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By my count, I saw 236 2021 releases in 2021 (an all-time record by far for me!), and could easily present a Top 50 here of films I’m really passionate and excited about. And yet, even so: I’m woefully behind! The year is over and I can’t drag out publishing this any longer, so here stands my work in progress: 10 of my favorite films (that I’ve seen so far) from 2021!
If there is a unifying trait to my favorite films of the year, it’s that I either saw them in a theater, or that they offered the kind of visual storytelling that richly merited viewing them on a theater screen. Wonderful as streaming is, there’s a seismic visceral impact to meeting a movie on its own terms, in a darkened theater. And the ten films that most rocked my world in 2021 richly deserved presentation in that forum.
A measured feature debut from director Maggie Gyllenhaal, The Lost Daughter provides an incisive look at motherhood seen through the expressive eyes of Oliva Colman.
Wow what a garbage year 2021 has been, and I didn’t think 2020’s sequel could be even worse, but here we are. However, thanks to the film gods, we didn’t have to go through it without some quality entertainment laid at our feet. Below is my top ten… ok top twelve movies for the year. One of the toughest parts of this list was which should be ranked where, so lets say they’re mostly tied with a couple stand-outs at the top.
Every year there are great films, yes, but it felt like 2021 was a particularly good year for movies. Certainly better than 2020, but what wasn’t better than 2020? These movies below are my favorites, but they were also the ones that provoked responses from me, whether it be enjoyment, anger, befuddlement or some combination of those (and others). There are a few movies I couldn’t make it to before the end of the year, a snowstorm in Seattle right after Christmas did my filmgoing plans no good, but I am confident this is a good representation of the strength of filmmaking in 2021.
In 2021 moviegoing ever-so-gingerly got back to something resembling normal. Sundance, SXSW, and SIFF stayed online, but by the late summer with vaccinations and testing I was lucky enough to get back into theaters for a couple glorious weekends of Telluride and TIFF. For the welcome thrill of getting back to the big screen, I was more than happy to show a vaccine card and wear a mask. Between festivals and the immense privilege of press screenings, I got to see quite a few of my favorites in cinemas while feeling relatively safe.
I’m not sure if these are “the best” per se, but they’re films experiences that stood out the most as I look back on the year.
The year saw a tentative return to in-person screenings, an experience I had deeply missed. Getting to see ambitious, challenging, and moving storytelling on the big screen was something I’ll be sure to never take for granted again. Here are the top films I saw in 2021.
I am fully in the tank for Paul Thomas Anderson; so the release of any new film from one of the greatest living American filmmakers marks a significant occasion to be celebrated. With that caveat in mind, Licorice Pizza, his deeply romantic tale of young strivers in the Valley, feels like a special holiday delivery with one of those giant novelty bows on it made especially for me. In the contrast to the icy focus of Phantom Thread (which vies for a spot on the summit of my ever-shifting rankings of his oeuvre), he’s returned to the wide-open sprawl of Southern California. Where Boogie Nights and Magnolia reckoned with ambitions hitting their natural limits, Licorice Pizza revels in the boundless optimism of youth. People may quibble about where it ranks in his pantheon, but I’ll happily take a hundred slices of this shaggy story of feeling of infinite possibilities.
The Matrix Resurrections makes subtext text right from the jump. Lana Wachowski embraces the meta of this new sequel and makes her new film explicitly about the despair of resurrecting the corpse of seemingly long-dead ideas to appease the hunger of a new generation of content producers and consumers. Whether it’s a sneaky scream from deep within an intellectual prison, a rousing successful return to form, or merely an well-intentioned but clumsily realized impulse to revisit old themes is likely to vary substantially by audience expectations and sympathies (or lack thereof). Some may rejoice to follow her and some familiar characters down the rabbit hole once again. Others, like me, may find themselves desperate to eject.
Challenging what it means to fashion a creative work in a world of endless sequels, it is as brilliant a way to end the year as one could hope for
