2) The Infinite Man
In a year that saw Bong Joon-Ho’s first English language film and Jonathan Glazer’s first steps into the remits of science fiction, there was one film in the sci-fi crowd that stood out more than anything. The Infinite Man is not an alien exploration of the modern day and it’s not a post-apocalyptic piece of bombasticism, yet in its own quiet and loving way, it managed to knock every other film I’d seen this year (save one) completely out of the park.
Melding indie rom-com eccentricities and mind-boggling time loops with the kind of effortless naturalism that has me worried about what’s going on in writer-director Hugh Sullivan’s head, The Infinite Man‘s ingenious and twisting screenplay is only matched by the beautiful, aching humanity at its core. This is a film that believes in love as much as it believes in smarts, boggling the mind and the tear ducts in equal measure, a piece of independent film at its most honest and brilliant.
Think of it as the sentimental but still whip-smart younger brother of Primer. Where Shane Carruth’s head-fucker wore trench coats in summer and listened to Joy Division, The Infinite Man is more of a Cure kind of kid, humming “Just Like Heaven” to itself as it writes crumby but adorable poetry to the latest in a long line of earnest and beautifully messy love affairs.