Films of greed, romance and daydreamers and confident as ever. Simon Pegg delivers the best performance of his career as Gary King, the confident but vulnerable burnout leading his old pals on a bar crawl. The sum of its parts would have more than qualified “World’s End” as a success — that it manages to synthesize itself into something greater than them justifies its inclusion on this list.
FILMS, continued from p. 13
on Solomon Northup’s memoirs, McQueen’s adaptation is unafraid to dig deeper into this dark period of history — where other prestige pictures would be content to just look at the surface. Chitwetel Ejiofor anchors the film with a brilliant, nuanced performance, which provides the film with its aching, resilient heart — even as the psychological damage and bloodshed adds up to become near unbearable.
GRAVITY
AMERICAN HUSTLE
FOCUS FEATURES
David O. Russell’s crime movie proves that pulling off old tricks well can be just as bracing and exciting as playing the role of innovator. Set in the impressively recreated 1970s, it’s in the Scorsese-vein — but filtered through the modern-day screwball dialogue and character-based humor that has become the director’s calling card. Although the whole cast is stellar, Amy Adams’ seductive con artist deserves award nods. Bradley Cooper is hilarious as a neurotic FBI agent, in a role that should finally wash away the brotastic scent of the “Hangover” sequels for good. Clever plotting, witty banter and stylish direction make “Hustle” fun from start to finish, and arguably the best film of O. Russell’s career.
A nostalgic pub crawl turns into “Invasion of the Body Snatchers,” in Edgar Wright’s “The World’s End.”
PACIFIC RIM
COMPUTER CHESS
WARNER BROS. PICTURES
Sandra Bullock drifts into space — in Alfonso Cuaron’s technical marvel, “Gravity.”
WARNER BROS. PICTURES/LEGENDARY PICTURES
In an indie scene increasingly dominated by manufactured quirk and the plight of listless twentysomethings, Andrew Bujalski’s earnestly weird and refreshingly original mockumentary is low-key, funny, smart and thought-provoking. Shot on vintage video cameras with a mostly non-professional cast, the whole movie plays out like a foundfootage documentary of a 1980s computer chess tournament — that is, until it doesn’t. As the movie progresses, Bujalski mixes in liberal doses of Lynchian, existential dread and the surreal with the established deadpan style. The result is like nothing you’ve ever seen before.
THE WORLD’S END
The final entry in director Edgar Wright’s so-called “Cornetto Trilogy” is a surprisingly emotional and bittersweet look at the effect of time on relationships the bonds of friendship. It’s also a sci-fi genre sendup that is seriously, seriously funny. Layering quick-witted banter, visual gags, physical comedy and perfectly timed callbacks — while also pulling back enough for emotional character beats — Wright’s direction is as stylized
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January 2, 2014
Set in outer space, Alfonso Cuaron’s visually compelling marvel makes the case that the artistic potential of 3D can be stunningly realized, when its tools are placed in the hands of a visionary filmmaker. The setting allows Cuaron’s camera to roam totally freely, and lends itself to his signature absurdly long takes — such as the masterful, nearly 13-minutelong opening shot. At its core though, the film works as a highly entertaining, tightly wound action-adventure (which, at 90 minutes, never overstays its welcome).
Monster movie destruction never looked better than in the eye-popping 3D of “Pacific Rim.”
I’d be lying if I said “Pacific Rim” wasn’t the most fun I had at the movies in 2013 (and also if I said I saw it less than five times in theaters). In the midst of a grim blockbuster season, Guillermo Del Toro delivered the kind of spectacle people crave during the summer. This modern twist on the Japanese monster movie utilizes eye-popping 3D to enhance its super-sized robots-versus-monster fights. Sure, it might be easy to criticize the dialogue (admittedly dumber than a sack of rocks at times) and archetypical characters — but in doing so, you’d be missing the joys the film has to offer, and quite possibly the point. The expansive world building and the epic scale of its action sequences are what matter here, and the film more than delivers in that regard. Just try to watch its wildly inventive, frenetic, neon-colored Hong Kong fight sequence without a huge, goofy grin.
SPRING BREAKERS
Response has been sharply divided — but love it or hate it, this film is definitely not what audiences showed up expecting to get. Though the shrewd advertising campaign played up the “Disney Girls Gone Wild” angle, writer/director Harmony Korine has a history producing another kind of exploitation flick — the kind that plays at art houses and thumbs its nose at conventional filmmaking (see “Trash Humpers”). It’s no surprise, then, FILMS, continued on p. 15
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