(this first appeared on my blog, The Most Beautiful Fraud in the World)
Now that 2009 has come to an abrupt center (today is the exact middle of the year - and my birthday to boot) it is time to look back at the first half that was.
So far 2009 has gotten off to a better start than 2008. Sure, last year may have had stellar films such as Charlie Kauffman’s directorial debut Synecdoche, New York, Desplechin’s gorgeous A Christmas Tale, Wendy Reichardt’s neo-neorealist Wendy and Lucy and Soderbergh’s two-part Che biopic extraordinaire, but none of those would open until later in the year. Not even The Dark Knight had opened yet. Of my eventual five favourite films of the year, only Carlos Reygadas’ Silent Light, which I had originally seen at the 2007 NYFF, had made an appearance at this point in 2008.
As of today, July 2nd (the exact middle of the year) there sits no less than six films that I could see being on my eventual best of 2009 list come New Year’s Day. With the almost inevitable influx of quality films that inundate us at the end of each year (and I do NOT mean the crush of usually tepid, middlebrow, mediocrities that are considered Oscar hopefuls!) this could all mean one of three things. 1. 2009 will be one of the best years in cinema in a very long time. 2. The second half of the year is going to suck big time. or 3. I’m getting soft in my old age and am not as critical as I used to be.
I am hoping for 1 but fearful of 2. As for 3, I am only turning 42 today so I don’t think I’ve lost my edge all that much. If anything I am a different kind of critical now than I was at 20 or 30. Seriously though, this has been a pretty good first half, and several films have really really moved me (I’ll mention them below) but even with all that in mind, it still seems like that one GREAT movie - the one that gleams at the top of my annual best of lists like a shiny new whatchyamacallit - has yet to make its appearance. I have an inkling it will be around by the end.
As for the best of the first half of 2009, here they are:
1) The Hurt Locker (Kathryn Bigelow)
2) Hunger (Steve McQueen)
3) The Class (Laurent Cantet)
4) Drag Me to Hell (Sam Raimi)
5) Gomorrah (Matteo Garrone)
6) The Girlfriend Experience (Steven Soderbergh)
7) Sugar (Ryan Fleck & Anna Boden)
8) Star Trek (J.J. Abrams)
9) Goodbye Solo (Ramin Bahrani)
10) Watchmen (Zack Snyder)
Seriously, this is more than a respectable year-end Top Ten List! I would be proud to show this list to the world. Even that mealy-mouth crotch pheasant Ben Lyons couldn’t argue with me! Okay he probably would (especially considering Transformers didn’t make my list) but he’s a fucking idiot so who cares.
If the second half of the year is even half as good as the first half - and we have yet to see Inglourious Basterds, The Box, Shutter Island, A Serious Man, The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus, Nine or 9 (?) - then we are in for the best year in cinema in nearly a decade. Now if only we could stop Michael Bay from killing again.