It is that time of the year again: when the award season has started and movies, performances and cinematic achievements are being sorted out and rewarded accordingly (and sometimes unfairly, let's be real). So, even though the pandemic still goes strong, 2021 was a little bit better when it came to cinema. Movies actually came out this year and many were extremely successful even in comparison to pre-pandemic estimates. Naturally, as it is now a yearly tradition, this is the list of my personal favourites from 2021. Typically, this list does not contain a lot of the films that dominate the awards lists these few months but rather, I chose to include the ones for which I actually felt something more.
10. The Rescue
First and foremost, this is a documentary which was equally informative, shocking and awe-inspiring. National Geographic's The Rescue is a presentation of a real event which shocked the entire planet in the quite recent 2018; a group of 12 boys and their coach got trapped in a cave in Thailand due to the excessive rain and the rescuers were in a contest against time in order to find a way to get them all out safe before the whole cave flooded for good. The mission demanded world-wide help with people arriving from many countries, putting their heads together and trying to find new and innovative ways to bring the trapped people out of the mostly-flooded 2.6 kilometre cave. The documentary features real footage, interviews and some reenactments for the visual presentation of the danger. The Rescue is a film which keeps you at the edge of your seat and makes you admire the people who put their lives at risk to save anyone who is in trouble; making us not lose our faith in humanity's best qualities. An absolute must-see.
9. Belfast
Kenneth Branagh's autobiographical, black-and-white love letter to his hometown and his childhood memories from Belfast is a touching, sweet and naturally rather personal-feeling film. When the movie starts we are immediately thrown in a late-1960s neighbourhood without any introductions or preparation whatsoever. We soon meet
Buddy (the fantastically talented newcomer
Jude Hill) and his family;
Caitriona Balfe [
Outlander] as his mother,
Jamie Dornan [
Fifty Shades of Grey series] as the dad,
Judi Dench [
Shakespear in Love (1998),
Skyfall (2012),
Notes on a Scandal (2006)] as the grandmother and
Ciaran Hinds [Game of Thrones] as the grandfather. They are all a tight family which tries hard to make ends meet while in the neighbourhood riots begin to break out: the Protestants attack the Catholics' homes and nothing is the same anymore.
Buddy experiences all this through the innocent eyes of a kid who tries to simultaneously make sense of the turmoil in his neighbourhood and accept the changes that may happen to his own family. Belfast is a beautiful coming-of-age film, unusual in the way it approaches its subject and always having the idea of family in its core; that being the people you grow up with, the streets you see every morning while you go to school or work and the essence of community and brotherhood. Such a sweet, heartwarming experience.
8. A Hero
How many times can a director make a good movie? Well in
Asghar Farhadi's case, the answer is "a lot".
A Hero is a bleak, honest, realistic, sometimes deceptively hopeful yet always exasperating film. It is the story of
Rahim (
Amir Jadidi) who is in prison for debt and on his two-day leave from prison tries to find a way to pay his debtor back and live as a free man once again. On these rather adventurous two days he finds a bag full of coins which he tries to sell to get the money he owes. Seeing, however, that the money will not be enough, he chooses to return the bag to the owner. This makes him "
a hero"; a diamond among the prisoners. And it starts a domino effect where hope is always just out of reach.
A Hero follows the tradition of Iranian movies that are usually too realistic and too frustrating; hope is a rare thing and a happy ending often is an unattainable dream. Nonetheless,
Asghar Farhadi's latest is a great watch and even if it shows us a side of the world that seems pessimistic and hopeless, love and companionship always prove to be the things that keep us afloat.
7. West Side Story
Although this film fills all the boxes of things I love (Spielberg, Musicals and West Side Story in particular), I wasn't sure that it would enthrall me, let alone exceed my expectations. West Side Story is Steven Spielberg's take on a successful musical written by Arthur Laurents, with music by Leonard Bernstein and lyrics by the recently deceased Stephen Sondheim. It is a quite modern itteration of Romeo and Juliet set in 1950s New York telling the story of two opposing gangs, the Jets (white Americans) and the Sharks (Puetro Ricans) who fight for the control of their block. Soon, Maria, the Sharks' leader's sister falls in love with Tony, a member of the Jets, and chaos ensues.
