My Top 10 Films of 2012

Another year, another batch of good and bad films gone to the history books. To conclude, 2012 will not be remembered as a banner year for narrative films.

This year’s selection of cinematic offerings, meanwhile, was a bit better than 2011’s. Looking back at the films seen and the ratings given, I liked 49 out of the 89 films viewed, meaning they got three stars or higher in this reviewer’s opinion. That is four more recommendations than I gave in 2011, when I saw 90 films.

Hollywood’s output of narrative films could be summed up as decent, alright and good enough. The five biggest box-office hits of the year – The Avengers, The Dark Knight Rises, The Hunger Games, Skyfall and The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey – all got a competent three stars from this critic. They were great entertainment but none of these should be mistaken for a great film.

There were also very few game-changers this year. I cannot think of a single film released in the past 366 days that I am confident will be marveled at in years to come as a milestone of cinema. 

Nevertheless, 2012 did offer us some excellent work from some breakthrough voices, whether it is Benh Zeitlin (the invigorating Beasts of the Southern Wild) or Josh Trank (Chronicle). Neither of those films made my list, nor did Holy Motors, Bernie, Looper, Rebelle, Headhunters, Searching for Sugar Man, Brave or The Raid: Redemption. There are moments from these ten aforementioned films that made the 2012 cinematic landscape a pleasure, even if the movies were stained with a few imperfections.

Well, here they are.

10: Indie Game: The Movie

(Dirs. Lisanne Pajot and James Swirsky)

Few films dedicate the crux of their running time to chronicling the creative process. However, this Canadian documentary that explores the artistic struggle of four independent video game designers does not just make a supreme case for classifying this interactive media as a viable art form, but also introduces us to some of this generation’s most brilliant designers.

Among this collection is Phil Fish, whose cubist game Fez became an Internet punchline for its much-delayed production. The reason: Fish was so enamored by new technology that he redesigned the game three times over. Other subjects include the makers of Super Meat Boy, a character without skin whose objective is to find a healer named Bandage Girl. It is an animated personification of the creators’ lives: their perception and creative capacity will flounder if they do not sacrifice their bodies for their work.

Frequently fascinating and surprisingly moving, Indie Game: The Movie delves deeply into the creative psychology of unacknowledged artists hoping to rack up points and win on a personal and public level, even if those levels seem impossible to finish.

9. The Imposter

(Dir. Bart Layton)

A line of voiceover in my favourite film, Magnolia, sums up three stories of coincidence and change by claiming that, “if that was in a movie, I wouldn’t believe it.” In a year where films like Argo and Compliance get their material from the fascinating truths behind their stories, no film seemed as outlandish or improbable as The Imposter, a thrilling documentary about a true-life master of disguise.

The charlatan is Frédéric Bourdin, a cunning, smart-alecky Frenchman who assumed the identity of a missing Texan teen named Nicholas Barclay in 1997. The documentary tracks his journey of improbable deception as Barclay’s family picks him up in Spain and ends up believing that Bourdin is their missing son. Director Bart Layton has a sharp eye and re-enacts the drama with prime suspense, slowly peeling back the layers of what makes this master trickster tick.

The dramatic irony works in the story’s favour: if Bourdin had not directly revealed his fraudulent identity until the film’s end, the whole story would have seemed completely improbable. Instead, the film is a frightening and shockingly hilarious trip. Believe it.

8. Monsieur Lazhar

(Dir. Philippe Falardeau)

Canada’s recurring appearance on the Academy shortlist for Foreign Language film is well deserved. Incendies appeared on my 2011 list in the #4 spot, while Monsieur Lazhar is just as stirring and deeply moving. It examines the strong, although sometimes knotty, bond between an Algerian teacher working in Canada and his students.

