25.) “At Berkeley” (directed by: Frederick Wiseman)
All encompassing in scope yet acutely intimate in its observations, Fredrick Wiseman’s At Berkeley provides possibly the most expansive look at higher education ever committed to celluloid. Refraining from applying a didactic form and eschewing the traditional trappings of a more conventional documentary such as talking heads interviews, instead Wiseman allows At Berkeley’s 4 hour running time to speak for itself: static shots of a lone groundskeeper cutting the campus grass give way to glimpses of a budget cut meeting where it’s revealed that said groundskeeper is Berkeley’s sole grass cutter. Wiseman’s camera seemingly captures Berkeley’s every nook and crevice, revealing a tenuous ecosystem of students, faculty, administrators, and physical plant workers all attempting to coexist within the vast halls and expansive fields of the legendary institution. – Nick Usen
24.) “Fruitvale Station” (directed by: Ryan Coogler)
Released in the year of so-called “race-themed” movies, Fruitvale Station explores not this country’s past history of racism, but its very real present. First-time director Ryan Coogler’s simple but powerful script and Michael B. Jordan’s stellar performance come together to produce a moving, complex portrait of Oscar Grant. Just 22-year-old when he was shot on New Year’s Day in 2009, Grant was a young black man whose legacy had been distilled down to a four-minute YouTube clip of senseless police brutality. But the brilliant, most significant thing about Fruitvale Station is how it expands the news story we thought we knew, presenting Grant not just as a casualty of prejudice but a fully realized human being with hopes, dreams, and flaws just like the rest of us. So while 12 Years A Slave stands an important testament to how far we’ve come, Fruitvale Station is a brilliant reminder of how much farther we have to go. – Zeba Blay
23.) “Nebraska” (directed by: Alexander Payne)
I’ve returned to no film more this year than Alexander Payne’s lovingly quaint yarn, Nebraska. Something about this anamorphic black and white excursion through the barren terrain of Middle America keeps me coming back for more. Perhaps it is Mark Olson’s endearing score, June Squibb’s eccentric performance, or most likely, the father and son relationship at the center of the movie (played by Will Forte and Bruce Dern). The mercurial bond between the two is at once familiar and foreign: a 30-something trying to connect with his aging, alcoholic father who believes he has won a million dollars. Payne (The Descendants, Sideways and Election) has a knack for wringing palatable emotion out of any story he touches. Nebraska is no exception. – Sam Fragoso
22.) “Like Someone in Love” (directed by: Abbas Kiarostami)
What Roger Ebert once said about Robert Altman’s The Long Goodbye applies equally to the work of Abbas Kiarostami, especially his enigmatic latest, Like Someone in Love: “The plot can be summarized in a few words, or endlessly.” In a few words, Kiarostami’s film is about a prostitute assigned to an old client who does not seem to want sex and who becomes a grandfather figure in the young woman’s perception. But to leave it there would be to omit its undulating, fluid character roles and its depiction of lonely strangers accepting the roles foisted upon them by the other in order to feel loved. Quietly funny and unexpectedly frightening, Like Someone in Love is also one of the more forthright demonstrations of Kiarostami’s Bressonian mastery of sound as a tangible property: the opening shot alone is a masterclass in sound editing, and not too shabby a lesson in composition, either. – Jake Cole
21.) “Prisoners” (directed by: Denis Villeneuve)
Prisoners worked. It worked when, perhaps, it shouldn’t have. There are many Hollywood thrillers that try to be clever, but aren’t, and those that are perhaps too clever for their own good. But Prisoners perfectly toes the line of the cerebral and the suspenseful with its labyrinthine plot, its bleak visual atmosphere, and its humming musical score, all wrapped up neatly with a philosophical question: Who are the prisoners, really? It’s the questions of right or wrong that raise the stakes and set Denis Villeneuve’s English-language debut apart from other movies in this genre. The idea of “good” and “bad”, of the fragile duality of our own moral codes, is most effectively explored through the movie’s stellar cast: the refreshingly benign Terrence Howard, the inscrutable Paul Dano, the marvelously calculating Melissa Leo. But it’s Hugh Jackman and Jake Gyllenhaal who really make the movie work, representing the most fascinating opposite poles of ethicality (and acting styles) with their performances. Jackman has an exhausting degree of commitment, in various stages of weeping for about 80% of the movie, while Gyllenhaal is almost masochistically restrained and delightfully idiosyncratic as the detective determined to find Jackman’s missing daughter. Watching them play off each other is one of the main delights of this well-crafted thriller which was, easily, the most deliciously stressful movie of 2013. – Zeba Blay
20.) “All Is Lost” (directed by: J.C. Chandor)
