For those of you I haven’t sent this to before,
this is my fifth annual ranking of every movie I watched in the past year. For me, the calendar year starts at the
beginning of the summer and runs through the end of the school year. The list isn’t necessarily ranked by how good
a movie is, but rather how much I enjoyed watching the movie. As a case in point, one of the movies near
the bottom of my list this year is considered one of the greatest films of all
time, but it nearly put me to sleep. And
at the top is a movie with humor that I wouldn’t let my kids or my parents
watch, but had me nearly crying I was laughing so hard. I put together the list mostly because I’m a
bit obsessive about things that involve rankings or lists of some sort, but
also because I like hearing other people’s opinions of films. It’s always interesting to see what other
people think about movies. Last year the
movie I caught the most grief about was Twilight. I had it ranked low on my list, but just the
fact that I watched it was enough for people to give me a hard time. So please feel free to reply, and comment on
my comments – even if you totally disagree with me – in fact that’s part of the
point. Also, feel free to add anyone to
the email thread that I forgot to put on the distribution list. When I first did this 5 years ago it was
literally just a list, in order, of the movies.
Last year the whole thing became a 9 page two-part email, and this
year’s is 5 pages long and I’m only halfway done.
This
ended up being a great movie year for me – probably the best since I started
doing my rankings. For one, I had a free
year of HBO, so I was able to watch a few more movies and series that I
wouldn’t have otherwise. Second, I
watched a lot of movies this year – 60, and that includes several whole
series. And finally, there were more
good movies this year, and fewer bad ones.
Most years there are 7-10 movies in my top category, “Movies I Loved”. This year there are 19. So all in all, it was a great movie year for
me. Enough with the rambling – here is
the list, in reverse order.
Movies I
couldn’t finish
60. Bruno. Sascha Baron Cohen’s follow-up to Borat. To give you some perspective, a couple years
ago Borat was in my top 5 movies of the year.
I loved it – there are only a handful of movies where I’ve laughed
harder. Take everything that was painful
to watch about Borat, and then make it not funny, and you’ve got Bruno.
59. Australia
– I didn’t give this movie much of a chance. I’m not sure why I even rented it, except
that it got fairly good reviews. The
first 20 minutes or so were about as interesting as watching paint dry.
58. Happy
Go Lucky – British movie. The
Oregonian loved this movie. It’s about a
woman who is happy-go-lucky. Or
something like that. I wouldn’t know,
because I stopped watching after 30 minutes.
It made me realize that British chick-flicks are just as bad as American
ones.
57. Reservation
Road – A normal guy (Mark Ruffalo) runs over a kid and kills him while
driving his own son home from a baseball game, but leaves the scene without
doing anything. It seemed like it would
be the kind of movie that would be interesting enough, but leave you feeling
like you got punched in the stomach after watching it. I am not a big fan of these movies already,
but when the guy who ran over the kid gets hired as the lawyer to help solve
the case, I couldn’t watch anymore.
Really? You had to go that over
the top to make the movie interesting?
56. Bad
Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans – Another movie that I watched because
it got good reviews. I guess I’ve liked
a few movies Nick Cage has been in, but I can think of about 10 bad ones he’s
been in for every good one. If I really
wanted to watch something about a shady cop I could watch a much better version
of it by renting a season of the Shield.
Or The Wire. Or NYPD Blue. Or just about any other cop TV show.
55. The
Bicycle Thief – This is considered one of the greatest movies of all-time. But for as much as I love all kinds of
movies, I have to admit that most of the time when I go back and watch movies
more that about 25 years old that are considered “classics”, I find them
boring. There are a few exceptions (Dr.
Strangelove is one of my top 10 of all
time), but usually if I have the choice between watching an older classic (like
the Bicycle Thief) and a newer, thoroughly mediocre movie (like Sherlock
Holmes), I’ll pop this one out after 30 minutes and watch the newer one. Which is what I did.
