sticking to the exclusive use of sign language and tackling the subject of inherent evil. Aided by some superb, mutely suggestive camerawork, his every step forward feels fresh, raw, unpredictable. And although part of the plot is bound to get lost in the gesticulating, how most of the (largely lascivious) turns of events is communicated at all speaks volumes about the intelligence of the filmmaking as well as what dirty cognitive wiring we share as a species. Imperfect but stunningly new and intensely original, one of a kind.
9. Turist (Force Majeure) (dir. Ruben Östlund)
It's unlikely one would have been made to feel more uncomfortable by any other film this past year, or more compelled to laugh and then, upon realizing the inappropriateness of the urge, slightly shamed about one's schadenfreude toward the unfortunate situation portrayed. Unsparing and incisively observant, this story about the marital repercussions from an avalanche accident by Swedish writer/director Ruben Östlund is so relentlessly sharp it first cuts open the skin and then tears apart the scab again. In using the magnificent, secretly treacherous Alpine slopes as backdrop and dominant visual aid, the filmmaker blends unknowable natural elements with his dissection of modern masculinity and the result is striking in every sense. The two leads Johannes Kuhnke and Lisa Loven Kongsli are both terrific, mapping with great nuance the progression of their characters' mental state. Except for the vaguely metaphorical ending that's not necessarily a home-run, this is quite the rare gem that tickles and unsettles in equal measure.
10. Whiplash (dir. Damien Chazelle)
Rocking, sweating, bleeding, burning, this movie about the pedagogic relationship between a young jazz drummer and his band conductor that slowly descends into war is literally a tour de force. American writer/director Damien Chazelle is clearly driven by an indefatigable supply of passion when telling this story about expectation versus exploitation and that energy is felt throughout. Although many technical aspects of the film like editing or cinematography can feel a bit too unsubtle and inexpertly showy, the constant rush of hot blood that sends your head spinning and your feet stepping proves irresistibly winsome. Miles Teller impresses with a ruthlessly committed performance and J.K. Simmons, who commands the quiet menace, contemptuous rage and enigmatic motives of the dictator Fletcher, gives one of the year's most charismatic, repulsive, all-around fascinating on-screen creations. The final, drawn-out show-down between the two escalates to such dramatic heights it enters a blissfully trance-like territory that absolutely electrifies.
Mittwoch, 31. Dezember 2014
Dienstag, 30. Dezember 2014
Montag, 29. Dezember 2014
Sonntag, 28. Dezember 2014
Samstag, 27. Dezember 2014
Mittwoch, 1. Januar 2014
My Top 10 Movies of 2013
Honorable Mentions (cinematic highlights from movies that did NOT make it to the top of my list):
The breakthrough performance by Jella Haase as Chantal in "Fack ju Göhte" / Onata Aprile as Maisie in "What Maisie Knew" / Samuel Schneider as Ben in "Exit Marakkech"
The art direction of "Stoker" / "The Great Gatsby"
The film music of "Ain't Them Bodies Saints" / "Boa Sorte, Meu Amor" / "Los amantes pasajeros"
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The on-screen duo Sandra Bullock & Melissa McCarthy in "The Heat" / Gemma Arterton & Saoirse Ronan in "Byzantium"
The cinematography of "La grande bellezza" / "Post Tenebras Lux" / "Una Noche"
The performance by Paulina Garcia as Gloria in "Gloria" / Anders Danielsen Lie as Anders in "Oslo, 31. August"
The screenplay of "消失的子彈 (The Bullet Vanishes)" / "Die Wand" / "The Best Offer"
The ensemble cast of "廚子．戲子．痞子 (The Chef, the Actor, the Scoundrel)"
The on-screen couple Julie Delpy & Ethan Hawke in "Before Midnight"
The breakthrough director Ramon Zürcher for "Das merkwürdige Kätzchen"
The musical number "Hang Me, Oh Hang Me" from "Inside Llewyn Davis" / "Love Is an Open Door" from "Frozen" / "I Dreamed a Dream" from "Les Misérables"
The action sequence "airfield showdown" from "Fast & Furious 6" / "Busan apartment" from "도둑들 (The Thieves)"
