True Grit: the masters of subversion go classical

Movie fans have come to expect certain things from a Coen brothers film. Foremost on the list of expectations is, conversely enough, to confound our expectations. Whether teleporting a hard-bitten noir crime story to small-town Minnesota with a pregnant, mumsy police chief as our guide (Fargo) or finishing a thrilling chase movie with a brutal rumination on their sheer randomness of life (No Country For Old Men), the brothers Coen are masters of the sly left turn.

These trademark jarring moments make it easy to forget that the Coens also clearly have a deep attachment to simple genre filmmaking, even if they do like to kick a genre down a flight of stairs every now and again. It's this unvarnished appreciation that seems to guide True Grit, the Coens' re-telling of the Charles Portis Western novel, 40 years after the Henry Hathaway version that yielded the Duke his first and only Oscar.

The movie follows Mattie Ross (Hailee Steinfeld), a plucky 14 year-old who steams into town looking for a suitably tough lawman to help her track down Tom Chaney (Josh Brolin), the hired hand who shot her daddy down for the gold in his pocket and the horse beneath his saddle. What she gets is a two windbags, one drunk (US Marshall Reuben "Rooster" Cogburn, played by Jeff Bridges) and one sober but pompous (Texas Ranger LaBoeuf, played by Matt Damon). The three of them head out to the Indian Territories to bring Chaney to justice, where he's thought to be taking refuge with an outlaw gang led by the fearsome "Lucky" Ned Pepper (Barry Pepper).

True Grit is a Western with a capital W and an old, dusty six-shooter replacing the R. It's the kind of classically told, ripping yarn that faithfully adds to a genre that has mostly either been ignored or revised over the last decade. Mattie's journey with Rooster and LaBoeuf (pronounced "le beef", in as laconic a drawl as you can summon) has an irresistible sense of forward momentum as they pin down Pepper's gang of marauders. There's also a surprisingly light tone, as the two lawmen bicker over war records, marksmanship and honour, strutting like old hounds to impress their surprisingly formidable young ward.

There's still a smattering of stylised Coen touches, like the surreal moment that Rooster and Mattie, waiting for LaBoeuf, encounter a bizaare old witch doctor covered in a full bear pelt riding towards them. "That...is not...le beef," drones Rooster. The film's violence is not pervasive but, in true Coens style, is distressing and dehumanising when it does crop up, the shock of bullet wounds and finger amputations leavened only by Rooster's occasionally amusing brutalisation of LaBoeuf.

Roger Deakins' predictably superb (and now Bafta-winning) cinematography also brings the film a sense of detail that the original was happy to gloss over, the camera lingering over the ugly crevices of 19th century Arkansas (corpses, hangings) as much as its inspiring vistas (evergreen forests, autumnal plains, snowcapped peaks).

True Grit's heart lies with the three captivating performances at its centre. Mattie, Rooster and LaBoeuf form a strange triangle made credible and moving by Steinfeld, Bridges and Damon. The former two are getting plenty of attention for their portrayals of Mattie and Rooster, and deservedly so. Steinfeld avoids the typical precocious child performance trap with a genuine sense of wit and pitch-perfect dialogue delivery, while Bridges brings out Rooster's irascibility, poor social skills and deeply buried honour in a way that would have been beyond John Wayne even if it had been expected of him. But for me, Matt Damon stands out as LaBoeuf, a character who reveals the layers behind his loudmouthed vanity as the story progresses. The Texas Ranger's misguided attempts to take Mattie under his wing, as well as the genuine affection that grows between the two, is one of the film's chief pleasures. Rooster Cogburn might get to be the hero, but it's LaBoeuf's fragile nobility and unraveling ego that steals our hearts.

I couldn't help but feel a little disappointed that the film's riveting storyline wasn't joined by an equally impressive sense of meaning. Although True Grit left me satisfied and elated, there isn't the rich seam of subtext that made No Country For Old Men such a meaty offering. The film does take some time to ponder on the fleeting nature of life in a callous era, and one scene involving a night-time ride that pushes Rooster to the limit of his failing frame is particularly effective at delivering that message.

But all in all, the impression that we're left with is a fine story, well told and beautifully acted, and one that could reward repeat viewings in the same way as another Coens genre classic, Miller's Crossing. Even if True Grit doesn't deliver much subtext-jerky to chew over, it's still an incredibly powerful, unashamedly traditional Western story. And that's a helluva thing, pard.

The Fighter: a tale of loyalty, family, and punching

The Fighter is at least partly about punching. But it's about other things, too. That's important when a movie features a lot of punching, as it tends to overshadow the scenes that are cursed with a lack of punching. But if a movie has non-punching scenes that still pack an emotional punch, that's when you know you've got a good movie with punching in it, rather than just a good punching movie.

The Fighter is a good movie with punching in it. In many ways, it fits into the archetypal underdog sports movie mould, in the vein of Rocky or, uh, The Mighty Ducks. Based on a true story, the film follows Micky Ward (Mark Wahlberg), an Irish-American welterweight boxer living in the blue-collar city of Lowell, Massachusetts, splitting his time between getting pummelled in the ring and laying tarmac on the street. Micky's older brother Dicky (Christian Bale) is the former 'Pride of Lowell', famed for besting Sugar Ray Leonard back in the day. He's now Micky's part-time trainer and full-time crackhead.

The movie charts Micky's rise from a glorified punching bag to a title contender, complete with appropriately stirring training sequences and surprise turnarounds in the ring. As a simple addition to the 'inspiring underdog story' stable, The Fighter more than holds its own. The punching scenes are effectively shot, maintaining an authentic feel but slowing the action down just enough that we can register the force of every haymaker and body blow.