If it wasn’t for a certain space-set 2013 blockbuster, All Is Lost would have been named survival movie of the year. As it stands, writer-director JC Chandor will have to make do with second place, but there could be no finer companion for Alfonso Cuaron’s sci-fi. Like Gravity, All Is Lost is a transcendental single-character experiment about mankind’s arrogant complacency towards nature, foolishly thinking he can conquer it but being proven very, very wrong. All Is Lost is not to be mistaken for a Hollywood star vehicle; on paper, it’s Robert Redford versus the raging sea, but this near-wordless study of perseverance is, in Chandor’s hands, able to take you someplace beyond the cinema entirely. Indelible minimalist imagery, Alex Ebert’s miraculous score and the director’s relentless probing of a monumental Redford result in one of the greatest ever films about man lost at sea. – Brogan Morris
19.) “To the Wonder” (directed by: Terrence Malick)
To the Wonder is another step in Terrence Malick’s evolution as an artist. His progression away from narrative leads to a film so abstract, that it not so much a love story as the love story. Filled with the promise of joy, deep yearnings and continual frustrations, Malick’s romance story is an exploration of all romances. He’s not only interested in how the romance happens, but why we yearn it. It’s Malick’s story at its most abstract and his themes at their most overt. As a visual craftsman and an editor, Malick captures some of the finest sequences of cinema. His use of motion, editing and music continues to present the world as a place of awe and beauty, each film sees the world through eyes gleaming with wonder. Furthermore, his visual reinforcement of his themes remains subtle and magnificent. Capturing the shadow of the earth is not only be a visual spectacle but also one of the most thematically significant moments in the entire film. Some are quick to deride this film as a shadow of Malick’s previous work, but, if anything, it’s the natural conclusion of the themes, narrative sensibilities and aesthetic he’s built over the last four decades. – James Blake Ewing
18.) “The Wind Rises” (directed by: Hayao Miyazaki)
Even when you exclude the fact that Hayao Miyazaki’s WWII-set film may be his last feature, The Wind Rises is in a league all on its own. Transcending the boundaries of both biopics and animated films alike with rich material, gorgeous images, a devastating story, and one of the most powerful thematic interpretations of the passion that comes with creativity, the story of Jiro Horikoshi and his journey from wide-eyed dreamer to war-engineer is a heartbreaking, existentially maddening, astoundingly beautiful and human film. Whether or not Miyazaki truly is retiring, I can’t imagine a more ultimate distillation of the themes and images that make the legendary Japanese animator the master of what he does, even if it is so different from his usual work. As filled with wonder and beauty as The Wind Rises is, it is the first film he’s made in which his trademark innocence dies; and still, the beauty and love that inhabits his films still persists. No matter the cruelty of humans, masterpieces and works of art like Jiro’s planes, Hayao Miyazaki’s films, and the simple love of two humans, all will strive to live forever. The wind is rising, indeed. – Christopher Runyon
17.) “Stories We Tell” (directed by: Sarah Polley)
There isn’t a day that goes by in our life that we don’t tell someone some sort of story. Of course, the nature of these narratives oscillates from intimately personal to extraordinarily universal, impressively profound to endearingly simplistic. No matter, Stories We Tell – Sarah Polley’s ingenious quasi-documentary – illuminates not just our proclivity to tell stories, but just how we tell our stories. Through a series of interviews with family and friends, Polley attempts to uncover a secret her charismatic mother kept with her until her premature death. Personal accounts are gathered by Polley in a sincere, yet meticulously investigative fashion. Naturally, many of the tales told on screen contradict one another, omitting facts and replete with bias. This, very gracefully I may add, speaks to the ephemeral nature of our memories. We share personal stories as if they’re factual retellings of what truly transpired. But our memories are wildly selective, quick to fill in gaps with convenient mythology. What’s not imaginary, however, is just how transcendent and impactful Stories We Tell manages to be. I can only hope Polley’s masterpiece doesn’t get lost in the shuffle – as memories so often do – in years to come. – Sam Fragoso
16.) “Drug War” (directed by: Johnnie To)
Fans of Johnnie To worried that moving from Hong Kong to mainland China would somehow dilute the director’s sensibility. They needn’t have. Drug War is kind of like the bolito in The Counselor – it wraps itself around you and winches ever tighter and tighter, building into a frightening, cataclysmic climax. It’s a meticulous game of chess right up until the board is upended in the most spectacular manner possible. Louis Koo’s Timmy is unquestionably the most loathsome cinematic villain of the year. He’s an unrepentant rat with a superhuman will for self-preservation, dragging everyone in his orbit down with him as he claws against his inexorable slide towards the execution chamber.
