MY TOP 5 FAVORITE FILMS OF 2016!
It's been a hard year, y'know? Nothing made me happier than to ring in the new year last night with friends and family. I know what you may think: years are arbitrary markers of time, what difference does it make? Even if 2017 isn't an automatic clean slate for us all, it's what it represents, isn't it? And that's all the cinema is, life represented. This year offered a lot of hope...and superhero movies. In my personal selections of the five greatest films released this year (1/1/16-12/31/16), you'll see reoccurring themes of grief, family, hope, identity. It was a stellar year for the movies, and the fact that I had to leave gripping films like Love & Friendship, Nocturnal Animals, Hacksaw Ridge and Sausage Party (my ultimate guilty pleasure) off the final cut. And I still haven't movies I've been dying to see like Fences, The Lobster or Hell or High Water. Revel in the new year with me and enjoy my list!
5. SING STREET
I nodded knowingly when I saw that this Little Indie That Could was helmed by John Carney, whose previous effort Begin Again had the same folksy, looking-for-love bittersweet flavor Sing Street has. It even has original songs, another Carney staple, while not being full-musical like perhaps another film you'll catch on this list. Despite its predictability, you can have a blast with Conor, aka Cosmo, as he and his little band of Irish schoolboys serenade their way into your heart, and show you how wonderful it is to have youthful dreams that will never last forever.
4. CAPTAIN FANTASTIC
Viggo Mortensen has picked up a Golden Globe and a SAG nomination for his stirring performance in this film, another low-on-the-radar indie, and I'm hoping Uncle Oscar will invite him to the party come February. It was one of my biggest regrets of this blog this year; for whatever reason I was too lazy to review this quirky, inspiring film that, until the winter came around was my favorite film of the year. Ben Cash, a man who lives off the grid, takes his six hyper-intelligent children back into society to go to his wife's funeral. A simple premise that is at once a critique on modern society, an examination of nontraditional family and an ultimately heart-warming picture.
3. MOONLIGHT
I never understood it when critics called a movie "haunting"...until I saw Moonlight, and the glow of this movie bathed over me like only one other film did this year. Besides shining a spotlight on faces that don't usually get screen time, Barry Jenkins' haunting triumph about the life of young Chiron and the people he meets during his life in modern Miami, is just plain good cinema. Three chapters, all mostly of equal strength, reveal a complex young man who aches to be himself in a world where all the cards are stacked against him, who desperately wants to answer the question "Who is you, Chiron?". We needed Moonlight in this year of boiling racial violence, and the avalanche of awards it's been pulling in confirms my thoughts.
2. LA LA LAND
Please, please believe the hype, and go support the enormously talented Damien Chazelle, who I would go so far as to say surpasses his 2014 effort Whiplash, and I don't say that lightly. Gosling is wonderful, but it's Emma Stone, who does much more than flaunt her doe eyes, that deserves all the attention for her role as Mia. They're both dreamers in Los Angeles, and as corny as that may sound on paper, its execution is perfect. The songs are infectious, the production is A+, and Chazelle doesn't litter his musical with a huge ensemble of characters, because we call came for the Gosling/Stone romance. And though it doesn't end like your grandfather's musical, I wouldn't want it to. This is a musical for my generation, an urge to never stop dreaming.
1. MANCHESTER BY THE SEA
I'm afraid this will be the only time Manchester by the Sea bests La La Land (the clear Best Picture frontrunner) but even if it's just in my books, that's okay. I don't know why I always choose movies that make me weep as my number one pick (see: Inside Out, Fruitvale Station). Perhaps because they represent how powerful the art of cinema can be, how these made-up characters played by overpaid famous people can still make you well up because you see yourself in them. Casey Affleck stars in the performance of the year as Lee Chandler, a shell of a man entrusted with the son of his dead brother. The script couldn't be tighter if it was vacuum-sealed, balancing devastating drama with gallows humor and revealing the whole story to us in just the right way. I'll probably watch La La Land ten more times before I die, but Kenneth Lonergan's Manchester by the Sea is the movie of a lifetime, and one you need only see once in yours.
Read on to see my picks that would be there if I saw enough movies to constitute a top ten, and my picks that left me wanting much, much more as I left the theaters!
