THE VERY BEST OF 2016

“Consumed with worry.”
An epitaph for 2016. A prophecy for 2017.






BEST SONGS:
01 Prince – Moonbeam Levels
02 All Hail The Silence – The Alarm
03 Carly Rae Jepsen – Cry
04 Beyonce – Sorry
05 Ladyhawke – Wild Things
06 Sia – Waving Goodbye
07 Rihanna – Love on the Brain
08 Pet Shop Boys – The Pop Kids
09 Kevin Abstract – Runner
10 Solange – Don’t Wish Me Well
11 Kelly Clarkson – It’s Quiet Uptown
12 Brendan MacLean – Never Enough
13 Childish Gambino – Redbone
14 Shooter Jennings – Love Kills
15 Beyonce & The Dixie Chicks – Daddy Lessons (Live)
16 Plumb – Smoke (Dave Aude Remix)
17 Celine Dion – Encore un Soir
18 Tan – Telephone Tan
19 S.W.I.M. featuring Natasha Giannaraki – Anazatisi (Never Find It)
20 Puro Instinct – Peccavi
21 Britney Spears – Make Me
22 Kanye West – Fade
23 The Weeknd – I Feel It Coming
24 Lady Gaga – Diamond Heart
25 Julian Winding – The Demon Dance
26 Giorgio Moroder featuring Karen Harding – Good For Me
27 Brendan MacLean – Tectonic
28 The Lonely Island featuring Emma Stone – Turn Up The Beef
29 Book of Love – All Girl Band
30 Kiiara - Gold



BEST ALBUMS:



01 Beyonce/Lemonade
02 Solange/A Seat at the Table
03 Ladyhawke/Wild Things
04 Carly Rae Jepsen/E Mo Tion Side B
05 Brendan MacLean/Funbang1
06 Childish Gambino/“Awaken, My Love”
07 Shooter Jennings/Countach (For Giorgio)
08 Kevin Abstract/American Boyfriend
09 Pet Shop Boys/Super
10 Tan/Musik City
11 Jean-Michel Jarre/Electronica 2: The Heart of Noise
12 Celine Dion/Encore un Soir
13 The Weeknd/Starboy
14 Tegan and Sara/Love You to Death
15 Azealia Banks/Slay-Z






BEST TV:
Channel Zero: Candle Cove, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, Lady Dynamite, Not Safe, Other Space, Search Party, Stranger Things, Yuri on Ice



WORST FILMS:



01 PATRIOT'S DAY
02 INDEPENDENCE DAY: RESURGENCE
03 DON'T BREATHE
04 SUICIDE SQUAD
05 EYES OF MY MOTHER
06 INCARNATE
07 SHUT IN
08 YOGA HOSERS
09 THE DISAPPOINTMENTS ROOM
10 RATCHET AND CLANK






BEST DIRECTOR



Apichatpong Weerasethakul (Cemetery of Splendor)
Anna Biller (The Love Witch)
Robert Eggers (The VVitch)
Karyn Kusama (The Invitation)
Lucile Hadzihalilovic (Evolution)
Yorgos Lanthimos (The Lobster)
Oz Perkins (I Am The Pretty Thing That Lives In The House)
Joel Potrykus (The Alchemist Cookbook)
Jeremy Saulnier (Green Room)
Athina Rachel Tsangari (Chevalier)
Paul Verhoeven (Elle)
Denis Villeneuve (Arrival)






BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY



David Birke (Elle)
Eric Heisserer (Arrival)
Jeong Seo-kyung and Park Chan-wook (The Handmaiden)
Whit Stillman (Love and Friendship)



BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY



Anthony Bagarozzi and Shane Black (The Nice Guys)
Phil Hay and Matt Manfredi (The Invitation)
Yorgos Lanthimos and Ephthymis Philippou (The Lobster)
Kenneth Lonergan (Manchester by the Sea)
Ephthymis Philippou and Athina Rachel Tsangari (Chevalier)
Ira Sachs and Mauricio Zacharias (Little Men)



BEST COSTUME DESIGN



Colleen Atwood (The Huntsman: Winter’s War)
Erin Benach (The Neon Demon)
Anna Biller (The Love Witch)
Sarah Blenkinsop (The Lobster)
Sonia Grande (Julieta)
Linda Muir (The VVitch)









