Not Another Top Films of the 2010s List
12 Years a Slave 2013 - Steve McQueen
Steve McQueen’s gutrenchingly painful rendition of slavery in America captured the horrific cruelty humans are capable of in a way almost unseen in Hollywood historical tradegies. As he did with Hunger and Shame before, McQueen represents the incredible physical pain his characters experience. He never lets the audience off easy, forcing them to witness brutal acts with long breathtaking takes that make the viewer a witness to atrocity after atrocity. Two of the most memorable such scenes feature the whipping of a slave woman and a scene where Solomon Northrup, the protagonist, is left hanging by the neck from a tree, barely keeping himself alive by standing on the end of his toes. McQueen holds these shots far longer than the comfortable quick cutting we are accustomed to seeing in a Hollywood prestige picture, engraving them into the audience's memory. All of this is beautifully shot, paradoxically contrasting the haunting natural beauty of the landscapes with the tragic events depicted.
45 Years 2015 Andrew Haigh
British director Andrew Haigh’s brilliant debut Weekend told a short romance between a young gay couple with poingnant delicacy. In his sophomoric effort he changes generation, and looks at a couple who have spent nearly their entire lives together who are about to celebrate their 45th wedding anniversary. Problems arise when the body of the ex girlfriend of Geoff, the husband, is found perfectly preserved in a glacier, like a ghost of a past life, perfectly youthfully preserved, arriving in the twilight of life to make one wonder what could have been. This causes the seemingly happy and loving couple to reevaluate their marriage. Is a life spent together a representation of true lasting love, or just the final role to play after a lifetime of acting? The film brilliantly plays with the answers to these questions, showing just how subjective and performance based our relationships and life in general are. Are we truly happy, or are we happy because we convince ourselves we are? The film poses these questions and stunningly concludes with a silent stare from Charlotte Gainsbourg that says everything.
120 Beats per Minute 2017 Robin Campillo
Robin Campillo’s brilliant film set in France during the AIDs crisis depicts the organization ACTup and the way it fought for homosexual rights during this tragic chapter in gay history. It is the perfect blend of facts and important events that come with any historical drama, but what makes it so much more than just another film that shows you the chronological order of events on screen, is how it depicts the gay community living their lives as normal human beings between the action. Yes, they protest, throw fake blood, and give speeches, but they also have private lives, and party, fall in love, and have sex. What is best about Campillo’s film is that the scenes linger on much longer than expected. Instead of cutting right after a sex scene, when they finish we stay with them, and they talk about their lives, their fears, their hopes, their histories. The sex scenes are not just exploitative sexy scenes, but scenes of love, and we as an audience have the pleasure of staying around for the pillow talk. In the same way, a death scene is not just a death scene. Someone dies and his lover cries, but Campillo does not cut away. He stays with them as they go through the procedural aftermath. They prepare the body, invite friends over, have a toast in honor of the deceased. Dramatic things happen, but they are displayed in such an undramatic human way that renders them so much more powerful. The film is held together by an exceptional performance by Nahuel Pérez Biscayart, whose humor, anger, calm, and care are seamlessly interwoven in a way that makes him the heart and soul of the film.
Animal Kingdom 2010 David Michôd
David Michôd’s Australian crime drama about a family of criminals is one of the best of its kind of the new millennium. It is a moody, trilling film with outstanding performances from all the cast. Jackie Weaver and Ben Mendelson stand out in particular, playing two very different types of psychopath. Weaver is the seemingly sweet, bright eyed, all-seeing matriarch who has an all too creepily close relationship with her sons, and Mendonson is the head of the family, an empty eyed unpredictable violent maniac who snaps when you least expect it. Michôd’s dark and entirely unromantic depiction of this family will haunt you long after the credits roll.
Black Swan 2011 Darren Aronofsky
Darren Aronofsky’s bonkers and utterly enjoyable B-movie thriller places Natalie Portman’s goodie good girl into a paranoid hellish world because of her own artistic ambition. Through the course of the film we see our overprotected and repressed white swan slowly and painfully turn into the black swan mentally, physically, and finally, quite literally. It is a great genre film with a powerful performance by Portman and strong supporting turns. Aronofsky clearly had a great time while creating this absurdist parable of the Swan Lake ballet, and his enjoyment is palpable. It is a cautionary tale about the danger of ambition, and the physical and emotional strain it takes to create true art. Is giving absolutely everything to achieve our dreams the true meaning of life? Is it worth it?
Call Me By Your Name 2017 Luca Guadagnino
James Ivory of brilliant Merant Ivory productions such as Remains of the Day and Maurice steps down from the director’s chair to script this Italian set period piece about a summer of love between an American gay couple. Luca Guadagnino exquisitely directs this story of forbidden love, emmercing the audience not only in the beautiful romance on screen, but also in the stunning small 1980s Italian countryside village setting. The setting, and more importantly, the chemistry between the two leads is so subtly real and relatable that it makes it as emotionally impactful as the best Merchant Ivory films. The performances are perfect, and the trajectory of the romance ending in the devastating way it had to end is so familiar yet timeless that it feels like it's made out of the very DNA of classic cinema. It is one of, if not the best, love story of the decade.
Dogman 2018 Matteo Garrone
Dogman features two stunning leading performances by Marcello Fonte as Marcello, a small goofy looking dog groomer and Edoardo Pesce as Simoncino, a brutish criminal who controls the neighborhood through violence and fear. Marcello, a bit of a dorky loser wants to fit into Simoncino’s exciting world and unwisely sees him as his best friend. Garrone, famous for his mob epic Gimorrah, here creates a more comedic and symbolic crime film which portrays it’s characters, sometimes quite literally, as dogs, animals that can lose control and could need to be tamed. It is a depressing film about living in a place where fear and crime rules over honesty and truth, and both actors seem to so perfectly inhabit the skin of their characters that I cannot imagine seeing them in other roles.
Dolor y Gloria 2019 Pedro Almodóvar
Antonio Banderas gives the performance of his career in Pedro Almodovar's episodic autobiographical film about an aging director reconnecting with people in his current life, and looking back at his childhood and the discovery of his sexuality. The most hypnotising scene of the film comes when Banderas meets an ex lover of his for the first time in decades. Their reunion is his flat is heartbreaking. They discuss how their lives are now and give explanations for what happened in the past, but what is most impactful is what is not said. The way the two look at each other we see what they had and what they lost, what was experienced and what could have been, and how time unforgivably keeps pushing us forward, leaving us incapable of understanding, correcting, or continuing what has past. It is an astonishingly honest and personal film with some truly unforgettable moments.
Frances Ha 2012 - Noah Baumbach
In contrast to many of Noah Baumbach’s other films that tend to be stories about depressed middle aged men, Frances Ha could not be more different. This is thanks in large part to co-screenwriter Greta Gerwig who also gives a brilliantly enjoyable performance as the titular character, Frances, a young somewhat lost woman living in New York. The film radiates with joy as Gerwig clumsily blunders from one situation to another under Baumbach’s playful direction and nostalgic black and white cinematography. The film evokes Woody Allen and François Trauffaut in equal parts and was the most fun I had in the cinema in the decade. It’s a simple but truly extraordinary film that does feel the need to marry off its protagonist, instead focusing on the complexity and beauty of friendships and being alone.
Happy as Lazzaro 2018 Alice Lohrwacher
This magical film by Alice Lohrwacher feels like a wonderfully modern version of something Felini would have done were he working today. Split into two parts, it follows Lazzaro, a bright faced innocent young man who lives in a community of workers who unknowingly are illegally being used by a Marchesa to do free hard labor. Lazzaro seemingly dies in an accident just as government officials liberate the workers, then inexplicably wakes up 20 years later without having aged at all, and makes his way to the city and reencounters the older versions of people from his past life. It is a miracle of a film that is a brilliant mix of small fantastical moments within a past and modern reality, and a comparison of past rural Italian life and modern urban life.
