My take, for my sake:
1.
1. The Tree of Life
I have a feeling that in 20 to 30 years’ time, this film
will be regarded with the same veneration that 2001: A Space Odyssey is today.
9/10
2.
2. The Artist
That magic, sheer magic of silent cinema resurrected. Being
a Griffith and Buster Keats admirer and all, this struck an unforgettable chord
with me. The Heartist. 9/10
3. 3. The Ides of March
I’m not much of a Clooney-as-an-actor fanboy. In fact, I’m
not much of a fanboy of any actor, except maybe Jimmy Stewart, Ed Norton, and
Samuel Jackson, and for reasons not necessarily related to their acting. But
Clooney-as-a-director, specifically Clooney-as-a-director-of-political-dramas,
I don’t really think it can get better than him. I’m placing this at a higher
position than The Descendants, a classy gemstone of a film made by one of my
most favorite filmmakers, Alex Payne, so it can say how much I loved it. 8/10
4.
4. The Descendants
There is something about the subtleties of Payne’s wrting/directing,
something inexplicable, that makes me watch it over and over and over again
like you listen to your favorite song in repetitions. The Descendants just goes
on to reinforce what I already believed after watching Sideways several
times. 8/10
5.
5. Our Idiot Brother
One of the sweetest, dumbest, warmest flicks of the year.
And the only film this year I watched twice back to back. 8/10
6.
6. A Separation
Despite my skepticism of how good and how overrated the film
might be before actually watching it, I was thoroughly, and pleasantly,
surprised to be proven wrong. One seriously awesome movie! 8.5/10
7.
7. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo
Fincher has finally found his voice, his style. I thought he
wouldn’t be able to pull off another high-wire film like The Social Network
again, but he did, very visibly so. To have two of films two years in a row win
the Best Editor Oscar actually says quite a lot about his newfound style. 8/10
8.
8. 50/50
A moving drama peppered with comedy in small doses and a
powerful performance from its lead, it so didn’t turn out like another one of
Seth Rogen’s cut-and-dried attempts at light comedy of retards. 7/10
9.
9. Hugo
Scorsese’s first (in
hopefully a line of) big bugdet film about how loss is defined in childhood, about
how cinema can offer at least a semblance of comfort in its escapism, and most
importantly, about a legendary filmmaker whose name was lost in the pages of film
history. No one, NO ONE, is more qualified to make a film about origins and history
of cinema than Scorsese. 8/10
1
10. Carnage
Though not exactly an admirer of Polanski (LOVED the
Pianist), he certainly pulled this (small) film like only he could. Strangely,
despite being set only inside a house, the film cost $25 million to make,
taking into account the actors’ and director’ sallaries and about 400 special
effect features including the views from the windows. Strange. 8/10
1 11. We Need to Talk About Kevin
Tilda Swinton’s best performance of her career which she
might never be able to outperform herself. 7/10
12. Contagion
One of Soderbergh's best, and unlike most films of this genre, rooted very strongly in real science. No heroism, no buffoonery. No star is given an ego massage of extra screen time. It captures an epidemic on a large-scale perspective. 8/10
12. Contagion
One of Soderbergh's best, and unlike most films of this genre, rooted very strongly in real science. No heroism, no buffoonery. No star is given an ego massage of extra screen time. It captures an epidemic on a large-scale perspective. 8/10
Anywho, I still have yet to watch many, many more films from
last year, all waiting on my IMDb watchlist with over 700 films, documentaries,
TV series, short films, etc. on it. But I’m saving those for later times, for
my old age, so this is good enough for now.