Big Letdowns
54. A
Serious Man – There wasn’t a movie that I watched all of this year that I
enjoyed less. The only reason I watched
the whole thing is that it was a best picture nominee, and I wanted to be able
to say I’d seen the whole thing. I
consider the Cohen brothers to be some of the best directors alive. They’ve made an incredibly diverse catalog of
interesting movies, from No Country for Old Men to The Big Lebowski. But this movie sucks. Totally depressing and pointless. I didn’t hate it as much as I hated
Synechoche, NY, which was my bottom ranked movie last year, but it was one of
two movies this year that I was angry after watching.
53. Observe
and Report – This was the other movie that made me angry. Seth Rogen plays an angry mall cop (not to be
confused with Mall Cop, where Kevin James, another fat guy plays a bumbling
mall cop). There’s a scene in the movie
where Rogen’s character tries to get a job as a cop, and goes totally wacko in
the psychiatric evaluation part of the interview. So one of the cops has a couple of co-workers
hide in the closet to listen while he tells Rogen he’s not going to get the job
because they think it should be pretty funny.
After a few minutes of Rogen breaking down when he get the news, the
other cops walk out of the closet and say “I thought this was going to be
funny, but it’s just sad.” That
perfectly summed up how I felt about the movie.
52. Eastbound
& Down – The First Season. In
this HBO series, Danny McBride (who can be great) plays a failed major league
baseball player that can’t let go of his past and is now working as a long-term
substitute gym teacher. It is a
promising premise, but I disliked it for the same reason I didn’t like Observe
and Report. When you hate the
protagonist, it’s hard to enjoy the movie (or show, in this case). Sometimes these kinds of characters can be
watchable if they are a lovable loser (like Michael Scott from The Office), or
an antihero that is just too compelling to take your eyes off (Tyler Durden in
Fight Club, Vic Mackey in The Shield).
But when you just flat-out dislike the main character, well, what’s the
point of watching?
Not as good as they should have been
51. The
Informant – Matt Damon was nominated for Best Actor for his role in
this. To me, it was one of those movies
where you watch the whole thing and say “really? That’s it? “
It’s not awful, it just isn’t very interesting. This came out around the same time as Up in
the Air, and both received award nominations, so I sort of associate the two
movies with each other. Not much happens
in that movie either, but Up in the Air has everything that makes a film
enjoyable to watch that this one lacks.
50. 9 –
Animated movie that looks really cool in the previews. Weird creatures inhabit some sort of
futuristic post-apocalyptic world. But
the story is a mess. It seems like the
kind of movie I would have made when I was in high school if I’d been given a
$20 million budget to make an animated movie.
And that’s not a compliment.
You’ve Seen
This Movie Before
49. Bedtime
Stories – Adam Sandler plays an uncle or a friend that babysits, or
something like that, and every night he makes up a bedtime story, and the next
day whatever he says in the story comes true, although not always in the way
you’d expect. Watched it with the
kids. It made me smile at times. No surprises.
48. Ransom
– Mel Gibson movie where his kid gets snatched, and he tries to track down the abductors. This is an older movie that I got sucked into
watching on TV. It was entertaining
enough that I didn’t stop watching, but I think that every year someone makes a
movie with some version of this plot.
Maybe because a movie where the kid is abducted and they just find the
dead kid’s body in the forest wouldn’t do quite as well at the box office.
47. Eagle
Eye – Another movie I watched on HBO.
Fairly entertaining but not memorable at all. There is some sort of giant conspiracy
causing Shia LeBouff to run around a lot.
I find it kind of depressing that I even know who Shia LeBouff is.