The will of the Chinese censors is that cops are the good guys and criminals the bad, with no wiggle room. To takes this idea to heart so fully that it almost inverts. “You’re a drug dealer, I’m a cop. I didn’t betray you, I busted you.” But in the end, it’s really just a cartel against a police state, with all the players caught in the same firestorm, one man stoking the flames in the hopes that it will let him escape. That’s the nature of survival in To’s vision of modern China. – Dan Schindel
15.) “Museum Hours” (directed by Jem Cohen)
“Hey, how about a movie where all of these things are going on?” Jem Cohen muses over his initial ideas for the film, and this simplistic yet charming sentence tells a lot about its creator and creation. With its inviting plethora of lightly connected narrative strings and transitory rambling watching the film analytically seems unjust and inconsequential, but its humbled viewers will try, because Museum Hours will let them through the door and pat their backs, allowing every soul to become lost within the alluring enigma. Its genuine undercurrent is soft enough to impress a feeling of being completely dismantled but leaving no bruises to show from the experience, Anne wonders why people become so suddenly fascinated with people they do not know, and soon the viewer will be wondering the same thing of their relationship with the film itself. It simultaneously feels as if people-watching and being led down a very loosely connected road that won’t lead anywhere in particular, and one doesn’t even want it to. Museum Hours stutters serene unnoticeable incantations to sooth the soul, its ephemeral behavior infinitely seductive, it enamors speedily and the piecing together of its cryptic jigsaw is not something that you even feel the need to do, but you will try. – Matt Hughes
14.) “Leviathan” (directed by: Lucien Castaing-Taylor and Verena Paravel)
Leviathan is one of those movies that fully deserves the description “like nothing else you’ve ever seen”. You’d think that a documentary that’s just about life aboard a fishing vessel would be as far away from that descriptor as you can imagine, but the images and sounds that directors Lucien Castaing-Taylor and Verena Paravel have captured truly are like nothing else you’ve ever experienced. Managing to be both beautiful and horrifying all at once, and with no talking heads or voice over to distract from the pure audiovisual experience of it all, Leviathan absorbs you in its world and keeps you in its choke hold for the entire ninety minutes.
Those visuals and aural tones we witness take what seems to be a slice of life depiction of living at sea and turns it into an existential nightmare. The boat sways back and forth in the water just as much as the severed fish heads that are dumped into the grimy metal bowls of the film. Seagulls hover over the boat not as birds of prey but specters from beyond; angels waiting to pluck us away. That Leviathan can conjure these emotions with such simple material is the true definition of what cinema is capable of. – Christopher Runyon
13.) “Blue is the Warmest Color” (directed by: Abdellatif Kechiche)
The famous sex scene doesn’t quite soar. It fails to overpower us with its explicitness and length, but not because it was directed by a heterosexual man as if it were a close judo match. (That’s actually the best way to go about it.) It doesn’t zing us as intended, I venture, because the two actresses involved are not lesbians. Every caress seems choreographed by an offscreen bullhorn rather than exploding spontaneously from physical chemistry. It’s the emotional chemistry that these two generate all over the rest of the film that make this pivotal scene work in spite of itself. To sweat the sexual verisimilitude (as many have done) is like claiming Hitchcock’s Shadow of a Doubt is no masterpiece because of unconvincing rear projection shots during the denouement. And, yes, Blue is the Warmest Color is easily a masterpiece of the ordinarily PG-13 coming-of-age genre. – Steven Boone
12.) “Short Term 12” (directed by: Destin Cretton)
With such an expansive sea of characters and emotional payoffs bursting forth, it’s a wonder Short Term 12 is only a 96-minute film and not a long-running cable series. Such is the miracle of writer-director Destin Cretton’s impeccably tailored screenplay about a staff of twentysomethings at the titular foster care ward and the at-risk youth under their valiant supervision. Culling from his own experiences working in a similar facility, Cretton captures a kaleidoscope of unpredictability among the handful of foregrounded teens whose often prickly relationships with the staff elucidates the impossibly delicate nature of the job. The supervisors, led by Grace (a ferocious Brie Larson) and Mason (John Gallagher Jr.), are to neither act as friends nor parents to these kids, and despite similarly tumultuous upbringings must strain their affection through a more disciplinary sieve, even under the most unthinkable circumstances. It’s a nimble high-wire act that Cretton, expanding on his 2008 short film of the same name, executes with poise and precision. Short Term 12 weaves an earnestly affecting tapestry that doesn’t for a second drift into schmaltz territory, and is a prime showcase for Larson who gives the performance of her already stellar career. – Jeese Knight