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Runners-up (all-around solid movies just missing my top 10), in alphabetical order:
1. Blancanieves
2. 寒戰 (Cold War)
3. Finsterworld
4. Flight
5. Fruitvale Station
6. 一代宗師 (The Grandmaster)
7. Jeune & jolie
8. Mud
9. Tore tanzt
10. The Physician
And finally, the cream of the crop- out of the 220 movies I saw in 2013 (a personal record!), these are my favorite 10, in alphabetical order:
1. Blue Jasmine (dir. Woody Allen)
Sharply observed and mercilessly written, Woody Allen's latest story takes you plunging into the psyche of a pathologically vain and insecure woman. Filled with scenarios that ring frighteningly true and dialogue at once cruelly funny and acidly biting, it's a script that probes the inside of a proud but pitiful mind with the precision of a surgeon. It allows you not just to witness the gradual collapse of sanity but be reminded of the abuse and neglect we exercise on those around us without a second thought. Juggling the gravity of the material and the comedy in the approach, the cast is splendid all around. Cate Blanchett uncovers every single one of the innermost human survival instincts in a revelatory performance that's mighty but deplorable, ragged yet majestic. Sally Hawkins plays the yin to her yang in a marvelous supporting turn. Every time they clash on screen it's music to my eyes.
2. The Broken Circle Breakdown (dir. Felix Van Groeningen)
The joy of love and the grief of loss are polar opposites of the emotional spectrum but beautifully brought together in this heart-wrenching tale about the tumultuous relationship between a Belgian couple. With the innate understanding that the most powerful way to engage and touch through film is to simply let the humanity of the situation play out, helmer Felix Van Groeningen refrains from showy directorial tricks and relies on the expressions, looks, bodies, voices of his actors to take the audience on a journey through light and darkness. Soberly but profoundly told, aptly edited, sincerely performed and accompanied by the sweet, earnest sound of bluegrass music, this movie is a pitch-perfect, enormously moving celebration of birth, death and all the transcient happiness and sorrows in between.
3. Gravity (dir. Alfonso Cuarón)
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Delivering one of the best arguments why movies still need to be seen in cinemas, "Gravity" offers an experience that's transportive, all-enveloping, awe-inspiring. Carried by director Alfonso Cuarón's singularly daring vision, aided by cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki's lyrical, fluid, omnipotent camerawork, enhanced by immaculate sound design and the cutting-edge visual effects technology of the day, this movie realizes the grand illusion of space travel complete with the weightless pull, the breathtaking splendor, the deafening airlessness, the claustrophobic infinity and it's all spectacular. Sandra Bullock displays physical strength and grace as the stranded astronaut and George Clooney in his brief moments on screen leaves warmth and solace behind. Thanks to them the film is never just a showcase for cooly metalic technical wizardry but also a resonant story about finding a connection and a deeply felt meditation on the reason to live.
4. Pacific Rim (dir. Guillermo del Toro)
Granted, the script and the narrative arc of Guillermo del Toro's robot-vs-monster movie are not the most original out there. But it more than makes up for that with elaborate, brillianly conceived and masterfully executed action sequences that, despite their otherworldly scale, never seem overly CGI-ed to the point of being mechanical and alienating nor so compulsively edited as to lose all sense of speed and perspective. Demonstrating a magnificent visual blueprint, impeccable employment of cinematographic and sonic techniques as well as some truly stupefying special effects, these scenes soar high and they always land with an impact. The result is 130 minutes of pure, jaw-dropping awesomeness. Watching this movie is like leaping into a pool of icy water on a hot summer day, the shock to the senses is visceral, the satisfaction immediate. You know it's silly and probably not the most advisable thing to do, but every part of your body screams in pleasure anyway.
5. Le passé (dir. Asghar Farhadi)
Family is a battlefield and love can be weaponized. Iranian director Asghar Farhadi gets this and crafts the most suspenseful film of the year accordingly. Unassuming at the outset, this relationship drama proves to be a labyrinth of secrets and lies, pitfalls and entanglements that keeps rounding corners as it raises the stakes. The script is exquisitely constructed, pitting strong personalities and their versions of truth against one another without ever taking sides, all the while leaving just enough room for speculation to draw the viewer ever deeper into a mystery where everyone's conscience is at risk. Directed with momentous force and dazzling poise, featuring an ensemble performance of the highest order, this movie makes you see the intricacy of the workings of the heart and proves the humanity of our being lies in the fact that though every passing second is already in the past, nothing's ever really gone.
6. 郊遊 (Stray Dogs) (dir. 蔡明亮 Tsai Ming-liang)
There are strange movies, incomprehensible movies and then there are Tsai Ming-liang's movies. In any given lineup his film would always stand out by a mile and this one's no exception. Epic long takes featuring random bits of life from a squatting family bearing no narrative element or thematic coherence make up its 130+ minutes. From every point of view it's a beast created out of blind indulgence and pure whims. However, Tsai is nothing if not a master conductor of the symphony of chaos, an artist who sees the essence of life in all its magnificent disorder. He composes images with the rapt attention of a fanciful child and let them flow by with the stony patience of a wise old monk. In the sure-to-become legendary penultimate scene, when all that jumbled beauty culminates in two people standing wordlessly next to each other for a quarter-hour, when everything's so dead and quiet you can hear your own breath in the theater, it's also the most poignant, vital, absolutely liberating cinematic moment you're likely to experience all year.
7. Upstream Color (dir. Shane Carruth)
Equally impenetrable is Shane Carruth's fragmented, poetic, mystifying "Upstream Color". It's pointless to talk about plot here, seeing how purposefully, violently its creator tries to disarrange all you see. But Carruth, who also wrote, edited and scored the film, succeeds in making an enigmatic mass so organic in its alienness, so completely and gorgeously foreign it confounds yet captivates nonetheless. Technical aspects of the movie are across the board outstanding, from the crisp but dreamy cinematography, magnetically synthesized music, bold, logic-defying editing to the dense, layered, aggressively present soundwork, everything comes together to build a trove of impressions and sensations with such kaleidoscopic richness that, even without meaningful verbal communication, the themes of identity and loss of self rise instinctually, vividly to the surface.
8. La vie d'Adèle (dir. Abdellatif Kechiche)
Movies are faked reality, fictionalized lives, staged, made-up, rehearsed. But every once in a while, a film will come along that's so sensitive, empathetic, so keenly attuned to facets of our most primal urges and feelings it makes you relive that skipped heartbeat, that caught breath and even those tiny trembles of exhilaration and anticipation caused by something as close to the heart as love. Now things don't get much more real than that. Abdellatif Kechiche chronicles in this movie the relationship between two young girls with care, candor and the utmost compassion, his two lead actresses Adèle Exarchopoulos and Léa Seydoux throw themselves into the characters with ferocious commitment and bare their souls with beguiling transparency. The result, as straightforward and unembellished as it is, is realist cinema at its most compelling and a fearless pursuit of truth not easily to be forgotten.
9. The Wolf of Wall Street (dir. Martin Scorsese)
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Filmmaking doesn't need to be an exercise in restraint. This raunchy adaptation of Wall Street broker Jordan Belfort's unbelievable life story demands to be recognized exactly because it dares to go there, to push hard, to lose control. Non-stop profanities, heavy drug use, a parade of kinky sex and debaucheries fill up three hours of hedonistic screen time. A little excessive/repetitive? Yes. But was moderation ever a concern for people like Belfort? Probably not. With sadistic humor and explosive charge, Martin Scorsese takes the audience into an authentically rendered world of greed, decadence, the twisted American dream, and while what's portrayed is often shockingly offensive, watching the movie is never less than electrifying. Principal reason is, besides the superb cinematography, a staggering star turn by Leonardo DiCaprio. Crazed, charismatic, thunderously domineering, he gets the inseparable combination of tragedy and comedy in this larger-than-life character and delivers a performance that is, like the movie itself, scary because it's so terribly hilarious.
