As we reach the end of my salute to the achievements of 2009 here are my top films. I have been lucky, of the 42 times I went to the cinema I only consider 6 outright failures, and none of the films were so dreadful they had nothing to recommend them. That doesn't make the compilation of a top ten list any easier, in fact the overall quality has meant that many films which were very good ended up being left out. All but the top 3 could easily have been displaced by the dozen other contenders.
I won't be giving any commentary to list, not even a brief sentence, but please note that I have chosen these films because they moved me, gave me pure unadulterated pleasure or just led to more conversation than any of the other films I saw (number 10 for instance has led to 4 different viewings with deep discussions about the outcome).
1. Where the Wild Things Are
2009. Dir: Spike Jonze. Starring: Max Records, Catherine Keener, James Gandolfini, Catherine O'Hara and Lauren Ambrose. My Review
2. Maria Larsson's Everlasting Moments
2008. Dir: Jan Troell. Starring: Maria Heiskanen, Mikhail Persbrandt, Jesper Christensen, Emil Jensen and Ghita Nørby. My Review
3. Che Part 2
2008. Dir: Steven Soderbergh. Starring Benicio Del Toro, Franka Potenta, Joaquim de Almeida, Demián Bichir and Lou Diamond Phillips. My Review
4. A Serious Man
2009. Dir: Ethan and Joel Coen. Starring: Michael Stuhlbarg, Richard Kind, Fred Melamed, Sari Lennick and Aaron Wolff. My Review
5. Away We Go
2009. Dir: Sam Mendes. Starring: John Krasinski, Maya Rudolph, Carmen Ejogo, Catherine O'Hara and Jeff Daniels. My Review
6. Milk
2008. Dir: Gus van Sant. Starring: Sean Penn, Emile Hirsch, Josh Brolin, Diego Luna and James Franco. Not Reviewed.
7. Antichrist
2009. Dir: Lars von Trier. Starring: Willem Dafoe and Charlotte Gainsbourg. My Review
8. Avatar
2009. Dir: James Cameron. Starring: Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Stephen Lang, Sigourney Weaver and Michelle Rodriguez. My Review
9. Drag me to Hell
2009. Dir: Sam Raimi. Starring: Alison Lohman, Justin Long, Lorna Raver, Dileep Rao and David Paymer. My Review
10. Doubt
2008. Dir: John Patrick Shanley. Starring: Meryl Streep, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams, Viola Davis and Joseph Foster. My Review
Thursday, 31 December 2009
2009 in Review - Best Film
Monday, 28 December 2009
2009 in Review - Best Supporting Actor
Supporting performances are always tought ot choose from. On one hand nearly every performance is there to support the story, but you don't want a piece that could conceivably be called the lead, nor do you want to glorify a cameo (I may be about to do that). Of the 5 performances listed below only one is likely to get an Oscar nod, and I've completed ignored last years selection that could have been eligible (Brolin, Hoffman and Shannon), however all these actors have reached out and grabbed me in their own way. Each of them lifted the overall piece and that, surely, is worth celebrating.
1. Christoph Waltz - Inglorious Basterds. As you know I had big problems with the lack of humanity in this film, but strangely it was the least humane character who lights up the screen. Waltz veers from comic to serious poses often in the same sentence, and shows he can act in 4 different languages - no mean feat.
2. Fred Melamed - A Serious Man. Before Melamed enters we get a vague idea of his character from Larry Gopnik and his wife as they consider the forthcoming divorce, but nothing prepares you for his melodious voice and hurt dog tone. Possibly the worst person you'd want to lose your wife to.
3. Stephen Lang - Public Enemies. Lang is barely in Michael Mann's latest exercise in digital film; he's merely an additional agent called in by Christian Bale, but he carries himself, and speaks in such a way that you know he's seen every crime imaginable and he knows how to catch this criminal.
4. Rayniel Rufino - Sugar. The character is there as a foreshadow to our protagonist. He has moved to the states earlier and his career will dramatically change earlier, but with every decision Rufino makes with the part you can understand it and appreciate where's he's heading to.
5. Tom Wilkinson - Duplicity. This is a bit of a guilty pleasure, and I've probably seen better performances that fail to make this list, but Tom's proper bastard CEO relishes the competition he sets himself. He also is involved in a completely barmy bust up with Paul Giamatti so extra points for that.
Saturday, 19 December 2009
A Serious Man
2009. Dir: Ethan and Joel Coen. Starring: Michael Stuhlbarg, Richard Kind, Fred Melamed, Sari Lennick and Aaron Wolff. ●●●●○
Book a ticket to see a Coen brothers film and you know that they will try to subvert your expectations, from the grim tone of No Country for Old Men to the celebrity smug off that was Burn after Reading, it's probably best to leave those expectations at the door and their latest, A Serious Man, proves the case. Whatever you have heard, whatever you imagin this film to be, it can only be appreciated or understood through actually seeing it for yourself.
It's a meditation about what it means to be Jewish, a parable about middle class complacency and a intelligent comedy about family and relationships. It manages to all these things, and yet comes across as nothing. It is both highly entertaining and fearlessly opaque - if you have to believe one thing you've read in the reviews then trust me this is a film the Coen's have made for themselves.
The film begins with an reenactment of a Jewish superstition. This may seem disconnected to the rest of the film, however it sets up the theme of bad things happening to good people - we don't know who the good person is in the prologue, this will depend on whether you believe the husband or the wife, but we know that good deeds lead to misfortune. Flash forward to the 1960's, not the counter culture we explored in Taking Woodstock but to the buttoned down suburbia that populates the rest of America.