11.) “The World’s End” (directed by: Edgar Wright)
For Gary King, life never got better than one epic night in his hometown of Newton Haven, engaged in a legendary pub crawl that was never completed. In The World’s End, Edgar Wright’s best film to date, Gary takes the same gang of gents back home to try to recapture the glory days of youth. Beyond the alcoholism and the corporate commentary and the robot invasions (quite a potent combination), this is first and foremost a film about growing up. Unlike the leading men in so many American comedies, here is a film that finds comedy and heart in the sad desperation to cling to perpetual adolescence. Any man being honest with himself will find a self-portrait somewhere among the madness– the nostalgia, the regret, the love lost, the vices, the selective memory, and the question of where to find contentment in adulthood. Simon Pegg and Nick Frost have never been better as childhood best friends who have grown far apart, and the script provides Wright with his most snappy dialogue and clever structure yet. It would be an insult to call this one of the best comedies of the year– it’s absolutely one of the best films of the year, regardless of genre. – Russell Hainline
10.) “Gravity” (directed by: Alfonso Cuarón)
No other film in 2013 demanded to be seen in a cinema more than Gravity did. It used the pure scale of a big screen, and the isolation of a dark room not just to dazzle us with effects, but to truly put us in the position of Dr. Ryan Stone. It’s easy to say that it merely succeeds as a technical exercise, but to do so misses one of the film’s key points. Midway through the film, we hear Kowalski express how much he understands Stone’s desire to quit. He sees the peacefulness and control that comes with just lying down and accepting ones fate. It’s a situation that many of us earth find ourselves in time and again – fighting against odds that seem highly stacked against us. In these moments of deep gravity, something can be said for taking control of our fate, and ending things on our own terms. But before we do, we owe it to ourselves to look around – both to the stars in the heavens and the world around us. If we do so and find even one thing worth living for, we owe it to ourselves to try harder, and to fight on. – Ryan McNeil
9.) “Upstream Color” (directed by: Shane Carruth)
Nudging aside the cold and often impenetrable nature of his debut film Primer, Shane Carruth’s Upstream Color successfully operates as pure cinema of the mind, body, and spirit. Allowing us to feel and hear our way through the tangled and jarring narrative structure, Carruth is offering up the melody, but it’s up to the viewer to identify and single out the notes. Playing like some warped configuration of sci-fi, romance, and heist film, Upstream Color works best as a portrait of two people’s embattled quest to heal after trauma. While the brunt of Upstream Color is fairly easy to decipher, Carruth refuses to spoon-feed his audience. Most of the film’s 96 minute run-time is free of dialogue, and while each gorgeous frame carries an intended significance, the film’s plotty landscape was built for repeated viewings and further discoveries. The finite artistry that Carruth wields is predicated upon bursting emotional currents that initially seem out of reach due to the way the film begins. In its purest form, Upstream Color can be viewed as a balancing act of textures and surfaces — the crucial discourse between image and sound to depict a state of pureness within our complex and achingly human world. – Ty Landis
8.) “Frances Ha” (directed by: Noah Baumbach)
As the statistics and critical discussion this past year have made brutally clear, movies are generally not about women. Even rarer are they about a relationship between women, as the ubiquitous Bechdel Test has told us time and time again. So thank God for Frances Ha: so wholly, delightfully, and unapologetically about women. And not in the abstract— it doesn’t set out to make any sweeping feminist statements. It’s a small platonic romance between one smart, creative, goofy woman and her best friend. It’s just a story that happens to be about female people. In this cinematic landscape, that is what you call a revelation. Frances, Greta Gerwig’s effervescent protagonist, is a dancer, and her leaps and twists across New York streets carry us through an odyssey of mid-twenties personal crises. Under Noah Baumbach’s direction and Jennifer Lame’s zippy editing, it’s a movie about personal stagnation that never stops moving. Frances Ha is a bright, breezy call of carpe diem to a generation of wandering postgrads, and an affectionate ode to female friendship. Ahoy, sexy, indeed. – Lauren Wilford
7.) “The Act of Killing” (directed by: Joshua Oppenheimer)
Joshua Oppenheimer’s documentary about former leaders of Indonesian death squads isn’t brilliant just because it sheds light on an oft-ignored chapter in history. What makes it such a one-of-a-kind gem is how it acknowledges the role that movies play in influencing attitudes and worldviews and confronts viewers with the uncomfortable truth that art is powerful, capable of shaping cultural ideas about violence in meaningful, long-lasting ways far beyond what artists might intend.