46. Crazy
Heart – I rented this movie because Jeff Bridges (aka The Dude in Big
Lebowski) won best actor for this role as a washed up country singer. And he is great. What I forgot is A) I hate country music, B)
Maggie Gyllenhall (who almost ruined my favorite movie from last year, The Dark
Knight) plays the love interest, and C) Colin Farrell, who also sucks, plays a
big name country music star. Dislike A
ended up not being so bad, because the music is by the awesome T-Bone Burnett,
who did the music for O Brother Where Art Though. That wasn’t enough to overcome the sea hag
Maggie Gyllenhall and the fact that we were supposed to believe an Irish guy
with a ponytail was massively popular country musician. On top of that, the movie feels like about an
hour of the story got edited out, and they just put in a screen that says “16
Months Later…” and all of a sudden everything is different. The Dude is the only thing that keeps this from going lower.
45. Earth
– If you haven’t seen any of Planet Earth, then this would be a spectacular
movie. The only problem is, I’ve seen
every episode of Planet Earth multiple times, and for this movie they tried to
repackage it as a new movie, when really it was just the same footage from the
series. Really you’re much better off
just watching the individual episodes.
No
surprises, but still fun to watch
44. Sherlock
Holmes – Lots of action, Robert Downey Jr. is fun to watch, and all in all
it is entertaining if you have low expectations, which I did. It is a little hard to believe the Holmes
character because he’s basically Steven Segal as a fighter with the Rain Man’s
attention to details, so that keeps it from being any higher on the list.
43. Role
Models – A couple of guys, including Paul Rudd (who is always fun) get in
trouble and get assigned community service hours working as Big Brothers for
troubled kids, one of whom is the kid that plays McLovin in Superbad. If you watch this movie you will laugh, and
then forget almost everything that happens in it within an hour.
42.5 Monsters vs. Aliens – In my top 20 movies this
year are three “kids” movies that I actually watched without my kids and
loved. This movie doesn’t meet those
kinds of standards – it’s a good family movie, entertaining and fun, but not
much past that. You wouldn’t really want
to watch it if you weren’t watching it with kids.
42. Friday
Night Lights: The First Season – For years I’ve had a bunch of people tell
me I needed to start watching this show.
And I’ve always wanted to. For
one thing, it’s created by Peter Berg, who graduated from Macalester College
(my alma matter), so it’s got that going for it. And the plot sounds like something I should
love – it’s about a high school football team, but it’s about a lot more than
football. In the first game of the
season the star quarterback with the cheerleader girlfriend gets
paralyzed. The team falls just short of
the championship. There is white-black
tension within the team. A few games
into the season an incredibly talented quarterback comes to the school after
being displaced by Hurricane Katrina, but everything about him coming is a
little shady. Great story lines, and all
believable stuff. But I just couldn’t
get into it. It was a little too corny,
and a little too predictable for me, which is too bad because I really wanted
to like the series. I still haven’t
ruled out watching more episodes this summer though.
41. The
Omega Man – Those of you that have read this list of reviews for the last
couple years are aware of my enjoyment of vampire and zombie movies. It was bad enough that I even watched the
first Twilight movie, which is the kind of drivel I normally hate. Well, one vampire/zombie movie that I was
intrigued by a couple years ago was I Am Legend with Will Smith – a movie that
had some great scenes, but was ultimately disappointing. This led me to read the book the movie is
based on by Peter Mathwick, which is fantastic.
And then I found out that I Am Legend was actually the third movie
adaptation of the book. The first was
called The Last Man on Earth, starring Vincent Price. I watched it last year, and it was comically
bad. The second adaptation was this one,
The Omega Man, starring Charlton Heston.
Of the three, this is probably closest to the book, but still diverges
significantly. It made me wonder: If
this book is so great (which it is) that they keep making movie versions of it,
why does every version diverge so significantly from the original story? Another interesting thought about the movies
is looking at the leading men in the different generations. It is a story where there is only one person
left on Earth, so it has to be an actor that can carry the movie without other
characters to dialogue with. So in each
generation we get a different version of the iconic leading man – Vincent Price, Charlton Heston, and now
Will Smith – all very different, but all probably emblematic of the leading man
role for their era. These reviews are
getting way too long for movies this far down on the list. Is anyone still reading?
40. Away We
Go – Maya Rudolph and Jim from the Office (I can’t spell his real name, and
don’t really care what it is, for that matter) play a pregnant couple that
travels around the country visiting friends and trying to decide where they
want to settle down to live. Funny at
times, and warm at times, but never really hilarious or touching. I had high expectations for this since I saw
it in the theater, but only mildly enjoyed it, partly because all the supporting
characters are just a little too over the top, including the Sea Hag.
39. Bored
to Death – HBO series, starring Jason Schwartzman as a guy who gets dumped
by his girlfriend and decides to start working on the side as an unlicensed
private detective. Schwartzman is pretty
good. His boss is played by Ted Danson,
who is ok. But his best friend is played
by Zach Gallifanakis (the guys with the beard from The Hangover), who is pretty
much the funniest person alive right now.
A decent show, which could be great if Gallifanakis played a bigger
role.
38. I Love
You, Man – Paul Rudd plays a guy that is getting married, and realizes that
he doesn’t really have any male friends close enough to be his best man. During his friend search he ends up hitting
it off with a slacker played by Jason Segall.
Not groundbreaking stuff, but it works in all the ways that Away We Go
doesn’t. The characters are just more
fun, and the movie ended up being a pleasant surprise.
37. Defiance
– A group of Jews, led by Liev Scrieber and James Bond (well, the guy who plays
James Bond, at least) form a resistance group that hides out in the forest and
struggles to survive while periodically fighting off the Germans. Interesting and entertaining.
36. Taken
– Last year’s version of the Mel Gibson/Ransom story. This time it is Liam Neeson’s daughter who
gets kidnapped, and he gets to go kick some ass to get her back. I have to admit that I enjoyed watching
it. Every time I see a movie with Liam
Neeson I can’t help but think of the episode of Seinfeld where Jerry tries to
argue with George that Liam Neeson is more famous than John Voigt.
35. Year
One – In almost every Jack Black movie I’ve seen, I’ve been a little
disappointed that he isn’t quite as funny as I thought he would be. I mean he seems like he should be hilarious –
he’s got great energy, he’s fat, both key elements for being funny. But even in movies I’ve liked, he has never
been quite as funny as I thought he should be.
So in this, I wasn’t expecting him to be that great, and I ended up
being pleasantly surprised. Michael Cera
plays his sidekick, and he’s another one of those guys who always plays the
same character but I still enjoy it. Not
a great film, but fun, nonetheless.
34. Terminator
Salvation – The first two movies in the Terminator series were science
fiction classics. The third one, not so
much, although it does have an epic chase scene. I thought this one was an improvement over
T3, but still not close to the first two.
Dark and intense, but not a bad rental if you’re looking for an
entertaining action movie.
33. Land of
the Lost – I won’t try to defend this movie on any artistic merit. It stars Will Ferrell, and I love Will
Ferrell. I think he’s hilarious in
almost anything he does. It also has
Danny McBride, who is pretty funny here.
If you aren’t a Will Ferrell fan, then this probably isn’t for you.
32. State
of Play – Ben Affleck plays a senator running for President. Things are going well for him, but then his
secretary, who also happens to be his mistress gets murdered. His buddy from college happens to be Russell
Crowe, a prominent journalist, who gets enlisted to help solve the case. I’ve always kind of liked movies where the
reporter is trying to uncover some mystery and gets involved in the case, and
this one is a fun watch.
31. Blood
Simple – Every year it seems I go back and watch a couple of older Cohen
Brothers films. This year after watching
A Serious Man (which, as I mentioned before, sucked big time), I went back and
watched No Country For Old Men, and then this one. Blood Simple was one of their earlier films,
which I hadn’t seen before. A lot of
themes that you see in their later films are present in this one. In all of their movies there seems to be some
sort of simple man that gets in over his head, and makes a series of bad
decisions that become progressively worse, usually resulting in at least one
dead body. Most of their movies seem to
have a feeling of encroaching doom, where you can just tell it isn’t going to
end well for anyone involved. And in a
Cohen Brothers movie, it almost always does end badly for all involved. If you are a Cohen Brothers fan this is one
you should see.
