I’ve gone to the cinema far more this year than I’ve ever been before. Nothing beats seeing seeing a film on the big screen. Looking back, there have been so many incredible films I’ve seen this year, it’s probably been a very long time since there’s been so many films out which I genuinely loved. Here’s 15 of those films.
Honourable Mentions: Gone Girl, X-Men: Days of Future Past, Mr. Turner, Edge of Tomorrow, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, 22 Jump Street, Nightcrawler, The Double, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes
15. Inside Llewyn Davis (The Coen Brothers) 
Just a few minutes into Inside Llewyn Davis, I realised it’s been years since I last watched a Coen brothers film, probably True Grit in 2011. But it doesn’t take long for me to feel safely back in Coen territory, if not for the film’s caustic wit and playful sense of irony. Although playful may not always be the right word for this film, which is often melancholy and at times quite bleak.
Set in New York’s Greenwich Village in 1961, it follows the eponymous hero (Oscar Isaac), a struggling folk musician having to sleep over on couches and failing to make ends meet. And that’s about it really. A sub-story about the search for a lost cat forms the closest the film has to a conventional plot. Instead, much of the running time is given to live performances, and various episodes of bad luck in Llewyn’s life. Although much of the shit in his life comes down to the fact he’s an unlikeable jerk with a stubborn need for authenticity in everything, it’s testament to Oscar Isaac’s understated performance that Llewyn’s struggles don’t verge on unwatchable, and I look forward to seeing Isaac in upcoming films A Most Violent Year and Ex Machina. Brimming with the most exquisite cinematography and some wonderfully poetic shots and moments (one of a cat limping into the bushes on the side of a misty motorway still sticks out for me), Inside is yet another triumph for the Coens.
14. The Grand Budapest Hotel (Wes Anderson)
Any new film from Wes Anderson is always greatly welcomed, and Grand Budapest is no exception. Anderson’s vision has become so singular and distinct as to become instantly recognisable, and that brings the fear that style will overpower substance. Whilst I still prefer the more focused character studies of Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums, the zany capers of Grand Budapest still reveal a playful soul beneath all the artifice and dense non-stop plotting.
A formidable handling of the conventions of time and place makes a film that evokes a deep-rooted sense of loss for a way of life that has long since passed. A second viewing reminded me how this story can be quite sad at times, but that doesn’t take away from how much fun this pristinely made adventure is.
13. American Interior (Dylan Goch/Gruff Rhys)
There were plenty of great films that could have gone on this list, but this charming film has been so gravely underappreciated this year that I thought it deserved a little more love. A four-part project by Gruff Rhys, frontman of Welsh band Super Furry Animals and solo artist, consisting of a book, an app, an album (which is really good, seriously, check it out), and this film; American Interior is part documentary, part concert movie, part road movie. It follows Rhys as he retraces the journey of his distant ancestor John Evans, who travelled across America in the 1790s in search of a fabled lost tribe of Welsh-speaking Native Americans.
Accompanied by a puppet Evans companion, Rhys explores Evans’s bizarre and extraordinary life story through interviews with local historians, which provides the inspiration for his latest album, shown on screen through recording sessions and live performances. Gorgeously shot in black and white with occasional bursts of colour and animation, American Interior is a glorious homage to the majesty of the American landscape, as well as a lament on the decline of native cultures and languages. Rhys proves an engaging guide in this ode to exploration and fantasy, well worth seeking out.
12. Guardians of the Galaxy (James Gunn)
I have started to grow slightly tired of the sheer proliferation of superhero movies (although admittedly many of the ones I saw this year turned out to be surprisingly great). And seeing the schedule Marvel and DC already both have for the next few years is a little disconcerting, knowing essentially there’s no escape from them. So when news came out that Marvel were making a big budget blockbuster based on a little-known comic from their back catalogue, you couldn’t help escaping the feeling they were starting to scrape the bottom of the barrel.
So it was most pleasing to discover that the risks paid off: this riotously entertaining film helps to inject some much needed anarchic fun back into the summer blockbuster. But what surprised is just how fiercely intelligent this film is: able to establish character far quicker and deeper than most other Marvel releases, and by having the protagonist be the only human in this alien galaxy, especially one as watchable and charismatic as Chris Pratt, helps makes this far-out premise genuinely engaging, even relatable. The 70s soundtrack, as well as being just downright fucking sweet, helps humanise this bizarre (and I don’t know if it was just me, but sometimes confusing) premise into something joyously impressive.
11. 12 Years a Slave (Steve McQueen)
A deserving Oscar winner, Steve McQueen applies his unflinching clinical gaze to the atrocities of slavery in this undeniably powerful drama. The precise framing and long takes seem the only suitable way to do justice to this atrocious story of a free man Solomon Northup (Chiwetel Ejiofor) tricked and sold into slavery.
