'Pan’s Labyrinth shows that the human monsters are far worse than the magical-world ones.'

Who needs an Oscar, Golden Globe or a Tony when you can have a Couch! DVD reviewer Steve Couch offers his awards for the best films of the last 12 months

Best Foreign Language film

An incredibly strong field in this category. In a normal year, any of the following would be a shoo-in to win: The Lives of Others; Pan’s Labyrinth; Volver; Letters From Iwo Jima. Yimou Zhang’s Curse of the Golden Flower wasn’t bad either, although not reaching the heights of Hero or House Of Flying Daggers.

My Damaris colleague Tony Watkins describes The Lives Of Others as probably the best film he’s seen in the last five years. Tony knows what he’s talking about when it comes to films, but nevertheless my award goes to Pan’s Labyrinth, which I found to be the more compelling experience. And it’s fun to annoy Tony.

• Click here to buy Focus: The Art and Soul of Cinema, Tony Watkins’ book on film

• Click here for a Damaris article on Pan’s Labyrinth

• Click here for a Damaris study guide on Volver

• Click here for a Damaris article on The Lives Of Others

• Click here for a Damaris article on Letters From Iwo Jima

Best Postmodern Fairy Tale

Pan’s Labyrinth would be a strong contender for this too, particularly as the human monsters are far worse than the magical-world ones.

But one of my arbitrary rules is that no film can win two of my categories, which leaves this as a straight fight between the delightful Hoodwinked and the quirky Stranger Than Fiction. On the basis of the sublime last half-hour, Stranger Than Fiction gets the nod.

Best Animated Film

OK, so this was the year of Shrek the Third and The Simpsons Movie. Battle of the heavyweights for this one, yes? No.Both of the big hitters underwhelmed me, although they are perfectly watchable. Hoodwinked, was one of my surprise favourites of the year, and well worth a watch if it passed you by.

• Click here for a Damaris article on Shrek the Third

Best sci-fi

If you don’t count Children of Men as sci-fi (which it kind of is and kind of isn’t), this is a head to head between Sunshine and Transformers. Only joking, it’s a walkover for Sunshine, even if the last reel is a little bit confusing at first viewing.

• Click here for a Damaris study guide on Children of Men

• Click here for a Damaris article on Children of Men

Best film about stage magicians

Moving swiftly past Mitchell and Webb’s Magicians, this is a showdown between The Prestige and The Illusionist. One starts in the world of smoke and mirrors and moves somewhere decidedly spookier; the other starts spookily and reveals itself to be smoke and mirrors. My vote goes with the former, so the prize goes to The Prestige. Ta-Dah!

Best film about cops

Gritty Americans or hilarious Brits: This comes down to Scorsese’s The Departed or Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright’s Hot Fuzz.

Hot Fuzz scores bonus points because Simon Pegg looked like footy legend Stuart Pearce in the jogging-round-the-village scenes, but I’m giving this to The Departed for two reasons: first of all, because it finally won Scorsese his long-overdue Oscar.

Secondly, the pressure of deadlines meant I had to watch the film one evening when my Mum was visiting. Her verdict was ‘once you get past the swearing, it’s quite a good story’. High praise indeed!

• Click here for a Damaris article about The Departed

• Click here for a Damaris article about Hot Fuzz

Best film about spies

Depends what you are looking for: if it’s moody and thoughtful, The Lives of Others –trumps The Good Shepherd. If you’re looking for action, then The Bourne Ultimatum beats Casino Royale (and Jason Bourne makes Bond look like Johnny English). The Lives Of Others is the most human of the four, and on that basis I’m giving it the award (just to keep Tony happy).

Best sequel

Another good reason for giving the award to The Lives Of Others in the previous category is that The Bourne Ultimatum is the only credible winner in this one.

Spider-Man 3 gets an honourable mention: it was better than most superhero flicks, but doesn’t live up to the high standards of its two predecessors.

By contrast, the third instalment of Jason Bourne’s one-man quest for identity is an edge-of-the-seat ride from start to breathtaking finish. More than that, it finds time for more substance and depth (as opposed to glamour and action) than the whole back-catalogue of Bond movies. Superb.

