It is time to take a look back at some of the best movies of the last decade. Here are a few of the best movies of the 2010s.
Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood (2019)
Tarantino’s penultimate film (or so he claims) reimagines the fringes of Hollywood in the era of the Manson murders, resulting in a riveting revisionist history. In the film, a fading TV star (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his stunt double (Brad Pitt) find their paths intersecting with rising starlet Sharon Tate (Margot Robbie) and the Manson gang. From its movie-mad giddiness to its deep pop culture references and word-perfect dialogue, it is pure Tarantino.
The Tribe (2014)
Myroslav Slaboshpytskiy’s suffocatingly tense debut was the decade’s most innovative use of sensory deprivation. We are immersed in a Ukrainian school for the deaf with a new student (Grigoriy Fesenko) quickly learning the ropes – and discovering a criminal underworld that operates underground. This bleak drama, performed by a deaf, non-professional cast in sign language, transforms the Lord of the Flies scenario into a thrilling cinematic experience without subtitles, voiceover or background music.
Lincoln (2012)
Tony Kushner, the director and screenwriter, takes a less traveled path with this movie. Abraham Lincoln’s biography offers an opportunity to analyze the unruly adolescence of American politics, the responsibility of keeping a divided nation together during wartime, the horse-trading lollapalooza of legislation, and what constitutes a presidential legacy. You get Lincoln both as a man and as a myth. You also learn about history in a way that feels vibrant, vital, and contemporary.
Personal Shopper (2016)
As a continuation of her collaboration with Clouds of Sils Maria director Olivier Assayas, Kristen Stewart cemented her victorious post-Twilight transformation into one of our finest actresses with this beguiling portrait of a woman in mourning. In Paris, Maureen works for a high-powered (but rarely seen) model, but her recent loss of twin brother is troubling her, and she believes she may be able to contact him from the afterlife. At this point, she begins receiving strange texts from a possible stalker. Those three dots on an incoming message have never been so terrifying. It is an enigmatic, profoundly moving, and the perfect existential ghost story for the 21st century.
Hereditary (2018)
In his auspicious debut, Ari Aster directs Toni Collette in a witchy fright fest about inherited trauma, starring a mother looking for answers after tragedy. As she starts to look deep into her family history, she finds out that the odd occurrences have something to do with her recent loss and her son’s erratic behavior. The horror film is extraordinary mainly because of the absolutely incredible performance from the cast.
Amour (2012)
Amour is a breathtaking love story that cross-examines the concepts of mortality. The devastating look at an elderly couple has a different approach when considering other films Micheal Haneke (and proof that the director does have a heart). Dealing with illness, the movie can be considered as one of the best works from the director. Don’t let the posters and title fool you. It is a romantic tragedy and there are plenty of moments in the movie when tears roll down your eyes.
Call Me By Your Name (2017)
Filmmaker André Aciman turned André Aciman’s novel into a powerful memory piece, all sensual images and sweaty euphoria. The Italian director’s coming-of-age romance charts the short-lived summer fling between bright teenager Elio (Timothée Chalamet) and Oliver (Armie Hammer), the indestructible graduate student who enters his orbit. Love affairs are powerful because they don’t last – but anyone who has seen Call Me by Your Name will never forget it.
First Reformed (2018)
Director-writer Paul Schrader has long battled flesh and spirit (remember, this is the same strict Calvinist who wrote Taxi Driver). In his late-career masterpiece about a Dutch Reformed pastor (a brilliant Ethan Hawke) who experiences an existential crisis of faith triggered by eco-terrorism and love, he throws compassion into the mix as well. He brings vitality to this journey into the dark night of the soul at 71 years old. Schrader’s most searching, intriguing, provocative film in years is more than a return to form.
45 Years (2015)
An old couple (Tom Courtenay and Charlotte Rampling) celebrate their 45th wedding anniversary when a body is found frozen in the Alps decades after an accident. She turns out to have once been the husband’s girlfriend; his wife, however, is the one who starts to fall apart. In Ramping’s stunning turn, ice shelves of desolation crumble in the face of sensible Englishness as her life’s partner becomes a stranger to her. The vivisection of a marriage in Andrew Haigh’s drizzly, rural, hatchback-and-high-street ordinary is a vast epic of minute intimacy. Sometimes the fire in your heart is not love, but grief – and either way, smoke gets in your eyes.
We Are the Best (2012)
The early ’80s saw many misfits who were dissatisfied with their lives start punk bands as an outlet to express themselves. However, for bored Swedish middle schoolers Bobo (Mira Barkhammar) and Klara (Mira Grosin), it’s just a pipe dream. When they meet fellow student/classical guitarist Hedvig (Liv LeMoyne), the idea of forming a female preteen power trio begins to make sense. Lukas Moodysson (Lilya 4-Ever) adapts his wife Coco’s graphic novel to capture the joy of discovering your bliss in two chords and the truth. This is one pure, unadulterated blast of girl power that you don’t want to miss.
Tangerine (2015)
‘Sin-Dee Rella’ (Kitana Kiki Rodriguez) and ‘Alexandra’ (Mya Taylor) are best friends who work as transgender sex workers. The friends spend Christmas pursuing an ex-boyfriend who cheated on them. Sean Baker’s comedy is an empathetic, raw, and ferociously funny work of cine-anthropology that could almost pass for a documentary. It was also infamous for being shot on an iPhone 5S. As a challenge to the next generation of filmmakers, it adds a vibrant, hyperreal aesthetic and DIY feel.
You Were Never Really Here (2017)
The revenge noir genre is turned into a bouquet of barbed wire by Lynne Ramsay. There’s something irreplaceable about the glitchy score, the throbbing cinematography, and Joaquin Phoenix’s schlubby angel of death rescuing a young girl and dealing revenge on a high-society pedophile ring. The real brilliance of this revenge movie lies in its rhythm. A set of already thin scenes is sushi knifed and sharpened until it resembles a torturer’s weaponry. It is surprising to see that most films waste so much time in neutral after watching this brutal, brittle, balletic film.
