Deviation Actions
), here we go with the MIDDLE ten, essentially the runners-up that didn't QUITE make it into my Top Ten, but which I still loved TONS.Anyways, ONCE AGAIN I present THE DISCLAIMER!!
These are my FAVOURITE movies of 2014, not necessarily the BEST, rated because of how big a an impression they made on me and how much I loved them. So you guys might think I'm nuts with some of my choices, or might think I missed something important. I'd love to hear what you guys think, but as always, please be kind.20. GODZILLA – in 2010, virtual-unknown visual effects artist (Walking With Dinosaurs) Gareth Edwards blew minds with his stunning directorial debut Monsters, which deservedly became a major sleeper hit. Naturally Hollywood grappled to snap him up, giving him an enviable pick of potential projects ... even so, because of his debut’s slow-burn, character-driven nature, this long-awaited remake of the classic Japanese monster movie seemed an odd choice. Thankfully the end result is a perfect progression for Edwards – big, loud and HIGHLY destructive, but also ferociously intelligent with strong, well-rounded characters very much at the forefront. A slow-burn opening revolving around a Japanese nuclear reactor meltdown provides an intriguing, mystery-shrouded jumping-on point to the story, subtly hinting at the true threat of the gargantuan radioactive “MUTO” monsters which eventually break free to wreak havoc around the Pacific. The Big G himself, on the other hand, is here presented more like the heroic “cavalry”, his arrival delayed until it can have maximum impact, driving the collateral and emotional stakes as high as possible so we’re properly invested in the action. Kick-Ass star Aaron Taylor-Johnson is a suitably strong, convincing heroic lead whose consistent placement in the thick of the action never feels contrived, while Breaking Bad’s Bryan Cranston, The Last Samurai’s Ken Watanabe and David Strathairn use sheer charisma to give the exposition some flow; even potentially-token female presence Elizabeth Olsen makes a strong impression as Taylor-Johnson’s gutsy ER-nurse wife. Even so, the real stars are, of course, the monsters themselves, with the insect-like MUTOs proving suitably nasty antagonists, while Godzilla himself cuts an impressively beat-down bruiser figure much more in keeping with his classic man-in-suit visage (genuinely LOOKING the part after the nondescript overgrown dinosaur of the 1998 Hollywood movie). Whenever they meet, we’re treated to some very impressive property damage, the action frequently rivalling a Michael Bay free-for-all, albeit with far more emotional resonance and realistic cost of life, especially in the dust-strewn climax with its evocative HALO-jump opening. Off the back of this, Edwards deserves his new gig directing one of the Star Wars spin-off films, but he’s also promised to return for a sequel to this, and I for one can’t wait.
19. OCULUS – right up front, I’m gonna say that writer/director Mike Flanagan’s follow-up to his ingenious breakthrough indie horror Absentia is THE scariest movie I’ve seen in years. Making great, often inspired use of one of the great staples of haunted house horror, this does for mirrors what Ring did for TVs and videotapes, with a haunted/possessed/take-your-pick looking glass providing the focus of some of the most effective and well-executed scares since The Shining. A pair of traumatised siblings (Doctor Who’s Karen Gillan and rising star Brenton Thwaites) lock themselves in a secluded house with a bunch of digital cameras and a fiendishly rigged “safety” switch to prove that an antique mirror really contains the malevolent force that drove their parents (Rory Cochrane and Battlestar Galactica’s Katee Sackhoff) so insane that they tried to kill them when they were children. Flanagan plays a meticulous game from start to finish, his intricately twisted narrative leapfrogging from past to present and back, sometimes in the same shot, continually wrong-footing the viewer and tightening the thumbscrews while delivering some truly devastating shocks, jumps and skin-crawling chills. He’s aided by a small but uniformly exceptional cast – Gillan is wonderfully complex throughout, driven to obsessed extremes by her search for the truth, while Thwaites is a revelation, admirably crumbling as he tries to stay rational after years of therapy; Sackhoff cuts a thoroughly tragic figure as she visibly unravels, and Cochrane freezes the blood as he descends into quietly murderous madness, a loving father transformed into a brutal monster; meanwhile the newcomers playing the siblings as children are both excellent, Annalise Basso particularly stunning as a young Gillan. Smart, insidious and nightmarish right up to its shocking climax, this is one of the strongest horrors to come along for years, and EASILY my horror movie of 2014.