Holy Motors 2012 Leos Carax
Leos Carax returned to filmmaking after an extended break to make this fantastically bizarre film about a man named Mr. Oscar who is driven around in a limo fully equipped with all the hair, makeup, and props necessary to prepare him for the variety of 'meetings' he will attend throughout the day. The meetings consist of him getting into character and performing various roles throughout Paris including a beggar woman, a crazy sewer Leprechaun, a terrible father, and a dying man. The film is entirely ludicrous, unpredictable and completely puzzling. It features a show-stoppingly physical performance from Denis Lavant who morphs into each new skin like a chameleon. Carax seems to be critiquing the new technological and the digital world in which we live in, with particular disdain towards the way it has affected cinema, but the film is so whacky and inexplicable, that each viewer has to make up for themselves exactly what this mad scientist is trying to say with his Frankenstein’s monster-like conglomeration of vignettes.
Killing Them Softly 2012 Andrew Dominik
The use of the word soft in the title of Andrew Dominik’s brutally violent film could not be more misleading. More adverbs would be hardly, or loudly, or anything contrary to softly, quietly, or gently. This mob genre film starring Brad Pitt as a hitman is a bloody parable about the harsh reality of capitalism that moves through the veins of the US like an unkillable and constantly adaptable virus. The film’s soundtrack is composed of television and radio excerpts of George W. Bush and Barack Obama talking about the 2008 economic crisis and shows how the entire society runs on economic transactions. Filled with screen chewing supporting performances by Ray Liotta, Scoot McNairy, Ben Mendelson, Richard Jenkins, and especially James Gandolfini, Dominik boldly and bluntly criticizes the American way of life in such an unforgiving and obvious way that it is impossible to leave the cinema without feeling complete disgust for the impersonal, money driven, commercial world we live in.
Leviathan 2014 Andrey Zvyagintsev
Russian auteur Andrey Zvyagintsev’s Leviathan depicts a Leviathan-like, monstrous bureaucratic governmental system from which it is impossible to escape. The film itself feels a bit like a Leviathan. It is epically long, with striking, bold cinematography, and an inescapably soul crushing ending that continues pursuing me. It begins as an enjoyable dramatic comedy about a corrupt mayor who wants the property of a local mechanic. Much vodka is consumed, and drunken antics ensue. However, the ending of the film takes a dramatic turn that sees our protagonists consumed by the Leviathan of the state, in part represented by courtroom monologues of predetermined verdicts, read rapidly and breathlessly in uncaring, robotic tones that demonstrate the impossibility to fight or escape from fate.
The Tree of Life 2011 Terrence Malick
Terrence Malick’s film begins with the creation of the universe and finally settles on the memories of a man’s childhood after a family tragedy. It is as abstract and beautiful and long and confusing as can be expected from Malick, but it completely absorbed me from beginning to end. As many of his films are, The Tree of Life is about a balance between the cruelty and love that exist both in the natural world and in human relations. The portrayals of harsh masculinity embodied by Brad Pitt, and motherly feminine care by Jessica Chastain are incredibly powerful. However they are not so much characters as representations, images or symbols that carry greater meaning with them. Nothing is so literal in a Malick film, and every beautifully composed and edited shot is masterfully compiled to make this film the indescribable experience it is. It is a film that only Malick would have attempted, and not only is it successful in what it does, but it is a revelation of daring art cinema that is seen less and less nowadays.
The Trip 2010, 2014, 2017 Michael Winterbottom
The Trip is a series of films featuring comedians Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon as they travel through Northern England, Italy, and Spain in their various respective outings. Originally debuting as a series for television in the UK, and edited to film format for international distribution, The Trip is essentially plotless. Coogan and Brydon play themselves, two middle aged comedians traveling through Europe and eating exquisite food at 5 star restaurants. It does not sound like much but the films are tremendously enjoyable, profound explorations of middle aged white masculinity. It is a series that is completely aware of the status of its protagonists. It unashamedly represents how pathetic and hypocritical they can be, while also making them two amazing travel companions whose bickering and competitions of famous actor impressions are irresistibly funny. And though they are two men who seem to have the wealth and success that many dream of, they are hopelessly imperfect and human. As funny as it is, conversations often take a dark turn, and suddenly the men make existential realizations. There is a time limit to everything, and one day, even these two moderately famous actors will be entirely forgotten.