• Click here for a Damaris article on Spider-Man 3

Best mediocre sequel

In a year when almost all sequels disappointed, there can only be one winner. Fantastic 4: Rise of the Silver Surfer.

There are better films eligible for this category (lots of them). But Silver Surfer achieves the rare feat of being fair to middling and still being much better than the film that spawned it. Next time, they are aiming for ‘reasonable’.

• Click here for a Damaris article on Fantastic4: Rise of the Silver Surfer

Best Biopic:

A bumper crop of worthy contenders here. I am going to pass over The Queen (sorry, Ma’am), Amazing Grace (sorry, Christendom); Becoming Jane (sorry, Jane Austen fans) and Miss Potter (sorry, fans of Hamster-faced actresses). Instead the award goes to Last King Of Scotland (hoorah for, erm, mad, bloodthirsty dictators)

• Click here for a Damaris article on Last King Of Scotland

• Click here for a Damaris study guide on The Queen

• Click here for a Damaris study guide on Amazing Grace

• Click here for a Damaris article on Amazing Grace

• Click here for a Damaris study guide on Becoming Jane

• Click here for a Damaris article on Becoming Jane

Best Road Movie

Little Miss Sunshine was the first great DVD release of the year. You can’t go wrong with a dysfunctional family on their way to a junior beauty pageant. And the set-piece dance routine at the end of the film deserves an award all to itself. In fact…

Best Set Piece Dance Routine At A Junior Beauty Pageant

The one in Little Miss Sunshine. All film you are waiting to see just how wrong it’s going to be, and then it raises the bar of wrongness to a whole new level. Excruciatingly funny.

• Click here for a Damaris study guide on Little Miss Sunshine

Best War movie

It’s Clint versus Clint. Flags Of Our Fathers breaks out from the standard war movie template a little more than it’s Japanese counterpart Letters From Iwo Jima, but the latter has more heart and takes the award. If Clint had only made one of these – either one – it would have been rightly acclaimed. As a pair, they make a fascinating double bill.

• Click here for a Damaris article on Flags Of Our Fathers

Best Nostalgia-fest:

Starter For Ten made it feel like the 90s never happened. 80s music, student politics and – of course – the blessed Bamber. Who needs Paxman?

• Click here for a Damaris article on Starter For Ten

Best Political Movie

Blood Diamond raised issues and pulses in equal measure (although you don’t have to scratch far beneath the surface of The Bourne Ultimatum to find a serious political agenda).

• Click here for a Damaris study guide on Blood Diamond

• Click here for a Damaris article on Blood Diamond

Most divisive movie

The Fountain (although you may want to disagree). Depending on your point of view, this was either a profound treatise on existence and mortality, or an overblown heap of psychobabble hooey. Personally, in the words of Louie Walsh, I liked it.

Most incoherent mess of a movie

Some would argue for The Fountain in this category. I disagree. Although I understand why the nay-sayers say, er, nay, I think there is a clear line of thought running through The Fountain. The same cannot be said for Lady In The Water, much as I have defended M.Night Shyamalan in the past.

Top five DVD movies releases of 2007

1. Pan’s Labyrinth
2. The Bourne Ultimatum
3. Hot Fuzz
4. The Departed
5. Little Miss Sunshine

Honourable mentions to (in alphabetical order)

Blood Diamond; Last King of Scotland; The Lives of Others; The Prestige; Stranger Than Fiction.

To my mind, 2007 has been a much better year for films on DVD than 2006. I suspect that if any of the top ten listed above had been released a year earlier they would have found a place in 2006’s top five. Let’s hope for more of the same in 2008.

Person of the Year award

James McAvoy had a cracking year, starring or co-starring in Last King Of Scotland (which just missed a place in my top five), Starter For Ten and Becoming Jane.

He’s excellent in all of them, and if Atonement had managed a 2007 DVD release (it’s due in February 2008), he might have snatched the title out of Matt Damon’s vice-like grip. Damon features in two of my top five films (The Departed and The Bourne Ultimatum) as well as the aptly named The Good Shepherd and the not so good Ocean’s Thirteen.

• Other DVD recommendations
• surefish.co.uk culture index

Steve Couch is a writer for Damaris Trust