What elevates the movie from its genre is what's happening outside the ring. Micky's family is a tornado that swirls around him while barely acknowledging his existence. He's henpecked into mismatched fights by his domineering mother Alice (Melissa Leo) and his seven sisters, who are more interested in indulging Dicky's boxing past than supporting Micky's present. Dicky means well, but he has become a liability, failing to turn up for training and getting Micky into trouble with the law. Into this scene storms Charlene (Amy Adams), a no-nonsense, bar-tending college dropout who acts as the catalyst for Micky to take control of his life and career, both of which are being dragged down by his oblivious family.

This family drama is heightened by a raft of excellent performances. Christian Bale is superb as the drug-addled Dicky, infusing the character with a bug-eyed charisma that intoxicates the audience as much as it does his family and friends. But he's a ghost of his former self, a wispy shade obsessed with his one defining moment in boxing and deluded about an HBO documentary crew following him around. He thinks they're there to chart his comeback, despite the crew's insistence that they're making a film about the ravages of drug abuse. Dicky's inhabiting his own fantasy, and Bale works hard to heighten the impact when he's finally, brutally, evicted from that fantasy and shoved out into the cold light of day.

There are also great turns from the female influences in Micky's life. Melissa Leo brings out the steely pragmatism of Alice when it comes to shaping Micky's career, as well as her blind, unjustified dotage on Dicky, her first-born and the apple of her eye. We also see a new side of Amy Adams, such an expert at playing timid, as Micky's rock-hard girlfriend Charlene, who hates what Alice is doing to her youngest son's chances but might share more characteristics with the aging matriarch than she cares to admit.

Behind it all is Mark Wahlberg's quietly brilliant performance as Micky, a man undermined at every turn. He embodies the quiet resignation of a younger brother, aware and unresentful of the fact that Dicky casts an inescapable shadow. He's there in every scene, physically cringing at all the shouting and posturing around him. He's at once fiercely loyal to his kin and painfully aware that they are poisoning his chance to make a name of his own. Watching Micky's growing assertiveness despite his reluctance to take the spotlight is a genuine pleasure, and its a real shame that of all the film's Oscar nominations for acting, not one was for Wahlberg.

All of this struggle and tragedy outside of the ring makes the events that go on inside it all the more bracing. Micky's relationship with his family rings out with every punch, both given and received. His quiet determination gives weight to training sequences that would otherwise be simple genre staples. The script, along with director David O. Russell (Three Kings, I Heart Huckabees), makes us care more about this family of nutjobs than the outcome of any title bout. In fact, I can't think of a better recommendation for The Fighter than the fact that none of its most memorable moments involve punching, including one of the most heartwarming and beautiful final scenes that I've watched for some time.

The mathematics of reviewing

The title of this post is pretty misleading. Reviewing isn't maths, after all, and boiling a review down to a simple formula is anathema to reading something new and surprising (although it seems to work pretty well for the Daily Mail website, which operates on a strict formula of liberal baiting + contrived outrage x gross hypocrisy - basic human compassion = mad web traffic).

Of course I'm not going to argue for some inane system for reviewing; each one has to be written in its own way. But writing (and reading) a lot of reviews makes you think about what exactly it is that you like or dislike about an album or a film, about the process you naturally go through before you sit down to try and express your conclusions. Exactly why are you willing to forgive those crappy lyrics on that album you just bought? Exactly why do you love that beautiful film that has no plot or dialogue?

Reviews are my favourite things, both to read and to write. As a deep down obsessive, I'd generally rather spend my time deliberating about chord changes and camera angles than trying to vicariously be friends with the people behind them. So I tend to give a lot of thought to qualifying what it is that makes a great album great, or what makes a guilty pleasure guilty, or what makes a film that seems so brilliant on paper such a chore when you're sitting through it.

The best I've come up with so far is a variation of the classic "style/substance" idea that we've read in so many reviews. I always thought the "style over substance" phrase was a little dismissive of the "style" part, given that it's the style that makes an immediate impact on the listener and appeals to the oft-underrated gut. I'm going to explain my idea in relation to music, but I think it applies just as much to film (not so much to games, which I'll touch on in a bit).

It's helpful for me to split an album into two broad, subjective scales - the satisfying scale and the interesting scale. Satisfaction replaces "style" in the aforementioned metaphor as representative of that instant gut reaction that you can't reason with - in essence, it's that feeling we all got from listening to The Darkness' first album and now feel a little ashamed of. The interesting scale is the "substance" that comes after; all the opinions on pacing, lyrics and the musicians' choices that form after bedding down with a record for a while. All the stuff that gets channeled through a thought process rather than a cocky toe tap, in other words.

I think an album generally needs to captivate me on both counts to feel like a lasting classic. An album that you'll love in the moment for its immediate impact, but revisit month after month to plumb its depths. I love all three of Arcade Fire's LPs because they fill my brittle bones with the urge to stomp around like a mad baby rhino, but in the long-run they offer me three very different worlds to explore, from Funeral's inner-city carnival through Neon Bible's great foreboding plains to the restrained desperation of The Suburbs.

An album can be excellent just by nailing one of these two criteria. Biffy Clyro's 2009 album Only Revolutions had me caterwauling up and down the walls of my flat, but the songs didn't quite match those on Blackened Sky or Vertigo of Bliss for atmosphere and strange rhythms. This doesn't detract from my enjoyment of Revolution's bombast, but it gives the album a natural shelf-life that the very best records transcend.

