2009 Retrospective: The Best Films of 2009

Most modern film buffs and pundits are fans of 2009 cinema. Many treasure the year for its box-office spectacles like Avatar and other high-caliber genre films like District 9, and the year had a lot to live up to as it ended the first decade of the 21st century. While the year is not quite as remarkable as 1999, 2009 was still a towering year, with many films going on to have a strong shelf life. It was a year where quite a few films played off even better over time, especially Tarantino’s Inglorious Basterds, which has aged like a fine wine. Many of these astounding films below have ended up finding an audience and a larger appreciation over the years, and time will more than likely continue to be kind to these titles as well. In short, 2009 was a mesmerizing year that has already left its imprint.

1. Inglorious Basterds (d. Quentin Tarantino)

Stylized and transcending, Quentin Tarantino’s sixth feature, Inglorious Basterds, a fictional war movie that takes place during WWII, is the launch of Tarantino’s historical period pieces, where he continued to utilize his genre sensibilities and love for cinema while crafting something politically combative. Ultimately, it’s a film about the power of cinema, as Tarantino rewrites history during its setting of Germany’s occupation of France. It’s an exhilarating film with many great set pieces, but it’s elevated due to Tarantino’s memorable characters that inject enough energy and exuberance onto the screen, thanks to Tarantino’s skillful writing and directing. Led by Brad Pitt in a mesmerizing role as Allied officer Lt. Aldo Raine, who leads a band of Jewish soldiers to battle against SS officers, which includes taking off their scalps and engraving the swastika on their foreheads so they can’t run away from who they are. They end up teaming up with Bridget von Hammersmark (Diane Kruger), a famous German actress and Allied uncover agent, to bring down Adolph Hitler and other leaders of the Third Reich during a movie premiere that is owned by Shoshanna Dreyfuss (Melanie Laurent), who has her own plot of revenge against Hans Landa (Christophe Waltz), a Nazi commanding officer  who murdered her family and friends in the beginning of the Nazis’ occupation of France. Subsequently, Tarantino is aiming to do many things here, and it never feels overstuffed, counting on his characters and performance to deliver the goods. Waltz, Pitt, and Laurent are the keys to Inglorious Basterds, but the rest of the supporting cast shines too, including Daniel Bruhl and Michael Fassbender. The third act is towering filmmaking—one that is explosive and towering. Inglorious Basterds is a monumental achievement, a revenge period piece that raises the bar on what genre cinema can be capable of.

2. A Serious Man (d. Joel Coen and Ethan Coen)

The Coen’s Bros. dark comedy A Serious Man ranks as one of their most existential and sophisticated, recalling their other cerebral and idiosyncratic films like Barton Fink, The Man Who Wasn’t There, and Inside Llewyn Davis, but it also works great as a character study with its attention to character depth that makes it so compelling. It’s set in 1967, in St. Louis Park, Minnesota, where the Coen’s are from. The film examines the life of Larry Gopnik (Michael Stuhlbarg), a high-minded physics student at a college who finds both his professional and personal lives collapsing around him. His wife (Sari Lennick) is leaving him for a family friend, his jobless brother (Richard Kind) moves in with him,  and Larry finds himself being bribed and sabotaged for his chances of gaining tenure. Larry attempts to get advice from rabbis, but their advice leaves even greater ambiguity in Larry’s existential journey. Stuhlbarg achieves great nuance for his role, and it will remain a highlight in his career. The Coen’s style is some of their most unique; they perfectly recreated the look and feel of 1967 while never drawing attention to nostalgia. This is a profound film about the chaotic drudgery of life and just how things can speed up for us and slow down depending on life’s predicaments. It may seem simple in its title, but it’s a brilliant and intricate film, one of Coen’s most brilliant works.

