2023: My Year in Films
Yes, I watched a lot...
I watched 372 films this year (I know!!!) but my only list started in February when I decided to keep a record inspired by Stewart Lee’s Cultural Year newsletter and his Liverpool performance when he did a whole bit on John Carpenter. That prompted a ‘John Carpenter Season’ which got me watching films again, after being a film obsessive for much of my life. Then it was made dormant partly because I had to care for my Mum for a few years, but also for reasons too long, complicated, and relationshippy to go into.
But now I’m back. There might be some missing from January except ‘Cocaine Bear’ (meh!) which I saw at a midnight showing at the cinema in Salford Quays.
Some of my judgements were affected by how I saw the films. For the first half of the year, I was watching films on my laptop but in the Summer moved my office to another smaller room, and reassembled my home cinema projector using my 90 inch retractable screen. I noticed the bigger screen changed my attitude to films. I watched ‘The Shining’ twice and the difference between the small 15” laptop and the cinema screen was revelatory.
My selection of films is also hugely affected by accessibility. I’ve done okay finding some obscure movies, but lots are beyond my reach (I missed many spaghetti westerns and indie films). I have a Cineworld Unlimited ticket, which is a good deal at £17 a month, but they only show popular films. There’s a new ticket just been introduced at HOME in Manchester which I might switch to but have to work out how to afford the £10 train ticket. I might be able to claim it as an expense if I start reviewing films in a more professional context but not sure people want that. I’ll have to see... The beauty of Warrington is I can cycle there in the Summer and the train it only £4 when I need it.
Still, the choices are usually pretty dire.
In other words: wish I could see a wider selection of films but this is what I have access to.
The Best
Best Films or Most Surprising (any of which I want to watch again, with the exception of ‘Barbie’ which I’ve now overdosed on)
Barbie – This choice might age but, for me, the smartest film of the year because it walked a fine line between annoying every side of the gender war, whilst voicing a fairly pragmatic and welcome argument about leaving people the fuck alone to be who and what they want to be. For this alone, I will call it my Film of the Year. I’ve now seen it 4 times, though by the 4th time, I didn’t want to see it again… Still sang along with Ken, though, and cried with the Billy Ellish bit.
Sisu – First ‘wow’ moment of the year in the cinema. Seen it 3 times. Not going to win any awards but just so pitch-perfect and a homage to some of my favourite movies. Been recommending it to anybody near me all year long.
Pina – Biggest surprise of the year. I adored this Wim Wenders film which gave me calm in December when I really needed some calm in my life.
The Old Oak (CINEMA) – Hugely affecting. I don’t want to say too much because it will turn into a rant about despicable racists, xenophobes, and flag shaggers in this country.
Killers of the Flower Moon (CINEMA) – Another Scorsese epic and one of his best telling a story that made me justifiably angry. I seem to be getting upset a lot about films in which men mistreat women or don’t appreciate/exploit loving relationships. Am I projecting my loneliness too much? Perhaps I am. Still not a fan of DiCaprio, though. I can see how he thinks he’s the new De Niro, which he’s not. De Niro’s best performance in years, btw. I’d give him the Supporting Oscar.
Trish (CINEMA) – About an artist destroyed by the benefits system and a class-ridden arts establishment. I cried and cried and want to cry just thinking about this film, given I am living through some of this myself, in my own very humble way.
The Flash (CINEMA, 2nd Time) – Not going to be in anybody’s top ten but fuck it. I loved it. I loved the sexy new Supergirl (almost as much as I loved Eva Green movies this year). I liked old Batman Keaton. Before I knew any of the backstory and allegations, I even liked the lead whose name I shall not utter.
Wonka – Could easily be my pick of the year but I can’t help but feel I was being emotionally exploited. The strings it was pulling at were established by the original film, plus just adding a reunited with your mother subplot was so cheap I resented the tears coming out of my eyes. Great songs, though. A divine comedy! Ha! (See what I did there?)
Dance First (CINEMA) – Total revelation. I thought when watching it that I wouldn’t see a film I enjoyed more and I still feel that way. I don’t know why I don’t pick this as my film of the year, except I think I might be ridiculed and called pretentious.
The Killer (CINEMA) -- Second viewing wasn’t as good as the first, but I love Fincher’s eye, the sound design, and the cool aesthetic.
Scrapper (CINEMA) -- Warm and life-affirming.
