List: Top Ten Films of the Decade (2010-14)

1. Certified Copy (Abbas Kiarostami)

2. Tabu (Miguel Gomes)

3. Neighboring Sounds (Kleber Mendonca Filho)

4. Museum Hours (Jem Cohen)

5. The Strange Little Cat (Ramon Zurcher)

6. The Illusionist (Sylvain Chomet)

7. A Separation (Asghar Farhadi)

8. Senna (Asif Kapadia)

9. Toy Story 3 (Lee Unkrich)

10. Oslo, August 31st (Joachim Trier)
Honorable mention: The Master (Paul Thomas Anderson)

Pictures: My Top Dozen Favourite 2011 Films

So here it is, finally. My top dozen favourites of 2011. I wanted to dedicate a post to each of the films and write about them in detail, but this has taken long enough (3 months!) and school work never seems to be over. I’ll just go ahead with a small list for now, and hopefully in the future, I’ll get to give some space to each of them separately.

Though I’d like to think that I have a pretty good taste and my favourite film equates the best film, I’m not confident enough in my academic knowledge of cinema to claim such a thing – and generally, I don’t think anyone should be. So what I’ve written here is a list of my favourite films of 2011. A film like Terrence Malick’s Tree of Life, which I respect much more than I love, couldn’t find a place here, for example, because having seen it twice now and despite absolutely,wholeheartedly being floored by its central performance, I can’t say the film as a whole touches me in any way.

There are a few titles I wish I hadn’t missed but as I said, it’s already late March and definitely time to move on to the new year. Ultimately, the entire year can be summarized in 18 films for me. As per tradition – and by that I mean an arbitrary rule I made up just last year – this blog only awards a Top Dozen so as much as it pains me to do so, I’ll have to leave six films off the list. Ask me on a different day and these honourable mentions can swap places with any of the films in the bottom six of my top dozen. No matter the placement, I love all these films and I’ll be going back to them in the future. And if you haven’t had the chance to see any of them yet, I really hope I can encourage you to do so.

Honourable Mentions
Miss Bala (dir. Gerardo Naranjo), Young Adult (dir. Jason Reitman), Weekend (dir. Andrew Haigh), The Skin I Live in (dir. Pedro Almodovar), Attack the Block (dir. Joe Cornish), Tomboy (dir. Celine Sciamma)

12. Moneyball (dir. Miller)

There are rich teams and there are poor teams. Then there’s fifty feet of crap. And then there’s us.

11. Sleeping Beauty (dir. Leigh)

You are very beautiful, very talented. But we are going to make you even more beautiful, even more talented.

Craftsmen: 2011's Best Technical Achievements

Honourable Mentions
Costume Design and Visual Effects of Immortals, Cinematography of Jane Eyre, Production Design of Pa Negre, Editing of Martha Marcy May Marlene, and Production Design of Hugo

12. The effects team behind the Visual Effect of Attack the Block

For compensating for the tight budget with creativity, for creating memorable monsters, and for serving the story without being gimmicky

11. Jacqueline Durran for the Costume Design of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

(also noteworthy: Production Design)
For understanding the intricacy of men’s clothing, for building character from the threads, for conveying the different classes of MI6 agents, and for working beautifully in tandem with the production design team

10. Dana Glauberman for the Editing of Young Adult

For the impeccable comic timing, and for perfectly balancing the laughs with the drama

9. Udo Kramer and Bernhard Henrich for the Production Design of Chicken with Plums

(also noteworthy: Costume Design)
For nailing every aspect of the period in Iran without losing the directors’ playful vision, for using colours and shadows to perfection, and for the broken violin

8. Alberto Iglesias for the Original Score of The Skin I Live In

(also noteworthy: Production Design)
For the thrill in every pulsating moment, for working within the atmosphere to create mood, for the range, and for continuing his collaboration with one of the world’s most exciting directors

7. Robbie Ryan for the Cinematography of Wuthering Heights

For capturing the beauty of a butterfly on the ledge of a window and the mane of a horse in the field, for the intimacy, and for shaping the story with image

6. Hayedeh Safiyari for the Editing of A Separation

For creating a maze without getting lost, for taking the audience right to the edge of discovery and pulling back, and for shaping the narrative and visual structure of the film through her cuts