In chronicling the journey of Anwar Congo and his cohorts to re-construct mass killings in the style of their favorite films, The Act of Killing acts as both a scathing indictment of American popular movies and a celebration of the power of the camera to move and enlighten. They are not the only ones on trial here; it’s the culture, institutions, and yes, cinema that must be interrogated as well. Oppenheimer has produced a mesmerizing, groundbreaking call to action, not just for the government of Indonesia to acknowledge its atrocities, but for people everywhere to become more conscientious about the art they consume and create. It’s the rare masterpiece that manages to have its cake and eat it too, critiquing the role of movies in perpetuating myths about violence while also bringing both its subject and the audience to greater insights about their own propensity for it. After this film, how can we demand movies that present murder as escapist entertainment and still sleep at night? – Andrew Johnson
6.) “Spring Breakers” (directed by: Harmony Korine)
Harmony Korine’s filmography is generally obsessed with the outcasts, adopting their point of view, mannerisms and “freakish” qualities until one can never be sure whether he is condescending to his subjects or empathetic of them. With Spring Breakers, he surveys not the outliers but the heart of contemporary culture, and with this turn toward nominally mainstream filmmaking, he has at last clarified his stance: at once both mockery and love letter and neither. Much as critics (yours truly included) have rushed to discuss what image the film paints of a youth culture weaned on warped images of the American Dream, Spring Breakers is not “about” such things but a simple observation. That holds true even when the film quickly rides off the rails, when the women are revealed to be symbolic of a commodifying culture and when James Franco arrives as the symbol of their own projections. It is a film in which the ephemeral becomes corporeal and the real slips into fantasia, making for Korine’s most beautiful film not only in aesthetic terms but tonal ones as well. – Jake Cole
5.) “The Wolf of Wall Street” (directed by: Martin Scorsese)
So much has been written online about Martin Scorsese’s brilliant new film The Wolf of Wall Street that trying to follow the talented likes of Richard Brody, Glenn Kenny, and Nick Pinkerton in 150 words feels akin to being the guy who has to give a speech after Jordan Belfort at Stratton Oakmont. Still, consider the plea of this penny stock of a blurb: this is Scorsese’s greatest in nearly twenty-five years, from Leonardo DiCaprio’s career-best work to the masterful way the pitch-black satire both entertains us and makes us hurt. Far too much has been made of alleged glorification of the leading character by refusing to show the victims. Seeing as how the victims weren’t present in his life, I’m not sure why anyone would expect them to be present in his film. Besides, does anyone expect a simply-sold message from an artist the likes of Scorsese? From the FBI agent riding the subway to the provocative final shot, Scorsese has the balls to do what far too few cinematic storytellers would dare: tell the truth, simply, and let the audience see in it what they may. I saw hysteria. I saw depression. I saw people I know, including myself. I saw it, and continue to see it, as a landmark achievement in one of the greatest careers the art has ever known. – Russell Hainline
4.) “Inside Llewyn Davis” (directed by: Joel & Ethan Coen)
It’d be a bit redundant, after months of press, to note that Inside Llewyn Davis is a downtrodden picture. Yet nestled behind the snow and the sludge, behind the commercial concerns beating Llewyn down physically and the lost partner tearing him apart spiritually, is a not-at-all-downtrodden treatise focused on why men and women like the Coen brothers create art in the first place. Davis’ passion, we learn, was never cultivated for the sake of making money. Like the brothers themselves, his art is uncompromisingly personal, even as it riffs on past standards and archetypes. He doesn’t forsake ‘audience-friendly’ music for the sake of elitism – he’s simply incapable of playing anything not ripped directly from his soul.
