Time seems to be really good at sneaking up on people, and for a lot of us here at Way Too Indie it was hard to believe that our little site has been running for five years (Happy Anniversary to us!). We weren’t sure on what the best way to celebrate our anniversary month could be, but then it suddenly hit us: Way Too Indie’s 5th anniversary just so happens to fall on the halfway point of the decade.

So we spent most of the last 2 months putting together our collective list of the best 50 films of the decade so far. After a lot of deliberating and discussing, we compiled this list of 50 films that came out between 2010 and 2014 (Note: we went by original release date, not US, meaning some films like Dogtooth and A Prophet couldn’t make the cut). These are the films we love, cherish, and will remember years and years from now. A lot has changed with film in the last 5 years, but the quality of the creative output only seems to keep getting better. Here’s to an amazing first half of the decade, and let’s hope the next five years lead to even bigger and better things.

Each day this week we will reveal ten films from our list of 50, so check back tomorrow for the next group of films.

Best 50 Movies Of The Decade So Far
(#50 – #41)

Argo

This 2012 political thriller won Ben Affleck the Oscar for Best Picture but that wouldn’t have guaranteed it a spot on this list. What really put it over the edge were a number of factors including the combined talents of Bryan Cranston, Alan Arkin, and John Goodman. My favorite moments of the movie were all of the ones with them in it. Though Argo has been criticized for taking some all too common Hollywood liberties with the truth, such as minimizing the role of the Canadian Embassy in the rescue, it’s success in revisiting a moment in our history whose details had only been made known to the public when the classified documents were published in 1997 made it a film worthy of note and attention for it’s portrayal of CIA exfiltration specialist Tony Mendez’s unconventional attempt to rescue members of the US Embassy in Iran taken hostage during the revolution. [Scarlet]

Beasts of the Southern Wild

Beasts of the Southern Wild’s biggest achievement is its ability to create a world that is both fantastical and grimly realistic. Benh Zeitlin’s Hurricane Katrina parable plays as a fantasy, but doesn’t wash away the serious realities facing the people in this environment. Enhancing the world-building is the community of actors (in many cases, non-actors) who feel authentic but are never looked down on. Honestly, I have nothing in common with these characters and don’t have any contact with the real-life versions of them, but I’m able to live in this world for 90 minutes. This community is strong, happy, unwilling to be changed or catered to. Some have complained that this approach feels like a grotesque travelogue for privileged outsiders to connect with the less fortunate, but I think that is a grave exaggeration. Perhaps I could see that a little more if there wasn’t as much soul in the work. Beside its wonderful magical realism, Beasts of the Southern Wild is grounded in the relationship between Hush Puppy and Wink, with powerful performances from Quvenzhané Wallis and Dwight Henry. [Aaron]

Toy Story 3

For all of its technological greatness, Pixar Animation’s first film, 1995’s Toy Story, was also a triumph in the story it told—a story embracing nostalgia (with ample pathos) and doing so without schmaltz or contrivance. After A Bug’s Life came 1999’s Toy Story 2, which is remarkable as both a glorious stand-alone tale (this time about commodifying nostalgia) and one of those rare better-than-the-original sequels. The studio’s next seven films would offer an embarrassment of creative and original riches: Monsters, Inc., Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, Cars, Ratatouille, WALL-E, and Up. But for their 11th film, the studio knew it had one more great tale to tell from the toy box, and Toy Story 3 turned out to be the best of the trilogy, continuing its path down nostalgia lane to…the lane’s end. It’s heartbreaking farewell to nostalgia—a farewell born of something as normal and natural as growing up, summoned forth the heaviest of tears in a collection of films rich with Kleenex-demanding moments. There’s now a Toy Story 4 in the works, and while my knee-jerk reaction is to scoff at the notion of another sequel, Pixar’s handling of Woody, Buzz, and friends has not let me down yet; in fact, it has only ever lifted me up. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have something in my eye. [Michael]

