Mansel Stimpson Looks Back at the Year of 2023
During 2023 I saw only two films that I regarded as perfect. Both were documentaries. Since I regularly view large number of works in this genre, I made the point when looking back on 2022 that because such challenging areas as casting and acting are not involved, documentaries have what could be considered an unfair advantage. Accordingly, so as not to push out fictional features too much, I not only set out my top ten titles for the year but added the ten runners up and do the same again now for 2023. But, in fairness to my top two this year, I must add here that to make a work of art like The Nettle Dress, so poetic and so individual, is far from easy, while 20 Days in Mariupol illustrates remarkably how a cinema film made by a talented filmmaker can bring home the experience of a city under attack in a way that is indelible and beyond anything that TV reportage can do.
Even if slightly less than flawless, there were plenty of very fine pictures to be seen in foreign-language cinema with France in particular scoring highly. However, many films that started out really well lost their footing in their later stages (fatally, I thought, in the case of Scorsese’s overlong Killers of the Flower Moon and somewhat less damagingly with Anatomy of a Fall, although it was only the first half that looked set to be the film of the year). But, regardless of any flaws in the writing, 2023 was again a great year for acting and especially so when it came to actresses. If Bríd Brennan was my actress of the year for the relatively little known My Sailor, My Love, there were outstanding performances from, among many others, Carey Mulligan, Sandra Hüller, Trace Lysette, Emily Watson, Tilda Swinton and Alma Pöysti. Furthermore, distinguished contributions from actresses included remarkable work by elderly players (Line Renaud in Driving Madeleine, Chieko Baishô in Plan 75 and Maggie Blinco in A Stitch in Time) while at the other end of the scale we had child players of immense distinction (Naíma Sentíes in Totem, Zelda Samson in Love According to Dalva, Luana Guiliani in L’immensita). One unusual feature of 2023 was the ability of great players working in pairs to turn unexceptional films into works not to be missed due to the acting that they contained. I am thinking of Michael Caine and Glenda Jackson in The Great Escaper, Monica Dolan and Kelly Macdonald in Typist Artist Pirate King and Annette Bening and Jodie Foster in Nyad.
Here then are my ten runners up: 11. Mavka, The Forest Song. 12. Totem. 13. Full Time. 14. One Fine Morning. 15. The Beasts. 16. Lie With Me. 17. Paris Memories. 18. Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom. 19. You Hurt My Feelings. 20. Anatomy of a Fall. I leave it to my colleagues on Film Review Daily for any wider comments on current commercial cinema but offer one hope. A year ago the box-office flop of She Said suggested that Hollywood might turn against more intelligent fare but, as 2023 ends, I ask if the great success of two adventurous mainstream films, Oppenheimer and Barbie, might just possibly encourage a more adventurous outlook.
Mansel Stimpson’s Favourites: