It doesn't hurt that these are interesting characters with interesting things to say. It also doesn't hurt that if you've seen the first film you're already pretty invested in them. In fact the film kind of hinges on that, and I'd be interested to talk to someone who hadn't seen the first one to find out if this still grabs them. But regardless, Linklater puts you next to these people and lets you follow them around for an hour and a half and you never want to leave and when you finally have to, it's at the most frustrating point possible and you're shaking your fist at the screen yelling "Link-laterrrrrrrr!!!!!!" kind of like the Dean on Futurama yelling "Robot Houuuuusssse!!!!" Or at least I almost did.

What's more is that this is a sequel. And sequels are supposed to suck. But that rule got broken many times this year (Spider-Man 2, The Bourne Supremacy, Shrek 2, etc.) but most of all by this one. It was hard enough to pull off a walking My Dinner with Andre the first time, but to have the balls to do it again?

Hats off to Linklater, Hawke, Delpy, and co-writer Kim Krizan for pulling off the most elegant cinematic feat of the year.

Now on to 2005. My money's on The Wallace and Gromit Movie, but I'll give the other ones a shot, too.