My top 20 movies of the year... so far (part #1)

Blimey, those six months just sped by, didn't they? And with them lots of very, very good films. I don't know whether we've had a stone-cold classic yet but with the likes of Todd Haynes' Carol, Michael Fassbender starring in Macbeth, and Crimson Peak from Guillermo del Toro scheduled for later in the year, there's still plenty to look forward to in 2015. Of all the films I've seen there is only one I can honestly say I hated – American Sniper – but that was more about its lousy politics than Clint Eastwood's skill as a director or the merits of Bradley Cooper as an actor. 

Anyway, the rules here are simple: all films under consideration had to have had a UK cinema release between January 1 and June 30 2015 (to prevent moans of 'But surely that was out last year', I've even included each film's official UK release date, courtesy of launchingfilms.com). No straight to Netflix/Amazon Prime or straight to DVD/Blu-ray movies were considered (sorry, Starry Eyes). 

Not being a professional critic, there are dozens of films I've yet to catch up on that have been released in the last six months (The Falling, White God, and Slow West to name but three) but of those I've seen – 59 as of this morning – these will be my 20 21 favourites. Let's start with numbers 20-11, shall we?

=20. Selma
(Director: Ava DuVernay UK release date: February 6)
The fact David Oyelowo wasn't nominated for an Oscar for his astonishing portrayal of Martin Luther King still sticks in the craw. The rest of this civil rights drama doesn't quite hit the heights of the British actor's performance but is powerful, heartfelt stuff nevertheless.

=20. A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Reflecting on Existence
(Director: Roy Andersson UK release date: April 24)
Bizarre comedy following the antics of two dour salesmen as they attempt to flog a range of hopeless novelty items. There isn't a coherent plot as such, just a string of loosely connected sketches each commenting on some aspect of human existence. Gloriously odd.

19. Blind
(Director: Eskil Vogt UK release date: March 27)
Fantasy and reality merge in this extraordinary Swedish film from a first-time writer/director about a young blind woman struggling to come to terms with isolation and paranoia. Boasts a great central performance from Ellen Dorrit Petersen (below)

18. Kumiko, the Treasure Hunter
(Director: David Zellner UK release date: February 20)
Terrific but elliptical drama charting a young Japanese woman’s quest to find the briefcase full of cash buried by Steve Buscemi’s character in the movie Fargo. Is the titular Kumiko mentally ill or merely so alienated from modern life that taking refuge in fantasy is her only option? 

17. Inherent Vice
(Director: Paul Thomas Anderson UK release date: January 30)
Vague and sprawling, this adaptation of Thomas Pynchon’s similarly opaque novel features Joaquin Phoenix at the top of his game. Perhaps a difficult film to truly love but it is nevertheless enormous fun.

16. Jauja
(Director: Lisandro Alonso UK release date: April 10)
A weird and woozy ‘western’ set in the wilds of 19th Century Patagonia and starring Viggo Mortensen (below) as a Danish engineer on a quest to find his missing daughter. I’d be surprised if I saw a more visually stunning movie all year.

15. Wild
(Director: Jean-Marc Vallée UK release date: January 16)
Reese Witherspoon is terrific as an emotionally shattered young woman hiking a thousand miles up America's west coast in a bid to come to terms with her mother's death and the downward spiral it has plunged her into.

14. Foxcatcher
(Director: Bennett Miller UK release date: January 9)
Haunting adaptation of a true story featuring superb performances from a strong cast. Steve Carell is creepiness personified as John E du Pont, the unstable multi-millionaire who founds a wrestling academy to train US Olympic hopefuls. Suffice to say, it doesn’t end well...

13. Wild Tales
(Director: Damián Szifrón UK release date: March 27)
Argentine portmanteau featuring six stories about rage and vengeance. The final sequence centring on the meltdown of a couple’s relationship at their wedding (below) is a tour de force of bleak humour and brutal emotion.

12. The Duke of Burgundy
(Director: Peter Strickland UK release date: February 20)
BDSM and lepidoptery (the study of butterflies and moths) make strange but beguiling bedfellows in this eccentric and gorgeous lesbian relationship drama. Not sure I’ve ever seen anything quite like it.

11. Mad Max: Fury Road 
(Director: George Miller UK release date: May 15)
Max Rockatansky (Tom Hardy, pictured at the top of the page) returns to the post-apocalyptic Aussie badlands in a movie for which the term high-octane was surely invented. Charlize Theron’s badass Imperator Furiosa steals the film out from under him though.

Numbers 10-1 coming later in the week...

TV Movie Picks (UK): Monday, May 25 - Sunday, May 31

VIEW ON DEMAND (VOD): Having never read Cheryl Strayed’s titular novel (based on her own true story), I was prepared to dismiss Wild (Various Streaming Services) as “Eat Pray Love for hikers” with Reese Witherspoon standing in for Julia Roberts on some self-important journey of self-discovery. I couldn’t have been more wrong, though, because director Jean-Marc Vallée’s follow-up to Dallas Buyers Club is a far better and bleaker film than Ryan Murphy's soppy effort. Witherspoon – who was deservedly Oscar-nominated for her role – is Cheryl, a woman destroyed by grief following the death of her beloved mother (Laura Dern). It impacts every aspect of her life, leading to the breakdown of her marriage and a steep descent into heroin use. Desperate to escape her increasingly parlous situation, on a mad whim she decides to hike the 1,100 mile Pacific Crest Trail. What follows is a little predictable but gripping nonetheless as Cheryl overcomes a series of difficult obstacles – mostly involving ill-fitting boots, creepy fellow travellers and a lack of proper food – to slowly but surely make her way up America’s West Coast. Of course her hard physical quest is matched every step of the way by Cheryl's mental journey as she battles her demons to achieve some kind of inner peace. It’s beautifully told and I can’t remember the last time I saw a film that utilised flashbacks so effectively. Some are lengthy, some no more than tiny little echoes of conversations and moments. Crucially, though, every single one of them adds a little to our knowledge of the characters and Cheryl’s situation.



