Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!: 2013 in films

1/01/2014

2013 in films - according to Film Excess

The best of 2013

The best film of 2013 seen in retrospect (so far), Nicolas Winding Refn's Only God Forgives

1. Only God Forgives - Nicolas Winding Refn

2. The Conjuring - James Wan

3. The Incredible Burt Wonderstone - Don Scardino

4. Side Effects - Steven Soderbergh

5. Behind the Candelabra - Steven Soderbergh

6. The Last Stand - Kim Jee-Woon

7. Monsters University - Dan Scanlon

8. Nymphomaniac - Lars Von Trier

9. Despicable Me 2 - Pierre Coffin & Chris Renaud

10. Star Trek Into Darkness - J. J. Abrams

11. Evil Dead - Fede Alvarez

12. Oz the Great and Powerful - Sam Raimi

13. White House Down - Roland Emmerich

14. Pacific Rim - Guillermo Del Toro

The worst of 2013

1. The Last Exorcism Part 2 - Ed Gass-Donnelly

2. Odd Thomas - Stephen Sommers

3. The Bling Ring - Sofia Coppola

Remarks:

I have not seen a true, cinematic masterpiece from 2013 yet, but I have seen a lot of good films, and I'm sure the overwhelming 2013 pearls have just been hiding from me so far, and I will find it or them sooner or later. I have missed a lot of the big, celebrated films, but I will get to them some time soon. Films like Gravity, 12 Years a Slave, Enough Said, Kill Your Darlings, Nebraska and Blue Is the Warmest Color spring to mind as films that seem especially worth watching.

Refn's strange, neon-bend Only God Forgives has been the best new film experience of my 2013. Lots of people don't like it, but I love it and have already seen it thrice.
Following on the top 14 list is Wan's super-hit horror spooker The Conjuring, which had me and other audiences jumping nearly out of their pants. The Incredible Burt Wonderstone was a very over-looked comedy gem with some of the best stars like Jim Carrey and Steve Carell.
Soderbergh sits on the two following slots with his two excellent films of 2013, Side Effects and Behind the Candelabra. The Last Stand was a great, but commercially nonviable come-back for Arnold Schwarzenegger, who will stand the test again soon with the promising Sabotage (2014). Monsters University was a great sequel with heart and lots of laughs, and Nymphomaniac was nearly the complete opposite. Despicable Me 2 was, like MU, an incredibly fun time.
The year's good films also included the Star Trek sequel Into Darkness, the rebirthed, gory Evil Dead, Sam Raimi's effect-swooning Oz the Great and Powerful and flawed but enjoyable mega-movies White House Down and Pacific Rim.

The 3 'worst of 2013' films are all similarly bad, lacking scares (The Last Exorcism Part 2), sense of reality (Odd Thomas) and an intriguing story and characters (The Bling Ring).

Please comment on the lists and your best and worst movies of 2013

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Donald Sutherland has passed away

Born in Canada, Sutherland battled polio as a child. His first credit was in Suspense (1963, TV-series) and his first film was The Castle of the Living Dead (1964). Later credits in his remarkable career include The Saint (1965-66), The Dirty Dozen (1967), M*A*S*H (1970), Kelly's Heroes (1970), Klute (1971), Don't Look Now (1973), 1900 (1976), Casanova (1976), The Eagle Has Landed (1976), Ordinary People (1980), A Dry White Season (1989), JFK (1991), Outbreak (1995), Fallen (1998), Virus (1999), Fierce People (2005), Pride & Prejudice (2005), Lord of War (2005), The Hunger Games (2012), The Undoing (2020, miniseries) and many more. He passed away at age 88. R.I.P.

Roger Corman has passed away

Born in Detroit, Michigan, Corman had a sprawling, intellectually hungry life as a youth and young man before arriving with his first film in 1955, Five Guns West. He would follow that with titles such as Apache Woman, It Conquered the World, Attack of the Crab Monsters, Teenage Cave Man, A Bucket of Blood, House of Usher, The Little Shop of Horrors, The Pit and the Pendulum, The Intruder, The Raven, The Terror, The Masque of Red Death, The Tomb of Ligeia, The Wild Angels, The Trip, Bloody Mama and many more. As a producer he was behind almost 500 films. Arguably among the most important filmmakers of the 20th century, Corman passed away at age 98. R.I.P.

