The 10 best films of 2015 so far Because we do this now, it’s the best movies of the year’s opening half Well, this has been a very fine year for films so far. The arse end of awards season gave us great US pictures such as Foxcatcher, Whiplash and A Most Violent Year. It also gave us Birdman, which, though a logistical triumph, has proved all too easy to forget. As summer loomed we got films that had been hanging around since last year’s Cannes (Mommy), Sundance (A Girl Walks Home at Night) and Venice (A Pigeon Sat on a Branch Contemplating Existence). We also got a real blockbuster contender — that didn’t quite make it to the final 10 — in the impressive form of Mad Max Fury Road. Indeed, I am pleased to say that, whereas it proved no problem to find enough worthy films, it was quite hard to whittle the long list down to just 10. A few notes on rules. As is the case with most domestic publications, we are only considering films that have received a theatrical release in Ireland during the relevant period. So, as always, there are a few awards season pictures that seem like 2014 releases. The Irish Times aims at a 32-county readership (or the film department does, anyway) and we have, for once, been left with one film that turned up only in Belfast. See if you can guess which one. We have appended the nearly rans at that bottom. So, in no particular order: MOMMY (Xavier Dolan) The annoyingly young Xavier Dolan, French-Canadian wunderkind, delivers his most accessible film yet with this melodrama concerning a fabulous mother dealing with a troubled young man. Some stunning games with ratio. IT FOLLOWS (David Robert Mitchell) Fascinating horror film concerning a spirit that is passed on during the act of sex. The devotion to 1970s Carpenteria is so complete that the clothes and cars seem sucked back in time. Great use of Detroit. Superb score. FOXCATCHER (Bennett Miller) It premiered over a year ago at Cannes. It knocked up some major Oscar nominations, but Miller’s tale of wretchedness among the American elite still feels as if it was a little overlooked. A stifling atmosphere that hangs menacingly over the viewer. Great work from Steve Carell. A MOST VIOLENT YEAR (J C Chandor) Now, here’s a film that was really overlooked. There was a time — 30 years ago, alas — when a film such as Chandor’s tense tale of corruption in New York City could have become a significant hit. As it was, the film was talked about in hushed tones in empty rooms. THE DUKE OF BURGUNDY (Peter Strickland) What is Peter Strickland up to? We’re not sure, but we are delighted the British director is about the place. His follow-up to Berberian Sound Studio references Italian soft pornography with an S & M tale set in a beautiful European Nowhere. Cheekily released a week after 50 Shades of Grey. WHILE WE’RE YOUNG (Noah Baumbach) I hear and understand people who object to the baffling moral of the bourgeois ending. The female characters are also a bit flat. But this remains the funniest analysis of contemporary hipster chic we have yet seen. Also very wise about the art of the documentary. A PIGEON SAT ON A BRANCH CONTEMPLATING EXISTENCE (Roy Andersson) Apparently some cretins in the Italian media have complained that, by awarding Andersson’s comic masterpiece top gong over Birdman, the folk at the Venice Film Festival failed to get into the Oscar prediction game. THESE PEOPLE! A bleakly hilarious end to a flawless trilogy. THE TRIBE (Myroslav Slaboshpytskiy) What a year the Critics Week had at Cannes last year. That under-exposed strand offered us It Follows and Slaboshpytskiy’s singular tale — told in Ukrainian sign language — of corrupt goings on at a school for the deaf. A brilliant conundrum composed of hugely complex, lengthy shots. A GIRL WALKS HOME ALONE AT NIGHT (Ana Lily Amirpour) Is there anything left to be done with the vampire movie? So it seems. Amirpour brings the mythology to a version of Iran that half-exists in southern California of frontier myth. A beautiful film that comes closes to being overpowered by its own cool, but just escapes. LONDON ROAD (Rufus Norris) Norris transfers his weird musical — culled from testimony of those around the 2006 Ipswich murders — with unexpected success and some cinematic flair. It’s a deeply unsettling work that somehow manages to find melodies for the most unharmonious thoughts. One of a kind. Olivia Colman predictably brilliant. The ones that nearly made it in (and might rally by the end of the year): Force Majeure, Mad Max Fury Road, Big Game, Unfriended, Catch Me Daddy, Inherent Vice, Slow West, The Look of Silence, Timbuktu, Whiplash, Selma, Am