On the other side of the coin, an album can connect with your intellect and build a fascinating space for your ears without ever really grabbing you. I can recognise the poetry and character of Bob Dylan's music, but it has only ever impressed me. It never ambushed me, pushed me up against a wall and had its way with me. When people patiently, sighing all the way, try to explain to me why Dylan's songs are so powerful and timeless, I can understand and agree. But my gut remains stubbornly unstimulated. Give me Springsteen any day of the week. When that guy revs his engines, he leaves tire-marks all over my heart.

This satisfying/interesting balance tends to help me when thinking about films and movies, but falls down a bit when it comes to videogames. Partly as a result of the games industry's relative youth, combined with the prevalence of interactivity over passivity, games can often be considered masterpieces for simply delivering truckloads of sensory pleasure. Genuinely interesting concepts are a bonus, but at the moment they're optional. What developers really have to nail is providing game mechanics that are satisfying to interact with. Games like Bioshock and Braid might be pushing the medium to new heights, but their exploration of the human condition doesn't make them any more fun to play than Tetris or Pac-Man, even after all these years.

So this isn't my "system" for reviewing. There is no system. It's just a broad categorisation of the feelings I get from listening to an album or watching a film that helps me formalise where those feelings come from when I want to express myself about it in the clearest way possible. In order to express myself with clarity, I find that I need to delve a little into why I've reacted to an album in the way I have.

So are there any albums or films that max you out for satisfaction but feel a little empty after the first few spins? Or those that you can appreciate on a cerebral level but leave you yearning to be swept off your feet? Let's compare notes in the comments below. Also feel free to let me know if I'm talking a load of bollocks. I find it hard to tell sometimes.

Escape Artist's Best Games of 2010

I've just spent a couple of hours playing Dead Space 2 on my own, in my flat, at night. This might mean nothing to you, but trust me, this pretty much makes me a goddamn superhero. Horror games are the perfect example of the power of the interactive medium. I get scared watching [REC] or Night of the Living Dead, but the difference with horror games is you're expected to actually do something about the awful things happening on screen. The whole appeal of horror is putting yourself in the shoes of someone experiencing a terrifying ordeal, and there's no better way to do that than to pick up a controller and take part.

Anyway, to distract myself from thoughts of horrific mockeries of nature ambushing me from air vents, I thought I'd do a quick round-up of some of the best games of the past year. 2010 was a pretty strong year for gaming, with a great mix of reliable sequels that built on the work of their predecessors and new titles to expand our horizons.

There were disappointments - Fable III and Vanquish spring to mind - but for the most part last year's games delivered. 2010 also marked a bit of a turning point for the games industry, as publishers began to release more top-drawer titles outside of the traditional pre-Christmas period. This is a great thing for gamers and for the industry itself as it begins to realise that quality speaks for itself, no matter what time of year. With the success of early-year titles like Red Dead Redemption and Mass Effect 2, and now Dead Space 2 in 2011, this promising trend looks set to continue.

Bayonetta (Platinum Games)

The third-person action genre is a pretty crowded one, with the likes of Ninja Gaiden, God of War and Devil May Cry filling our screens with musclebound anti-heroes grunting and shouting for our entertainment. Bayonetta trumps all of these games on most counts, and adds a healthy dose of batshit insanity for good measure.

At the game's core is a rock-solid combat system. Titular (not to mention tit-tacular) heroine Bayonetta feels lithe and responsive to control as she pirouettes between enemies unleashing a wide array of crunchy, satisfying combos. But the game really separates itself from the crowd with its sheer eye-humping visual splendour. The design of levels and enemies is consistently surprising, throwing an astonishing variety of extra-dimensional environments and enemies at the player. The story is pretty inscrutable (something about witches and motorbikes and angels with glowing vaginas?), but when a game offers you the chance to throw a reborn god-queen into the fires of the sun, the wheres and whys are pretty irrelevant.

Mass Effect 2 (BioWare)

Hands-down the best videogame story of 2010, as Commander Shepard recruits a new crew on his space-faring mission to defend the galaxy against the planet-harvesting Reavers. Yeah, it might sound like an episode of Stargate SG-1, but the appeal of Mass Effect lies in making the story your own. With the best conversation mechanics of any game so far, the ability to make meaningful choices that alter your game world in sometimes unexpected ways, and some of the best characters this side of the Omega-4 Relay, there's a real feeling of consequence behind the superb firefights. I got my entire team through the game unscathed because I am the King and Queen of Cheese, but the very real chance of losing treasured teammates before the game's end adds consistent tension and even (whisper it) a hint of emotional resonance.

Red Dead Redemption (Rockstar San Diego)

How did it take this long for an unreservedly great cowboy game to come out? All the elements are right there - quickdraw duels, roaming the open plains, fisticuffs in smoky saloons... you know, cowboy stuff. Whatever the case, it wasn't until 2010 that a game brought all these elements together, bundled them into the back of a rickety ol' wagon and rammed them into our eye-holes. Rockstar San Diego has made expert use of Grand Theft Auto's game engine to create a gorgeous natural game world, spanning pine forests and great plains in the north to the ochre-tinged sandstone monoliths of Mexico in the south. The diversity of gameplay options is more than a match for Red Dead's setting. The long journey of blackmailed ex-outlaw John Marsden makes for a great story, filled with imaginative diversions and the colourful characters that have made Rockstar releases so special over the years.

