Dynamic Top Tens of 2009

[mfunk9786]

good list, but 12 is a few years old.

*shrug* It didn't get a theatrical, non-festival, release in Canada until this year.

Best of 2009 based on US release date

:-"

[El Manchego]

1. Applause (Martin Zandvliet)
2. A Single Man (Tom Ford)
3. Up (Pete Docter)
4. Revanche (Götz Spielmann)
5. A Serious Man (Coen Brothers)
6. Everlasting Moments (Jan Troell)
7. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Niels Arden Oplev)
8. The Limits of Control (Jim Jarmusch)
9. Broken Embraces (Pedro Almodovar)
10. The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (Terry Gilliam)

[Yojimbo]

1. Tokyo Sonata (Kiyoshi KUROSAWA, 2008)
2. Inglourious Basterds (Quentin TARANTINO)
3. Two Lovers (James GRAY, 2008)
4. Summer Hours (Olivier ASSAYAS, 2008)
5. Up (Pete DOCTER & Bob PETERSON)
6. Public Enemies (Michael MANN)
7. Adoration (Atom EGOYAN, 2008)
8. In the Loop (Armando IANNUCCI)
9. Il Divo (Paolo SORRENTINO, 2008)
10. Duplicity (Tony GILROY)

Others of some value: The Hurt Locker; Goodbye Solo; Drag Me to Hell; The Girlfriend Experience

I'm glad somebody else loves 'Tokyo Sonata', although I was disappointed with 'Il Divo', and I haven't seen too many 2009 films, never mind the remaining 8 films in your list

[JabbaTheSlut]

1. The White Ribbon (Michael Haneke)
Inglourious Basterds (Quentin Tarantino)

3. A Prophet (Jacques Audiard)
4. Mother (Joon-ho Bong)
5. Hadewijch (Bruno Dumont)
6. Let The Right One In (Tomas Alfredsson)
7. Redbelt (David Mamet)
8. Hunger (Steve McQueen)
9. Katalin Varga (Peter Strickland)
10. Antichrist (Lars von Trier)

[Awesome Welles]

Still lots to see, but so far...

Lourdes
The White Ribbon
Tokyo Sonata
Let the Right One In
The Limits of Control
Il divo
The Class
Katalin Varga
District 9
Sin Nombre

Disappointments:
A Serious Man
Mesrine: Killer Instinct
The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
Moon
The Girlfriend Experience
Frost/Nixon
Public Enemies

Awful:
Inglourious Basterds
Synecdoche, New York
Blessed

[Forrest Taft]

1. White Material
2. Still Walking
3. Everlasting Moments
4. Il Divo (saw it last year, but US release etc.)
5. The Hurt Locker

Honorable Mentions
The Informant!, Dr Parnassus, Inglourious Basterds, Whatever Works

[MichaelB]

Here's Sight & Sound's top ten:

1. A Prophet (Jacques Audiard)
2. The Hurt Locker (Kathryn Bigelow)/35 Shots of Rum (Claire Denis)
4. The White Ribbon (Michael Haneke)
5. Let The Right One In (Tomas Alfredson)
6. Up (Pete Docter)/White Material (Claire Denis)
8. Bright Star (Jane Campion)/Antichrist (Lars von Trier)
10. Inglourious Basterds (Quentin Tarantino)

I was one of the sixty contributors, and my list was:

1. A Prophet
2. The White Ribbon
3. The Hurt Locker
4. Snow White and Russian Red (Xawery Żuławski)
5. Katalin Varga (Peter Strickland)

[Grand Illusion]

I didn't have any idea Audiard released a new film this year. Excellent news to me. I really enjoyed his two previous.