BEST PRODUCTION DESIGN



Anna Biller (The Love Witch)
Doug Chiang and Neil Lamont (Rogue One)
Thomas S. Hammock (Blair Witch)
Craig Lathrop (The VVitch)
Lisa Soper (Clown)
Patrice Vermette (Arrival)



BEST 3D



Doctor Strange
Ghostbusters
Kung Fu Panda 3
The Legend of Tarzan
The Mermaid
The Secret Life of Pets



BEST EDITING



John Axelrad and Kayla Emter (Miles Ahead)
Christopher Barwell (Under The Shadow)
Julia Bloch (Green Room)
Job ter Burg (Elle)
Joan Sobel (Nocturnal Animals)
Joe Walker (Arrival)



BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY



Natasha Braier (The Neon Demon)
Manuel Dacosse (Evolution)
Greig Fraser (Rogue One)
M. David Mullen (The Love Witch)
Jack Pettibone Riccobono and Shane Slattery-Quintanilla (The Seventh Fire)
Linus Sandgren (La-La Land)






BEST ORIGINAL SCORE



Mark Korven (The VVitch)
Mica Levi (Jackie)
Cliff Martinez (The Neon Demon)
Max Richter (Morgan)
Suzuki Keiichi (For The Plasma)
Adam Wingard (Blair Witch)



BEST ORIGINAL SONG



Equal Rights (Popstar)
The Great Beyond (Sausage Party)
The Riddle of The Model (Sing Street)
Waving Goodbye (The Neon Demon)
Wiener-Dog (Wiener-Dog)
You’re Welcome (Moana)



BEST VISUAL EFFECTS



Arrival
Beyond The Gates
Blair Witch
Doctor Strange
The Jungle Book
The Mind’s Eye



BEST DOCUMENTARY



I Am Not Your Negro
No Home Movie
The Seventh Fire
13^th
Tickled
Tony Conrad: Completely In The Present



BEST FILM WITHOUT A U.S. DISTRIBUTOR



All The Cities of The North
The Death of Louis XIV
Found Footage 3D
The Lure
Nocturama
What’s The Matter With Gerald?



BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR



Mahershala Ali (Moonlight)
Tom Bennett (Love and Friendship)
Alden Ehrenreich (Hail, Caesar!)
Joe Mangianello (Pee-Wee’s Big Holiday)
Kyle Mooney (Zoolander No. 2)
Makis Papadimitriou (Chevalier)






BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS



Olivia Colman (The Lobster)
Greta Gerwig (20^th Century Women)
Lily Gladstone (Certain Women)
Dakota Johnson (A Bigger Splash)
Janelle Monae (Moonlight)
Angourie Rice (The Nice Guys)



BEST ACTOR



Casey Affleck (Manchester By The Sea)
Colin Farrell (The Lobster)
Ryan Gosling (The Nice Guys)
Ty Hickson (The Alchemist Cookbook)
Aharon Traitel (Tikkun)
Anton Yelchin (Green Room)



BEST ACTRESS



Sonia Braga (Aquarius)
Isabelle Huppert (Elle)
Sandra Huller (Toni Erdmann)
Natalie Portman (Jackie)
Narges Rashidi (Under The Shadow)
Emma Stone (La-La Land)
Anya Taylor-Joy (The VVitch)