William Friedkin has died

Born in Chicago, Friedkin accrued TV credits prior to his advance to the big screen as the director of Good TImes (1967), The Birthday Party (1968), The Night They Raided Minsky's (1968) and The Boys in the Band (1970) before his major breakthrough, The French Connection (1971), for which he won his only Oscar. He followed it up with the even bigger smash, The Exorcist (1973), arguably the best horror film of all time, for which he was Oscar-nominated. Later credits include Sorcerer (1977), Cruising (1980), To Live and Die in L.A. (1985), Rampage (1987), Rules of Engagement (2000), Killer Joe (2011) and The Devil and Father Amorth (2017, documentary). Friedkin passed away at age 87. R.I.P.

Louise Fletcher has passed away

Born in Alabama to deaf parents, Fletcher got her first credits in late-1950s TV-series.She took a 10 year-long sabbatical to devote her time to motherhood after the release of A Gathering of Eagles, but then came back and soon saw her career's most important part, as Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975), for which she won her sole Oscar. Later credits include Exorcist II: The Heretic (1977), The Lucky Star (1980), Brainstorm (1983), Two Moon Junction (1988), Cruel Intentions (1999), A Perfect Man (2013) and many more. Fletcher passed away at age 88. R.I.P.

Jean-Luc Godard has passed away

Born in Paris, France, Godard lived much of his life in Switzerland. He wrote for French film criticism magazine Cahiers du Cinema and became foundational for the New French Wave that inspired new waves in scores of other countries across the world with his Breathless (1960). Later credits include A Woman Is A Woman (1961), Vivre Sa Vie (1962), Le Petit Soldat (1962), Contempt (1963), Alphaville (1965), Pierrot le Fou (1965), 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her (1967), Weekend (1967), Every Man for Himself (1980), King Lear (1987), Century of Cinema (1995, documentary), Goodbye to Language (2014) and many more. Godard died of assisted suicide at age 91. R.I.P.

Wolfgang Petersen has died

James Caan has died

Caan was born the son of Jewish immigrants from Germany in New York. He got his start on TV in the early 1960s. His credits include El Dorado (1966), The Rain People (1969), Brian's Song (1971, TV movie), The Godfather (1972), - for which he earned his only Oscar nomination, - Slither (1973), The Gambler (1974), Funny Lady (1975), Rollerball (1975), Silent Movie (1976), Hide in Plain Sight (1980), - the only film he also directed, - Thief (1981), Misery (1990), Honeymoon in Vegas (1992), Bottle Rocket (1996), Eraser (1996), Dogville (2003), Elf (2003), Las Vegas (2003-07), Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (2009) and many more. Caan passed away at age 82. R.I.P.

Jean-Louis Trintignant has died

Born in Vaucluse, France, Trintignant's theatrical debut as an actor was in If All the Guys in the World... (1955). Later credits include ...And God Created Woman (1956), The Seven Deadly Sins (1961), Inferno (1964), A Man and A Woman (1966), My Love, My Love (1967), A Man to Kill (1967), The Great Silence (1968), Z (1969), The Assassination (1972), Three Colors: Red (1994), Amour (2012), Happy End (2017) and many more. He also wrote and directed two films in the 1970s. Trintignant passed away at age 91. R.I.P.

Ray Liotta has died

Adopted from an orphenage at a young age, Liotta got hooked on acting in high school. He had various TV credits in the late 1970s and early 80s, with his film debut in The Lonely Lady (1983). Later credits include Something Wild (1986), Field of Dreams (1989), Goodfellas (1990), Cop Land (1997), Hannibal (2001), Blow (2001), Narc (2002), John Q (2002), Identity (2003), Observe and Report (2009), Youth in Revolt (2009), The Details (2011), Killing THem Softly (2012), The Place Beyond the Pines (2012), Shades of Blue (2016-18), The Simpsons (2018, TV-series), Marriage Story (2019), The Many Saints of Newark (2021), Black Bird (2022, TV-series) and many more. Liotta passed away at age 67 in his sleep while on production in the Dominican Republic. R.I.P.

Philip Baker Hall has died

Born in Ohio, Hall didn't start acting until he was 30. His long list of credits include Zabriskie Point (1970), Miami Vice (1987, TV-series), Midnight Run (1988), Ghostbusters II (1989), Cheers (1993, TV-series), Hard Eight (1996), The Rock (1996), Air Force One (1997), Boogie Nights (1997), Seinfeld (1991-98), Rush Hour (1998), The Insider (1999), Magnolia (1999), The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999), Bruce Almighty (2003), Dogville (2003), The Zodiac (2005), Zodiac (2007), Curb Your Enthusiasm (2004-09), Mr. Popper's Penguins (2011), Modern Family (2011-12) and many more. Hall passed away at age 90. R.I.P.

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1/01/2014

2013 in films - according to Film Excess

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