Top films of 2014 – in pictures

• 

• 

  Under the Skin. Equal parts beautiful and terrifying in its alien mystery, Jonathan Glazer’s extraterrestrial shocker (with Scarlett Johansson as the otherworldly being that touches down in, of all places, Glasgow, Scotland) made for a searing cinematic experience of sound and imagery. – JC A24 Films / AP Photo

• 

  The Grand Budapest Hotel. Wes Anderson’s heroes are, like him, devotees of brilliant escapes: the beachside oasis of Moonrise Kingdom, the play land of Rushmore Academy, or the pre-war elegance of his latest film’s Eastern European resort. Dreams are inevitably punctured by outside forces and a new, compromised life must be found – some melancholy combination of fantasy and reality. And, usually, Bill Murray’s there somewhere. – JC Wes Anderson, we surrender – to your whimsy and singular imagination. This movie is a visual delight – it’s also a madcap caper and, a layer deeper, a more serious look at a dying way of life in Europe. Mostly, it’s a perfect vehicle for Ralph Fiennes, as a wonderfully pompous concierge, to display his lesser-known comic skills. – JN Fox Searchlight / AP Photo

• 

  Interstellar. Admittedly, I’m a sucker when it comes to stories about dads and daughters. Many critics poked holes in the imperfectly stitched cosmic fabric of Christopher Nolan’s space drama, but I found the time-travelling epic – science fiction built on science fact – grandly moving. So I’m a sentimentalist who digs space. Sue me. – JC Paramount Pictures, Melinda Sue Gordon / AP Photo

• 

  Boyhood. One of the most memorable trends in film this year was seeing movies play with time: capturing it as it elapsed (Boyhood), bending it (Interstellar) and wryly gazing at its course across the centuries (Jim Jarmusch’s excellent Only Lovers Left Alive). However, Richard Linklater’s 12-years-in-the-making Boyhood was the high point. For a much-lauded masterpiece, it’s incredibly humble and warm – JC This movie just pulsates with the feeling that it’s something utterly unique – something rare and exciting. It’s not just that the director Richard Linklater managed to shoot it over 12 years, creating an astonishingly fluid view of a boy’s life; it’s how the film makes us feel. By the end, we know Mason (the sensitive Ellar Coltrane) so well, it feels wrong to leave him. Shouldn’t he be coming home with us? – JN IFC Films / AP photo

• 

  Whiplash. None of us would ever want to be in a classroom with the abusively demanding music teacher played by J K Simmons – it’s hard enough to be in the movie theatre. But boy, Simmons grabs the role by the throat, thrillingly. Miles Teller is excellent, too, as the driven student who accepts this abuse, all to be a jazz drummer. – JN Sony Pictures Classics, Daniel McFadden / AP photo

• 

  The Theory of Everything. Eddie Redmayne is remarkably effective as Stephen Hawking, eventually using only his eyes and a crooked smile to express what’s inside a blazing mind. - JN Jack English / AP photo

• 

  Ida. Where did this perfect little gem come from? Its director, Pawel Pawlikowski, wasn’t previously a big name in international cinema. Yet at a time when most filmmakers can’t keep their movies under two hours, Pawlikowksi plunges into Polish history and back again in less than 90 minutes. Yes, an austere, black-and-white Polish film doesn’t sound like the most appetising prospect for a night at the cinema. But it’s a hauntingly beautiful film and, thanks to the tremendous Agata Kulesza, there’s humour here, too. – JC Pawel Pawlikowski’s film is pure, austere, and powerful – exactly how one might describe its young star, Agata Trzebuchowska, who plays an orphaned novice about to take her vows when she learns she has an aunt, her only living relative. Ida’s subsequent journey, in which she explores Poland’s wartime past to discover both who she is and who she wants to be, is mesmerising. – JN Music Box Films / AP photo