BEST PICTURE
01 The Alchemist Cookbook/The Lobster
Deeply profound meditations on identity in the face of a society that just doesn’t make any sense. Rebellion from opposite ends. To win is a concept inevitably defined by those from whom power derives.
02 Arrival/La-La Land
As always, genre fare tells us exactly where the heart and soul wants to live. Better ways, sprung from the humanity that so often limits us.
03 Pee-Wee’s Big Holiday
The kindest, sweetest, most versatile love story of the year.
04 I Am Not Your Negro
One of the greatest American thinkers and critics speaking across time; visceral and wrenching and deeply painful. We haven’t learned a thing.
05 Aquarius/Cemetery of Splendour/The Nice Guys/The VVitch
The act of excavation. Inspecting the foundation. The places where conspiracies build, and restless spirits are drawn in. Every space is a mystery.
06 Clown/Tikkun
The social contract cannot abide monsters. Whether by grotesque action or mere contrary existence, a being which pushes out from within makes that which is established nervous and uneasy; ideology can never be a supportive caress. Deeply upsetting and uncompromising, political visions.
07 Elle/Lemonade/The Love Witch
We think we know a woman’s story by its trappings. By its means of presentation. But women’s stories are not so easily bound by facile first impressions. Further investigation is warranted. Multiple viewings yield untold rewards. There is so much more than a cursory glance can reveal.
08 Chevalier/Everybody Wants Some!!
Exceptional and kind films which deal with male socialization and patterns of interaction while never descending into macho foolishness.
09 Green Room
Human decency in an all-night battle to the death with highly-bureaucratized and weaponized racist bullshit. A business plan does not make an abhorrent ideology any more palatable or acceptable.
10 The Neon Demon
Sleek abstractions that careen the Grimmest fairy tale tropes, cautionary Hollywood excesses, and videogame structure off of one another. Playful and portentous, with a militant chromatic philosophy; when the color blue finally showed up for its close-up in the final scene, I gasped.









2017 FILMS I ANXIOUSLY AWAIT

ALIEN: COVENANT

THE BEGUILED

CALL ME BY YOUR NAME

COLOSSAL

DARK NIGHT

GET OUT

A GHOST STORY

HIGH LIFE

THE HOUSE THAT JACK BUILT

I DON’T FEEL AT HOME IN THIS WORLD ANYMORE

KEDI

LIFE

MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS

PREVENGE

(Re) ASSIGNMENT

ROXANNE ROXANNE

SEQUENCE BREAK

SILENCE

SUSPIRIA

WONDER WOMAN

XX

Thank you for reading this far.

The Very Best of 2015.

TOP TEN:

1 BY THE SEA/CLOUDS OF SILS MARIA

Passionate, polyglot observations of the processes we set up for ourselves. We are unexceptional rocks; the beauty comes from what is revealed in the collisions of living, and loving, and engaging in amateur pharmacology, and exorcising the legacy of lovers past, and finding the way back to ourselves. Finding that victory, that pure sense of creation, and accomplishment, is a terrifying and amazing journey that goes through the weird shit. I clutch these films to my chest; there is always a way through whatever lies before us.

2 MAD MAX FURY ROAD

Everything people have been saying is true. A grand new myth for the coming horrors of our collective annihilation. Creates and passes the DodecaBechdel Test as well.

3 PHOENIX/SAINT LAURENT

A hall of elegant mirrors, where the wearing of clothes and the telling of tales seeks to hammer in place a vision of a life composed of moments, memories. Let's dig deep and get at the Who. Let's swandive into the shadows and see what we can find.

4 CAROL

Aesthetically flawless, semiotically charged, and filled, ultimately, with a fierce hope. When Carol Aird says “We are not ugly people,” it's the cinematic moment of the year. But in the actual world outside, in 2015, what with the Trumpery and the Tennessee state legislature, maybe that's not the case anymore. An immaculate jewel.

5 THE ASSASSIN/THE HATEFUL EIGHT/LI'L QUINQUIN

How is it that we psychotic apes have managed to survive as long as we have? The land itself bears the scent of our sickness, with blood spilled clinging to us like an unremovable shroud that tangles the knees and clouds the will to try and do better. Sometimes you have to laugh to keep from vomiting in terror. Sometimes you have to stay the course of the procedural to keep from slipping off the rails and into the abyss. Upholding expectations is not, however, an inherently moral act. And that awareness defines us.

6 MAGIC MIKE XXL

A utopian vision of egalitarian, pleasure-driven lives where the primary commodity is joy, not money, and smiles and orgasms are how a good day are properly measured.

7 THOU WAST MILD AND LOVELY/TOM AT THE FARM

Gloriously surreal maps of human desire, bound in exterior, 'other' spaces. Humor and horror only a heartbeat away at any given moment.

8 ARABIAN NIGHTS/CHI-RAQ/HARD TO BE A GOD/THE TRIBE

How does one actually forge a community? Is what we perceive as civilization a starting point, a hard-won but tenuous victory, a delusional pipe dream, or a hiccup on the metaphorical road to something else?

