The year 2015 certainly seemed long enough that it might never arrive, but the time has indeed come to talk about it in the past tense. Let the record show that it was a better year for mainstream film than mainstream music, though not as exciting as the last couple. It’s also the year the whole world just seemed to go crazy: Donald Trump in the lead for month after month in the polls despite all the inflammatory and outright ignorant things he says. And the Democratic Party base is angry enough at the establishment that a 74 year old self-described socialist only capable of speaking in a Larry David shout seems to many to be the great hope. The weather is getting warmer and crazy. The cops, despite all the attention placed on them by the new civil rights activists, killed even more people than in the year prior. From the Charlie Hebdo massacre to the numerous terror attacks from Nigeria to Beirut, Paris, and San Bernardino the sense of danger has seldom been this high. The effect on our national politics will likely not be healthy.
That’s where movies are supposed to come in and occasionally it seemed like the only things being churned out by Hollywood were big unimaginative superhero pics. One thing that definitely suffered was the quality and abundance of male acting. In 2014 there were three or four performances by actors-maybe more-that gave me that excited “legend in the making” feeling. This year there weren’t really any on that level, though fortunately female acting fared better and many of the most acclaimed movies (Tangerine, Carol, Mad Max: Fury Road) are bolstered by female characters. Paul Dano would be my choice for Best Actor (Love & Mercy) and Charlotte Rampling for Best Actress (45 Years). Jason Mitchell’s performance as Eazy-E has been looked over but really should be in serious contention for Best Supporting Actor. I haven’t yet seen The Revenant, but Leo will no doubt finally win this time, it seems abundantly clear (hard to imagine Matt Damon or Michael Fassbender standing in the way of his inevitability). In fairness, I still haven’t caught The Danish Girl either.
As always there were some genuine surprises and even more soul-crushing letdowns. I didn’t have much anticipation for the The Force Awakens (I like the original trilogy fine and will never forget the awful feeling of seeing The Phantom Menace in seventh grade when it hit theaters) but it turned out to be solidly rousing, nothing life-changing or even as exciting as J.J. Abrams Star Trek reboot. To be honest, its star dims a little each time I think about it. The much acclaimed Hungarian Holocaust drama Son of Saul is a contemptible exploitation that I couldn’t wait to be over. Trainwreck was enjoyable to me mainly for the dynamic between Bill Hader (so good) and Lebron James. I couldn’t have been more excited to watch Sam Mendes direct another James Bond movie after Skyfall but Spectre is decisively the worst 007 in years. I was also stoked for The Hateful Eight, which was a disappointment despite the best score and cinematography of the year along with some memorable performances. I’m a big fan of virtually everything the director’s done to date but this was ugly. Steve Jobs is a pointless embarrassment. Me and Earl and the Dying Girl was well-made but I didn’t believe a second of it. I absolutely adore Francis Ha so I was looking forward to both While We’re Young and Mistress America but I wish that Noah Baumbach had just made one great film this year instead of two passable ones. I loved most of Anomalisa but am still scratching my head over the last fifteen minutes or so.
On the other hand, I never knew how much I needed an addition to the Mad Max franchise or another Rocky movie. I similarly had no expectations for an N.W.A. biopic and it turned out to be much better than a summer biopic has any right to be. I didn’t predict that one of the most informative and searing movies to date about the financial crash would be directed by Adam McKay of Anchorman and The Other Guys, but then The Big Short happened. Sometimes it felt like a dismal year, but it ultimately wasn’t and the cream of the crop is roughly as good as any. The films that made my list all had that element of surprise that worthwhile theatergoing can still offer. That said, let’s face it: the jaw dropping second season of Fargo was tv-art at its highest level and offered thrills nobody else could match in any other medium (even if the last episode was a letdown). Happy New Year everybody, now let’s get to the 10 Best Films of 2015!
10. Chi-Raq
Spike Lee is no stranger to controversy and this modern update of the ancient Greek play Lysistrata in which a woman withholds sex from her husband in an effort to end the Peloponnesian War to be about the gang violence in Chicago was received with mixed reviews and hostility from some. There are fair criticisms to make of this very funny and bold satire, but the idea that making a movie about something is per se exploiting it I can’t accept. Lee, who co-wrote with Kevin Willmott, is sincere in his depiction of America’s inner cities being trapped between bad cops and ruthless gangs (the harshest indictment of all is saved for the NRA). Chi-Raq is his most powerful and passionate filmmaking in several years. It’s both mournful and raunchily hilarious: a sermon of a movie.
9. Room
Few scenes this year had me quite as breathlessly nervous as when the mother and son held captive finally make their escape. Based on the 2010 novel of the same by Emma Donoghue, Room begins mysteriously as we watch two people coping with life as prisoners without having any idea why they’re there or where they even are. That it turns out to be a shed in the back of an ordinary house in a suburban area just makes it all the creepier. What could have turned sensationalistic instead by focusing on the relationship between a remarkable Brie Larson and her five year old child (the gifted Jacob Tremblay) becomes something far more fascinating and unlike any other film I can recall seeing.
