Empire's 50 Best Films of 2014

e_e

MisterAnarchy wrote: »

How does one find the "right" movies because that seems to be the hardest problem now.

Listen to movie podcasts (I highly recommend Filmspotting), check out sites like Letterboxd and find a critic who has a similar taste to you (not just one that reviews multiplex stuff either). Also I'm not sure if you're near an arthouse/independent cinema but I find that there's almost always something very interesting playing there.

But I've truly never had a problem finding good stuff. I managed to see at least 100 new releases this year alone and can safely say that I enjoyed the majority of them.

Dirty Steve

e_e wrote: »

hmmmmmmmm

While Under the Skin might have had some nice visual aspects to it, as a whole it's not a very good film.

I like my films to have actual story lines; but that's just me...

e_e

Under the Skin had a story line, it just wasn't the film's primary focus.

My post wasn't about what you thought of the film though, it was about calling it "standard fare". Love it or hate it it certainly stood apart in terms of the year's movies and doesn't belong in the same conversation as film's that play it safe and aim for the middle ground. It's a film that dared to alienate a good number of people who saw it and good on it for that imo. It was a really risky, strange, challenging and rewarding film for me. A lot of year end lists are commending it for that too.

MakeEmLaugh

Admittedly, there's a lot of films I meant to catch up with this year but didn't (Stranger by the Lake, Ida, Mr Turner, Leviathan) but of the over 30 released that I did see, many didn't live up to expectations.

Maps to the Stars left me cold. Calvary was one of the worst films I've seen in years.

Such was the dearth of quality films this year, decent but unremarkable films like Nightcrawler and Her are being exceedingly overpraised.

As for mainstream Hollywood cinema... The Lego Movie, Guardians of the Galaxy, A Million Ways to Die in the West, X Men: Days of Future Past. They varied from watchable to dreadful.

There were some exceptions. The Wolf of Wall Street was Scorsese's best in a decade and a half, capturing the frenetic energy of a Goodfellas (I thoroughly enjoyed The Departed, but as it was a remake, most of the heavy lifting had already been done by Andrew Lau). 12 Years a Slave was excellent (though probably my least favourite of Steve McQueen's films so far). Boyhood was a fascinating experiment. Under the Skin was hypnotic.

Here is my Top 10 of the films released in the UK/Ireland this year.

1. The Wolf of Wall Street
2. 12 Years a Slave
3. Boyhood
4. Under the Skin
5. Inside Llewyn Davis
6. Starred Up
7. Interstellar
8. 20 Feet From Stardom
9. The Grand Budapest Hotel
10. Tim's Vermeer

e_e

Ha if anything to me Her and Nightcrawler were among the best and Wolf of Wall Street was the most absurdly overrated. Even watched it twice but it was just a load of noise signifying nothing. Nightcrawler did a similar scumbag character but was just so much more focused and thematically resonant imo.

Warper

Predictable safe list tbh

Anyone who thinks that it was a bad year for cinema obviously has no inclination to look beyond whatever the local cineplex is playing, and saying that all I can think is just how many indie or "art house" (I hate that term) films played across the country. I have a list of films released in the past year that I want to see and atm there's 78 titles on it, they include 71, The Homesman, Life or Riley, Stranger by the Lake, Force Majeure, Like Father, Like Son, We Are the Best, Norte the End of History, The Blue Room, The Dance of Reality, Boyhood, Dead Snow 2, The Crossing, Mr. X, Wetlands, Die geliebten Schwestern and so on. It has been a fantastic year for cinema and anyone judging the year based on whatever Empire recommends is doing themselves a disservice.

Beefy78

No love for 'Next Goal Wins' on here?

Telecaster58

My list of the 10 best films of 2014 necessarily takes in a few that pre-date the year owing to the lag between release and eventually getting here. These were all films I saw on the big screen this year.

Grand Budapest Hotel
Metro Manila
Nebraska
God's Pocket
The Past
Nightcrawler
The Babadook
The Golden Dream
Ida
Whiplash

MakeEmLaugh

Deleted User wrote: »

Anyone who thinks that it was a bad year for cinema obviously has no inclination to look beyond whatever the local cineplex is playing, and saying that all I can think is just how many indie or "art house" (I hate that term) films played across the country.

