Fassbender, Fargo and Fitzgerald - a personal review of the year

I am truly determined to commit more time to this blog in 2016 (not that it would be possible to commit *less* time to be honest).  I am not aiming high, as I have experience of this e.g. "I will do three pilates classes, two zumba classes, two runs and two swims EVERY WEEK" "I will never drink AGAIN" "I will stop shopping ALTOGETHER".  2016 is about all things in moderation for me, so I promise I will attempt to blog once or twice a week, even if just a sentence of two, about stuff I've seen, heard, read.  

Anyway, before I pack the laptop away for the holidays, I present the first part of my annual review of the arts....

Best film

Special mentions to Spectre, Slow West and Amy, but my Top Five favourite films in 2015 were:

Brooklyn - a beautiful charming joy of a film with a stunning central performance from Saoirse Ronan and a fabulous screenplay from Nick Hornby.

Macbeth - Michael Fassbender in my favourite Shakespeare.  'Nuff said.

Carol - absolutely gorgeous adaptation of Patricia Highsmith's book.  If Todd Haynes doesn't get a Best Director Oscar I will be horrified.

The Martian - unexpectedly, so much fun.

Eden - a little French masterpiece with a knockout soundtrack of French house music.

Best TV

Fargo - super stylish, super funny, super quirky, right up my street. 

Catastrophe - Rob Delaney and Sharon Horgan are geniuses.  Full stop.

This Is England '90 - this made me laugh out loud and also properly properly sob.  I don't think I have ever been so emotionally invested in a TV programme.  Lol, Milky and the gang still pop into my head at random times.  I hope they're ok.  They're real people right??

The Legacy - no one else I know apart from my mum watched this.  More proof that everyone I know apart from me and my mum is an idiot.

The Bridge - at the time of writing, the third series hasn't finished but it has to go on my list.  Saga Noren is just the most compelling character around.

Best book

God, this has been a sparse year for good reads.  I've had a phase of reading utter tripe recently, and nothing I've read in the past six months has made this list:

A God in Ruins by Kate Atkinson - predictable but my god, this is a great book.  I'm already looking forward to re-reading it.

Station Eleven by Emily St John Mandel - I picked this up and thought 'a post-apocalyptic science fiction novel, no thanks'.  But rave reviews on twitter made me look again and I loved it.  Fascinating, thoughtful and beautifully written.

Villa America by Liza Klaussmann - an absorbing novel about life and love, based on the life of Gerald and Sara Murphy, friends of F Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald.

This House of Grief by Helen Garner - another odd choice, this non-fiction story of a murder trial in Australia is horrifying and unputdownable.

End of Year Review

Well, I can't deny the fact they we're firmly into the New Year now (I had my annual tax return meltdown this morning) so it seems like a good time to look back at my highlights of 2014.  As usual, my attempts to stick to a Top Ten have failed miserably.

Art

I found 2014 a little disappointing for visual art in all honesty, although this is probably down to me rather than the exhibitions on offer.  There were several interesting shows in commercial galleries, including Steve McQueen at Thomas Dane, and Gerhard Richter at Marian Goodman, but the blockbusters didn't really do it for me, apart from the Richard Hamilton exhibition at Tate Modern.  I wrote about how much I adored this show back when I saw it, and I still find myself thinking about it regularly.  

Books

Going Off Alarming, the second volume of Danny Baker's autobiography, is the funniest, properly laugh out loud, book I've read in a long time.  Baker writes beautifully about his life, his rise to fame and the absurdity of the worlds of tv and radio in the 1980s and 1990s.

The Paying Guests is yet another gem of a book by the wonderful Sarah Waters.  I don't want to say too much about it for risk of spoiling it, but I didn't want it to end.

Yes Please by Amy Poehler is smart, funny, warm, wise and inspiring.  I don't think I could be friends with anyone who didn't love it.

Shotgun Lovesongs by Nickolas Butler is a quiet calm book set in a small town in which nothing much happens.  It is beautifully written, and Butler draws complex but real characters and creates an immaculate sense of place.  My book of the year. 

Film

With additional positive nods to Gone Girl and The Imitation Game, the highlights of my film year were:

12 Years A Slave
I've written about this before, but I can't overstate how moving, challenging and downright beautiful this film is.  Steve McQueen is a genius.

Frank
It's true that I am a little obsessed with Michael Fassbender, but seeing he spends the vast majority of Frank hidden by a large plastic head, that can't be the only reason I loved this film sooo much.  Quirky and original, funny and moving.

The Grand Budapest Hotel
Wes Anderson is a 'love him or hate him' director and I LOVE him.  I think The Grand Budapest Hotel is the finest of all his films, with an inspired central performance from Ralph Fiennes and a bucketful of Anderson's distinctive visual panache.


Pride
A lovely, funny and altogether cheering film about gay activists who supported a village of striking Welsh miners in the 1980s.  The set design totally captivated me, dragging me into a wave of nostalgia for childhood visits to my grandparents' house in Wales.

Boyhood
Boyhood just blew me away.  Filmed for a week or two every year over twelve years, it is just a wonderful original premise executed perfectly.  I couldn't have loved it more.


Theatre

The Crucible
Quite aside from an unbelievably powerful central performance from the unfeasibly attractive Richard Armitage, this production from Yael Farber at the Old Vic was the best I have ever seen of The Crucible.  The tension in the auditorium was palpable and you could have heard a pin drop during the final act.  Stunning.

Wolf Hall and Bring Up The Bodies
I loved these RSC productions of the books by Hilary Mantel so much I saw them twice, once in Stratford and once in the West End.  

Skylight
I sat in the front row of this new production of David Hare's play (not deliberately - I didn't book the tickets) and I can tell you it is very unnerving watching Bill Nighy on stage when he is basically looking at you straight in the eye.  That aside, he and Carey Mulligan both put in captivating performances, the play doesn't seem to have dated a bit and the set design was gorgeous.