Bachir Lazhar, played with quiet grace by Mohamed Fellag, gets a post at a Montreal primary school to replace a young teacher that hanged herself from her classroom’s pipes. The students are fraught with despair as the shadows of her death loom over their day-to-day interactions. The film’s most poignant moments involve the relationship between Lazhar and two of his despairing middle-schoolers: Alice (played by Sophie Nelisse, just 11 when she won a Genie award for this role) and Simon, a rambunctious student with deep regret played by Émilien Néron.

Falardeau’s drama balances grief and levity with ease, nary appearing too light or too somber. Led by nuanced performances in a class of the highest order, this humanist drama is an insightful look into loss and the lessons that teach both pupil and professor.

7. Wreck-it Ralph

(Dir: Rich Moore)

The most dazzling film from this year’s Disney vault, both in storytelling and visual heft, is surprisingly not their annual Pixar entry. Instead, Rich Moore’s comedy, which explores the existential crisis of a villainous, coin-operated arcade game character (voiced by John C. Reilly) is packed to the brim with audacious humour and verbal wit without failing to recognize the heartfelt story at its centre.

The film is both high-concept and character-driven. The protagonist is a giant villain with block-sized fists who questions the meaning of his role as his game’s eternal antagonist. He rebels by ditching his game to search for his own code in a video game world where he can prove to be the hero. His calling will come as the older brother figure for Vanellope (voiced by Sarah Silverman), who lives in an obnoxiously cute go-karting game, Sugar Rush.

Although the film’s story DNA and barrage of cameos from licensed arcade characters recall Pixar’s Toy Story, Wreck-It Ralph has enough charm, creativity and colour to nearly match that studio’s tour de force.

6. The Invisible War

(Dir. Kirby Dick)

The year’s most important documentary, Kirby Dick’s gripping examination of sexual assault in the American military deserves your attention. Dick is best known for docs about sexual secrecy and cover-ups, such as Twist of Faith and This Film is Not Yet Rated. This film, also a shocking indictment, already helped to influence military reforms after it won an award at Sundance.

Most of the assault victims are female, but a few are male. Many come from military families and believe it is their duty to serve and protect. The film’s most shocking revelation is not that 20 per cent of soldiers admit to being assaulted, but that so few of the assailants are reprimanded by their superiors.

Many of the women discuss their intense valour for wanting to serve their country and the vitriol they underwent later as victims of rape and harassment. While more than a dozen women show their faces with pride and open up to their traumatic experiences in this unflinching documentary, the shame is that there are so many who would not.

5. Zero Dark Thirty

(Dir. Kathryn Bigelow)

A searing, suspenseful recount of the 10-year manhunt to capture Osama Bin Laden, Zero Dark Thirty is like a 21st century version of All the President’s Men – a thrilling fuse of first-rate investigative journalism and filmmaking.

Its biggest standouts are Jason Clarke as penetrating interrogator Dan and Jessica Chastain as Maya, the determined, no-bullshit CIA officer whose role in the manhunt becomes increasingly personal (and obsessive). They should both take group therapy with Jeremy Renner’s addicted maverick sergeant from The Hurt Locker, a film that comes from the same director (Kathryn Bigelow) and screenwriter (Mark Boal).

Like in The Hurt Locker, Bigelow shows the shadows that come as a side effect of serving your country. Meanwhile, the raid on Bin Laden’s compound in Abbotabad is the most gripping, edge-of-your-seat sequence in any film this year – even more impressive since we all know the outcome.

4. Marley

(Dir. Kevin MacDonald)

Before his anthems of love and freedom turned him into one of the world’s most revered musicians, Bob Marley’s home community in Jamaica rejected him for his mixed ancestry. As a result, he moved with his mom to Trench Town, a densely populated slum in Kingston, Jamaica. The rest is history. However, in Kevin MacDonald’s superb biographical documentary, it is an electrifying history. The film itself is as smooth and revitalized as one of Marley’s buoyantly optimistic singles. Unlike the figure at its centre, though, the film never drags.