10. Zero Dark Thirty (dir. Kathryn Bigelow)
One of the first movies I saw this year remains one of its very best. Written by Mark Boal with substantiality, concision, cool-headed reason and directed by Kathryn Bigelow with ironfisted focus, this military procedural thriller about America's decade-long hunt for Osama Bin Laden is a tight pack of muscles sculpted with discipline and finesse. Expertly shot, capturing both scenes of combat and consultation in striking frames while pondering all the different shades of the exotic desert light, and flawlessly edited, giving the film its lean shape, relentless tempo and a constant sense of urgency, it's intense but clear-sighted, allowing the viewer to fully submerge in the environment and mindset of those involved. Jessica Chastain shines in the role of CIA analyst Maya, showing not just her fierce intellect, steely will but also the downward spiral into obsession, supplying the film with a perfectly ambivalent concluding remark.
The breakthrough performance by Jella Haase as Chantal in "Fack ju Göhte" / Onata Aprile as Maisie in "What Maisie Knew" / Samuel Schneider as Ben in "Exit Marakkech"
The art direction of "Stoker" / "The Great Gatsby"
The film music of "Ain't Them Bodies Saints" / "Boa Sorte, Meu Amor" / "Los amantes pasajeros"
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The on-screen duo Sandra Bullock & Melissa McCarthy in "The Heat" / Gemma Arterton & Saoirse Ronan in "Byzantium"
The cinematography of "La grande bellezza" / "Post Tenebras Lux" / "Una Noche"
The performance by Paulina Garcia as Gloria in "Gloria" / Anders Danielsen Lie as Anders in "Oslo, 31. August"
The screenplay of "消失的子彈 (The Bullet Vanishes)" / "Die Wand" / "The Best Offer"
The ensemble cast of "廚子．戲子．痞子 (The Chef, the Actor, the Scoundrel)"
The on-screen couple Julie Delpy & Ethan Hawke in "Before Midnight"
The breakthrough director Ramon Zürcher for "Das merkwürdige Kätzchen"
The musical number "Hang Me, Oh Hang Me" from "Inside Llewyn Davis" / "Love Is an Open Door" from "Frozen" / "I Dreamed a Dream" from "Les Misérables"
The action sequence "airfield showdown" from "Fast & Furious 6" / "Busan apartment" from "도둑들 (The Thieves)"
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Runners-up (all-around solid movies just missing my top 10), in alphabetical order:
1. Blancanieves
2. 寒戰 (Cold War)
3. Finsterworld
4. Flight
5. Fruitvale Station
6. 一代宗師 (The Grandmaster)
7. Jeune & jolie
8. Mud
9. Tore tanzt
10. The Physician
And finally, the cream of the crop- out of the 220 movies I saw in 2013 (a personal record!), these are my favorite 10, in alphabetical order:
1. Blue Jasmine (dir. Woody Allen)
Sharply observed and mercilessly written, Woody Allen's latest story takes you plunging into the psyche of a pathologically vain and insecure woman. Filled with scenarios that ring frighteningly true and dialogue at once cruelly funny and acidly biting, it's a script that probes the inside of a proud but pitiful mind with the precision of a surgeon. It allows you not just to witness the gradual collapse of sanity but be reminded of the abuse and neglect we exercise on those around us without a second thought. Juggling the gravity of the material and the comedy in the approach, the cast is splendid all around. Cate Blanchett uncovers every single one of the innermost human survival instincts in a revelatory performance that's mighty but deplorable, ragged yet majestic. Sally Hawkins plays the yin to her yang in a marvelous supporting turn. Every time they clash on screen it's music to my eyes.
