Top 10 Movies of 2011

Film critic Dana Stevens of Slate is out with her top-10 list for the year, though she says that pickings were generally slim in 2011. A sampling:

• Buck: This documentary by Cindy Meehl about Buck Brannaman, the real-life inspiration for the Horse Whisperer, includes an encounter with a nasty stallion and its owner that "made for some of the year's most affecting unscripted drama."
• Certified Copy: Abbas Kiarostami's film starring Juliette Binoche "is an insoluable puzzle of a movie about the insoluble puzzle of love." In other words, plan on two viewings.

• Rise of the Planet of the Apes: Yeah, much was typical blockbuster fare, but things changed whenever Caesar, played by Andy Sirkis in a motion-capture suit, came on screen. It "definitively established the mo-cap technique as an exciting new art form." Plus, the Golden Gate Bridge scene was terrific.
• Tree of Life: Not everything worked, but the middle part focusing on a Waco childhood "felt like a rediscovery (or maybe a reinvention) of what cinema was made to do."

Click for the full list. (More Best of 2011 stories.)