• About AwardsDaily
  • Sasha Stone
  • Advertising on Awards Daily
Awards Daily
  • 2026 Oscar Predictions
  • 2025/2026 Awards Calendar
  • EmmyWatch
  • Buzzmeter
  • NextGen Oscarwatcher
No Result
View All Result
  • 2026 Oscar Predictions
  • 2025/2026 Awards Calendar
  • EmmyWatch
  • Buzzmeter
  • NextGen Oscarwatcher
No Result
View All Result
Awards Daily
No Result
View All Result

Richard Brody names “The 26 Best Films of 2011”

Ryan Adams by Ryan Adams
December 7, 2011
in Top Ten Lists
0

Nothing about Richard Brody’s list of 26 films in The New Yorker touches me more than his introductory premise.

2011 in cinema could be called, with apologies to Joan Didion, the year of magical thinking. Many of the year’s best movies exalt the metaphysical, the fantastical, the transformative, the fourth-wall-breaking, or simply the impossible, and—remarkably—do so (following Didion’s theme) in response to loss, grief, mourning. These films depart from “reality” (or what is often offered up as such with a stern reproach to the ostensibly frivolous alternatives) not in order to forget the irrefutable but in order to face it, to think about it, to act on it more freely. And much (though not all) of the new realm of cinematic fantasy results from the increased availability and quality—the very inescapability—of sophisticated digital cinema. Every technological advance starts as a miracle, becomes a necessity, and ends up as a vice. Despite ambient complaints about the alienation of the real by means of the virtual, the powers of the virtual are now being wielded by artists, who reverse the course —- they restore to daily life its share of the miraculous.

Writing like that is a reminder that obsessing over the specific of each critic’s year-end round-up can sometimes tend to diminish what we value most about their work. Reading sharp analysis of films in their cultural context is one of the great pleasures associated with loving movies and thinking about what makes the best of them so special.

1. The Future

Miranda July is the Marguerite Duras of 2011: she infuses her movie with literature in order to make it more truly cinematic, reveals a choreographic precision that evokes physical intimacy and remoteness better than any other film this year, bares her metaphysical strivings in order to explore her most practical and venal fears and desires, fulfills the promise of her film’s exquisite title.

2. The Tree of Life

The very nature of inchoate thought, discovered and actualized by way of cinema. Terrence Malick overcomes the nearly insurmountable risks of the long-dreamed-of project to fuse autobiography and philosophy of mind, scientific fascination and religious reminiscences, desires and realities, a receding past and an uncertain future—and to do it with a fusion of dramatic intensity with visionary exaltation. The film’s very existence is a marvel.

(You’ll find a few more gems of crystallized distillation at The New Yorker, but I don’t want to re-publish the whole article)

3. Film Socialisme
4. Hugo
5. Certified Copy
6. Margaret
7. Petition
8. Putty Hill
9. Silver Bullets
10. A Screaming Man
11. The Interrupters
12. You All Are Captains
13. Bellflower
14. J. Edgar
15. Midnight in Paris
16. Terri
17. Impolex
18. Moneyball
19. Road to Nowhere
20. Bridesmaids
21. The Descendants
22. Uncle Kent
23. The Time That Remains
24. Le Havre
25. The Skin I Live In
26. Restless

Tags: Top 10 Lists
Previous Post

Peter Travers’ top 10 in Rolling Stone

Next Post

Thom Ernst names Top 6 Canadian Films of 2011

Next Post

Thom Ernst names Top 6 Canadian Films of 2011

2026 Oscar Predictions: The Frontrunners in Each Category
2026 Oscar Predictions

2026 Oscar Predictions: The Frontrunners in Each Category

by Sasha Stone
October 17, 2025
3

Sinners is showing some signs of life now that it's been given the Ensemble tribute by the Gotham awards, following...

The Daily Wire’s Pendragon Cyle: The Rise of Merlin Gets a Trailer

The Daily Wire’s Pendragon Cyle: The Rise of Merlin Gets a Trailer

October 17, 2025
Oscar Podcast: Frontrunners and Challengers Episode 2 with Mark Johnson

2026 Oscars — Podcast Alert: Frontrunners and Challengers, Episode 5

October 16, 2025
Let’s Talk Cinema: The 2000’s

Let’s Talk Cinema: The 2000’s

October 15, 2025
CNN Frets That The “Male Gaze” Might Be Coming Back

CNN Frets That The “Male Gaze” Might Be Coming Back

October 14, 2025
The Critics Choice Reveal Documentary Nominations

The Critics Choice Reveal Documentary Nominations

October 14, 2025
Nextgen Oscarwatcher: Best Supporting Actress and a Grassroots campaign for Amy Madigan

Nextgen Oscarwatcher: Best Supporting Actress and a Grassroots campaign for Amy Madigan

October 13, 2025
Read Woody Allen’s Tribute to Diane Keaton

Read Woody Allen’s Tribute to Diane Keaton

October 13, 2025
The Buzzmeter — Box Office Disaster: Has Hollywood Lost the Plot?

The Buzzmeter — Box Office Disaster: Has Hollywood Lost the Plot?

October 12, 2025
The Great Diane Keaton Passes On … Leaving a Legacy to Treasure

The Great Diane Keaton Passes On … Leaving a Legacy to Treasure

October 11, 2025

Oscar News

2026 Oscars —  Best Director: There is Ryan Coogler and Everyone Else

2026 Oscars — Best Director: There is Ryan Coogler and Everyone Else

September 23, 2025

2026 Oscars: What Five Best Actor Contenders Will Get Nominated? [POLL]

“Politically Charged” One Battle After Another Dazzles Crowds at Early Screenings

2026 Oscars: The Themes That Will Drive This Year’s Best Picture Race

The Buzzmeter: Can Brad Pitt’s and F1 Invite the Public Back to the Oscars?

2026 Oscars: Neon Nails it Again with Sentimental Value at Cannes

EmmyWatch

CBS Finally Ends the Stephen Colbert Show

CBS Finally Ends the Stephen Colbert Show

July 18, 2025

The Gotham TV Winners Set the Consensus to Come

Gothams Announces Television Nominees

White Lotus Finale – A Deeply Profound Message for a Weary World

  • About AwardsDaily
  • Sasha Stone
  • Advertising on Awards Daily

© 2025 JNews - Premium WordPress news & magazine theme by Jegtheme.

No Result
View All Result
  • About AwardsDaily
  • Sasha Stone
  • Advertising on Awards Daily

© 2025 JNews - Premium WordPress news & magazine theme by Jegtheme.