My 10 Favourite Directors of 2011.

2011, you say? That thing that happened over seven months ago? Sorry, guys in the future, but my mind has just clicked out of 2011 mode. I've seen all of the '2011' films that I'd wanted to see (apart from Carnage, which doesn't hit for another month, unfortunately), so I figured it was time to give my full, official 2011 retrospective. Why didn't I just do that at the start of the year and leave all of the 2011 films released in 2012 to be 2012 films? Because that's dumb. I didn't really want to be talking about films like War Horse, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Artist etc etc etc when it came time to make my 2012 list. And it's better late than never, am I right?

Tonight, I'll be looking at my favourite directors of the year. Tomorrow will be reserved for actresses, Saturday for actors, and Sunday for my favourite films of 2011. So set those clocks back and bear with me: I know I'm behind, but you try live in New Zealand!

Honourable mentions for my favourite directors of the year: Michel Hazanavicius - The Artist, Pedro Almodovar - The Skin I Live In, Martin Scorsese - Hugo, Jeff Nichols - Take Shelter, Sean Durkin - Martha Marcy May Marlene, George Clooney - The Ides of March, Bennett Miller - Moneyball, Mike Mills - Beginners, Cary Joji Fukunaga - Jane Eyre, Asghar Farhadi - A Separation, Neil Burger - Limitless.

10. Brad Bird - Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol

This may strike some as an odd choice for a list that is filled with a whole lot of independent/arthouse films, but hear me out. Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol was definitely one of the best blockbusters to come out last year (and to think I nearly missed out on it because I couldn't be bothered watching the first three...and I didn't even need to), mainly because it has some kick-ass action set-pieces. I mean, come on, that scene way up on the Burj Khalifa Tower in Dubai? That had me scared like I've never been scared before. There's also an extremely well choreographed scene which involves a lot of cars. And not to mention, an action sequence taking place during a sandstorm. It is a heavy load to carry in order to ensure that these insane sequences look slick, but Brad Bird - in his live-action directorial debut - manages to take it all in his stride and make a rousing blockbuster.
Key scene: The Burj Khalifa Tower scene was definitely one of the most memorable of the year, but the scene involving all of the cars was pretty darn well choreographed.

A Film Like a Migraine, But One You Can Appreciate

Film: Tyrannosaur
Year: 2011
Written and directed by: Paddy Considine
Starring: Peter Mullan, Olivia Colman, Eddie Marsan, Paul Popplewell, Ned Dennehy, Samuel Bottomley, Sally Carman, Sian Breckin.
Running time: 92 min.
This film will be released on DVD by Madman Entertainment on June 14th in New Zealand.

Let me be straightforward from the get-go: Tyrannosaur is not a feel good movie. It is not the kind that one can easily crack the faintest of smiles at. I've heard it said many times before that the cheeriest scene in this movie is a funeral scene. Which is absolutely true. This film is exactly like a cracking migraine. It crushes your brain for the entire time, leaving you completely still and transfixed on the screen as if the slightest movement could make the migraine worse. Your eyes are forced to see things they don't want to see, and they want to shift out of focus so that things don't turn out so bad. While the film is heaving this mass amount of pressure onto your head that ensures the most uncomfortable viewing ever, it rips your heart out and holds it in this dark cube, where happiness is about ten planets away. Tyrannosaur may be capable of all of those different, horrible feelings, but I can promise that it is a very good film. It isn't the kind that you can easily sum up as being a "film that I enjoyed". It is a film that I "endured and appreciated".

Evil Lives Here.

Film: Red Riding Trilogy (In the Year of Our Lord 1974; 1980; 1983)
Year: 2009
Director: Julian Jarrold (1974), James Marsh (1980), Anand Tucker (1983)
Written by: Tony Grisoni
Starring: Andrew Garfield, Rebecca Hall, David Morrissey, Paddy Considine, Robert Sheehan, Peter Mullan, Warren Clarke, Jim Carter, Eddie Marsan, Sean Harris, Maxine Peake, Sean Bean.
Running time: 295 min.

I've always somewhat disliked television, but what I dislike even more are made-for-TV films. They usually don't have much going for them, have no stylistic intentions whatsoever and employ a who's who of B-grade actors. All too often have I likened completely average movies with a huge amount of potential to the made-for-TV area, or used it as a whipping stick of some sort. However, there was a trilogy of movies made for British televisions in 2009 which was good enough to get a theatrical release in America in 2010. It was also good enough to change my attitude towards the television movies I so disliked before. The Red Riding trilogy, based upon David Peace's quartet of books looking at a series of murder and crime in Yorkshire, is one heck of a trilogy, ranking up there with the best. In fact, you wouldn't even be able to tell that this started out as a television project, because of the high-calibre of actors and well-informed production and stylistic values.