Winter’s Bone

Debra Granik had only directed one other film when her indie Winter’s Bone came out. Starring the yet-to-be national treasure Jennifer Lawrence, then relatively unknown, the film was a sleeper. The kind that had a general buzz, though no real commercial success, following its Sundance premiere and a Grand Jury Prize win. After all, a backcountry noir taking place in the bluish bleak Ozarks following a teenager looking for her missing father among her rather sinister meth-making family, was never going to be the family-fun hit of the summer. And while we’re grateful for this film catapulting J-Law into the serious film world (and earning a first Oscar nomination), what makes Winter’s Bone deserving of this list is that Granik created an enthralling mystery propelled by the immense talent of all its performers (though, definite shout out to John Hawkes and all his cigarette smoking). Up until its last shocking moments the film captivates. Most especially by Lawrence’s Ree Dolly, a feminist heroine holding her own among bumpkins, addicts, liars, and her own evil family. Watching a man endure what she faces would surely not have been as compelling. Winter’s Bone is a film of strength and artistry, a time-tested combination. [Ananda]

Leviathan

Harvard’s Sensory Ethnography Lab (official site) has been home to some seriously innovative and aesthetically astute moving images since 2007. It wasn’t until 2012, however, that whispers of this wondrous Lab began to resonate wider in the film world, when Lucien Castaing-Taylor (director of SEL, and professor of Visual Arts and Anthropology at Harvard) and Véréna Paravel got together and created something wholly extraterrestrial in feel. Leviathan is a documentary (though that term is used very loosely when labeling anything that comes out of SEL) that follows a fishing trawler in the dead of night, as it goes about its unceremonious business. With freewheeling cameras strapped to the boat, at times operated by fishermen, or seemingly capsized on the murky surface of the ocean, Leviathan tethers the audience to the experience of industrial fishing, and to the beasts and humans who all play a role in the cruel theatre of unrestrained nature. It’s a viewing experience unlike any other of the decade so far, and is the furthest one could get from conventional, mainstream, filmmaking. Unforgettable, transportive, and frantically cinematic, Leviathan breathes through celluloid, drowning our senses in saltwater and the glory of filmmaking. [Nik]

Amour

Michael Haneke’s Amour might be a slow-burner, but it packs one hell of a mean emotional punch. The film features two brilliant performances from Emmanuelle Riva and Jean-Louis Trintignant, who play an elderly couple madly in love with each other. The film defines what true love means, especially after the wife suffers from multiple strokes and the husband attends to her without feeling an ounce of burden. Haneke gambles by heavily implying how this will end from the opening scene, but his masterful presentation in this gorgeous foreign saga is anything but a wager. This may be Haneke’s most accessible film to date, earning the auteur the first Oscar nominations of his career. Amour is an emotionally charged love story that’s both inspirational and devastating, and if by the end you haven’t teared up at least once, you are a robot. [Dustin]

Oslo, August 31st

Joachim Trier’s Oslo, August 31st, while not at the top of this list, is certainly one of the most devastating films of the last five years. Taking place over a day in Oslo, the film follows Anders (Anders Danielsen Lie), a 34-year-old recovering addict trying to start his life over. Anders constantly teeters right on the edge of relapse, but the things driving him back to taking drugs are the sorts of universal issues films rarely address with this much potency. It’s about trying to move on from your mistakes when everything around you serves as a reminder of your past. It’s about seeing everyone you know leaving you behind as they figure their own lives out. It’s about spending every waking minute thinking about any life but your own. Oslo, August 31st is a film about failure, and one of the only films to deal with this topic in such a nuanced, sympathetic and realistic manner. [CJ]

Stray Dogs

Taiwanese director Tsai Ming-liang’s Stray Dogs is a cavernous picture about a family scraping through the world inch by inch, tearing themselves to the bone. Lee Kang-sheng plays a homeless man who feeds his two children by holding up advertisement placards at a busy intersection all day, rain or shine (and boy do we see it rain). He and his kids squat in a dank abandoned building by night, bathe in public restrooms, and are forced to scrounge for their dinner. There’s a woman involved, too, but it’s not clear who she is, exactly. Is she the mother? A guardian angel? What makes things even murkier is that she’s played by three separate actresses. Ming-liang has a proclivity for insanely long takes, ten minute-plus static shots that achieve a level of intimacy only found in the corner of cinema he’s dug out for himself. Stray Dogs has a few of them, and they’re astonishing (especially the film’s final shot, which crushes the heart harder with each passing second). What’s remarkable about the film is that it forces you to take a long, hard, unblinking look at the nightmare of abject poverty, an issue we’ve all been conditioned to walk away from. It’s a devastating experience, and a stunningly beautiful one, too. [Bernard]

