Better Late Than Never: Best Films of 2011

It’s taken me a long time to catch up with all the 2011 films that I wanted to see before I could make my top 20 of the year. There is still a whole bunch of films I need to see that might have made the list including The Skin I Live In, Midnight in Paris, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Project Nim and The King’s Speech. But it’s getting ridiculous now as I’m about to post my top 20 of 2012 so without further ado, here are my top 20 favourite films of 2011. Expect my top 20 of this year coming very soon.

    20.  A Separation

19. True Grit

18. 50/50

17. Rise of the Planet of the Apes

16. Bridesmaids

15. Tyrannosaur

14. Snowtown

13. Tomboy

12. The Artist

11. Warrior

10. Animal Kingdom

Australian crime drama that digs beneath the sunny exterior to the seedy underbelly. Brilliant performances all round and a fascinating insight into a criminal family.

9. Senna

Best documentary of the year and the only one to make the top 20. The story of F1 racer Senna is riveting and emotionally resonant even though I barely remember the guy.

 

8. Drive

Best soundtrack of the year, a riveting performance from Ryan Gosling and another film to make you weep with the gorgeous stylishness of it all.

7. Attack the Block

Confident debut from Joe Cornish taking genre conventions like a good old fashioned alien invasion and throwing in some British council estate stereotypes before peeling away the outer skin and revealing the heart beneath the hoodies. Sick bruv.

6. Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol

Best action film of the year and infinitely better than any of the previous films in the franchise. Tom Cruise is insane and the stunts aren’t bad either. Achieved the impossible and made me hope for a sequel.

5. Submarine

Richard Ayoade’s directorial debut is funny, warm and beautiful. Quirky characters including a hilarious cameo from Paddy Considine make this a must-see.

4. Rubber

Demented tale of a rubber tyre on a killing spree. The less said about it, the better. Surreal, bonkers and absolutely hilarious.

3. In a Better World

This is a fascinating study about bullying, moral dilemmas and violence. Packed with great performances and enough tension to keep you gripped until the end, Susanne Bier delivers a brilliant drama thriller.

2. 127 Hours

The true story of survival featuring a man forced to desperate measures under extreme circumstances. Danny Boyle directs with abundant style and James Franco holds attention despite being trapped under a rock almost throughout. Inspirational.

1. We Need to Talk About Kevin

Lynne Ramsay dazzles with this grim look at the absolute evil present in a child and the mother who has to deal with the consequences of his terrible actions. Frightening, beautiful and unforgettable.

 

So there you have it: hope, despair and everything in between. It was a great year for movies but 2012 has been even better so watch out for my top 10 of 2012 coming soon!

Any thoughts on this list? Drop them in the comments below!

A Cry for Help: Sports Movies

I've never really done much sports.  I was always the kid at the other end of the field from where the ball was; picking daisies or daydreaming about being a Goonie and being chased by criminals in an underground cave system. 

Therefore I don't really do sports movies.  That said, I'm looking into writing an article about them so I need your help.  What makes a good sports movie?

I recently saw Rocky for the first time.  Not much boxing but an endearing character and sweet love story.

I also saw Moneyball.  Again, not much baseball; a lot of talking, a lot of maths and statistics but equally as enjoyable as Rocky.

Looking around on the internet shows there is a huge amount of love for Raging Bull, Field of Dreams, Chariots of Fire, The Hustler, Seabiscuit (all films I've yet to see) and many others but there isn't that much agreement on lists of the top sports movies.

Check out a few lists to see what I mean:

Time Out top 50

Top 100

NY Daily News Top 25

I've seen quite a lot of the best sports documentaries; When We Were Kings, Hoop Dreams, Murderball but I still need to see Senna.  What are the best documentaries about sports in your opinion?

And how come a film like Point Break isn't classified as a sports movie?  There's a hell of a lot of surfing and skydiving. 

What about future sports; do Rollerball and even something like The Running Man count?

Do you have to like a sport to like the film about the sport?

What sports make the best films?

Are documentaries about sport better than fiction films?  What are your favourite sports movies?  What should I see before I go any further in life?

Fact VS Fiction at the London Film Festival

Tonight I've got tickets to the BFI London Film Festival. In previous years I have been up to see a Q&A with notorious director of cinematic headfucks Irreversible and Enter the Void, Gaspar Noe to find out if he is more dribbling madman or groundbreaking artist. Another year I saw the lovely creator of Wallace and Gromit, Nick Park to hear about how he got into animation. But this year I'm heading to the festival to hear 'a discussion on the line between fact and fiction with filmmakers from this year's programme'.

'Panellists confirmed so far include directors Kevin Macdonald (The Last King of Scotland, Touching the Void), Asif Kapadia (Senna, Far North), Carol Morley (Dreams of a Life, Edge) and Marc Evans (Hunky Dory).' http://www.bfi.org.uk/lff/events/other_events/1970

Kevin Macdonald is a bit of a hero of mine after Life in a Day.  I've banged on about it on this blog a couple of times now.  He's a great documentary maker but I'm not a massive fan of his fiction feature films like The Last King of Scotland.  I will be very curious to hear why he decides to shoot some films as documentaries and some as fiction films.



I'm hoping that the discussion may also touch on questions relevant to my PhD.  Why are so many recent horror filmmakers playing with the mock-doc format?  It seems like barely a month goes by without an addition to this sub-genre.  Most recently Apollo 18 took horror mock-docs into space and the upcoming Paranormal Activity 3 will likely show there is still high demand for films following this trend.

The director of Senna, Asif Kapadia, is also going to be there and I hear this is an excellent documentary.  It also ties into my interest in cinematic depictions of death.  Many horror mock-docs relish in killing the characters in front of and behind the cameras and presenting this as real footage.  This documentary presents the real footage of Senna's death, perhaps making it cinematic snuff.  Is real death something to include in films sold for entertainment?



Michael Moore has used the moment the second plane hit the WTC in Bowling for Columbine.  This was also a moment of murder.  Do documentary makers have more license to show the truth?  Even the truth of death?  Is it their responsibility to show reality?  Even the reality of death?  And are horror filmmakers capitalising on the increase of 'real deaths' in documentary and TV when making mock-docs?

Anyway it will be interesting to here from these filmmakers.  I hope the discussion will shed some light on 'what motivates the decision to present a story as documentary or fiction'.