The 25 best films of 2012: 15 through 11

ParaNorman

15: Amour, Michael Haneke.

After I saw this at the New York Film Festival I called my wife, from whom I have a not insub­stan­tial age dif­fer­ence, and sin­cerly apo­lo­gized to her for ruin­ing her life. So, you know, anoth­er feel-good clas­sic from Haneke. But seriously…yes, indeed, “but ser­i­ously,” because there’s a cer­tain sense in which this movie does sat­is­fy a con­ven­tion­al jones for “ser­i­ous” film. I don’t think such a thing is to be deplored, but it’s also not really (as far as I know in my self-searching) a com­pon­ent in my com­mend­a­tion for the film. It is har­row­ing, it is tender, it is troub­ling, it is com­pel­ling, and Haneke is work­ing with a tech­nic­al mas­tery that comes with­in spit­ting dis­tance of Bergman’s, and those are the com­pon­ents in my com­mend­a­tion of the film. 

14: Hello, I Must Be Going, Todd Louiso, reviewed here.

13: ParaNorman, Chris Butler and Sam Fell, reviewed here.

12) Once Upon A Time In Anatolia, Nuri Bilge Ceylan.

I’ve blown hot and cold on Ceylan’s films for a long time. While the peanut-choking bit in Climates nearly made me a con­vert for life, the schem­at­ics of Three Monkeys (yep, THOSE KIND) turned me back around. With this com­mited, tense, claus­tro­phobic near-epic, he nails both atmo­sphere and con­tent in what seems an effort­less exhal­a­tion. Nice. 

11) This Is Not A Film, Jafar Panahi.

I’m sorry that I did­n’t get to review this, and in a sense I’m not. It’s a movie that’s so per­fectly self-contained that a description/exegesis would seem at least mildly insult­ing. It should be seen, is really all I’ve got to say about it.