3. The Girlfriend Experience (d. Steven Soderbergh)

Though not many first think of this highly artful gem when they think of Soderbergh’s impressive filmography, it should. Later, it was made into a successful television mini-series on Starz (which Soderbergh served as executive producer on). This experimental and freshly innovative work by Soderbergh and screenwriting duo Brian Koppelman and David Levien (Rounders) is nothing short of a masterpiece. Starring former adult movie actress Sasha Gray in a very natural and comfortable performance, a likable high-end escort in which Soderbergh observes in a fragmented glossy, cinema veritas style where you feel like your eavesdropping due to its natural realism during the leadup to the historical 2008 election between Barack Obama and John McCain. Tastefully done, vulnerable, highly sophisticated, and artistically savvy—Soderbergh takes the lifestyle of an upper Manhattan escort and makes a truly distinctive vision out of the material that is unlike anything he has ever crafted. More importantly, Soderbergh never sensationalizes the escort service; in fact, the film cuts away from sex scenes and has no nudity. The brilliance is the fetishization of escorts, sex, or the female body. It of course dives into sexuality and how men unease their stress from their careers and families to unease the tension that is building inside them. Soderbergh and writers examine the economic uncertainties of the 2008 era and work indirectly with the themes of human nature and desire, which makes it even more effective. Soderbergh examines the routines of an escort lifestyle: listening to her clients, sharing dinners, and listening to their worries right before they have sex. All of these moments should be dull; however, Soderbergh’s camera is observational, and he gets right to the emotional core and subtext with his astonishing framing and wide shots (Soderbergh lensing again as Peter Andrews). The film also shows the competitiveness of escorting and the desperation Christine, alias Chelsea (Gray), would go through to get her name out there, which involves an icky scene involving an escort critic (played creepily effective by film critic Glenn Kenny) who tries to sway Chelsea into bartering her escort services for a glowing review on his blog. All around, The Girlfriend Experience is a great piece of cinema, surely to be on my list for the best of the 2000’s when I later reveal that. The final moments of the film are absolutely unforgettable and unforgettable, reflecting back now, right before 2008, that life is truly a cycle of uncertainty that eventually gravitates us towards a shimmer of hope.

Courtesy Magnolia

4. Two Lovers (d. James Gray)

James Gray’s Two Lovers” tackles 21st-century depression with restraint and sincerity when a relatively depressed aspiring photographer moves back into his parents Queens apartment to cope with the recent breakup of his fiancée. Leonard (Joaquin Phoenix) is eccentric, caring, and holds a lot of emotional and even physical scars from his past relationships. Gray’s use of visual language is as sophisticated as his direction—confined apartments, windows, isolated beaches, and overcast rooftops become emotional barriers between Leonard’s desires for his new neighbor Michelle (Gwyneth Paltrow), who holds signifiers to a projected love, as a new potential love, Sandra (Vinessa Shaw), holds greater authenticity and hope that he’s too blindsided and distracted to see. Gray doesn’t give too many details on Leonard’s depression; he allows Phoenix to take his time with Leonard’s pain, allowing it to fester into a complex character study of affliction and unspoken longing. This is truly a great film and certainly highlights James Gray and Joaquin Phoenix’s careers.

5. 35 Shots of Rum (d. Claire Denis)

Hands down, Claire Denis is at her most delicate and emotionally resonant. Nearly every frame is filled with not only intoxicating imagery but also endearing humanism, as Denis studies compelling actors who are all in deep need of making the next steps in their lives. Denis’s channeling Ozu’s “Last Spring” with the father-daughter relationship played wonderfully by Alex Descas and Mati Diop holds some of the most tender father-daughter relationships you will ever see in a film. What’s even more remarkable is how much of a homage Denis plays to Ozu; she never gets sidetracked by Ozu’s aesthetics and stays true to her singular style while staying true to Ozu’s delicate style by using motifs of trains. Denis heartfelt ode to parents and children and to Yasujirō Oz ends up being her most personal and deeply affecting film.