Ferrari (CINEMA) – Technical masterpiece about a technical master. Really expected to be lukewarm about it but came out very impressed. In a year when older film makers have largely disappointed, it was great to see the return of Michael Mann.
Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning P1 (CINEMA) – Populist cinema at its best. Hard to fault Cruise. I went to see it again just to listen to the theme music very loud.
Cobweb (CINEMA) – Hated the trailer. Loved the movie. It’s like a live-action Edward Gorey story.
The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (Fincher) – One I hadn’t seen. Blew me away. Even better (imho) than the original.
Other Great Movies I’d Either Seen Before or Not Making my Best-Of List.
Look Who’s Back
Wings of Desire
Raging Bull
Shanghai Express
The Big Lebowski (CINEMA)
The Wicker Man (CINEMA) – Funniest night at the cinema when the audience nearly rioted when the film was preceded by a (decent) hour-long feature on its anniversary.
Night of the Hunter
House Around The Corner
Miss Peragrine’s House of Peculiar Children – Love Eva Green. Love, love, love. Would marriage be really so out of the question?
Eraserhead -- The film that made me watch to watch more Lynch (See Wild At Heart)
Der Blaue Engel – The film that made me a big Marlene Dietrich fan.
Eastern Promises – I really enjoyed it and was so surprised that I watched Crash which felt more like the Cronenberg I knew and loathed.
Touch of Evil
The Conversation
Cemetery Man – Fun Italian schlock Byronic horror comedy with lots of breasts. I approved.
Joker (CINEMA) – Enjoyed it so much more than when I watchced it on my laptop.
Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (CINEMA) – Flaws but nostalgia goes a long way. I wish they’d cast Eva Green in the Fleabag role, though. If they had: instant FILM OF THE YEAR.
The Shining -- One of the best films I saw this year. Big screen supercharged my appreciation for this film which I’d watched at home earlier in the year and couldn’t finish.
Zodiac
Serpico (CINEMA)
The French Connection
A Clockwork Orange
The Abyss (Special Edition)
Ex-Machina — Intelligent Alex Garland AI drama, with nudity. What’s not to like?
Jojo Rabbit
Inglorious Basterds
Keoma – Loved the soundtrack by Iain Duncan Smiths’s sister. My best movie fact of the year.
Django Unchained
Matewan (1987)
Limbo – Became a John Sayles fan this year but this was my pick. Very peculiar to me, I think, but triggered my romantic side in a big way.
Ennio
The Hill
The Searchers
F For Fake
Once Upon A Time In America
The Hunt — Caused controversy but still rate this anti-Trump satire.
Worst Films
Badge of Honour to Christopher Forbes for making the worst films I saw this year, but I only watched them because they were so bad. These were the worst and therefore the funniest: Billy The Kid; Die By The Sword; King of the Britons; The Last Days of Billy The Kid.
Worst film of the year…
The Meg 2
Saw it at the cinema and loathed it. I now hate Stratham. I hate that shitty American accident he adopts which doesn’t sound even slightly American except in a way you hear old footballers sound slightly American after moving to the US to commentate for a few years. I saw he’s made a new film about bees and has the same accent. I wanted to throw something at the screen. As for Meg 2: the action was awful, the premise dumb, and I just hated everything about it, hated the people who loved it, and resented that this piece of shit took up a screen at the cinema for two months when I could afford to travel further afield to see the kinds of films they show in the indie cinemas in Manchester and Liverpool. Fucking awful.
Perhaps great movies but, for me alone, really really disappointing:
Past Lives – Great film (I get it) but, urgh, the lead character’s story arc just hit me on a personal level. She’s loved by two guys and navigates a path where she really doesn’t choose as much as maintaining the status quo. I couldn’t identify with it. Maybe I’d just feel blessed to be loved by two beautiful women but I hope I wouldn’t feel so damn indifferent about it. I just wanted to shout ‘fuck off’ at the screen and tell her to stop acting so spoiled.
Anatomy of a Fall – I liked a lot about it but it didn’t spark into life. This one really sits in my aesthetic blind spot. It was merely okay but I was not carried away by it. Really don’t understand the acclaim.
Saltburn (CINEMA) – Awful class politics, complete absence and demonisation of the working classes, esp. Prescot and the NW. Great if you enjoy watching Barry Keoghan’s cock flapping around but that person wasn’t me.