Marley features incredible live performances of the man born Robert Nesta Marley, alongside jovial interviews with many of the key elements of his legendary career, from members of The Wailers to his children, the latter of whom noted their father's neglect for his family and his freedom to sleep with other women.

MacDonald got close access with family and friends to construct a sometimes enlightening, if not always esteemed, glimpse into Marley’s life. Regardless, this is the definitive film about one of the world’s most essential musicians, made with an immersive, explosive blend of archival footage and the sweet sounds of reggae.

3. Moonrise Kingdom

(Dir. Wes Anderson)

Wes Anderson is a filmmaker known for writing eccentric plots and directing with an intricate visual style, and his best films explore very adult themes but with a childlike imagination. An auteur as revered as he is mocked, Anderson can seem both overly precious and emotionally inert with his work. That is why Moonrise Kingdom is such a warm surprise. It is the first film from the writer/director that feels entirely in touch with human emotion.

Set on the fictional island of New Penzance in the mid-1960s, the film follows two pre-pubescent outcasts – Sam Shakusky and Suzy Bishop, played by excellent newcomers Jared Gilman and Kara Hayward – as they flee from their habitats to spend the last days of summer together. Both of these adventurous souls were made for each other, independent and misunderstood by societal powers, including a scoutmaster played by Edward Norton and a lonesome police captain (Bruce Willis).

Tonally and thematically, Moonrise Kingdom takes place in a realm between youth and adulthood – a place that Anderson knows well. In this case, the quirks of this inner space are delivered with emotional brevity by the two young protagonists, who are endearing, vulnerable and courageous.

2. Stories We Tell

(Dir. Sarah Polley)

Canadian actress-turned-filmmaker Sarah Polley’s third turn in the director’s chair is something of a miracle. An insightful glimpse into the fragile secrets and tangled relationships from Polley’s actual family life, Stories We Tell also experiments with the tenuous strands that separate fact from fiction.

Many of Polley’s family retell the story of Sarah’s mother in their own words. Diane Polley  died from cancer when Sarah was 11 but also took a giant secret to the grave. In compiling this family history, Sarah gives many of the stories equal weight, although not all of these narratives reconcile with each other. Even in the framework of this documentary, the possibility of doubt remains.

This interviewing of family and friends becomes an interrogation into the skewed subjectivity of storytelling. It is also significant that many of the people shadowed in the film are actors, whose job is to reveal deep truths under a guise of artifice. Polley explores the intricacies of truth and memory, but is constantly reminded how she has the cunning power as the creative director of the film to alter the audience’s impression of the story. It is a feat of tender, intelligent filmmaking.

1. The Master

(Dir. Paul Thomas Anderson)

No film in 2012 was full of as many mesmerizing performances, striking sequences or as much accomplished technical precision as Paul Thomas Anderson’s latest, a film built around the tormenting master-slave relationship between an erratic alcoholic and a mysterious spiritual leader.

Alternatively, is it a dysfunctional father-son relationship, like the ones Anderson has explored in his other films? Could it be about the psychological confrontation of an id and superego personality? Or is the fiery and often troubled relation between Freddie Quell, a hypersexual, Salinger-esque wanderer played by Joaquin Phoenix and Lancaster Dodd, a charismatic, if insecure preacher of sorts portrayed by Philip Seymour Hoffman, a friendship? I think it is a mix of all of these; unfortunately, most moviegoers would like to settle with one.

Quell is trying to adjust to the rhythms of postwar America and he finds refuge in the Cause, a hackneyed philosophical movement that Dodd commands (and which has clear parallels to the Church of Scientology). The most arresting moments come from the electrifying duels between Phoenix and Hoffman. Meanwhile, Amy Adams is terrific as Dodd’s harsh wife and, possibly, the master behind the exalted iconoclast.

As audacious as it is fascinating, The Master shows one of the finest American filmmakers working at the peak of his powers. Anderson's bold and bizarre journey into postwar American identity is a captivating and complex character study, as well as the year’s best and most daring film.