THE way we've watched new films has changed drastically of late, with a lot more movies being enjoyed via streaming means at home due to Covid restrictions forcing cinemas to close for extended periods.
Thankfully, there have been some absolute crackers released over the past year to help distract us from the pandemic – a couple of which even made it to the big screen, giving us the perfect excuse to escape from our Covid-safe bunkers in order to enjoy some much needed socially distanced cinema fun.
I've chosen 21 of my 2021 favourites below. Hopefully, this alphabetically ordered list includes a few titles which you might have missed first time around. Maybe pencil them in for the first lockdown of 2022...
1. BARB & STAR GO TO VISTA DEL MAR
Clueless culotte-clad middle-agers Barb (Kristen Wiig) and Star (Annie Mumolo) take an increasingly surreal vacation to Florida, where they become embroiled in a plot to unleash killer insects while courting a handsome stranger called Edgar (Jamie Dornan). Dumb 'Friday night film' fun.
2. BOSS LEVEL
It's 'Ready Player One meets Groundhog Day meets Tron' for Frank Grillo in Joe Carnahan's enjoyably daft sci-fi actioner about an ex-soldier stuck in a time loop where real life resembles an ultra-violent computer game. Can his gamer nerd son (Grillo's real son, Rio) help him beat its final, seemingly impossible mission? Hugely preposterous but highly entertaining with it.
3. CENSOR
Set at the height of England's 'video nasty' panic in the mid-1980s, Prano Bailey-Bond's memorable debut feature is a stylish psychological horror in which Niamh Algar's film censor Enid gradually loses her grip on reality with deadly results. Features a great supporting turn by Michael Smiley as a sleazy movie producer.
4. DINNER IN AMERICA
This anarchic indie centres on a pair of seemingly mis-matched misfits (Kyle Gallner and Emily Skeggs) who team up to take on parents, bullies and the law in their small mid-western town before forming an awesome punk rock duo. Adam Rehmeier's film is gritty, darkly hilarious and also kind of sweet.
5. FREAKY
A great horror comedy twist on the classic body-swap concept, this involves Vince Vaughn's serial killer accidentally trading physical forms with one of his intended teen victims, played by Kathryn Newton. It's Freaky Friday meets Halloween, only much better than that sounds on paper.
6. GHOSTBUSTERS: AFTERLIFE
Who you gonna call? Jason Reitman, that's who(m): the son of original Ghostbusters director Ivan gets this franchise back on course after Paul Feig's somewhat unfairly slated 2016 misfire. An enjoyable mega-dose of nostalgia mixed with a promising injection of new blood in the excellent McKenna Grace as Egon Spengler's ghostbustin' grandkid.
7. THE GUILTY
Superb one location thriller starring Jake Gyllenhaal as a disgraced LAPD officer relegated to emergency switchboard duty who becomes a little too invested in a 911 call from a kidnap victim. It's mostly just Gyllenhaal's twitchy cop and a bunch of voices on the other end of a phone (including Ethan Hawke, Riley Keough and Paul Dano), but director Antoine Fuqua skilfully builds the tension to unbearable levels. Recommended.
8. I CARE A LOT
Excellent pitch-black comedy thriller starring Rosamund Pike as a con artist running a lucrative scam where, with the help of Alicia Witt's crooked doctor, she is able to pack vulnerable wealthy people off to a care home and then strip their assets. Things get spicy when she targets Joanne (Diane Wiest), who has a son you really shouldn't mess with (Peter Dinklage).
9. IN THE EARTH
Ben Wheatley's atmospheric pandemic-set psychedelic horror actually made it to cinemas, where audiences were best able to enjoy the immersive sound design created for its potent blend of chuckles, squirms and scares as research scientist (Joel Fry) and his guide (Ellora Torchia) are tormented by Reece Shearsmith and Hayley Squires deep within remote and potentially haunted English woodland.
