2014 Revisited: The 30 Best Movies of the Year - Part 1

In which I revisit a previously explored topic with fresh eyes and an open mind.

Everybody's pretty much caught on by now that 2014 was an absurdly good year for movies.  Most years I struggle with making a top ten list, but for this last year it was outright impossible.  There were far too many outstanding films that deserved recognition - that in virtually any other year would place prominently in my top ten, but have to settle for my top twenty or thirty or forty in this particular year.  Limiting myself to only ten movies would not just prove to be an exercise in futility, but do a grave injustice to many of the more obscure films that relatively few people have seen but and never the less utterly remarkable.

And while I already wrote up a top ten list from 2014, it is hopelessly outdated by now.  At the time when I composed that line-up, I had only seen one of the would-be Best Picture nominees, hardly any of the year's lower profile gems and absolutely no non-English language films.  And while it's true that there are a few stragglers that I'm trying desperately to get under my belt before 2015's extraordinary-looking movie lineup gets underway in earnest, most of those are unlikely to upset the established hierarchy and won't get a DVD release for months yet.  And since I don't want to come out with a list in April, it was pretty much now or never.

I also wanted to take this opportunity to introduce a new article series to Filmquisition: Revisited.  The idea behind this series is to (as the title suggest) revisit something with a fresh set of eyes and an open mind.  It could be giving a previously seen movie a second chance or looking back to see if "X movie really did deserve to win Best Picture / Actor / Actress / etc...  It's a way to take stock of changing tastes, values and opinions and keeping myself intellectually honest.  So without further ado, here are the best films from last year:

30) Predestination - I don't want to say too much about this Australian sci-fi film  based off of the Robert Heinlein short story "-All You Zombies-" because so much of it relies on a series of escalating twists and revelations that shed new and damning light onto everything that had been established as true,  Think of it like Looper meets Gone Girl starring the broadly under-appreciated Ethan Hawke.

What I can safely tell you is that Ethan Hawke plays an time-travelling cop charged with policing a particular stretch of space-time: uncovering, investigating and then preventing the crimes of the future from ever occurring in the past.  While hunting down a would-be unibomber, he recruits his replacement and sets into motion a series of ouroboric events with far-reaching consequences across the space-time continuum.  It's intriguing, intelligent and easily the biggest mind-fuck of the year - a year, mind you, which included the likes of Enemy and Under the Skin.

29) The Imitation Game - To be honest, I'm surprised that this excellent historical drama wound up so low on my Best Of list.  Not only does the unparalleled Benedict Cumberbatch give a career-best performance as Alan Turing - the man who broke the Nazi Enigma code during World War II by inventing what is arguably the first modern computer - but he does so in a twisting, Cloud Atlas-styled narrative that follows three parallel stories from Turing's life: a childhood spent in a draconian boarding school with his first love, his resplendent work during the second World War and his post-war persecution by the British Government for the crime of being a homosexual.

The film seamlessly cuts between these three timelines without ever becoming confusing.  Rather than competing with one another for screen time, each segment augments the others, shedding revelatory light and persistently deepening our understanding of Alan Turing.  This film is as much about breaking the Enigma code as A Beautiful Mind is about John Nash developing Game Theory: both are included, but it is always the man who is in focus, never his brainchild.

28) The Guest - It should come as no surprise to those who know me - nor those who have followed this blog since its Just a Matter of CineMantics days - that horror is my favorite genre.  I'm more than willing to sit through a lot of schlock to get to the unpolished gems that get lost amidst the shuffle of sequels, remakes and outright trash.  But everybody needs some help from time to time, and YouTube critic Chris Stuckmann turned me on to this stylish retro-slasher from director Sam Wingard and writer Simon Barrett (the behind-the-camera duo responsible for You're Next).

While the film does over-justify its antagonist's combat prowess, it is without question the most fun horror film not to branch off into outright comedy to come out this century.  When a grieving family is visited by a man claiming to have served with their dead son, they invite him to stay with them for while.  But when their duplicitous guest begins taking out their neighbors with extreme prejudice, the family has to choose between standing safely by his side, or defiantly in his way.

27) John Wick - By all rights, John Wick should have been terrible.  Keanu Reeves is a fifty-year-old action star who hasn't made a single good movie since The Matrix and goes on an Equalizer-esque rampage against a crime lord over a dog that his son killed in front of him.  Absolutely nothing about that sounded even remotely good, and it wasn't until Chris Stuckmann and Jeremy Jahns swore to its worth that I swallowed my pride enough to check it out.

But despite my initial misgivings, it really was one of the most exciting and emotionally resonant action films of the year.  It prominently featured an escalating series of world-building events that created a richly populated criminal underworld that I have no doubt will get earn it a well-deserved sequel.  Although it ultimately went on for one extended fight scene too long, it was the best version of the semi-serious B-movie that it wanted to be.

