It's the 2014 Betters!

Our recurring film award show hops on the Carousel to honor 2014's best movies, performances, directors, and needle drops.

Welcome to the 2014 Better Awards! The word “annual” is withheld because we did this exercise just 5 months ago with our pal Michael. We had such a rousing time that bringing it back for our 2014 Carousel trip was a no doubter.

If you’re new here or could use a refresher, The Betters are a made up awards ceremony (that we take extremely seriously) named after our site, but in our heavily biased opinion, we also think they’re better than the Oscars. Remember in 2019 when the Academy failed to nominate Lupita Nyong’o for her bone-chilling turn in Us, and decided to nominate Charlize Theron for portraying Megyn Kelly in the same year? That’s the kind of stuff we don’t put up with.

2014 was a formative year for the Even Better duo as a couple of 20-year-old dudes who were falling in love with cinema. The 2014 Carousel gave us a welcome excuse to revisit some favorites from our cinematic boyhoods (aka when we first got deeper into movies) as well as discover gems we didn’t know existed at the time.

Without further ado…let’s get going!

Best Supporting Actress

Elliott: We could fill up both of these supporting categories with nothing but supporting turns in Inherent Vice and I’d still think highly of the lists. What supporting actress performances from 2014 jump out to you?

Shawn: Man, I could be content with any and all Inherent Vice turns showing up (maybe would be partial to Hong Chau for making me laugh harder than anyone in that movie — save for Brolin — with Katherine Waterston right there too). But this is the one place where I actually have to give it to the Oscars. Especially given that slate of noms, Patricia Arquette was and remains the right choice for that year. I think she has as strong a case as anybody to crack our lineup here too — what do you think?

Elliott: Patricia Arquette… (first introduced to me as Kissin’ Kate Barlow in 2003, one year after Boyhood started filming) congratulations…on not just the Oscar win, but your first Betters nomination! We know it’s a toss up on which achievement means more to you. 

Katherine Waterston has a huge task as Shasta Fay Hepworth in Inherent Vice, requiring a mythical and haunting residence throughout the film even when absent from the screen. When Shasta Fay appears like a ghost out of the past, we fully understand why Doc can’t seem to let her go. Waterston gives her presence a beguiling gravity and I gotta give the nod to her. I’m not ruling out a Hong Chau nom too (such a heat check performance), but this really is a loaded field…

Shawn: Unbelievably loaded. Seo Young-hwa is amazing in Hill of Freedom, making sense of the jumbled fragments right alongside us. And while we gave our boy Lee Kang-sheng his flowers with ease up there, I think fellow Tsai mainstay Yi-ching Lu is equally deserving for bringing such gentle notes to Stray Dogs. It’s easy to imagine the hackneyed American independent cinema version of that story (grocery clerk lends her humanity and maternal touch to two children who can’t find much of either at home), but she gracefully makes their world a bit less isolating.

Elliott: Seo Young-hwa and Yi-ching Lu attempt to bring stability to the restless men in their respective films. The same could (sort of) be said for Elisabeth Moss, giving a performance in Listen Up Philip that’s nearly worthy of and surely indebted to the films of John Cassavetes/performances of Gena Rowlands (RIP to the goat). There’s about a 20 minute stretch where Moss takes over the movie, and no shade to the always great and 2023 Betters nominee Jason Schwartzman, but it’s the highlight of the movie/one of the best stretches of the year. 

Shawn: After just catching up on this one, I could not be more with it. That means congratulations are in order for…

Winner: Elisabeth Moss for her first Betters award and nomination for Listen Up Philip!

Elisabeth Moss in Listen Up Philip

Nominees:

• Katherine Waterston — Inherent Vice

• Patricia Arquette — Boyhood

• Seo Young-hwa — Hill of Freedom

• Yi-ching Lu — Stray Dogs

• Elisabeth Moss — Listen Up Philip

Best Supporting Actor

Shawn: Tyler Perry, you may never be nominated for an acting Academy Award…yet I think you might be seriously in the mix for a Betters nomination?

