Best and Worst of January 2015

One month down, eleven to go. Here is a look back at the three best films I’ve seen in January 2015 and the one worst film as well. I think I can say that it’s pretty good start to the year. Naturally no major blockbusters yet but a few smaller films and some stragglers from 2014 show up in UK cinemas. So without further ado let’s tackle the best

3: Foxcatcher

An amazing and brutal film, stripping down the glamourous sports life to its raw and ugly core. Steve Carell, Channing Tatum and Mark Ruffalo all appear to play three very different but very tragic figures, each with their own traumas that plague them and ultimately destroy their hopes and aspirations. Throw in the beautifully bleak directing and you have the most successful sports tragedy for a long time.

2: Whiplash

A thriller about Jazz. Ask yourself how such a concept was pitched to studios, on paper it must have looked mediocre and fairly straight forward. But then you add the directorial techniques of a thriller from Damien Chazelle. Then you add the damaged and aspiring performance from Miles Teller and JK Simmons as his psychotic and brilliant teacher. You then have the most thrilling, emotional, and thought provoking film of last year. You’ll be left with your heart in your mouth and yelling for more.

1: Birdman

Not only is Birdman a painfully true performance from Michael Keaton, it soars on cinematic imagination. It’s an experience unlike anything else in film history and it all spans from the mind of Alejandro Gonzalez Inarittu. It reminds me why I love movies, it’s humorous, emotional intellectual, visually breath-taking and vital to the time. It acts as a commentary on the movie industry as we watch the mother of all meltdowns and the father of all fight-backs.

And now the worst…

Taken 3

Wow, I’d say this franchise has fallen a long way but it didn’t have that long to fall in the first place. The brutal action of the first has been reduced to a mix of sequences more comfortable in Tolkien’s Middle Earth. All held together with a thin and tiresome plot. Liam Neeson gives a decent performance given the poor writing but that is definitely not enough to save it. Expect the full review shortly.