Top Films of 2018: 13-10

13. Marty (1955), Delbert Mann, United Artists
 
 Delbert Mann's award-winning Marty is a painful exploration of human nature, in part, due to Ernest Borgnine's acting range. Borgnine is good at playing the heavy or the slapstick character, but here he plays the sensitive and misunderstood title lead. His family and friends are hassling him for not settling down and having a family. He succumbs to their pressure but on his own terms. The film won four Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Actor, as well as the Palme d'Or.

12. The Other Side of the Wind (2018), Orson Welles, Netflix
 This will probably be an unpopular and polarizing choice, but I really enjoyed Orson Welles' lost film. While not anywhere near the level of his famous pictures, the experimental film holds together despite the cobbled nature of its production. The film's film-within-a-film structure complicates the viewing experience, but does an impressive job satirizing the golden age of Hollywood as well as the age of the 1970s auteurs. However, it is more graphic than any of Welles' other pictures, which is off-putting at first. The acting is superb, and the cast is impressive. However, I would have loved to see what Welles would have done if he had ever been capable of finishing it.

11. The Killing of a Sacred Deer (2017), Yorgos Lanthimos, A24

Yorgos Lanthimos' returns with another film that tests the limits of conventional storytelling and sometimes borders on the ludicrous. The story of a Cardiac surgeon, Steven Murphy (Colin Farrell), who introduces his family to a boy he knew in the past. They start getting sick and losing mobility in their legs. Of course, the boy is causing this due to secrets in Murphy's past. In another director's hands, the plot might buckle under the weight of its many inconsistencies, but Lanthimos does a good job with pacing and characterization.

10. Bicycle Thieves (1948), Vittorio De Sica, Produzioni De Sica
Bicycle Thieves is deserving of its reputation as a classic of Italian neorealism. The film captures the poverty and desperation of post-war Italy by presenting the story of Antonio who needs a bicycle to distribute advertisements so that he can support his family. When his bike is stolen, he and his son search the city for it. De Sica captures the desperation of mundane life through naturalistic performances from untrained actors that lived very similar lives to the film's plot.

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