The Babadook

Good horror movies scare you with the unreal. Great horror movies terrify with the real. Jennifer Kent’s The Babadook does both. The writer/director sets us up and wears us out with a very real, first-half study of a mother’s descent into parental madness. Amelia (Essie Davis) is a tired single mom with a thankless job, inconsiderate friends, a flatlined love life, and a hyper kid. She is also a woman whose husband was killed in a car accident six years prior while en route to deliver that kid, leaving an ever-present—and always discomforting—sense of resentment that a mother should never feel towards her child. And that child is a handful—always at full volume and always full speed, ranting and raving and railing against a monster that doesn’t exist. Yet. Then the unreal occurs and the monster manifests itself from one of the simplest joys of childhood and one of the great mother/child relationship conduits: a children’s book. No sooner does Amelia wither from tired to exhausted, she must dig deep to find indefatigable to save her son and herself. [Michael]

Moneyball

It’s rare for a sports drama to discover untouched terrain within its genre. Story after story following ragtag bunches forming bonds to overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles have played out so often in movies that the entire sports genre is often discarded sight unseen. Moneyball proves the exception to this unstated rule by largely moving the action away from the baseball diamond and into the executive conference rooms. Tracking often-derided Oakland Athletics’ general manager Billy Beane (Brad Pitt) at the forefront of a burgeoning sports analytics movement, the sharp dialog in Aaron Sorkin’s script communicates the intricacies of “Moneyball” without becoming lost in a haze of batting percentages or average WAR scores. Moneyball makes the story of a sports executive engaging by illustrating the relationship dynamics Beane navigates between himself and members of his organization, as well as executives outside of the Oakland A’s. Seeing Beane negotiate, and attempt to influence the sports culture within his club makes a mostly unnoticed aspect of team sports appear just as vital as it is fascinating in the film. [Zachary]

See the rest of our Best Movies Of The Decade lists!

View Other Lists of this Feature:
Best 50 Movies Of The Decade So Far (#40 – #31)
Best 50 Movies Of The Decade So Far (#30 – #21)
Best 50 Movies Of The Decade So Far (#20 – #11)
Best 50 Movies Of The Decade So Far (#10 – #1)

Winter’s Bone will likely be the film most people never heard of that is up for the 2011 Best Picture Award. In terms of the other nine films up for Best Picture, it did not generate nearly the amount of hype in Hollywood. The story is a little different in indie-land as it did receive the most nominations of the Independent Spirit Awards and was a double prize winner at Sundance 2010.

Based on the novel by Daniel Woodrell, Winter’s Bone is about a 17 year-old girl named Ree Dolly (Jennifer Lawrence). She is in charge of the household by taking care of her little brother and sister and her mentally absent mother. This all takes place in the poor rural area of the Ozarks.

The local Sheriff shows up at their home and inform Ree that her father, Jessup Dolly, is now out on bond because he is cooking meth again. He explains that if he does not show up for his court date, she will lose the house and land because he put those up on the bond. Ree confidently tells the lawman she will find him.

She is determined to find her father, so she takes it upon herself to go around town asking if anyone has seen him only to end up with the same answer over and over, stay out of his business. No one seems to want to help her out but she is persistent. Her determination is less of a choice as it is a responsibility, after all her brother and sister depend on her to put food on the table and roof over their heads.

Jessup’s brother Teardrop (John Hawkes) stops by to tell Ree that Jessup did not show up for his court date. He urges her to sell the woods for the money before the government takes it away. She quickly declines. But later it does cross her mind as she slowly begins to accept she may not find her father at all, let alone alive.