Elliott: As long as I’ve known you Shawn, we’ve gotten along swimmingly. Nothing but positive things to say about my Even Better partner. But if you were to deny Tyler Perry this Betters nomination, I think we’d experience the first real thorn in our friendship. Thankfully I’m getting defensive for no reason as I know we both love everything Perry brings to the table in Gone Girl. I couldn’t believe the news when I heard Perry was cast, and now I can’t imagine anybody else in his role as a slimy defense lawyer.

Josh Brolin as Lieutenant Detective Christian F. “Bigfoot” Bjornson in Inherent Vice feels like the other shoo-in, a real contender for my favorite performance of the year. Who else would you make the case for? 

Shawn: For my Oscar overlap pick here, I’ll hand one to Ethan Hawke in Boyhood, who on rewatch holds together that film’s greatest strengths (hilarious bits of tossed-off wisdom, and interrupting the sometimes overcooked dramatic beats). For the less Oscar-friendly pick, I’m looking at Bill Paxton in Edge of Tomorrow, who reorients the kind of Tom Cruise movie (and performance) we’re watching here, while proving you can successfully Full Metal Jacket our biggest movie star without a bunch of annoying quips.

Elliott: Terrific and worthy additions. I nearly went with Patrick d'Assumçao for his grounding presence in Stranger on the Lake, but I want to honor Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje. Despite what the haters say, multiple Paul Andersons released great films in 2014, and Akinnuoye-Agbaje is a huge reason for why W.S. Anderson’s Pompeii is so moving. Part gladiator tale, part disaster epic, Pompeii powerfully posits that death is the great equalizer, and Akinnuoye-Agbaje embodies the human spirit that will fight, but ultimately heroically accept our universal end. He’s also badass as hell in it.

Shawn: Love the pick. But I think this is our place to honor possibly the greatest performance in one of the year and decade’s best movies. That’s right…

Winner: The Better for Best Supporting Actor goes to Josh Brolin for Inherent Vice!

Josh Brolin in Inherent Vice

Nominees:

• Tyler Perry — Gone Girl

• Ethan Hawke — Boyhood

• Bill Paxton — Edge of Tomorrow

• Josh Brolin — Inherent Vice

• Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje — Pompeii

Best Actor

Elliott: I guess the question is… who are the four that are gonna be joining our main man Lee Kang-sheng?

Shawn: He’s basically the Daughtry of the group, a no-doubter lock who could possibly see anything less than the top prize as a snub. As the heart and soul of Stray Dogs, turning in one of his most physically demanding roles (with some of the more grotesque food moments) I’ve seen to date, that one’s easy. But how about the heart and soul of The Grand Budapest Hotel in Ralph Fiennes? And what do we think of the slightly less soulful, but no less hilarious, bone-dry stuff from Ben Affleck in Gone Girl?

Elliott: Yes and yes. You’re higher than me on Grand Budapest but you won’t catch me pushing back on Fiennes’ performance. He balances classic Hollywood screwball wit and physicality with heart-stopping delicacy. And then Affleck gets in of course, as certainly the best casting of a hunky movie star as an aloof husband in a pitch black comedy about the terrors of marriage since Tom Cruise in Eyes Wide Shut? “We should go to Outback tonight” alone is worthy of a Betters nom.

That puts us at 3. Any other favorites in this category that you can’t imagine omitting? 

Shawn: Well, in the present he’s a movie-tanking diva and liability before production even starts, but in 2014, Joaquin Phoenix probably delivered the very best performance of his career in Inherent Vice? He’s so dialed into this movie’s shifts from goofy madcap physical sequences to the languid, stoned confusion and longing that ground its dramatic arc. Maybe more of a bubble pick, but if there’s a spot to recognize another movie with a comedic, destabilizing narrative, I could be convinced to hand Ryo Kase the nod for Hong Sang-soo’s Hill of Freedom. What say you?

