2012 roundup: The Bulletin's top 5 DVDs

Brussels is a great city for the cinema, but you have to work hard to see everything. For the films that you missed, or that won't let go of your imagination, there is DVD. Here's our selection of the year's essential discs.

A perdre la raison 

For the best Belgian film of 2012, choose A perdre la raison by Joachim Lafosse. It's the story of a young couple, Murielle and Mounir (Emilie Dequenne, Tahar Rahim), who set up home in small-town Wallonia with Andre (Niels Arestup), a wealthy doctor who has been a sort of godfather to Mounir. This arrangement puts a strain on Murielle. As the family grows, the mental pressure increases until she can take no more. Lafosse performs a very subtle alchemy in moving from the facts of the case that inspired the film to fiction. Each element in the complex web of relationships is re-imagined, dramatised and put into place so we can see how they might, just possibly, create an unconventional but functioning family, yet also set the scene for a tragedy. As a rare bonus, the DVD has English as well as Dutch subtitles.

(O'Brother)

Brave/Rebelle 

Merida is a flame-haired Scottish princess who would rather ride her horse and practice archery than refine her domestic skills. It doesn't occur to her that she is being prepared for marriage, so she's taken by surprise when a selection of suitors arrives from other clans. First she protests, then she rebels and finally she turns to magic to avoid being married off. That's when things start to get out of hand. Brave will entertain kids and adults alike thanks to the impressive animation we've come to expect from Pixar plus a satisfying hint of darkness in the story that has been missing from its recent films. Known here as Rebelle, most DVDs feature the original Scottish voice cast, including the excellent Kelly Macdonald as Merida.

(Disney Pixar)

Martha Marcy May Marlene 

Sean Durkin's debut film is a small masterpiece of American independent cinema. Despite winning the prize for best actress at the Ghent Film Festival in 2011, it was mysteriously denied a cinema release in Belgium, so the DVD makes an ideal gift for the 'seen-it-all' cinephile. The names in the title all refer to a young woman (Elizabeth Olsen, an exceptional performance) who has escaped from a communal farm in the Catskills. Taking refuge with her married sister in Connecticut, she tries to adjust to life outside the strict rules of the community and away from its charismatic leader. Yet her memories gradually reveal that she was more deeply involved with the cult than appearances suggest. The story is told slowly but, like the cult, never loses its hold.

(Fox)

The Cabin in the Woods 

Of all the year's big budget genre films, The Cabin in the Woods is the one that most lends itself to a second viewing. Full of teasing detail and sharp dialogue from writer Joss Whedon (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) and director Drew Goddard, it's a satisfying trip even if you already know where you are going. It begins in traditional horror territory with a group of unwitting college students setting off to spend a weekend at an isolated cabin in the woods. We guess that they are doomed, but how and why turns out to be more outrageously complex and sinister than anything the well-worn genre has given us to date. The result is spectacularly funny, tolerably gory and yet not particularly frightening. 

(Dutch Film Works)

The Deep Blue Sea 

If ever a film deserves the Blu-Ray treatment it is The Deep Blue Sea, Terence Davies' gorgeously shot version of Terence Rattigan's 1952 play. The shabby pubs and lodging houses of 1950s London are photographed in a velvety half-light, making them feel by turns welcoming and desperately lonely. Davies cuts Rattigan's wordy play to the bone, rebuilding its central relationships in elegant, minimal scenes that bring out the emotional core of the story. This revolves around Hester Collyer (Rachel Weisz), twice unlucky in love and, as the film opens, about to commit suicide. Not the happiest story in the world, but an authentic, beautiful tale of existential despair.

(Wild Bunch Benelux)