Reel Life: The best films of 2014

With the year almost over, here's my pick of the best of this year's releases. They are in no particular order and are based on release dates in South Africa.

Boyhood

Twelve years in the making, Richard Linklater's examination of the small ups and downs in the life of a Texas boy from early childhood to adolescence proved not only a singular technical achievement but, more importantly, a moving and touchingly human story of the bittersweet passage of time.

Under the skin

An eerie, atmospheric and bare-bones plotted story about a man- eating alien on the prowl in Scotland, Jonathan Glazer's third film benefits from a complex and honest performance from Scarlett Johansson, a disquietingly atonal soundtrack and a challenge to its audience to allow its creepiness to take them on a journey that proves to be one of the most cinematically rewarding experiences of the year.

The Grand Budapest Hotel

With a surprisingly anti-type but brilliantly timed comic performance from Ralph Fiennes, director Wes Anderson returned to form with this charming, beautifully realised and elegantly literary tale of the fortunes of an Old-World European hotel and its employees. Displaying all of the director's telltale stylistic penchants and many of his stock troupe of actors, it is also his most humane and gently touching film.

Snowpiercer

Korean director Bong Joon-ho's post-apocalyptic film adaptation of an obscure 1980s French graphic novel sees the world's remaining citizens divided across the compartments of a train. When the back compartment's downtrodden decide enough is enough they lead a revolutionary charge to the front. Joon-ho's imaginative realisation of the different worlds within a world and adept handling of difficult action sequences, together with star turns from Tilda Swinton, Chris Evans and Ed Harris, make the film an entertaining piece of intelligent oddball dystopian allegory.

Locke

One man in a car, on the phone. Add to that the fact that the man is a construction engineer and much of his conversation has to do with the biggest concrete pour of his career and you might think this is the most boring premise for a film. However, thanks to a career- defining performance from Tom Hardy as Ivan Locke, the man whose carefully orchestrated life is quickly falling apart, and a script that creates suspense out of everyday dilemmas, this is one of the year's most dramatically engaging and subversively simple films.

Omar

In a year in which the troubles of the Middle East grabbed headlines, Hany Abu-Assad's gripping story of love in the occupied territories brings home the tragic and deep- seated psychological trauma that inflicts every aspect of daily life in Palestine. Part thriller, part romance, it is a thought-provoking and unsettling examination of ordinary people caught in extraordinary circumstances created by history.

Nymphomaniac

Having announced that now that he's done rehab he's not sure he'll be able to make more films, this two-part, four-hour, often brutal examination of sexual obsession may be Danish bad boy Lars von Trier's last film. With a deceptively accessible and often humorous first part, the second film enters murky and often uncomfortable waters as the story traces the sexual development and proclivities of Charlotte Gainsbourg's Joe, the nympho of the title. Equal parts infuriating and brilliant, it is a fitting tribute to Von Trier's reputation as the most provocative and intelligent filmmaker of his generation.

All is Lost

JC Chandor's nameless man in a fight for his life while lost at sea film was inexplicably ignored by the Academy, despite the masterclass lesson in pure acting given by its only cast member, Robert Redford. The 77-year-old legend gives the greatest performance of his career as a nameless man with no back story who is forced to utilise every skill when his boat crashes into a shipping container and things go from bad to untenable.

The Great Beauty

Paolo Sorrentino's Best Foreign Language Oscar winner is a ravishing, sensuous take on the emotional emptiness of Rome's upper set at the end of the Berlusconi era. Visually rich, strange and sad, it manages to encapsulate the history not only of Italy but also its prestigious cinematic history.

The Wolf of Wall Street

A resounding return to form for Martin Scorsese that revels in the baroque excess of its sleazy finance con men characters, this is the best of the director's collaborations with leading man Leonardo DiCaprio and a film that bursts with anarchic energy punctuated by sharp one-liners and expletive-laden dialogue. Incorporating Scorsese's signature camera use, soundtrack selection and knack for telling stories of morally questionable but charismatic men, it's his best film in years and a sterling reminder of what makes him such a revered figure in US cinematic history.

Fruitvale Station

Anchored by an excellent, restrained and sympathetic performance by Michael B Jordan, Ryan Coogler's quiet, realistic look at the last hours in the life of Oscar Grant III, a young black man killed by Transit Authority Police in Oakland on New Year's Day 2009, is a resonant reminder of the cheapness of black life in the US and the depressing failure of the systems meant to protect people.

Opening Today

Hobbit - Battle of five armies

What a horrible way to go. Peter Jackson made history with his take on 'The Lord of the Rings' and even the first two instalments of his 'Hobbit' adaptation had their good points. The kiss off, however, is pompous, crude and bitty. And it doesn't even have any nice songs.

Charlotte O'Sullivan, London Evening Standard

Walking on sunshine

A movie counter-programmed against the dog days of summer, a jukebox musical fanatically selling a feelgood stereotypical hen night vibe with miscellaneous 1980s hits. An alternative title could be 'Now That's What I Call a Commercially Viable Mamma Mia! Follow-up'.

Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian

Love Rosie

This marzipan-sweet adaptation is elevated by vibrant visuals and the winsome chemistry of Lily Collins and Sam Claflin. A romantic comedy that could also woo the adult chick-lit crowd.

Guy Lodge, variety.com