6. Where the Wild Things Are (d. Spike Jonze)

For the record, the Maurice Sendak illustrated children’s book Where the Wild Things Are was one of my favorite books growing up. It was the most imaginative, quirky, and entertaining and it had an innovative use of character, themes, and so many other children’s books just didn’t compare with its uniqueness. When something like that connects with your childhood, and then you see a live action version of it, I approached it with some hesitance. Luckily, the film was co-written and directed by pioneer Spike Jonze–also co-written by Dave Eggers–who both manage to re-capture the innovation and charm that made the book so wondrous with the coeval of turning a 40-page children’s into a 90-minute film that tackles some very lofty existential themes for kids like loneliness, anxiety, sadness, and anger and how children use their imaginations to cope with these real-world feelings and experiences. Feeling isolated from his siblings, friends, mother, and classmates, young Max (Max Records) ends up escaping off to a far-out land called Wild Things. A fantastical place with vast forests, deserts, and caves where a group of beasts reside. They allow Max to become their king, and he promises to create a kingdom where nothing changes, and there will always be joy However, Max soon discovers that the beasts have their own complex emotions and that human emotions are universal even in far-out kingdoms. There is a great revelation not only to the themes but to Jonze’s technical craftsmanship with his collaborators and actors as well. The costume work, animatronics, and CGI are revelatory as actors Lauren Ambrose, Chris Cooper, Catherine O’Hara, Forrest Whitaker, and the late James Gandolfini as Carol all do fabulous voicework in bringing charm and vulnerabilities to their beastly characters. Likewise, the visual scheme by Jonze and cinematographer Lance Acord astonishes that brings a deft balance of an imaginary world and the rear world. By the end, Where the Wild Things Are will certainly move you. It’s an uncompromising vision, one that isn’t afraid to explore scary places while capturing blissfully joyful ones as well.

7. Fantastic Mr. Fox (d. Wes Anderson)

Who would have thought Wes Anderson’s first venture into animation would have been so perfectly suited to his vision and peculiarities? It’s also one of his most insightful and mature works to date that’s adapted from the beloved children’s novel Fantastic Mr. Fox by Roald Dahl. While the material already has all of Wes Anderson’s sensibilities, including his witty material and themes on family disconnect and the importance of families going through the motions in reconnecting with one another. In this highly inventive and emotionally effective family tale of reconciliation, centering on a family of foxes who find their homes in danger after Mr. Fox (voiced by George Clooney) breaks an oath to his wife, Felicity Fox (Meryl Streep), after breaking into the farms of his human neighbors and taking their chickens, in which his irrational decisions end up endangering his family as well as other animal friends. With its remarkable technical achievement, this film is a must-see for any Anderson fan with its quirky touches. The end result is a very comical and endearing achievement that finds its goal in delivering great entertainment for kids while also offering enough sophisticated humor and touching themes to satisfy adult viewers as well.

8. Tetro (d. Francis Ford Coppola)

Artful and somber, Francis Ford Coppola’s Tetro is an extraordinary art-house drama about estranged families, brotherhood, love, trauma, and reconciliation. It embraces artistic expression while rejecting egocentrism and narcissism at the same time. The film is about a young cruise line waiter named Bennnie (Alden Ehrenreich), who arrives in Argentina looking for his estranged older brother, Tetro (Vincent Gallo), who is far from the idealistic and ambitious big brother from his childhood, but who is now anguished and self-destructive and has given up his career as a writer. While Tetro’s anguish escalates, Bennie gets inspired by some old journals about hidden family secrets involving their father, who is a world-renowned musical composer. The writings inspire Bennie to secretly write and complete Tetro’s incomplete novel. Bennie eventually submits to a prestigious literary festival. This is at first met with rejection and outrage by Tetro. Luckily, Tetro’s loving girlfriend Miranda (Maribel Verdú) convinces him that entry to the festival is a form of healing and bonding, and they head out to Patagonia as they learn their writing is now a finalist in the competition.

9. Lorna’s Silence (d. Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne)

The Dardenne Brother’s Lorna’s Silence plays out like a greatest hit compilation, and it’s not quite as embraced as much as Rosetta, Two Days, Two Nights, The Kid with a Bike, or L’Enfant, but I can wholeheartedly recommend it to modern film buffs who are looking out for great world cinema. Like Rosetta and L’Enfant, it plays out like a parable that has very powerful moments of dignity and grace, but it’s also riveting and unnerving. The film begins with Lorna (Arta Dobroshi), a young Albanian who lives in Belgium and has pursuits of opening her own cafe with her boyfriend Claudy (Jeremie Renier). She ends up marrying him to gain legal residency, only to discover that Claudy has a severe drug addiction. This leads to her wanting a divorce, and her yearnings become a reality once she gets an offer for a large sum of money from a seedy cab driver, Fabio (Fabrizio Rongione from Rosetta), to marry a Russian mobster so he can get legal status. The divorce takes a delay, leading Fabio to want to plot for Claudy to die from an overdose, which puts Lorna in a very dangerous position.

