Out of Focus

OOF Year-in-Review 2009: Top 10 films ... adjacent

Uh … where was I. Really? Not so important. When I was so rudely interrupted by real-world endeavors, I was smack dab in the middle of expressing my love for any number of films released in 2009. I find it fascinating that such a crappy year (and awful decade) produced so many great films. Certainly, the correlation is a natural one: many great artists are tortured or, at the very least, bit-time complainers. But not everything in the world of film 2009 centered on morose melancholia or seriously issue-oriented; not even close.

The 10 films I listed as the best of 2009 in my last post were really just the sprinkles on top of the cinematic sundae that was 2009. Cutting to the required 10 only made me wish Mel Brooks’ joke in History of the World: Part One was actually history (or mythology, I suppose): that there truly were 15 commandments as then, our “top” lists likely would have 15 slots. And really, was 15 even enough? I count seven films that live on my next tier and each, at some point, spent time in my top 10 before I finalized my list and rankings. And beyond those seven, there were another 13 that popped into momentary consideration as I first pulled together all the titles I would consider.

Meanwhile, there are plenty of other films that don’t belong to this additional group of 20 that I still thoroughly enjoyed watching and while heavily flawed and even denigrated by many, I would still describe as “good” movies if only for pure entertainment value and/or as semi-innocuous comfort film. (Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call – New Orleans fits into this category; but so do It’s Complicated and Julie & Julia, two easily dismissed pieces of fluff that really shouldn’t be and aren’t … even though both have tremendous problems. And if I get around to a post on some of the films I consider most overlooked of the year, I’ll be sure to mention Bandslam.)

So here and now, I would like to devote a little time to acknowledging the films that are Top 10-adjacent (my favorite term originating from Los Angeles real estate). In the 2009 Book of Aaron, they’re all still winners.

Top 10-Adjacent (Click on title for further comments)

11. Up
    
12. The White Ribbon
    
13. Up in the Air
    
14. Adventureland
    
15. Every Little Step
    
16. Passing Strange: The Movie

Those were my “next seven,” and while I simply don’t have the patience (nor time, right now; the primary goal for 2010 is to do less, better, while not over-extending myself, so let’s start – sort of – now). Among the other distributed films I really liked in 2009 (in alphabetical order), I must mention Antichrist, Anvil: The Story of Anvil, The Cove, Duplicity, Food Inc., Forbidden Lie$, The Girlfriend Experience, The Headless Woman, The House of the Devil, The Hurt Locker, I’m Gonna Explode, My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done, Night and Day, Outrage, Racing Dreams, The Road, Sugar, A Town Called Panic and Two Lovers.

After the jump, more comments about the adjacents, and coming soon, more comments about the year and decade in film as well as the year in decade in television; and, who knows what else. (Well, I do, but no more promises without follow-through. So there.)

OOF Year-in-Review 2009: Top 10 films of the year

The best film with a theatrical release I saw in 2009 was made in 1948. That’s not actually a knock on 2009, easily one of the stronger cinematic years this decade. But as I consider The Red Shoes to be among the top five greatest films ever made, I can’t ignore that the release of its pristinely restored version was a (if not the) highlight of my cinematic year. I’m only sorry I did not have the chance to attend the special screening at the DGA Theater to see it on a significantly larger screen than the one at Film Forum. Bruce Goldstein’s repertory programming at Film Forum is on its own almost enough for me to never even consider leaving New York, but oh how I wish their screens were significantly larger.

Yet I digress. My list of the top 10 films of 2009 completed in time for indieWIRE’s annual critics’ survey is now live at their site. I find creating lists to be simultaneously entertaining and frustrating exercises, but for me, the list simply can’t be the (only) thing. A list without an explanation might as well resemble a visually stunning plate of food that somehow lacks any flavor. So over the next two weeks, I shall explain my lists; the ones on indieWIRE as well as a few others. And so, first up: The Top 10 films of 2009.

Determining my top 10 this year was probably more difficult than any other year during these terrible Aughts, with the possible exception of 2004. Determining rankings (required by indieWIRE’s poll) proved particularly trying. I settled on my top 5 with relative ease and without internal argument. But after that, not only were there 10 or 20 films that convincingly deserved one of those lower-half slots, but they also kept hopping in and out of the list.