8. Going Clear
The scariest movie since The Bababook is not It Follows. It’s this comprehensive expose of the Church of Scientology by documentarian Alex Gibney. Chronicling its origins as a moneymaking enterprise by hack conman L. Ron Hubbard it shows how since his death it has carried on dodging the taxman and making life hell for the people it preys on. This is the same ideology and tactics of any of the 20th century worst tyrants only on a smaller scale and the most chilling statistic is that the organization has fewer members than ever—and its biggest profits. HBO’s Going Clear is an act of bravery.
7. Creed
Two years ago Ryan Coogler made an auspicious debut with Fruitvale Station, a movie that decried police violence against young black men before Ferguson brought it so forcefully to the front of national attention. With this new chapter in the Rocky franchise (the best entry since the original) he’s become even more confident and surefooted a director. This was one of the most pure satisfying times I had at the movies this year. Creed wore its heart on its sleeve and I liked it-and its exceptional performances from Michael B. Jordan, Tessa Thompson, and Sylvester Stallone (easily the best he’s ever been)-unreservedly.
6. Mad Max: Fury Road
In a year marked by some very justifiable outrages-the Confederate flag still hanging on public grounds, university buildings named after slave masters-the lamest controversies were the reactionary bellowing of a small, vocal fringe to the diversity in Star Wars and the feminist agenda of this Fury Road. We’re so used to seeing damsels in distress that it’s still a revolutionary act in this patriarchy-snubbing epic to see the most important and decisive characters be all women (hail Charlize Theron)—and the man reduced to a nearly wordless primate (Tom Hardy). Visionary director George Miller returns to the post-apocalypse land of the cuckoo after thirty years and the result is one of the craziest and most exhilarating actions movies ever made. So much to take in, but in particular the ferocious sand storm and its descent into a desert Hades blew my mind. Godspeed with the revamped Mad Max sequels.
5. Inside Out
The days of Pixar consistently churning out great movies years after year are behind us. But with Pete Docter’s Inside Out they came up with one of their most clever hooks in quite a while: the way that are emotions work together to form who we are. It’s a wonderful and deeply empathetic picture that still has all the creative exuberance of the studio at its best (the dream-production sequence where Joy and Sadness try to wake up 11 year old Riley is effusively witty). The voice acting is down the line terrific (especially Phyllis Smith as Sadness and Lewis Black as Anger). Hard not to let that ending get to you. This earns all of its sneakily disarming tears.
4. Sicario
No direction this year was as stunning as Denis Villeneuve’s in Sicario (yes, even more than Miller with Fury Road). The first time I saw it I left a fan but crudely summarized it as “two-thirds serious, credible socio-political drama and one third preposterous Breaking Bad episode”. Watching it again I was fully taken by the staggering power of his vision, so much so that even the over the top quality to the Benicio del Toro character’s revenge didn’t detract from it and my few reservations melted away. This bleak and morally queasy story about the government’s war on drugs is a thriller that rivals Zero Dark Thirty in intensity. Emily Blunt’s performance is equally riveting.
3. Spotlight
A throwback to journalistic-thrillers of yesteryear Spotlight is a knock-out from filmmaker Tom McCarthy. He’s never directed with as much deftness and purpose as he does in this smart, absorbing procedural-drama about a special investigative unit at The Boston Globe who in the early 2000s broke the story about the Catholic Church’s cover up of rampant sexual abuse by their clergy. The cast is one of the most stellar ensembles of the year (Michael Keaton, Mark Ruffalo, Rachel McAdams, Stanely Tucci, John Slattery, and in the single best performance, Liev Schrieber as the new editor with the guts to stay on the case). The closing credits with the complete list of every major city around the world where rape and molestation of children was concealed is chilling and stomach-churning. It’s a great movie.
2. Carol
The 1952 novel The Price of Salt is a book that like 12 Years a Slave seems astonishing it took as long as it did to become a full-length feature motion picture. Both were like treasures hidden in plain sight (indeed the process of adapting this radically ahead of it time story of a wealthy socialite divorcing her husband as she finds love with a younger department store girl began over eighteen years ago). What superficially looks at first to be Todd Haynes rehashing his Far From Heaven (still the best film of the last fifteen years) proves to be a very different type of picture—one that doesn’t depict the era through a looking glass and finds a liberatingly unabashed romantic spirit in this story of sexual awakening. Carol is a near-masterpiece with arguably career-peak performances from both Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara. Few movies in recent memory have had such a rapturous ending.
1. The End of the Tour
A conversational drama tinged with humor in the vein of Linklater’s Before Sunset or My Dinner with Andre, The End of the Tour is a movie in which not much appears to happen and indeed in terms of plot, next to nothing actually does. It starts in 2008 when David Foster Wallace took his own life and then brings us back to the five days in 1996 David Lipsky spent with him for a Rolling Stone cover story. The two men talk about fast food, getting laid, Alanis Morissette, and fret over what’s off limits for the interview. Lipsky, himself a novelist (played by Jesse Eisenberg) can barely conceal his envy of the success Wallace (Jason Segel, in a genius casting decision) had suddenly attained with Infinite Jest. Wallace for his part can barely cope with it. A profound character study and a haunting depiction of modern loneliness that celebrity can’t cure, director James Ponsoldt’s The End of the Tour was the year’s most warmly, endearing surprise and an unflashy triumph.
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