Desperate for answers on what to do next, she goes as far as to ask her mother for advice. Pleading with her to help her out just this one time. This is hard for her to do because of her mother’s condition; she knew she would not get an answer. But it is hard for her also because it is against her basic philosophy. Earlier in the film Ree tells her brother, “Never ask for what ought to be offered” which she is clearly doing. It is easily one of the most emotional scenes as her mother continues to stare off and ignore her.

A bondsman shows up to tell Ree that her father never showed up for his court date. This comes as little surprise to Ree. The bondsman goes on to tell her that even with the land, Jessup was short on bond. Out of nowhere an anonymous person came in and covered the rest in crinkled money. This means that someone wanted Jessup out quickly and this provides Ree with a stronger lead. She will need it as the bondsman informs her that she has about a week left before the property is gone.

In almost any other year, Jennifer Lawrence would have probably have received an Oscar for her performance as Rolly Dee. Unfortunately for her, this year she was up against some stiff competition from Annette Bening, Nicole Kidman, Michelle Williams and the favorite to win, Natalie Portman. The role is not an easy one, playing a 17 year-old hillbilly who is in charge of the household. She also had to learn how to skin squirrels, chop wood and fight for her role in the film.

Debra Granik’s Winter’s Bone came up a little short for me but maybe that is because the terrific acting surpassed the sluggish storyline. What it did do right though, is give off a genuine feel with a chilling conclusion. There is no glamour shown in the film but these characters are not used to seeing any either.

There were a total of 615 films that have been released in 2010. Here is the total list alphabetically, in case you need to make a Top 10 of 2010 or if you were at all curious (courtesy of indieWire).

[Rec] 2
127 Hours
16 to Life
180 South
2012: Time for Change
3 Billion and Counting
44 Inch Chest
45365
8: The Mormon Proposition

A Film Unfinished
A Film With Me in It
A Marine Story
A Mother’s Courage: Talking Back to Autism
A Nightmare on Elm Street
A Prophet
A Room and a Half
A Small Act
A Woman, a Gun and a Noodle Shop
A Year Ago in January
After the Cup: Sons of Sakhnin United
After.Life
Agora
Ahead of Time
Ajami
Alamar
Alice in Wonderland
Alien Girl
All Good Things
Alpha and Omega 3D
Altiplano
American Radical: The Trials of Norman Finkelstein
And Everything Is Going Fine
Animal Kingdom
Another Year
Anton Chekhov’s The Duel
Applause
Around a Small Mountain
As Good as Dead
Atithi Tum Kab Jaoge?
Audrey the Trainwreck

Babies
Barefoot to Timbuktu
Barking Water
Barney’s Version
Bearcity
Beautiful Islands
Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo
Behind the Burly Q
Beijing Taxi
Beneath the Dark
Best Worst Movie
Between Two Worlds
Biker Fox
Bitch Slap
Bitter Feast
Biutiful
Black Swan
Blood Done Sign My Name
Blue Valentine
Bluebeard
Boogie Woogie
Boxing Gym
Bran Nue Dae
Break ke Baad
Breaking Upwards
Breath Made Visible
Broderskab
Brooklyn’s Finest
Brotherhood
Budrus
Buried
Burlesque
Burzynski

Ca$h
Cairo Time
Carbon Nation
Carlos
Carmo, Hit the Road
Case 39
Casino Jack
Casino Jack and the United States of Money
Catfish
Cats & Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore
Centurion
Chain Letter
Chance Pe Dance
Charlie St. Cloud
Cherry
Children of Invention
Chloe
Circle
City Island
Clash of the Titans
Clear Blue Tuesday
Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzer
Coco Chanel and Igor Stravinsky
Come Undone
Con Artist
Convention
Conviction
Cool It
Cop Out
Countdown to Zero
Country Strong
Crazy on the Outside
Creation
Cropsey
Cyrus

