2019 IN FILM

Of the 800+ titles I saw this year, these were my most favourite. A Top 30 & many many honorables. Also, my 2019 film ballot at the Wandering Image, highlighting the year's best in film by category. 







30.                   FURIE

29.

PORTRAIT OF A LADY ON FIRE

.

.

28.      VIOLENCE VOYAGER

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27.              DIAMANTINO

.

26.                 CLIMAX

.

25.         MIDNIGHT FAMILY

.

24.AN ELEPHANT SITTING STILL

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23.      ONE CUT OF THE DEAD

.

22.        CHINESE PORTRAIT

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21.               AD ASTRA

.

                 ONCE UPON A
20.     TIME... IN HOLLYWOOD

.

19.           THE SOUVENIR

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18.              ATLANTICS

.

17.            UNCUT GEMS

.

16.  THE GOSPEL OF EUREKA

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15.             ASAKO I & II

.

14.              PETERLOO

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13.                SHADOW

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12.           A HIDDEN LIFE

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11.           THE IRISHMAN

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10.              HER SMELL

.

9.                PARASITE

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8.                  TRANSIT

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                 A LONG DAY'S
7.    JOURNEY INTO NIGHT 3D

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6.     TIGERS ARE NOT AFRAID

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5.        HOTEL BY THE RIVER

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4.         THE NIGHTINGALE

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3.   THIS MAGNIFICENT CAKE!

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2.     ASH IS PUREST WHITE

.

1.            BLACK MOTHER

*****

ALSO ESSENTIAL. NOT RANKED.

(the other titles of 2019 I loved that could've placed)

DARK WATERS

.

.

THE KID WHO WOULD BE KING

CRAWL

ANIMA

THE FOREST OF LOVE

IN FABRIC

RELAXER

ALITA: BATTLE ANGEL

HIGH LIFE

.

HONEYLAND

I DO NOT CARE IF WE GO DOWN IN HISTORY AS BARBARIANS

DOLEMITE IS MY NAME

PEGASUS

PROMARE

THE WIND

REZO

MAIDEN

THE MAN
WHO KILLED DON QUIXOTE

BIRDS OF PASSAGE

DEADWOOD: THE MOVIE

ANTHROPOCENE: 

THE HUMAN EPOCH

THE FALL

MISSING LINK

HARRIET

MISTER AMERICA

THE HEAD HUNTER

PAIN AND GLORY

US

MARRIAGE STORY

DEPRAVED

PASOLINI

THE IMAGE BOOK

SYNONYMS

GLASS

AVENGEMENT

ACID RAIN

FAST COLOR

HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON:

THE HIDDEN WORLD

GHOST FLEET

KNIFE + HEART

ARCTIC

EXTRA ORDINARY

GEMINI MAN [HFR 3D]

ONE CHILD NATION

 

THE BODY REMEMBERS WHEN THE WORLD BROKE OPEN

THE GOLEM

A BEAUTIFUL DAY
IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD

  

HIGH FLYING BIRD

FIRST LOVE

 PIERCING

 

THE BEACH BUM

63 UP

INVADER ZIM: 

ENTER THE FLORPUS

 

KNIVES AND SKIN

 

DOMINO

  

DAUGHTER [DCERA]

 

THE AMAZING JOHNATHAN 

DOCUMENTARY

LEAVING NEVERLAND

SISTER 妹妹

FEAST OF THE SEVEN FISHES

VIRUS TROPICAL

KITBULL

TOMORROW I WILL BE DIRT

****

recap
2019

1. BLACK MOTHER (Allah)
2. ASH IS PUREST WHITE (Zhangke jia)
3. THIS MAGNIFICENT CAKE! (Emma De Swaef)
4. THE NIGHTINGALE (Jennifer Kent)
5. HOTEL BY THE RIVER (Hong sang-soo)
6. TIGERS ARE NOT AFRAID (Issa López)
7. LONG DAY'S JOURNEY INTO NIGHT (Gan bi)
8. TRANSIT (Petzold)
9. PARASITE (Bong joon-ho)
10. HER SMELL (Alex Ross Perry)
11. THE IRISHMAN (Scorsese)
12. A HIDDEN LIFE (Malick)
13. SHADOW (Yimou)
14. PETERLOO (Leigh)
15. THE SOUVENIR (Joanna Hogg)
16. ASAKO I & II (Ryûsuke Hamaguchi)
17. THE GOSPEL OF EUREKA (Palmieri, D.Mosher)
18. UNCUT GEMS (Safide bros)
19. ATLANTICS (Diop)
20. ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD (Tarantino)
21. AD ASTRA (Gray)
22. CHINESE PORTRAIT (Wang Xiaoshuai)
23. ONE CUT OF THE DEAD (Shin'ichirô Ueda)
24. AN ELEPHANT SITTING STILL (Hu Bo)
25. MIDNIGHT FAMILY (Lorentzen)
26. CLIMAX (Noe)
27. DIAMANTINO (Abrantes, D.Schmidt)
28. VIOLENCE VOYAGER (Ujicha)
29. PORTRAIT OF A LADY ON FIRE (Sciamma)
30. FURIE (Le-van kiet)

