With the Oscars happening tonight, I figured now is the last possible time it's even the slightest bit acceptable to release a top ten list of 2012 movies. Considering the tremendous amount of movies that were only released the last couple weeks of the year, it took me a bit to catch an acceptable amount. From there, I also re-watched a lot of them while I tried finalizing this list. So here I am - close to 3 months after 2012 has ended, but I think I'm finally ready. Of course I didn't get to see EVERY movie that came out last year, but I did see more than a normal human being ever should. Also for what it's worth, I'm not saying these are the ten best made movies, but rather these are the ten I personally loved and related to the most.
10. Les Miserables
I almost didn't include this one on my list, because I guess I'm slightly embarrassed that I enjoyed this one nearly as much as I did. But I wouldn't be being true or honest with myself in any capacity if I didn't. The truth is this movie made me hysterically cry multiple times. I'm talking shameless, inconsolable tears. I've heard complaints about the singing, but honestly I think all that is bullshit - the raw emotion you get from every song magnified every song by like 8000x. I wouldn't call this movie completely perfect, but I definitely found myself continually thinking about it days after I'd watched the movie and I most definitely annoyed the shit out of my landlords for weeks performing my own emotionally charged renditions of the soundtrack.
9. The Master
PT Anderson is one of my all time favorite directors, so I was extremely excited to see this one. Boogie Nights and There Will Be Blood are pretty huge exampels of exactly what I look for in a movie. For starters, this was one of the most gorgeous movies of the year - just absolutely mesmerizing to look at it. But even more so were the performances. Philip Seymour Hoffman is amazing outstanding, but specifically Joaquin Phoenix gave what was my favorite performance of the year. It's really something that needs to be witnessed, and it's pretty unreal.
8. Paranorman
This was so surprising for me. I guess I'm always slightly biased towards animated movies, which is dumb. But this may be my favorite one ever. This movie had everything: gorgeous animation, I thought it was hysterical, had nice throwbacks to vintage horror, and was actually at times terrifying. I love movies that center on lonely characters, and this one was really sad and sweet. For reference, I saw this and Frankenweenie close to the same time - and thought Paranorman blew Frankenweenie out of the water.
7. Oslo, August 31
I put an active effort into watching more movies from different countries this year, and I'd say my favorite I stumbled upon was Oslo, August 31. I guess what made this movie so interesting to me was the tremendous amount of suspense and unease built around the main character. The movie follows one guy on this one day, and asks if relapse is really the issue, or if any of it is even worth it all? I've seen a lot of movies attempt this format and it's more often than not, a boring mess - this was just a wildly successful attempt. The Catcher in the Rye is my all-time favorite book, and I think I connected to this movie as much as I did because of how much Holden Caulfield I saw the central character.
6. The Cabin in the Woods
I absolutely love the horror genre. When done right, it's probably my favorite. But that's the thing - it's rarely ever done right. I'm incredibly picky with horror, so this movie was such a delight. It's not *really* a horror movie, but rather it deconstructs the genre with what originally feels like a dumb slasher movie, and then launches into this elaborate horror plot in which the end result decides the fate of the world. It's genius, and fantastic, and original. The last half hour is such an amazingly chaotic sequence - if you appreciate horror or even movies in general, it's definitely worth seeking out.
5. Seven Psychopaths
I'm not even sure what to say about this one - it was just such a thoroughly entertaining movie from start to finish. It's essentially fueled by tremendous performances from Colin Farrell, Sam Rockwell, Woody Harrelson, and Christopher Walken - and it's truly impossible to tell who was best, they were all so incredible. Even Colin Farrell, it's hard playing the straight man against such big and bizarre characters, and he was great. This movie constantly skates the line between movie and reality, and pretty effortlessly at that. The format of this movie is incredibly easy to screw up, but taking the right chances in the right places made this one of the best of the year.
4. Looper
How absolutely amazing was the first half of this movie? I swear, if it had kept up the momentum that the first hour had - this probably would have been the best movie of the year. But it didn't, so it's not. I wasn't totally fond of the Emily Blunt half (that's not to say I didn't still enjoy it, I really did), and I also believe the movie used a couple different conflicting theories of time travel - but I'm not gonna get into all that. For now let's just talk about the good stuff, and there was a lot in this one. Such an original and amazing world, stunning visuals, and minimal CGI - which I was a huge fan of. JGL being Bruce Willis was fantastic. The sequences were outstanding and some were downright terrifying. All in all just an absolutely outstanding sci-fi movie.
3. The Perks of Being a Wallflower
This one came as a huge shock to me. It's so rare that a movie can properly articulate the way you feel as a teenager - when you're not really sure who you are or who you want to be or who you can even really relate to. How lonely and terrifying it can be. The author of the book also made this movie, and it's insanely obvious exactly how much thought he clearly put into how he wanted that transition to go. I thought the pacing on this movie was flawless, many big things could be explained in a 3 second shot. I hadn't really noticed this movie being mentioned practically at all in many year-end wrap-ups, and it kind of bothered me because it was absolutely fantastic. It made me laugh, cry, and feel infinite.
2. Django Unchained
Oh my god, I had a huge smile on my face from frame one. At this point I'm not sure I'll ever get tired of the Tarantino revenge sagas. This one was my favorite since the first Kill Bill, with such a tremendous cast and packed with so much action - it's incredible to not be bored at all during an almost three hour movie. The last couple years I've grown a huge fondness for spaghetti westerns, and this was such a fantastic nod to that genre. Just a thoroughly entertaining movie from start to finish.
1. Moonrise Kingdom
I have been anticipating this movie long before I even was aware of its existence. That being said, in my mind it had a tremendous amount to live up to and somehow managed to exceed my absurd expectations. In my opinion, this is Wes's best since The Royal Tenenbaums, which for me is a perfect movie. This one may very well be his masterpiece. It's as if he combined the greatest elements of all his films in one giant perfect superfilm. There's just something indescribable about these worlds Wes Anderson is able to create, there's really nothing else like them. There's such incredible detail to every facet and every person involved, and they always have a perfectly nostalgic soundtrack set to them. This movie was truly better than anything I could have imagined and was more than worth the wait.
A lot of movies were also absolutely fantastic and missed my list by only a small margin, some of these include but are not limited to:
Life of Pi
Holy Motors
Rust and Bone
Skyfall
The Dark Knight Rises
Dredd
Amour
Bernie
Killing Them Softly
Goon
Safety Not Guaranteed
Celeste and Jesse Forever
Argo
Pitch Perfect
21 Jump Street
Tim and Eric's Billion Dollar Movie
In conclusion, I thought 2012 was an overall incredible year for movies. I'd love to hear your opinions on any of these, and also suggestions of some of your favorites I may have missed. I guess now we have nothing left to do watch the Oscars and be incredibly disappointed, same as every year!
