My Top 10 Films of 2014
March 6, 2015 Leave a comment
1.
The Grand Budapest Hotel (★★★★)
Written/directed by Wes Anderson
A re-telling of Austrian author Stefan Zweig’s writings, wrapped inside of a vibrant, colorful homage to a wide array of classic films, particularly early screwball comedies of the 1930s and ‘40s, “The Grand Budapest Hotel” is the best and funniest movie I’ve seen this year, and easily the most assured, fully realized and entertaining work writer/director Wes Anderson (“The Fantastic Mr. Fox,” “Moonrise Kingdom”) has done.
Highly stylized and charming to no end, “The Grand Budapest Hotel” must be experienced. It must be seen and heard, felt and tasted. It engages all of the senses and rewards multiple viewings. Like many of the most interesting filmmakers working today, Anderson tells stories that possess the power to enrich our perspective of the world. While immersed in his reality, we are able to better understand our own, and with “The Grand Budapest Hotel,” he has opened yet another window through which we are free to gaze in wonder.
2.
Interstellar (★★★★)
Directed by Christopher Nolan
Written by Christopher and Jonathan Nolan
“Interstellar” is writer/director Christopher Nolan’s most successful attempt at balancing story and spectacle. It’s a deeply impassioned, visionary film of great beauty and power that makes brilliant use of the 70mm IMAX format — believe me, if you can see it that way, that’s the way to see it. Matthew McConaughey, continuing his winning streak of great films and performances, gives a riveting, painful performance as a man chosen (by whom? is the question) to carry out a mission to save the human race, not by reviving the dying, dried-up planet Earth, but by finding a new planet in a new solar system.
Nolan clearly has a message here about the importance of space travel and exploration, and there some biting criticisms in “Interstellar” about an apathy that exists currently. “Interstellar” has the power to at least begin chipping away at that indifference, and to inspire us all on a cinematic level. Last year, it was “Gravity” that captured my imagination of space travel and its perils. “Interstellar does it bigger and better, and with just as much grace and style.
3.
Blue Ruin (★★★★)
Written/directed by Jeremy Saulnier
“Blue Ruin” is one of the best thrillers you’re likely to see because it knows that when it comes to revenge, it never ends well. In a startlingly brilliant and understated performance, Macon Blair as Dwight takes us through the raw nerves and tendons of human desperation and retribution, and Jeremy Saulnier’s sharp writing, direction and photography carry us through it all with odd grace and perfect pacing — at a tight 90 minutes, this movie gets in, does it’s work, and gets out.
This is as stripped down, dark and dirty as it gets, a taut revenge drama tinted with pitch-black humor and brutal humanity drawn from questionable characters. It’s a film reminiscent of Joel and Ethan Coen’s debut feature, “Blood Simple,” a neo-noir in which a woman and her lover plot to have her abusive husband killed. This is particularly true in the way Saulnier allows suspense to build and give, build and give in almost every scene, until it explodes in a flash of violence on screen. Brace yourself: “Blue Ruin” is a blood-soaked triumph.
4.
Boyhood (★★★1/2)
Written/directed by Richard Linklater
Filmed over 12 years using the same actors, Richard Linklater’s astonishing cinematic experiment “Boyhood” is the ultimate coming-of-age story. From age 5 to 18, we follow Mason (Ellar Coltrane), a shy kid full of curiosity about the world. I can’t say that I’ve seen a film more universal than this. We’ve all seen and felt the things Mason experiences. They are profoundly familiar to us, and it is in its authenticity, attention to detail and grounded structure that “Boyhood” shines.
The dedication and risk that everyone took while making this film is incredible. To shoot a film over 12 twelve years and capture and harness the true changes in the actors’ lives and appearances was a stroke of genius, one that pays off so well that “Boyhood” literally vibrates with life and energy. It’s a sprawling film that runs at just under three hours, but it never outstays its welcome. You get lost in it, and its heart and ingenuity overcome you.
5.
Joe (★★★★)
Director: David Gordon Green
Screenwriter: Gary Hawkins
“Joe” is a simple story that is told poetically with astonishing depth and almost frightening sincerity. Nicholas Cage, returning to top form after a recent sea of garbage, delivers another great performance as the eponymous anti-hero, Joe, an ex-con haunted by a violent past and an uncertain future. This is the kind of powerful character study we’ve seen before from Cage in films like “Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans” and “Leaving Las Vegas,” and director David Gordon Green, also in top form again after slumming it with unfortunate flops like “The Sitter” and “Your Highness,” generates an atmosphere thick with tension.
This is a visual experience as well as a compelling story, and with “Joe,” Green is working in the mode of his early independent films, particularly his stunning first two features, “George Washington” and “All the Real Girls.” Working with his longtime cinematographer Tim Orr, Green hypnotically captures the essence of the rural south, and the murky back woods setting these characters inhabit, in every frame. You can’t shake this film. Its humanity warms you and its realism causes you to shudder. It will undoubtedly be one of the year’s best films, and indicates the beginning of another golden period of filmmaking for Green.
6.
The Babadook (★★★★)
Written/directed by Jennifer Kent
“The Babadook” is a horror movie about the things that haunt us in reality. Whatever preconceived notions you may have about the horror genre, Jennifer Kent’s film shakes them up, reassembles them and filters them through a frightening screen of humanity and understated horror with perfect grace and restraint. Inarguably, “The Babadook” is of the one the best horror movies made in the past decade. It’s a tour de force from Kent, who is an Australian first time writer/director, making this her big-screen debut—what an entrance.