Limbo (Playdead Studios)

A brilliant X-box Live Arcade puzzle-platformer with a unique atmosphere. Players control a little boy searching for his sister in a spectral purgatory realm. That's all the story there is, and this game needs no more. Everything else in Limbo is conveyed through its shadowy, silhouetted world. Threatening little details emanate from every crevice, from the world's mysterious and hostile inhabitants to the shockingly gory death animations when the player slips up. The game's puzzles, which revolve around using physics to move through areas, constantly introduce new mechanics to keep things fresh for the duration. Limbo is an excellent puzzle game, but it's the melancholy ambience that makes it great. Oh, and the giant spider chase sequence. Can't go wrong with a giant spider chase sequence.

Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood (Ubisoft Montreal)

After two games that struggled to match their immaculate sense of style with equally engaging gameplay mechanics, Brotherhood is the first game in the AC franchise that's an unmarred pleasure to play. The action may see players jump back into the bejewelled pantaloons of AC2's Ezio Auditore as he murders his way up Rome's corrupt Borgia hierarchy, but Brotherhood comprehensively refines the series' ideas that work and overhauls those that don't.

Combat is smoother and more interesting; assassination missions are better structured and reward good planning; stealth sections are now a joy rather than a chore. The most impressive thing about Brotherhood is the sheer amount of content there is to distract the player in Rome's vast play area, from the simple pleasure of chasing thieves and couriers across the city's terracotta rooftops to piloting a frankly absurd 16th century stealth bomber. The story continues to be sub-Dan Brown secret society wankery, but if the franchise's gameplay continues to improve at this rate, all that nonsense can be forgiven. Now let's have Assassin's Creed III set in Victorian London, please.

Halo: Reach (Bungie)

The only straight-up shooter on this list, Bungie's swansong to the legendary series just radiates the experience and dedication of its development team. The Call of Duty franchise might have overtaken Halo as the number one blockbuster FPS, but for my money Reach outstrips Black Ops both as a single-player story and a multiplayer playground. The game's premise of fighting a losing battle against overwhelming Covenant forces on a doomed colony world packs more emotional punch than most other shooters (including a brilliant ending), and the enemy AI is superb, creating combat moments with a real sense of space rather than the shooting galleries that have become so popular of late.

Online, Reach is the best of the best. I may have spent more hours compulsively logging into Modern Warfare, but Reach makes every new game a unique encounter. The game types are varied, the maps are stupendously well-designed and playing Firefight mode with friends is like a whole extra game. And for hardcore fanatics, there are the well-featured Forge level creation tools. With this treasure chest of riches, Bungie has ensured that Reach will continue to thrive long after the studio has moved on to new projects.

Alan Wake (Remedy Entertainment)

Not a smash hit by any means, but if Alan Wake doesn't get a sequel it would be a great shame. This isn't necessarily because of the scares and solid combat (based on giving your corrupted enemies the willies by lighting them up with your torch), both of which are excellent, but because Alan Wake is quietly revolutionary in its approach to interactive storytelling. We guide our titular confused writer through the town of Bright Falls and the surrounding forests in search of his missing wife who has been abducted by a dark presence that's infecting the whole area.

The fascinating layer buried beneath the narrative is that Wake has lost time, during which he seems to have written about the events he's currently living through. Pages found on the forest floor or strewn about rusty old sawmills serve to deepen the narrative as well as warn players about dangerous encounters ahead. It's an amazing way for the developer to communicate with the player, not to mention push some pretty far-out ideas about authorship and the constraints of moving through a world that has been designed for you. As the game progresses the rabbit hole only gets deeper, with Wake beginning to question why he wrote the things he did and realising that his words might be the key to breaking free of the town's strange curse.

Fallout: New Vegas (Obsidian Entertainment)

After 60 hours or so of exploring Fallout 3's post-apocalyptic nuclear wasteland, the thought of diving back in to a sequel that uses the same creaky engine and transports the story from Washington D.C. to the ostensibly less memorable Mojave Desert didn't seem all that appetising. New Vegas didn't immediately prove me wrong - the first couple of hours is filled with the critter hunting, stat-levelling and V.A.T.S. combat strategies that had become all-too familiar from the previous game. The story's opening is also a little contrived. The player wakes up after being shot in the head and having his courier package stolen, and decides, with a slightly incredible level of job dedication, to hunt down his ambushers and get it back.

It was only when I arrived at the New Vegas Strip, filled with decay and corruption but a bustling vibrancy that was missing from Fallout 3's communities, that it all started to come together. Obsidian, a team that contains some of the original Black Isle developers who worked on the first Fallout PC games, has pushed the modern franchise forward by thrusting players into a more rich and morally confusing world. None of the Strip's factions are unblemished, which makes choosing who to support (if any) all the more thrilling because there are no convenient signposts. You begin to realise that you are, much more so than in Fallout 3, a catalyst for massive change across this seedy desert, and by leaving you to make your own mind up, New Vegas burdens you with the full weight of your actions. It's a scary prospect, and one that provokes real thought. After another 60 hours of wandering the wasteland, I really would like to see the back of the game's charming but tired and buggy engine. Then again, I've been proved wrong before...

Film review: Black Swan

It's a Gothic melodrama. No, it's a companion piece to The Wrestler. Oh hang on, it's classic body horror in the vein of Cronenberg. But it's Polanski-esque in its exploration of the darkest corners of the mind. And surely it's an unflinching character study about fear and weakness and transcendence, right? Just what is Black Swan?

All of the above descriptors apply to Darren Aronofsky's (Requiem for A Dream, The Fountain, The Wrestler) latest film to some degree. The movie tells the story of fragile mummy's girl Nina (Natalie Portman), who gets cast for the prestigious role of the Swan Queen in a New York ballet company's new production of Swan Lake. In the process of preparing for her role, for which she must excel as both the virginal White Swan (which comes naturally to Nina) and the sensuous Black Swan (which decidedly doesn't), Nina is plagued by nightmarish visions and paranoid fantasies.

