As noted on my original list of favorite 2010 movies, the end-of-year lists only include new-ish movies I saw during the calendar year, not necessarily movies the IMDB would consider 2010 movies (I think only 5 of the 12 I saw in 2010 would count). At the end of any given year, thanks to not-yet-distributed festival films and award nominations and critics’ favorite lists, I end up with more must-sees than seen titles (example list from 2010). And as noted in my Four Lions write-up, this year I’ve been trying to avoid watching foreign and indie films as soon as they’re available on blu-ray and streaming, since movies I’ve watched at home (most recently Phoenix) get belated theater openings here, then I feel dumb for having already seen them. So I tried to focus on the year 2010 – five years ago, old enough that everything should be out on video. Therefore I thought it’d be fun to make a new list of favorite 2010 movies. Maybe not too exciting since these have mostly shown up on my other lists already, but hey, I enjoy making lists.

Top Twenty-Five of 2010:

1. Certified Copy (Abbas Kiarostami)
2. Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (Edgar Wright)
3. Mysteries of Lisbon (Raoul Ruiz)
4. The Four Times (Michelangelo Frammartino)
5. Nostalgia for the Light (Patricio Guzmán)
6. Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
7. Essential Killing (Jerzy Skolimowski)
8. I Wish I Knew (Jia Zhang-Ke)
9. The Social Network (David Fincher)
10. Oki’s Movie (Hong Sang-soo)
11. Surviving Life: Theory and Practice (Jan Svankmajer)
12. Toy Story 3 (Lee Unkrich)
13. Finisterrae (Sergio Caballero)
14. Tabloid (Errol Morris)
15. The Oath (Laura Poitras)
16. El Sicario Room 164 (Gianfranco Rosi)
17. Cave of Forgotten Dreams (Werner Herzog)
18. Attenberg (Athina Rachel Tsangari)
19. Shutter Island (Martin Scorsese)
20. Super (James Gunn)
21. Tiny Furniture (Lena Dunham)
22. Black Swan (Darren Aronofsky)
23. Oddsac (Danny Perez)
24. True Grit (Joel Coen)
25. Submarine (Richard Ayoade)