The musical or movie lovers already know the extremely successful 1961 adaptation starring Natalie Wood [Rebel Without a Cause (1955)], Richard Beymer, and Oscar Winners George Chakiris and Rita Moreno. So, what would the point of a new adaptation be, really? This time, Spielberg opted for a completely Latin-American cast for the Sharks side of the story and he did not allow subtitles for the words spoken in spanish. He even put the songs in the original Broadway order, whereas the original film had moved them around a bit. What is more, he allowed for some moments of prose in between the songs making his adaptation "breathe" a little more. In usual Spielberg fashion, the direction, photography, costume design and sets are all of impeccable quality as well as the choreography, the dancers and the singing [with his Maria (18-year old Rachel Zegler) and his Anita (Hamilton's Ariana DeBose) stealing the show]. The greatest praise I can give this movie is that while watching it, I stopped comparing it to the original (which I've watched more times than I can count) and soon I found myself wondering which of the two adaptations it'd be better to recommend to someone who has never experienced West Side Story before. Even though both have their merits and one could possibly say that everyone should watch the original first and then this new adaptation, I can argue that Spielberg's version is a great achievement that managed to differentiate itself from the legacy the original created.
6. The Beatles: Get Back
Peter Jackson is no stranger to trilogies. After all, he is the man responsible for the little film which fantasy lovers all around the world look up to as their Holy Grail of movies:
The Lord of the Rings. This time,
Jackson had the fortune to get his hands on 60 hours of never-before-seen footage shot back in January 1969 by
Michael Lindsay-Hogg. The footage was intended for a documentary film which would chronicle the four Beatles members recording a whole album and presenting it in front of a live audience in a stadium somewhere in the world; this being their first live appearance after many years.
Fate had it that this would be almost the last time that the four Beatles would record together and certainly the last time that they performed live together: that infamous semi-last-minute concert on the rooftop of Abbey Road studios where they were composing and recording; thus elevating the historical significance of the footage. The video and audio was left in a safe for 50 whole years and Jackson, along with his collaborators, managed to remaster its image and sound and bring three amazing episodes (whose duration is nearly 8 hours) to our screens.
The sentimental value of this movie is indescribable for any music lover; even more so, if, like myself, you are a Beatles fanatic. The documentary achieves the unimaginable: it allows the viewer to become a wallflower in the studio where four geniuses are in the middle of creating so many famous songs which have shaped the history of modern music. It is unbelievable that we see these people, who have become legends, being ordinary 20-something-year-olds who have fun, play music, experiment with their compositions, fight with each other, smoke, drink and laugh as if they are not part of history. As one watches the film, one of the striking realisations that occur is that for these people on screen, music melodies and lyrics are in the progress of being created; we see them struggle with the creative process and we become witnesses of the exact moment when songs, which we have heard countless times, are played for the first time ever. The Beatles: Get Back is a tremendous watch and a rather unexpected gift for anyone even remotely interested in the great names of rock 'n' roll. It gives us a fresh perspective to things we thought we knew about Paul, John, George and Ringo and it humanises the myth that the Beatles name has carried through the decades.
5. Drive My Car
Just after the middle of our list, we find a Japanese sensation. Drive My Car, directed by Ryusuke Hamagutsi is a three-hour, slow-burning adaptation of a short story written by the famous author Haruki Murakami. Despite its length, however -and the surprising fact that the opening credits come on screen 40 minutes into the film - Drive My Car is an extremely interesting story of a man who tries to cope with the sudden death of his wife. Two years after his loss, Yusuke (Hidetoshi Nijishima), a renowned stage actor and director moves to Hiroshima to direct an experimental adaptation of Anton Checov's Uncle Vanya. There, he is not allowed to drive his car and the producers of the festival that he is directing for, employ a woman, Misaki (Toko Miura) as his chauffeur. The woman, taciturn yet very professional, takes him to and from his work every day and soon the two quite reserved people start to open up and find comfort in the fact that everybody has experienced some tragedy in their lives. Drive My Car is one of those movies that takes its time and for good reason. It is a story about first impressions and how mistaken they can be as well as the power secrets can have resulting in dominating our lives. A truly beautiful, psychological, character-driven drama.
