So Far This Year XIII

[samsong]

well... here.

[JG]

1 HELMUT BERGER, ACTOR (Andreas Horvath) Maybe the best motion picture of the year is also the worst? One-time dreamboat movie star and lover of Visconti, Helmut Berger, now seventy-one and sometimes looking like Marguerite Duras, rants and raves in his ramshackle apartment while the maid dishes the dirt about his sad life. The rules of documentary access are permanently fractured here when our featured attraction takes off all his clothes on camera, masturbates, and actually ejaculates. The Damned, indeed.

2 CINDERELLA (Kenneth Branagh) Yes, you heard me, Cinderella. I fucking love this Disney film.

3 THE FORBIDDEN ROOM (Guy Maddin and Evan Johnson) The most insanely inventive, hilariously funny faux-silent movie of all time, with sound design that should win the Oscar.

4 TOM AT THE FARM (Xavier Dolan) A Genet-like love story between a smart-ass hipster and his dead boyfriend's domineering and dangerously closeted brother who once ripped the mouth off of a man who cruised his sibling. I thought it was sexy.

7 THE DIARY OF A TEENAGE GIRL (Marielle Heller) A powerful, realistic, and amazingly well-acted comedy about sex between adults and teens that isn't creepy but authentic, ballsy, and totally unpredictable.

8 TANGERINE (Sean Baker) Last Exit to Los Angeles. A beautifully shot underground transgender adventure story that's worth seeing for the scary extras alone.

10 LOVE (Gaspar Noé) The first Official Selection of the Cannes Film Festival to show hard-core heterosexual rimming—in 3-D, no less. Thank God for Gaspar Noé.

http://artforum.com/inprint/issue=201510&id=56221

wow, haven't seen any of these yet, and now you have me thinking i have a lot of work to do this december. i'm not shy, i'll say it: i love making my list, i think we all secretly love it..

[cronopio2]

i've seen so very few films this year but  i will name

1.phoenix
2.inside out
3.love and mercy
4.ex machina

edit: had forgotten to include ex machina.


as the best i've seen.


i've yet to see blackhat, and carol looks beautiful. psyched about star wars and hateful 8.

[Garam]

no order

Bitter Lake - Adam Curtis



Catch Me Daddy - Daniel Wolfe



Cobain: Montage of Heck - Brett Morgan



Ex Machina - Alex Garland



Heaven Knows What - Bennie Safdie, Josh Safdie



Inherent Vice - P. T. Anderson - though was underwhelmed. Perhaps because The Master was such a big deal to me and i'd followed this one since 09, i've never done that with any of his other films before.



The Lobster - Yorgos Lanthimos



Mad Max Fury Road - George Miller - though wasn't nearly as keen as the rest of the forum, or, indeed, the world



Tangerine - Sean Baker



Junun - P. T. Anderson



no regrets

Amy
Beasts of No Nation
Entertainment
Going Clear
Hot Girls Wanted
Louis CK: Live at the Comedy Store
Prophet's Prey
Thought Crimes
The Wolfpack

diz wuz bad

Chappie
Jurassic World
Love
Straight Outta Compton

not seen
lots of things

oddest things to exist

Soaked in Bleach

tv

Fargo
Hannibal
Mr Robot
Nathan for You
Peep Show
People Just Do Nothing
Silicon Valley
W/ Bob and David

haha

True Detective

[modage]

1. Mad Max: Fury Road (George Miller) It's very rare for me to see a film where I know immediately, "this is one of my favorite films of all time." It's not an intellectual exercise, it's a purely chemical thing that happens when a film takes over, lifts me out of my chair and slaps a stupid grin on my face from beginning to end. Mad Max: Fury Road is a cinematic miracle: a sequel/reboot of a 30 year old dormant action franchise from a 70-year old filmmaker who had spent the previous decades making children's movies, that puts most modern blockbusters to shame. It's proof that we don't have to accept shitty weightless CGI-action films and that great filmmakers can do better. Writer/director George Miller spent 15 years developing the film and it shows in every detail of this epic, which is as visually stunning as it is emotionally involving. It's the rare film that makes a case for film itself because it wouldn't be possible in any other medium, not as a TV show, a play or a book. It'll be a shame if Miller never gets to make another Mad Max film. But I'm forever grateful that he got to make this one.



