Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!: 2015 in films and TV-series

1/13/2018

2015 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]

The 10 Best Movies and TV-series of 2015:

1. Inside Out - Pete Doctor and Ronaldo Del Carmen + Best Family Movie of the Year + Best American Movie of the Year

2. Brooklyn - John Crowley + Most Deserved Hit of the Year + Best Irish Movie of the Year + Best Period Movie of the Year + Screen Couple of the Year: Saoirse Ronan & Emory Cohen

3. Looking S2 - Michael Lannan (creator) + Best LGBT Movie/TV-series of the Year + Best San Francisco Title of the Year + Most Underappreciated Title of the Year

4. Embrace of the Serpent/El Abrazo de la Serpiente - Ciro Guerra + Best Colombian Movie of the Year + Best Psychedelic Movie of the Year + Best B/W Movie of the Year + Best Poster of the Year

5. Carol - Todd Haynes + Best Romance of the Year + Best Adaptation of the Year

6. Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation - Christopher McQuarrie + Best Action Movie of the Year

7. The Big Short - Adam McKay + Best Political Movie of the Year + Best New York Movie of the Year

8. Amy, documentary - Asif Kapadia

9. Star Wars: The Force Awakens - J.J. Abrams + Best Blockbuster of the Year + Best Shooting Star Actress of the Year: Daisy Ridley

10. Spotlight - Tom McCarthy + Best True-Crime Movie of the Year + Best Boston Movie of the Year

Other great 2015 movies (in alphabetic order):

A War/Krigen - Tobias Lindholm + Best War Movie of the Year + Best Danish Movie of the Year

The Danish Girl - Tom Hooper + Best Drama of the Year

Jurassic World - Colin Trevorrow + Best 3D Movie of the Year

Mad Max: Fury Road - George Miller + Best Australian Movie of the Year + Best Comeback of the Year: George Miller

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl - Alfonso Gomez-Rejon + Best Youth Movie of the Year

Spy - Paul Feig + Best Comedy of the Year

Straight Outta Compton - F. Gary Gray + Best Music Movie of the Year

The Witch - Robert Eggers + Best Horror Movie of the Year + Best Debut Movie of the Year + Best New England Movie of the Year

Good, recommendable 2015 movies (in alphabetic order):

Ant-Man - Peyton Reed + Best Superhero movie of the Year

Green Room - Jeremy Saulnier + Most Violent Movie of the Year

Irrational Man - Woody Allen

Klown Forever/Klovn Forever - Mikkel Nørgaard + Best Los Angeles Movie of the Year

Spectre - Sam Mendes

Strangerland - Kim Farrant + Best Mega-Flop Movie of the Year

Trainwreck - Judd Apatow

Trumbo - Jay Roach

The Worst Movies of 2015:

1. Terminator Genisys - Alan Taylor + Worst Sequel of the Year

2. The 33 - Patricia Riggen + Most Expensive Flop of the Year

3. The Elite/Eliten - Thomas Daneskov

4. Avengers: Age of Ultron - Joss Whedon + Most Undeserved Hit of the Year

5. Silicon Valley S2 - John Altschuler, Dave Krinsky, Mike Judge, creators + Worst Poster of the Year

6. Anomalisa - Duke Johnson, Charlie Kaufman

7. The Revenant - Alejandro González Iñárritu + Most Overrated Movie of the Year

Other failed, poor or mediocre 2015 movies (in alphabetic order):

Far from the Madding Crowd
Magic Mike XXL + Sexiest Movie of the Year + Best Dance Movie of the Year + Best Shooting Star Actor of the Year: Donald Glover
Minions
Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No!, TV movie + Most Ridiculous Movie of the Year
The Visit

[38 titles in total]

Notes:

