Top 10 Films of the Year

In compiling this list I have decided to include films that may have been released internationally in 2013 but which I saw upon their release in UK cinemas in 2014.

10. 'Her' (Spike Jonze)

Spike Jonze's 'Her' is a compelling depiction of a near-future in which human relations have become fragmented and challenged by the development of 'sophisticated software' that has the faculties to emote and provide some kind of companionship for the lonely and disaffected in a digital world.

Whilst its premise may be contentious, there are certainly societal trends manifestly unfolding that render 'Her' a useful extrapolation of possibilities. For a film ostensibly about a man falling in love with his computer system, I found it rather affecting and an interesting view of where technology may be heading.


9. 'Calvary' (John Michael McDonagh)

Despite its flaws, 'Calvary' is a very worthwhile watch, in that it escalates tension to a satisfying conclusion and cleverly examines the resilient faith and conviction in the Stoic individual when all that seems to surround him is a cumulus of apostasy.

Read my full review of 'Calvary' here.


8. 'Blue Ruin' (Jeremy Saulnier)

A low-budget, independent American film, 'Blue Ruin' is a taut and effective revenge thriller with little in the way of genre pretensions to keep it from seeming either fresh or involving. It attempts to take the Peckinpah vigilante drama, as in 'Straw Dogs', and push it into oft-unexplored recesses of motive and retribution.


7. 'Norte - the End of the History' (Lav Diaz)

Lav Diaz's 'Norte' is a film that requires perseverance and patience; many shots linger interminably (despite the cinematography being constantly wonderful), and many scenes appear to languish unnecessarily; but the overall impact is of a sprawling, novelistic investigation into the lives and fates of two disparate men woven together by the strands of situation and circumstance.

Read my full review here.


6. '12 Years a Slave' (Steve McQueen)

It would be a stubborn philistine who managed to come away from Steve McQueen’s adaptation of Solomon Northrup’s harrowing autobiography without feeling some degree of emotional turmoil, and there are few films that really do demand mandatory viewing. The performances are outstanding and the overall handling of the subject is very well achieved.

 

At times I felt that McQueen’s direction was in danger of skirting over the line into the realm of gratuitousness, instead of maintaining a cold, affectless and ‘observer’ eye. Nevertheless, '12 Years a Slave’ is one of the hardest-hitting films of the year and certainly one of the most essential.

5. 'Two Days One Night' (Jean-Pierre Dardenne, Luc Dardenne)

As a portrait of resilience amidst despair and self-belief amidst doubt, 'Two Days, One Night' is an engrossing and affecting story about one woman facing redundancy unless she can convince her fellow colleagues to stand in solidarity and support her. As an example of natural realism it is reminiscent of 'Bicycle Thieves' in its instilling of justice and dignity in work, along with the assortment of ordinary people with their principles, convictions and foibles.


4. 'Citizenfour' (Laura Poitras) (documentary)

Set almost entirely within the claustrophobic confines of a high rise Hong Kong hotel room, as a unique insight into the life and circumstance of a man surrendering his life as he knows it for a principled cause, ‘Citizenfour’ is easily the most important documentary film of the year, if not the decade.

Read my full review here.


3. 'Boyhood' (Richard Linklater)

Richard Linklater’s ‘Boyhood’, 12 years in the making, is one of the most life-affirming films I have seen in a long time.  It is thoroughly well-observed, poignant and tense in all the right places and succeeds in pretty conclusively cordoning off the coming-of-age film as unsurpassable territory for quite some time.

2. 'Blue is the Warmest Colour' (Abdellatif Kechiche)

I can scarcely think of another film I've seen that captured so accurately the exhilarating high of falling in love, and the suffocating low of subsequent loss.

Read my full review here.


1.  'Under the Skin' (Jonathan Glazer)

Scarlett Johansson is superb in this bizarre and disturbing depiction of alienation and separation, an examination of the void that permeates between our sensibilities and emotional attachments. 'Under the Skin' is almost impossible to categorize, slithering as it does from one stylistic trope to another like an only slightly more restrained David Lynch film. From the homage to Kubrick in the opening 'birth' sequence onwards, the film presents a delightfully ambiguous commentary on modern society, exploring the vacuity of existence, the struggle to relate and the pervading sense of feeling decidedly 'other'.