Movies I
really enjoyed
30. (500)
Days of Summer - This is quite
simply a charming movie. It’s a
relationship movie, but it doesn’t fit the standard Hollywood rom-com
mold. Joseph Gordon-Leavitt is an actor
for some reason I always expect not to like, but this movie made me realize I
really enjoy him. He’s perfect in this
as a guy that’s alternately exhilarated and depressed by a relationship. My only complaint – I just don’t like Zoey
Deschannel. She’s the opposite of
Gordon-Leavitt for me. She seems to
always play the fun, slightly offbeat girlfriend and I think I’m going to like
her, but she always ends up annoying me.
29. Half
Nelson – This was a movie I couldn’t decide where to rank – it could’ve
easily been several spots higher. It’s a
movie about a junior high teacher in an urban school that is passionate, if
slightly disorganized. He forms a close
bond with a sweet girl that is being pulled by some bad influences in her life,
such as an older friend that is a drug dealer.
It has terrific acting, and is really compelling stuff, because as he’s
trying to steer this girl along the right path, he’s also spiraling into his
own drug addiction. It’s a movie that
doesn’t have a clear story arc, so we don’t really get things wrapped up
neatly, but maybe that’s part of what makes it good.
28. The
Warriors – Serious blast from the past.
I don’t know what year this movie was made (late 70’s?), but from almost
any boy growing up in the 80’s this was a classic guy movie. I still remember watching it with David Rider
when we were in 7th grade, and saying wow – that was one badass
movie. I actually remember almost being
a little bit scared by it – at the time it just seemed really edgy. So I went back and watched it 20 years later
to see if it was as cool as I remembered, and you know what? It was still really fun. Some of the gangs that seemed kind of scary
to me, like the Baseball Furies seemed mostly comical now. But it was still great fun seeing the
Warriors fight their way back home across New York with every gang in town
trying to bring them down. Warriors,
Warriors, come out to play….
27. Che:
Part Two
26. Che:
Part One I’ll talk about these
movies together since they are really just two parts of one movie. I am somewhat ashamed to admit that I don’t
know all that much about Che Guevara, so I’m not sure if they are historically
accurate or not, but from what I read, they mostly are. These were very interesting, if a bit long,
movies. Benicio Del Torro is really
good, and I thought he was a great fit in this role. Since I didn’t know many details about
Guevara’s involvement in the Cuban revolution, it was a fascinating story for
me to watch. Part one is mostly about
Cuba, but part two follows his story into Bolivia. I didn’t really know anything about what
happened in Bolivia, so again, it was really interesting to watch the story
unfold. I’d be interested in the
perspective of one of the social studies teachers on what they thought of this
movie.
25. The
Pacific This is basically the sequel to Band of Brothers. It follows a group of marines through the
campaign in the South Pacific during WWII.
It was both entertaining and interesting. Again, it was a piece of history that I
didn’t know a ton about, and I felt like it definitely made me appreciate the
sacrifice these soldiers made for our country.
It was particularly interesting for me because my grandfather was
stationed in Guam during WWII. At the
same time I didn’t think the characters were quite as compelling or well
developed as they were in Band of Brothers.
24. Flight
of the Conchords: The Second Season
Last year I watched season one, and loved it. While the second season wasn’t quite as good,
I thought it was great fun, and was quite disappointed to hear that they
weren’t going to make a third season. If
you aren’t familiar with the show, it follows a pair of friends/roommates from
New Zealand that are in a band that only has one fan, and she is obsessed with
them. The whole show is very absurd, and
the humor is pretty dry, but it is great summer Netflix material.