2. The Broken Circle Breakdown (dir. Felix Van Groeningen)
The joy of love and the grief of loss are polar opposites of the emotional spectrum but beautifully brought together in this heart-wrenching tale about the tumultuous relationship between a Belgian couple. With the innate understanding that the most powerful way to engage and touch through film is to simply let the humanity of the situation play out, helmer Felix Van Groeningen refrains from showy directorial tricks and relies on the expressions, looks, bodies, voices of his actors to take the audience on a journey through light and darkness. Soberly but profoundly told, aptly edited, sincerely performed and accompanied by the sweet, earnest sound of bluegrass music, this movie is a pitch-perfect, enormously moving celebration of birth, death and all the transcient happiness and sorrows in between.
3. Gravity (dir. Alfonso Cuarón)
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Delivering one of the best arguments why movies still need to be seen in cinemas, "Gravity" offers an experience that's transportive, all-enveloping, awe-inspiring. Carried by director Alfonso Cuarón's singularly daring vision, aided by cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki's lyrical, fluid, omnipotent camerawork, enhanced by immaculate sound design and the cutting-edge visual effects technology of the day, this movie realizes the grand illusion of space travel complete with the weightless pull, the breathtaking splendor, the deafening airlessness, the claustrophobic infinity and it's all spectacular. Sandra Bullock displays physical strength and grace as the stranded astronaut and George Clooney in his brief moments on screen leaves warmth and solace behind. Thanks to them the film is never just a showcase for cooly metalic technical wizardry but also a resonant story about finding a connection and a deeply felt meditation on the reason to live.
4. Pacific Rim (dir. Guillermo del Toro)
Granted, the script and the narrative arc of Guillermo del Toro's robot-vs-monster movie are not the most original out there. But it more than makes up for that with elaborate, brillianly conceived and masterfully executed action sequences that, despite their otherworldly scale, never seem overly CGI-ed to the point of being mechanical and alienating nor so compulsively edited as to lose all sense of speed and perspective. Demonstrating a magnificent visual blueprint, impeccable employment of cinematographic and sonic techniques as well as some truly stupefying special effects, these scenes soar high and they always land with an impact. The result is 130 minutes of pure, jaw-dropping awesomeness. Watching this movie is like leaping into a pool of icy water on a hot summer day, the shock to the senses is visceral, the satisfaction immediate. You know it's silly and probably not the most advisable thing to do, but every part of your body screams in pleasure anyway.
5. Le passé (dir. Asghar Farhadi)
Family is a battlefield and love can be weaponized. Iranian director Asghar Farhadi gets this and crafts the most suspenseful film of the year accordingly. Unassuming at the outset, this relationship drama proves to be a labyrinth of secrets and lies, pitfalls and entanglements that keeps rounding corners as it raises the stakes. The script is exquisitely constructed, pitting strong personalities and their versions of truth against one another without ever taking sides, all the while leaving just enough room for speculation to draw the viewer ever deeper into a mystery where everyone's conscience is at risk. Directed with momentous force and dazzling poise, featuring an ensemble performance of the highest order, this movie makes you see the intricacy of the workings of the heart and proves the humanity of our being lies in the fact that though every passing second is already in the past, nothing's ever really gone.
6. 郊遊 (Stray Dogs) (dir. 蔡明亮 Tsai Ming-liang)
There are strange movies, incomprehensible movies and then there are Tsai Ming-liang's movies. In any given lineup his film would always stand out by a mile and this one's no exception. Epic long takes featuring random bits of life from a squatting family bearing no narrative element or thematic coherence make up its 130+ minutes. From every point of view it's a beast created out of blind indulgence and pure whims. However, Tsai is nothing if not a master conductor of the symphony of chaos, an artist who sees the essence of life in all its magnificent disorder. He composes images with the rapt attention of a fanciful child and let them flow by with the stony patience of a wise old monk. In the sure-to-become legendary penultimate scene, when all that jumbled beauty culminates in two people standing wordlessly next to each other for a quarter-hour, when everything's so dead and quiet you can hear your own breath in the theater, it's also the most poignant, vital, absolutely liberating cinematic moment you're likely to experience all year.
