The best movies to grace the silver screen this past year.
2013 was a pretty good year for films. Box office successes with big name stars and smaller independent and foreign films that few people have seen made up my list of the top ten films released in the United States in 2013.
First, some honorable mentions:
“All Is Lost,” “Behind the Candelabra” (TV movie), “Blancanieves,” “Blue Jasmine,” “Fruitvale Station,” “Her,” “Inside Llewyn Davis,” “Love Is All You Need,” “Prisoners,” and “Side Effects.”
*10. The Bling Ring (Sofia Coppola)
*In 2008 and 2009, a group of young adults broke into the California homes of celebrities such as Paris Hilton and stole cash, jewelry and clothing. The idiotic bandits bragged about their scores and posted pictures of themselves online which led to their arrest. Sofia Coppola and the late cinematographer Harris Savides brilliantly capture the vapid lifestyles of these morally bankrupt and fame-obsessed airheads with a detached eye that lets the audience form their own opinions about the real-life characters. Emma Watson is a riot in a supporting role as Nicki, one of the group’s nastiest members. The film is filled with lavish clothing and a rocking soundtrack all while being set in sunny L.A., but this hilarious satire is a horrifying portrait of the greed and emptiness of this TMZ, celebrity-driven American generation.
*9. Wadjda (Haifaa Al Mansour)
*Al Mansour wrote and directed the wonderful feel-good drama “Wadjda,” the first feature film shot entirely in Saudi Arabia and the first feature-length film directed by a female Saudi. The simple plot follows a young girl (Waad Mohammed) in an oppressive country who wants to buy a bicycle and enters a Koran reciting competition to win the prize money. What might sound like a mawkish Oscar contender for Best Foreign Language Film is actually an entertaining and frequently funny picture that slides in political messages about equality for women without seeming to at all. The natural performances, the invisible direction and deft screenplay come together to make a life-affirming film that sneaks up and becomes surprisingly powerful and moving.
*8. Nebraska (Alexander Payne)
*Shot in appropriately dreary black and white, Alexander Payne’s “Nebraska,” written by first-time film screenwriter Bob Nelson, is a droll, note-perfect road trip comedy with a flawless lead performance by 77-year-old character actor Bruce Dern. He plays Woody Grant, a retired drunk who insists on going to Lincoln, Nebraska, to claim a million dollar cash prize that a bogus sweepstakes letter says he has won. His son, played by SNL-alum Will Forte, finally agrees to make the trip in order to appease him and to have some father-son time with his old man. Woody’s wife, hysterically played by June Squibb, bluntly speaks her mind at all times and lives by Groucho Marx’s old saying, “If you don’t have anything nice to say, go ahead and say it.” Payne is one of the finest American filmmakers working today because he can mix savage satire into a soulful character study. He creates flawed, often selfish characters and brings the audience along for a journey with them. Few directors these days capture America and its citizens in such a perceptive and achingly funny way.
*7. Captain Phillips (Paul Greengrass)
*Tom Hanks gives one of his best performances in years in Paul Greengrass’s incredibly intense and nerve-racking thriller based on the true story of Captain Richard Phillips, whose cargo ship, on a routine voyage, was hijacked by a small band of Somali pirates in 2009. The crew was taken hostage, and Phillips delicately tried to keep the poor, bone-thin pirates satisfied while also trying to protect his crewmen. Greengrass (“United 93,” “The Bourne Ultimatum”) captures the harrowing ordeal with a documentary realism that puts the audience right there on the boat and later in the cramped lifeboat with only Phillips and the pirates. Greengrass and the screenwriter Billy Ray are not perpetuating American jingoism or making Phillips an invincible Rambo-like hero. The final scene shows the emotionally overwhelmed, sweat-soaked, mentally-drained Phillips having a medical exam once he is finally free (not a spoiler, he wrote a book about it) that shows that he is only a man who bravely tried to protect his crewmen and survived a living hell. That scene is reason alone for him winning an Oscar for Best Actor. One forgets it is Tom Hanks.
*6. American Hustle (David O. Russell)
*No other film last year was quite as gloriously, vibrantly entertaining. A better Scorsese film than 2013’s actual Scorsese film (the still wickedly fun “The Wolf of Wall Street”), “American Hustle” seems to effortlessly float along for over two hours and a quarter with a to-die-for cast, many giving career-best performances, a witty, whip-smart, perfectly structured script, smooth direction, a killer soundtrack and hysterical but spot-on set design, costumes and hair. The story is loosely based on the Abscam case in which the F.B.I. tried to stop political corruption in the late 70’s and early 80’s but, as the opening slyly states, “Some of this actually happened.” This is a farce about an array of criminals and the law enforcers who tried to stop them. Christian Bale, a method actor who often plays dark, brooding characters, has never been more funny and lively, and Jennifer Lawrence is a marvel as his younger ditzy wife. This is one of those films in which the real world completely goes away while watching it, and the audience is swept away into the world of cinema.
