I steal this idea from Salon.com‘s movie section (even though they abandoned it in the meantime). I immediately liked the concept: a list of the films I watched and commented on here, in the order of how I like them. A ranking! I also like Salon’s Andrew O’Heir’s liberty to not keep the ranking constant. When you look weeks or months later at a list that is based on your subjective impression right after watching a film, you can have a new impression – some films you imminently liked, but each time you see the list they end up a bit further down or have since disappeared from your memory. Others you found hard to access, but they lingered and worked their way through your guts and brain:
So from now on, my effort to maintain such a list, including mostly new films that have been released not too long ago. Next January I can then just pick the best picture winner from this list, and save the Academy the boring nomination and award procedures. “Winter’s Bone” should win next year, as well. And the year after that. But it won’t … dropped out of the list for old age reasons, unfortunately..
Update December 2014: As I have failed to update this list in many months, here is a new one for the 2013 and 2014 films I have seen over the last months:
- Under The Skin (2014)
- Paradise – Faith (2013)
- American Hustle (2013)
- Calvary (2014)
- Boyhood (2014)
- Locke (2014)
- The Lego Movie (2014)
- Blue Ruin (2013)
- Snowpiercer (2014)
- Interstellar (2014)
- Paradise – Hope (2013)
- The Armstrong Lie (2013)
- Philomena (2013)
- Gone Girl (2014)
- Nymphomaniac (2013)
- The Monuments Men (2013)
- The Congress (2014)
- Maleficent (2014)
- The Zero Theorem (2013)
- The Hobbit – The Battle of The Five Armies (2014)
- Sein letztes Rennen / Back On Track (2013)
- Godzilla (2014)
- Saving Mr Banks (2013)
- Chef (2014)
- Transcendence (2014)
- Big Hero 6 (2014)
- The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (2013)
- Robocop (2014)
- Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes (2014)
- Fury (2014)
- The Raid 2 (2014)
- Escape Plan (2013)
- 3 Days to Kill (2014)
- Wolf Creek II (2014)
- Thor – The Dark World (2014)
- Ender’s Game (2013)
- Exodus: Gods and Kings (2014)
- Pompeii (2014)
- Transformers – Age of Extinction (2014)
Last Update Febr. 8, 2014:
With broken heart, I got rid of the 2011 movies. Because so many of them were so good, I could not quite do it, however, so I decided to create a historic list for 2011-2012, and won’t touch that anymore. The list below is the one where I will keep updating the 2012-2013 releases.
Finally managed to update the list for plenty of 2013 releases. And it allows me to make an interim assessment of my 2013 favourites:
- Jagten / The Hunt (2013)
- 12 Years A Slave (2013)
- Pieta (2013)
- Mud (2013)
- Drug War (2013)
- Dallas Buyers Club (2013)
- Inside Llewyn Davies (2013)
- Her (2013)
- Side Effects (2013)
- Ain’t Them Bodies Saint (2013)
This is the list for the 2012-2013 films:
- Jagten / The Hunt (2013)
- Paradies: Liebe (2012)
- Beasts of the Southern Wild (2012)
- Magic Mike (2012)
- Holy Motors (2012)
- The Gatekeepers (2012)
- Barbara (2012)
- The Master (2012)
- Kapringen (A Hijacking) (2012)
- 12 Years A Slave (2013)
- Looper (2012)
- Zero Dark Thirty (2012)
- Pieta (2013)
- End of Watch (2012)
- Mud (2013)
- Drug War (2013)
- Dallas Buyers Club (2013)
- Inside Llewyn Davies (2013)
- Rampart (2012)
- The Wolf of Wall Street (2013)
- Lincoln (2012)
- Lore (2012)
- Her (2013)
- En Kongelig Affaere (A Royal Affair) (2012)
- Moonrise Kingdom (2012)
- Argo (2012)
- Side Effects (2013)
- Ain’t Them Bodies Saint (2013)
- Django Unchained (2012)
- The Place Beyond the Pines (2012)
- Blue Jasmine (2013)
- Prisoners (2013)
- Killer Joe (2012)
- Killing them Softly (2012)