7. Upstream Color (dir. Shane Carruth)
Equally impenetrable is Shane Carruth's fragmented, poetic, mystifying "Upstream Color". It's pointless to talk about plot here, seeing how purposefully, violently its creator tries to disarrange all you see. But Carruth, who also wrote, edited and scored the film, succeeds in making an enigmatic mass so organic in its alienness, so completely and gorgeously foreign it confounds yet captivates nonetheless. Technical aspects of the movie are across the board outstanding, from the crisp but dreamy cinematography, magnetically synthesized music, bold, logic-defying editing to the dense, layered, aggressively present soundwork, everything comes together to build a trove of impressions and sensations with such kaleidoscopic richness that, even without meaningful verbal communication, the themes of identity and loss of self rise instinctually, vividly to the surface.
8. La vie d'Adèle (dir. Abdellatif Kechiche)
Movies are faked reality, fictionalized lives, staged, made-up, rehearsed. But every once in a while, a film will come along that's so sensitive, empathetic, so keenly attuned to facets of our most primal urges and feelings it makes you relive that skipped heartbeat, that caught breath and even those tiny trembles of exhilaration and anticipation caused by something as close to the heart as love. Now things don't get much more real than that. Abdellatif Kechiche chronicles in this movie the relationship between two young girls with care, candor and the utmost compassion, his two lead actresses Adèle Exarchopoulos and Léa Seydoux throw themselves into the characters with ferocious commitment and bare their souls with beguiling transparency. The result, as straightforward and unembellished as it is, is realist cinema at its most compelling and a fearless pursuit of truth not easily to be forgotten.
9. The Wolf of Wall Street (dir. Martin Scorsese)
-crop.jpg)
Filmmaking doesn't need to be an exercise in restraint. This raunchy adaptation of Wall Street broker Jordan Belfort's unbelievable life story demands to be recognized exactly because it dares to go there, to push hard, to lose control. Non-stop profanities, heavy drug use, a parade of kinky sex and debaucheries fill up three hours of hedonistic screen time. A little excessive/repetitive? Yes. But was moderation ever a concern for people like Belfort? Probably not. With sadistic humor and explosive charge, Martin Scorsese takes the audience into an authentically rendered world of greed, decadence, the twisted American dream, and while what's portrayed is often shockingly offensive, watching the movie is never less than electrifying. Principal reason is, besides the superb cinematography, a staggering star turn by Leonardo DiCaprio. Crazed, charismatic, thunderously domineering, he gets the inseparable combination of tragedy and comedy in this larger-than-life character and delivers a performance that is, like the movie itself, scary because it's so terribly hilarious.
10. Zero Dark Thirty (dir. Kathryn Bigelow)
One of the first movies I saw this year remains one of its very best. Written by Mark Boal with substantiality, concision, cool-headed reason and directed by Kathryn Bigelow with ironfisted focus, this military procedural thriller about America's decade-long hunt for Osama Bin Laden is a tight pack of muscles sculpted with discipline and finesse. Expertly shot, capturing both scenes of combat and consultation in striking frames while pondering all the different shades of the exotic desert light, and flawlessly edited, giving the film its lean shape, relentless tempo and a constant sense of urgency, it's intense but clear-sighted, allowing the viewer to fully submerge in the environment and mindset of those involved. Jessica Chastain shines in the role of CIA analyst Maya, showing not just her fierce intellect, steely will but also the downward spiral into obsession, supplying the film with a perfectly ambivalent concluding remark.
