Best of 2012: Sound Editing and Sound Mixing

Best Sound Editing

• The Grey - For the discomforting grisliness of the bone-crunching, the unrelenting elemental dangers of the survivors' surroundings, and the gnarling viciousness of their predators.

• Life of Pi - For oodles of dreamy riches the sound team captured for the film's aquatic soundscape, and all of those ripely textured animal sounds.

• The Turin Horse - For the bellowing blusters of those sizably apocalyptic winds, and all of the quotidian details of the father and daughter's life.

• Wuthering Heights - For minimalist achievement in capturing agitated nature that perfectly and thematically serve this cinematic treatment to Bronte's work.

• Zero Dark Thirty - For confirming how horrible waterboarding sounds and the disquieting affect of the gunshots in the film's titular action sequence.

 Honorable Mentions: (in alphabetical order) - The Amazing Spider-Man (even though I disliked the film a lot and found Sam Raimi's take on the web-shooting sound design much more vibrant); The Avengers; Brave; Django Unchained; Killer Joe; Looper; Moonrise Kingdom; Skyfall; The Snowtown Murders

Best Sound Mixing

• Moonrise Kingdom - For shimmering with the same amount of dioramic detail Anderson puts into his sets with a summery, campfire-centric sonic palette.

• The Snowtown Murders - For tone-setting incorporation of its seedy score and brilliant evocation of space which the film uses to swelteringly oppresive effect. (Which is meant in the best possible since.)

• Tabu - For nailing its very bold narrative gambit, blending bewitching African soundscape and beautifully composed narration (in lieu of dialogue) that linger over the intimately stark images.

• The Turin Horse - For taking those aforementioned apocalyptic winds and quotidian details and keeping them in a tight, tonally agonizing grip.

• Wuthering Heights - For serving the film's elemental fascination with cold, dilated atmosphere, incorporating such bold strokes with rustic melodies of its heavy downpours and barren fields.

Honorable Mentions: (in alphabetical order) - The Avengers; Battleship; The Deep Blue Sea; Django Unchained; End of Watch; Life of Pi; Looper; Miss Bala; Skyfall; Zero Dark Thirty

Best of 2012: Cinematography & Film Editing

Welcome back to my belated celebration of the best of 2012! Sorry it's been a while, but sickness and last week of classes before Spring Break kept me busy. Nevertheless, I'm back with two of my favorite categories!

Best Cinematography

• Alps - For enveloping us in its world of nervy unsustainability with bizarre, absurdist textures; and for crafting an appropriately alien surface in which to project them.

• The Master - Because while at times they feel impenetrable, each image (beautifully shot in 65mm) bursts with dream-like beauty and captivating surfaces.

• Skyfall - For crackling use of light in its setpieces (and an apt sense of pure sensuality). Deakins might be showing off, but it's a wonder of gobsmackingly beautiful lensing.

• Tabu - Speaking of gobsmackingly beautiful, Tabu, a film that swells with unapologetic romanticism in its images, uses gorgeous B&W to capture fragmented memories of the past and foggy loneliness of the present. Deserves much more than one sentence can give it.

• The Turin Horse - For apocalyptic sorrow in its wonderfully dreadful atmosphere and engaging mundanity in its compositions. Unrelenting work.

Honorable Mentions: In a year as strong as this one for cinematography, it killed me to leave off Wuthering Heights' brutal elemental awareness, The Snowtown Murders' well-earned sordid imagery, Beasts of the Southern Wild's magical naturalistic detail, Moonrise Kingdom's warm storybook aesthetics and human detail, and Once Upon a Time in Anatolia's hemispherical richness and ingenious natural lighting.

Best Film Editing

• How to Survive a Plague - For masterful arrangement of archival footage and emotionally-stirring confessionals that vividly insert us in this important place in history and tells a wholly rousing story while doing so.

• Moonrise Kingdom - For what some might call fussy preciosity I find to be quaintly immersive and  pleasantly paced storytelling. The letter montage is an utter delight.

• The Snowtown Murders - For an impeccable vice-grip on its complex narrative structure, slow-burn tension and eerie economy in claustrophobic dread that slowly slithers its way under your skin. 

• Tabu - For the profound dead air of "Paradise Lost" and the nostalgic liveliness of "Paradise." "Paradise" especially evokes an exciting free-flow of sensations.

• Zero Dark Thirty - For juggling a vast conduit of details while remaining light on its feet and assembling such a tight, muscular final act.

Honorable Mentions: Magic Mike for an eclectic array of surprises in its genre-weaving (from Mike's final dance to Adam's awry night of drug experimentation); Alps for a constant unspooling of new perspectives and wavy formal flow; Amour for surgical precision in its long takes and clinical cuts; and Oslo, August 31st for a mesmerizing and hypnotic tracking of a day in the life of Anders.