My Top Movies for 2014...

"Her", Spike Jonze needs to make MORE science fiction films and if they revolve around people in heavy romantic entanglements with their smartphones, so much the better. "The Grand Budapest Hotel" Wes Anderson believes in Irony the way The Pope believes in Transubstantiation...and Anderson will dish it out any way he can, subtle heavy handed, silly...and if along the way he makes a great comedian out of Ralph Fiennes then it is all for the good. "Jodorowski's Dune" This might be THE BEST science fiction movie I saw all year which was nothing more than an exhaustive documentary about Alejandro Jodorowski's attempt to make a movie out of Frank Herbert's SF novel "Dune" back in 1975. The film would have been an eccentric catastrophe but Good Lord What a Production Notebook! Fading Gigolo The only thing cooler than casting Woody Allen as a Pimp is casting John Turturro as a Brooklyn Gigolo. Snowpiercer Loved it, I'll never dismiss Chris Evans ever again, even if he decides to wreck the Doc Savage franchise I will always forgive him because he starred in Snowpiercer. Dawn of the Planet of the Apes I dunno, somehow 2014 despite a plethora of shitty tentpole franchise super hero flicks and fantasy extravaganzas still managed to squeeze out a really really good SF movie like every three months or so...this one is doubly memorable for being a sequel but a robust one in every way...what can I say sometimes remakes work. "Lucy" While we are at it, Luc Besson should make nothing but science fiction movies with Scarlett Johansson...I'd watch them both tear into a revisionist Flash Gordon all done from Dale Arden's perspective. "Art and Craft" I love fakes and phonies, and this documentary on Art Forger Mark Landis is amazing because the poor sod gets away with his forgeries because he has never made a dime off them! He DONATES carefully executed simulacrums to museums out of a spectrumy need for approval. Fascinating story. "St. Vincent" I don't care if Bill Murray has done better work elsewhere, JUST GIVE HIM THE DAMN OSCAR!! "Birdman or the Unexpected Virtues of Ignorance" If you love this movie, chances are you are a man over the age of fifty, and its about time someone did something for me and my homies. "The Homesman" Tommy Lee Jones can just play grizzled drunken cowboys for the rest of his life and sooner or later the rest us (much as was the case with the late John Wayne) will finally catch up to him creatively speaking. "Nova Express" This is a shout out to director Andre Perkowsky who apparently is allowing a ninety minute version of his projected three hour long adaptation of the novel by William S. Burroughs to circulate....STOP RIGHT HERE DUDE!! You got it right the first time, the select readings from the novel, the surreal stock footage this movie is perfect as is!! Don't push your luck! "Foxcatcher" I have a dreamy dream that the Best Actor Oscar is a dogfight between three avowed comedians, Steve Carell, Bill Murray and Michael Keaton...can't say who I'd root for....after all, when are those three ever gonna be in that room ever again? "Wild" I love survival stories...and if Reese Witherspoon wants to make a movie about swimming the English Channel in January...I Am There. My only complaint about this flick is that clearly thousands of dollars were spent trying to make Ms Witherspoon look worn, filthy, fetid & dirty....all of it wasted. "Big Eyes" No one is ever gonna accuse Tim Burton of being subtle...but then again this could have been a sort of comical "Female Ed Wood" film but for a subtle performance from Amy Adams who turns everything into a plea for artistic integrity even for hacks (who need it most of all).