Steve McQueen’s gutrenchingly painful rendition of slavery in America captured the horrific cruelty humans are capable of in a way almost unseen in Hollywood historical tradegies. As he did with Hunger and Shame before, McQueen represents the incredible physical pain his characters experience. He never lets the audience off easy, forcing them to witness brutal acts with long breathtaking takes that make the viewer a witness to atrocity after atrocity. Two of the most memorable such scenes feature the whipping of a slave woman and a scene where Solomon Northrup, the protagonist, is left hanging by the neck from a tree, barely keeping himself alive by standing on the end of his toes. McQueen holds these shots far longer than the comfortable quick cutting we are accustomed to seeing in a Hollywood prestige picture, engraving them into the audience's memory. All of this is beautifully shot, paradoxically contrasting the haunting natural beauty of the landscapes with the tragic events depicted.
45 Years 2015 Andrew Haigh
British director Andrew Haigh’s brilliant debut Weekend told a short romance between a young gay couple with poingnant delicacy. In his sophomoric effort he changes generation, and looks at a couple who have spent nearly their entire lives together who are about to celebrate their 45th wedding anniversary. Problems arise when the body of the ex girlfriend of Geoff, the husband, is found perfectly preserved in a glacier, like a ghost of a past life, perfectly youthfully preserved, arriving in the twilight of life to make one wonder what could have been. This causes the seemingly happy and loving couple to reevaluate their marriage. Is a life spent together a representation of true lasting love, or just the final role to play after a lifetime of acting? The film brilliantly plays with the answers to these questions, showing just how subjective and performance based our relationships and life in general are. Are we truly happy, or are we happy because we convince ourselves we are? The film poses these questions and stunningly concludes with a silent stare from Charlotte Gainsbourg that says everything.
120 Beats per Minute 2017 Robin Campillo
Robin Campillo’s brilliant film set in France during the AIDs crisis depicts the organization ACTup and the way it fought for homosexual rights during this tragic chapter in gay history. It is the perfect blend of facts and important events that come with any historical drama, but what makes it so much more than just another film that shows you the chronological order of events on screen, is how it depicts the gay community living their lives as normal human beings between the action. Yes, they protest, throw fake blood, and give speeches, but they also have private lives, and party, fall in love, and have sex. What is best about Campillo’s film is that the scenes linger on much longer than expected. Instead of cutting right after a sex scene, when they finish we stay with them, and they talk about their lives, their fears, their hopes, their histories. The sex scenes are not just exploitative sexy scenes, but scenes of love, and we as an audience have the pleasure of staying around for the pillow talk. In the same way, a death scene is not just a death scene. Someone dies and his lover cries, but Campillo does not cut away. He stays with them as they go through the procedural aftermath. They prepare the body, invite friends over, have a toast in honor of the deceased. Dramatic things happen, but they are displayed in such an undramatic human way that renders them so much more powerful. The film is held together by an exceptional performance by Nahuel Pérez Biscayart, whose humor, anger, calm, and care are seamlessly interwoven in a way that makes him the heart and soul of the film.
Animal Kingdom 2010 David Michôd
David Michôd’s Australian crime drama about a family of criminals is one of the best of its kind of the new millennium. It is a moody, trilling film with outstanding performances from all the cast. Jackie Weaver and Ben Mendelson stand out in particular, playing two very different types of psychopath. Weaver is the seemingly sweet, bright eyed, all-seeing matriarch who has an all too creepily close relationship with her sons, and Mendonson is the head of the family, an empty eyed unpredictable violent maniac who snaps when you least expect it. Michôd’s dark and entirely unromantic depiction of this family will haunt you long after the credits roll.
Black Swan 2011 Darren Aronofsky
Darren Aronofsky’s bonkers and utterly enjoyable B-movie thriller places Natalie Portman’s goodie good girl into a paranoid hellish world because of her own artistic ambition. Through the course of the film we see our overprotected and repressed white swan slowly and painfully turn into the black swan mentally, physically, and finally, quite literally. It is a great genre film with a powerful performance by Portman and strong supporting turns. Aronofsky clearly had a great time while creating this absurdist parable of the Swan Lake ballet, and his enjoyment is palpable. It is a cautionary tale about the danger of ambition, and the physical and emotional strain it takes to create true art. Is giving absolutely everything to achieve our dreams the true meaning of life? Is it worth it?
