The writers here at Film Journal seem to agree with The Academy and its selection of the top films of 2013. Each of the nine Best Picture nominees found favor with our critics when it first premiered last year. Spike Jonze’s dystopian love story, Her, came the closest to receiving what could be considered a negative review, with critic David Noh singling out “eternal sufferer” protagonist, Theodore Twombly, for being too passive a hero. Yet, even with Twombly’s persistent moroseness, the character's world was nonetheless full of “droll moments and real surprise,” Noh acknowledged. As is the case with several directors whose films received nominations, Spike Jonze turned in one of his finest works in years.
Here’s what the FJI critics had to say about the best films of 2013:
12 Years A Slave:
12 Years a Slave is a landmark film, complete with a terrific ensemble (Paul Dano, Sara Paulson and Brad Pitt need to be mentioned in certain key roles), and the vision and skill required to do justice to such historically complex material. It is one of those rare pieces of art that all its successors taking a shot at the same topic will be measured against.
Click here for the full review.
American Hustle:
With a crackling script and masterful direction, Russell has made a fiction that is stranger—and way more fun—than the truth. He has the help of a dream cast of actors, all at the top of their games.
Click here for the full review.
Dallas Buyers Club:
Screenwriters Craig Borten and Melisa Wallack don’t fall back on any heroic or clichéd turns but keep Woodroof on an outlaw course where no pro-gay marches or quilts sweeten the way or soften the character’s macho, prejudicial core. Yet it’s McConaughey’s savvy incarnation of this Lone Star brute that makes this gritty tale worth the ride.
Click here for the full review.
Captain Phillips:
But Captain Phillips functions most as a handsomely, elaborately produced “hardware” movie that satisfies in both its details and the sustained suspense of its action elements. And by having Hanks in the starring role.
Click here for the full review.
The Wolf of Wall Street:
Unlike its mostly slimy characters, The Wolf of Wall Street favorably impresses on every level. Perversely enjoyable and entertaining, this wild ride of a film offers a motor-mouth chorus of really bad boys whose rousing cantata celebrates the recent era of easy money and financial funny business. Audiences—their values be damned—will sing along.
Click here for the full review.
Nebraska:
Like a Hitchcock MacGuffin, the non-existent prize is the peg on which screenwriter Bob Nelson hangs an alternately charming and caustic road movie about the often exasperating bonds between parents and children and how we could all benefit from taking the time to get to know those sometime-strangers we call Mom and Dad.
Click here for the full review.
Philomena:
Philomena is as much a sharp exploration of class, sexuality, faith and relationships as it is a wittily written, devastating account of the barbaric treatment of unwed mothers in Ireland as recently as the 1950s, with a plum role for the remarkable Judi Dench.
Click here for the full review.
Gravity:
Cuarón and his team have created screen spectacle with a searing human dimension, and bring a true sense of wonder to a groundbreaking movie experience.
Click here for the full review.
Her:
It's a fiendishly clever concept, his most satisfying outing since the brilliant Being John Malkovich, rife with droll moments and real surprise.
Click here for the full review.
The Internet is of course full of Oscar lists and countdowns today, posing much more of a distraction than usual for film-lovers. In-keeping with this spirit of enjoyable diversions, here’s another (brief!) list outlining What the Internet Has to Say About Oscar:
Film.com: The 12 Best Acceptance Speeches in Oscar History
Replete with video and fully subjective commentary.
Entertainment Weekly: The 10 Most High-Powered Oscar Races of the Past 25 Years
A fun trip down commemorative lane. Who knew Kate Winslet had already received three nominations by age 26? More importantly: Can Jennifer Lawrence best her record?
Vulture: Where to Stream This Year’s Oscar-Nominated Documentaries
A fantastic resource.
Indiewire: Interview: Lupita Nyong’o
Months before she received a Best Supporting Actress nomination for 12 Years a Slave.
Vanity Fair: Celebrating The Oldest-Ever Class of Best Actress Nominees
Take that, Sexist Agism.
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