Black Swan brings together all the aforementioned elements and sharpens them to a razor's edge to stab its point home. Taken at their face value, a lot of these elements might seem derivative or cliche, but all these techniques are ruthlessly honed by Aronofsky and aimed towards what the film is trying to express. The use of tight, over-the-shoulder camera angles and the constant presence of mirrors are both staples of the horror genre, but here they reinforce Nina's inability to escape her panicky bubble of existence and her crisis of identity (of course, they also serve to make you shit your breeches on several occasions).

Similarly the transformation scenes, in which Nina begins to see herself physically morphing into a swan, owe a debt to the mortification of the flesh seen in some of Cronenberg's best films, and even Clive Barker's Hellraiser. But again, Aronofsky bends this concept to serve his film's specific goals. As such, we see some fairly tired ideas find a new lease of life when bound to a fresh purpose.

Nina's strange hallucinations signpost the growth of her repressed dark side, leading her ever closer to the performance of the Black Swan she so obsessively desires, and ever closer to the brink of madness. When those two roads converge at the end of the movie, it's so cathartic because of the constant tension that Aronofsky has built up throughout.

Black Swan's performances are roundly superb, with Portman the obvious standout. She excels at conveying her character's brittle vulnerability, but really shines as Nina's darker impulses begin to flutter to life. Mila Kunis isn't stretching herself as the Nina's new friend Lily and the liberated yin to Nina's tightly-wound yang, but she's excellently cast and carries an effortless charisma that serves the character well. Similarly, Vincent Cassel's natural sly charm translates perfectly for idealistic but cruel ballet director Thomas. Special mention should also go to Barbara Hershey as Nina's overbearing mother, exposing the character's cloying need to live through her daughter while somehow finding her sympathetic side by the film's end.

So yes, the film is all the things I mentioned at the top of this review. All those things and more. Subtlety has never been Darren Aronofsky's M.O, and Black Swan is no exception. It's gloriously over-the-top, unapologetically theatrical, and hits home with the force and precision of a laser-guided missile. Black Swan isn't out to confound audiences. It's not a brain teaser. It simply concentrates on throwing its every resource behind expressing its ideas (perfection, psychological extremes, absurd dedication, the fracturing of identity) as clearly and as forcefully as possible.

Escape Artist's Top Five Films of 2010

I've decided to cut down this year's top films into a list of five for a couple of reasons, both of which are a bit depressing. First of all, there's an uncomfortable number of movies that might well have made the list if I hadn't been too busy and/or lazy to see them (The Social Network, Winter's Bone, The Illusionist). This is depressing because I don't particularly want to live in a world where I miss Winter's Bone but manage to drag my carcass to Fulham to see Solomon Kane.

The second reason is that 2010 wasn't exactly a banner year for cinema, all things considered. Of course there were great movies, but the gaps between them felt unusually wide. A hefty proportion of this year's blockbusters failed to make an impression (Iron Man 2, Clash of the Titans, The A-Team, Prince of Persia), and the latest Harry Potter was baffling and frustrating in equal measure for a non-reader (wait, Ron has another brother? When did the Ministry of Magic turn into a magical wing of the Gestapo? Oh, and what in the motherloving fuck is a Horcrux?). A few smaller films have been thoroughly enjoyable and thought-provoking, but just a little too slight to merit full celebration (Buried, Jackass 3D, Valhalla Rising, I'm Still Here).

With the likes of The King's Speech, True Grit, Black Swan and Never Let Me Go kicking off 2011, hopefully our cinema calendars will be more enticing this year. But in the meantime, here are five films that shone like twinkling diamonds on the dung hill of 2010.

Four Lions (d. Chris Morris; w. Chris Morris, Sam Bain & Jesse Armstrong)

Coming from minds that brought us the likes of The Day Today, Brass Eye, Nathan Barley and Peep Show, it should come as no surprise that Four Lions is bladder-worryingly funny. This story of bumbling jihadists from Sheffield struggling to pull off a suicide attack at the upcoming London Marathon is stuffed to the gills with timeless slapstick gags and hilarious sound bites ("I'm not confused, brother. I just took a picture of my face and it's deffo not my confused face"), with just the right amount of sly subversion.

The surprising thing about Four Lions is everything else. The performances, which are at once funny and sinister and somehow sweet, are a revelation. Riz Ahmed as Omar is the perfect anchor for the film, the Wise to the rest of the crew's Morecambe. Omar's struggles as a leader, his joy as a family man and his inner conflicts as a human being are constantly playing across Ahmed's beleaguered face. Nigel Lindsay as overcompensating fanatic Barry and Kayvan Novak as impressionable simpleton Waj are also both deserving of the highest praise.

It's also surprising that so much poignancy and humanity has been squeezed around all the laughs. The film expertly treads a fine line in not excusing the characters' actions, but portraying them as human and fallible. It looks at the complex factors that lead to radicalisation with a light touch and a great deal of consideration. The secret of Four Lions is that it forces us to see its "martyrs" as real people led down a devastating path by a mix of chance and prescriptive ideology. As such, it's a rare example of a comedy that plays to the best in us, when it could have so easily pandered to the worst.

Scott Pilgrim vs. The World (d. Edgar Wright; w. Edgar Wright & Michael Bacall)

Possibly the most divisive movie since The Fountain thrilled/bored audiences with its bold vision/pretentious claptrap (delete as appropriate). For every diehard adherent, there's someone else claiming that Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, based on the graphic novels by Bryan Lee O'Malley, is the worst kind of empty hipster nonsense that caters to the worst impulses of the MTV generation.