23. Life
As long as we’re on the subject of series, I might as well throw in this
one. In this case, it is essential the
sequel to Planet Earth. And it is
spectacular at times – the footage they capture is unlike any other – such as
seeing a pair of cheetahs hunting and catching an ostrich, or 300,000 monarch
butterflies taking flight in a Mexican forest.
Truly breathtaking. But again, it
doesn’t quite capture the magic of the original series for me, and maybe that’s
just because it isn’t the original.
Oprah Winfrey just didn’t really do it for me as a narrator either. I’ll probably buy the British version of it
when it comes out on DVD.
22. Gran
Torino – I think Clint Eastwood is 104 years old now, but it is great to
see that the old man can still bring it.
This was a movie that the previews totally undersold for me. Based on the previews I expected the movie to
essentially be “Grumpy old man lives in neighborhood being taken over by
minorities. He gets angry, but
eventually befriends them, and finds redemption.” And I guess
in some ways it is that story, but it is told well, and it is a lot more
powerful than I expected it to be. It
seems as though at the end of his career Clint as an actor has played roles
that are much more human and in a way turn on their heads the stereotypes of
the Dirty Harry and Man With No Name characters he played in his early carrer.
21. Coraline
– Wow, what a beautiful movie. I wish
I’d seen this one in 3-D in the theater, because the animation was amazing to
look at. I started to watch this movie,
planning to just preview a bit of it to see if my kids would like it, but then
I got totally sucked in and watched the whole thing. On top of that, it’s supposedly a kids movie,
but I actually wouldn’t let my kids watch it.
It’s pretty dark, and while its not violent at all, the stuff that goes
on with Coraline’s parents I think would be pretty unsettling to younger kids. Some years this would’ve been in my top 10
movies.
20. No Country
for Old Men – Not worth discussing this movie too in depth, because we’ve
discussed it to death each of the last two years. When I watched it for the first time two
years ago, I didn’t really like it, but realized that it was an amazing
movie. Last summer I watched it again,
and had an even greater appreciation for it.
So much so that it ended up being in my top 30 movies of the decade list
(yes, I made a list for that too). The
only reason it’s not higher here is that I wanted to save the top spots for
movies that actually came out in the past year, and it was a movie I’d already
seen.
Movies I
Loved
19. Inglorious
Basterds – Speaking of movies that
seemed lame in the previews but were actually terrific, this one takes the
cake. In the previews I thought the
movie was just going to be Brad Pitt, The Nazi Hunter, taking out bad guys in
violent fashion while talking with a funny accent. On top of that I really disliked the last two
Tarrantino movies (Kill Bill and Death Proof).
I thought this one got back to what made some of his earlier movies
good. The Brad Pitt gang is a big part
of the movie, but there is a whole different plot line that is even more
interesting. But the best part of the
movie, without a doubt, is Christopher Waltz, an actor that I didn’t know at
all before this, who won best supporting actor for his role. He is sadistically amazing.
18. The
Cove – After you watch this movie, you will never look at a captive dolphin
the same way. It is a documentary that
tries to uncover a dolphin slaughter that occurs in Japan. Even though it is a documentary it plays like
a suspense or detective movie, as the filmmakers try to set up cameras to film
the alleged slaughter in the heavily guarded cove. The team is led by Ric O’Barry, who a former
trainer for the TV show Flipper who has now dedicated himself saving dolphins. I was both deeply saddened and infuriated
after watching the movie.
17. The Curious
Case of Benjamin Button – People that I’ve talked to about this movie
seemed to really like it or really hate it.
I think the best word I can use to describe it is charming. It is a bit slow, and obviously a story about
someone that ages in reverse isn’t totally realistic, but I just found it to be
a touching story. Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett
spend most of their lives either too old or too young for each other, but keep
being pulled together. I thought it was
terrific. On a side note, how great is
Cate Blanchett? I think she may be my
favorite current actress, and she always seems to pick good roles.