Napoleon (CINEMA) -- Long and boring, and lousy sense of history.
The other films that disappointed me the most or I just hated the most:
One Million Years BC – I hoped for some campy Hammer fun and lots of Raquel Welsh but I was just bored.
The Nun 2 (CINEMA) – Short and boring. Nothing new.
The Swarm (Long Version) – Long and tedious. A waste of a great cast. Short version is supposedly much better.
The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou – My Wes Anderson love died. Just as I begin to think I might start to like him, I’m reminded of why he’s so bad. Needs somebody funny looking over his scripts. High formalism just ain’t funny.
Ad Astra -- a lousy clone of ‘Heart of Darkness’ that missed everything but did have excellent special effects.
The Sound of Freedom – Q-Anon bollocks.
Smoking Causes Coughing (CINEMA) – That French guy who annoyed me in the past annoyed me again. I should have known better.
Strays (CINEMA) – I only went because Peter Bradshaw rated it highly. Utter toss. Dreadful. Only film where I thought I might actually walk out.
Chevalier (CINEMA) -- Just dumb. Simplified history; racial politics that were even more racist than the racists they were trying to criticise. Insulting to everybody portrayed in the film, including Mozart.
Wild At Heart -- The film that made me swear never to watch any more Lynch (See Eraserhead)
The Rest
These are a mix. I’ve not given ratings because I often rate movies too highly depending on my mood. There’s a mix. Lots of classics which I’ll have rated 10/10.
Cocaine Bear (CINEMA)
Halloween
They Live
Everything Everywhere All At Once
Once Upon A Time In Hollywood
The Big Gundown
Assault On Precinct 13
Vampires
Escape From New York
God Said To Cain
The Fog
Big Trouble In Little China
Django
In The Mouth of Madness
The Thing
Unearthly Stranger
The Gentleman
High Crime
Christine
My Name is Nobody
Jerimiah Johnson
Brubaker
One Upon A Time In The West
Hot Rock
Fistful of Dollars
Blake of the Immortal
Shaloka
The Wicker Man
For A Few Dollars More
The Good, The Bad and the Ugly
The King of Comedy
Taxi Driver
Barry Lyndon
Dog Day Afternoon
After Hours
The Great Silence
Anchorman 2
The Offence
The First Great Train Robbery
Zardoz
Outland
Total Recall
True Grit
Raising Arizona
A Man Called Sledge
A Gun For Ringo
The Death of Stalin
The Russia House
Unforgiven
The Anderson Tapes
The Untouchables
The Witches of Eastwick
Starblack
My Name is Trinity
Trinity Is Still My Name
Blindman
Spiderman No Way Home
Ready Player One
The Canterbury Tales
Thor Love and Thunder
Kundun
The Sisters Brothers
El Topo
Gremlins 2
Parasite
Shango
Rango
The Package
Jodorowsky’s Dune
The Holy Mountain
Rio Bravo
Key Largo
Evil Dead 2
Requiescant
El Dorado
Army of Darkness
Time Bandits
Close Encounters of the Third Kind: Coll Ed.
Cannon for Cordoba
The Nineth Gate
Frantic
Chinatown
The Last Detail
One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest
Henry Fool
Free Guy
Tepepa
Death Rides A Horse
Return of Ringo
Howard the Duck
Day of Anger
One Eyed Jacks
Massacre Time
Cut-Throats Nine
Little Big Man
Tootsie
A Fistful of Dynamite
Night Moves
Red Sun
I Was Born, But…
A Town Called Bastard
Good Morning (Uzo)
Face to Face
The Scarlet Claw
Underwater
Les Patterson Saves The World
Nobody
My Darling Clementine
The Parole Officer
Contamination
The Island of Doctor Moreau (1996)
Les Diaboliques
The Gauntlet
Mimic
A Fistful of Lead
Rocket Hunters
Conan The Barbarian
Mimic 2
The Car
Django, Kill! If you live shoot!