The sad thing is that most of the bile floating aroung the net has more to do with knee-jerk reactions against an indie culture that is perceived to be snide and pretentious rather than the film itself. Because Scott Pilgrim, viewed without scoff goggles, is 2010's best example of pure, effervescent action/comedy joy. The jokes share the zing and bounce of the original books, and the action fleshes out the vision of the comics with the mischief and flair that Edgar Wright has displayed since his breakout TV series Spaced.

Behind the one-liners and slapstick fight scenes, the film does have something to say about graduating from man-boy to man, as our titular hero (Michael Cera) fights for the heart of his latest infatuation Ramona Flowers (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) while slowly realising the flaws in his own self-obsessed personality. But at its heart, Scott Pilgrim is pure fantasy, melding Jackie Chan-esque chop socky and hyper-real visuals with the quirks of Toronto's music scene (while also, haters take note, poking fun at it). From the immaculately conceived soundtrack (with Beck's contributions to the Sex Bob-Omb songs a particular standout) to the pervasive presence of videogame stylings, it's a spectacularly well-conceived bubblegum experience, bursting with the vitality and enthusiasm of youth.

Inception (d. & w. Chris Nolan)

One of the finest filmmakers working in mainstream cinema today, Chris Nolan has been on a pretty flabbergasting run in the last few years. He effortlessly restored Batman's street cred. The Dark Knight transcended all expectations of what a superhero movie is expected to be. He knocked out cinematic rubik's cube The Prestige in between his Batman blockbusters. Throughout, his movies have retained the crispness of thought and the purity of vision that made Memento such a success, while simultaneously raking in hundreds of millions of dollars and making Nolan of the most powerful voices in Hollywood.

Inception marks another triumph for Nolan as the pre-eminent master of accessible moviemaking that's as deep as you need it to be. Casual viewers of Inception will find immense satisfaction in the film's thunderous action scenes and strong performances from the likes of Leonardo DiCaprio, Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Marion Cotillard. But those who want to delve deeper into this story of subconscious subterfuge will strike hidden reserves. Inception has been created with a blistering level of forethought (nearly ten years of forethought, in fact), Nolan playing with physics and metaphysics as Cobb and his dream spies plunge ever deeper into the recesses of the mind. That might sound dull on paper, but when it's all played out through anti-gravity fistfights and folding cities, it makes for an experience that's as spectacular as it is cerebral.

With Inception, Nolan has also answered the criticism that he is so consumed with the mechanics of the mind that he leaves little room for the tender fluctuations of the heart. That most of the film takes place in the world of dreams allows Nolan to give flesh to raw emotions and thoughts that in other films remains buried behind characters' eyes. Protagonist Cobb's lingering guilt over the fate of his wife Mal, as well as his desire to find his way back to the children he's been forced to flee from, provides the story's backbone and emotional anchor. Inception adds to the already compelling evidence that if Nolan has indeed become the most powerful director in Hollywood, we're in safe hands.

How To Train Your Dragon (d. Chris Sanders, Dean DeBlois; w. Chris Sanders, Dean DeBlois, Peter Tolan, Adam F. Goldberg)

Probably the most satisfying film to watch this year, and definitely 2010's best use of 3-D. I may be slightly biased due to my borderline unhealthy obsession with scaly flying leviathans since the approximate age of zero onwards, but I don't know anyone who has seen How To Train Your Dragon who would disagree with me. The story of soft-hearted muppet Hiccup's struggle to win the approval of his dragon-hunting Viking peers while keeping his new draconic friend a secret, How To Train... is a true family film.

The movie was always going to be a hit with kids, but it snags the affection of adults not by sneaking in some pop culture references, but by giving grown-ups a chance to access their inner child. Watching Hiccup's maiden flights on his tame Night Fury Toothless, it's almost impossible not to giggle along like a child on a roller coaster. The art direction is coherent and well thought-out, from the simple beauty of the rugged landscapes to the charming menagerie of different dragon species, with the strangely feline and utterly disarming Toothless a particular standout (the directors also helmed Lilo & Stitch, and the Toothless-Stitch connection is clear).

The characters and story have a great deal of charm, leading up to a genuinely thrilling climax with real bite (pun 100% intended). But in the end they play second fiddle to the simple pleasure of watching a boy and a dragon make friends while soaring around in the clouds. For anyone else who dreamed of befriending a giant flying lizard (or still does, there's no judgement here), we can finally replace those old VHS copies of The Flight of Dragons with the best dragon fantasy ever. Just figure out a better title for the sequel, please.

Somewhere (d. & w. Sofia Coppola)

It's so easy to dislike Sofia Coppola movies. The fact that she's the privileged daughter of a world-renowned film director, combined with her predilection for hazy ambiguity and eschewing propulsive narrative, often plays to her critics' nastiest assumptions. But Coppola's films would stand with or without the backing of a Hollywood legend (whether she would have gotten the opportunity to make them is another question, obviously). They share a quiet, elegant tone that tries to say a lot with as few words as possible. While Coppola may frustrate some viewers looking for a quick snackdown on some plot pie, we should celebrate directors who are taking the harder path by trying to stretch the boundaries of what can be expressed on film, shouldn't we?

Of all Coppola's films, Somewhere might be the most trying for audiences. Dialogue is really cut down to a minimum, with whole scenes dedicated to the likes of a girl cooking a poached egg or a sports car roaring monotonously around a race track. This story of isolated actor Johnny Marco (Stephen Dorff) having his 11 year-old daughter Cleo (a radiant and refreshingly unprecocious Elle Fanning) unexpectedly foisted upon him doesn't give much in the way of context. Scenes slide into one another with little connective tissue, building the impression that Marco's existence is confined to a series of sumptuous hotel rooms.

