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Anyway, I'll avoid trying to draw a link from film-to-film, gradually building to a year-end crescendo - I don't feel like it and honestly there isn't much there. So without further ado, the twenty best films of 2010:
#20
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"CATFISH"
Henry Joost, Ariel Schulman, Relativity Media/Universal
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The first of the two "is it real?" documentaries of the year, Catfish is a tense, awkward and finally poignant film about online identity told like a thriller.
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#19
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"THE GHOST WRITER"
Roman Polanski, Summit Entertainment
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Speaking of thrillers, Roman Polanski's The Ghost Writer is a wonderful little minor work, echoing the overseas paranoia of Frantic and the hopelessness of Chinatown.
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#18
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"ANIMAL KINGDOM"
David Michod, Screen Australia/Film Victoria
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This Australian crime drama following the rise of a young, nearly mute teenager thrust into the bowels of his family's nest of criminals - the ending packs quite a punch. -
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#17
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"THE AMERICAN"
Anton Corbijn, Focus Features
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Anton Corbijn's European-styled anti-thriller is more of an exercise in mood than anything else, but its commitment to its craft and the chiseled brow of George Clooney see it through. -
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#16
"TRON: LEGACY"
Joseph Kosinksi, Buena Vista/Disney
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Quibbling about writing and storytelling and acting and all that stuff? Pfff. You missed the year's greatest sound-and-light show - a pounding techno-musical. -
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#15
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"TOY STORY 3"
Lee Unkrich, Buena Vista/Pixar Studios
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Yeah, it's really good.....what's next?
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#14
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"VALHALLA RISING"
Nicolas Winding Refn, IFC Films
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Nicolas Winding Refn's minimalist viking odyssey brought us some of the more memorable images of the year - brutal and spiritual.
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#13
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"INCEPTION"
Christopher Nolan, Warner Bros.
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Christopher Nolan's massive science-fiction epic may indeed become dulled by home viewing, but in a summer full of limp, stolid studio fare, Inception engaged and absorbed like no other.
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#12
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"BLUE VALENTINE"
Derek Cianfrance, The Weinstein Company
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Capturing both the levitation and the destruction of young love, Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams do more than enough to cover up the film's sporadically authentic story structure.
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#11
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"THE FIGHTER"
David O. Russell, Paramount Pictures
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Fidgeting between commercial viability and edgy realism, David O. Russell's boxing flick ultimately wins us over because of its daring ensemble and portrait of a damaged family.
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#10
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"SHUTTER ISLAND"
Martin Scorsese, Paramount Pictures
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As the year tumbled along, the film starring a broken-down, mentally unstable Leonardo DiCaprio that stuck with me the most was not Christopher Nolan's mammoth actioner, but rather Martin Scorsese's "Shutter Island." Sure, even at first glance, the film feels an awful lot like an exercise (its final revelation hardly unanticipated), yet it's inevitable depiction of a tragic husband and father lingers long after that lighthouse has faded from view.
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#9
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"FISH TANK"
Andrea Arnold, BBC Films/UK Film Council
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Andrea Arnnold's expertly shot coming-of-age drama is a spunky, grimy dose of British kitchen-sink realism. Charting but a few months in the life of 15 year-old Mia (played wonderfully by newcomer Katie Jarvis), "Fish Tank" is a rush of sexual curiosity, hopeless dreaming and yes, a scummy, glassed-in setting.
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#8
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"HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON"
Chris Sanders, Dean DeBlois, DreamWorks Animation
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In a banner year for animation (the nostalgic "Toy Story 3," the song-and-dance fairy tale "Tangled"), DreamWorks' "How to Train Your Dragon" was just pure storytelling. There's nothing revelatory in its dweeby coming-of-age arc or know-your-enemy resolutions, yet its ability to hit all of the required notes with precise timing and minimal deluge should be commended. John Powell's score is one of the best of the year.
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#7
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"RABBIT HOLE"
John Cameron Mitchell, Blossom Films/Lionsgate
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When approaching the death of a child, one would immediately think of something either tediously depressive or fallaciously uplifting, but "Rabbit Hole" is easily the most truthfully moving drama of the year. The film subverts our typical expectations of the grieving process by providing no easy answers. It says, in way that's not cynical but rather comforting, that life is unpredictable and highly enigmatic and we must deal with the outcomes we're dealt with.
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#6
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"SOMEWHERE"
Sofia Coppola, American Zoetrope/Focus Features
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In a year full of redemptive stories of middle-aged men overcoming the failures in their respective professions ("The King's Speech", "The Fighter"), Sofia Coppola's "Somewhere" may be the best of the bunch. Stripping down her proven formula of celebrity ennui ("Lost in Translation") to its bare essentials ironically allows Coppola to make perhaps the warmest film of here career.
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#5
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"THE SOCIAL NETWORK"
David Fincher, Paramount Pictures
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Inevitable potshots and front-runner backlash be damned, David Fincher's "The Social Network" is still one of the singular artistic achievements left standing. Despite its formal exactitude and brainy, eccentric dialogue, allegations about the film's coldness remain more than a bit befuddling - Zuckerberg's ironic, self-made seclusion is one of the more tragically human resolutions of the year.
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#4
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"EXIT THROUGH THE GIFT SHOP"
Banksy, Paranoid Pictures
-Banksy, Paranoid Pictures
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While the questionable authenticity of "Catfish" leaves that otherwise terrific film about the perils of online identity in the shadow of doubt, the mysteries surrounding the hooded Banksy and his strange documentary about the hypocrisy of the modern art world actually enhance the film's message about the blurred line between meaning and cheap imitation.
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#3
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"A PROPHET"
Jacques Audiard, Sony Pictures Classics
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Jacques Audiard's stark but thrilling French prison drama is one of the more indelible experiences of the year, balancing traditional rise-to-the-top crime saga storytelling with more delicate themes of supernaturalism and globalization.
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#2
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"WHITE MATERIAL"
Claire Denis, Wild Bunch, IFC Films
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Claire Denis' simmering, unshakeable drama quietly evokes the tensions and desperate struggles of a French plantation owner attempting to wait out civil war in Africa, Pulsing with inevitability and conflict, the film masterfully sidesteps broad statements and easy racial boundaries.
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#1
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"BLACK SWAN"
Darren Aronofsky, Cross Creek/Fox Searchlight
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Lurid and sensational, fierce and beautiful, Darren Aronofsky's psychological ballet-thriller is a provocative pastiche of everything from the sexual identity of Roman Polanski to the violent technicality of Dario Argento, all the while continuing the director's fascination with the debilitation and the extremes of the human body.
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Natalie Portman's frantic, ragged performance is surprisingly moving as her heightened repression and bottlenecked anxiety finally give way to exhilarating artistic liberation and - sometimes literal - transformation.
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So, to recap:
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1. "Black Swan"
2. "White Material"
3. "A Prophet"
4. "Exit Through the Gift Shop"
5. "The Social Network"
6. "Somewhere"
7. "Rabbit Hole"
8. "How to Train Your Dragon"
9. "Fish Tank"
10. "Shutter Island"
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11. "The Fighter"
12. "Blue Valentine"
13. "Inception"
14. "Valhalla Rising"
15. "Toy Story 3"
16. "Tron: Legacy"
17. "The American"
18. "Animal Kingdom"
19. "The Ghost Writer"
20. "Catfish"
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And for kicks, the five worst of the year:
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5. "The Secret in Their Eyes"
4. "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo"
3. "Harry Brown"
2. "Eat Pray Love"
1. "Valentine's Day"
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