Elliott: What I say is I don’t have much to say. We’re in lockstep with our picks. Phoenix and Ryo Kase round out the crew. Though they’ll have to be satisfied with the nomination alone because they won’t be taking the trophy home…

Winner: The Better for Best Actor in a Lead Role goes to Lee Kang-sheng for Stray Dogs!

Lee Kang-sheng in Stray Dogs

Nominees:

• Lee Kang-sheng — Stray Dogs

• Ralph Fiennes — The Grand Budapest Hotel

• Ben Affleck — Gone Girl

• Joaquin Phoenix — Inherent Vice

• Ryo Kase — Hill of Freedom

Best Actress

Shawn: The Oscars corresponding with 2014 finally crowned a legend in this category (Julianne Moore) for a considerably less than legendary performance (Still Alice). I’d be surprised if she turns up here, but who do you like as our Best Actress frontrunners?

Elliott: Sorry to Ms. Moore but this is not her year at the Betters (look for her at the 2015 Betters though when she’s eligible for Maps to the Stars 👀). There’s a couple I could see us aligning on — both with each other and the Academy — Rosamund Pike (Gone Girl) and Marion Cotillard (Two Days One Night). The Oscars left off who may be our mutual frontrunner however. I’ll give you a hint: she’s married to an SNL Weekend Update host that isn’t Michael Che. And just in case that hint isn’t enough, she’s in We Bought a Zoo. 

Shawn: Damn I didn’t know Jost got hitched to Crystal the Monkey! Really though, Scarlett Johansson reached a career apex in Under the Skin, grounding that movie’s chilly, unfeeling desolation. Watching the contours of that performance shift and expand as her character (credited as “The Female”) develops something like a consciousness rivals anything else in 2014. But those other two are the bona fide contenders for me too, with Cotillard pulling double duty in Two Days, One Night and The Immigrant. This is the one category where my memory (and catch-up watches) are coming up a bit empty, so I’ll send it right back to you. Who sticks out to you from some of your more recent watches?

Elliott: French actor Louis Garrel starred in his father Philippe’s film Jealousy, but it’s his love interest/co-lead Anna Mouglalis that lingers with me. So convincing is her character at fooling us and herself that she’s happy, only for that facade to crumble in an instant several times over. Mouglalis dances with discontentment in all too relatable ways. And I’ll give the last slot to Japanese musician/actress Atsuko Maeda for her role in Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s Seventh Code, traveling to Russia and obsessing over a businessman she met in Tokyo just one time. Maeda is entrancing throughout, but it’s in the film’s final stretch that we’re bowled over by her deception of the characters and the audience alike.

You’ve got the envelope Shawn. Who takes home the prize?

Winner: My eyes see Scarlett Johansson for Under the Skin!

(The Betters orchestra begins to play Mica Levi’s deathly unnerving “Death” composition from the Under the Skin score as Johansson strolls to the stage.)

Scarlett Johansson in Under the Skin

Nominees:

• Rosamund Pike — Gone Girl

• Marion Cotillard — Two Days, One Night

• Scarlett Johansson — Under the Skin

• Anna Mouglalis — Jealousy

• Atsuko Maeda — Seventh Code

Best Director

Elliott: This is stupid. We’ve got an unbelievably stacked group of candidates. I first proposed that we dish out 10 nominations for 2014 best director, but I’m glad you talked me out of it. That’s the easy route and that’s not what The Betters are about. You and I could debate this forever so I’m going to propose a speed round for the first 4 of 5 nominees. I’ll say a director that I think should be in, then you do the same. We do that once more and then we’ll agree (or argue) on who should be the 5th, and also give the option for any last minute swaps. Deal?

Shawn: I’ll take the deal Howie.

Elliott: Okay. Jean-Luc Godard for Goodbye to Language. 

Shawn: In the interest of our #1s making the cut, I’ll take Wes for Grand Budapest.

Elliott: Tsai Ming-liang for Stray Dogs. Obviously.

Shawn: PTA and Inherent Vice, welcome to the roster. Now it gets dicey.

