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1. The Master
2. Amour
3. Holy Motors
4. Killer Joe
5. Zero Dark Thirty

Honorable Mentions (in alphabetical order):
Django Unchained
Killing Them Softly
Magic Mike
Moonrise Kingdom
Skyfall

Well...

Skyfall
ParaNorman
Dredd
The Master
Chronicle
The Woman in Black
The Avengers
The Hunger Games

Year is determined by the date of the world premiere, i.e. IMDb rules.

Summary: Not the best year for English-language cinema, but a decent year for the rest of the world, especially for Denmark that produced no less than three great films.

Films Seen: 90

Top Ten:
1) Amour (Michael Haneke - France) - ****3/4
2) Cesare deve morire // Caesar Must Die (Paolo & Vittorio Taviani - Italy) - ****1/2
3) Jagten // The Hunt (Thomas Vinterberg - Denmark) - ****1/2
4) En kongelig affære // A Royal Affair (Nikolaj Arcel - Denmark) - ****1/2
5) Kapringen // A Hijacking (Tobias Lindholm - Denmark) - ****1/2
6) The Perks of Being a Wallflower (Stephen Chbosky - United States) - ****1/2
7) Holy Motors (Leos Carax - France) - ****1/2
8) The Imposter (Bart Layton - United Kingdom/United States) - ****1/2
9) Silver Linings Playbook (David O. Russell - United States) - ****1/4
10) The Master (Paul Thomas Anderson - United States) - ****1/4

On the Cusp:
11) De rouille et d'os // Rust and Bone (Jacques Audiard - France/Belgium) - ****
12) Starlet (Sean Baker - United States) - ****
13) Wadjda (Haifaa Al-Mansour - Saudi Arabia) - ****
14) Tabu (Miguel Gomes - Portugal) - ****
15) Dupa dealuri // Beyond the Hills (Cristian Mungiu - Romania) - ****

Watchlist:
Like Someone in Love (Abbas Kiarostami - Japan)
Paradies: Glaube // Paradise: Faith (Ulrich Seidl - Austria)
Après mai // Something in the Air (Olivier Assayas - France)
The Broken Circle Breakdown (Felix van Groeningen - Belgium)
Die Wand // The Wall (Julian Pölsler - Austria)

Bottom Five: bearing in mind that I'm primarily going to watch stuff that I think I'll enjoy...
1) Ginger and Rosa (Sally Potter - United Kingdom) - *3/4
2) Bachelorette (Leslye Headland - United States) - *3/4
3) Populaire (Régis Roinsard - France) - **
4) The Cabin in the Woods (Drew Goddard - United States) - **
5) The Unspeakable Act (Dan Sallitt - United States) - **

1. The Master, Paul Thomas Anderson
2. Amour, Michael Haneke
3. Django Unchained, Quentin Tarantino
4. Bernie, Richard Linklater
5. The Turin Horse, Bela Tarr
6. The Loneliest Planet, Julia Loktev
7. Zero Dark Thirty, Kathryn Bigelow
8. Lincoln, Steven Spielberg
9. Tabu, Miguel Gomes
10. The Central Park Five, Ken Burns, Sarah Burns, and David McMahon

Out of about 57 2012 films

1. Brave
2. Skyfall
3. Lincoln
4. Much Ado About Nothing
5. Searching for Sugar Man
6. Moonrise Kingdom
7. Les Miserables
8. Pitch Perfect
9. Argo
10. Game Change

Brave, Pitch Perfect, and Skyfall have really benefited from repeat viewings, Brave in particular, features the best/most complex parent/child relationship in an American animated film: ever. That the film takes the Beauty and the Beast ending and has the magic happen not with a Belle's profession of love nor with Merida's magical stitch, rather the magic of the family repairing itself is contingent upon a sincere and profound apology and a willingness to make amends is just incredible to me. Just a tremendously great film that has gotten better every time I've seen it.


hm: Django Unchained
Invisible War
Casting By
Looper
Avengers
Wreck it Ralph
Zero Dark Thirty
Love, Marilyn
Dark Knight Rises
The Pirates!

1. Holy Motors
2. Once Upon a Time in Anatolia
3. Amour
4. Goodbye First Love
5. Cosmopolis
6. Two Years at Sea
7. Barbara
8. Tabu
9. The Master
10. Faust

01. Drug War (Johnnie To)
02. Wolf Children (Mamoru Hosoda)
03. Gangs of Wasseypur (Anurag Kashyap)
04. Like Someone in Love (Abbas Kiarostami)
05. Holy Motors (Leos Carax)
06. The Master (Paul Thomas Anderson
07. Lesson of the Evil (Takashi Miike)
08. Eega (S.S. Rajamouli)
09. Barbara (Christian Petzold)
10. Cosmopolis (David Cronenberg)

1. Beyond the Hills
2. The Dark Knight Rises
3. Once Upon a Time in Anatolia
4. Tabu
5. The Master
6. Skyfall
7. Zero Dark Thirty
8. Looper
9. Barfi
10. Sister (Meier)

Honorable Mentions: Prometheus, Kahaani, The Life of Pi (in 3D), Argo, Wuthering Heights, Barbara, The Hunt, Silver Linings Playbook, Berberian Sound Studio, Passion (De Palma), Haywire, Shanghai (Banerjee), Django Unchained, Talaash.

Others Seen: Anna Karenina, Moonrise Kingdom, The Avengers, Vicky Donor, The Bourne Legacy, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, Agneepath, Killing Them Softly, John Carter, Les Miserables.

1. Moonrise Kingdom
2. Frances Ha
3. Beyond the Hills
4. Skyfall
5. The Master
6. Lincoln
7. Amour
8. Zero Dark Thirty
9. Django Unchained
10. Holy Motors

01. Amour (Michael Haneke)
02. The Sessions (Ben Lewin)
03. Paradise: Faith (Ulrich Seidl)
04. Holy Motors (Leos Carax)
05. Paradise: Love (Ulrich Seidl)
06. Dead Europe (Tony Krawitz)
07. Lore (Cate Shortland)
08. Call Girl (Mikael Marcimain)
09. Outing (Sebastian Meise & Thomas Reider)
10. Sightseers (Ben Wheatley)

1. Moonrise Kingdom (Wes Anderson)
2. The Master (Paul Thomas Anderson)
3. Detention (Joseph Kahn)
4. Seeking a Friend for the End of the World (Lorene Scafaria)
5. Starlet (Sean Baker)
6. It's Such a Beautiful Day (Don Hertzfeldt)
7. Wuthering Heights (Andrea Arnold)
8. Smashed (James Ponsoldt)
9. Alps (Yorgos Lanthimos)
10. The Color Wheel (Alex Ross Perry)

Past lists: 2011, 2010, 2009, 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005-2000