Amplified by a slate of "Best of the Decade" pieces (which we'll get to in early 2010), this year's "best of" features seem more overcrowded than ever, but it's human nature to want to rank. When I tell people that I'm a film critic, they almost always ask me what the best movie is I've seen lately or my favorite of all time. As much as we like to try and raise the conversation about film and add to the discussion instead of just giving a film a grade, people are always going to want to know if movie X is better than movie Y.

Was any film of 2009 more uniquely self-confident than Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds? So many filmmakers work to appease producers or focus groups. Tarantino makes films for himself. Very few movies are so clearly the product of a filmmaker making something they want to see instead of trying to appeal to the widest possible audience. When I first saw Inglourious Basterds, I assumed that the long, dialogue-heavy scenes would turn off ADD-riddled audiences still twitching after seeing Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. One of my favorite stories of 2009 is how wrong that assumption was on my part and this totally trippy and weird slice of action revisionist history became one of the most successful films of the year. Inglourious Basterds is proof that not everything needs to be spoon-fed or cross-marketed to be a massive hit and that writer/directors can express their individuality and still make audiences happy. If only there were more filmmakers like Tarantino.

The most highly ranked debut in a year of excellent ones, Sin Nombre is as visually confident a first film as I've seen in years. What's most remarkable about Cary Joji Fukunaga's story of the interweaving journeys of a young girl looking for a new life in America and a young man merely trying to escape his awful one in Mexico is the blend of striking, nearly majestic photography with an amazing ability to tell a human story. Our best filmmakers merge the visual power of the medium they work in with something more human and relatable for the audience. Sin Nombre is about people living life on a razor thin line of survival. It is a brutal, dark film and even though I saw it many months and a few hundred movies ago, there are still images, themes, and characters from Fukunaga's debut seared in my memory.

Joining Fukunaga as one of the most remarkable young voices of 2009 is Ramin Bahrani with his third and best film, a marvelous character study about the impact one man can have on another, even as that man is planning to say goodbye to a cruel world. Goodbye Solo is about an old man named William who wants to die and a cab driver named Solo who becomes obsessed with why and attempting to change his mind. Avoiding Lifetime TV movie clichés, Bahrani made a film that's more about how William's journey impacts Solo's. We all have fears of ending up like William, alone and almost too aware that our dreams have gone unfulfilled. With pitch-perfect performances and nary a forced moment, Goodbye Solo haunts me as much as nearly any film from 2009. William and Solo don't feel like movie creations. They feel like real people and I wish there were more 2009 characters as marvelously well-written as these two.

Pure, escapist entertainment doesn't get any better than Star Trek. J.J. Abrams' film is a master class in summer movie storytelling – a perfectly paced, wonderfully cast, cleverly written, and expertly designed thrill ride that works on every level. The beyond-the-camera contributions, from Michael Giacchino's flawless score (surpassed this year perhaps only by his other score for Up) to the seamless technical design of the film, one that made the Enterprise feel more three-dimensional and alive than any sci-fi creation of the year, are beyond reproach. Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman's screenplay is both wonderfully "meta" (it's a franchise reboot that’s about revising history) and straight-up entertaining. Finally, there's not a miscast role in an underrated ensemble. Star Trek is the kind of old-fashioned adventure ride that seems harder and harder to make in the era of bloated star salaries and CGI overload.

What happened to Jane Campion's masterful film about the doomed romance between Fanny Brawne and John Keats? It was swept under the rug of similar awards season fare and hasn't received nearly the year-end credit it deserves. Bright Star is one of the most lyrical, beautiful love stories of the last several years, an ode to the overriding power of romance and the way it can aspire one to greatness. The most notable thing about Campion's luscious drama is that it maintains its poetry while still presenting viewers with flesh-and-blood people to bring it to life. With one of the best lead actress performances of the last few years and a screenplay that should be earning far more praise for its stunning mix of the romantic and the real, Bright Star is a timeless gem, a film that will still have the power to move an audience decades from now.