18. SIN CITY: A DAME TO KILL FOR – WAY back in 2005, Frank Miller broke into the Hollywood mainstream he’d flirted with for years (most notably on his heavily-rewritten screenplays for Robocop 2 and 3) when he co-wrote/directed an epic crime-saga based on his own popular comic book series with the great Robert Rodriguez. The result was a tour-de-force of startling visual style and brutally bloody substance that’s often been copied but rarely equalled; meanwhile fans have been crying out for the much-deserved sequel, but the wait has been interminable. Of course it was also pretty necessary (while the central story of the title comes from one of the best books in the series, the other two main tales interwoven here are completely new, original pieces Miller penned expressly for the film), and entirely worthwhile – the new material is as strong and evocative as everything Miller’s presented before, while the central story itself was always one of the strongest Sin City tales, and the writer/directors have adapted it with characteristic flair and panache. All the old, familiar faces are here (even if some of them have had some recasting-based ‘lifts) – Mickey Rourke’s show-stealing force-of-nature Marv is back with a vengeance, while Josh Brolin does an admirable job taking over from Clive Owen as we’re treated to the compelling origin story of fugitive killer Dwight McCarthy, and Jessica Alba gets her best role in years as wronged stripper Nancy deals with the fallout at the end of the first movie and the death of her beloved saviour Hartigan (Bruce Willis); meanwhile saga newcomers make equally strong impressions, with The Dark Knight Rises star Joseph Gordon Levitt as cocky professional gambler Johnny, out to fleece Basin City big bad Senator Roark (a ferocious turn from Powers Boothe), and Eva Green completely steals the film as the ultimate femme fatale, Ava Lord, the venomous Dame of the title. The CGI has advanced in leaps and bounds since the original (it’s astonishing to think that NONE of the film’s environments actually exist outside a computer), the costumes and production design are sumptuous throughout and effortlessly evoke the pages of the comic, and the action sequences are staged with gruesome gusto. Bloodthirsty, ballsy and sexy as hell, this is every inch the sequel we’ve been hoping for ... let’s just hope we won’t have to wait so long for the next one. After all, there’s still plenty of books left to adapt.
17. ONLY LOVERS LEFT ALIVE – I am a BIG Jim Jarmusch fan – his best work, Ghost Dog: Way of the Samurai, is one of my ALL TIME favourite movies (and HANDS DOWN the epitome of cinematic COOL), while his super-quirky arthouse western Dead Man is my favourite thing Johnny Depp’s ever done, so I was already looking forward to this LONG before it finally arrived. Thankfully the end result is as strong as Jarmusch’s previous best features, as well as one of the most unusual vampire movies around, revolving around an irresistible central concept – two lovers who have been around for thousands of years, and what their lives would REALLY be like after so long. Tilda Swinton and Tom Hiddleston are Adam and Eve, two perfect gothic specimens who are as much in love now as when they first got together, but the years are REALLY taking their toll. Adam’s finding it hard to stick around (he’s even invested in a wooden bullet, just in case), rambling around a rundown Detroit townhouse and creating experimental rock music for the hell of it, so Eve returns from an extended sojourn in the Middle East to try and cheer him up. Then things go all pear-shaped when Eve’s unwelcome little “sister” Ava (Stoker’s Mia Wasikowska) turns up unexpectedly with a serious hunger ... as usual with Jarmusch while there IS a plot in there somewhere, it’s secondary to the far more important business of exploring the characters and the world they inhabit, and as usual it’s a very rich, intricately crafted one indeed. There’s great pleasure to be had in the rambling, quirky and frequently funny tangential conversations and observations about metaphysics, the nature of existence, dead poets and writers and old, beautiful art, music and culture, while the director still has his typically masterful eye for visual composition, exquisite soundscapes and off-kilter character beats. The cast is uniformly excellent, Swinton and Hiddleston effortlessly holding the screen and making us fall in love with them even when they’re at their most alien, while Wasikowska, Star Trek’s Anton Yelchin and John Hurt, as fellow vampire Kit, all provide memorable support. Achingly beautiful, thoroughly memorable and very odd, then – this is the COOLEST thing I saw in 2014. Which makes it a quintessential Jim Jarmusch movie, I guess.
16. THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN 2 – 2012’s franchise reboot may not have been the most welcome idea, but it can’t be denied that aptly-named director Marc Webb’s first Spider-feature was a resounding success, both commercially and critically. It certainly clicked with me – while a big fan of Sam Raimi’s cracking “original” trilogy (at least the first two), I really responded to Webb’s darker, grittier Ultimate Spider-Man comics-inspired take, so I eagerly looked forward to more. This follow-up has clearly divided audiences and critics alike, becoming a bona-fide “marmite” superhero movie, but I’m very much in the like category – this is a much stronger film than its predecessor, and now that we’ve got the tricky origin story business out of the way, Webb and co. get to do the fun stuff. Namely exploring the world of now-graduated New York teen superhero Peter Parker (The Social Network’s Andrew Garfield, as awkward, geeky and smart-mouthed as ever) while delving into the unanswered questions surrounding his parents’ mysterious deaths. Meanwhile he also has to contend with a brand new villain, lightning-throwing, power-absorbing industrial-accident-on-legs Electro (Jamie Foxx, one complex bundle of obsessive neuroses funnelled into an apocalyptic force of nature), as well as Oscorp heir and Peter’s former childhood friend Harry Osborne (Chronicle’s Dane Dehaan, further mining his talent for wounded, deeply-troubled potential megalomaniacs), who’s suffering from the same retrovirus that crippled his late father and convinced that Spider-Man’s blood holds the key to his cure. Like its predecessor this is breathless fun, an enjoyable mix of skilfully staged big budget acrobatic thrills and stunning visuals, smartly observed character beats and a hefty dollop of teenage (and grown-up) angst, all tempered with a healthy edge of good-natured humour. Sure, Marvel’s more established film franchises may have ruled the roost throughout 2014, but this was still a strong contribution to their continued conquest of the big screen, and made plenty of promise for the promised follow-up. Roll on part three, I’m definitely in.
15. THE HOBBIT: THE BATTLE OF THE FIVE ARMIES – it’s safe to say that, in splitting his Hobbit adaptation into THREE parts, Peter Jackson put himself in a very difficult position when it came to this final instalment in the makeshift trilogy. The Desolation of Smaug was a hell of a benchmark, particularly with its all-conquering barrel-ride centrepiece and that dragon-heavy last act – having blown most of his Smaug-shaped wad in the last movie, Jackson could well have turned the final film into one long anticlimax. Indeed, TBOTFA’s opening sequence – jumping STRAIGHT INTO the thunderous burning of Laketown and Bard’s heroic slaying of Benedict Cumberbatch’s big bad dragon – is such a spectacular set-piece that it does come close to eclipsing everything that follows ... thankfully Jackson’s still on top form here, so once the last film’s baggage has been dealt with we move onto the potent emotional business as Thorin Oakenshield (Richard Armitage) succumbs to “dragon sickness”, the corrupting allure of Smaug’s golden horde turning him against his friends. Not to mention setting up the mother of all Middle Earth battles, as elf lord Thranduil (Pushing Daisies’ Lee Pace) leads his army to Erebor with conquest on his mind, newly-crowned “king” of men Bard (Luke Evans, the saga’s latest heroic heartthrob and Viggo’s strongest competition to date) seeks to reclaim what his people have lost now the dragon’s dead, and the monstrous Orc armies, led by Manu Bennet’s brutal Azog the Defiler, swoop in to start a fresh assault for Sauron. The resulting ruck, after a suitably tense build-up, is an epic affair, bringing to mind the drawn-out, multi-pronged climax of (Jackson’s obvious blueprint) Return of the Jedi, and certainly equalling the heights of LOTR closer Return of the King in both intensity and digital splendour. Of course, as with its predecessors this is, thankfully, not all action with no deeper substance – as always, Jackson and co-writers Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens have kept the story and characters strong, bolstered by the uniformly excellent cast. Martin Freeman brings Bilbo Baggin’s heroic journey full circle, while Armitage gets to really flex his broody acting muscles as he takes Thorin all the way to the dark side, and the addition of the unlikely courtship between dwarf warrior Kili (Aiden Turner) and elf archer Tauriel (Evangeline Lilly) adds a much-needed frisson of star-crossed love to the proceedings. Okay, this is certainly going to get the goat of many Tolkien purists, given Jackson’s decidedly cavalier attitude to the faithfulness of his adaptation, but many of the departures from the text here add a real element of danger and uncertainty to the action, as well as setting up a suitably tragic, powerful climax. Ultimately this trilogy will always remain the lesser companion to The Lord of the Rings, but overall it’s still a compelling saga of which Peter Jackson should still be rightly proud. Certainly George Lucas should take notes ... 