Silver City
Sunshine State
Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings
Eight Men Down
The Rover
High Ground
Into the Inferno (Herzog)
High Noon
Four in the Apocalypse
Northwest Passage
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
Southern Comfort
Shanghai Joe
Damsel
First Cow
Kumiko the Treasure Hunters
Dead for a Dollar
Winchester ’73
If You Meet Sartana... Pray for Your Death
The Deep
The Revenant
Aguirre: The Wrath of God
Phase 3
Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 3 (CINEMA)
Hypnotic (CINEMA)
Sisu (CINEMA)
Tremors
Reservoir Dogs
The Devils
Spiderman: Into the Spiderverse
Coffin Full of Dollars
God Bless America
Beau Is Afraid (CINEMA)
Pale Rider
Spiderman: Across the Spiderverse (CINEMA)
The Boogeyman (CINEMA)
Wyatt Earp
Tombstone
Evil Dead Rise (CINEMA – EMPTY)
Transformers: Rise of the Beasts (CINEMA, 3D)
Sisu (CINEMA, 2nd time)
The Grand Budapest Hotel
No Hard Feelings (CINEMA)
Following
The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent
Spy
Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (CINEMA)
Asteroid City (CINEMA)
Tenet
Prey
Batman (1989)
Batman Begins
The Dark Knight
Beetlejuice
Elemental (CINEMA)
Insidious: The Red Doom (CINEMA)
The Dark Knight Rises
Dressed to Kill
Man of Steel
Batman vs Superman
Mission Impossible: Fallout
Zack Snieider’s Justice League
Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning P1 (CINEMA)
Shazam
Shazam 2
Oppenheimer (CINEMA)
Barbie (CINEMA)
Barbie (CINEMA)
Catch Me If You Can
Snow White and the Seven Dwarves (CINEMA)
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (CINEMA)
Joy Ride (CINEMA)
Gran Turismo (CINEMA)
Dungeons & Dragons
Enter the Dragon (CINEMA)
Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore
Barbie (CINEMA)
The Wolf of Wall Street
The Blue Beetle (CINEMA)
Silence
Kill List
Logan
65 — Adam Driver dino nonsense.
Whatever Happened To Baby Jane
Tentacles
Theater Club
The Dive
A Reason To Live A Reason To Die
Taxi Driver (CINEMA)
Training Day (CINEMA)
Equalizer 3 (CINEMA)
For Few Dollars More
Men — Minor Alex Galdland moview / Rory Kinear porn.
Gravity
Juggernaut
Sorcerer
Equalizer 3 (CINEMA)
The Equalizer
Equalizer 2
Lone Star
The Sweeney
Past Lives (CINEMA)
Rise of the Footsoldier: Vengeance (CINEMA)
Rogue One
A Haunting in Venice (CINEMA)
Dumb Money (CINEMA)
Knock on the Cabin
The Lesson (CINEMA)
John Wick
John Wick 2
John Wick 3
John Wick 4
AntiGang
The Creator (CINEMA)
The Exorcist
To Live and Die in LA
Fight Club
Dr No
Casino
The Church
Shadows and Fog
The Yakuza
The House That Screamed
The Girl In the Spider’s Web
The Evil Dead (CINEMA)
Anatomy of a Fall (CINEMA)
Alive but Preferably Dead
The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo
The Girl Who Played With Fire (Part 1)
Fury of Johnny Kid
Renfield
The Girl Who Played With Fire Part 2
Dream Scenario (CINEMA)
The Marvels (CINEMA)
Roma Open City (Sleepy)
Cisco Pike
The Friends of Eddie Coyle
The Pigeon Tunnel
Fall
Kingdom of Heaven: Roadshow Edition
Ninotchka
Hannie Caulder
Dirty Harry
Vengeance is Mine
The Killer
MI: Ghost Protocol
Thanksgiving (CINEMA)
A Foreign Affair
War Horse
Privilege
The Fortune Cookie
Polar
Riders of Justice
Arctic
Revolver
The Tomorrow War
Next Goal Wins (CINEMA)
Eileen (CINEMA)
The Antichrist
Witness for the Prosecution
Hunger Games: Songbirds & Snakes (CINEMA)
Double Indemnity
Blonde Venus
Judgement at Nurenberg
Rancho Notorious
Morocco
No Highway in the Sky
Godzilla Minus Zero
Now Voyager
The Three Musketeers: D'Artagnan
The Three Musketeers: Milady (CINEMA)
The Big Racket
Five Graves to Cairo
Another Earth
A Canterbury Tale
Crash
The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes
Bluebeard’s Eighth Wife
The Salvation
Night Falls on Manhattan
One Two Three
Last Temptation of Christ
Q&A
Nerdling Bingo is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.