To simply rattle off the movies I enjoyed, and the reasons why, would be too safe and too shallow. What follows is not a list of my favorite movies this year but rather an examination of one obvious, omnipresent theme: desperation.

Movies spend a lot of time ruminating on how much of who we are is inherent and how much is learned. Yet the films Good Manners, The Woman, and Spring ask us: what if nothing about us is a choice?