Another Year

6. Another Year (December 31; Sony Pictures Classics)

What’s The Deal? Mike Leigh follows up 2008’s lauded “Happy-Go-Lucky” with this character study of a group of aging people trying to make sense of their lives. “Vera Drake” cast members Jim Broadbent, Lesley Manville and Imelda Staunton all return for “Another” collaboration with Leigh.

Who’s Already Seen It? 20 critics gave it an average of B+ on the film’s criticWIRE page.

Why is it a “Must See”? The virtually unstoppable Leigh found many critics proclaiming “Year” among his best work when it premiered in Cannes. “Leigh magnifies the existential reflections of his middle-aged subjects, eschewing plot for mere observation and stuffing emotional realism into near-theatrical constraints,” indieWIRE‘s Eric Kohn wrote at the time.