The only movie I watched on that list was Enter the Void, and it was … of technical interest.
—PolarisDiB
“Ha ha a bona fide hipster placing Noé’s Enter the Void at #2.”
But few hipsters refer to Noé as their sweetheart.
Not surprised that Enter the Void made his list, no Woody this year though.
Domain sounds pretty interesting. Anyone seen it? I’m surprised Waters would like Solondz. Not sure why but their sensibilities seem on hand superficially similar yet so diametrically opposed.
I love John but I have to disagree with him about Ricky. It is in my opinion Ozon’s worst film.
Anybody have hardcopy of the Dec Artforum? I’d be interested to see Amy Taubin’s and James Quandt’s lists.
@ Ari
I see a lot of affinities between Waters and Solondz. Solondz just works in a much more Keatonesque deadpan, I think.
I have the Best of 2010 issue of Artforum -
Taubin- the social network, film socialisme,and everything is going fine,exit through the gift shop, persecution, inside job, last train home, ruhr, aurora, wah do dem
Quandt – rite of spring and the strange case of angelica, mysteries of lisbon, uncle bonmee, film socialisme, aurora, carlos, le quattro volte, la bocca del lupo, the wanderer, static
I guess I like Waters as much as I dislike Solondz but I’d say Waters’ sophomoric good-natured gross-out sensibility stands in sharp contrast to Solondz’s sophomoric mocking vitriol (I get the sense that Waters likes his characters as much as Solondz hates his).
Thanks, Dial
@ Ari
Hmm, I’m not a huge fan of his work, but I’ve never gotten the sense that Solondz hates his characters, just that his sense of humor is blacker and more absurd (while at the same time being less expressive). In Waters everybody is secretly (sometimes not so secretly) crazy; in Solondz everybody is secretly (sometimes not so secretly) depressed.
I wish to see Domain.
Life During Wartime was a fantastic film, as good as Hapiness in capturing the small moments of depression in life and making them personal yet epic. The ending is fantastic as is Rampling and everyone else.
Haven’t seen Life During Wartime yet.
I’ve only seen three films on his list – Enter The Void, Dogtooth, Mesrine – but did not like them enough to put into a top ten. But I always like the spirit of his year-end lists.
I did not like Life During Wartime but I LOVED Dogtooth. Those are the only two on the list I have seen sadly.
O, Domain is avialable here on Mubi.
I agree, I like the spirit of his year-end lists.
Has anyone seen any other year-end film lists that are interesting/intelligent or unique.
I’m really tired of seeing “The Social Network” on every list.
I agree, I like the spirit of his year-end lists.
Has anyone seen any other year-end film lists that are interesting/intelligent or unique.
I’m really tired of seeing “The Social Network” on every list.
I hadn’t even heard of Domain. Thanks to the 3$ credit given to me & MUBI’s offering of it… I’m sitting down to watch it tonight. Here’s hoping it’s good. I have faith in John Waters. His short-lived Movies That Will Corrupt You series felt like it was tailor-made for me.
Here is the 2011 List:
1. The Skin I Live In (dir. Pedro Almodóvar) “A dark, twisted, beautiful, and, yes, funny shocker from the greatest director in the world. God bless you, Pedro Almodóvar!”
2. Mildred Pierce (dir. Todd Haynes) “This elegantly shot, pitch-perfect made-for-TV melodrama makes everyone who watches secretly yearn to be a woman with issues. The best period film in decades—period.”
3. Justin Bieber: Never Say Never (dir. Jon M. Chu) “I’m not kidding. A well-made doc that proves the Bieb was a child prodigy. Wait until you see Justin stick his head into the audience and shake his hair in 3-D. I screamed.”
4. Hadewijch (dir. Bruno Dumont)
5. Kaboom (dir. Gregg Araki) “Doomsday never looked so hot.”
6. If a Tree Falls: A Story of the Earth Liberation Front (dirs. Marshall Curry and Sam Cullman)
7. The Tree of Life (dir. Terrence Malick) “You’d think I’d hate this film, and I almost did—until I realized it’s the best New Age, heterosexual, Christian movie of the year.”
8. I’m Glad My Mother Is Alive (dirs. Claude and Nathan Miller)
9. We Were Here (dir. David Weissman)
10. Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (dir. Apichatpong Weerasethakul) “A spooky, witty, never pretentious meditation on the otherworldly lust of ghosts and wild animals. Aren’t you glad art films don’t get test-screened?”
This proves it. If even John Waters, a man who places a Bieber doc or a Jackass film on his top 10, places The Tree of Life in his top 10, it must have been the best film of the year.
Salem Kapsaski
http://artforum.com/inprint/id=26857
1 Domain (Patric Chiha) My favorite movie of the year. A forty-year-old alcoholic aunt (played by Béatrice Dalle—“Betty Blue” herself!) and her gayish teenage nephew form a perversely close relationship by taking walks together. Lots of walks! So many walks you’ll be left breathless by the sheer elegance of this astonishing little workout.
2 Enter the Void (Gaspar Noé) The best film ever about taking hallucinogenic drugs. Seizure-inducing title credits, cinematography that looks as if it were shot by a Gerhard Richter–influenced kamikaze pilot—even vagina cams. Gaspar, thank you. You’re my sweetheart.
3 Buried (Rodrigo Cortés) The most excruciatingly painful date movie imaginable comes complete with a very smart feel-bad ending. See it with someone you hate.
4 Ricky (François Ozon) A great special-effects movie, though there’s only one effect: a flying baby. If David Lynch and David Cronenberg had sex and one of them magically got pregnant, this film could be their offspring.
5 Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work (Ricki Stern and Annie Sundberg) Talk about granting access! Are you crazy, Joan?! If Jews went to confession, this film would be a sacrament.
6 Jackass 3D (Jeff Tremaine) A scatological, gay, s/m, borderline snuff movie amazingly embraced by a wide, American blue-collar family audience. Isn’t Steve-O chugging down a glass of sweat collected from the ass-crack of an obese man and then vomiting at you in 3-D the purest moment of raw cinema anarchy this year?
7 Life During Wartime (Todd Solondz) Paul Reubens (without a trace of Pee-Wee) is a suicidal ghost who’s still miserable, and Charlotte Rampling plays a bitter, self-loathing hotel hornball. Both performances will break your heart.
8 Dogtooth (Yorgos Lanthimos) If your parents raised you into your teen years without ever once letting you out of the house and taught you that “outside” means climbing in the trunk of the family car and locking yourself in, are you in mental trouble? Hilarious, original, and very discomfiting, the way movies should be.
9 Carlos (Olivier Assayas) I loved all five-plus hours of this French hymn to celebrity revolutionary–turned-mercenary Carlos the Jackal. He’s so sexy that even militant, left-wing German feminist terrorists give him head and his own hostages ask for his autograph.
10 Mesrine (Parts 1 and 2) (Jean-François Richet) Four and a half more hours about another French criminal–folk hero–stud. Who’s badder? More butch? Cuter nude? Carlos or Jacques Mesrine? Why not a subtitled ten-hour “Freddy vs. Jason” combined sequel about both? In Sensurround, s’il vous plaît.