Dienstag, 31. Dezember 2013
Montag, 30. Dezember 2013
Sonntag, 29. Dezember 2013
Samstag, 28. Dezember 2013
Freitag, 27. Dezember 2013
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Dienstag, 1. Januar 2013
My Top 10 Movies of 2012
Honorable Mentions (cinematic highlights from movies that did NOT make it to the top of my list):
The cinematography of "Lore" / "白鹿原 (White Deer Plain)" / "Wuthering Heights"
The action sequence "Tsunami" from "The Impossible" / "Manila chase" from "The Bourne Legacy"
The screenplay of "Dans la maison" / "Electrick Children" / "Margaret"
The production design of "Prometheus"
The costume design of "Anna Karenina"
The film music of "Chico & Rita"
The opening sequence of "Holy Motors"
The cinematography of "Lore" / "白鹿原 (White Deer Plain)" / "Wuthering Heights"
The action sequence "Tsunami" from "The Impossible" / "Manila chase" from "The Bourne Legacy"
The screenplay of "Dans la maison" / "Electrick Children" / "Margaret"
The production design of "Prometheus"
The costume design of "Anna Karenina"
The film music of "Chico & Rita"
The opening sequence of "Holy Motors"
The performance by Ann Dowd as "Sandra" in "Compliance" / Rebel Wilson as "Fat Amy" in "Pitch Perfect" / Charlize Theron as "Mavis" in "Young Adult"
The musical number "Tap Dancing to the Top" from "The Artist" / "The Sambola! International Dance Craze" from "Damsels in Distress"
The onscreen couple 楊千樺 & 余文樂 in "春嬌與志明 (Love in the Buff)" / Marion Cotillard & Matthias Schoenaerts in "De rouille et d'os" / Uhm Tae-woong & Han Ga-in; Lee Je-hoon & Bae Suzy in "건축학개론 (Architecture 101)"
Runners-up (all-around solid movies just missing my top 10), in alphabetical order:
1. "Alps"
2. "Barbara"
3. "觀音山 (Buddha Mountain)"
4. "The Dark Knight Rises"
5. "Hugo"
6. "Looper"
7. "On the Road"
8. "ParaNorman"
9. "Silver Linings Playbook"
10. "Skyfall"
And finally, the cream of the crop- out of the 202 movies I saw in 2012 (a personal record!), these are my favorite 10, in alphabetical order:
1. "Amour" (dir. Michael Haneke)
With his trademark austerity and frightening repose, writer/director Michael Haneke created this chamber piece about love and death that's serene, pristine, ruthlessly unsentimental and wrenchingly human. Despite its spacial confines, structural simplicity and thematic universality, this movie is a towering achievement in filmmaking that engrosses, provokes and challenges with quiet authoirty throughout. Emmanuelle Riva's portrayal of a dying pianist traces the cracks spreading across a placid surface and taking over a failing mind with utmost precision and dignity; the pairing of her and fellow acting legend Jean-Louis Trintignant is the stuff film classics are made of.
2. "Beasts of the Southern Wild" (dir. Benh Zeitlin)
Seen through the eyes of a tough and wise 6-year-old, the dangerous, menacing wetland of the American deep south could look so teeming with life and wonder. Played with dazzling fierceness by Quvenzhané Wallis and captured with endless tenderness by debut director Benh Zeitlin, Hushpuppy is cinema's unlikeliest heroine this year, in a movie that is a giant burst of energy and imagination that celebrates home, nature and our bond to the world with such abandon it wants you to hear, smell, feel everything- and it did just that. Sensational in every sense of the word.
3. "The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel" (dir. John Madden)
With John Madden's muted direction and a dutifully by-the-numbers screenplay, this could have been a run-of-the-mill, harmlessly sweet, fish-out-of-water comedy for the elderly. With an ensemble cast from heaven including Judi Dench, Maggie Smith, Bill Nighy, Tom Wilkinson and Penelope Wilton, however, it was turned into cinematic gold. Watching such a superb group of actors at the top of their game act, react and interact with one another, by turns playfully and gracefully, expressing every nuance on the spectrum of human emotions in the process, is to witness a masterclass in performance and the experience is undeniably moving and inexplicably purging.
4. "The Cabin in the Woods" (dir. Drew Goddard)
Unabashedly genre and outrageously fun, director Drew Goddard and co-writer Joss Whedon used their wicked bloodlust and grisly humor to cook up a story that pays hommage to its horror roots and yet yanks up those roots with a twist that's clever, original and just so delicious. While the production value and the acting may not be top-notch, this movie follows its evil masterplan like a well-oiled, slightly crazed machine with deadly efficiency and a cheeky grin. When the tides turn in the third act, literally all hell breaks loose and the ensuing mayhem is a spectacle that's hard to forget.