Call Me By Your Name 2017 Luca Guadagnino
James Ivory of brilliant Merant Ivory productions such as Remains of the Day and Maurice steps down from the director’s chair to script this Italian set period piece about a summer of love between an American gay couple. Luca Guadagnino exquisitely directs this story of forbidden love, emmercing the audience not only in the beautiful romance on screen, but also in the stunning small 1980s Italian countryside village setting. The setting, and more importantly, the chemistry between the two leads is so subtly real and relatable that it makes it as emotionally impactful as the best Merchant Ivory films. The performances are perfect, and the trajectory of the romance ending in the devastating way it had to end is so familiar yet timeless that it feels like it's made out of the very DNA of classic cinema. It is one of, if not the best, love story of the decade.
Dogman 2018 Matteo Garrone
Dogman features two stunning leading performances by Marcello Fonte as Marcello, a small goofy looking dog groomer and Edoardo Pesce as Simoncino, a brutish criminal who controls the neighborhood through violence and fear. Marcello, a bit of a dorky loser wants to fit into Simoncino’s exciting world and unwisely sees him as his best friend. Garrone, famous for his mob epic Gimorrah, here creates a more comedic and symbolic crime film which portrays it’s characters, sometimes quite literally, as dogs, animals that can lose control and could need to be tamed. It is a depressing film about living in a place where fear and crime rules over honesty and truth, and both actors seem to so perfectly inhabit the skin of their characters that I cannot imagine seeing them in other roles.
Dolor y Gloria 2019 Pedro Almodóvar
Antonio Banderas gives the performance of his career in Pedro Almodovar's episodic autobiographical film about an aging director reconnecting with people in his current life, and looking back at his childhood and the discovery of his sexuality. The most hypnotising scene of the film comes when Banderas meets an ex lover of his for the first time in decades. Their reunion is his flat is heartbreaking. They discuss how their lives are now and give explanations for what happened in the past, but what is most impactful is what is not said. The way the two look at each other we see what they had and what they lost, what was experienced and what could have been, and how time unforgivably keeps pushing us forward, leaving us incapable of understanding, correcting, or continuing what has past. It is an astonishingly honest and personal film with some truly unforgettable moments.
Frances Ha 2012 - Noah Baumbach
In contrast to many of Noah Baumbach’s other films that tend to be stories about depressed middle aged men, Frances Ha could not be more different. This is thanks in large part to co-screenwriter Greta Gerwig who also gives a brilliantly enjoyable performance as the titular character, Frances, a young somewhat lost woman living in New York. The film radiates with joy as Gerwig clumsily blunders from one situation to another under Baumbach’s playful direction and nostalgic black and white cinematography. The film evokes Woody Allen and François Trauffaut in equal parts and was the most fun I had in the cinema in the decade. It’s a simple but truly extraordinary film that does feel the need to marry off its protagonist, instead focusing on the complexity and beauty of friendships and being alone.
Happy as Lazzaro 2018 Alice Lohrwacher
This magical film by Alice Lohrwacher feels like a wonderfully modern version of something Felini would have done were he working today. Split into two parts, it follows Lazzaro, a bright faced innocent young man who lives in a community of workers who unknowingly are illegally being used by a Marchesa to do free hard labor. Lazzaro seemingly dies in an accident just as government officials liberate the workers, then inexplicably wakes up 20 years later without having aged at all, and makes his way to the city and reencounters the older versions of people from his past life. It is a miracle of a film that is a brilliant mix of small fantastical moments within a past and modern reality, and a comparison of past rural Italian life and modern urban life.