But everything that makes the movie a hard sell is what makes it special. The movie paints Marco as a disconnected, lonely individual, whose luxurious surroundings belie the mind-numbing tedium of his contractual obligations. Like the sports car speeding around the track at the film's opening, Marco is a trinket going nowhere. The sudden intrusion of Cleo doesn't quite kick off the Hollywood-patented journey of emotional reengagement, but it adds a sense of urgency to Marco's confusion about his public and personal life (the former he has lots of, the latter he has almost none).

Although the story marks no seismic change in Marco's life and his relationship with Cleo, there are so many fascinating little details that elegantly build the strange little world he inhabits so joylessly. The film is also one of the best examples of weaving music into the narrative, providing extra hints into Marco's mindset without superfluous lines of explanatory dialogue. Somewhere will never be lauded for its brash visuals or explosive storyline, but it has a boldness of its own; a willingness to speak quietly in an industry that too often rewards the loudest voice.

Escape Artist's Top Ten Albums of 2010

I originally thought I'd try introducing this list with a concise paragraph blithely summarising 2010: The Year In Music. I imagined myself like an Errol Flynn version of Lester Bangs, issuing proclamations on the birth and death of genres while swinging from a chandelier and slashing at the darkness of the artless abyss with my gleaming rapier (only the rapier is actually my WIT!). After 30 minutes of staring blankly at the screen, drooling all over my keyboard and pretending I wasn't just fantasising about Errol Flynn, I gave up.

Thing is, music is so huge (and has been for such a long time) that anyone with a brain that isn't located in their belly button knows that the grand musical decree is rendered irrelevant by the vast oceans of the music out there. To make brash, all-encompassing statements about music, you either have to boil it down to what people have been buying this year (that Lady Gaga, isn't she something else?) or you have to think really really hard about it. And I'm not willing to do either.

So suffice it to say that lots of good music came out this year. Here are ten bits of music, in no particular order, which I thought were the goodest.

Marnie Stern, Marnie Stern

Ever since her debut In Advance of the Broken Arm in 2007, Marnie Stern has been a fascinating guitar player and sporadically brilliant songwriter, but it wasn't until her self-titled third album that it all seemed to click. Before, her guitar's mix of reverb-laden distortion and rhythmic finger-tapping was entrancing but occasionally frustrating, too often flitting on to a new melody and tempo before the listener was done with the first.

Not that this year's album is all that different from its predecessors - the zinging guitar twang is intact; Stern's pixie-berserker howl is accounted for; Zach Hill still provides the waterfall of drums that adds to the tracks' breakneck abandon. But Marnie Stern feels like the purest and most condensed distillation of what makes its creator so invigorating. The guitar hooks are purer, the songs are more energised and focused, and the lyrics bleed raw emotion more than ever before. In this case, an eponymous album title makes perfect sense: these songs feel like the same Marnie Stern, just more so.

Kanye West, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy

...On which an egotistical virtuoso finally justifies his ego. West's past albums, despite moments of brash power and his undeniable ear for a hit, felt like shades of the versions archived away in his head. But just when we were ready to consign Yeezy to the trash can of promising rap careers swept away on a riptide of swagger and hubris, he opened up and showed us his twisted fantasy. It was beautiful (and dark).

It's not like there isn't boatloads of self-fellatio on Fantasy. Far from it. But it's joined by seething layers of self-hatred and revelations that always seem to come a little too late. What's so astonishing about this record it actually feels like a fairly comprehensive deconstruction (conscious or not) of a mind that straddles the line between preening ego, demented ambition and brittle vulnerability. And all put to one of the most consistently brilliant set of beats that mainstream hip hop has ever seen. From the Godzilla posturing of 'Monster' to 'So Appalled''s resigned decadence and 'Blame Game''s confused heartache, this is the sound of a facade forever cracked.

Deftones, Diamond Eyes

Diamond Eyes isn't a leap forward for Deftones. If anything, it's a scaling back. After a car crash left bassist Chi Cheng in a semi-conscious state from which he is yet to fully recover, the band temporarily shelved the record they had been working on, called Eros, and reassessed. They decided to draft in ex-Quicksand bassist Sergio Vega and record an album fast and loose, sharing more DNA with the relentless shred of Around the Fur than with the more languorous exploration found on Saturday Night Wrist.

The result is the band's least self-conscious record for years, filled with a renewed ferocity and energy. The album's first four tracks, starting with the gothic title track and running through to booming riff monster 'You've Seen The Butcher', comprise one of the best opening sections of the year. Throughout, the band seem more unified than they have since White Pony, and their enjoyment at rediscovering the relative simplicity of their early days is almost palpable. This is Deftones trimmed of the fuzzy edges, all lean muscle and hellcat fury. Just don't call it a comeback. This is a reassertion.

John Grant, Queen of Denmark

After ten years of labouring away as frontman of the Czars to little recognition and suffering through that band's disintegration, John Grant has ironically gotten the attention he deserves by embracing his outsider status. Part of the thanks for dragging Grant into the light should go Texas band Midlake who saw him perform and insisted on producing and recording his debut solo album, more than six years after the Czars' demise.

