"2014 - This Year In Film"

Well another cinematic year draws to a close. And it gives us the opportunity to reflect on the best and the worst from the past 365 days.

As ever as becoming the norm with Cinema, biopics once again were a huge part of the year, starting off with two good movies, namely "The Railway Man" and "12 Years a Slave", the latter going on to win Best Picture at The Oscars, and despite being an unpopular opinion, I felt there were more deserving films.

Marvel had a better year. There was once a time when a Marvel was almost like an event as they maybe released a film or two every year. Now it is almost like there is one every few months, and I think it is a case of saturation at times, but this year they did excel themselves.
"Captain America: The Winter Soldier" was a great sequel featuring Steve Rogers, and it was quickly followed by "The Amazing Spiderman 2", which I thought was one of the best Marvel films for some time. "X-Men: Days of Future Past" was enjoyable enough, and certainly visually stunning, and then saving the best for last we had "Guardians of the Galaxy" whih was one of the top box office films of year, worldwide.

The mature film stars flourished this year, with Douglas, Kline, Freeman and De Niro having fun in "Last Vegas" and Mr. Neeson still playing the hard man in both "Non Stop" and "A Walk Among the Tombstones", although the latter remains a pretty awful film.
You probably cannot get more mature than the collective known as Monty Python, who were on our Cinema screens in a one off live performance, which raised many laughs.

September was a bad month in that there were three major turkeys viewed in just over a one week period, see below for more details.

All in all though it has been a pretty poor year again. It has only been saved from being a complete disaster by some remarkable films in the closing few months, such greats like "Pride", "The Imitation Game", "Mr. Turner", "Nightcrawler" and "'71".

The Award for Promising so much, and failing to deliver goes to - "Interstellar" and "The Expendables 3"

 

Here is a selection of films which share the Award for Worst Film of The Year    -

But now time for some praise.

The Award for Best British Talent goes
to Jack O' Connell, who gave amazing performances in both "Starred Up" and also "'71", and is currently being seen in "Unbroken"

The Harry H. Corbett Award for Comedy by a Dramatic actor goes to Ralph Fiennes for his hysterically funny work on "The Grand Budapest Hotel"

The Kleenex Award for Best Weepie of 

the  Year goes to "The Book Thief" 

It is a tough call for Best Actor, and I very seldom do this but we have a tie. The winners for Lead Actor are:

Jake Gyllenhaal for "Nightcrawler" and Benedict Cumberbatch for "The Imitation Game".

 
Before I get to Best Actress, I have to mention there were several outstanding performances by actresses in a Supporting Role.

We have on the left the amazing Dorothy Atkinson who brought both many emotions to her performance as 'Hannah' in "Mr. Turner". In the centre there is the excellent Rene Russo who was great as TV executive 'Nina' in "Nightcrawler". And on the right there is Imelda Staunton who was hysterically funny in "Pride"...all worthy winners in my opinion.


It is a great shame but there were very few outstanding Lead Actress Performances during 2014, and I suspect it is the age old problem of poor writing for female characters.

But there can be only one winner, and it is:

 

 

 Rosamund Pike for her first class work on psychological thriller "Gone Girl" 

As for Best Picture, well there were several movies that would on any other year have been worthy winners, but there can be only one movie crowned best of 2014...............