Dabangg
Daddy Longlegs
Daddy’s Home
Dancing Across Borders
Daniel and Ana
Date Night
Daybreakers
DDR/DDR
De Mai Tinh
Deadfall Trail
Dear John
Death at a Funeral
Defendor
Delta
Despicable Me
Devil
Diary of a Wimpy Kid
Dinner for Schmucks
Disco and Atomic War
District B13 – Ultimatum
Dogtooth
Don McKay
Double Take
Double Tide
Douchebag
Down Terrace
Dream Boy
Dreamkiller
Due Date
Dulha Mil Gaya

Easier with Practice
Easy A
Eat Pray Love
Eccentricities of a Blonde-haired Girl
Edge of Darkness
Eichmann
Enemies of the People
Enter the Void
Entre Nos
Etienne!
Everyone Else
Everything Strange and New
Exit Through the Gift Shop
Expecting Mary
Extraordinary Measures
Eyes Wide Open

Fair*Game
Falling Awake
Farewell
Faster
Finding Bliss
Fish Tank
Flipped
Flooding with Love for the Kid
Floored
For Colored Girls
For My Father
Formosa Betrayed
Four Lions
Frankie and Alice
Freakonomics
Fresh
From Paris With Love
Frozen
Furry Vengeance

Garbage Dreams
GasLand
Genius Within: The Inner Life of Glenn Gould
George A. Romero’s Survival of the Dead
Get Him to the Greek
Get Low
GhettoPhysics: Will the Real Pimps and Ho’s Please Stand Up?
Ghost Bird
God of Vampires
Godspeed
Going Blind
Going the Distance
Gravity Was Everywhere Back Then
Great Directors
Green Zone
Greenberg
Grown Ups
Gulliver’s Travels
Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench
Guzaarish

Hadewijch
Handsome Harry
Happiness Runs
Happy Tears
Harimaya Bridge, The
Harlan: In the Shadow of Jew Suss
Harlem Aria
Harry Brown
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part I
Hatchet II
Have You Heard from Johannesburg?
Heartbreaker
Heartless
Helen
Hell on Wheels
Hemingway’s Garden of Eden
Henri-Georges Clouzot’s Inferno
Here and There
Hereafter
Hideaway
Hiding Divya
Holy Rollers
Honeymoons
Hot Summer Days
Hot Tub Time Machine
House
How Do You Know
How to Train Your Dragon
Howl
Hubble 3D
Hugh Hefner: Playboy, Activist, Rebel

I Am Love
I Love You Phillip Morris
I Spit on Your Grave
I Want Your Money
I’m Still Here
Idiots and Angels
In My Sleep
In My Sleep
In Search of Memory
Inception
Inhale
Inside Job
Inspector Bellamy
Iron Man 2
Ishqiya
It Came from Kuchar
It’s a Bash!
It’s Kind of a Funny Story

Jack Goes Boating
Jackass 3D
Jean-Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child
Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work
John Rabe
Jolene
Jonah Hex
Just Say Love
Just Wright
Karthik Calling Karthik
Kawasaki’s Rose
Kick-Ass
Killers
Kimjongilia
Kings of Pastry
Kings of the Evening
Kisses
Kites
Knight and Day

La Mission
Last Train Home
Lbs.
Leap Year
Leaves of Grass
Leaving
Lebanon
Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole 3D
Legendary
Legion
Leonard Cohen Live at the Isle of Wight 1970
Let Me In
Letters to Father Jacob
Letters to God
Letters to Juliet
Life As We Know It
Life During Wartime
Like Dandelion Dust
Little Fockers
Living in Emergency
Logan
Looking for Eric
Lottery Ticket
Lourdes
Love & Other Drugs
Love Ranch
Lovely, Still
Lovers of Hate

MacGruber
Machete
Made in Dagenham
Mademoiselle Chambon
Make-Out with Violence
Making Plans for Lena
Manuela and Manuel
Mao’s Last Dancer
Marmaduke
Mars
Marwencol
Megamind
Mercy
Meskada
Mesrine: Killer Instinct
Mesrine: Public Enemy Number One
Micmacs
Mid-August Lunch
Middle Men
Midnight Reckoning
Milh Hadha al-Bahr
Milk and Money
Mine
Misconceptions
Modern Love Is Automatic
Modus Operandi
Monsters
Morning Glory
Mother
Mother and Child
Mugabe and the White African
Multiple Sarcasms
Mundane History
Murder in Fashion
Music Makes a City
My Dog Tulip
My Name is Khan
My Soul to Take
My Year Without Sex

