This has certainly been one of the most challenging years for me, in terms of great cinema access. I moved back to Preston for my first graduate position and found myself, for the first time in four years, living in a town with no independent cinema. Stuck between a bad Odeon and a more than terrible Vue, I had to take advantage of Odeon’s wonderful Screen Unseen strand and make occassional trips to Liverpool to see the art house flicks I couldn’t bear to miss. I also made sure that I binged on the great programmes at both Edinburgh International Film Festival and Sheffield Doc/Fest to make up for the absence I faced during the rest of the year. I also got to two of the Independent Cinema Office’s seasonal screening days – allowing me to see a bunch of movies ahead of their release. The majority of my top 20 films of the year have come from these days. Two of my top ten are from Edinburgh Film Festival, one is from Sheffield Doc/Fest, two were from the Odeon Screen Unseen screenings, five were in regular theatre screenings and ten were from screening days. One of my top ten is a documentary, four are foreign features and one is British. There are two animation features and five biopics in the list.
Here it is:
1. Inside Out
2. The Tribe
3. It Follows
4. Love & Mercy
5. Whiplash
6. Sunset Song
7. The Lobster
8. The Look of Silence
9. Room
10. Big Hero
11. Spotlight
12. Grandma
13. Selma
14. Heaven Knows What
15. Ex Machina
16. Timbuktu
17. Bridge of Spies
18. The Grump
19. Trumbo
20. Youth
After being mesmerised and traumatised by the brutality of The Tribe I was surprised that it had been knocked down to second place by Summer. Inside Out captured my childhood spirit through its originality, its tender handling of youthful emotion and suffering and its charismatic voice work. It’s also been a wonderful year for horror fans with the likes of The Babadook breathing new aesthetic and life into the genre. It Follows remains the most enticing and satisfying retro horror in years and took wonderful inspiration from the likes of Halloween. When it comes to this year’s academy awards it was only Selma and Whiplash that truly impressed me. Disney combined with Marvel to make the glorious Big Hero 6 and Terence Davies graced us with his latest masterpiece, Sunset Song. A lot of my list is taken up by previews which will hit cinemas in 2016 – the likes of Spotlight and Room proving to be my hot favourites for the next award season. All in all I’m delighted to see the variety of style, genre, form, subject and theme in my top ten, proving what a diverse and adventurous year of cinema it’s been.
Thanks for reading and let’s all keep supporting our beloved film industry.
Hannah McHaffie 