Ejiofor’s quietly dignified performance, often only expressed through the smallest of facial gestures, is the anchor at the heart of this film which would be better defined as an endurance test rather than a viewing experience. Indeed, all performances are uniformly excellent, although the intense focus on Northup doesn’t allow the film to explore any other characters in as great a depth. The magnificent cinematography and bold imagery displays human capability for both great cruelty and goodness, and provides a necessary depiction of a time when slavery was seen unquestionably as an ordinary feature in everyday life.
10. Ida (Pawel Pawlikowski)
A young orphaned nun Anna (Agata Trzebuchowska) in 1960s Poland is advised to visit her aunt, her last living relative, before taking her vows. Her aunt Wanda (Agata Kulesza) is an alcoholic judge who tried many anti-Communists for Poland’s Stalinist regime, and together the two women travel to their home village to discover what happened to their family.
Ida is the very definition of the power of simplicity. Crisply shot in 4:3 and exquisite black and white, large portions of the film take place in near-silence. Characters are often framed at the bottom of the screen, with great emphasis on the vast spaces above them, creating a spiritual void at a time when much of Europe was still suffering from the consequences of the Holocaust. The use of completely static camerawork and two incredible performances help give even the smallest and quietest of moments (a slight giggle during a silent meal, for example) great power. Very short and concise, this unassuming drama is a hugely effective study on the nature of identity.
9. Under the Skin (Jonathan Glazer)
The long-delayed and highly anticipated third feature by visionary director (this term is so overused, but if ever it applies to any director working today, it’s gotta be) Jonathan Glazer, Under the Skin is just one of a surprising number of films this year to explore the nature of humanity. But none have been as unique and challenging as this honestly unknowable visual feast.
Offering a remarkable outsider view on the most ordinary of situations, it follows Scarlett Johansson as a mysterious stranger who preys on men in Scotland. Often keeping viewers at a distance, and never offering any form of rationality or explanation, Under the Skin can at times be frustrating, and other times exhilarating. Mica Levi’s creepy score (one of the year’s best), and some truly bold unforgettable imagery help create this nightmarish vision.
8. Interstellar (Christopher Nolan)
Expectations are now sky high with every new Christopher Nolan, and yet again, he delivers. Epic in every sense of the word, this latest project crams near enough every giant sci-fi trope to create a sprawling intergalactic odyssey unlike anything else this year, with some of the best realisations of outer space I’ve ever seen.
Plagued somewhat by an incessant need for exposition, at times verging on the wrong side of sentimentality, and open to a great degree of logical nitpicking (its ambition sometimes is just to excessive to really contain itself), but Nolan is absolutely right when he describes this as “experiential” cinema. This is one of those movies you just need to sit back and truly feel, to experience rather than simply view. Of course it definitely helped that this was the first film in years that I’d seen in Imax. I’d forgotten just how huge the screen was, too gigantic to even fully take in, and with sound so deep it makes the room rumble. It was magnificent.
7. The Lego Movie (Phil Lord/Christopher Miller)
With the news that yet another movie was coming out based upon a toy, hopes were not high for this film. Yet, after seeing the trailer, I got genuinely excited. And after watching it at the cinema, I was surprised just HOW much I loved this movie. Coming from directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller, the guys behind the also surprisingly great Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs and 21 Jump Street, it’s no surprise this turned out to be probably my most gleefully enjoyable trip to the cinema last year. It emphasises the simple but unmistakable benefits of good writing, and is so beautifully rendered; plastic never looked so good!
Of course there’s no escaping the fact that this is at its core, one giant advert for LEGO®, although the film frankly accepts this and openly undermines it with plots about corporate dictatorship, destructive consumerism and a gigantic love for absurdist humour and pop culture references, coming to the slightly suspicious conclusion that individual creativity can be expressed most freely if one owns a Lego playset. I actually wrote an essay about The Lego Movie for uni, and was delighted to find that the film stood up to multiple viewings; indeed it is so rich in visual humour that many jokes I only discovered or appreciated upon subsequent viewings. Frankly, exploring the film’s flaws and inherent contradictions made it even more fascinating for me.
6. Stranger by the Lake (Alain Guiraudie)
Franck (Pierre Deladonchamps) begins spending his free time at a nudist bathing spot by a lake, also popular with gay men as a cruising spot. He sparks a friendship with recently divorced Henri (Patrick d’Assumcao) who unusually sits fully clothed and away from the other men. Franck later becomes totally infatuated with Michel (Christophe Paou), a Tom Selleck-style moustachioed man he spots on the beach and in the woods. However, the tranquillity of the lake is disturbed with the discovery that a murder has taken place there.
Set entirely at these locations and layered only with a soundtrack of blowing winds and rippling water, Stranger is a genre-crossing study of the murky forces of lust and desire. Controversial for its copious amounts of full-frontal male nudity and extremely explicit sex scenes, but, similar to Blue is the Warmest Colour, I feel these scenes suitably convey the all-consuming power of obsessive love and sexual desire, rather than any use as mere shock tactics. The directing is technically brilliant and innovative, whilst the use of repetition and deadpan humour makes this almost Hitchcockian thriller a weirdly hypnotic experience that’s deeply compelling.