The difficulty in ranking combined with the pains of trimming illustrates a great year for film. However, it additionally proclaims a year in which the standout movies are mostly of such a high level that they simply don’t stand out from each other individually as much. I don’t mean to imply that the great films of 2009 aren’t unique and special; far from it, in fact. Rather, the voices that shouted, “Look at me” from screens this year were all so compelling, comparing most of them to each other in any attempt to rank them becomes quite complicated.

One special note about one title not on my top 10: Steve McQueen’s Hunger is one of the most unique and impressive achievements in cinema of the last couple years. I saw it at the 2008 New York Film Festival before it received a one-week release in LA. Because of that, I included it on my top 10 last year, as did 18 other participants of indieWIRE’s survey. However, it didn’t receive a New York release until this year, and it seems 10 critics voted for it this time around. If I hadn’t included it on last year’s list, it would definitely be on my current one, but I thought it inappropriate to list it twice. Where would it have placed this year? I’m not sure, and since I don’t have to make that determination, I’m not going to.

Of course, all of these exercises, especially when it comes to ranking, are more than simply subjective. And even in the days since submitting my ballot, I’ve thought to myself, maybe this film should replace that one; or, maybe this film should rank higher. One of the next posts will focus on the top films of the decade, which noticeably will not include any of the following titles. I’ll explain that deliberate choice further at that time. But for now, below is my list of the best of 2009, and after the jump, the reasons why:

Top 10 Films of 2009

1. Where the Wild Things Are
   
2. A Serious Man
   
3. Summer Hours
   
4. Fantastic Mr. Fox
   
5. 35 Shots of Rum
   
6. In the Loop
   
7. Inglourious Basterds
   
8. The Informant!
   
9. The Limits of Control
   
10. Lorna’s Silence

Blurring focus once again: Let the lists begin to roll

After a week filled with cramming and catch-up, I finally finished the first of my own lists. Best of the year. Best of the decade. My deadline was set by indieWIRE, and I’m a person who tends to do better with deadlines set by others. So … I got it done.

It’s a fascinating exercise every year, and it all takes much more explanation (I prefer that word to “defense”) than is appropriate on the indieWIRE ballot. As mine is processed and goes live on their site, I’ll post more detailed explanations here. (No, really, I will.)

But more importantly, after months of claiming a return to this space, I plan to actually follow-through now. As I’ve described before, I keep creating these walls for myself, and I’m determined to leave them behind as we enter the T(e)ens, but why wait until then. Now is the time for reflection, in no small part, so that as we move forward into the next year and decade, we can leave a lot of the reflection behind. Not that I would ever claim it’s a good idea to forget the past, but some of us can, on occasion, get too stuck within it.

I found that happening to me quite a lot this year, and it kept blocking me from all the projections I would make to the future. For some reason, I not only work best when my responsibilities are to others as opposed to myself, but I also seem to need benchmarks. Jan. 1 at 3 am west coast time will mark the exact instant I quit smoking 15 years ago. The 3 am was somewhat arbitrary (it’s when my pack ran-out), but New Year’s Day was timed with the first of California’s anti-smoking laws. And New Year’s is easy to remember. Big, tall, column-like, unforgettable benchmark.

So my first real post back couldn’t be just another review or opinion piece. It had to be something broad in scope; mammoth in size; a launching pad of one form or another. As ridiculous as that may seem, for months, I’ve intended to write something that would almost be an abstract of what may (or may not) actually be to come. But as is often the case, the larger the wall I build, the more I sometimes put off climbing over it.

In no small measure, I blame Twitter. When I started Out of Focus nearly six years ago, it was a repository for all the jumble of opinion and information exhausting my grey matter. At times I would get too busy with work (especially when I would be knee-deep in Tribeca), but other times, I would dash off a quick thought via Twitter, plan to delve into more detail later, but then put it off. Much as people communicate directly with others across Twitter in a way that they would likely never simply yell across a crowded room to transmit the same information, my natural inclination to detail (and, sure, verbosity), was somehow mollified by Twitter.