5. "Cloud Atlas" (dir. Lana & Andy Wachowski, Tom Tykwer)
A whiff of new-agey pseudo-zen in its tone? Sure. Does not invite a second sit-through with its 3-hour running time? Probably. Still, this fearless adaptation of David Mitchell's novel by the Wachowski Siblings and Tom Tykwer is the most audacious cinematic endeavor of the year, with a whopping scale that commands attention and demands admiration. The technical aspects of the film, from its epochs-and-genres hopping production design, rich sound and sweeping cinematography, to the smart editing that put all those narrative threads in place, are irreproachable, on top of which is the directors trio who mapped centuries of sorrow and longing and told a tale as old and brutal as time.
6. "In Another Country" (dir. Hong Sang-soo)
With comically broad and brazenly simple strokes, writer/director Hong Sang-soo crafted three episodes of cross-cultural semi-romances with few showy moments and little resounding consequence. And yet these whimsical, strangely philosophical tales, in which a physically unvarnished and emotionally unguarded Isabelle Huppert gives splendid performances as three women stranded in a Korean village, spark with such wonderful spontaneity and a palpable joie de vivre they hook you right in and offer you a version of life scattered with symbols, parallels, repetitions and coincidences that's at once mystifying, invigorating and liberating- auteur cinema at its purest.
7. "Life of Pi" (dir. Ang Lee)
Adapting Yann Martel's novel for the big screen proved to be too daunting for Hollywood until the incomparably chameleonic Ang Lee came on board. Under his direction, which breaks new grounds in the deployment of 3D technology without compromising the essence of this unlikely survival tale rooted deep in the inner workings of the mind, the movie became a magically immersive experience that overwhelms the senses and credibly questions the notions of faith, reason and storytelling. Some of the images lensed by cinematographer Claudio Miranda and enhanced by the FX-team are so otherworldly beautiful they, like the story itself, soar into mythical realms.
8. "Oh Boy" (dir. Jan Ole Gerster)
The most delightfully chilled, casually melancholic 85 minutes at the cinema this year were to be had with Niko Fischer, a young guy on a 24-hour odyssey through Berlin searching for a purpose and a cup of coffee in writer/director Jan Ole Gerster's feature film debut. Drunken on a jazzy soundtrack and hazy with smoke and light scorched on brilliant b&w images, this movie scoops you up in its swinging steps and whispers in your ear the angst of not finding a place in life, the comical details of the anonymous everyday, the loneliness and occasional comfort offered by the immense city through an incisively observant script and remarkably varied performances from a cast led by Tom Schilling. The Berliner flair, captured here to a T, is to die for.
9. "The Perks of Being a Wallflower" (dir. Stephen Chbosky)
Of my top 10 selection this year, this is probably the least technically accomplished. The editing and cinematography leave something to be desired and let the fact that it's director Stephen Chbosky's first movie felt. However, Chbosky, who also wrote the original story and the script himself, unsurprisingly nailed the highly complex sense of struggle, elation, panic and confusion inherent to the passage from adolescence to adulthood and etched in his poignant words. Aided by Logan Lerman, who gave a heartbreaking performance as Charlie, he delivered numerous scenes that come from such an honest place they feel profound, timeless, true.
10. "Tabu" (dir. Miguel Gomes)
This movie unfolds through digging up pieces of memory hidden in the heart of a dying woman and buried in the swamps of colonial Africa. What it uncovers is the age-old story of passion, forbidden love, secrets and betrayal, and yet it does that in such an intense, hypnotic cinematic language the exposed desire, pain and loss seem to melt like heated asphalt and burn right off the celluoid. Distinct in his grand, retro, romantic gestures and bold, poetic aesthetics, director Miguel Gomes made a deliberately paced, gorgeously shot and scored (or left silent) film that's full of contrasts, feverish recollections and earnest displays of emotions; watching it is like dreaming with your eyes open- submerged, surreal, sublime.
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