[Finch]

Here's Sight & Sound's top ten:

1. A Prophet (Jacques Audiard)
2. The Hurt Locker (Kathryn Bigelow)/35 Shots of Rum (Claire Denis)
4. The White Ribbon (Michael Haneke)
5. Let The Right One In (Tomas Alfredson)
6. Up (Pete Docter)/White Material (Claire Denis)
8. Bright Star (Jane Campion)/Antichrist (Lars von Trier)
10. Inglourious Basterds (Quentin Tarantino)

Nice to see the love for the Bigelow but I'm astonished (and not in a good way) that Up garnered more votes than Bright Star. I would also question the inclusion of A Prophet and Let The Right One In: A Prophet is not showing in UK cinemas until Jan 2010 even though it is a 2009 film. But if they selected films on the criteria that they were released in their country of origin in 2009 as they seem to with their inclusion of the Audiard, then the Alfredson shouldn't be on that list. I'm not criticising their choices of the films as such but their criteria for selecting films is inconsistent unless S&S just told the UK critics to pick the favourite films they'd seen in 2009 and completely disregard whether they were festival only showings or theatrical runs.

[Flike]

I always look forward to the Sight & Sound list, as I like the pool of critics they poll. Surprised to see Inglourious Basterds on there.

In reference to their loose polling policy, Let the Right One In came in at 9th last year. I believe the criteria is films that were debuted theatrically in the respective critic's country during the course of the year... ?

[colinr0380]

I think the favourite films criterion was the main one Mr Finch – for example in the commentary Mr Romney mentions The Headless Woman placing low because it has not been released in cinemas yet and he expects it to place higher next year as more see it. Ditto Let The Right One In still placing highly on this year's list due to it reaching a wider number of those polled this year.

I'll tally up all the films by number of votes here in a couple of hours, if that is alright, since I've always been annoyed that S&S don't do a full voting breakdown!

EDIT: I thought I would tally up the full list by number of votes for those of us curious about how the lower reaches of the chart break down. Here is the list of films that received more than one vote, with associated links to trailers. If there's interest I'll try doing the films that received just one vote, which may be more varied and interesting:

16:
A Prophet

12:
The Hurt Locker
35 Shots of Rum

11:
The White Ribbon

9:
Let The Right One In

8:
Up
White Material

7:
Antichrist
Bright Star

6:
Inglourious Basterds

5:
Fish Tank
Les Herbes Folles (Wild Grass)
sleep furiously

4:
Anvil! The Story of Anvil
Synecdoche, New York

3:
Alle Anderen (Everyone Else)
The Beaches of Agnès
La Danse: The Paris Opera Ballet
Il Divo
Dogtooth
Fantastic Mr Fox
The Headless Woman
I Am Love (Lo Sono L’Amore)
In The City Of Sylvia
Katalin Varga
The Maid (La Nana)
Mother
Police, Adjective
Public Enemies
A Serious Man
Shirin
Vincere


2:
Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call: New Orleans
Broken Embraces
City of Life and Death
Coraline
District 9
Eighteen
Enter The Void
Father Of My Children
Helen
Karaoke
Lourdes
Raging Sun, Raging Sky
Samson & Delilah
To Die Like A Man
Tulpan
Villalobos
The Wrestler

[Flike]

Thank you! I was very surprised to see Fish Tank and Fantastic Mr. Fox left out of the top ten.

[Finch]

Slant's 2009 list:

http://www.slantmagazine.com/film/featu ... infilm.asp" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[sharunasbresson]

1)La mujer sin cabeza by Lucrecia Martel
2)Judge by Liu Je
3)Two lovers by James Gray
4)La danse by Frederick Wiseman
5)Tulpan by Sergej Dvortsevoy
6)Where the wild things are by Spike Jonze
7)Cafe noir by Il Sung Jung
8)White ribbon by Michael Haneke
9)Lourdes by Jessica Hausner
10) Villalobos by Romuald Karmakar
11) Inglorious Bastards by Quentin Tarantino

epiphanies from the past:
Nous ne viellierons pas ensemble by Maurice Pialat
Comrades by Bill Douglas
A brighter summer day (long cut) by Edward Yang
Wings by Larisa Shepitko
Moi, Pierre Riviere by Rene Allio

still, too many movies I haven’t been able to watch yet:
last features from Koreeda, Hong Sang Soo, Assayas, Egoyan, Dumont, Tsai Ming Liang, Jim Jarmush, Carax etc. etc.