9 JUPITER ASCENDING/STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS

Joyful intergalactic romps that reexamine (and in some cases gleefully explode) the structures that keep our imaginations (and selves) locked in a tiny corner of ignorant space. Mapping desires onto new bodies, new stars, and offering the widest continuua of enjoyment.

10 INSIDE OUT/LOVE 3D/THE MEND

Messy, maddening, meaningful visions of the heart and soul in crisis. The ritual brings catharsis. Sadness and helplessness fuels adaptation and evolution.

BEST DIRECTOR:

Bertrand Bonello (Saint Laurent)

Guillermo Del Toro (Crimson Peak)

Xavier Dolan (Tom At The Farm)

Fabrice Du Welz (Alleluia)

Miguel Gomes (Arabian Nights)

Todd Haynes (Carol)

Guy Maddin and Evan Johnson (The Forbidden Room)

George Miller (Mad Max Fury Road)

Gaspar Noe (Love)

Angelina Jolie Pitt (By The Sea)

Sam Taylor-Johnson (Fifty Shades of Grey)

Andy Wachowski and Lana Wachowski (Jupiter Ascending)

BEST ACTOR:

Matt Damon (The Martian)

Benicio Del Toro (Sicario)

Tom Hanks (Bridge of Spies)

Stephen Plunkett (The Mend)

Bernard Pruvost (Lil' Quinquin)

Gaspard Ulliel (Saint Laurent)

Leonid Yarmolnik (Hard to be a God)

BEST ACTRESS:

Cate Blanchett (Carol)

Luisa Cruz (Arabian Nights Volume 2: The Desolate One)

Anne Dorval (Mommy)

Lola Duenas (Alleluia)

Amy Everson (Felt)

Nina Hoss (Phoenix)

Rinko Kikuchi (Kumiko The Treasure Hunter)

Lola Kirke (Mistress America)

Teyonah Parris (Chi-Raq)

Charlize Theron (Mad Max Fury Road)

Alicia Vikander (Ex Machina)

Arielle Walker (Heaven Knows What)

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR:

Louis Garrel (Saint Laurent)

Oscar Isaac (Ex Machina)

James Marsden (The D Train)

Jason Mitchell (Straight Outta Compton)

Michael Pena (Ant-Man)

Colin Quinn (Trainwreck)

Michael Stuhlbarg (Steve Jobs)

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS:

Jessica Chastain (Crimson Peak)

Deanna Dunagan (The Visit)

Jennifer Jason Leigh (Anomalisa)

Julianne Moore (Maps to the Stars)

Jada Pinkett (Magic Mike XXL)

Kristen Stewart (American Ultra)

Kristen Stewart (Clouds of Sils Maria)

Mickey Sumner (The Mend)

Mya Taylor (Tangerine)

Tessa Thompson (Creed)

Katherine Waterston (Queen of Earth)

BEST SCREENPLAY:

Olivier Assayas (Clouds of Sils Maria)

Bruno Dumont (Lil' Quinquin)

Joel Edgerton (The Gift)

Rick Famuyiwa (Dope)

Drew Goddard (The Martian)

Charlie Kaufman (Anomalisa)

Max Landis (American Ultra)

John Magary (The Mend)

Phyllis Nagy (Carol)

Abderrahmane Sissako and Kessen Tall (Timbuktu)

Quentin Tarantino (The Hateful Eight)

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY:

Peter Andrews (Magic Mike XXL)

Sean Baker and Radium Cheung (Tangerine)

Christian Berger (By The Sea)

Roger Deakins (Sicario)

Josee Deshaies (Saint Laurent)

Stuart Dryburgh (Blackhat)

Erdely Matyas (Son of Saul)

Vladimir Ilin and Yuriy Klimenko (Hard to be a God)

Alwin Kuchler (Steve Jobs)

Dan Laustsen (Crimson Peak)

Mark Lee Ping-Bin (The Assassin)

Emmanuel Lubezki (The Revenant)

John Mathieson and Seamus McGarvey (Pan)

Sayombhu Mukdeeprom (Arabian Nights)

Robert Richardson (The Hateful Eight)

BEST 3D:

In the Heart of The Sea

Jupiter Ascending

Love

The Martian

Pan

Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension

Point Break

The Spongebob Squarepants Movie

The Walk

BEST EDITING:

