In 2017 I saw 76 movies in theaters, more than I have ever done in a whole year. While there were a ton of films that I enjoyed this year, I find only a handful will stick with me into the new year.
In lieu of my typical top 10 year-end list, I instead opted this year to highlight my five favorite movies from this year, listed in no particular order. Beyond that I have listed 18 more films on which I can put my stamp of approval.
Blade Runner 2049
The original Blade Runner is a movie I enjoy talking about with people more than I do watching it. I adore the world it inhabits and marvel at the idea of a cyberpunk hard-boiled noir thriller, but always felt that I was more in love with the ideas than those who made it were. When it was announced that Denis Villeneuve, one of my favorite directors working today, was going to be making a legacy sequel I was appropriately terrified that there was an infinitesimally small chance that things would line up in my favor. Not only were my fears completely eradicated but my secret hyperbolic expectations were met if not exceeded! The world was flushed out; not in the contrived and obligatory way sequels tend to balloon things bigger at the expense of a hollow core, but in meaningful ways that raise poignant questions about humanity like the best science fiction does. Even if it somehow completely missed me on its substance, which it certainly did not, on a purely aesthetic level it is one of the most beautiful films I have ever seen. Blade Runner is still a well of talking points for me, but now, finally, it feels like something that was hand-crafted specifically for my enjoyment.
Dunkirk
Dunkirk is on my list this year almost entirely because of how much it surprised me. Going in, I had started to sour a bit on Christopher Nolan, whose earlier films like Memento, The Prestige, and even Batman Begins were huge hits with me but more recent efforts like Interstellar, Inception, The Dark Knight Rises, and the last half of The Dark Knight made me question if he valued spectacle more than good storytelling. Knowing that his latest would be a recount of a colossal British military failure in World War II, I was already certain of exactly what we were going to get. Much to my astonishment, it was nothing like I could’ve ever expected it to be. In a very Nolan way of problem-solving, a very bland survival story was invigorated by segmenting three perspectives of the same event and splicing them into one cohesive narrative. Top-notch cinematography by Hoyte van Hoytema and visceral sound design hammer home the pure terror and catastrophe without feeling like we’re exploiting history for cheap thrills as the war becomes a backdrop for personal stories on land, in air and sea. Dunkirk is on this list because for the first time in close to a decade I am excited to see what Christopher Nolan does next.
The Killing of a Sacred Deer
Even more so than Blade Runner 2049, The Killing of a Sacred Deer feels like a movie oddly specific to my tastes in film and I’m not sure what that says about me as a person. Whereas the former I can recommend to just about anyone for them to find something to enjoy, I really need to assess the darkness in one’s heart before endorsing this one. Sacred Deer marks the second English-language film from Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos, a man with a aptitude for the absurd and darkly humorous. Without getting to deep into particulars, the film revolves around a surgeon (Colin Farrell), his family, and a young boy he befriends. As a mistake from his past surfaces, the surgeon is given a dark ultimatum as some twisted act of justice. Revenge is a prominent theme and the plot could technically be described as a thriller/mystery, but above all else I would classify it as a dark dramedy. As with his other films, Sacred Deer also has vaguely supernatural or fantastical undercurrents that are alluded to, but not fully explored. It’s a combination of the offbeat humor and mystery that attracted me to this film, but I can see how it might be a bit too much for most others.
Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri
Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri is the newest from writer/director Martin McDonagh, the man responsible for two of my favorite dark crime comedies, In Bruges and Seven Psychopaths. Three Billboards, while not concerned with hitmen or psycho-killers, follows the mother of a recently murdered teenage girl as she wages a personal war on the local police station she holds responsible for not solving the crime. Where on the surface it appears to be a departure from the other films in his filmography, it shares the very same mix of very dark and emotional material married very effectively with dry humor and bursts of extreme violence. At times I was reminded of the early films of Joel and Ethan Coen in how these elements mix together so well without undermining one another. This is all held together in Three Billboards by an insanely talented cast consisting of Frances McDormand, Woody Harrelson, Sam Rockwell, Peter Dinklage, John Hawkes, and Caleb Landry Jones. As evident in this film particularly, McDonagh is an expert at writing dynamic and multi-faceted characters. No character is without their faults and even those clearly painted as despicable human beings are still in fact very human and capable of at least partial redemption.
Your Name. (Kimi no Na wa.)
Technically released in 2016, Your Name. is a Japanese drama anime film that got a limited US theatrical run in 2017. Written and directed by Makoto Shinkai, it tells the story of Taki and Mitsua, two teenagers living in Tokyo and rural Japan respectively, who discover that at seemingly random intervals they are swapping bodies and living days in the life of the other. Without getting too much into the details of how the plot develops, I can say that part of what resonated with me about this film is how subverts expectations and almost completely changes genre as it progresses through at least two abrupt plot twists. Fantastical elements aside, it is essentially a very grounded dramatic film at its core, and for that I feel that it is way more accessible than many other anime because of this. It’s also worth adding that in a year where Roger Deakins shot a Blade Runner movie, Your Name. might be my second favorite-looking film, particularly in scenes that depict the Japanese countryside. I will say that the voice acting in the English dubbed version is not too hot and the subtitled version should be a priority watch.
Other Recommendations
A Cure for Wellness
Baby Driver
Get Out
Good Time
I Don’t Feel at Home in this World Anymore
It
Kong: Skull Island
Lady Bird
Logan
Logan Lucky
Molly’s Game
mother!
Raw
Spider-man: Homecoming
Split
Thor: Ragnarok
Wonder Woman