26) Selma - It should be pretty obvious by now that I am of the opinion that #OscarsSoWhite is an overblown, reactionary movement against the fact that the Oscars, to their credit, chose to award actual merit over political importance for once in their near-century of existence (Oyelowo's snub not withstanding).  That's not to say that it was not one of the best films of the year, though, nor that most others would not have had it firmly entrenched within my top ten films of that year, because that is most definitely not the case.

Even though the cast as a whole came off more coldly than they should have, the three principle actors - David Oyelowo, Tom Wilkinson and Tim Roth - were entrancingly excellent, and, in a pleasant change of pace, more screen time was afforded to women than was strictly necessary for a Martin Luther King Jr. biopic.  It was well-directed, well-written and had more than its share of truly riveting sequences, and Glory was the inspired touch that drove the whole production home.

25) Gone Girl - You might remember me mentioning this film on the inaugural Monthly Countdown earlier this month.  Despite the simplicity of its narrative, director David Fincher conflated it into one of the definitive media narratives of this century.  As I mentioned already in that aforementioned review of the film:

despite what you might at first think, Gone Girl is not a movie about a media darling's disappearance and eventual return.  That's the plot, yes, but the actual point of the film is everything surrounding that: everything other than Amy Dunne.  It is at its core a deconstruction of the media, media crusaders, public opinion, law enforcement, feminism, marriage and social privilege.  It's about everything dredged up and put on display because of her disappearance.  Amy Dunne is simply the occasion that director David Fincher found to address the sound-bitten, honey-combed court of public opinion that loves nothing more than another dead white girl to increase ratings and direct web traffic.

24) Big Hero 6 - While 2014 was a fantastic year for film on the whole, it was more specifically one of the best years in animation that we've seen in a good long while.  Duet is easily the best piece of animation that I have ever seen - feature length or otherwise - and my initial list of best 2014 movies had three animated films on it, of which Big Hero 6, Batman: Assault on Arkham and How to Train Your Dragon 2 did not make the cut.  Keep in mind that that's still with me having not had the opportunity to see The Tale of the Princess Kaguya and Song of the Sea yet.

Big Hero 6 was the perfect blend of Marvel heroism and Disney production values: crisp animation, endearing characters and exciting fight sequences all compressed into a single film.  While I still feel that the Disney's willful insistence on a kid-friendly run time kept it from exploring its eclectic cast of characters to the extent that it should have, it's an oversight that's bound to be rectified by a slew of sequels that are sure to be released in the near future.

23) The Grand Budapest Hotel - Although I've said it before, it warrants repeating here.  I have never been a Wes Anderson fan.  While I have always appreciated his fresh take on reality and his visual flair, his films have always struck me as being quirky for the sole purpose of doing something different.  Despite being fine films, The Royal Tenenbaums, The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou and even Moonrise Kingdom kept me wondering what the point of it all was.

That all changed with The Grand Budapest Hotel, though: simultaneously his most visually striking and conventionally told film to date.  The experience of watching it is like reading an especially colorful pop-up book: perfect staging and eye-catching colors causing added visual depth and peripherally broad sets that extend well beyond the sights of the camera.  If this is the Wes Anderson that we can expect from now on, then sign me up as a fan.

22) Locke - Locke seems like the kind of film that directors make on a dare.  It is set entirely within the protagonist's car while en route to the hospital, with only its title character physically present.  His co-stars (if they can even be called that) only ever appear as speaker phone voice-overs as Locke calls them in an attempt to make amends for past wrongs, complete work on a massive civil construction project and come to terms with his own inner demons.

Tom Hardy was unquestionably just as robbed of an acting nomination as Jake Gyllenhaal and David Oyelowo.  His often-solo performance is forced to carry the entire weight of the film, which he handily succeeds at doing with only his facial expressions and voice to work with.  His willfully reserved and quietly intense performance was a hallmark in a year of outstanding performances and a testament to how far a great script and an outstanding actor will take a film.

21) Rosewater - While watching Rosewater, it's almost impossible to believe that it's the work of a first time director, especially since the uniquely visual direction was just as integral to conveying the story of a famously imprisoned journalist as its lead actor was.  Although the story did drag when Maziar Bahari is imprisoned and Stewart unnecessarily frames the reasons for his detainment in flashback, these are minor issues when compared to a film depicting the intense isolation of a man imprisoned for the crime of simply bearing witness to history.

Rosewater is a grippingly emotional tale told with unparalleled sophistication and insight.  It impossibly succeeds at staying apolitical while depicting such intensely politicizing events that remain fresh in the minds of news savvy Westerners.  I pray that Jon Stewart lends such light touches to further projects that he is involved in, especially with his departure from The Daily Show.

Like what you've seen so far?  Please check out Part 2 (20-11) and Part 3 (10-1) of this list.

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