14. FURY – I love a good war movie, me, and no historical conflict has so consistently drawn my attention as the Second World War, but while there’s been a lot of really great films about that particular struggle over the years, one particularly fascinating aspect has, by and large, been criminally ignored – tank combat (one of the only real notable exceptions being the excellent Clint Eastwood vehicle Kelly’s Heroes). The latest feature from Hollywood hot property writer turned talent-to-watch director David Ayer (Training Day, Dark Blue, Street Kings, End of Watch) goes a long way to redressing the balance, as well as signalling a significant step away from his usual comfort zone of corrupt cops and drug dealers in Los Angeles. Set in the closing days of the war in Europe, Fury revolves almost entirely around the (mis)adventures of the Allied Sherman tank crew under the command of hardboiled sergeant “Wardaddy” (Brad Pitt), facing fearful odds and dwindling allies as they face the ferocious last-stand of Hitler’s SS. Into their midst comes last minute replacement assistant tank driver Norman Ellison (Percy Jackson’s Logan Lerman), an army clerk who’s never even seen the inside of a tank – he’s terrified, seriously out of his depth and completely unprepared for the gruelling knife’s-edge life of the tank corps, especially under Wardaddy’s uncompromising, fight-or-die command. This is definitely not a film for the faint-of-heart, an intense “war is hell” allegory to rival Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket – particularly polarised by a scene in which Norman is physically forced to shoot an unarmed German prisoner in cold blood – but there’s great rewards to those who can stomach it. Violent as they are, the set-pieces are consistently spectacular, white-knuckled works of visceral art (especially the thrilling third-act tank battle and all-in climactic crossroads showdown against an entire company of German infantry), while the tank crew are one complex band of brothers – far from being a cardboard cut-out recreation of “Aldo the Apache”, Pitt’s Wardaddy has a tragically poetic soul under his battle-scarred shell, sowing the seeds for a powerful, heroic last-stand; Lerman, meanwhile, adds some much needed morality to proceedings, Jon Bernthal redeems his seemingly unrepentant redneck brute Travis in one seemingly throwaway but nonetheless deeply affecting scene, and Shia LaBeouf delivers the finest performance of his career as “Bible”, the burned out “soul” of the crew. Challenging, uncompromising and thoroughly unforgettable, this is the masterpiece Ayer’s fans have been waiting for him to deliver, and, without a shadow of a doubt, the best war movie since The Hurt Locker.
13. THE MAZE RUNNER – another year, another raft of Young Adult movies, but while The Hunger Games still rules the roost both in the bookshops and the box office, debuting director Wes Ball’s adaptation of the first novel in James Dashner’s YA trilogy is the strongest screen challenge Katniss and co have had to date. It jumps right into the thick of the action with a killer concept – teenage amnesiac Thomas (Dylan O’Brien) wakes up in an industrial lift that surfaces in a mysterious wooded glade at the heart of a vast concrete labyrinth, the latest in a long string of boys who have been sent up to live a Lord of the Flies style existence while a gang of “maze runners” attempt to find a way out of the maze they’re trapped in. Worse, every night the gates close, sealing the glade off, and no-one who’s been trapped outside has ever survived a night in the maze. This is an incredible stripped-down, anything-can-happen action adventure, effortlessly passing beyond its YA roots to become one of the strongest pure-science fiction offerings of 2014, the fascinating central premise opening up some intriguing possibilities that Ball does a fine job of exploring. O’Brien makes for a strapping yet vulnerable hero as irrepressibly curious troublemaker Thomas, butting heads with Will Poulter’s self-appointed “peacekeeper” Gally, while Skins star Kaya Scodelario impresses as late-arrival (and the glade’s first ever girl) Teresa, displaying a welcome lack of simpering love-interest status. There’s a strong atmosphere of pervading threat throughout the film, the harrowing sequences involving the maze’s monstrous “grievers” (seriously nasty giant cyborg spiders) are super-tense, and the ever-changing maze itself makes for a compelling villain all on its own. Visually arresting, endlessly inventive and thoroughly thought-provoking, this is one hell of a boy’s-own action adventure and a surprisingly grown-up chunk of sci-fi – this more than delivers on the promise of its premise, and with two more novels still to adapt it has strong potential for the post Hunger Games future. I look forward to The Scorch Trials with great interest ...
12. THE GUEST – in 2013, director Adam Wingard wowed horror fans with his edgy home invasion slash-and-stalker You’re Next, a tour-de-force exercise of slow-burn atmospherics and thumbscrew-twisting terror. His follow-up with screenwriter Simon Barrett is, on the surface, a rather different beast, but scratch under the surface and you’ll find some suitably twisted common ground. 
