Filmatique's Best of 2019
Fire Will Come, Oliver Laxe (2019)
In turbulent times, we believe that art can serve as a balm for the soul, a point of contact into worlds unseen. Cinema has the power to encourage new perspectives, to change the way we see, listen, and think. Filmatique was founded on the mission of harnessing this power to promote diversity, to cultivate a more inclusive collective consciousness. We remain committed to underrepresented voices and their stories—in an increasingly fractured world, their visibility remains more important than ever.
Among other things, Filmatique's best films of the year open lenses onto the vicissitudes of beekeeping in Macedonia, drug culture in nocturnal Kolkata, and class conflict in contemporary Seoul. Promising debuts herald a new generation of filmmakers that dare to challenge conventional ideas of what cinema is and can be—Miko Revereza's No Data Plan is an invigorating portrait of undocumented existence in America, Ena Sendijarevic's Dutch-Bosnian Take Me Somewhere Nice proposes new constructions of female desire, while David Zonana's Mano de obra (Workforce) excavates the origins of exploitation in Mexico City.
Below are Filmatique's Top Films of 2019:
Bacarau, Kleber Mendonça Filho
Beanpole, Kantemir Balagov
Cat Sticks, Ronny Sen
Das Vorspiel (The Audition), Ina Weisse
Divine Love, Gabriel Mascaro
Ema, Pablo Larraín
Fire Will Come, Oliver Laxe
For Sama, Waad Al-Kateab & Edward Watts
God of the Piano, Itay Tal
Honeyland, Tamara Kotevska & Ljubomir Stefano
La cordillera de los sueños, Patricio Guzmán
Mano de obra (Workforce), David Zonana
Monos, Alejandro Landes
No Data Plan, Miko Revereza
Noura's Dream, Hinde Boujeema
Parasite, Bong Joon-ho
Radius, Akshay Indikar
Sister, Svelta Tsortsorkova
So Long, My Son, Wang Xiaoshuai
The Souvenir, Joanna Hogg
Take Me Somewhere Nice, Ena Sendijarevic
Temblores (Tremors), Jayro Bustamante
Wet Season, Anthony Chen
A White, White Day, Ingvar E. Sigurðsson
Mano de obra (Workforce), David Zonana (2019)