5. Only Lovers Left Alive (Jim Jarmusch)
Just when you thought the vampire genre couldn’t go any further, back it rises from the dead with a fresh breath of life. Jim Jarmusch’s hyperstylised and largely plotless deconstruction of the genre follows long-married Adam (Tom Hiddleston) and Eve (Tilda Swinton). Focused less on the supernatural aspects on vampirism, Only Lovers explores the couple’s differing responses to everlasting life, and their outsider view onto the state of human culture. Adam has become disillusioned with the decline of human artistic output, choosing to isolate himself in the ruinous streets of Detroit to make droning guitar music. Eve meanwhile, retaining her love of life, explores the nightlife in Tangier and hangs out with Christopher Marlowe (John Hurt) (one of the film’s jokes being that the greatest human creations were actually made by superior vampires).
Full of casual namedrops of writers and rock musicians, Jarmusch has made a film that is deeply cool and sexy, and has in my view the best soundtrack of this year. Hiddleson’s and Swinton’s fine performances meld perfectly with Jarmusch’s trademark offbeat humour and minimalist style. Perhaps simply about an aging couple struggling to adapt to the changing world around them, Only Lovers also argues that like Adam and Eve, great art is timeless.
4. The Wind Rises (Hayao Miyazaki)
With the sad news of Hayao Miyazaki’s retirement from feature filmmaking, comes the pleasing discovery that this, his last film, is one of his best, in an already illustrious career A fictionalised biopic of Japanese aeronautical engineer Jiro Horikoshi, who was the chief designer of the aircraft Japan used in World War Two, The Wind Rises is less fantastical than previous Miyazaki films but no less spectacular and amazingly realised. A character study that largely forgoes plot in favour of important scenarios in his life and within the context of Japanese history, the film gorgeously expresses the beauty of design, and visualises the excitement and anticipation Horikoshi feels about flight and creation in ways that are breathtaking to watch.
At times ponderous and even slow, and displaying a fervor for technology unusual for a director so often invested in environmental interests, The Wind Rises is undeniably a deeply personal film from a master storyteller. It is both about, and by, dreamers with an intense passion for beautiful design drawn from nature, and strong pacifist tendencies. As with all Studio Ghibli films, every frame is a work of art in itself, and clever dream sequences and the inspired touch of having human voices make all of the film’s sound effects, from engines to wind and earthquakes, help make this truly magical.
3. Pride (Matthew Warchus)
Taking a little known story about the an unlikely allegiance between a group of Welsh striking miners and a London gay and lesbian rights protest group, Pride has most definitely earned its place as one of the most beloved crowdpleasers of the year. Whilst the directing is fairly unexceptional, it’s down to the strength of the excellent script and fantastic ensemble of actors that this film is able to grant depth to this large cast of characters, and offer them all moments to shine.
At once laugh-out-loud funny and tearjerkingly heartfelt like the best melodramas can be, Pride is one of those rare films full of moments that make you want to burst into applause or stand up and cheer. It’s a joy to watch, even after multiple viewings.
2. Her (Spike Jonze)
What initially sounded like a potentially disastrous concept for a film: a man falling in love with his computer, miraculously turned out to be one of the most touching, delicate and heartbreaking love stories of the last few years. A smart and funny exploration on love and a surprisingly genuine study on the nature of modern relationships, Her further cements Spike Jonze’s place as one of my favourite filmmakers.
Joaquin Phoenix plays against type as the sensitive romantic Theodore, while Scarlett Johansson brings an incredible emotional depth as the operating system Samantha. Excellent production design confirms this as one of the best sci-fi films recently made, and every frame looks like it’s been Instagramed to within an inch of its life. No degree of hyperbole can do justice to just how wonderful Her really is.
1. Boyhood (Richard Linklater)
It just couldn’t be anything else really. The 12 year filming period is remarkable enough, but the degree of intimacy and truthfulness Linklater and his cast achieves with this sprawling tale is even more miraculous. Boyhood perfectly blends the specific story of the Evans family, through snapshots of the events of their lives both remarkable and discerningly ordinary, with an exploration of the universal truths that form the facets of the human condition we all experience in our own lives.
Parenthood, friendship, first loves, self-discovery… Boyhood covers this and more. The film is not about any great aim or journey or conclusion. It simply shows one example of how we all live in the present, the minutiae of little moments that form our every days, and mould us into the people we are today, yet we’re still shifting into the people we will be tomorrow, or next year. So many moments in Boyhood are, despite the specifics of the characters, so relatable and universal, it’s seriously quite special to watch.
Stuff I missed: Calvary, The Raid 2, The Lunchbox, Nymphomaniac, Locke, Blue Ruin, We Are the Best!, Snowpiercer, Frank, The Drop, The Babadook, The Homesman, Leviathan, Two Days, One Night
Musings from a Darkened Room 