When it comes to the end of the year, it's easy to look back over the big cinematic releases and get a bit depressed. And from one angle that's certainly the case with 2014. The highest grossing movie of the year was the fourth entry in the abhorrent Transformers series, sappy teen dramas taking themselves way too seriously popped up with weekly regularity and long-running franchises were hampered by the studio-enforced decision of splitting movies in two. It's enough to make you forsake the whole medium. But to get waylaid by all that ignores that, while offering up some absolute dross, 2014 has been one of the strongest twelve months for cinema in a long time. Although going in it looked like a bit of a filler year before the franchise smörgåsbord of 2015 (it'd be easier to name the big series that aren't returning to screens next year), it's wound up offering up some films that are all-but destined to become all-time classics, and plenty of other enjoyable flicks besides. This makes picking out the year's best films incredibly enjoyable, but also incredibly frustrating; narrowing it down to just twenty a very hard task. After much deliberation and debate, here's the twenty best movies of 2014. It's worth noting that this list is based off UK release dates, so some movies that were released in other territories in 2013 may appear, and likewise some yet to reach the British Isles have obviously been omitted.
