The Top 10 Films of 2013 (Redux)

10) Fruitvale Station
Directed By: Ryan Coogler
Starring: Michael B. Jordan, Melonie Diaz, & Octavia Spencer
STARS: 3 out of 4

Brief Description: This film takes an unflinching look at the last day Oscar Grant (Jordan) lives before his brutal murder on New Year's Eve in 2008. Analogous to Zero Dark Thirty, the third act is spectacular and makes the film.

9) Frozen
Directed By: Chris Buck & Jennifer Lee
Starring: Kristen Bell, Idina Menzel, & Josh Gad
STARS: 3.5 out of 4

Brief Description: Frozen is Disney's adaptation of The Snow Queen, with some excellent songs. If this film was made in the 90's around the same time as The Lion King and Beauty and the Beast, Frozen would be an instant classic right along with them.

2014 Oscar Preview: Best Picture

NOMINEES:
- 12 Years A Slave
- American Hustle
- Captain Phillips
- Dallas Buyers Club
- Gravity
- Her
- Nebraska
- Philomena
- The Wolf of Wall Street

SHOULD BE HERE: The Place Beyond The Pines

This was a decently small film that was released in April of 2013 by an Indie director. Granted, the names attached like Ryan Gosling, Bradley Cooper, and Eva Mendez gave it some credibility to the outside world, but still, I get why it wasn't nominated. Being "good" doesn't cut it- you have to be able to promote and network as well. Despite that, The Place Beyond The Pines was excellent. In this year of mediocre films, The Place Beyond The Pines was one of the best of them. I don't want to give anything more away about the plot of the film, because it's best knowing as little as possible about it going in. I was initially off put by the 140 minute run time, but I promise you, it's worth it.

Now, out of the films that at least had somewhat of a chance to be nominated but was not, Friuitvale Station was the best of them.

2014 Oscar Preview: Best Screenplay

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY

NOMINEES:

- Before Midnight (Ethan Hawke, Julie Delpy, Richard Linklater)

- Captain Phillips (Billy Ray)

- Philomena (Steve Coogan, Jeff Pope)

- 12 Years A Slave (John Ridley)

- The Wolf of Wall Street (Terrence Winter)

SHOULD BE HERE: The Place Beyond The Pines (Derek Cianfrance, Ben Coccio, Darius Marder)

The main reason The Place Beyond The Pines is such an excellent film was because of the script. The style used throughout in combination with the unconventional story telling makes this script easily one of the best of the year. I could go into all sorts of detail about how great the script is, but then I'd ruin the movie for you. Just go rent it now.

Top 10 Films Of 2013

In October 2010, I was sitting in a movie theater with my then girlfriend (now wife) watching David Fincher's newest movie. It was called The Social Network. After the movie ended and after I picked my jaw up off of the floor, I turned to her and said, "Holy Shit, that was great. I don't know which movie was better, this or Inception!" Inception had come out a few months earlier, and was just groundbreaking and breath taking. In my mind, at that time, I couldn't decide which awesome movie was more awesome.

2010 had two Holy Shit movies. A "Holy Shit movie" is a movie that is just so damn good that the only words that come out of your mouth after you see it are "holy shit." Obviously those movies were The Social Network and Inception. The reason I bring this up, is because we haven't had a Holy Shit movie in over 3 years since The Social Network. 2011 had "Drive", which is really the only movie that could even be considered a Holy Shit movie since 2010. However, Drive was really good, and maybe even great, but it wasn't Holy Shit good. Need further proof? Cracked recently named Drive the most overrated movie to come out in recent years, my old site Game of Inches didn't even consider it for its list of the 25 Best Films of the Past 25 Years (it was eligible), and it only received 1 (minor) Oscar nomination (Best Sound Editing) at the 2012 Academy Awards. Now you can make very easy arguments against all 3 of those instances; however, the problem is that Holy Shit movies don't even get that kind of bad publicity. You haven't heard a single complaint about Inception or The Social Network for the past 3 years. They're both still almost universally revered.