2. Star Wars: The Force Awakens (J.J. Abrams) A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away we all loved Star Wars. Then came the Special Editions and the prequels and a decade of dormancy. Then the man who had both created and destroyed the greatest cinematic universe in film history sold it off to the biggest corporation in the world and stepped aside. And they hired J.J. Abrams, a man known more for franchise management than having a distinctive vision of his own, to resurrect the franchise and rushed to meet a release date. It shouldn't have worked. And yet, here we are. The Force Awakens might be fan fiction but it's great fan fiction – as it turns out, the Star Wars movie J.J. Abrams wanted to see is almost the same as the one I wanted to see too – perfectly encapsulating not the universe we'd seen onscreen before but the one we dreamed of in our heads with an expanded universe, new characters and more adventures for Luke and company. I have some minor issues with it and could nitpick the joy out of it (and I'm sure the internet will) but after two viewings I'm still marveling at how much Abrams and his team got right. This is the Star Wars you've been looking for.



3. Inside Out (Pete Docter) After a disappointing run of films that had some questioning whether Pixar would ever make another original film as good as Up or Wall·E again, the studio came roaring back this year with Inside Out, one of their finest films to date. While it may not be in my personal Top 5 for the studio, it's arguably their most important film because of its deceptively simple message: being sad is okay and it's a part of life. It's hard to imagine any other studio making a film with that takeaway. I took my 4 year old niece to see a handful of films this year and while Big Hero 6 and Minions and Peanuts were all good, only Inside Out felt important. The themes may go over her head now but for her and the other kids who grow up watching it, they'll have a road map for dealing with their feelings, especially when they turn 12 or 13. How many films can you say that about?



4. The Martian (Ridley Scott) While not as ambitious as films like Gravity or Interstellar, The Martian may have more modest ambitions but soars past them. Ridley Scott's sci-fi adventure is about as good as mainstream filmmaking gets (without transcending to that next-level status of classics like Alien or Blade Runner). Entertaining from beginning to end, featuring a cast of great actors that you want to keep watching, this is the kind of studio film that makes it look so easy, which leads some to mistakenly think that it actually is. In a few years it will be playing around the clock on TNT with The Shawshank Redemption.



5. Crimson Peak (Guillermo del Toro) For the longest time I didn't quite get Guillermo del Toro, I saw his films and admired them but never loved them, though improbably that all changed with Pacific Rim, which despite its silliness was dialed directly into my pleasure centers. He continues his hot streak with Crimson Peak, a gothic romance dressed up as a Hammer Films haunted house movie, which I loved every gorgeous frame of. Like the preceding 4 films on my Top 10, an example of the best of what studio filmmaking can be in the hands of the right filmmaker.



6. It Follows (David Robert Mitchell) I love horror films but the great ones only come around every so often and when they do, they usually blindside you. It Follows mixes the have-sex-and-die ethos from 80s slasher films with the mood of paranoia from John Carpenter films like The Thing. The premise is brilliantly simple: a teen has sex with her boyfriend only to find out afterwards that he has passed something onto her, it could look like anyone and it won't stop until it kills her or she passes it on. If you prefer your scary movies high on atmosphere and low on gore, this is your new favorite movie.



7. Cobain: Montage Of Heck (Brett Morgen) While I admit I'm the right age to be perfectly primed for Nirvana nostalgia – has it really been 22 years since Kurt killed himself? – this doc wisely avoids the rise-and-fall arc of so many Behind The Music episodes. Featuring unreleased home movies, recordings, artwork, photography, journals and animated segments narrated by Cobain (which, quite frankly are possibly more interesting if they're fiction), Cobain: Montage Of Heck brilliantly edits together these left behind scraps to make a portrait that looks nearly complete.