RUNNER-UP: 
DARK WATERS (Haynes), KID WHO WOULD BE KING (Cornish), CRAWL (Aja), ANIMA (P.T. Anderson), FOREST OF LOVE (Sono), IN FABRIC (Strickland), RELAXER (Potrykus), ALITA: BATTLE ANGEL (Rodriguez), HIGH LIFE (Claire Denis), HONEYLAND (Kotevska), I DO NOT CARE IF WE GO DOWN AS BARBARIANS (Radu Jude), DOLEMITE IS MY NAME (Brewer), PEGASUS (Han Han), PROMARE (Imaishi), REZO (Gabriadze), THE WIND (Emma Tammi), MAIDEN (Holmes), MAN WHO KILLED DON QUIXOTE (Gilliam), BIRDS OF PASSAGE (C.Gallego, C.Guerra), DEADWOOD THE MOVIE (Minahan), ANTHROPOCENE (Jennifer Baichwal), THE FALL (Glazer), MISSING LINK (Chris Butler), HARRIET (Lemmons), MISTER AMERICA (Notarnicola), HEAD HUNTER  (Downey), PAIN AND GLORY (Almodovar), US (Peele), MARRIAGE STORY (Baumbach), DEPRAVED (Fessenden), PASOLINI (Ferrari), THE IMAGE BOOK (Godard), SYNONYMS (Lapid), GLASS (Shymalan), AVENGEMENT (J.V. Johnson), ACID RAIN (Tomek Popakul), FAST COLOR (Julia Hart), HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON 3 (DeBlois), GHOST FLEET (Service, Waldron), KNIFE + HEART (Yann Gonzalez), ARCTIC (Penna), EXTRA ORDINARY (Ahern, E.Loughman), GEMINI MAN (Ang Lee), ONE CHILD NATION (Nanfu Wang, Lynn Zhang), THE BODY REMEMBERS WHEN WORLD BROKE OPEN (Tailfeathers, Hepburn), THE GOLEM (Paz bros), A BEAUTIFUL DAY IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD (Heller), HIGH FLYING BIRD (Soderbergh), FIRST LOVE (Miike), PIERCING (Pesce), THE BEACH BUM (Korine), 63 UP (Apted), INVADER ZIM ENTER THE FLORPUS (Jhonen Vasquez), KNIVES AND SKIN (Jennifer Reeder), DOMINO (De Palma), DCERA (Daria Kashcheeva), AMAZING JOHNATHAN DOCUMENTARY (Berman), LEAVING NEVERLAND (D.Reed), SISTER (Siqi Song), FEAST OF SEVEN FISHES (Tinnell), VIRUS TROPICAL (Caicedo), KITBULL (Rosana Sullivan), TOMORROW I WILL BE DIRT (Robert Morgan)

KOKO-DI KOKO-DA (Nyholm) 2020 release

FARMAGEDDON (Becher,Phelan) 2020 release

JESUS SHOWS YOU

THE WAY TO THE HIGHWAY (Llanso) 2020 release

(festival films I loved that got no 2019 theatrical release & no distribution deal) 

MY FIRST FILM (Zia Anger), GREENER GRASS (DeBoer,Luebbe), FUNAN (Denis Do), RAY & LIZ (Billingham), VARDA BY AGNES (Varda), SUBURBAN BIRDS (Sheng Qiu), THE PLAGIARISTS (Parlow), 3 FACES (Panahi), LOS REYES (Osnovikoff,Perut), EMPTY METAL (Sweitzer,Khalil), SO PRETTY (Rovinelli), BURIAL OF KOJO (Blitz Ambassador), STANDOFF AT SPARROW CREEK (H.Dunham), QUINQUIN PART 2 (Dumont), THE IMAGE YOU MISSED (D.Foreman), VELVET BUZZSAW (D.Gilroy), AMERICAN FACTORY (J.Reichert,Bognar), LIGHT FROM LIGHT (Harrill), TRIPLE FRONTIER (Chandor), TRIPLE THREAT (JV Johnson), STRAY (Joe Sill), NEVER GROW OLD (Ivan Kavanagh), BLACK CIRCLE (Bogliano), AMERICA (E.Stoll,Whiteside) THE DIVINE MOVE 2: THE WRATHFUL (Lee Khan), EXTREME JOB (Lee Byeong-heon), SUNSET NAPSZALLTA (László Nemes), OUR TIME (Reygadas), EL CHICANO (Bray), WILD ROSE (Tom Harper), LITTLE JOE (Hausner), THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING (Avi Lewis), IN THE TALL GRASS (Natali), SEBERG (Benedict Andrews), HARPOON (Rob Grant), CHAINED FOR LIFE (Schimberg), REPLACE (Keil), CULTURE SHOCK (Gigi Guerrero), COLD SKIN (Gens), FUGUE (Smoczynska), THE QUAKE (John Andreas Andersen), MARY MAGDALENE (Garth Davis), SEE YOU YESTERDAY (bristol), DON'T LET GO (Jacob Aaron Estes), GIRL WITH NO MOUTH (Evrenol), COLD CASE HAMMARSKJOLD (Brügger)