We meet Larry Gopnik (Michael Stuhlbarg) an academic who is waiting for the decision on his tenure. Like the biblical Job he is being faced with a catalogue of appalling disasters, his wife is asking for a divorce, his brother is sleeping on the sofa and getting in trouble with the law, he is being blackmailed by a student, threatened by a neighbour and a hate-letter campaign is being raged against him.
Faced with an extraordinary amount of bad luck he attempts to seek advice from the Rabbis. Each of these visits is a new chapter during which the advice he is given either assists or confuses him.
The performances are perfect, Stuhlbarg internalises much of his emotion which makes him a fascinting comic stooge and Fred Melamed steals every scene he's in as Larry's patronising love rival. The set-up may seem far fetched but the writing is so on the button that you go along with the Coen's punishment for Gopnik and each fresh obstacle for the character seems organic. Although the open-ended finish seems to indicate a running out of ideas rather than a perfect way to leave our characters.
Technically the film is top rate with Jess Gonchor's production design striking that fine balance between period and lived in.
Overall this is the best comedy I've seen in 2009, and one of the most fascinating projects within the Coen's back catalogue.
Friday, 20 November 2009
Out this week (20/11/09)
Quite a tough choice this week with a few films looking reasonably interesting. There's only one film that's going to come close to the top of the charts but for me it's the Coen brothers that will get me into the cinema. 
The First Day of the Rest of Your Life
French comedy that follows a family over 12 years revisiting them on five days that shape the history and relationships within the family unit. It's an interesting concept, but with no names I'm reticent about recommending it.
Runs like a Gay Excitometer: ●●●○○○○○○○
Glorious 39
Stephen Poliakoff has spent many years producing glossy British TV adaptations of little known historical events, and has met many great contacts. They all turn up here, but let's be honest this gothic melodrama set on the eve of the second World War is only interesting for it's cast list.
Runs like a Gay Excitometer: ●●●●●○○○○○
The Informant!
Steven Soderbergh's third release of 2009, with one more coming later in the year, is a satirical look at the whistleblowing career of Mark Whitaker, as played by a chubby Matt Damon. If I can make it to the cinema twice this week this will be seen.
Runs like a Gay Excitometer: ●●●●●●●○○○
Kurbaan
Bollywood thriller about a teacher who falls in love only to find her beau is not all he seems to be - and then is dragged into a spiral of danger and intrigue. Sounds like most teachers to me.
Runs like a Gay Excitometer: ●●○○○○○○○○
Machan
Umberto Pasolini is a fascintating film producer with The Full Monty and Palookaville in his back catalogue, however his latest project raelly tops the biscuit - based on the true story of the Sri Lankan Handball team which blagged a tour of Germay in spite of most of the team never having heard of handball, and then they disappeared...
Runs like a Gay Excitometer: ●●●○○○○○○○
Sea Wall
French guilt about the independence and subsequent war in Vietnam has been well served in cinema yet reappears in the simple parallels between a plantation owning mother dealing with her children's break for independence. Starring Isabelle Huppert and Gaspiel Ulliel.
Runs like a Gay Excitometer: ●●●●●○○○○○
A Serious Man
The Coen brothers have returned with wahta is being alternatively described as their most personal and most inaccessible film to date. Set in a Minnesotan Jewish community, following the titular family man seeking advice from the Rabbis a working knowledge of Yiddish seems to be a prerequisite.
Runs like a Gay Excitometer: ●●●●●●●●●○
Southern Softies
The second of a series of films by comic Graham Feellows as 'Jilted' John Shuttleworth, no, I can't remeber the first either. Described as hilarious by his own press release.
Runs like a Gay Excitometer: ●●○○○○○○○○
The Twilight Saga: New Moon
It's broken records for pre-release sales, it's got screaming teenage fans throughout the Western World, it's a thinly veiled propanganda piece about the abstinence movement as pushed by the Christian right. Hardly seems worth saying any more. Except there are many buff actors wandering around shirtless so let's watch it with as much irony as we can.
Runs like a Gay Excitometer: ●●●●○○○○○○
Tuesday, 13 October 2009
Tuesday Trailers - A Serious Man
The Coen Brothers are pretty hit and miss for me, I find a lot of their films to be just outside my comfort zone. This Jewish comedy is currently my top of the year, so I'm willing to give it a go. You've just got to love the repetitive beat of bashing a head against a blackboard and the "he didn't look busy" joke.
A Serious Man opens on 20 November 2009.
Tuesday, 19 August 2008
Coming Soon (maybe)
All the news that's fit to take a slight interest in.
Sex and Sylvia Plath
The buzzed script from newbie writer Jennifer O'Kieffe has been picked up by WAM films. The story is based on a 16 year old teenager who obsesses on death and shares a lover with her mother. Sounds like a laugh riot to me. It's got good pedigree, though - nominated for the Sanuel Goldwyn award and on last years Black List of unproduced screenplays.
Untitled Nancy Meyers Flick
Yes Nancy Meyers is responsible for formulaic romantic comedies like The Holiday and Something's Gotta Give but it has to be said she can get decent performances from the genre. Her latest, currently plotless, has Meryl Streep and Alec Baldwin signing on so it might be worth a gander.
Serious Man
The Coen brother's have decided on their next project. A Serious Man has beaten back Surbicon and Hail Ceasar (honestly the one I'm more interested in based on the imdb synopsis). It's about a man who's life is falling apart around him when his wife leaves and his brother doesn't. It's too soon to tell if it's No Country or Burn After Reading type Coen.
