{"id":7373,"date":"2009-12-31T21:02:59","date_gmt":"2009-12-31T21:02:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.filmdetail.com\/?p=7373"},"modified":"2010-01-01T01:08:15","modified_gmt":"2010-01-01T01:08:15","slug":"the-best-films-of-2009","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.filmdetail.com\/2009\/12\/31\/the-best-films-of-2009\/","title":{"rendered":"The Best Films of 2009"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

As usual my best films of the year are presented in alphabetical order and in the interests of brevity I’ve decided to make the descriptions shorter so I can post each one on Twitter<\/a>.<\/p>\n

THE BEST FILMS OF 2009<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

A Prophet<\/a><\/strong> (Dir. Jacques Audiard): A stunning French prison drama with grit, style, humour and killer performances from Tahar Rahim and Niels Arestrup.<\/p>\n

A Serious Man<\/a><\/strong> (Dir. The Coen Brothers): This sly re-working of the Book of Job was arguably the finest film of the Coen Brothers distinguished career.<\/p>\n

Adventureland<\/a><\/strong> (Dir. Greg Mottola): A coming-of-age drama which defiantly proved that movies featuring teenagers can be funny, moving and smart.<\/p>\n

Avatar<\/a><\/strong> (Dir. James Cameron): The dialogue creaked but Cameron returned with a dazzling sci-fi experience and took cinema visuals into a new world.<\/p>\n

In the Loop<\/a><\/strong> (Dir. Armando Ianucci): The joyous foul-mouthed wit of this political satire was only matched by the intelligence of its observations on modern politics.<\/p>\n

Inglourious Basterds<\/a><\/strong> (Dir. Quentin Tarantino): A cinematic mash up of WW2 movies and spaghetti westerns saw Tarantino return to form with a bang.<\/p>\n

Sin Nombre<\/a><\/strong> (Dir. Cary Fukunaga): This beautifully shot immigration drama featured some fine performances and heralded a new talent in director Cary Joji Fukunaga.<\/p>\n

The Hurt Locker<\/a><\/strong> (Dir. Kathryn Bigelow): A pulsating and provocative examination of a US bomb squad in Iraq that may come to be a defining film of the conflict.<\/p>\n

The Road<\/a><\/strong> (Dir. John Hillcoat): Cormac McCarthy’s parable of a book came to the screen with admirable levels of emotion, horror and realism.<\/p>\n

The White Ribbon<\/a><\/strong> (Dir. Michael Haneke): A stunning examination of a German village beset by mysterious cruelties which became a telling meditation on the roots of Nazism.<\/p>\n

Up<\/a><\/strong> (Dir. Pete Doctor): Pixar triumph again with this lovingly rendered tale of the young and the old learning from one another on a unique balloon trip.<\/p>\n

Up in the Air<\/a><\/strong> (Dir. Jason Reitman): A skillful comedy-drama that was both funny and thoughtful, featured a terrific performance from George Clooney.<\/p>\n

HONOURABLE MENTIONS<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

A Single Man<\/strong> (Dir. Tom Ford)
An Education<\/strong> (Dir. Lone Scherfig)
Broken Embraces<\/strong> (Dir. Pedro Almod\u00f3var)
Coraline<\/strong> (Dir. Henry Selick)
35 Shots of Rum<\/strong> (Dir. Claire Denis)
District 9<\/strong> (Dir. Neill Blomkamp)
Moon<\/strong> (Dir. Duncan Jones)
Star Trek<\/strong> (Dir. JJ Abrams)
The Cove<\/strong> (Dir. Louie Psihoyos)
Fish Tank<\/strong> (Dir. Andrea Arnold)
Where The Wild Things Are<\/strong> (Dir. Spike Jonze)<\/p>\n

FROM 2008<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Encounters at the End of the World<\/strong> (Dir. Werner Herzog)
Two Lovers<\/strong> (Dir. James Gray)
Il Divo<\/strong> (Dir: Paolo Sorrentino)
Mid-August Lunch<\/strong> (Dir. Gianni di Gregorio)<\/p>\n

What about you? Leave your favourites from this year in the comments below.<\/p>\n

> Find out more about the films of 2009<\/a> at Wikipedia
> Check out more end of year lists<\/a> at Metacritic
> Have a look at the Movie City News end of year critics chart<\/a>
> Check out our best DVD and Blu-ray releases of 2009<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My best films of 2009<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25,17],"tags":[1254],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.filmdetail.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7373"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.filmdetail.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.filmdetail.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.filmdetail.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.filmdetail.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7373"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.filmdetail.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7373\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.filmdetail.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7373"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.filmdetail.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7373"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.filmdetail.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7373"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}