There are few people out there who appreciate a good, old-fashioned bummer like I do.  Through cinema history, the downer has grown more and more scarce in mainstream cinema, being replaced by films that may not be intentionally depressing, but are depressing in their awfulness. The ones I really love are the films that embrace the black side of life, sometimes with humor, but sometimes without.

Films don't always have to be about entertainment. Sometimes it is quite enough for a film to simply evoke a strong emotional response.  I tend to be more impressed with films that can put me in a funk than those that tug at my heartstrings.  Perhaps it is a byproduct of my persistent clinical depression, but once in a while I just like to see characters to whom I can relate. These are the films that did it best for me in 2011.



1. Melancholia
Lars von Trier is an asshole. I don't think there's much argument around that point. What does bear arguing is whether or not Melancholia is self-indulgent and mockable or whether it is a cogent representation of depression in a symbolic way. I take the second route.

More than any film I've seen in a long time, Melancholia shows what depression is like. Far from being self-indulgent, the film's languid pace mirrors my own psyche when I'm in the depths of a depressive fugue. Kirsten Dunst's portrayal of the bride to be, Justine, is a pitch perfect expression of the highs and lows of manic depression and just how quick the swing can bring the entire world crashing down around you.  Her sister Claire is also a perfect representation of the constant prodding from well-meaning loved ones who attempt to get people like me to "snap out of it", all the while, not realizing just how deep the rabbit hole of depression can go. 

The great success of Melancholia is to present Dunst's Justine as the heroine in a film with no happy ending.  She may have been inconsolable and her actions may have seemed completely self-indulgent, but that is what depression is like. It is like the world is conspiring against you, and in this case, she was right.

2. We Need to Talk About Kevin
I caught this film as a last minute addition to Fantastic Fest 2011 and was blown away. This is another film from a notorious auteur that eschews the happy ending in order to explore the dark side of the mind.  In my review I put it this way:

Lynne Ramsay takes a touchy subject and makes it an emotionally jarring experience, but not in the way that you'd expect.  We Need to Talk About Kevin is deeply affecting and a sobering look at what happens when dysfunction runs rampant. Tilda Swinton's performance is absolutely harrowing, and her metamorphoses through the film from reluctant mother to desperate mother to the mother of that kid who killed people is devastating. With the entire weight of We Need to Talk About Kevin on her shoulders, Swinton hoists the film from a possibly melodramatic mire to a crushing discussion on the impact of nature vs. nurture. Ramsay and Swinton are an amazing team, and this film is definitely worth seeking out.

The film may make you want to slit your wrists (or at least your vas deferens), but as an allegorical, symbolic expression of the fears which parents face all the time, it is brutally effective.

3. Hobo with a Shotgun
Jason Eisener's Hobo with a Shotgun differs from the first two films on this list in that it isn't about depression, or particularly depressing itself.  The reason for its inclusion here is less psychological, it is just an angry and mean-spirited film, and I mean that in the best way possible. 

After several years of films capitalizing on the new fetishization of exploitation cinema that followed Grindhouse, this is the first film to attack the genre without turning to slapstick.  Hobo with a Shotgun is mean and nasty just like those old films were.  There is all kinds of horrible stuff in this film that we haven't seen used as entertainment since the late '80s, and I like it!  Eisener's decision to play his film with a relatively straight face is a bold one, and one that led to at least five walkouts when I saw it theatrically.  Anytime a film causes people to walk out, it's got to be doing something right. Jason, thanks for fighting the good fight!

4. Kshay
Films about obsession often hit the right chord with me, especially the kind of obsession that leads to self-destruction, and Kshay fits that description to a tee. The irony of the lead characters' destructive obsession with a statue of the Hindu goddess of luck and prosperity is palpable, and her descent is something to see. The progression of her desire to nearly suicidal proportions is taken one step at a time and feels very believable, enveloping the audience in her plight.  Here's what I said in my review from SAIFF 2011:

Kshay is a wonderfully unsettling film.  It explores obsession with the insight and care of a late-era Cronenberg or David Lynch. Karan Gour may not go to the extremes of those two filmmakers, but the feeling of obsession and compulsion is on a similar plane. In addition to being the director, Gour also scripted the film, composed the outstanding score, edited, mixed the sound, and produced Kshay. I've not seen many debut features as confidently done as Kshay, and I'm hoping it leads to big things for Karan Gour. 

5. I Saw the Devil
This film was on a few lists last year, but with its theatrical and home video releases in the US coming in 2011, I'm including it here. Kim Ji-Woon is among the strongest stylistic voices in Korea today, which is both a strength and a weakness.  Many have said that this film is little more than a glossy catalog of atrocities, but I'd argue that it is more than that, and I did in my review of the Blu-ray disc back in May:

Perhaps it's excesses could be seen as a distraction and for some they may appear to suck the soul out of the film, but I can see other possibilities.  I saw the film's devolution into one horrific set piece after another as a mirror for the mind of Lee Byung-Hun's Soo Hyun.  As Soo Hyun moves further and further from being and feeling human, so do his actions and the film's obsession with the gory details reflect that deterioration.  Soo Hyun doesn't see his victim as human, and as such, he feels no compunction to treat him as one, or, in reality, to feel anything.  Soo Hyun is shown regressing to a very base form of himself, and his tunnel vision informs the film and its point of view.  Then again, I could be talking out of my ass.

