“Wake in Fright”: an Australian nightmare that I found I couldn’t
quite shake.
“Lore”: notable for great performances and for not going where you
think it might.
“Heli”: does a fine show of what it’s
like to live with unspeakable violence as part of daily life
“Blue Ruin”: a brilliantly performed little thriller that
concentrates on how pathetic and self-destructive revenge fantasies can be.
“What
Richard Did”: a
small story about how one irredeemable act can ruin lives, all filtered through
the kind of convincing naturalism that makes most other drama look like panto.
“A
Field in England”:
because having a tiny budget shouldn’t stop you from making a trippy Civil War
re-enactment.
“12 Years a Slave”: an important film about what men can do to one
another – pretty and painful in equal amounts.
“Bronco Bullfrog”: captures that adolescent feeling of being
unwanted and having nowhere to go as well as a miserabilist Britain that will
instantly recognisable to anyone living through either.
“Animal Kingdom”: because I like this style of film-making and I
like Ben Mendelsohn.
“Neighbouring Sounds”: The guy that served me in Fopps said this had
a tremendous opening. ‘Better than ‘Enter the Void’? I asked. Yes, he answered after some thought. The
truth is that it is different rather than better, of course, and the subsequent
film is no let down. A film full of the tensions of everyday life.
“The Grand Budapest Hotel”: funny and gorgeously designed, of
course; probably Wes Anderson’s most commercial film.
“The Selfish Giant”: a moving account of
a friendship between two boys, one of which especially isn’t particularly
likeable, but it is all credible despite its Oscar Wild fairy tale basis.
Surprise
watches…
“Spring Breakers”: for being a trippy music-video of a film and
almost the total opposite of Harmony Korine’s “Trash Humpers”.
“Tucker and Dale vs Evil”: for its central gag (what’s the ‘evil’?)
and for being funny and nasty.
“Permissive”: for being like a Larry Clark
film decades before Clark had a career (minus the porn-fetish); and for a
glimpse into another England long since gone.
“Combat Shock”: for being no-budget guerrilla film-making, looking
it, and being grungy, unforgettable and ambitious in equal amounts.
“Sky
Blue”: for being
delicious to the eyes and not having a storyline that totally ruined the
pleasure.
“Arbitrage”: for showing how money corrupts and can get you out of anything
without resorting to reducing Richard Gere to standard villainy.
“Frankenweenie”: for being amusing and gorgeous
and a horror fanboy’s delight.
I
also want to mention “A Separation”
for outlining how complex working life can be, and “Import/Export” for portraying working life as a series of
degradations.
Notable
re-watches:
“The Tin Drum”, because I have always
loved this film and haven’t seen it in a long time.
“The Fall of the House of Usher”: how did I not see how wonderful
and wonderfully twisted this is the first time I saw it? I mean, I knew it was
good, but… And gothic atmosphere to die for. And Vincent Price, of course.