The second update of the 2015 lists adds 4 titles to the mix, bringing the tally up from 34 to 38, - still very far from comprehensive.
On the best-of list, the year's best film remains Pete Doctor and Ronaldo Del Carmen's ingenious and insightful family animation Inside Out, - the first animated movie to top the Film Excess annual lists. It is followed by the only good 2015 addition to the site this year, John Crowley's sensational period romance drama Brooklyn. Michael Lannan's second and regrettably already last season of the amazing Looking series takes the 3rd spot, and the rest of the ten are; Ciro Guerra's transcendent Amazon excursion Embrace of the Serpent, Todd Haynes' sensational 1950s-set lesbian romance Carol, Christopher McQuarrie's flawless action jewel Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation, Adam McKay's indignant, inventive financial crisis movie The Big Short, Asif Kapadia's devastating Amy documentary, all masterpieces, capped with great films; J. J. Abrams' inspired, tremendous Star Wars: The Force Awakens and Tom McCarthy's Catholic Church pedophilia scandal drama Spotlight. Leaving the top 10 this year is Colin Trevorrow's terrific thrill-ride Jurassic World.
Other fine films of the year include Paul Feig's hysterically funny Spy, Tobias Lindholm's forceful A War, George Miller's acclaimed actioner Mad Max: Fury Road and Mikkel Nørgaard's laugh-coaster Klown Forever. Also among the year's highlights are: a fine transgender drama (The Danish Girl), a poignant youth drama (Me and Earl and the Real Girl) and a creepy religious period horror (The Witch). Daniel Craig returned in another good Bond movie, explosive, fun Spectre, and Amy Schumer made her much-hyped big screen debut in the successful Trainwreck.
The worst-of list is crowned by Alan Taylor's jumbled Terminator: Genisys. It is followed by a dismal mining accident movie, Patricia Riggen's The 33, and a new entry, the debuting Thomas Daneskov's low-budgeted generational drama The Elite. The rest are: Another poor tentpole sequel, Joss Whedon's disappointing Avengers: Age of Ultron, the second season of John Altschuler, Dave Krinsky and Mike Judge's Silicon Valley, in which the sitcom's quality plummeted, Duke Johnson and Charlie Kaufman's intricately designed and off-puttingly dispiriting Anomalisa, and finally Mexican master filmmaker Alejandro Gonzáles Iñárritu's acclaimed, hollowly violent, preachy and overlong The Revenant.
Among the other master filmmakers who churned out sub-par films in 2014 are Thomas Vinterberg (Far from the Madding Crowd) and M. Night Shyamalan (The Visit).

Notes on the 2016 Oscars:

The ceremony was hosted for the second time by Chris Rock, who faced a hard task in making the evening enjoyable after some mentally draining months of the so-called 'Oscars so white'-controversy, targeting the academy for the few black faces to be nominated that year and in general, (not a movement for non-white people in general, the problem was, curiously, according to the statements from everyone from execs to major stars, specifically the lack of black nominees and Oscar winners...) Rock tried and enlisted Whoopi Goldberg to pump some fun out of this, admitting Hollywood's racism while also attacking vocal protesting talents such as Will Smith and Spike Lee for their stances. The night wasn't fun though, - probably among the least bearable Oscar nights in my memory.
It didn't help that the biggest winners were the wrong films: Mad Max: Fury Road (6 Oscars) and The Revenant (3 Oscars) don't even make Film Excess' top 10 of the year.
Spotlight won Best Film and Original Screenplay (Tom McCarthy, Josh Singer). Revenant won Best Director (Alejandro Gonzáles Iñárritu thus became, ridiculously, the third of all time to win the award consecutively), Actor (Leonardo DiCaprio) and Cinematography (Emmanuel Lubezki, also ridiculously, became the first to win the award three years in a row). Masterpiece Room won Best Actress (Brie Larson), and Mark Rylance won Best Supporting Actor for Bridge of Spies. Alicia Vikander won Best Supporting Actress for The Danish Girl. Adam McKay and Charles Randolph won Best Adapted Screenplay for The Big Short. Inside Out won Best Animation, Son of Saul Best Foreign Film (ahead of Embrace of the Serpent, Mustang, Theeb and A War) and Amy won Best Documentary. The short film Oscars went to A Girl in the River - The Price of Forgiveness (short doc.), Stutterer (short live-action) and Bear Story (short animation). Ennio Morricone won Best Score for The Hateful Eight, and Jimmy Napes and Sam Smith won Best Song for Writing's on the Wall (Spectre). Smith provided one of the evening's most embarrassing moments, when he stated that he was honored to be the first out gay person to win an Oscar, (which had already happened more than once in the few years preceding the 2016 show.) Mad Max: Fury Road took a batch of technical Oscars: Sound Mixing, Sound Editing, Editing, Makeup and Hairstyling, Production Design and Costumes. Ex Machina won Best Visual Effects.
Honorary Oscars went to Spike Lee, Debbie Reynolds and Geena Rowlands.

