Counting Down The Fourteen Best Films Of 2014
In this totally subjective game of lists, there can only be one winner.
#2: Inside Llewyn Davis, dir. The Coen Brothers
It seems so long ago now that I reviewed the Coen Brothers’ elegiac musical drama about folk, felines and failure, which was released in January in Australia. But Llewyn’s struggle to accept that the times have passed him by remains exquisitely poignant. The film is sodden with rich and mystical moments that are presented with the Coens’ trademark dry humour. And Oscar Isaac’s soulful lead performance is magnetic – it was criminal that this film was snubbed at the Oscars.
As I wrote at the time: “What makes this film so haunting is its ambiguity. I’m still not sure whether Llewyn, like Sisyphus, will become trapped in a hell of his own making, or if he’ll get the homecoming he desires. None of us are ever sure if this is the end, until it is.”