• 

  Selma. Talk about a movie that comes just when the country needs it most. A beautifully restrained performance by David Oyelowo as Martin Luther King, Jr anchors this stirring account of the events surrounding the famous march from Selma, Alabama to Montgomery. The director Ava DuVernay is equally adept at depicting intimate moments – like a testy Oval Office exchange between Lyndon B Johnson and George Wallace – as she is at conveying the sweep of a historic movement. – JN Paramount Pictures, Atsushi Nishijima / AP Photo

• 

  The Immigrant. A number of films in 2014 weren’t shy about their “big American themes”. Bennett Miller’s Foxcatcher was the most mesmerising; J C Chandor’s A Most Violent Year the most atmospheric; and Clint Eastwood’s American Sniper the tautest. But James Gray’s period Ellis Island tale was the most majestic. The film’s powerful last shot is an absolute knockout. – JC The Weinstein Company, Anne Joyce / AP Photo

• 

  Foxcatcher. Grim and unrelenting but expertly rendered, this real-life tale of the Olympic wrestling Schultz brothers and their billionaire benefactor John DuPont is worth seeing both for the shocking true story and the acting. Steve Carell makes a striking physical transformation, but it’s his reedy voice that’ll really creep you out. Mark Ruffalo, as the more nurturing brother, and Channing Tatum, as the more troubled, are just as compelling. – JN Courtesy Cannes Film Festival

• 

  The Theory of Everything. Eddie Redmayne is remarkably effective as Stephen Hawking, eventually using only his eyes and a crooked smile to express what’s inside a blazing mind. Liam Daniel / Focus Features

• 

  Inherent Vice. Obviously, I’m also an easy mark for a glorious mess. Paul Thomas Anderson’s adaptation of Thomas Pynchon is probably a noble failure in an impossible task. But there’s no movie I’m keener to return to, to again feel its electric songs and its scruffy sadness. – JC Warner Bros. Pictures, Wilson Webb / AP photo

• 

  Birdman. Absolutely bracing in its verve and inventiveness, Alejandro González Iñárritu’s meditation on fame, relevance and self-worth is a marvel. Michael Keaton is raw and vulnerable as an ageing actor trying to exorcise his superhero past; Edward Norton is superb as a charismatic jerk. The cherry on top: Emmanuel Lubezki’s stunningly seamless camera work. – JN Fox Searchlight, Atsushi Nishijima / AP photo

• 

  Starred Up. Four walls, a father and a son, plus a whole lot of violent rage. The ingredients of this British prison drama are simple, but its force is ferocious. In one of the more remarkable father-son dramas you’ll see (a young punk gets locked up in the same facility as his dad), Jack O’Connell (the star of Angelina Jolie’s Unbroken) dramatically arrives. But the movie’s also a reminder that there is no more riveting actor in movies than Ben Mendelsohn, who plays the father. – JC Courtesy Film4

• 

  Leviathan. There’s a stout Russian muscularity to Andrey Zvyagintsev’s bleak, Job-like tale of corruption in a coastal Russian town. A framed portrait of Vladimir Putin above the police chief looms large. – JC Courtesy ADFF

• 

  Mr Turner. Timothy Spall studied painting, drawing – and even Greek and Roman architecture – all to play the great landscape painter J M W Turner. And it shows: the wonderfully gruff Spall doesn’t seem to act in this movie as much as inhabit it, messily and fully. Mike Leigh’s gorgeously detailed biopic doesn’t fall into typical formula – and the visuals do Turner proud. – JN Sony Pictures Classics / AP photo

• 

  Still Alice. As an early-onset Alzheimer’s patient in Still Alice, Julianne Moore is sensitive, warm and heartbreaking – and deserves all the awards buzz she’s getting. – JN Sony Pictures Classics, Linda Kallerus / AP photo

From slightly obscure art-house hits to mainstream box-office smashes, Jake Coyle and Jocelyn Noveck pick the 2014 movies that made the biggest impression on them.

Honourable mentions:

Two Days, One Night; The Babadook; Ernest & Celestine; Locke; Citizenfour; Stranger By the Lake; Dear White People; Timbuktu; The Trip to Italy; Neighbors; Only Lovers Left Alive; American Sniper.