5. Emmanuel Lubezki for the Cinematography of Tree of Life

(also noteworthy: Visual Effects)
For the picturesque imagery, for capturing the intimacy of a mother’s affection for his son with as much mastery as he does the grandiosity of genesis, and for giving us thousands of postcard perfect images

4. Matthew Newman for the Editing of Drive

(also noteworthy: Costume Design)
For heightening our tension, for releasing that tension with explosive bursts of violence, and for allowing the subtleties of the performances and Gosling’s cool charisma to sink in

3. Gokhan Tiryaki for the Cinematography of Once Upon a Time in Anatolia

For endlessly broadening his range with a limited palette, for continuing to intrigue in the most monotonous locale, and for crafting a beautiful film out of an excruciating lighting exercise

2. Chris King and Gregers Sall for the Editing of Senna

For producing a coherent narrative entirely from existing footage, for transitioning between family videos and racing footage with ease, and for controlling our heartbeats and tear glands at once

1. Manuel Alberto Claro for the Cinematography of Melancholia

(also noteworthy: Visual Effects and Production Design)
For the complexity of the relationship established between scenes, for the thematic significance of every shot, and for the striking beauty of every frame

Previously on Best of 2011

The Documentary Dilemma

Ever since I saw Jose and Pilar, the Portuguese documentary film submitted for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar, I've been wondering whether the voters in that branch have it in them to go there and nominate a documentary. The question's also been on my mind about the editing of Senna - which you might remember is one of my favourite films of the year - and Chris King's chances at getting a nomination in that category. 

I imagine the answer is a no in both cases, but anyway, over at The Film Experience, I've given the academy four suggestions to nominate docuementaries in non-documentary categories, because the more we talk about it, the likelier it is for voters to hear us! Have a read and join the conversation!

Scene from Pina, Germany's submission for best foreign film

Senna

Grade: A

Directed by Asif Kapadia and written by Manish Pandey, Senna tells the story of the eponymous Brazilian Formula One driver who rose to fame in the 1980s and became known as one of the greatest racers of all time, only to have his career abruptly and tragically ended in 1994 because of an accident. Although the material is ripe for a "Greatest Hits" documentary -- one that reviews the milestones in the hero's life chronologically, without engaging with his personality on a deeper level -- Kapadia paints a picture that is energetic, inventive and transcendent.


The filmmaker's approach is a curious one, but it is immensely rewarding. He hasn’t shot any new material for the film. There are no talking heads. Nothing we see here is what we usually get in documentaries of this type. The only new material is the voice-over commentary given by Senna’s contemporaries and his family members. Instead, Kapadia focuses on archival footage of Senna’s life, stretching all the way back to his introduction to Formula One. These images, sometimes even taken from intimate family home videos, serve to familiarize the audience with Senna with more authenticity than any interview could. Building on this close relationship between the audience and the hero, Kapadia breaks a barrier that could have existed for those not interested in racing (myself included).

This is not to say that there’s a shortage of racing footage or that they aren’t riveting enough to give everyone goosebumps. The intense competitive relationship between Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost that is revisited several times and the final encounter between Senna and Michael Schumacher are such a thrill to watch on the big screen. But Kapadia reaches for something beyond these sensational auto-racing thrills. His comprehensive study of Senna’s life allows for an in-depth look into the politics of Formula One and better yet, an emotionally resonant narrative about Senna as a human being, not just a champion. Our familiarity with Senna makes the heartbreaking finale all the more perplexing.

The film’s real ace, in my opinion, is Chris King’s editing. I’m not at all surprised at how masterful he is at creating a coherent narrative from pre-existing footage given that I considered him one of the best editors of 2010 for Exit through the Gift Shop. Here, the task at hand is even grander since there is no Banksy or Shepard Fairey to lead the way. But King nails it again. He knows exactly what order to set the sequences in to control our heartbeat just as easily as our tear glands. He’s smart in gradually cueing us toward the ending without explicitly opening it from the beginning as well.

Sports documentaries rarely aim so high as Senna does. What Kapadia and his team do here is more than a documentary about a champion. Even though they leave the darker details of Senna’s life out of the film, they never fall into sentimentality. They bring Senna’s larger-than-life story to the screen without losing the essence of his life, how important he was to the world of racing and more importantly, to Brazilians. Simply put, Senna is one of the great biographies ever made.