6. Dream Home
Dream Home is, in my opinion, the best slasher of 2011. Pang Ho-Cheung took a tired genre, and brought it up to date by including topical issues and creative editing in a way that made it more than your typical hack 'n slash film.

Josie Ho's performance as a woman obsessed with the buying the perfect flat, the titular Dream Home, in Hong Kong is remarkable.  This is another study in the deterioration of the mind much in the same way that I Saw the Devil and Kshay were explorations of the same condition.  Except, in this case, the means are in no way justified by the ends, at least to any reasonable, sane person. That is what makes this slasher great, Josie Ho has an understandable motivation. We can relate to her desires, how she accomplishes her goals, well, that's another story all together...

7. City of Life & Death
I first saw City of Life & Death in 2009 on an import Blu-ray disc from Hong Kong, but its theatrical and home video release in the US this year means I can post it here. This film is an unsentimentalized retelling of one of the most horrific tragedies of modern humanity.  The massacre at Nanking in 1937 is one of those things that you just can't imagine occurring among civilized people, and it certainly puts into question the idea that all people are born good. Absolute power corrupts absolutely, and the ferocity shown toward the Chinese civilians at Nanking is proof of that.  I was able to review the Blu-ray from Kino a few months ago, and this is what I said then:

You will cry when watching City of Life and Death. It's only natural and right that you do.  The film is more than just one tragic event after another, it is a reminder of man's capacity for cruelty and inhumanity against his fellow man.  It is also a reminder of the capacity for compassion, especially with the people within the camp, and their commitment to easing the pain when they are unable to stop the bleeding. This is one of those films, like Schindler's List, that tells a story that deserves to be told.  This film is less cloying than Schindler's List, though, and therefore more able to affect a wider audience.

8. The Woman
The Woman is a film whose effect of people has ranged from wild ranting outside of the cinema to lukewarm responses critically. I, however, loved this film. The target of Lucky McKee's venom is not any secret, he has taken on misogyny before, and his stories often focus on female empowerment, but the way he accomplishes this in The Woman is different, and more extreme, than before. It takes an unsympathetic look at humanity, and combined with it's crazy tone juxtapositions, it lands on my feel-bad films of 2011 list:

Lucky McKee's The Woman starts off with a whimper and ends with a bang, as all good horror films should.  McKee's newest project shows the attention to story and atmosphere that many contemporary horror films have lost, instead filling that space with grue.  The film is horrific, dark, demanding, at times hard to watch, and unsettling.  Then again, there are a surprising number of humorous elements to The Woman, well, surprising if you don't know McKee's style.  The Woman is a brutal film, but not in the way that a Saw film, or a Hostel is brutal, it is brutal in that it insists upon making you witness to man's inhumanity to man, or, more specifically, to woman.

9. Poetry
This one is a bit of a stretch, I will admit, but I stand by its inclusion. Lee Chang-dong's Poetry is a film about a older woman finding herself after years and self-imposed servitude. There is an argument to be made that this servitude is the nature of femininity in the world today, women are expected and raised to be nurturing, often at their own expense, so breaking free from that cage might be enough to qualify this film.  However, it is the backdrop on which this flowering occurs that is the real reason for Poetry making my feel-bad list.

Mija, played with brilliant simplicity by Yoon Jeong-hee, is the grandmother and guardian of a bratty adolescent. The film opens with a young girl's suicide by drowning, and we come to learn that this boy is to blame, in part, for the tragedy.  Mija is continually prodded to pick up the pieces around her son's horrific actions. Her blossoming is on an inverse curve to her involvement with this dirty business.  This is the feel-bad part of Poetry, in order for Mija to truly become her own woman, she must deal with an anti-social prick of a grandson, and ultimately, she conquers her own fears sense of obligation in order to break free from her chains. A wonderfully stirring piece of cinema, and a big downer.

10. Super
Following directly on the heels of the shoot-em-up theatrical flash of Kick-Ass, James Gunn's homemade superhero flick, Super, took a decidedly darker approach to the material. Rainn Wilson, whose lethargically magnificent turn in Hesher almost got that film on this list, is here as a man who sees his world crumble around him. Rather than the conscious effort taken by the characters in Kick-Ass, Wilson's Frank D'Arbo suffers a psychotic break, and decides to take matters into his own hands.

The Crimson Bolt is the raging id of modern society. He punishes everyone from drug dealers to jaywalkers with the same maniacal fury, and a pipe wrench. His complete inability to moderate his actions or to ensure that his punishment fits the crime, is a clear sign that he has just completely lost it, in the way that a real person who decided to do this would have to be mentally unstable. Super whips back and forth tonally from borderline slapstick comedy to super dark territory, while this has been pointed out in many reviews as a weakness, I see it as a reflection of D'Arbo's clear instability. This film is incredibly fun to watch, but as an investigation into mental illness and untreated mania, it clearly fits the feel-bad label.

That's it. Though I will say that I don't go into every film looking to be bummed out. Next up we'll see my top ten best movie memories of 2011, and that will be a notably more cheerful list.  Also, keep your eye out for my 2011 home video year in review, probably a week or so from today.  Cheers, and let's hope 2012 features just as many fucked-up depressed characters and films as 2011!