So now there’s a backlog, and I want to clear it out. I obviously still can’t simply start writing without this bookend, but I found new inspiration in all this reflection, and what pops-up next will come as it always has … just hopefully, more regularly. When I started the online incarnation of Out of Focus (as opposed to my column at UCLA in 1991-92 from which I stole the name), it was in part to distract from a job in which I found no enjoyment. The situation is different, but in some ways, even in a much different environment, I’m again looking for such a productive distraction.

So what better way to refocus than to time it with the end of a year, end of a decade and revealing of indieWIRE’s critics polls? Exactly. That’s what I was thinking, and here we are. I hope you stick around and visit now and then, even if you don’t ever call or write.

And so, with that in mind … Next up: Why (for one of the few times ever) I agree with A. O. Scott that Where the Wild Things Are is a significant achievement and the best film of 2009. And after that, we’ll delve into why I also agree (which happens more frequently now as long as a guy named Gallo is not involved) with Filmbrain that Synecdoche, New York is the best film of the decade.

Punch me once, shame on me

It would be too easy for me to assume that some supernatural force, I shall personify as “The Universe,” continues to conspire against my attempts to create (re-create?) a writing habit and routine. For the past several months, I keep experiencing these huge blocks; in fact, let’s call them Great Walls, analogous to China’s. Hurdling the walls shouldn’t be so difficult: each one simply involves a subject I want to discuss, ramble and rant over, but the sit-and-write cubicle of my brain keeps hiding.

Yesterday, however, I was determined to find it. Motivated, mostly focused, and ready to let my fingers do play a coherent form of trampoline on my keyboard, I settled-in at a table at the Sheirdan Square Starbucks (the one on 7th Avenue South near where W. 4th and Christopher Streets cross). Starbucks: I know. But my laptop battery blows, and Starbucks offers me the opportunity for WiFi (free for me), and more importantly, plenty of electrical outlets. I needed to write a few emails, but then I planned to tackle this one post I considered the great drawbridge gate which needed to be lowered so I could cross the moat and get at the more specific subjects concerning individual films, television, theater, and all those other things I think about and apparently, on some level, want to write about.

Climbing the walls I create for myself seems not to be enough for the chess-player some call God, others Fate, or as I apparently decided to personify it in all my conversations yesterday: The Universe. In reality, I’m rational enough to realize that there is no boogie-power out to get me, and I can certainly compare myself and my not-ideal current situation to others and recognize that in the proverbial grand scheme, I don’t have things so bad. Plus, I definitely see how a whole situation could have been avoided had I not essentially ignored one or two things, so of course, I blame myself. Still, with that said, yesterday, The Universe chose to fuck me up.

Now, apparently, if when these metaphysical powers-that-be decide the time is ripe to threaten and rob Aaron, they don’t intend for it to be simple or ordinary. No dark alleys. Nothing as simple as, “He came out of the shadows.” Only events that generally lead to a first response from others that resembles, “You’re kidding,” or, “You’re not serious,” or, “That’s not possible,” or … well, you get the idea.

So there I am: laptop on table. Sitting. Typing. Next to my laptop are my new (used) iPhone and my old (very used) iPod. The iPhone was new to me; after three years of using a now slow and constantly malfunctioning Blackberry Pearl, and no longer tethered to the Microsoft Exchange system of the ex-job, I was finally able to follow my Mac-addicted sensibilities and transition to the iPhone. Lucky for me, my best friend in San Francisco was kind enough hand-me-down his: an iPhone 3G sitting unused ever since he upgraded to the 3GS.

You know all those signs on the subway from the MTA or the NYPD giving advice on things not to do so you don’t get robbed or fall on the tracks? And you know how much of the time you look at the stupidly staged photos or the common sense idea and chuckle a bit at the simplicity of it, obviously thinking, “Well … duh!” That’s how the utter obviousness of this next thought felt to me after, even though I had perpetrated the idiotic mistake.

People: There’s not really any good reason to sit there with a $200 phone on the table where others can ogle it, especially when you’re sitting there alone. Keep it in your pocket. Would that have changed yesterday’s situation … most likely.