This week’s round of list-making opens with New York‘s “The Year in Culture 2013” issue. Sitting atop film critic David Edelstein‘s top ten is Spike Jonze’s Her, currently sharing the “Best Picture” award from the Los Angeles Film Critics Association with Alfonso Cuarón’s Gravity, which goes utterly unmentioned on Edelstein’s list, even in the also-ran categories. And by the way, if you were out, this weekend was filthy with awards: European and British Independent, plus those from critics in Boston and New York.
At any rate, back to Edelstein: “Her is not just the best film in years, it has the best performance of 2013 by a cosmic margin. Perhaps no actor but [Joaquin] Phoenix could express emotions that are so painfully unformed. He’s not just unafraid of regressing, of getting lost—he lives for it.” And again, all of New York‘s lists—television, books, art, and more—are collected here.
“I looked back on the year and thought about single cinematic images that knocked me flat. Or produced an actual ‘wow.’ Or somehow encompassed a film in a strange way.” At the House Next Door, R. Kurt Osenlund considers “20 Great Shots from the Films of 2013.”
Curators’ Choice: The Best of 2013, six films selected by Museum of the Moving Image Chief Curator David Schwartz and Assistant Film Curator Aliza Ma, runs from January 3 through 5. The six (in order of screening): The Grandmaster, Viola, Museum Hours, Computer Chess, Leviathan, and A Touch of Sin.
“Leviathan is an extreme example, but so many of the year’s standout documentaries were equally committed to veering away from the realm of magazine pieces or Wikipedia, and finding truths only the camera can reveal,” writes Scott Tobias, looking back on the year in nonfiction at the Dissolve.
The Guardian‘s person of the year is Edward Snowden. While you let that sink in, the film writers and editors have begun their countdown of the paper’s top ten, beginning with Henry Barnes on #10, Haifaa Al-Mansour‘s Wadjda.
Meantime, the Guardian‘s Peter Bradshaw has his own private fantasy awards show going on, “whimsically called the Braddies… presided over by Dara Ó Briain or Mariella Frostrup,” for which he’s put forward ten nominations for each of eight categories.
“What was your biggest artistic disappointment of 2013?” asks Sam Adams, and the Criticwire network responds in droves.
Eric Kohn lists the “Top 10 Undistributed Films of 2013.” Also at Indiewire, Alison Willmore picks the top TV shows of the year and Toby Ashraf, Austin Dale, Peter Knegt, Matthew Hammett Knott, Sophie Smith, Oliver Skinner, and Erin Whitney write up “10 Highlights From a Landmark Year For LGBT People and the Movies.”
Esquire‘s editors look back on “26 Things That Brought Us Joy in 2013.”
Tom Shone lists his top soundtracks of the year. The New Yorker‘s Sasha Frere-Jones discusses his favorite music of 2013, while PopMatters lists its “75 Best Albums.” And the Grammy nominations are out.
Slant‘s listing the “25 Best Video Games of 2013.”
Books? You’ll find the latest lists here. Meantime, here at Keyframe, we carry on posting one unusual end-of-the-year list per day, all month long. Today, for example: Adrian Martin on the year’s “Ten Best Confrontations.”
Lists and Awards 2013 Index. For news and tips throughout the day every day, follow @KeyframeDaily on Twitter and/or the RSS feed. Get Keyframe Daily in your inbox by signing in at fandor.com/daily.