HONORABLE MENTIONS (in alphabetical order):
5. SING STREET
I nodded knowingly when I saw that this Little Indie That Could was helmed by John Carney, whose previous effort Begin Again had the same folksy, looking-for-love bittersweet flavor Sing Street has. It even has original songs, another Carney staple, while not being full-musical like perhaps another film you'll catch on this list. Despite its predictability, you can have a blast with Conor, aka Cosmo, as he and his little band of Irish schoolboys serenade their way into your heart, and show you how wonderful it is to have youthful dreams that will never last forever.4. CAPTAIN FANTASTIC
Viggo Mortensen has picked up a Golden Globe and a SAG nomination for his stirring performance in this film, another low-on-the-radar indie, and I'm hoping Uncle Oscar will invite him to the party come February. It was one of my biggest regrets of this blog this year; for whatever reason I was too lazy to review this quirky, inspiring film that, until the winter came around was my favorite film of the year. Ben Cash, a man who lives off the grid, takes his six hyper-intelligent children back into society to go to his wife's funeral. A simple premise that is at once a critique on modern society, an examination of nontraditional family and an ultimately heart-warming picture.
3. MOONLIGHT
I never understood it when critics called a movie "haunting"...until I saw Moonlight, and the glow of this movie bathed over me like only one other film did this year. Besides shining a spotlight on faces that don't usually get screen time, Barry Jenkins' haunting triumph about the life of young Chiron and the people he meets during his life in modern Miami, is just plain good cinema. Three chapters, all mostly of equal strength, reveal a complex young man who aches to be himself in a world where all the cards are stacked against him, who desperately wants to answer the question "Who is you, Chiron?". We needed Moonlight in this year of boiling racial violence, and the avalanche of awards it's been pulling in confirms my thoughts.2. LA LA LAND
Please, please believe the hype, and go support the enormously talented Damien Chazelle, who I would go so far as to say surpasses his 2014 effort Whiplash, and I don't say that lightly. Gosling is wonderful, but it's Emma Stone, who does much more than flaunt her doe eyes, that deserves all the attention for her role as Mia. They're both dreamers in Los Angeles, and as corny as that may sound on paper, its execution is perfect. The songs are infectious, the production is A+, and Chazelle doesn't litter his musical with a huge ensemble of characters, because we call came for the Gosling/Stone romance. And though it doesn't end like your grandfather's musical, I wouldn't want it to. This is a musical for my generation, an urge to never stop dreaming.
1. MANCHESTER BY THE SEA
I'm afraid this will be the only time Manchester by the Sea bests La La Land (the clear Best Picture frontrunner) but even if it's just in my books, that's okay. I don't know why I always choose movies that make me weep as my number one pick (see: Inside Out, Fruitvale Station). Perhaps because they represent how powerful the art of cinema can be, how these made-up characters played by overpaid famous people can still make you well up because you see yourself in them. Casey Affleck stars in the performance of the year as Lee Chandler, a shell of a man entrusted with the son of his dead brother. The script couldn't be tighter if it was vacuum-sealed, balancing devastating drama with gallows humor and revealing the whole story to us in just the right way. I'll probably watch La La Land ten more times before I die, but Kenneth Lonergan's Manchester by the Sea is the movie of a lifetime, and one you need only see once in yours.Read on to see my picks that would be there if I saw enough movies to constitute a top ten, and my picks that left me wanting much, much more as I left the theaters!
HONORABLE MENTIONS (in alphabetical order):
- Captain America: Civil War. Though Deadpool was raucous entertainment, Avengers 2.5 as it's been frequently called, was my favorite superhero flick in a year overflowing with them. Will we tire of them in about five years? That's my guess. But let's admire how the Russo brothers were able to balance all of these characters and introduce a new, superior Spider-Man all under two and a half hours.
- The Nice Guys. Under-seen but not underrated, Shane Black's rapid-fire noir had Ryan Gosling's best performance this year, a complicated, twisty plot I didn't mind getting lost in. Hopefully a cult following will develop and the future years will mend what 2016 did to this gem.
- Zootopia. I rarely see animated movies in theaters, so I caught this film on a plane and loved every minute of it. From "Breaking Bad" references to thinly veiled stabs at intolerance and racism, this was a crime drama done Disney, and despite its predictability, it's a blast for all ages, something Disney should always try to aim for.
DISHONORABLE MENTIONS (in alphabetical order):
- Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. Not a lot worked for me in Zack Snyder's second superhero outing, filled to the brim with an embarrassment of riches in superheroes, and not a lot to do with them. If you dig Jesse Eisenberg force-feeding Jolly Ranchers or Ben Affleck screaming "MARTHA," BvS was probably your favorite superhero movie. If not, join the party.
- The Neon Demon. I was excited to see this film at London's BFI Theater, partly for the atmosphere and partly for Nicholas Winding Refn, whose Drive floored me years ago. This movie is a model of a mess, beautiful to look at but grating to watch at times. I get Refn's point: L.A. people are phony. But was necrophilia necessary in that explanation?!?
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