N-Secure
Nanny McPhee Returns
Ne change rien
Nénette
Neshoba: The Price of Freedom
Never Let Me Go
Night Catches Us
Nine Nation Animation
No One Knows About Persian Cats
Nobody’s Perfect
North Face
Nothing Personal
Nowhere Boy
Nuremberg restoration
NY Export: Opus Jazz

Ocean of Pearls
Oceans
October Country
Off and Running
Ondine
Only When I Dance
Open Five
Open Five
Operation: Endgame
Order of Chaos
Our Beloved Month of August
Our Family Wedding

Paranormal Activity 2
Patrik, Age 1.5
Peepli Live
Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief
Perrier’s Bounty
Phish 3D
Phyllis and Harold
Picasso & Braque Go to the Movies
Picture Me: A Model’s Diary
Piranha 3D
Please Give
Pop Star on Ice
Pornography: A Thriller
Preacher’s Kid
Predators
Primal
Prince of Broadway
Prince of Persia: Sands of Time
Princess Kaiulani
Prodigal Sons
Punching the Clown

Queen of the Lot

Raavan
Rabbit à la Berlin
Rabbit Hole
Race to Nowhere
Rachel
Racing Dreams
Rajneeti
Ramona and Beezus
Rann
Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale
RED
Red Alert: The War Within
Red Birds
Red Hill
Red Riding: 1974
Red Riding: 1980
Red Riding: 1983
Red White & Blue
Remember Me
Repo Men
Resident Evil: Afterlife 3D
Restrepo
Robert Jay Lifton: Nazi Doctors
Robin Hood
Rosencrantz and Guildenstein are Undead
Rush: Beyond the Lighted Stage

S&Man
Saint John of Las Vegas
Salt
Salt of This Sea
Saw VII 3D
Scott Pilgrim vs. The World
Secret Sunshine
Secretariat
Sex and the City 2
Shanghai Red
She’s Out of My League
Shrek Forever After
Shutter Island
Shutterburg
Skyline
Smash His Camera
Solitary Man
Somewhere
Soul Kitchen
South of the Border
Speed-Dating
Splice
Spoken Word
Spring Fever
Standing Ovation
Step Up 3D
Still Bill
Stolen
Stone
Stonewall Uprising
Strange Powers: Stephin Merritt and the Magnetic Fields
Sweetgrass
Sweethearts of the Prison Rodeo

Takers
Tales From the Script
Tamara Drewe
Tangled
Teen Patti
Terkel in Trouble
Terribly Happy
The A-Team
The Afterlight
The Agony and the Ecstasy of Phil Spector
The American
The Anchorage
The Army of Crime
The Art of the Steal
The Back-up Plan
The Big Uneasy
The Book of Eli
The Bounty Hunter
The Cartel
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
The City of Your Final Destination
The Company Men
The Concert
The Crazies
The Cremaster Cycle
The Debt
The Disappearance of Alice Creed
The Dry Land
The Eclipse
The Expendables
The Exploding Girl
The Extra Man
The Father of My Children
The Fighter
The Freebie
The Ghost Writer
The Girl
The Girl on the Train
The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest
The Girl with the Dragon Tatto
The Good Guy
The Good Heart
The Good, the Bad, the Weird
The Greatest
The Happy Poet
The Human Centipede
The Illusionist
The Joneses
The Juche Idea
The Karate Kid
The Kids Are All Right
The Kids Grow Up
The Killer Inside Me
The King’s Speech
The Korean
The Last Airbender
The Last Exorcism
The Last New Yorker
The Last Play at Shea
The Last Song
The Last Station
The Legend of Pale Male
The Living Wake
The Losers
The Lottery
The Magician
The Milk of Sorrow
The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers
The Nature of Existence
The New Year
The Next Three Days
The Nutcracker in 3D
The Oath
The Other City
The Other Guys
The Paranoids
The Parking Lot Movie
The People I’ve Slept With
The Perfect Game
The Portuguese Nun
The Red Baron
The Romantics
The Runaways
The Secret in Their Eyes
The Secret of Kells
The Sicilian Girl
The Social Network
The Sorcerer’s Apprentice
The Spy Next Door
The Square
The Strange Case of Anjelica
The Sun Behind the Clouds
The Switch
The Taqwacores
The Tempest
The Temptation of St. Tony
The Thorn in the Heart
The Tillman Story
The Tooth Fairy
The Tourist
The Town
The Trial
The Trotsky
The Trouble with Terkel
The Twilight Saga: Eclipse
The Two Escobars
The Vicious Kind
The Virginity Hit
The Warlords
The Warrior’s Way
The Weathered Underground
The Wildest Dream
The Winning Season
The Wolf Man
Tibet in Song
Ticked-Off Trannies with Knives
Tiny Furniture
To Die for Tano
To Save a Life
To the Sea
Today’s Special
Toe to Toe
Total Badass
Touching Home
Toy Story 3
Trash Humpers
Tron: Legacy
True Grit
Twelve
Two in the Wave