The movie also calls to mind a wide spectrum of cerebral horror films, including flashes of F.W. Murnau’s “Nosferatu,” Nicolas Roeg’s “Don’t Look Now,” Darren Aronofsky’s “Black Swan” and Lynne Ramsay’s “We Need to Talk About Kevin.” Using almost all in-camera effects, Kent develops a deeply nuanced atmosphere that somehow feels equal parts old-fashioned and innovative. I’m not kidding, she does some things here that will blow your hair back, and remind you what it feels like to be 8 years old and terrified of the monster under the bed… or in the closet… or in the dark, damp basement.
7.
Enemy (★★★1/2)
Directed by Denis Villeneuve
Written by Javier Gullón
“Enemy” might be one of the most challenging and strange films of the year, although it might not seem like it on the surface and not right away. When a seemingly depressed history professor (Jake Gyllenhaal) sees a doppelganger (also Jake Gyllenhaal) of himself in a rented movie, he becomes obsessed with discovering who it is, and why he looks like him. The doppelganger is a married struggling actor. When their lives become entwined, things get dark and complicated.
Director Denis Villeneuve, whose film “Prisoners” was also one of the best of 2013, with “Enemy” delivers an unnerving, gripping, but also cold, almost “David Cronenbergian” experience that holds onto its secrets until the end, providing many subtle clues, but never complete answers. That’s one of the things I love about “Enemy” is it’s heady approach to the “doppelganger” thriller. It’s a gorgeously shot, almost indefinable film with echoes of early Cronenberg (“Scanners,” “Videodrome”) reverberating throughout. Gyllenhaal is excellent at subtly playing two characters — this is one of two great performances he’s given in the past year, the other being in “Nightcrawler” — and the final shot of the film… it’ll shake you.
8.
Noah (★★★1/2)
Directed by Darren Aronofsky
Written by Aronofsky and Ari Handel
Of all of writer/director Darren Aronofsky’s films, “Noah” is by far his biggest and most ambitious to date, a movie of biblical proportions (literally) that maintains the filmmaker’s idiosyncratic style and striking vision. This is what “The Fountain” could have been had the production not hit a financial wall, resulting in a cut budget, among other problems. Where that film fell short, “Noah” carries through and tells the story of Noah and his ark unlike any of us have ever experienced before. It’s Aronofsky’s ark, and I’m right on board with him in this incredibly imaginative, boisterous display of affection for humanity, and its many shades of gray.
As the titular character, Russell Crowe gives his best performance in years. His transformation through the film is something to behold, as is the way Aronofsky and his screenwriting partner Ari Handel develop this story from scratch, infusing elements from the source material with their own ideas, which are borderline insane but magically so. They aren’t so much interested in Noah as an archetype, but rather as a deeply human and conflicted mortal man, someone tortured by his given path, and by the idea of choice versus destiny, of mercy versus justice. Believe me, when that ark sets sale following an awe-inspiring visual sequence, there are no smiles or good cheer. Aronofsky isn’t known for giving us or his characters the easy way out, and here he continues his masterful storytelling ability with a familiar tale told refreshingly grim and well.
9.
Guardians of the Galaxy (★★★1/2)
Written/Directed by James Gunn
Writer/director James Gunn’s “Guardians of the Galaxy” is the freshest, funniest and most grounded of the Marvel movies — ironic, considering it takes place almost entirely in space and co-stars a talking raccoon. What’s great about “Guardians of the Galaxy” is that although its story breaks no new ground, it plays fast and loose with the rules established by previous Marvel movies.
From the stellar soundtrack featuring hits from the 1970s and 80s, to the sharp, twisty screenplay and the knockout performances by all, but particularly by Pratt, a TV goofball turned movie star, and Bautista, a professional wrestler who blends an unexpected amount of sincerity and tenderness into a character who could otherwise have been bland filler, “Guardians of the Galaxy” gets it right. It restores my excitement for comic book movies and, beyond all probability, has me totally ready for a sequel.
10.
Whiplash (★★★1/2)
Written/Directed by Damien Chazelle
“Whiplash” is an intense, vibrant exploration of teacher and pupil, ego and determination, and the costs that may be waiting for you at the end of that long road to success.
Miles Teller captures the desperation and frustration of a student trying to prove himself, even if he loses part of himself along the way. J.K. Simmons, a veteran whose performances have ranged from pure evil (Neo Nazi inmate Vern Schillinger on HBO’s “Oz”) to kind and empathetic (Mac MacGuff, Juno’s father in “Juno”). He’s always on point, and here he delivers one of the strongest, most intimidating performances of his career. On screen, Teller and Simmons ignite a fire, and enter the realm of cinema history right on tempo.
Damien Chazelle directs these sequences between them as if this were a thriller, and our hero were trying to diffuse a bomb beneath a table, all eyes (most importantly, Fletcher’s) upon his hands as they attempt to untangle and discern the correct wire to pull and cut. When Fletcher counts off a song, he expects excellence to follow. When it doesn’t, the bomb explodes.
“Whiplash” is a riveting film to watch, a master class in directing, editing and acting. It feels fresh, briskly paced, and incredibly disciplined in its approach to telling its story. The final 15 minutes are hair-raising, and make up one of the tensest endings of any film I’ve seen in the past year.
Glad to Be Weirdly Close 