[newland]

Top 12:

35 Shots of Rum
A Prophet
Mother
Import Export
Two Lovers
Tokyo sonata
Lorna's Silence
Broken Embraces
Vincere
Shirin
The Other One
Wild Grass

[barrym71]

10) The Bright Star
9) Whip It!
8) District 9
7) Moon
6) Up in the Air
5) Jennifer's Body
4) A Serious Man
3) The Fantastic Mr. Fox
2) Observe and Report
1) The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans

This has been one of the strangest years in terms of coming up with ten movies I genuinely liked. A lot of the indie favorites (Mother, The White Ribbon, Antichrist, Two Lovers, et al) didn't grab me the way they were supposed to, yet I loved silly mainstream fare like Whip It! and Jennifer's Body...Odd.

[The Elegant Dandy Fop]

In alphabetical order, my top 8:

Fantastic Mr. Fox
The Hurt Locker
Public Enemies
Red Cliff
Still Walking
Thirst
Tokyo Sonata
Up

This was mostly a great year to get classics on Blu-Ray and explore the films of the past more than anything. For new films, the year was mostly disappointing, even for international or independent cinema. Antichrist, The Limits of Control, Police, Adjective, Inglourious Basterds, The Brothers Bloom, Moon, Adventureland, The Girlfriend Experience, Hunger and Tokyo! ended up all being tremendous disappointments for me. Though there are several films from this year that I have yet to watch, it's been an uneventful year. It kills me to not come up with two more films for my list, but only eight were really worth it.

[menthymenthy]

1 . The Limits of Control
2 . Where The Wild Things Are
3 . Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans
4 . The White Ribbon
5 . Dogtooth
6 . Police, Adj.
7 . Public Enemies
8 . La danse - Le ballet de l'Opéra de Paris
9 . Nymph
10 . The House of the Devil

Although there are still quite a few I need to see, such as:
36 Views of Saint-Loup Peak, My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done, Hadewijch, Life During Wartime, Repo Chick

Nice year.

[Duncan Hopper]

Late, but here's mine.

1. The White Ribbon (Michael Haneke, Austria)
2. White Material (Claire Denis, France)
3. Hadewijch (Bruno Dumont, France)
4. Kynodontas (Dogtooth) (Giorgos Lanthimos, Greece)
5. Volchok (Wolfy) (Vasili Sigarev, Russia)
6. Henri-George Clouzot's Inferno (Serge Bromberg, France)
7. Antichrist (Lars von Trier, Denmark)
8. 35 Shots of Rum (Claire Denis, France)
9. Let the Right One in (Tomas Alfredson, Sweden)
10.Anvil! The Story of Anvil (Sacha Gervasi, USA)


And...


A Serious Man (Joel & Ethan Coen, USA)
La Teta Asustada (Milk of Sorrow) (Claudia Llosa, Peru)
Inglourious Basterds (Quentin Tarantino, USA)
The Wrestler (Darren Aronofsky, USA)

[abuckley89]

1. Tetro
2. Whatever Works
3. Antichrist
4. Inglourious Basterds
5. Up!
6. The Informant!
7. A Serious Man
8. Fantastic Mr. Fox
9. Star Trek
10. Thirst

Still have a lot to see. Excited for Une Prophete and The White Ribbon.

[swo17]

01 Police, adj. (Porumboiu)
02 A Serious Man (Coens)
03 The Sun (Sokurov)
04 Summer Hours (Assayas)
05 You, the Living (Andersson)
06 Cargo 200 (Balabanov)
07 The Headless Woman (Martel)
08 Ruhr (Benning)
09 Four Nights with Anna (Skolimowski)
10 Triangle (Smith)

Last edited Jan 9, 2016

[LQ]

10 Eden Is West (Costa-Gavras)

Nice to see this appear on another's list! As far as I know, it (sadly) didn't get any kind of theatrical release in the states.

[swo17]

It's not very believable as a true-to-life immigration story, but it has such an infecting rhythm to it, moving quickly from one mishap to the next, that I ultimately couldn't resist its charms.