5. The Lego Movie
What could have been a soulless toy commercial is the best animated film of 2014 and a creative masterpiece to boot. The awesome original song “Everything is Awesome” isn’t even the crux of it. “The Lego Movie” is a joyful rally for kindness, originality, imagination, and revolution in a not-so-free world full of rules and little risk-taking. It’s also a Hollywood parody that looks studio moguls in the eyes with a message of more awesome, please. Chris Pratt, Elizabeth Banks, and Morgan Freeman bring their individual charms to the Lego characters fighting for their Lego-world’s freedom when an overbearing leader threatens it with enforced mundanity.
4. Birdman
Once prolific master of absurdity Michael Keaton is back from the brink of “old Batman” obscurity with a masterclass of acting in a masterpiece of bravura filmmaking by Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu. This re-breakthrough could be an autobiography of his volatile career if it weren’t so by his own admission. Supported by Emma Stone as his malcontent daughter and a stellar Edward Norton as a critical theater diva, Keaton plays a famous Hollywood actor in the middle of a Broadway production, grasping for prestige in a world that’s passed him by. Edited to look like the entire film was shot in one two hour take, Inarritu’s magical realism and a plethora of great performances ensure “Birdman” is more than a psychological expose of celebrity blues.
3. Nightcrawler
Jake Gyllenhaal deserved a second Oscar nomination for his captivating turn as sociopath and all-around hungry capitalist Lou Bloom, and he didn’t get it. No matter, the Academy is as Academy does, and Gyllenhaal’s iconic character will live in infamy like Deniro’s Travis Bickle. But his performance is only the centerpiece of a film that’s both a satire of today’s bloodthirsty television news and a parable for the consequences of unchecked ambition, complete with a welcome return by the wonderfully aged Renee Russo. “Nightcrawler” holds up a mirror to our collective and violent thirsts for money and fame, and we can’t look away from it.
2. Dawn of the Planet of the Apes
Many movies have tried and failed to serve as allegory for the never-ending tug-of-war between east and west, most recently box office behemoth Avatar’s moralizing about the Iraq War. “Dawn of the Planet of the Apes” is the first to do so successfully, with enough subtlety, grace, and grandeur to suggest these metaphors without beating the audience over the head with it. But that’s not really why this latest franchise outing is so splendid, although it certainly infuses the whole affair with real-world implications. Toby Kebbell’s Koba and Andy Serkis’ Caesar are the Brutus and, well, Caesar of this story, and they’re something to behold, elevating motion-capture performance to another level as two leaders and former friends who find themselves at odds with one another. They’re apes with choices to make amid a conflict with humans over broken trust and scarce resources, and the resulting fallout of their falling out deepens an already mythic narrative with heroism, heartache, and Greek tragedy.
1. Selma
The best film of the year is also the most important, coming on the heels of several controversial cases in 2014 that shook the nation and challenged our collective perspective on modern race relations. It’s both a definitive examination of the great Martin Luther King Jr. and a call to arms for the downtrodden, the depressed, and the oppressed of this nation, exploring King and his comrades’ fight for voting rights in 1965 via the battleground of Selma, Alabama. Criticisms over the depiction of Lyndon B. Johnson are for naught, exemplifying a white patriarchal media obsessed with tearing down that which threatens it: a film with the power of revolution on the tip of its tongue. And with taut, intimate direction by Ava Duvernay, and a towering performance from David Oyelewo as Dr. King, “Selma” should have been an eight or nine category nominee at the Academy Awards this year, but instead must settle for a token Best Picture nomination. Time will tell. Many years from now, like many an Oscar bridesmaid, “Selma” will stand the test.
Film Epoch 
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