*5. Gravity (Alfonso Cuarón)
*Alfonso Cuarón and his son Jonás spent years making the visually stunning thrill ride “Gravity,” one of the best science fiction films ever made. Dr. Ryan Stone (Sandra Bullock), a medical engineer on her first mission into space, is hired to perform highly technical work on a satellite. Also on the mission is the experienced astronaut Matt Kowalski (George Clooney). When debris from a Russian missile strike smashes into their shuttle, it sends the two of them hurtling into space. The special effects, the cinematography and the 3D are absolutely outstanding and are used to craft a visceral and emotionally fulfilling film experience. Seeing the film on a small screen in 2D will not be the same as the IMAX 3D. The vastness of space and the horror of a person being trapped in such an open void is much more effective on a massive screen with the integral 3D. At its heart, “Gravity” is a B-movie sci-fi thriller, but it achieves greatness in its artful execution and proves that cinema is not dead.
*4. The Act of Killing (Joshua Oppenheimer)
*There have been few documentaries quite as extraordinary and strange as “The Act of Killing.” Without much persuading, Joshua Oppenheimer, an American-British filmmaker based in Denmark, convinced Indonesian mass murderers who killed thousands of people in the mid 60’s to restage their atrocities for his cameras in the style of different film genres. They put on makeup, wore costumes and walked onto constructed sets to reenact the horror they inflicted. The film is chilling and profound but shockingly enjoyable, if one could call it that. For most of the film, the men show no remorse for their actions and even gloat about their accomplishments. By the end, though, the main subject of the film, Anwar Congo, begins to realize the evil of his ways through watching his “acts” of killing. The final moments of the film are unbelievable and transfixing.
*3. Before Midnight (Richard Linklater)
*In the 1995 film “Before Sunrise,” strangers Jesse (Ethan Hawke) and Celine (Julie Delpy) met on a train in Vienna, started talking and ended up walking through the beautiful city together and falling in love. Nine years later, in “Before Sunset,” the couple reunited in Paris and, again, walked around and just talked. Nine years after that, in the latest film in what is now a trilogy, “Before Midnight,” the two are now a couple with two daughters, and they take a vacation in Greece. In an age of mindless action films filled with sound and fury signifying nothing, it is refreshing to see a film where intelligent, mature adults just talk with each other. The actors are so at ease, the dialogue is so attune to real life, and the shots go on so long without a cut that it feels improvised. The last act of the film has the couple having a big argument in a hotel room, and it is more gripping and exciting than any C.G.I. spectacle or comic book action.
*2. Like Someone in Love (Abbas Kiarostami)
*Not much happens plot wise in Abbas Kiarostami’s new film set in Japan, his second shot outside of his home country of Iran (the first being “Certified Copy”). A young woman who is a prostitute to help pay for her college education is hired by an elderly professor to be his companion. The attractive woman has a boyfriend, but the old man seems more interested in talking with her than being physical. Kiarostami is such a masterful filmmaker because his subtle camera placement and movement can alter the meaning of his films. The first thirteen minutes of the film show two people talking in a restaurant, and the film is cut back and forth between only two different camera positions in the whole scene. The next thirteen minutes follow the woman as she rides in a taxi to the professor’s house. The film is one that truly feels like real life is unfolding, but Kiarostami does not have anything in the film or in the frame that is superfluous. He continues to explore themes of identity, role playing, and the connection of people in modern society. “Like Someone in Love” is thought provoking and precisely directed and written.
*1. Blue Is the Warmest Color (Abellatif Kechiche)
*Based on a graphic novel by Julie Maroh, this romantic drama follows the life of Adèle (Adèle Exarchopoulos) as she struggles with coming to terms with her sexuality in high school and then as she explores her feelings in a relationship with Emma (Léa Seydoux), an older college student with dyed blue hair. Winner of the 2013 Cannes Film Festival’s Palme d’Or, Kechiche’s three-hour film is as awe-inspiring and cinema-redefining in its intimacy as “Gravity” is in its grandness. Rarely has a film been as physically and emotionally raw when it comes to human behavior and love. Yes, the film has some graphic sex scenes that definitely earn the film its NC-17 rating, but they are essential and absolutely in keeping with the rest of the film. The two lead performances are unbelievable. Because the film does not have any plot contrivances, the audience is completely invested in every moment of the characters’ lives while it is happening. “Blue” is a masterpiece that should win the Oscar for Best Picture, Foreign Language Film, Director (Kechiche), Actress (Exarchopoulos), and Supporting Actress (Seydoux).