I started this blog in September 2010, and I still use it as a storehouse of memory about my central, semi-professional hobby, watching movies.
The other day I was wandering through the pages and found a review of a film I not only didn’t know I’d seen, I didn’t even remember it existing. After some 4000+ reviews, I suppose that’s likely to happen once in awhile. My memory is certainly not improving, so it’s good to have somewhere to go where I can confirm, “So, that’s what I really thought of that picture.”
That’s also a double-edged sword, because as I change, so does my taste. I thought it was worth going back to my top movie every year and see whether I would still choose it as the best of the year — or would something else from that year take the crown now that years have passed? Maybe some movies have aged better, or maybe I’ve just aged into appreciating them more.
It’s also another way of underlining the subjectivity of this whole experiment, the flaw in this particular iris. (And, by the way, I wrote this piece about reviewer’s remorse, which is funny because I now have remorse about what I wrote about musicals!)
So, here we go, and feel free to click on the year to read my original list.
2010: I gave it to Christopher Nolan’s Inception, which remains the movie from 2010 I’ve probably seen the most often. But down there at number three is The Social Network, which I subsequently chose as the best movie of the decade and so it should’ve taken the cake. A film that has aged especially well on this list is Luca Guadagnino’s I Am Love, and one that hasn’t so much, The King’s Speech.
2011: I chose Jean-Marc Vallée’s Café de flore and it has delivered through the years — it’s a Canadian classic. Others on my Top 10 list have faded — I haven’t seen The Descendants once since 2011, but a movie on my Honourable Mentions list easily could’ve qualified: The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, and a 2011 film I didn’t catch up with until 2012, A Separation.
2012: I had two Sarah Polley movies on my list this year, including the number one, Stories We Tell, and they were well-chosen. She has never let me down. (That includes her fantastic book, Run Toward The Danger.) One movie among the honourable mentions is the one from 2012 I’ve seen the most often since, Skyfall. It should have replaced Cloud Atlas or Prometheus.
2013: Her is still my favourite movie of 2013, though looking back I’m not sure I still feel as strongly about The Past (Le Passé), I think Farhadi’s A Separation is a lot stronger. Philomena and Enough Said have both faded in my memory, but where is Love Is All You Need? The charming Danish romcom should’ve found a spot, as should Locke, but I didn’t see that until 2014 where it is on the list.
2014: This is a fantastic year, maybe the best of the decade — every single title here holds up. My number one still haunts the way other films cannot: Under The Skin. The one on the list I’ve probably revisited more than any other is Interstellar, it’s just grown in my estimation in the past decade, and even the list of honourable mentions is unimpeachable.
2015: “At the movies in 2015, there was Mad Max. And there was everything else.” I wrote that then, and it’s remained true about Fury Road — almost the case for the entire decade. This is also a pretty strong list, though I think Ex Machina should definitely be at number 2, and maybe Carol should’ve made the jump from the Honourable Mentions to the top 10. I realize now I was so besotted with The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby, especially the two-movie version, that I listed it over two years. I still think it should’ve gotten a lot more love.
2016: This was a year of Green Room, which is still a smoking thriller of the highest order. Still love Sing Street, Mustang, and Embrace Of The Serpent. Hail Caesar! could’ve been higher up on the list, and Honourable Mentions like Arrival, Shin Godzilla, and Toni Erdmann all could’ve made it onto the Top 10. Arguably they should have. The Neon Demon maybe hasn’t aged as well, though its outrageousness blew my socks off at the time.
2017: To extend the list and acknowledge more great movies this was the year I started doing the 10 Best Under-The-Radar movies, too, and the ones from 2017 are especially good: Columbus, The Little Hours, and Okja are fantastic, unique films. The Top 10 of the year is solid, but I would pull a few now — probably The Shape Of Water and mother! I haven’t watched either in seven years, but I’ve seen all the others multiple times. Today Personal Shopper would probably still top it, but Dunkirk would be a lot further up.
2018: No notes. The Favourite was the year’s best film, and all the others were a delight, too.
2019: This was a particularly uneven year, with a number of interesting, smaller movies on the Under The Radar list. On the Top 10, as much as I loved (and continue to love) Booksmart it’s hard to argue against Parasite being the year’s best film, which ended up winning the Oscar for Best Picture, well deserved.
2020: This is an odd year, a lot of peculiar and cool indie movies. In retrospect I think Luxor and Timmy Failure should’ve totally been in the Top 10. I still strongly about Possessor, but a number of the titles in the Top 10 could’ve taken the cake, including Palm Springs and Small Axe: Mangrove.
2021: Another year of oddities, lots of little movies — certainly more than a trend, fewer and fewer mainstream Hollywood pictures making the list, with less of a difference between the Under The Radar movies and the Top 10. Petite Maman is a good, low-key choice for the best of the year, but what strikes me now is how many excellent musicals came out that year — West Side Story, In The Heights, and tick, tick, BOOM! among them.
2022: I recall really loving Turning Red, but given a second run at this list would more likely choose One Fine Morning or another animated triumph, Pinocchio.
2023: This is a terrific year, the best of the 2020s so far, with Past Lives on top. Is it the best movie of the decade to date? Probably. While The Zone Of Interest, Rye Lane, and The Holdovers? Any of them could’ve taken it, too.
2024: This list feels a little too recent to have any distance on its picks, but it’s made me realize I chose as the top movies of the past two years the ones that brought forth the most tears — Past Lives and We Live In Time — and this year it looks entirely likely to go the same way. Have I become a sentimentalist in my middle age? Anything’s possible.