10. JUDAS AND THE BLACK MESSIAH
This gripping period bio-pic/crime thriller from director Shaka King stars Daniel Kaluuya as Black Panthers leader Fred Hampton and Lakeith Stanfield as William O'Neill, a petty criminal turned FBI snitch who successfully infiltrated the organisation and supplied information which eventually led to Hampton's state-sanctioned assassination in 1969. Both leads are superb.
11. MINARI
Lee Isaac Chung's autobiographical tale of a Korean family's struggle to adjust to life after emigrating to rural Arkansas in the early 1980s is beautifully shot and hugely affecting. A superb cast is lead by Steven Yeun and Han Ye-ri, with Youn Yuh-jung a deserved Oscar-winner for her turn as the clan's entertainingly truculent elder.
12. NOBODY
Bob Odenkirk of Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul fame is great in this Ilya Naishuller-directed revenge-fuelled actioner about a retired assassin who falls back on his 'certain set of skills' to get the bad guys who terrorised his family during a break-in. Violent, but sharply written and darkly funny too.
13. NOMADLAND
Chloé Zhao's poignant, beautifully shot portrait of a broken America starred the always excellent Oscar-winner Frances McDormand, who expanded her already versatile range here by pooping in a bucket while portraying a woman who abandons the wreckage of her post-economic collapse life to hit the road.
14. NO TIME TO DIE
We'd been expecting Mr Bond for about two years by the time this finally made it to cinemas, but happily Daniel Craig's 007 swansong proved to be one of his better outings as Ian Fleming's super spy – and certainly one of the most fun. Still not sure about that ending though.
15. PALM SPRINGS
Another time-loop flick for the locked down masses: Nyles (Andy Samberg) and Sarah (Cristin Milioti) get stuck living out the same day repeatedly and must figure out how to escape while avoiding the murderous Roy (JK Simmons). This acclaimed comedy took forever to actually come out over here, but was definitely worth waiting for.
16. PIG
Reclusive truffle farmer Nicolas Cage attempts to track down his beloved prize pig and the men who snatched her. Writer/director Michael Sarnoski's debut is a great slow-burn thriller featuring one of Cages's best performances in years – and it's unexpectedly poignant too.
17. PROMISING YOUNG WOMAN
Medical school drop-out Cassie (Carey Mulligan) hits bars and clubs by night in an attempt to snare would-be date rapists, risky nocturnal activity which has become a depressing focal point of her lonely life: enter Ryan (Bo Burnham), a 'nice guy' who may offer Cassie a shot at closure on a pivotal event from her past. Gripping, twisty and memorable film-making from writer/director Emerald Fennell.
18. RIDERS OF JUSTICE
Mads Mikkelsen is a veteran soldier who takes extraordinary steps to exact payback on those he holds responsible for his wife's death with the help of a group of tech-savvy misfits. However, nothing is certain in this intelligent and entertainingly quirky Danish twist on a genre picture.
19. ROSE PLAYS JULIE
Superb slow-burn Irish thriller from writer/director duo Christine Molloy and Joe Lawlor, starring Anne Skelly as an adopted veterinary student whose quest to connect with her birth mother (Orla Brady) leads to shocking revelations about her birth father (Aidan Gillen). Brilliant, highly unsettling viewing.
20. SOUND OF METAL
Riz Ahmed gives a powerhouse performance in Darius Marders' remarkable portrait of a rock drummer and recovering addict whose sudden hearing loss forces a complete re-evaluation of his life and relationship with bandmate, lover and fellow drugs survivor Olivia Cooke.
21. THE SPARKS BROTHERS
Edgar Wright condenses the Mael brothers' eclectic 40-year-plus career in music into one hugely satisfying and visually arresting documentary featuring plenty of illuminating and typically sardonic input from Russell and Ron themselves. A must-watch for Sparks fans and pretty damn enjoyable for casual viewers as well.
THREE STILL TO SEE