Udaan
Undertow
Unstoppable
Urville

Valentine’s Day
Valhalla Rising
Valley of the Hearts Delight
Vampires Suck
Veer
Videocracy
Vincere
Violet Tendencies
Vision
Visionaries

Wah do dem
Waiting for Armageddon
Waiting for Superman
Waking Sleeping Beauty
Wall Street 2: Money Never Sleeps
Waste Land
Watercolors
We Are Family
Welcome to the Rileys
What If…
When in Rome
When You’re Strange: A Film About The Doors
White Material
White on Rice
White Wedding
Whiz Kids
Who is Harry Nilsson (and Why is Everybody Talkin’ About Him)?
Who Killed Nancy?
Why Did I Get Married Too?
Wild Grass
Wild Target
Willets Point
William S. Burroughs: A Man Within
Winnebago Man
Winston Churchill: Walking with Destiny
Winter’s Bone
Women Without Men
Wonderful World
World on a Wire

Yellow Handkerchief, The
Yogi Bear
You Again
You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger
You Won’t Miss Me
Youth in Revolt

The 2011 Independent Spirit Award nominations were announced today with Debra Granik’s Winter’s Bone being the front runner. Winter’s Bone could be this year’s Precious as it has the most nominations this year with seven which include; Best Feature, Best Director, Best Screenplay and acting nominations for Jennifer Lawrence, Dave Dickey, and John Hawkes. Some of the other major nominees include The Kids Are All Right which received 5 nominations, Black Swan and Rabbit Hole which received 4. All four of those films have a good chance at Oscar nominations as well.

Although, I have not seen the Duplass brother’s Cyrus or Philip Seymour Hoffman‘s Jack Goes Boating, I am a little surprised that they were not one of the major contenders. I suppose Jack Goes Boating did haul in 3 nominations and Cyrus did receive 1 for Best Male Lead. I would have thought they would have had some more praise considering the people behind the films. Also Best Worst Movie did not make an appearance for Best Documentary, bummer.

Joel McHale will host the 26th Film Independent Spirit Awards in Santa Monica on Saturday, February 26 which will air that night on IFC at 10:00 p.m. ET/PT.

127 Hours, Danny Boyle, Christian Colson, John Smithson
Black Swan, Scott Franklin, Mike Medavoy, Arnold W. Messer, Brian Oliver
Greenberg, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Scott Rudin
The Kids Are All Right, Gary Gilbert, Philippe Hellmann, Jordan Horowitz, Jeffrey Levy-Hinte, Celine Rattray, Daniela Taplin Lundberg
Winter’s Bone, Alix Madigan-Yorkin, Anne Rosellini

Darren Aronofsky, Black Swan
Danny Boyle, 127 Hours
Lisa Cholodenko, The Kids Are All Right
Debra Granik, Winter’s Bone
John Cameron Mitchell, Rabbit Hole