8. Steve Jobs (Danny Boyle) None of this happened but it's all true. Aaron Sorkin and Danny Boyle take what could've been a very boring biopic and transform it into an imagined and electric three acts of real-time drama. The film can't quite sustain Act One's momentum and there are some emotional notes near the end that don't quite land like I wanted them to, but with Sorkin's ratatat dialogue and actors relishing the opportunity to deliver it, Steve Jobs is almost as good as you want it to be.



9. Carol (Todd Haynes) Emotionally distant but visually ravishing, Carol is the In The Mood For Love of 1950′s lesbian romances. Arguably the most beautifully shot film of 2015, the film features two knockout performances from Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara and sumptuous period detail from top to bottom, you'll want to live in this world even if you wouldn't want to live in it. Todd Haynes has always been a director whose films I admire more than love but I suspect this one will age well.



10. Creed (Ryan Coogler) Fruitvale Station director Ryan Coogler makes the jump to the big leagues with the best Sundance-to-studio transition since Christopher Nolan. Not only is Creed a worthy entry in the Rocky canon, it's arguably the best film in the series and proof that a familiar story – the film pretty much follows the first Rocky beat for beat – isn't necessarily an impediment to a great film as long as you have a unique point of view.

11. While We're Young (Noah Baumbach), 12. Mistress America (Noah Baumbach), 13. Ex Machina (Alex Garland), 14. Kingsman: The Secret Service (Matthew Vaughn), 15. The Hateful Eight (Quentin Tarantino), 16. Anomalisa (Charlie Kaufman), 17. Brooklyn (John Crowley), 18. Amy (Asif Kapadia), 19. The Avengers: Age Of Ultron (Joss Whedon), 20. Spotlight (Thomas McCarthy).

Runners-Up: Wild Tales (Damian Szifron), Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation (Christopher McQuarrie), Trainwreck (Judd Apatow), Eden (Mia Hansen-Løve), Magic Mike XXL (Gregory Jacobs), Love & Mercy (Bill Pohlad), Sicario (Denis Villeneuve), Bridge Of Spies (Steven Spielberg), Listen To Me Marlon (Stevan Riley).

[Something Spanish]

Is no one going to comment on jenkin's lauding of Hot Pursuit?

I missed a lot of stuff, but from what I managed to catch:

1 Phoenix
2 Straight Outta Compton
3 Son of Saul
4 Mad Max
5 Mommy
6 Mistress America
7 Jobs
8 Spotlight
9 The Stanford Experiment/ End of the Tour
10 Hateful Eight

Shoutouts to Heaven Can't Wait, Cobain, and Anomalisa

most pleasant memory of 2015 was seeing the Wild Bunch on 35mm.

[jenkins]

zero people have confirmed seeing Hot Pursuit. it's a current dream of mine to double Hot Pursuit and 2 Guns.

[Something Spanish]

live the dream, bro. live it.

[jenkins]

well it's like a future dream of mine.

[Jeremy Blackman]

Would anyone like to make an updated 2015 list? Trying to catch up and could use some recommendations.

[JG]

here are my fav movies of 15 that did not get enough love:

a poem a is a naked person (1973)
the look of silence
the mend
sicario
heaven knows what
chi-raq
l for leisure
arabian nights
tired moonlight
the visit
welcome to new york
the gift
jauja
aloha
ricky and the flash

[jenkins]

Sicario got enough love and jb saw it. i still need to se Aloha and Ricky and the Flash.

[Jeremy Blackman]

1. Mad Max: Fury Road
2. Room
3. The Lobster
4. Star Wars: The Force Awakens
5. White God
6. The Visit
7. Ex Machina
8. The Revenant
9. The Hateful Eight
10. It Follows