I have a list of films released in the past year that I want to see and atm there's 78 titles on it, they include 71, The Homesman, Life or Riley, Stranger by the Lake, Force Majeure, Like Father, Like Son, We Are the Best, Norte the End of History, The Blue Room, The Dance of Reality, Boyhood, Dead Snow 2, The Crossing, Mr. X, Wetlands, Die geliebten Schwestern and so on.

It has been a fantastic year for cinema and anyone judging the year based on whatever Empire recommends is doing themselves a disservice.

So, wait, you haven't actually seen any of the films you listed, and you're using them as evidence that it has been a fanstastic year for cinema?!

johnny_ultimate

MakeEmLaugh wrote: »

So, wait, you haven't actually seen any of the films you listed, and you're using them as evidence that it has been a fanstastic year for cinema?!

By the same extent...

MakeEmLaugh wrote: »

Admittedly, there's a lot of films I meant to catch up with this year but didn't (Stranger by the Lake, Ida, Mr Turner, Leviathan) but of the over 30 released that I did see, many didn't live up to expectations.

Such was the dearth of quality films this year, decent but unremarkable films like Nightcrawler and Her are being exceedingly overpraised.

MakeEmLaugh

MakeEmLaugh wrote: »

So, wait, you haven't actually seen any of the films you listed, and you're using them as evidence that it has been a fanstastic year for cinema?!

I'm using them as evidence of the diverse range of films on offer this year. While I have 78 films from this year I want to watch I've also seen a considerable number and the range of films has been staggering. We live at a time when access to cinema from around the world is just a few clicks away, services like VOD have made it easy to watch the best the world has to offer and as such saying its been a bad year for film is nonsense. We've never had it this good and it's improving each year.

MakeEmLaugh

MakeEmLaugh wrote: »

Here is my Top 10 of the films released in the UK/Ireland this year.

1. The Wolf of Wall Street
2. 12 Years a Slave
3. Boyhood
4. Under the Skin
5. Inside Llewyn Davis
6. Starred Up
7. Interstellar
8. 20 Feet From Stardom
9. The Grand Budapest Hotel
10. Tim's Vermeer

I'll have to amend this to include Blue Ruin somewhere. I watched it today on US Netflix.

Very good thriller, funded by Kickstarter, I believe. A fine example of what that website can achieve.

No real stars of note (unless you count Devin Ratray - aka Buzz from Home Alone) but great adherence to the principle Chekhov's gun.

There was also a bit of deus ex machina I could've done without (reminding me of Eli Wallach's great line from The Good, the Bad and the Ugly - "When you have to shoot, shoot. Don't talk).

OldeCinemaSoz

Just watching the excellent KINGS SPEECH on the telly at the mo
and just putting in ME TUPPENCE WORTH in...

just shading it is UNDER THE SKIN.
then the very excellent FILTH.
then up there is NEBRASKA.

there's others but those are in my top three.

Not a bad year for films if I may say.

cloud493

I didn't know whiplash was out yet.
I wasn't a fan of the kings speech, off topic

MakeEmLaugh

OldeCinemaSoz wrote: »

just shading it is UNDER THE SKIN.
then the very excellent FILTH.
then up there is NEBRASKA.

there's others but those are in my top three.

Not a bad year for films if I may say.

Only one of those films was released this year.

e_e

cloud493 wrote: »

I didn't know whiplash was out yet.
I wasn't a fan of the kings speech, off topic

Not out until January technically, but it's had a few previews here.

cloud493

Ah ok, lucky people

Technically her and wolf of wall street are 2013 so.

e_e

Yeah as one of the lucky few I can say it was great.

Ping Chow Chi

My ratings for the year will go as follows (only seen 6 films)

1.The Imitation Game
2.Winter Soldier
3.GoTG
4.American Hustle (Ive not seen the last 15 minutes, the plane journey finished before the end of the film!)
5.Lego movie
6.X-Men

There is nowt wrong with popular films lads!

Big Whiskey

ive only seen about 6 of these

OldeCinemaSoz

MakeEmLaugh wrote: »

Only one of those films was released this year.

Are you COUNTING THE YEARS, son?

Bipolar Joe

What the fuck are you talking about?

OldeCinemaSoz

Best EXTRAS of the year?

FILTH. only DELICIOUS.