The spotlight should remain on Grant, however, who has created an album of adventurous yet poised lovelorn anthems. Focussing primarily on growing up gay in a God-fearing Midwestern hometown as well as some of his (by the sounds of it, painful) adult relationships, Queen of Denmark could have so easily been a pity party. But between the album's interesting arrangements, Grant's rich vocals and lyrics both heartbreaking and humorous, it feels more like a treasure trove. Tracks veer from wistful acoustic balladeering ('TC And The Honey Bear') to honky-tonk singalongs ('Silver Platter Club'), but they share Grant's appealingly direct lyrics and a world weariness that's occasionally leavened by bright thoughts.

Avey Tare, Down There

I'll happily admit that the debut solo album of Animal Collective's Avey Tare won't be for everyone. From the first sleepwalking beats on opener 'Laughing Hieroglyphic', a fair proportion of listeners would probably prefer to plug their ears with aggressive termites than continue. But those who stick around are rewarded with one of the year's most immersive albums, the lack of immediate hooks made irrelevant by the addictiveness of Down There's nocturnal atmosphere.

Here's my review of Down There for the BBC Music website.

Flying Lotus, Cosmogramma

A lot has been made of Flying Lotus' (aka Steven Ellison) jazz heritage as a central tenet informing his latest electro-headtrip Cosmogramma. There's definitely something to that - the freeform synths and constantly evolving beats of a track like 'Zodiac Shit' feel like a natural modern progression of the improvisational virtuosity of Miles Davis or John Coltrane (FlyLo's great-uncle).

But the overriding vibe flowing out of Cosmogramma's every pore is a grand psychedelia. If electronic music has a general flaw it's that it too often moves like mathematics, perfect rhythm matching pre-programmed harmonies in a way that can sometimes seem sterile and robotic. Flying Lotus has definitely bucked that trend on his latest album, more so than any of his other recordings. These tracks bend and creak and morph into one another. In a genre that often prioritises keeping toes tapping over scratching through to its soul, Cosmogramma is a revolution in its imperfection and humanity.

Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti, Before Today

One of America's great musical traditions, and one that is consistently underrated in the modern day, is that of the MOR radio rock song. Simple and unpretentious, this very American pop form tends to age well as a result of simple hooks and timeless, accessible melodies.

There are now a fair few US bands looking back into the country's B-league pop catalogue in an attempt to craft something new from the raw material of the 70s and early 80s. With his first major label release after a raft of lo-fi bedroom LPs, the prolific and obsessive Ariel Pink has emerged at the forefront of this movement. Before Today isn't just a series of nostalgic reconstructions, however. Every track seems to take a classic format and jumble it into something effortlessly modern.

The gloriously-named 'Butt House Blondies' matches the heavier moments of Husker Du and the Replacements with baroque pop verse sections to make a cocktail that's both smooth and gutsy. 'Beverly Kills' kicks off with the 70s soul staple of cop sirens and the hubbub of street chat before seamlessly busting out the slap-bass and loading the listener onto a disco bus - destination? Funky town. It's this makeshift stitching of styles, combined with the pervasive presence of Pink's distinctive vision, that makes Before Today so special.

The Besnard Lakes, The Besnard Lakes Are The Roaring Night

The Besnard Lakes' last album ...Are The Dark Horse was one of the most sensual pleasures of 2007, and as such many of us probably would have been perfectly happy for the Montreal-based band to just poop out a reconstituted version this year, complete with that album's elegant, spidery spirit.

Re-poop they did not, however, and shame on us for being willing to settle. ...Are The Roaring Night is a far more expansive experience than its predecessor, taking the epic template of 'Devastation', one of the few songs on Dark Horse that went really stratospheric, and using it to make an album of soul-scorching post-rock. 'Chicago Train' starts with an orchestral whisper and ends with an electrifying shout; 'Albatross' radiates warmth and light before exploding into an almost epiphanic supernova. The Roaring Night is an appropriate title for a record so epic that it might burst out of your speakers and do battle with a flaming unicorn made of lasers right there in your living room, before giving you a thumbs-up and imploding with the force of a hundred thousand collapsing stars. It's really good, essentially.

Arcade Fire, The Suburbs

So that makes three amazing albums in a row from the officially crowned Kings of Indiedom. This incredible streak is made all the more impressive because the band have (consciously or not) refused to retread old ground, placing each successive release with its own fully fleshed-out world. The Suburbs isn't nearly as flashy as Funeral or Neon Bible, but that's in keeping with the album's exploration of the mundane and the middle-class, the comfortable and the comatose. While by no means sparse, The Suburbs exercises a lot more restraint than its older siblings, constructing quietly desperate vignettes of defeated youth and the empty confection of privileged modern life. Old hat perhaps, but Arcade Fire never fail to separate themselves from the crowd with an abundance of passion and conviction. While there is a lower anthem ratio than some fans might expect, that sense of conviction burns as brightly and as intensely as ever.

Joanna Newsom, Have One On Me

Finally, a Joanna Newsom album we can all agree on. Her earlier albums Ys and The Milk-Eyed Mender are immensely impressive, but tend to split opinion, depending on the listener's proclivity for intricate harp plucking and vocals that occasionally hit a pitch that only dogs can truly appreciate. Despite being a somewhat intimidating triple album, Have One On Me is Newsom's most generous album to date, kind of like a sonic cuddle. The depth of the lyrics and stunning instrumentation is still there; the simpler arrangements simply sharpen the picture to show these virtues with due clarity. Tracks like 'Good Intentions Paving Co.', '81' and 'On A Good Day' are the clearest expression yet of Newsom's giving yet iron-strong vocals, as well as her talent for composition and swirling, Sufjan Stevens-esque orchestration.

Question to ponder: how different would the music world be if Sonic Youth had been called Sonic Cuddle?