So you see Davis playing ‘Fare Thee Well’ alone, at film’s end, and you know that this performance isn’t for the tip basket. You see it in his flaring lungs, his reddened eyes, and I presume if you could look behind the camera, you’d see that passion in the brothers Coen too. Davis’ music – his art – is not a means to a career. It’s an act of emotional exorcism, of purging the cruelties the life throws at him. Those musical acts are pure catharsis for Davis, as well as for the Coens – and they also form the crux of the strongest set of moving images I was privileged enough to see this year. – Jake Mulligan
3.) “Her” (directed by: Spike Jonze)
There have been times that I’ve cursed Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind for existing, because it created a longing for a cinematic experience that, it seemed, only it could fulfill. Here was a romance that used its slight sci-fi premise about memory erasure to get at the reality of being in relationship in a way that was weird and honest and unlike anything I’d ever seen. The decade after provided us with several entries in this vein of high concept romance— Stranger Than Fiction, Lars and the Real Girl, 500 Days of Summer, Ruby Sparks, 2013’s About Time— all films I enjoy and admire. But it’s hard to cram the nuances of two people opening up to one another in 120 minutes of film, let alone manage a fanciful narrative conceit alongside your lovers. It seemed to me that “Eternal Sunshine” would go untouched in its ability to make viewers feel so much and think so hard about what it is to give your heart to someone.
And then came Her. Spike Jonze’s film about a man who falls in love with his operating system is a tender, human thing. Yes, it’s tuned into the zeitgeist, and it takes on the questions of all those thinkpieces you’ve ever read about connection in the digital age. But it’s also deeply romantic. Scarlett Johansson’s artificially intelligent Samantha may not have a body, but the way that she laughs at the jokes of protagonist Theodore (Joaquin Phoenix) makes us immediately understand how he could fall for a disembodied voice. Jonze deserves commendation, too, for balancing out the script with supporting characters that have stories about love all their own. Her pulls off something brave in letting multiple voices be heard— you don’t walk out knowing exactly what Jonze wanted you to learn. Most wonderfully, it manages to be a movie about a hopeless love that is infused with joy. Wild, hard-won joy. – Lauren Wilford
2.) “12 Years a Slave” (directed by: Steve McQueen)
Steve McQueen’s scathing, angry biopic uses one man’s story of forced servitude to inspect all sides of slavery. He immerses us fully in the daily routine of the slave, from the horrible drudgery of the cotton field to the horrific violence of the overseers and Massas. McQueen keeps his distance; his matter-of-fact depiction forces the audience to supply, and simmer in, its own emotional reaction. 12 Years a Slave dares to have sympathy for the Devil and to wonder about the indirect complicity of a Northern freeman. (Ask yourself: How does Solomon feel about the slave he encounters in the store?)
Solomon Northup’s 1853 account, adapted by John Ridley, is the foundation for a searing view of the systemic, poisonous and profitable institution of forced, free human labor. McQueen elicits superb performances from Chiwetel Ejiofor, Lupita Nyong’o, Michael Fassbender, Alfre Woodard and, in a small but unforgettable role, Adepero Oduye. Nyong’o, in her first role, left me shaken and stunned.
As for the complaints of eye-burning scenes of violence: this is far from the most violent 2013 movie, and the violence is neither extraneous nor gratuitous. This is slavery, people, not a Southern cotillion. Blood will be shed. – Odie Henderson
1.) “Before Midnight” (directed by: Richard Linklater)
The third – and hopefully not final – installment in Richard Linklater’s beloved verbose romantic series, following Before Sunrise (1995) and Before Sunset (2004), exceeds near-impossible expectations by maintaining the incisive truth and microscopic clarity and wit of its predecessors, while introducing a jagged new edge to the enduring romance between Celine (Julie Delpy) and Jesse (Ethan Hawke): reality. Picking up nine years after Sunset’s ambiguous fade-to-black, Jesse and Celine are now together with twin daughters on the tail end of a summer vacation in Greece. Jesse has since spoiled his marriage, thus compromising the time he spends with his now-preteen son, while the ever ambitious and hardworking Celine, now saddled with unexpected motherhood, has halted her career goals.