IMDb's user-generated top 10 most popular movies of 2015:

1. Star Wars: The Force Awakens
2. Pitch Perfect 2
3. Spectre
4. Avengers: Age of Ultron
5. Jurassic World
6. Fifty Shades of Grey
7. Sicario
8. The Hateful Eight
9. Mad Max: Fury Road
10. San Andreas

2015 titles still on the watch-list:

Joy, In the Heart of the Sea, The Funhouse Massacre, Rock the Kasbah, Goosebumps (seen - okay), He Named Me Malala, Absolutely Anything, Pixels, Scream Queens (2015-), A Deadly Adoption, The Assassin, Dheepan, Youth, Sicario (seen - great), Hitchcock/Truffaut, Son of Saul (seen - good), Song of Lahore, Other Space (2015-), I Am Michael, Finders Keepers, People Places, Things, Mistress America, Shaun the Sheep Movie, Blackhat, Racing Extinction, Cartel Land, Cucumber (TV-series), High-Rise, The Colony, The Meddler (seen - good), Krisha, Bone Tomahawk (seen - great), Time to Choose, Walt Before Mickey, Bridge of Spies, Chronic, Room (seen - masterpiece), Steve Jobs, 45 Years, Creed (seen - great), The Hateful Eight (seen - okay), Ex Machina, Mustang, What Happened Miss Simone?, Winter on Fire: Ukraine's Fight for Freedom, A Girl in the River - The Price of Forgivenes, Stutterer, Ash vs Evil Dead (2015-), Behemoth, The Hunting Grown, The Devil Lives Here.

Previous annual lists:

2017 in films - according to Film Excess
2016 in films - according to Film Excess
2015 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2015 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess
2014 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED III]
2014 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]
2014 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2014 in films - according to Film Excess 2013 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED IV]
2013 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED III]
2013 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]
2013 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2013 in films - according to Film Excess

What do you think of the lists?
What's your favorite and worst 2015 movie and TV-series experiences?
What 2015 movies and TV-series are missing on the watch-list?

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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.

William Hurt has passed away

Born in Washington D.C., Hurt's first film role was the lead in Altered States (1980). Later credits include Body Heat (1981), The Big Chill (1983), Gorky Park (1983), Kiss of the Spider Woman (1985), for which he earned his only Oscar as Best Actor; Chilrdren of a Lesser God (1986), for which he was also Oscar-nominated; Broadcast News (1987), for which he was again Oscar-nominated; Smoke (1995), A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001), A History of Violence (2005), for which he was again Oscar-nominated; The Good Shepherd (2006), Into the Wild (2007), Robin Hood (2010) and many more. Hurt passed away at age 71. R.I.P.

Ivan Reitman has passed away

Born in Chechoslovakia, now Slovakia, Reitman's family fled the Soviet regime to Austria, then Toronto, when he was 4 years old. Reitman broke into movies as a director with Foxy Lady (1971). Later credits include Cannibal Girls (1973), Meatballs (1979), Stripes (1981), Ghostbusters (1984), Twins (1988), Ghostbusters II (1989), Kindergarten Cop (1990), Junior (1994), Father's Day (1997), Evolution (1998), No Strings Attached (2011), Draft Day (2014) and more. Reitman's son Jason Reitman is also a great filmmaker. Reitman passed away at age 75. R.I.P.

Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!

Eagerly anticipating this week ... (5-24)

1/13/2018

2015 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]

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