Clouds of Sils Maria

The Gift

Kingsman: The Secret Service

Last Shift

Love

Mad Max Fury Road

Saint Laurent

BEST COSTUMES:

Crimson Peak

Eden

Jupiter Ascending

Love

Saint Laurent

Tangerine

BEST PRODUCTION DESIGN:

Crimson Peak

Hard To Be A God

Jupiter Ascending

Mad Max Fury Road

The Martian

The Night Before

The Revenant

Saint Laurent

BEST DOCUMENTARY:

Amy

Approaching the Elephant

The Black Panthers: Vanguard of The Revolution

The Creeping Garden

Don't Think I've Forgotten

In Jackson Heights

The Look of Silence

BEST VISUAL EFFECTS:

Chappie

Ex Machina

The Last Witch Hunter

The Martian

Star Wars: The Force Awakens

BEST ORIGINAL SONG:

“The Final Derriere” (The Forbidden Room)

“Flashlight” (Pitch Perfect 2)

“Grip” (Creed)

“Love Me Like You Do” (Fifty Shades of Grey)

“Mean Ol' Moon” (Ted 2)

“None of Them are You” (Anomalisa)

BEST ORIGINAL SCORE:

Alleluia

By The Sea

Carol

The Creeping Garden

The Duke of Burgundy

For The Plasma

Girlhood

The Hateful Eight

It Follows

Mad Max Fury Road

Maps To The Stars

The Revenant

BEST RESTORATION:

The American Friend

Until The End of The World

Rocco and His Brothers

The Decline of Western Civilization Trilogy

The Swimmer

Out 1

The Miracle Woman

The Apu Trilogy

Apocalypse Now

BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM:

Akounak Tedalat Taha Tazoughai

Alleluia

Arabian Nights

Eden

Girlhood

Hard to Be a God

Lil' Quinquin

Saint Laurent

Timbuktu

Tom at The Farm

The Tribe

BEST SUPPORTED ACTOR:

Rebecca Ferguson (Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation)

Louis Garrel (Saint Laurent)

Tom Hardy (Mad Max Fury Road)

Oscar Isaac (Star Wars: The Force Awakens)

Olafur Darri Olafsson (The Last Witch Hunter)

Michael Pena (Ant-Man)

Stephen Plunkett (The Mend)

James Ransone (Sinister 2)

Clemens Schick (Point Break)

Michael Stuhlbarg (Steve Jobs)

WORST PICTURE:

Black Mass

Hot Tub Time Machine 2

The Lazarus Effect

Seventh Son

Stonewall

Terminator: Genisys

SONGS OF THE YEAR: 2015

1 Brandon Flowers/Lonely Town

2 Carly Rae Jepsen/Your Type

3 Sparks/The Final Derriere

4 Chvrches/Clearest Blue

5 The Weeknd/The Hills

6 Madonna/Ghost Town

7 Sufjan Stevens/John My Beloved

8 Ryan Adams/Style

9 Jidenna/Classic Man

10 New Order/Plastic

11 Chromatics/Yes (Symmetry Remix)

12 Adele/Hello (NOLA Bounce Mix)

13 JR Castro/Get Home

14 One Direction/Perfect

15 Jeremih/Royalty

16 Hailee Steinfeld/Flashlight (Math Club Remix)

17 Jonny Telafone/The Prayer

18 Prince/Screwdriver

19 J. Cole/Wet Dreamz

20 Taylor Swift/New Romantics

ALBUMS OF THE YEAR: 2015

1 Carly Rae Jepsen/E MO TION

2 Chvrches/Every Open Eye

3 Sufjan Stevens/Carrie and Lowell

4 The Weeknd/Beauty Behind The Madness

5 Shamir/Ratchet

6 (tie) Robyn & La Bagatelle Magique/Love is Free EP

Susanne Sundfor/Ten Love Songs

7 Trickfinger

8 New Order/Music Complete

9 Giorgio Moroder/Deja Vu

10 Grimes/Art Angels

TV OF THE YEAR: 2015

(in alphabetical order)

Broad City

Community

Difficult People

Grace and Frankie

Hannibal

Inside Amy Schumer

Key and Peele

Nathan for You

Penny Dreadful

Review

Rick and Morty

Sense8