Another year, another slew of movies added to my library. In celebration of tonight's Oscars ceremony, I present to you my ten favorite films from the past year.
(Disclosure: I was unable to see Destroyer before compiling this list.)
It's everything I've ever wanted from this franchise. Breakneck action, nonstop ingenuity, absurd humor, and pure terror. It's also easily the most beautiful film in the series. Most importantly, it's a total game-changer; it often does not feel like a Jurassic Park movie and indeed sets up a potential future for the franchise that completely ignores the Park. But come on, we've had the "Park" movie four times now. If this one hadn't set up a whole new vision, I fear my beloved dino flicks would go, well, the way of the dinosaurs. Mission: Impossible -- Fallout might boast the "best" action movie of the year, but my heart belongs to the final scenes of this movie, when the dinosaurs are unleashed on California wildlife. Perfection.
Steve McQueen does it again. It's got an ensemble cast all at their best, led by a fearless Viola Davis. A riveting, timely, and complex screenplay -- co-written with Gillian Flynn -- that balances heist with drama perfectly. A gorgeous score by Hans Zimmer and haunting cinematography from Sean Bobbitt. And, of course, a fresh story expertly told and so relevant to 2018 America that it's hard to know where to start praising it. Other worthy movies this year have featured women rising above their situations to wage war on men -- The Wife with Glenn Close and Bad Times at the El Royale with Cynthia Erivo and Dakota Johnson -- but Widows leads them all. It's dark and disturbing, never less than entertaining, and fabulously original.
Here it is. My favorite Marvel movie yet, and easily the most important one in the franchise. Black Panther is everything we dreamed it might be and then some. Suave and sophisticated, action-packed and thrilling, dazzling and gorgeous, it also doesn't skimp on relevance, timeliness, originality, and fun. It features some of the most sophisticated, dynamic characters I've ever seen in a superhero movie -- especially its antagonist -- and pairs them nicely with rich, thoughtful production design. Complex messages and rousing splendor make Black Panther the experience of the year, maybe the decade. Go watch it, and then go watch again. Buy it. Buy two and give one as a gift. It's important, beautiful, fun, and brilliant.
Science fiction at its very best, Annihilation takes what is already a fascinating premise and relies on smart storytelling to creep under your skin and mess with your mind. A Quiet Place was a close tie here, but Annihilation is a work of visionary genius, thrilling and horrifying but beautiful and wondrous. Its cosmic horror isn't just in the human body or biology at large -- though it's an entrancing vision into the disturbing nature of cancer -- but in the very mode of storytelling itself. Flashbacks and flashforwards interrupt the narrative while the mythic strength of a quest into a heart of darkness / into hell / for a beloved potently invites a wide range of speculation and interpretation. Which, really, is what science fiction is all about.
It was a pretty amazing year for Black cinema, and one for -- don't take this the wrong way -- masculine cinema. First Reformed, Beautiful Boy, and Ben is Back all sought to mine the hearts and minds of men struggling with identity and existence in a cruel, violent world. Hard to watch, they were mostly a once-and-done set of dramas. Though Spike Lee's movies can feel a bit preachy, by the end of BlacKkKlansman I wanted even more. While this film is an absolute assault on contemporary issues, it is also unusually indirect. He has created Art where he could have simply vomited rhetoric and style and morality on an age where Nazis are again openly marching in the streets. He has mined history and polished it, presenting it as truth and as allegory, framed it with art history in the form of film, and at the same time made an endlessly entertaining feature.
Family secrets are dangerous things, and sometimes the things we inherit from our ancestors are even thicker than blood. Hereditary is the horror movie of the year (with one exception), combining immaculate production detail and expert craft from first-time director Ari Aster with some of the best performances in horror cinema history. Aster's masterclass in directing is keenly focused on Toni Collette's impossibly brilliant delivery as a mother at the end of her rope, while Alex Wolff makes a strong case as the rising star of his generation. Much like The Little Stranger, a close contender for this spot in my list, this film doesn't just navigate between honoring specific classic films; it navigates effortlessly between subgenres of horror. We're being played by Aster and his team, much like the amazing miniatures featured as the mother's artwork. I don't want to give anything away, just know that you really don't know what's coming. And, really, when it comes to family, who does?
