Top 15 of 2011 in Retrospect: Months Later

Many of you probably read my post of my favorite films from 2011 earlier this year.  Its taken me quite some time since then to watch all the movies that I wanted to see from that year though.  The earlier list was probably a bit premature since there have been a couple of films that I had to see later that I really enjoyed.  For this reason I'm updating my list with changes regarding these films and my overall consensus feeling towards films that did make the list.  2011 was unusual since many of its movies had long dvd shelf lives or pesky qualifying releases for the Oscars which made them unavailable to watch until mid 2012.  These include movies like Rampart, We Need to Talk About Kevin, and Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory.  Other movies, like Maragaret, received such puny theatrical releases that it was impossible to see them in 2011 and then their dvd release dates were many months later.

Bertrand Bonello's Cannes House of Tolerance wasn't even on my radar of a possible yearly favorite until I saw it in March.

I've also decided to split fiction narratives from non-fiction.  I've found it hard to reconcile differeing aspects of documentaries from fiction and they have different qualities which make them great.  Some of the documentaries from last year are my favorite documentaries of all time, but they weren't my favorite films from last year.  A split may just be an excuse of a way for me to add more movies to the list. 

Here is the new updated top 15 list of 2011.  Movies I hadn't seen yet by the time of my original list are bolded.

My Top 15- Fiction

1. Melancholia (Lars von Trier)
2. Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives (Apichatpong Weerasethakul)
3. A Separation (Asghar Farhadi)
4. The Tree of Life (Terrence Malick)
5. Weekend (Andrew Haigh)
6. Margaret (Kenneth Lonergan)
7. House of Tolerance (Bertrand Bonello)
8. The Artist (Michel Hazanvicius)
9. Another Earth (Mike Cahill)
10. Kaboom (Greg Araki)
11. The Skin I Live In (Pedro Almodovar)
12. Take Shelter (Jeff Nichols)
13. Drive (Nichols Winding Refn)
14. Le Havre (Aki Kaurismaki)
15. We Need to Talk About Kevin (Lynne Ramsay)

Best Documentaries
1. Senna (Asif Kapadia)
2. Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory (Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky)
3. Pina (Wim Wenders)
4. George Harrison: Living in a Material World (Martin Scorsese)
5. Tabloid (Errol Morris)

Just missing the cut were Martin Scorsese's Hugo, Lu Chuan's City of Life and Death, Richard Ayoade's Submarine, and Tomas Alfredson's Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy.