Top Ten Films 2010

10. Winter’s Bone

Winter’s Bone is set in brutally impoverished Appalachia, where seventeen year old Ree has a week to track down the dead body of her meth cooking father before the law takes her house away. This requires her to tread to the muddy and dangerous social waters of the Ozarks. So as you can tell this is not exactly an uplifting movie, but it’s a wonderful unflinching and intense portrait of a series of very desperate people.

9. 127 Hours

With 127 Hours, director Danny Boyle has managed to create an action movie where the main character is unable to move. 127 Hours follows the real life story of Aaron Ralston, a climber who after going hiking alone, gets his arm crushed by a rock in a canyon. After desperately trying to free himself for five days, while slowly using up the little of his remaining water, he finally decides to sever his arm to escape. The film is anchored by a very expressive and powerful performance by James Franco, and is helped by beautiful cinematography that keeps the film moving despite the fact it’s always in the same place. Obviously the amputation sequence at the end is gruesome and not for everyone, but it’s very much necessary and is a powerful statement about the human drive for survival.

8. Machete / Piranha 3D

The exploitation movie is back! Machete is about an illegal immigrant wrecking bloody revenge on the politicians who want to deport him, and Piranha 3D is about teenagers on spring break getting attacked by giant fish. Filled with buckets of violence, nudity, and bad dialog, they’re wonderful fun that you’ll probably feel guilty about later. What makes it even better is that the directors are clearly in on the joke, and work to make their movies as extreme and ridiculous as possible. How could you deny a movie that contains the line, “You just fucked with the wrong Mexican!”

7. The King’s Speech

The King’s Speech is about King George VI, known by his friends as Bertie, who suffered from an extreme and humiliating speech impediment. He eventually turns to Lionel Logue, who cures his speech impediment and eventually becomes his friend. Now the premise sounds conventional and boring, but what really makes this movie superb are the performances by Colin Firth and Geoffrey Rush. They give beautiful and complex performances, and both of them deserve the buckets of awards that they are going to receive this year.

6. The Social Network

The Social Network is a tale of ambition, greed, and betrayal set to the story of the creation of Facebook. Driven by anger over his girlfriend breaking up with him, and jealousy of his fellow students at Harvard who come from old money, he creates one of the most popular websites in the world and becomes a billionaire. Driven by an unexpectedly brilliant performance by Jessie Eisenberg, who plays Mark as an awkward sociopath who’s horribly out of touch with everyone else, and a witty and fast paced script by Aaron Sorkin, the movie takes what could have been sensationalist bullshit and turns it into a polished reflection on class and ambition.

5. Splice

In probably the most original movie released this year, Splice is a movie about the consequences of the creation of human life. Splice surrounds Elsa and Clive, two scientists who end up creating a half human half animal chimera. But in many ways the creature is very human and they begin to treat it like their child. Although it was marketed as a horror movie, it’s not actually scary at all. It’s a very intriguing psychosexual Freudian family drama with a sci-fi twist. Understandably that isn’t for everyone, but I just loved it.

4. True Grit

Many may dismiss True Grit as a remake of a film that was already superb, but it’s a very different picture. While the 1969 version was vehicle for John Wayne, True Grit is a western about biblical retribution, but in true Coen brothers fashion it’s also a complex reflection on good and evil. It’s a story where the “good” characters and the “bad” characters aren’t that different, and karma simply deals justice with a swift and brutal hand. It’s very similar to No Country for Old Men, but Grit contains a lot more kindness and humor, and therefore is much easier to watch. Supported by great performances by the entire cast, particularily from newcomer Hailee Steinfeld, this is more evidence that the Coen brothers quite simply can’t make a bad film.

3. Exit Through the Gift Shop

Thierry Guetta was simply a Frenchman who owned a vintage clothing store, but who also constantly carried a camera and filmed everything that he saw. His cousin was the famous street artist Space Invader, and through him he ends up falling into the complex world of street art. After filming hours of footage of street art, he becomes obsessed with the idea of creating a documentary about the famous anonymous street artist Banksy, and therefore Banksy decided to make a documentary about Thierry. Exit Through the Gift Shop is that documentary. It functions as a character study, the charting of the birth of a movement, an expose on the exploitation of street art, and in many ways a practical joke. It’s endlessly entertaining and puzzling, but also inventive and insightful. I’d recommend it anyone.

2. Toy Story 3

Pixar seems to have a special ability that causes me to tear up during every single one of their movies, and Toy Story 3 was no exception. Andy is heading off to college and the toys’ fates seem to be in jeopardy, but they sent over to a daycare center that’s at first welcoming but then later sinister. Both emotionally beautiful and immensely creative, the movie never stops surprising you. In the end,it’s a simple beautiful love note to consumerism, childhood and the power of relationships.

1. Black Swan

Black Swan follows Nina Sayers, a ballerina at a top ballet company in New York, who is given the dual lead role in a production of Swan Lake. Director Darren Aronofsky views Swan Lake as a metaphor for the two extremes of art, which are controlled and rational versus passionate and dangerous. These extremes cause the childlike Nina to split in two, both literally and figuratively. This is all lead by Natalie Portman, in one of my favorite performances of all time, who takes an intellectual abstraction and turns it into a real human being who the audience can, at times painfully, relate to. The movie itself toys with both of these extremes and is both recklessly and powerfully melodramatic, but also interesting and complex. It forces the audience into Nina’s pointed shoes, and makes us feel like we ourselves are losing our grip on reality. It’s one of the most powerful movies I’ve ever seen, and is easily the best movie of the year.