What works best for the film is the angelic screen presence of the protagonist, lead actress Arta Dobroshi. The Dardenne’s user uses her photogenic robustness to capture her vulnerabilities, and in return, she delivers a naturalistic performance that doesn’t miss one false note. As the film unfolds, you hold a shimmer of hope that her predicament gets better. The Dardenne’s bring a delicate care to her character, and she delivers a very commanding performance of courage. The final scene is on par with Rosetta, and The Kid with a Bike has a pitch-perfect ending that reassures that Dardenne’s comparisons to Robert Bresson are earned and not overstated.

10. The White Ribbon (d. Michael Haneke)

Michel Haneke’s first film of two (the other being Amour) to win the prestigious Palme d’Or at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival is a haunting and unique film on the origins of European fascism and the Holocaust. No mentions of white supremacy or antisemitism are directly discussed. Instead, Haneke focuses on a community in Germany just before World War 1. You can see residents of the community abusing the power they hold over their social status, and the community loses its unity as it slips further into a state of despotism, fear, and paranoia. The film follows a baron (Ulrich Tukar), a doctor (Ulrich Tukur), and a pastor (Burghart Klaussner) as they are the leaders in their community. During the beginning of the story, the doctor suffers from an injury after someone mysteriously sabotages a pathway by tying a wire between two trees, causing the horse to tip over it. More menacing things occur, which include arson, vandalism, animal abuse, and other odd pranks directed towards the village’s upper class. We never see the perpetrators, but a local schoolteacher (Christian Friedel) holds his own theories as he falls in love with the baron’s nanny named Eva (Leonie Benesch), in which their friendship blossoms into an innocent and romantic one that is held to some reservations by Eva’s father due to the schoolteacher’s social status and age difference. The White Ribbon is a remarkable accomplishment by Michael Haneke, one that only gets better with each viewing. It’s a film designed to ponder why and how communities and society resort to aggression from despotism that leads to authoritarianism. The film’s craft is also exquisite, thanks to Christian Berger’s arresting black-and-white cinematography and framing, which are every bit as alluring as an Ingmar Bergman film. The film is also poetically narrated by Ernst Jacobi (The Tin Drum) as the narrator (voice only, the schoolteacher as an older man), who reminisces and contemplates the events. There is a muted quality to the film, which makes the shocking events even more brutal once they occur. It’s a demonstration of just how fragile unity can be and how unity and decency amongst each other can quickly be undermined by classicism, fear, division, and devotion.

Runners-Up in Alphabetical Order

Antichrist (d. Lars von Trier)

Lars von Triers look at a dysfunctional marriage goes into Ingmar Bergman and Andrei Tarkovsky territory with terrifying results –with Charlotte Gainsbourg and Willem Dafoe as a married couple referred to as “He” and “She” crippled with grief after losing their toddler who falls of three stories from their home. They go to a retreat cabin to clear their minds and the film examines grief, anxiety, and mental suffering. The film is brilliant at exploring the roles of men and women in relationship and the assumptions that arise from the genders. Only women are made out to be need psychological help during grief, as men are perceived to stay calm and controlling. Lars von Triers plays on these assumptions and examines who they horribly misaligned, the experience is unforgettable.

Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans (d. Werner Herzog)

While reworking the narrative of the 1992 Abel Ferrera masterpiece Bad Lieutenant, Werner Herzog’s variation Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans which is also about an unhinged, drug-addicted detective (Nicolas Cage), who works during twilight hours in New Orleans during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, carries on Herzog’s fascinating themes on how nature brings out man’s insanity. Herzog creates bits of over-the-top zaniness that’s merged with some dark deadpan hilarity, but its great strengths lie in its morality tale. Where Ferrera’s used religious iconography for its morality tale for its character arc, Herzog explores the longing for sobriety in his dark tale of self-destruction.

