10.) Ida

At a glance, Ida shares a great deal with the Polish Film School directors of the mid 1950s and early 1960s. Shot in black-and-white, Paweł Pawlikowski’s film tells the story of a novice nun in the 1960s who embarks on a journey with her aunt to find the resting place of her murdered Jewish parents. The Polish Film School directors were forced by censorship to set their films before the end of the Second World War; Ida, then, is out of time, similar to what many of the directors of that era would likely have made if they could. But being out of time translates into a form of timelessness and is precisely what gives Ida its power. The articulation of sacrifice and family that Ida offers transcends time and space, but the detail that Ryszard Lenczewski’s camera picks up by allowing characters plenty of headspace and in concentrating its action in interiors allows for a remarkably lived-in world, one in which history and tragedy seems to lurk between floorboards and in antiquated décor, and which questions ideas of nation and religion. It’s at once familiar and altogether new, a story we always knew existed but that never seemed to reach out to us until now. — Forrest Cardamenis 

9.) Stranger by the Lake

Stranger by the Lake is even better than just a riff on Hitchcock. It recalls to mind whenever Francois Truffaut would homage the master of suspense with his own thrillers: so deftly aware of all the filmmaker’s techniques while providing distinctly unique (and very French) spins on the formula. Stranger by the Lake not only transcends that by being one of the most exquisitely and gracefully crafted thrillers in recent memory, but also in how it manages to work wonderfully as a romance of forbidden desire and as a thoughtful meditation on the very nature of romance and desire. Writer/director Alain Guiraudie does this by not explicitly using the conventional tropes of either genre. His pace is methodical and slow, yet somehow rhythmic in its routinely repetition. The suspense doesn’t derive from chases and life-or-death situations, but instead bleeds out from the romance at the center between potential murderer Michel and the man who both desires him and wishes to expose him. Or does he? With an evocatively brilliant conclusion, Stranger by the Lake isn’t just steamy and thrilling, it is also a surprisingly human and powerful rumination on our need to connect, even when facing certain death. — Christopher Runyon 

8.) Obvious Child

In case of an unplanned pregnancy, having the baby -a la Knocked Up, Waitress, and even Juno-, is so 2007. In her outstanding and timely re-imagination of the romantic comedy genre, Gillian Robespierre not only grants her protagonist a sane alternative that the film is not afraid to call abortion, she also successfully resurrects the female image that many of the recent examples of the genre routinely demolished. All that, and Obvious Child is still legitimately romantic and incredibly funny in following the raunchy-humored stand-up comic Donna Stern (the terrific Jenny Slate) who gets dumped by her insensitive boyfriend at the start of the film, and further complicates her emotional troubles with an unplanned pregnancy resulting from a one-night stand with a sweet, preppy type (Jack Lacy). The film is perhaps a tad rough around the edges; yet, it’s a refreshingly authentic celebration of a contemporary female embracing her true, complete and perfectly chaotic identity. — Tomris Laffly 

7.) The LEGO Movie

In just a few short years, Phil Lord and Chris Miller have proven to be among the most adroit and deft filmmakers in either animation or live-action. In 2014 alone, they’ve worked in both formats to great, meta-tastic success with two of the more challenging types of big-budget films: the sequel and the toy adaptation. Somehow, 22 Jump Street was a fast-paced and hilarious follow-up to their 21 Jump Street, both with an improbably goofy conceit. But Lord and Miller’s real triumph this year was The LEGO Movie, which absolutely shouldn’t have worked as well as it did. How on Earth is a movie based on LEGO toys this clever, madcap, witty, or unexpectedly touching? How could a movie that incorporates Batman and Superman and all other sorts of heroic types not feel overstuffed or painfully unwieldy? The third-act twist regarding “the Man Upstairs” and President Business’ true evil plan turned some audiences off, but it’s an inherently logical capper to a delightfully outlandish, zippy, and wild story about creativity in the face of impossible odds. For at least two hours, in this world, everything is awesome. — Josh Spiegel

6.) Blue Ruin

No other movie so far this year excels at being so straightforward while dodging what you’d expect to happen at every turn. A lot of revenge films try to duck responsibility for exulting in violence by tacking on some “it wasn’t worth it” or “it destroys everything around you” lesson at the end. But when Blue Ruin says it, it means it, and you feel it. It does so by making its central act of vengeance come at the very beginning, and then showing how the consequences spiral outward. The at-first intimidating protagonist turns out to barely know what he’s doing. Standard genre hallmarks – a home invasion, a self-surgery, a gunpoint interrogation – are done in by morbidly humorous twists of realism that spoil the “fun” of the tropes while driving home how ugly our darkest impulses are, and that it’s for the best that we don’t listen to them. A vividly moody, often tense cautionary tale. — Daniel Schindel 

5.) The Immigrant

James Gray continues to advance as a filmmaker and storyteller, and with The Immigrant, he not only confirms his status as the preeminent American filmmaker of his generation but produces a film that can stand with the most piercing of New Hollywood films. Kent Jones once called A Woman Under the Influence and Raging Bull “the toughest of all great American films.” The Immigrant may deserve inclusion in these ranks. Like those films, it is an impressive aesthetic achievement, but its formal ardor is more than matched by unvarnished performances that prevent a Polish immigrant forced into prostitution fresh off the boat or her amorous pimp from existing as mere symbols. Money does not simply debase dignity but refashions it, and Marion Cotillard never slips into the easy role of martyr. Her Ewa is tough, vulnerable, disgusted and proud, and Joaquin Phoenix’s Bruno splinters trying to maintain control of her. The Immigrant has much to say about the three-card monte game of America’s promise of economic security, but it is precisely because it does not reduce itself to any one idea of America that its characters and themes reward so much scrutiny. — Jake Cole 

4.) The Double

Richard Ayoade is, first and foremost, a comedian, known for his role on the deadpan British sitcom The IT Crowd and his debut feature Submarine, a highly self-aware coming-of-age romance. He has written with John Oliver, directed an episode of Community, created an 80’s horror parody show, and generally kept himself busy with all manner of lighthearted projects— but nothing that could prepare audiences for the full-blown auteur he reveals himself to be in The Double. An adaptation of a Dostoevsky novella of the same name, The Double follows the nebbishy Simon James (Jesse Eisenberg) as he finds his life being taken over by a doppelgänger— a kind of evil twin who goes by James Simon, bold and charming and far less scrupulous. While this plot setup is packed with Russian-literary themes, it is the film’s aesthetic ambition that truly impresses. Ayoade’s steampunk vision of the office breathes life into the tired plight of the corporate drone. The camera stalks Simon in trains, elevators, cubicles, stairwells, giving the sense of being caught up in machinery, surrounded at all times by vaguely menacing metal. He shoots Eisenberg plodding down an empty fluorescent-lit hallway like it’s never been done before and pulls it off. The Double is pure, delicious paranoia. Between Andrew Hewitt’s riveting score full of twitchy beeps and typewriter stabs, Eisenberg’s uncanny ability to swing between loser and scoundrel, and Ayoade’s just-so staging of it all, The Double carries off its devious mission as handily as James Simon himself might do it. Oh, and did I mention it’s funny too? — Lauren Wilford 

3.) Only Lovers Left Alive

No one would ever accuse a Jim Jarmusch movie of being in a particular hurry. The king of languid, ellipsis-filled, road trip-to-nowhere movies, Jarmusch reaches his apotheosis in Only Lovers Left Alive, a film about sleeping all day, wearing sunglasses at night, driving around Detroit and recording droning noise pop in your bathrobe. It’s also about vampires. Adam (Tom Hiddleston) is a Romantic musician of the Byron/Shelley persuasion and Eve (Tilda Swinton) is a thousand-year old druid with an affinity for Elizabethan poetry and blood popsicles. Well into several centuries as the film’s title lovers, Adam & Eve naturally take the long view when it comes to their relationship: spending the weekend together becomes less important than the immediate challenge of finding clean blood to drink. Jarmusch creates a world you want to live in: one where an appreciation of Thelonious Monk is as valid as a love of Jack White and “Don Quixote” is held in the same esteem as “Infinite Jest.” In Jarmusch’s undead universe, music and poetry are as important as breathing–a luxurious artistic fantasy. Only Lovers Left Alive plays like your favorite vinyl record and feels like a warm mug of tea on a cold day. “If music be the food of love…,” vamp on. — Kristen Sales 

2.) The Grand Budapest Hotel

Frosted in powder pink and blue pastels and topped off with a vivid cherry coat and eggplant accents, Wes Anderson’s latest colorful charmer is a visual feast of style and story. An elder Zero Moustafa (F. Murray Abraham) takes his audience back to his early days as a bellhop at the titular Grand Budapest Hotel when it was a bastion of European luxury.  The story is equally about Moustafa’s mentor, M. Gustave (Ralph Fiennes) and the several scrapes the duo escapes when trying to secure a painting or fall in love. The Grand Budapest Hotel might be the best Wes Anderson picture that captures his sense of whimsy and calculated technique. Tracing its cinematic lineage from Max Ophüls’ stylized camera work and Ernst Lubitsch’s societal comedies, Grand Budapest Hotel is a morsel of a pretty world meant to be enjoyed slowly in order to appreciate its various layers. Buffeted with Anderson repertory stalwarts like Bill Murray, Jeff Goldblum, and Adrien Brody, the topsy-turvy plot feels both familiar and fresh as it travels through a romanticized era that never quite existed. It’s a shame you have to turn in your hotel key after 100 minutes. — Monica Castillo 

1.) Under the Skin

In Under the Skin, Scarlett Johansson plays an alien seductress who, in a reversal of ‘classic’ images of sexual predation, lures her unfortunate victims into the confines of a creepy white van. The vehicle – not to mention Johansson’s casting – is one of several meta-elements at work in Jonathan Glazer’s minimally plotted, intensely voyeuristic film, one that depicts seduction and desire with a terrifying, mesmerising dispassion. At times, we too feel like extraterrestrials, viewing our species from afar. The observational vibe is juxtaposed with scenes of striking experimentation, while a rhythmic, screeching score heightens the sense of otherworldly danger. No filmmaker so far this year has demonstrated more control over his aesthetic. For that, Under the Skin belongs at the very top of this list. — Tom Clift 

Check out other original illustrations by Alexandra Kittle on her Etsy page and follow her on Twitter here.

WHAT DID WE MISS? WHAT ARE SOME GREAT 2014 FILMS YOU’VE SEEN OVER THE PAST 6 MONTHS?