4. The French Dispatch
This is a typical
Wes Anderson [
The Royal Tenenbaums (2001),
Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009),
Isle of Dogs (2018),
The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014)]
film. Yet it is not your typical movie. It is a collection of four different stories based on four magazine articles which were featured in the titled fictional
French Dispatch magazine after its editor (
Bill Murray) dies of a heart attack. The editor's will claims that the publication of the magazine is to be immediately suspended in the case of his death, so the staff of the publication come together and remember the four most unique articles that were printed during the magazine's lifetime. Each story is different and extremely peculiar and it features some great names, such as
Owen Wilson, Adrien Brody, Tilda Swinton, Timothée Chalamet, and
Frances McDormand. While everyone watching the film can have a different favourite story and we can agree that not all four stories are equally strong, what is undeniable is the fact that when it comes to sets and shots,
Anderson is the master. Every single frame of
The French Dispatch needs multiple viewings for it to be appreciated fully; you have the people in the foreground talking and carrying the plot but in the background a whole different story takes place.
The French Dispatch is a masterclass of directing and a movie that one needs to pay attention to in order to enjoy everything it has to offer. Such a beautiful film and such a sad snub during this award season.
3. tick, tick...Boom!
The second musical in our list is
Lin-Manuel Miranda's directorial debut, starring the always fantastic
Andrew Garfield [
Hacksaw Ridge (2016] in the role of
Jonathan Larson, an aspiring musical writer who on the verge of becoming 30 years old, feels his life moving faster than what he needs to make his dreams come true.
Larson who actually wrote
tick, tick...Boom! as an autobiographical musical after some unsuccessful efforts to make it to Broadway, is also the writer of the extremely popular
Rent show, which has also been adapted for the big screen.
Miranda's direction is beautiful and full of winks for any Broadway lover yet it is
Garfield that carries this wonderful movie on his back.
From the first moment he comes to our screens he embodies Larson so skillfully that he loses himself in the role. His acting as well as his beautiful voice (who knew that Andrew Garfield was such a talented singer?) take us on a rather emotional journey with a man who struggles to make his artistic dream come true. Knowing the true story behind Larson (and don't worry, if you watch the film, you will get to know it) makes tick, tick...Boom! an even more sentimental experience. What is more, Miranda has chosen to blend the musical together with moments from Larson's real life, making the film a little more biographical that what was possibly intended when tick, tick...Boom! was first written. This is a film for anyone who feels broken whenever life seems to put their aspirations down.
2. Spider-Man: No Way Home
What can we say about the movie which exceeded every expectation possible, broke an unheard-of mould, did the unimaginable and became one of the most successful films of all time? No Way Home managed to surpass previous successful Marvel movies (a studio which, let's face it, dominates both the box office and our hearts now) by doing something which could be characterised fan service, yet it worked so well and it happened so flawlessly and effortlessly that everyone in the cinema was pinching themselves to make sure that this was not a dream but a real film which actually happened in our time. Coming out of a somewhat weak series of Spider-Man movies, No Way Home managed to become the film that the previous two were actually leading to, making the Home Trilogy a complete Spider-Man origin story (something that we would never imagine back in 2017 with Homecoming) with Tom Holland finally becoming the Spider-Man who we always knew he would be but the script never allowed him to. Speaking of Holland, here he shines as Peter Parker, giving his best performance in the MCU and truly being the star of a film where so many great things happen that could easily steal the spotlight from him. With No Way Home, Marvel has opened the door to so many opportunities; here's hoping that many more unforgettable moments are in store for us fans.
1. Dune
Finally, we reach my number one film of 2021. We talked in length about
Denis Villeneuve's dream adaptation
here and what an amazing achievement it was.
Dune, based on a book that has been called unfilmable, is the Holy Bible of science fiction. Written by
Frank Herbert, it is set in a whole new universe thousands of years in the future. It is a story of legend, prophecy and machinations yet in its core it is a cautionary tale about the destruction of the environment and the dangers which hide behind great personalities who shape our lives.
Villeneuve, dreaming of adapting this book since he was a teenager, succeeds in bringing the world to life, making it very tangible as well as allowing it to be out-worldly at the same time. To achieve this, he relies on huge real sets, beautiful costumes, a thrilling musical score by the inimitable
Hans Zimmer and an all-star cast (which includes
Timothée Chalamet, Josh Brolin, Oscar Isaac, Jason Momoa, Rebecca Ferguson and
Javier Bardem) that seems to leave its stardom behind in comparison to the magnitude of the material they have to bring to our screens. Everyone serves their purpose and the whole endeavour works so well making
Dune one of the best adaptations that I have ever seen. Knowing that this is only Part 1 of at least 2 - and hopefully 3 - movies in
Villeneuve's plans, makes me so excited for the future of science fiction films.
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