Bright Star (d. Jane Campion)

One of Jane Campion’s greatest accomplishments was exploring the heartbreaking love story between poets John Keats (Ben Whishaw) and Fanny Brawne (Abbie Cornish), which was undercut due to class, finances, and eventually, illness. Like The Piano, An Angel at My Table, and The Power of the Dog, there is a breathable artistry that is luminous and poetic. There are an equal number of fleeting and joyous moments that prevent it from being a complete exercise in romantic despair. It’s an engaging portrait of love, one that will always remain a highlight in the Campion’s oeuvre.

The Hangover (d. Todd Phillips)

The Hangover might seem like an unusual pick for my top ten lists, as I’m often not as favorable to studio comedies. Few films in recent memory have made me laugh as much as Todd Phillip’s comedic classic has; perhaps you can sense the cast just had a blast on set with this. The synergy between the leads, Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms, Justin Bartha, and Zach Galifianakis, shows a playful unity, something missing in the ungainly sequels. Let’s not forget the hilarious cameo of Mike Tyson and that missing tiger, as well as other hilarious performances from Ken Jeong and Heather Graham, and let’s not forget Rob Riggie and Clio King as the officers that hold the stun fun demonstration “in the face” scene. Galifianakis is the true standout here, as Alan Garner (Zach Galifianakis), who is perfectly cast, is a socially awkward, immature character who has ADHD and acts very childish. He is amusing in every scene from beginning to end.

The Hurt Locker (d. Kathryn Bigelow)

After a couple of misfires with The Weight of Water and K-19: The Widowmaker, Kathryn Bigelow had quite a comeback with The Hurt Locker, a gripping, intense, and refreshingly harrowing war film that made history with Kathryn Bigelow being the first female to win a Best Director Oscar. The film is about a staff sergeant (Anthony Mackie) and a specialist (Brian Geraghty) who lose their staff sergeant to explosives. They end up getting a new first-class staff sergeant (Jeremy Renner), who procures adrenaline from combat, risk-taking, and diffusing bombs. The film’s moralizing shows how war and combat are addictive and dehumanizing while never being didactic about them. Bigelow and writer Mark Boal keep the material fresh with so many expertly staged and taut scenes as the film unfolds. The Hurt Locker easily ranks as one of the finest war films of the 21st century.

Julia (d. Erick Zonca)

The closet modern film we will probably ever get that is in the vein of John Cassavetes Gloria (1980), Julia is sometimes derivative but even more thrilling and eventually compassionate, thanks to Tilda Swinton’s towering, powerful, and emotionally wounded central performance. Tilda Swinton delivers one of her most effective performances as Julia, an acholic named Julia who bands with one of her A.A. members to kidnap her young son, who is under the custody of his wealthy grandfather who has ties to the criminal underworld. Erick Zonca skills this film with a mix of noir and grit, finding the right tone and pacing for Gloria. It’s an intense film, perhaps even histrionic at times, but Swinton’s performance is electrifying. For fans of Swinton, this is an overlooked film, and Julia is highly recommended.

Honorable Mentions (In Alphabetical Order)

Anvil! The Story of Anvil (d. Sacha Gervasi)
The Beaches of Agnes (d. Agnes Varda)
Broken Embraces (d. Pedro Almodóvar)
Coraline (d. Henry Selick)
The Headless Woman (d. Lucrecia Martel)
The Informant! (d. Steven Soderbergh)
Red Cliff (d. John Woo)
Revanche (d. Götz Spielmann)
Sin Nombre (d. Cary Joji Fukunaga)
A Single Man (d. Tom Ford)
Still Walking (d. Hirokazu Kore-eda)
Sugar (d. Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck)
Up (d. Peter Doctor)
Up in the Air (d. Jason Reitman)
Watchmen (d. Zach Synder)

**Don’t Worry! Dogtooth, Enter the Void, Everyone Else, I Am Love, and White Material are featured in my 2010 Retrospective due to their North American theatrical release.