Elliott: So dicey. Gone Girl is Fincher’s apex in my opinion. Linklater does what only he could do in Boyhood. Abel Ferrara (Welcome to New York), Paul W.S. Anderson (Pompeii), Farah Khan (Happy New Year), Alice Rohrwacher (The Wonders), Hong Sang-soo (Hill of Freedom)…all of these are Betters-worthy in most years and deserve a shoutout. But I find one voice is separating himself from the field — that man is Jonathan Glazer for Under the Skin. 

Shawn: You know, we talked about ScarJo reaching a career apex in that same movie, and despite his short-but-stellar resume, I think Glazer does the same. No disrespect to the other contenders, who turn in strong work if not at the absolute peak of their powers in every case. So then there’s the issue of narrowing this ridiculously loaded field to one winner…

Elliott: We’ve deliberated behind the scenes and made our most difficult decision of the awards. The Betters are presenting this Betters trophy to a filmmaker who, 55 years into directing films, gave us something that still pushed the medium forward into entirely fresh terrain. I feel confident in saying that we’ll be wrestling with this picture for the rest of our lives, something that can’t be said for much else here, as strong as the field is.

Winner: The Better for Best Director goes to the God himself… Jean-Luc Godard for Goodbye to Language!

Nominees:

• Paul Thomas Anderson — Inherent Vice

• Wes Anderson— The Grand Budapest Hotel

• Jonathan Glazer — Under the Skin

• Jean-Luc Godard — Goodbye to Language

• Tsai Ming-liang — Stray Dogs

Best Picture

Below you‘ll find our individual top 10s for 2014. But whenever we do this exercise, we want to agree on a Best Picture winner. We didn’t even have a conversation about who would take the 2014 top prize though. We both knew. I mean, we went back and forth raving about it earlier this month!

The Better for Best Picture of 2014 goes to…Paul Thomas Anderson’s Inherent Vice! Moto Pannukeiku!!

Now to our personal lists:

Shawn’s Top 10:

1. The Grand Budapest Hotel

2. Under the Skin

3. Inherent Vice

4. Boyhood

5. Stray Dogs

6. Gone Girl

7. Goodbye to Language

8. Edge of Tomorrow

9. Two Days, One Night

10. Jersey Boys

Elliott’s Top 10:

1. Inherent Vice

2. Gone Girl

3. Stray Dogs

4. Welcome to New York

5. Hill of Freedom

6. Goodbye to Language

7. Under the Skin

8. Happy New Year

9. Pompeii

10. The Wonders

If you’d like to see my longer nerdy list of favorites on Letterboxd: click here

Bonus Better! Best Needle Drops: TIE…Boyhood and Inherent Vice

Boyhood

Shawn: “Hate It Here” by Wilco: Watching Boyhood as a 20-year-old is about relating heavily to Mason’s life (waiting in line at midnight for Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, being annoying). But watching Boyhood at 30 is all about feeling closer to Ethan Hawke as Mason Sr. (waxing poetic about Sky Blue Sky-era Wilco having the simplicity of modern Beatles songs).

Elliott: “Crank That (Soulja Boy)” by Soulja Boy: This deployment of the Soulja Boy classic manages to capture what it feels like when a girl passes you a note in class telling you that your new haircut is “kewl :)” AND what it’s like to skate around and shoot the shit with the boys.

Inherent Vice

Shawn: “Vitamin C” by Can: The moment when PTA became a needle drop guy. Doc stumbles after Shasta’s car, for the last time he’ll see her before her grand disappearance. Then “Vitamin C” simmers in gently, swelling to its crest right as the title card flashes green on the screen. Hits like a ton of bricks every time.

Elliott: “Journey Through the Past” by Neil Young: A fitting needle drop to go with our Carousel month and how Don Draper describes nostalgia: “nostalgia literally means the pain from an old wound, it’s a twinge in your heart, far more powerful than memory alone.” Few films capture nostalgia better than Inherent Vice, and no scene embodies it more than the Ouija board/running in the rain sequence set to Neil Young’s heart-tugger.