Year in ReView: Vanyaland’s favorite films of 2018

2018 was a lot of things: A ceaseless reminder that the never-ending hellscape we've crafted for ourselves in the weeks following the 2016 election will not abate without a seemingly herculean effort, a great baseball season for Red Sox fans, and perhaps best of all, a pretty damn good year at the movies. What follows is a year-end list of accolades and the films that received them, not in any particular order, in which I've pulled review samples from our archives over the past year. Because, if the holidays are about reflection and whatnot, what better way to ring in the season than by looking at the work you've done over the past year? There are a few listed that I never got the chance to review, and those will be accompanied by some hastily-written blurbs telling you to Go See The Thing I Liked. And you should! Each of these movies -- including those on the honor roll -- are worth your time and effort. Thanks for reading.

Honor Roll: A Prayer Before Dawn, Border, Widows, Halloween, I Think We're Alone Now, The House That Jack Built, BlackkKlansman, The Death of Stalin, Black Panther, Cam, Leave No Trace, Wildlife, The Sisters Brothers, Mid90s, Thoroughbreds, A Quiet Place, Unfriended: Dark Web, The Legacy of Whitetail Deer Hunter, The Captain, Clara's Ghost, The Devil's Doorway, Nico 1988, Ready Player One, Cold War, Shoplifters, The Mule

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Best Pets

The Favourite

From my review: “Lanthimos is well known as an aesthetic provocateur, but if you’re expecting something as shocking as his previous work, you may very well be disappointed. That’s not to say that the director is pulling his punches with The Favourite, but it’s more that he’s found a setting whose societal tics and heavy manners disguise more of the off-putting aspects of his prior work. The English court, with all of its stately rituals and entertainments, (made so surreal simply by the corrupting levels of wealth that allow them to take place) removes the sterility and artificiality in his exploration of interpersonal relationships and replaces them with period texture — duck races, orange fights, pigeon shooting — and the Barry Lyndon-esque richness found in every frame makes it visually unlike anything else he’s done before as well.”

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