The Year in Review: Best film of 2010
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.The Kids are All Right
Nothing was funnier or warmer than Lisa Cholodenko's comedy of familial dysfunction, which features a standout performance by Annette Bening as one half of a lesbian couple with kids trying to cope with the appearance of their sperm donor (Mark Ruffalo). Californian faddishness and foolishness are nailed as never before.
A Prophet
Jacques Audiard, a master dramatist of self-invention, cuts right to the heart of Darwinian survival in this French prison movie. Newcomer Tahar Rahim gives an astonishing performance, shifting from pale-faced loner to quicksilver thug as he negotiates the violent and racist microcosm of jail life. Its moments of tension grip tighter than a mafioso's garrotte.
The Secret in their Eyes
This Argentine thriller, surprise winner of the 2009 Best Foreign Language Picture, enfolds an intricate murder mystery with the story of a lost love between a criminal-court investigator (the great Ricardo Darin) and his high-born superior (Soledad Villamil). Writer-director Juan Jose Campanella overstretches it here and there, but his shuttling between timeframes – from present-day democracy to a dark past of death squads and disappearances – gathers a turbulent urgency.
I am Love
Tilda Swinton does constrained hysteria to perfection as the isolated wife who awakens to love in Luca Guadagnino's sensuous portrait of a super-rich Milanese family coming apart at the seams. Food has not been showcased so opulently in a movie since Babette's Feast, and the use of fish soup as a plot crux is brill – or was it carp?
Down Terrace
The best British picture of 2010. Ben Wheatley's debut is a Brighton-set comedy about a crime family whose lawlessness is only dimly discerned through a humdrum routine of domestic bickering, folk singalongs and willow-pattern dinner plates. Robert Hill as the patriarch is superb, a loquacious former hippie switching from menace to mildness with disconcerting ease. And the music is great.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments