By Foreign films are my bread and butter, so I’m pleased to be here to present our choice for the best foreign film of the year. There were a lot of great films to choose from. Bong Joon-Ho’s Hitchcockian thriller Mother, the surrealism and dark satire of the brilliant Dogtooth, and the stunningly gorgeous I Am Love were all among the forerunners this year.
Animated films (which also have their own category) received quite a bit of attention as well. Sylvian Chomet followed up 2003’s fantastic The Triplets of Belleville with The Illusionist, and Summer Wars was both my personal favorite movie of the year and one of the finest anime features in ages. With so much greatness to go around, which great film got the greatest amount of attention from our great staff?
Foreign films are my bread and butter, so I'm pleased to be here to present our choice for the best foreign film of the year. There were a lot of great films to choose from. Bong Joon-Ho's Hitchcockian thriller Mother, the surrealism and dark satire of the brilliant Dogtooth, and the stunningly gorgeous I Am Love were all among the forerunners this year.
Animated films (which also have their own category) received quite a bit of attention as well. Sylvian Chomet followed up 2003's fantastic The Triplets of Belleville with The Illusionist, and Summer Wars was both my personal favorite movie of the year and one of the finest anime features in ages. With so much greatness to go around, which great film got the greatest amount of attention from our great staff? {{page_break}}
It's The Illusionist! We love this film around here, as evidenced by the crazy-go-nuts 9.60 rating it got from Xander, one of the highest scores we've ever given. It's currently playing in some very lucky areas of the country, so check your listings and see this amazing piece of work if you can. It's beautiful, hilarious, and sad, and achieves more in a (mostly) dialogue-free 80 minutes than most 2+ hour films could dream of.
The only other films that approached The Illusionist in votes were Summer Wars and Mother. Both also incredible. See those as well, you will not regret it.
Voting Breakdown:
The Illusionist – 3
Summer Wars – 2
Mother – 2
Buitiful – 1
Dogtooth – 1
I Am Love – 1
Enter the Void – 1