Much has been made of Carey Mulligan's star-making performance as Jenny, the young lady at the center of the coming-of-age story in Lone Scherfig's amazing drama, but, much like last year with Anne Hathaway in Rachel Getting Married and Sally Hawkins in Happy-Go-Lucky, the strength of the lead actress work has overshadowed the rest of the film. Mulligan is my pick to win the Oscar (and was my vote in the Chicago Film Critics Association 2009 Awards), but people need to start looking beyond this luminous star to notice the confident direction by Scherfig, perfect script by Nick Hornby, and the best ensemble of the year. There's not a missed beat, false performance, unbelievable line, or misplayed motivation in the entire film. An Education is not just about a young girl becoming a woman but it’s about a changing country, a people on the verge of a cultural revolution, and it’s as well-acted as anything produced this year.

Michael Haneke does it again with arguably his most thematically dense and emotionally devastating film to date. The White Ribbon isn't just a slow burn of a film while it unfolds, but Haneke's dark vision of what is arguably the rise of fascism burrows its way into your brain and lingers there for days and weeks after the score-less credits roll. Images from the gorgeously conceived black and white cinematography will haunt you, but it’s not just a visual masterpiece. Haneke's script is also a thematic time bomb, the kind of film you’ll be thinking about and intellectually dissecting for a long time. Telling the story of a close-knit community falling apart under a wave of unexplained violent events, The White Ribbon is a film with no easy answers other than to say that no one is above the powerful pull of evil – not authority figures, not your neighbor, and not even the kid next door. It’s not an easy film. It’s slow and provides no easy answers. But sometimes the films without tidy resolutions can be the most rewarding.

The backlash bandwagon has already picked up steam on Up in the Air and it's a shame that Jason Reitman's third and best film could get buried by message board trolls just dying to pick apart the latest critical darling. Ignoring the morons who go to the movies merely to tear apart what everyone else likes on their Facebook page, I think some people are turning off to Up in the Air because of the relatively simple nature of the script but I'm tired of the idea that every film needs to be Memento to be memorable. There's a fine line between cliché and realism and nothing about Up in the Air feels melodramatic or false. We need more filmmakers that strive to tell human, identifiable stories like the one of a man learning that if you have no expectations or plans in your life than you will get nowhere and that if you have nothing tethering you down, you will merely float away. Up in the Air is a marvelously old-fashioned film about modern era fears that will stand the test of time; let the backlash work itself out.

Few films of the decade were more viscerally thrilling than Kathryn Bigelow's The Hurt Locker, a white-knuckle action film that has become the critical darling of the year. The first great film about the conflict in the Middle East, The Hurt Locker is an unapologetic powerhouse that was unlike any other film experience in 2009. It is a masterpiece of the art of building and releasing tension in a filmgoer, a visceral, shocking, riveting experience that takes a profession that is nearly impossible to identify with and makes it feel completely genuine. It could be your friend, son, or even you in The Hurt Locker. Life in a bomb disposal unit in the Middle East is like nothing that you or I could possibly understand and yet The Hurt Locker takes you there, throws you into the center of the action, and spits you out the other side with your pulse pounding and mind racing. It's arguably the best film of the year. But my heart goes with something else....

There's something so thrilling about seeing a filmmaker take a gigantic risk that completely pays off. So much great art of any medium has come from people unwilling to deliver what's expected and willing to swing for the fences instead of just getting on base. Where the Wild Things Are, no matter what you think of the final product, is an undeniable home run swing. It is a daring adaptation that wouldn't have been the same if it was made by anyone else. And features universal themes told in a unique way. This is not just a “kid’s film.” It is about a boy dealing with his parent's divorce and the fact that his big sister doesn't want to play with him any more. Where the Wild Things Are is the best film ever made about the way we use fantasy to deal with a changing reality. Isn't that a role of great film as well? To take our fears, loves, and entire range of emotions and weave them through the fantasy of film? Other 2009 films worked on my mind and a few great ones worked on my gut, but Where the Wild Things Are made me a teenage boy again and reminded me of the days when I realized I wasn't the king of my imaginary world any longer. It didn't just tug at my heart but worked on my memory banks while providing me with new ones. It's the best film of the year.