- The Raid: Redemption (2012)
- Before Midnight (2013)
- Only God Forgives (2013)
- The Impossible (2012)
- Arbitrage (2012)
- Stoker (2013)
- Gravity (2013)
- The Iceman (2013)
- Captain Phillips (2013)
- Enough Said… (2013)
- Flight (2012)
- Sightseers (2012)
- Rush (2013)
- The Angel’s Share (2012)
- The Cabin in the Woods (2012)
- The World According to Dick Cheney (2013)
- A Field In England (2013)
- Prometheus (2012)
- Everyday (2012)
- Pacific Rim (2013)
- Lawless (2012)
- The World’s End (2013)
- Blackfish (2013)
- Back to 1942 (2012)
- Iron Man 3 (2013)
- Jack Reacher (2012)
- Total Recall (2012)
- The Hole (2012)
- Hobo with a Shotgun (2011)
- We Steal Secrets (2013)
- Mea Maxima Culpa – Silence in the House of Gods (2012)
- Pitch Perfect (2012)
- Brave (2012)
- Skyfall (2012)
- Oz the Great and Powerful (2013)
- The Dark Knight Rises (2012)
- The Avengers (2012)
- The Last Gladiators (2013)
- Les Miserables (2012)
- Jeff, Who Lives At Home (2012)
- Life of Pi (2012)
- The Dictator (2012)
- World War Z (2013)
- Spring Breakers (2013)
- Star Trek Into Darkness (2013)
- This is the End (2013)
- Elysium (2013)
- Oblivion (2013)
- Silver Linings Playbook (2012)
- White House Down (2013)
- Sunshine on Leith (2013)
- Man of Steel (2013)
- Hunger Games – Catching Fire (2013)
- Mama (2013)
- Men in Black III (2012)
- The Bay (2012)
- Hunger Games (2012)
- Cloud Atlas (2012)
- The Bourne Legacy (2012)
- Piper Alpha – Fire in the Night (2013)
- The Amazing Spiderman (2012)
- Frozen Ground (2013)
- Jiro Dreams of Sushi (2012)
- Ender’s Game (2013)
- The Conjuring (2013)
- Olympus Has Fallen (2013)
- The Expatriate (2013)
- Lockout (2012)
- Battleship (2012)
- The Hobbit (2012)
- Ice Age 4 (2012)
- Monster University (2013)
- Searching for Sugarman (2012)
- Journey to the West (2013)
- Bullet to the Head (2013)
- Maniac (2013)
- Sinister (2012)
- Citadel (2012)
- After Earth (2013)
- Abraham Lincoln – Vampire Hunter (2012)
- Wrath of the Titans (2012)
- Lone Ranger (2013)
- CZ12 (2012)
- Chernobyl Diaries (2012)
- Switch (2013)
- The Last Stand (2013)
thomas4cinema 
9 Comments
…need to get back into Broadwalk Empire. I watched the first episode…enjoyed it…then haven’t watched another episode since.
Glad I see Alice In Wonderland so low down – I thought it was rubbish!
Boardwalk Empire really was a treat! I am very much looking forward to the next Season(s). Alice in Wonderland confirmed the downward trend Tim Burton showed since… hm… Beetlejuice? Thanks for the comment!
This is a pretty good list. Off the top of my head, I would have added Warrior and 50/50 to it from 2011.
I am still looking forward to seeing both, have not caught up yet… thanks for commenting!
Interesting to see a ranking of what you’ve watched.
1,2,3, 8, 16, 17, 24, 31, 41, 43 would be in my top 20 of last years films.
From my top 20, you haven’t seen: The Imposter, Laurence Anyways, Perks of Being Wallflower, Mud, Blancanieves, What Richard Did, Tabu, Woody Allen: A Documentary (All 2012 on IMDb)
thanks, great hints for films to catch up on, Mud is definitely way up on my to do list, “Perks…” at least a hot candidate, even though the title kind of puts me off 🙂 Well do the research on the other ones, some of which have been under my radar.
oh, some great stuff there, need to get my hands on Blancanieves, Tabu and What Richard Did soon…
I have only seen 37 of the films on your list and at least half of those would not be in my top 100 of the past two years.
here we go, another evidence of great minds not thinking alike 🙂 Probably has a lot to do with me being completely fed up with comic book adaptations and superhero franchises…. those drop further down my lists every year.
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