Initial tensions as a result are jarring, and the big showdown in the hotel room that takes up much of the film’s final half hour has a severe whiplash effect. Since we’ve grown protective over these two, watching them tear into each other so savagely is ugly to witness and vaporizes much of the hope generated by those first two films of a happily-ever-after. This is, after all, a relationship that should not exist. It’s a bizarro-world, sideways-universe coupling that epitomizes the phrase “the grass is greener on the other side”, which it ultimately rebuts. The fact that reality has settled in to this at once idyllic romantic fantasy is inevitable yet crushing. The eternal conflict in the film’s back half isn’t between Jesse and Celine as it may appear, but between reigniting the flame of fantasy and surrendering (or perhaps succumbing) to a resentful reality.
Jesse, now a successful novelist who’s bankrolled on fictionalizing his relationship with Celine, fights to keep the fantasy alive, while Celine is in danger of indulging her diminishing love for him. The way Before Midnight ends may not be as tidy or confident as it seems on first glance, but that’s another reason why Jesse and Celine’s relationship is not only worthy of checking in on every nine years, but essential nourishment for any crusading defender of romance. – Jesse Knight
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20 thoughts on “The 50 Best Movies of 2013”
the moral ambiguity in “Wolf of Wall Street” is summed up well above: “Scorsese has the balls to do what far too few cinematic storytellers would dare: tell the truth, simply, and let the audience see in it what they may.”
and while, NO!! I’m not going to go all Godwin’s law here, the simple fact is this: there are topics out there where “letting the audience see in it what they may,” is really not so good. i probably don’t need to list what those topics are.
I’m trying to understand your comment a bit more. Could you perhaps elaborate?
ok, sure, while I realize you can’t blame Friedrich Nietzche for Otto (in A FISH CALLED WANDA) not understanding Friedrich Nietzche, the truth is I was never that much of a fan of Friedrich Nietzche, and I’m not entirely convinced Scorcese had so fully embraced Nietzchean ideas until this movie. Thrilling for the majority, but it’s ok if it’s not thrilling for everyone.
Really great list of movies. Damn I am behind. I’ve only seen 18 on this list. Glad to see Much Ado About Nothing and What Maise Knew listed here. Loved your thoughts about Wolf Children and The Wind RIses. Need to check those ones out
THE WIND RISES really is something special. I hope it does well when it comes out in February.
I feel proud of the fact that I’ve directed many people to Wolf Children. Such a strange yet lovely film. I love it the more times I rewatch it.
I’m elated it made it on the list. Was worried it would fall through the cracks.
I have also seen 18 of these…
This list was full of percussive comedy, especially the inclusion of “Pacific Rim.” Good job Movie Mezzanine staff!
LET IT GO
CAN’T HOLD IT BACK ANYMOOOORE
(couldn’t resist)
Even though ‘Spring Breakers’ ranks quite high here…I still have no interest in checking it out. I just don’t think it would be my cup of tea. As far as ‘Before Midnight’ goes, I loved the first two in the trilogy because they were fairy tale stories. Once they brought in the crushing reality, I just didn’t want to see them end up that way. While it was a good film, it’s just not how I wanted it to be.
I could see where Before Sunrise was fairy-tale-ish, but Before Sunset has a lot of the same realities that Before Midnight did.
I think that’s exactly why I loved it. Life is hardly ever what we want it to be. It can be trying and difficult, but it can still be unmistakably beautiful–and I think ‘Before Midnight’ captures that in a way not many film’s can (because of the fairy tale set-up in the first two).
Interesting list, nothing that anyone should bemoan really. The key is in the variety, not all of my top 10 made the list, and some films I thought were middling did, but there’s nothing wrong with that. As a representation of the site this list is perfectly fine, so good job on that. I’m also a fan of any best of list that excludes Blackfish, it’s hard to put into words how inept I found that film to be.
I will say though, I’d like to see Jennifer Lee be given the credit she deserves for Frozen. She directed the film right alongside Chris Buck, and from all accounts it’s more her film than it is Buck’s.
Apologies for the error. The correction has been made. Blackfish is pretty awful.
I agree that there is no room for Blackfish on a top 50 list but how dare you call it awful.
This is the best best of 2013 list I’ve read yet (and I’ve read a lot of them). I’m gonna have to clear my schedule way more than I thought before. Great job!
Hey, thank you for the kind words.
I say the bigger the end of the year list, the better. Hard to disagree with any inclusions, and I’m not one to get picky about the comparative places each film has. Most diverse list I’ve seen, thanks a lot.