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28 December 2023

10 Years Gone: The Best Films of 2013

It takes a long time for movies to sit and develop both within a culture and within my brain. So in addition to reevaluating one year gone, we really need to do a ten-year reevaluation. That is what this is all about. We'll look at all of our previous 2013 lists and come up with something really really distinctive and definitive. So let's start with our shortlist. These would be all the movies I kind of liked from 2013:

John Dies at the End
Warm Bodies
Side Effects
Stoker
Spring Breakers
The Place Beyond the Pines
Pain & Gain
This is The End
The Lone Ranger
Bad Words
The Way Way Back
Pacific Rim
The World's End
You're Next
Prisoners
Cloud with a Chance of Meatballs 2
Don Jon
Gravity
12 Years a Slave
Nebraska
Frozen
Inside Llewyn Davis
American Hustle
Anchorman 2: The Legend Contiues
The Wolf of Wall Street

Alright, we've got to widdle this down. There are definitely some that have always been on my list, and I think that's true again here. Let's go with our immutable, the definitely always going to have a spot here:

The Wolf of Wall Street
Inside Llewyn Davis
Pacific Rim
Stoker
Spring Breakers
The Place Beyond the Pines
Pain & Gain

That might be it. I can't believe I dropped Frozen and 12 Years a Slave from that list, but I'm not sure either are totally as awe-inspiring as they once were. Maybe Frozen, still, just because that felt so fresh at the time. It's always hard to divest the original work from the repeated influences thread over the past ten years. I think on a real list it still has to make an appearance. I don't know who gets the last bit, out of either Apocalypse comedy this year, probably The World's End.

Okay, so here is our original list from 2013, which was weird because we copped out and gave very clear distinctions to everything. What's amazing is that that list is almost the exact same as what I have here, down to Don Jon and Side Effects. In 2017 we again added most of the same things we see here. In 2021 we morphed a bit, adding Anchorman 2 and room for both This is The End and The World's End as our three bonus films. Other than that, it's pretty much still on the money with my tastes.

One thing it really makes me thing is...why am I doing this? It's pretty much the same. I'm surprised at how much it canonizes so fast.

2013 becomes a nice year for everything, much like my original list. There are really compelling dramas, action films, and fun or experimental films pretty much everywhere. I'm surprised, honestly, that so many of these movies I can still think, "Yeah, that's okay!" Part of this is just me seeing more films like The Place Beyond the Pines and recognizing how legit they are.

2014 is weird, always the year of Guardians and Birdman, but I'm curious if we have more surprises than this year!

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