My Top 10 Best Movies of 2016

The prevailing wisdom about 2016 in the movies is that it was a bad year, but that might be overstating it. True, it's a step down from the highs of 2014 and 2015, and the summer season was catastrophic, but this year wasn't without its positive trends, and furthermore, even a lesser year isn't without its standout films. Here are the ten best which I saw.

Movie review: "Silence"

dir. by Martin Scorcese
Silence is a film which Martin Scorcese has been trying to get made since the 1990s. An adaptation of Shūsaku Endō's 1966 novel of the same name, the film dramatizes the oppression of Catholics in Feudal Japan, following a Portuguese Jesuit mission. What drew Scorcese, an auteur who frequently deals with themes regarding faith, to the material is obvious, and Silence is remarkable both for the obvious passion which went into its creation, as well as for its nuanced themes on the nature of faith, sin, guilt, and arrogance. However, at nearly three hours, the film is a monotonous and frequently unengaging sit, and while its fascinating concepts and enormity of vision make it worth seeing, it stands on the line between art and homework.

Movie review: "Rogue One: A Star Wars Story"

dir. by Gareth Edwards
Rogue One is a story about hope, like many stories in the Star Wars universe. In many ways, it's a darker chapter in the franchise, but at its core it still encourages hope, even at the most hopeless of times, and even when it requires the greatest of risks and sacrifices. At a time where hope is in short supply, such a film is undoubtedly appealing, but while Rogue One succeeds as a sturdy, entertaining blockbuster, it never becomes more than that, even in spite of the greater desperation found in its story. It's a minor side story dressed up as a big epic in its own right, and while it has the look, the characters - the heart and soul of so many of these movies - are sorely lacking.

Movie review: "Moana"

BEST NEW FEATURE
dir. by Ron Clements and Don Hall
Moana, the latest animated film from Walt Disney Animation Studios, is the film's first musical since 2013's Frozen, which gives it a very high bar to live up to. Frozen was a deserving phenomenon, containing some of Disney's absolute greatest songs and pairing them with visuals of immense beauty. While Moana never exceeds that film's audiovisual heights, it comes ever-so-close, and boasts a sharper narrative to boot, making for a truly enchanting experience.

TV review: "Luke Cage" season 1

Created by Cheo Hodari Coker
Another day, another Marvel Netflix series which gets sidetracked in its second half. Luke Cage takes its titular character from 2015's excellent Jessica Jones and relocates him in Harlem, wandering amidst gang warfare and questions about black history and the African-American legacy. Like all of Netflix's comic book offerings, it positions itself as a more thoughtful take on the universe, and for a while, it succeeds.

If only it actually maintained that.

Movie review: "The Edge of Seventeen" (2016)

BEST NEW FEATURE
dir. by Kelly Fremon Page
High school as a setting has been slowly declining in the world of cinema for years now, the teen demographic such films would normally target increasingly being taken over by YA fantasy adventures. The Edge of Seventeen, arriving in a surprising wide release after a warm reception at TIFF, might not have the rating to necessarily connect with that audience - its depictions of sex and alcohol earned it an R in the United States, although it's saddled with a much broader 14A here in Canada - but its universal depiction of an older teen struggling to find comfort in a world which seems to be set against her provides a fresh, authentic take on the high school genre.

TV review: "Daredevil" season 2

Showrunners: Douglas Petrie, Marco Ramirez
When Daredevil first premiered on Netflix in 2015, it was a darker, sleeker, and more daring tonic to the increasingly stagnant and bloated Marvel movies. With a compelling villain in Wilson Fisk and an intriguing Catholic morality, the show was more stylish and thoughtful than Marvel's usual fare. When Netflix's second Marvel series, Jessica Jones, turned out even better, it left a lot of promise for Daredevil's second season. And yet, without Fisk, the series had an uphill battle to climb to live up to its own reputation, and in spite of the fascinating introduction of The Punisher, this second season has failed quite dramatically to keep up the pace.

Spoilers for Daredevil season 2 follow.