Downton Abbey star Dan Stevens demolishes his sweet, posh-boy image in one fell swoop as Afghanistan War veteran David, who pitches up at the small middle American home of a fallen comrade to offer his condolences, subtly worming his way into the heart of the grieving, fractured family unit as he charms the shell-shocked mum (Sheila Kelly), intrigues the impressionable daughter (The Bling Ring’s Maika Monroe) and mentors the shy, ill-at-ease son (Brendan Meyer) on the merits of standing up for himself against a pack of boorish high school bullies. On the outside David’s all cool charm and spectacular sculpted abs, but as the story unfolds and the tension ratchets up it becomes clear that there’s something seriously, DEEPLY wrong with him ... this is an enjoyably old fashioned movie in many ways, Wingard paying breathless homage to the psychodrama exploitation potboilers of the early 80s (the Carpenter-esque vibe is strengthened by a deliciously spiky electronic score), while there’s a welcome streak of jet black humour throughout that spices the sudden jolts of shocking violence. As psycho thrillers go this is a real winner, and an impressive offering from one of the most promising new horror-making double-acts going. I could call this my guilty pleasure of 2014 if it wasn’t such a damn good film ... 
11. WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS – I could have called THIS my horror movie of 2014 if it wasn’t so unapologetically a COMEDY – Flight of the Conchords creators Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi’s fiendish mockumentary could well be considered this generation’s This is Spinal Tap, not least because it eschews washed-up rock stars to rip the piss out of Twilight and its ilk as a documentary crew is granted access to a household of New Zealand-resident vampires. The housemates are a brilliantly realised bunch – Waititi and Clement are both pitch perfect as super-nerdy, neurotic fop Viago and world-weary, laconic Dracula-homage Vladislav (aka “Vlad the Poker”), while Jonathan Bugh consistently steals the film as swarthy, “sexy” Lestat-nod Deacon – who gallivant around downtown Wellington looking for virgins and trying to get invited into nightclubs, while Nosferatu-style ancient Petyr (Ben Fransham) skulks about in the cellar and chows down on chickens. Then one of their intended victims, cocky hipster Nick (Cori Gonzalez-Macuer), is vampirized by mistake, and their seemingly perfect eternal existence gets turned on its head. The word hilarious doesn’t do this justice – it’s a consistently side-splittingly funny movie, the gag hit rate one of the highest I’ve ever seen, the comedy ranging from jet black and bitingly (ahem) satirical to broad slapstick and simply bizarre, and many of the skits and in-jokes are simply INSPIRED (for example Deacon’s “sexy” dance, or the brilliantly nerdy pack of local werewolves, led by Conchords co-star Rhys Darby – “we’re werewolves, not swear-wolves” – or Vlad demanding his friends leave him alone to do his “dark bidding” ... on eBay ). But there’s also a surprising amount of heart and soul here, with moments of real heart-wrenching pathos, albeit always cut with a healthy dose of funny, and it has great fun in subverting/downright SHREDDING the old vampire movie clichés, the kind that can only be achieved by filmmakers who clearly GENUINELY LOVE the genre – if ever there was a movie that could erase the memory of Twilight, it’s this one. The best horror comedy I’ve seen in years then, and just about the funniest thing I saw in 2014 – thoroughly deserving of some SERIOUS cult status.
Thank God I managed it in spite of my browser being a massive f£$%ing pig tonight ... literally have a matter of MINUTES to get this posted, so here we go. OBVIOUSLY if you've read this BEFORE you read Part 1 you're nuts ... please go HERE and read it properly:
2014 in Movies - My Top 30 (Part 1)So it's finally here (and as usual, it's about a WEEK lateSo as usual I'm gonna be posting it in THREE parts. And so, of course, here we go with the LOWER ten - not the BEST movies of the past year, but every single one a cracker which I can't recommend enough. So the half dozen people who usually read these things should, hopefully, feel at least REASONABLY inspired to check out some of the underdogs, yeah?
AAAAAAANYWAYS, as usual I present THE DISCLAIMER!! Basically, this is all MY OWN point of view, these aren't necessarily the BEST movies I saw, just the ones I loved the most and that made the biggest impression on me. I'd love to hear other folks' opinions on what they think about my choic
... in the meantime, I'll try to have the final part, the all-important TOP TEN, up by this time(ish) tomorrow. Meanwhile enjoy, okay?
Yup, here we go - Part 2 is up now too:
2014 in Movies - My Top 30 (Part 3)And so we come to the end of my gigantic and thoroughly indulgent rundown to all my favourite movies of 2014 - the all-important TOP TEN!! These are, of course, the absolute pinnacle of the movies that I loved over the past year, the ones that made it all bearable, the ones that were just the epitome of pure awesome in the cinema for me. Of course ...
One last time, I must, of course, present THE DISCLAIMER!! (Dun-dun-duuuuuuuuunnn!
10. DAWN OF THE PLANET OF THE APES – back in 2011, relative unknown director Rupert Wyatt (The Escapist) create
