2014 Mid-Year Review: Top 10 Films

MANILA, Philippines - We are past the halfway mark of 2014. It has been a great six months of movie-watching for this writer. I went to several film festivals and discovered a lot of great films in the process.

Below is my list of the Top 10 Films of the past six months. I saw 106 films but my selection process is limited only to those movies that were released in Los Angeles this year or late last year but only expanded this year. I also considered those films released in prior years but were only exhibited at a film festival that I attended this year. I did not consider the movies I saw on DVDs unless they were 2014 releases. 

1. We Are the Best! (Director: Lukas Moodysson, Denmark) — This film is about three adolescent girls who formed a punk band despite being told that punk was dead. It is a lovely film that pulsates with life and youthful exuberance. This one earned the biggest applause from me during the Scandinavian Film Festival in L.A. held in late January this year. If Denmark decides to submit this film to this year’s Oscars, it has a strong chance at making the shortlist. (And a nomination, I pray.)

2. The Fault in Our Stars (Director: Josh Boone, USA) — Gus and Hazel. Enough said. But, really, no recent movie has made me cry hard as much as this movie did. I saw this adaptation of John Green’s bestselling novel at an early screening in April and have already seen it four times after it opened in theaters in early June. The movie has all the winning elements of the genre and it features an Oscar-caliber performance by Shailene Woodley. 

3. Giuseppe Makes a Movie (Director: Adam Rifkin, USA) — This is easily one of the funniest and most interesting films I’ve seen this year. This documentary is a behind-the-scenes look at the making of Giuseppe Andrews’ (the title character) 30th feature as a D-I-Y filmmaker. Armed with a $1,000 budget and a cast of homeless friends and kindly neighbors, he makes a movie for two days and has lots of fun in the process. I discovered this film at this year’s Los Angeles Film Festival. I hope it gets picked up for distribution because it has the potential to become a sleeper hit. 

4. Ilo Ilo (Director: Anthony Chen, Singapore) — A favorite from the Palm Springs International Film Festival held in January this year, this heartwarming drama tells the story of the relationship between a rambunctious boy and his Filipino nanny during the Asian crisis in 1997. The filmmaking is simple and so is the story but the effect is powerful and moving. A great directorial debut!

5. Transit (Director: Hannah Espia, Philippines) — One of the best Filipino films I’ve seen in many years. I saw this film in January and I instantly liked it! This is also a directorial debut from Hannah Espia and she shows great potential at becoming one of the best Filipino directors ever. Her well-observed camera work and meticulous storytelling style showed in this masterful examination of the effects of Israel’s discriminatory law that called for the deportation of children born to non-Israeli parents to a group of Filipino migrant workers. 

6. Clownwise (Director: Viktor Taus, Czech Republic) — This film is about three estranged stage comedians whose friendship was inexplicably broken three decades earlier only to be confronted by their shared past when one of them tried to stage a farewell show. This is my favorite film from the Santa Barbara International Film Festival last February. It is an emotionally moving film that celebrates the lasting bonds of true friendship that may be broken by a decades-old conflict but nevertheless endures, survives and is eventually revived when the heart finally decides to recognize what it truly feels and starts to forgive and forget the past. 

7. The Gambler (Director: Ignas Jonynas, Lithuania) — Another favorite from the Santa Barbara Fest, this one is a gripping drama about a luckless paramedic who finds success in a scheme that plays on the survival chances of the patients they take in. It is a powerful film that mirrors the games of chances we play with our lives by the choices that we make every day. The closing scene is so haunting that it offers two plausible scenarios depending on one’s own disposition on the day he watches this movie. 

8. Mother, I Love You (Director: Janis Nords, Latvia) — This is a tender portrait of adolescence as seen through a young boy’s strained relationship with his mother and his tendency to solve his juvenile mistakes with equally juvenile solutions. The movie features a winning performance from Kristofers Konovalovs, the young actor who portrays the boy and whose character’s name is, ahem, Raymond. 

9. X-Men: Days of Future Past (Director Bryan Singer, USA) — This is the best popcorn entertainment that Hollywood offered this year. Bryan Singer’s reboot and reimagining of the X-Men universe is masterful. He brought old and dead characters back to life and we do not even pause for a second to ask why, instead we race everyone to a thunderous applause of appreciation for the gift that the filmmaker has bestowed his audience. 

10. The Life and Mind of Mark DeFriest (Director: Gabriel London, USA) — I saw this documentary at the Los Angeles Film Festival last June and it left me with a conflicted sense of the law. The story is about Mark DeFriest who was sent to prison in his early 20s for the crime of “stealing” some tools that his father willed to him. Thirty years later, he is still in prison — in a maximum security prison, no less — because he was incorrectly diagnosed as mentally fit for trial during his initial incarceration. The psychiatrist who made the mistake is now revising his initial findings but everything might be too late because Mark is not set for parole until 2081. You’ll have to watch this documentary to marvel at how even well-meaning laws can victimize the most innocent among us. Another remarkable thing about this movie is the length of time it took the filmmaker to complete the film: Thirteen years.

(If you want to view the list of the 106 movies I saw, please visit my blog: www.raymonddeasislo.blogspot.com.)