Disobedience is a fabulously melancholy chamber piece, reaching operatic heights in its depiction of the intersection of religion, history, and sexuality. In fact, this is the queer movie we should be raving about this year (step aside, Love, Simon). Boy Erased comes close, but never quite reaches the transcendence of this piece; If Beale Street Could Talk was my other romantic option here, but, dammit, I'm partial to the queers. Rarely have we ever seen a film that explores this fully the essence of the religious queer person; equally rarely do we see this sympathetic a portrait of modern Orthodox Jewish life. It's a lovely premise and and even lovelier slice of culture. These characters at once belong and do not, love and cannot, believe and should not. The film's insistence on delving into these complexities and shunning clear-cut answers, characterizations, or solutions -- along with extolling defiance and doubt as virtues -- makes this film a gripping exercise in humanity.
We got some great historical dramas this year, from the heartwarming Stan & Ollie to the queer feminist powerhouse Colette and of course the scathing dark dramedies of Vice and Can You Ever Forgive Me?, but Yorgos Lanthimos blew them all away with his newest spectacle. The Favourite charms before it chills, telling a story of female empowerment and warning of the pleasures and pains of excess. Irreverent, brutally funny and sad, this movie casts a stylish spell that will keep you giggling and thinking long after the credits roll. It centers on a trio of women all at the top of their game, playing characters that come along once in a lifetime. Their power play is endlessly entertaining, and I found myself laughing and gasping aloud in an otherwise pretty silent theater. Some people just don't understand quality comedy.
Mary Poppins Returns was a lot of fun and Vox Lux was dazzling, both were really close contenders here, but unfortunately not my favorite musicals in 2018. You might say A Star is Born is a spin-off of Romeo & Juliet, where the lovers aren't star-crossed so much as, simply, stars. It's the ultimate cinematic depiction of the glories and horrors of fame, framed in a gorgeous love story; it's been done before, but this movie validates itself time and again. An awesome outing from first-time director Bradley Cooper -- along with one of his very best performances -- and the kind of vehicle a goddess like Lady Gaga has long deserved. Beautiful and sad, the movie gives as much as it takes. It's an experience unlike anything of its ilk, a wholly unique spectacle of love and passion. Plus it's got an incredible soundtrack I've had on repeat for months.
Women behaving badly is always fun to watch, as we see in films like Thoroughbreds and A Simple Favor, both also in the running for this list. But nothing -- nothing -- prepared me for Luca Guadagnino's reimagining of this horror classic, his magnum opus for a new age of gods and monsters. Guadagnino has carefully calculated every breath of this film to be slow and deliberate, drawing you in and forcing you to exist in the sensory world it creates rather than simply watching. Along with entrancing music, the sound mixing and editing is designed to pop, creeping into your ears and under your skin to not only quicken your heart but also to pain it. The film knowingly invites you to share in its uncanny chill, its deliciously subversive approach to anticlimactic horror, and its ultimately tragic sense of how very wrong humans can go. It is a consummate work of art: a work about art that uses never-before-seen techniques to remaster the form of film itself, to make insightful commentary about the power of art in our broken lives and about broken art in our lives, and to make itself a new way of viewing not only a genre but our world. Allow its meditation on guilt, generational pain, female fellowship, and the limits of the body and of memory to invade your heart, and witness the awesome power of modern horror cinema.
Although Disney doesn't always succeed, 2018 made Disney more relevant than it's been in a long time. Not only is Black Panther a nominee for Best Picture at the Oscars (among six other categories), but it shattered box office records and inspired notable cultural shifts. Apart from the films that made my list, I wanted to include two honorable mentions from Disney that rounded out the year beautifully. A Wrinkle in Time wasn't everyone's favorite, but I found it a surprisingly beautiful, clever, and moving flick; it's also terribly important, normalizing female empowerment and racial diversity without much ado. Christopher Robin works not only as a nostalgic heartstring-tugger but as a rollicking comedy-adventure worthy of a classic Winnie the Pooh tale.
What were YOUR favorite movies this year? Let me know and we'll chat about some stellar cinema!
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