I do love films. And before the Oscar nominations are announced tomorrow, here are my picks for the best from this past year:
1) Boyhood. My favorite. The 12-year thing isn’t simply a gimmick; it’s fascinating. I wish I’d thought of it.
2) Whiplash. Holy shit this movie is so good. If you haven’t seen it yet, and you get to watch it for the first time, I’m genuinely jealous.
3) Gone Girl. You almost have to feel for Rosamund Pike – she’ll never get to play a role this good again.
4) The Grand Budapest Hotel. My favorite comedy of the year. It made me wish someday I could stay in an elegant, European hotel overrun by Nazis.
5) Edge of Tomorrow. Best sci-fi film in a long time. If you love Tom Cruise, you’ll love this movie. If you hate Tom Cruise, you get to watch him die 50 times.
6) Begin Again. A bit of a fairytale (Mark Ruffalo’s character always finds a parking spot right in front of wherever he’s going in Manhattan,) but a really sweet romantic musical comedy nonetheless.
7) Birdman. The movie features takes that can be ten minutes long, and the cast would practically crap their pants when it got to be nine minutes in and they didn’t want to be the actor who missed a line and ruined a scene. Super inventive.
8) Blue Ruin. A terrific independent thriller about revenge with a entirely unknown cast. (Except an odd cameo by Eve Plumb, who played Jan on “The Brady Bunch,” and is extra white-trashy in this.)
9) The Theory of Everything. You’ll cut your Stephen Hawking jokes by a third when you see the story of him being overpowered by his disease, and the woman who refused to bail on him.
10) The Imitation Game. Nobody could beat the Germans’ ass in WWII. Except a gay mathematician with a wicked case of Asperger’s.
