February 28, 2018
Page 5
o PinionAted
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u niversal p iCtures
A black man’s experience of
racism is powerfully portrayed
by Daniel Kaluuya in ‘Get Out,’
an unconventional new horror
film voted best picture of 2017
by Portland Observer film
critic and Opinionated Judge
columnist Darleen Ortega.
photo by
‘Get Out” Best Film of 2017
As usual, the more than 150 films I saw
this year includes almost all of those that
populate most critics’ top 10 lists. My own
list of the year’s best films includes some
overlap -- but five of the films on my list
were virtually unrecognized by critics.
I’m left savoring a game-changing social
thriller, two important documentary exam-
inations of systemic injustice, an animated
celebration of Mexican culture, an aching-
ly beautiful love story, a biopic that breaks
the mold, and four features that engage
mightily with stories of the marginalized.
So here’s the whole list, with fuller de-
scriptions below:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
Get Out
The Unknown Girl
The Florida Project
Whose Streets?
Coco
Abacus: Small Enough to Jail
Call Me By Your Name
I, Daniel Blake
A Quiet Passion
Maudie
1. The top of my list has been reserved
for “Get Out” since I first saw it last
spring, and every one of the many times I
have seen it and thought about it since. Not
since “The Matrix” has a film spoken so
cannily about the things I experience most
profoundly; it would not be an exaggera-
tion to say that I think about “Get Out” (as
I do “The Matrix”) literally every day -- it
helps me make sense of my world, gives
me ways of explaining things I could never
quite explain before. It irks me to hear what
much of the mainstream press says about
this film (such as referring to it as “Jordan
Peele’s film about racial paranoia”)--and
yet that very blindness is a manifestation of
the so-far intractable dynamics of racism
that Peele has illustrated so astutely. His
film is an achievement in originality and
visionary writing and directing without
any parallel, and Daniel Kaluyah has more
than earned the title of best actor. Like the
very best films, “Get Out” deserves to be
named Best Picture for reasons we are not
yet ready to understand.
2. “The Unknown Girl” is a thriller
of the best kind; it captures some profound
spiritual truth. It is the work of the Bel-
gian writer-director brothers Jean-Pierre
and Luc Dardenne, who make absorbing
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