Five more…Big Hero 6 (vss) Likeable but surprisingly dark animation about a boy and his inflatable robot/superhero pal.
The Emperor’s New Clothes (vss) Russell Brand puts the world to rights in this Michael Winterbottom-directed documentary.
Before Midnight (Amazon Prime Instant Video, from Thursday) Third instalment of director Richard Linklater’s ongoing relationship drama starring Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy.
The Devil’s Advocate (Amazon Prime Instant Video, from Thursday) Al Pacino is on top scenery-chewing form as the Devil himself in this blackly comic melodrama.
Timbuktu (vss, from Friday) Muslim director Abderrahmane Sissako’s powerful, Oscar-nominated drama tackles life under religious fundamentalism. Also in cinemas.

TERRESTRIAL: I haven’t seen Jagged Edge (Wednesday, 23:45, BBC1) for years but it’s a film I had enormous affection for when it was first released in 1985. You’ll already know the ’80s and early ’90s were synonymous with implausibly overblown thrillers (Fatal Attraction, Body Heat, Sea of Love, Basic Instinct, Someone to Watch over Me) and this is about as implausible, overblown and thrilling as it gets. Glenn Close is Teddy Barnes, a former criminal lawyer who returns to action to defend Jack Forrester (Jeff Bridges), a man suspected of murdering his beautiful heiress wife with a serrated knife (hence the title). Of course, the two commence a passionate affair despite the fact slippery Jack’s innocence is in doubt. Director Richard Marquand (Return of the Jedi) lets the is-he-or-isn’t-he question bubble away nicely as the tension inside and outside the courtroom builds and builds, before clipping you round the ear with an impressively-worked twist that you see coming but has you perched on the edge of your seat nonetheless. 

Five more…
Avengers Assemble (20:00, today, BBC1) Tom Hiddleston’s charismatic villain Loki steals the show in Joss Whedon’s hugely entertaining superhero blockbuster.
Seven Psychopaths (22:00, Thursday, Channel 4) Passable black comedy from In Bruges writer/director Martin McDonagh, starring Colin Farrell as a struggling screenwriter.
Rear Window (15:10, Saturday, BBC2) Alfred Hitchcock’s sublime and much-imitated thriller, starring James Stewart and Grace Kelly.
Shutter Island (21:00, Sunday, Channel 4) Martin Scorsese directs Leonardo DiCaprio in a mysterious melodrama.

Frost/Nixon (23:00, Sunday, BBC2) Michael Sheen and Frank Langella re-enact the famous post-Watergate interviews conducted by David Frost with disgraced US President Richard Nixon.

CABLE & SATELLITE: When it opened back in 2008, people's main problem with found-footage monster movie Cloverfield (00:25, Friday, Film4) was that they couldn't empathise with its cast of victims, all good-looking Manhattan yuppie types. As the titular beast fetched up in New York to rain down death and destruction, filmgoers simply didn’t give a hoot about gorgeous Beth (Odette Yustman), ambitious Rob (Michael Stahl-David) or any of their ghastly loft-dwelling pals either. Personally, I think they were reading the film completely wrong. They weren’t supposed to care about the yuppies because it’s the titular monster that is the hero of the story, self-absorbed couple Beth and Rob the villains in urgent need of the kind of corrective only a skyscraper-sized monkey/scorpion thing can provide. Once you view it in those terms – as a sort of creature feature with added class war – Matt Reeves’ picture is an absolute blast. (I’m sure the film was meant to be a 9/11 analogy but, even in 2008, that was a hackneyed approach and just seems even more so seven years later). There are a couple of other reasons to love Cloverfield. The fact Reeves keeps the creature under wraps for so long. You don’t see the bizarre beastie in all its glory until well into the film and it’s definitely worth the wait. And there’s also a clever idea involving Doberman-sized parasites that live on Cloverfield and end up having a little human-terrorising mini-adventure of their own. Now, whatever happened to that sequel? 

Five more…
We Need to Talk About Kevin (21:00, Tuesday, BBC4) Tilda Swinton is at the height of her powers in Lynne Ramsey’s unsubtle but powerful family drama.
Warm Bodies (21:00, Wednesday, Film4) Nicholas Hoult stars in a charming zombie rom-com.
Apocalypse Now (23:15, Wednesday, ITV4) Francis Ford Coppola’s psychedelic war movie from 1979 still stands the test of time. 
Oculus (07:50 and 22:00, Sky Movies Premiere, from Friday) Karen ‘Amy Pond’ Gillan battles a haunted mirror armed only with an unconvincing American accent.

Dune (21:00, Horror Channel, Friday) David Lynch's Marmite adaptation of Frank Herbert's sci-fi classic featuring Sting in his pants.

Please note: Films starting after midnight are always considered part of the previous day's schedule, e.g. Cloverfield begins at 00:25 - technically Saturday morning - but is still part of Friday's listings. All times in 24-hour clock.