Celebrate the best films of a shitty year with one critic’s best-of video countdown
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It may seem a lifetime ago, but we’ve only been out of 2020 for 11 days. 11 measly days! Time is an illusion! Age ain’t nothing but a number! The point is, the great films of 2020 are still great films, and you almost certainly haven’t seen all of them. Enter IndieWire’s David Ehrlich and his annual video countdown of his personal best-of list.
We look forward to Ehrlich’s video countdown every year, and it never disappoints. Not only is it a lovely reminder of some of the most striking cinematic moments of the year, it’s also always edited like a dream. But best of all, Ehrlich consistently finds echoes between the films on his list (and some that aren’t—Promising Young Woman, while not included in the top 25, figures prominently in the introduction and is thus easily called to mind when a clip from something like Never Rarely Sometimes Always strikes a similar note.)
That said, it’s unclear anything will ever top the time he used the big “Ahhhh, ahhh-ahhh-ahhhh, ahh-AHH-ahhhh-uhh-uhh, uhhh-ah-uhh-ah AHHHHHHHHHH I’M OFF THE DEEP END” part of “Shallow” to soundtrack his #7 entry on the 2018 list, Mission: Impossible – Fallout. The “Shallow” block starts with Mandy (#10) at around 8:30, if you’re interested.
And if you were interested, it’s worth knowing that Ehrlich is now keeping these countdown videos all in a nice, neat row at videocountdowns.com. Bookmark it for, you know, 2022. Whenever that happens.
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11 Comments
My favorite film of 2020 was Death Stranding. It was my favorite video game too. It was REALLY DAMN GOOD you guys.
I finished it last week and am still playing, love it so much.
I just wanted to say that at this point Kojima is a million times better at shooting “oners” than Cuaron ever was. MGSV and Death Stranding are some of the best shot things I’ve ever seen and it’s incredible that it came from a dude who used very on the nose imagery in MGS4.My favorite directorial flourish of his is when Sam does this big motivational speech but the camera focuses on his back and his allies, as if to give him space in a vulnerable moment.
I was super impressed. I’ve been around for a long time, seen a lot of games promise to combine movies and video games, Death Stranding was the first one to convincingly do that imho.
Death Stranding came out in 2019, but it WAS fantastic. It also had the single funniest moment of any video game ever, with the record scratch at Heartman’s house.
I have a PC so for me it came out in 2020.
I agree with your praise for 2018 portion for M:I – Fallout. However, I must deduct points because it doesn’t include Henry Cavill reloading his fists – a clip that’s as awesome as it is obligatory when any part of Fallout is shown.
If I’m Thinking Of Ending Things is on this list, the whole thing is invalidated. That movie was 3 hours of Charlie Kaufman being inserted all the way up his own ass.
I found it odd when the clip from First Cow rewound.
Didn’t he already use “I’ve Had the Time of My Life” in a previous video?
It’s always been my policy to “leave Britney alone,” however that violin cover of Toxic is an awesome piece of music.
I challenge your Shallow / M:I-Fallout moment (which is phenomenal) with the way Ehrlich uses the Shirley Bassey cover of My Way with Lady Bird in 2017 as the GOAT video countdown moment. It’s so spectacular.