Holy Motors 2012 Leos Carax
Leos Carax returned to filmmaking after an extended break to make this fantastically bizarre film about a man named Mr. Oscar who is driven around in a limo fully equipped with all the hair, makeup, and props necessary to prepare him for the variety of 'meetings' he will attend throughout the day. The meetings consist of him getting into character and performing various roles throughout Paris including a beggar woman, a crazy sewer Leprechaun, a terrible father, and a dying man. The film is entirely ludicrous, unpredictable and completely puzzling. It features a show-stoppingly physical performance from Denis Lavant who morphs into each new skin like a chameleon. Carax seems to be critiquing the new technological and the digital world in which we live in, with particular disdain towards the way it has affected cinema, but the film is so whacky and inexplicable, that each viewer has to make up for themselves exactly what this mad scientist is trying to say with his Frankenstein’s monster-like conglomeration of vignettes.
Killing Them Softly 2012 Andrew Dominik
The use of the word soft in the title of Andrew Dominik’s brutally violent film could not be more misleading. More adverbs would be hardly, or loudly, or anything contrary to softly, quietly, or gently. This mob genre film starring Brad Pitt as a hitman is a bloody parable about the harsh reality of capitalism that moves through the veins of the US like an unkillable and constantly adaptable virus. The film’s soundtrack is composed of television and radio excerpts of George W. Bush and Barack Obama talking about the 2008 economic crisis and shows how the entire society runs on economic transactions. Filled with screen chewing supporting performances by Ray Liotta, Scoot McNairy, Ben Mendelson, Richard Jenkins, and especially James Gandolfini, Dominik boldly and bluntly criticizes the American way of life in such an unforgiving and obvious way that it is impossible to leave the cinema without feeling complete disgust for the impersonal, money driven, commercial world we live in.
Leviathan 2014 Andrey Zvyagintsev
Russian auteur Andrey Zvyagintsev’s Leviathan depicts a Leviathan-like, monstrous bureaucratic governmental system from which it is impossible to escape. The film itself feels a bit like a Leviathan. It is epically long, with striking, bold cinematography, and an inescapably soul crushing ending that continues pursuing me. It begins as an enjoyable dramatic comedy about a corrupt mayor who wants the property of a local mechanic. Much vodka is consumed, and drunken antics ensue. However, the ending of the film takes a dramatic turn that sees our protagonists consumed by the Leviathan of the state, in part represented by courtroom monologues of predetermined verdicts, read rapidly and breathlessly in uncaring, robotic tones that demonstrate the impossibility to fight or escape from fate.
The Tree of Life 2011 Terrence Malick
Terrence Malick’s film begins with the creation of the universe and finally settles on the memories of a man’s childhood after a family tragedy. It is as abstract and beautiful and long and confusing as can be expected from Malick, but it completely absorbed me from beginning to end. As many of his films are, The Tree of Life is about a balance between the cruelty and love that exist both in the natural world and in human relations. The portrayals of harsh masculinity embodied by Brad Pitt, and motherly feminine care by Jessica Chastain are incredibly powerful. However they are not so much characters as representations, images or symbols that carry greater meaning with them. Nothing is so literal in a Malick film, and every beautifully composed and edited shot is masterfully compiled to make this film the indescribable experience it is. It is a film that only Malick would have attempted, and not only is it successful in what it does, but it is a revelation of daring art cinema that is seen less and less nowadays.
The Trip 2010, 2014, 2017 Michael Winterbottom
The Trip is a series of films featuring comedians Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon as they travel through Northern England, Italy, and Spain in their various respective outings. Originally debuting as a series for television in the UK, and edited to film format for international distribution, The Trip is essentially plotless. Coogan and Brydon play themselves, two middle aged comedians traveling through Europe and eating exquisite food at 5 star restaurants. It does not sound like much but the films are tremendously enjoyable, profound explorations of middle aged white masculinity. It is a series that is completely aware of the status of its protagonists. It unashamedly represents how pathetic and hypocritical they can be, while also making them two amazing travel companions whose bickering and competitions of famous actor impressions are irresistibly funny. And though they are two men who seem to have the wealth and success that many dream of, they are hopelessly imperfect and human. As funny as it is, conversations often take a dark turn, and suddenly the men make existential realizations. There is a time limit to everything, and one day, even these two moderately famous actors will be entirely forgotten.
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