Everything Strange and New, directed by Frazer Bradshaw; Producers: A.D. Liano, Laura Techera Francia
Get Low, directed by Aaron Schneider; Producers: David Gundlach, Dean Zanuck
The Last Exorcism, directed by Daniel Stamm; Producers: Marc Abraham, Tom Bliss, Eric Newman, Eli Roth
Night Catches Us, directed by Tanya Hamilton; Producers: Sean Costello, Jason Orans, Ronald Simons
Tiny Furniture, directed by Lena Dunham; Producers: Kyle Martin, Alicia Van Couvering

Daddy Longlegs, written and directed by Benny Safdie and Josh Safdie; Producers: Casey Neistat, Tom Scott
The Exploding Girl, written and directed by Bardley Rust Gray; Producers: Karen Chien, Ben Howe, So Yong Kim
Lbs., directed by Matthew Bonifacio, written by Matthew Bonifacio and Carmine Famiglietti; Producers: Matthew Bonifacio, Carmine Famiglietti
Lovers of Hate, written and directed by Bryan Poyser; Producer: Megan Gilbride
Obsedila, written and directed by Diane Bell; Producers: Chris Byrne, Mathew Medlin

Stuart Blumberg, Lisa Cholodenko, The Kids Are All Right
Debra Granik, Anne Rosellini, Winter’s Bone
Nicole Holofcener, Please Give
David Lindsay-Abaire, Rabbit Hole
Todd Solondz, Life During Wartime

Diane Bell, Obselidia
Lena Dunham, Tiny Furniture
Nik Fackler, Lovely, Still
Bob Glaudini, Jack Goes Boating
Dana Adam Shapiro, Evan M. Wiener, Monogamy

Annette Bening, The Kids Are All Right
Greta Gerwig, Greenberg
Nicole Kidman, Rabbit Hole
Jennifer Lawrence, Winter’s Bone
Natalie Portman, Black Swan
Michelle Williams, Blue Valentine

Ronald Bronstein, Daddy Longlegs
Aaron Eckhart, Rabbit Hole
James Franco, 127 Hours
John C. Reilly, Cyrus
Ben Stiller, Greenberg

Ashley Bell, The Last Exorcism
Dale Dickey, Winter’s Bone
Allison Janney, Life During Wartime
Daphne Rubin-Vega, Jack Goes Boating
Naomi Watts, Mother and Child

John Hawkes, Winter’s Bone
Samuel L. Jackson, Mother and Child
Bill Murray, Get Low
John Ortiz, Jack Goes Boating
Mark Ruffalo, The Kids Are All Right

Adam Kimmel, Never Let Me Go
Matthew Libatique, Black Swan
Jody Lee Lipes, Tiny Furniture
Michael McDonough, Winter’s Bone
Harris Savides, Greenberg

Exit Through The Gift Shop, Banksy
Marwencol, Jeff Malmberg
Restrepo, Tim Hetherington, Sebastien Junger
Sweetgrass, Ilisa Barbash, Lucien Castaing-Taylor
Thunder Soul, Mark Landsman

Kisses, Lance Daly
Mademoiselle Chambon, Stéphane Brizé
Of Gods and Men, Xavier Beauvois
The King’s Speech, Tom Hooper
Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, Apichatpong Weerasethakul

Please Give
Director: Nicole Holofcener
Casting Director: Jeanne McCarthy
Ensemble Cast: Ann Guilbert, Rebecca Hall, Catherine Keener, Amanda Peet, Oliver Platt, Lois Smith, Sara Steele

In-Ah Lee, Au Revoir Taipei
Adele Romanski, The Myth of the American Sleepover
Anish Savjani, Meek’s Cutoff

Hossein Keshavarz, Dog Sweat
Laurel Nakadate, The Wolf Knife
Mike Ott, Littlerock

Ilisa Barbash, Lucien Castaing-Taylor, Sweetgrass
Jeff Malmberg , Marwencol
Lynn True, Nelson Walker, Summer Pasture