16.5 The
Fantastic Mr. Fox – Why the 16.5? I
forgot about this when I initially made the list because I saw this one in the
theater with my kids. Rather than being
a kids movie that adults might enjoy, this is actually an adult’s movie that
kids might enjoy. For starters, it is
based on one of my favorite kid’s books, by the incomparable Roald Dahl. It is almost worth having kids just so you
can read Roald Dahl books to them. Plus
it is directed by my current favorite director, Wes Anderson. It diverges significantly from the book, but
it is soooo much fun. George Clooney is
perfect as the voice of Mr. Fox.
16. An
Education Every one of these movies in the top group is so good, it has
been impossible for me to come up with a perfect ranking. Again, this could be 10 spots higher – it was
such an interesting movie. It is a
British movie, and everything about it is spot on. The acting is spectacular. The character development is great. The
dialogue is great. And while the pacing
is deliberately slow, I wasn’t bored for a second. If you are the kind of person that likes
sequels, remakes, and ‘splosions (basically, summer movies), you won’t like
this. But if you like good movies you
will.
15. The
Blind Side Let me get all the reasons not to like this out of the way. It is very much a ‘feel good’ Hollywood
movie. It is predictable. It stars Sandra Bullock, who is not exactly
known for choosing great films. It is
sappy. I don’t care – I loved it. There is a reason Sandra Bullock won best
actress – she nailed this role. The fact
that it is a true story, and the main character is currently kicking butt in
the NFL makes it even better. After
seeing previews for this, I fully expected it to be in the “You’ve Already Seen
This Movie” category, but it has a heart that makes it tough not to enjoy.
14.
Adventureland – I haven’t talked to a single person that didn’t enjoy this
one. It’s the story of a bunch of
college-age kids working during the summer at a theme park. All of the supporting characters are fun, and
it is a terrific summer-coming-of-age story.
It should tell you something about the state of our country that movies
like this are only moderately successful while movies like Old Dogs (From the
people that brought you Wild Hogs!) make billions.
13. The
Hurt Locker – While I was a little surprised this won best picture, it is a
terrific movie. Not necessarily fun to watch, but very compelling. It gives a great glimpse into the insanity of
life for soldiers working as bomb disposal experts in Iraq. At first I didn’t like the fact that the end
is a little ambiguous, and that you don’t really know how or when things
actually end for this guy, or if the whole saga just keeps going until
eventually he dies. But then I realized,
“Oh, kind of like the whole war in Iraq!”
Everyone says that the movie isn’t really a commentary in any way on the
war, but I wouldn’t necessarily say it’s not.
12. Up –
This was my favorite kids movie of the year.
I watched it twice, and it is good enough that I would have seen it even
if I didn’t have kids. Like the best of
the Pixar movies, it is entertaining, looks great, and has incredible
heart. If you didn’t like the last
couple Pixar movies like Ratatouille and The Incredibles, then you might not
like this. But that would also
officially make you a curmudgeon. For my
boys (9 and 5), this was probably their favorite movie this year.
11. Star
Trek – Most of you probably saw this in the theater last year, but I didn’t
get around to seeing it on DVD until last June.
I’ve never been a huge Star Trek fan (I’m a Star Wars guy through and
through), but this was undeniably fun.
If only all Summer Movies were this good. Fast, fun, cool special effects, but not
dumb, either, which sets it apart from the Jerry Bruckheimer/Michael Bay movies
that usually come out in late May or early June.
10.
District 9 – Science fiction is probably one of my favorites, if not my favorite
genre. In addition to being an excuse to
showcase great special effects and show off creative ideas for gadgets, the
best ones often explore some significant moral and social issues. The bad ones, of course are just about
blowing stuff up in outer space, but some of the good ones like Gattaca or even
the first Terminator movie get you to think about possible futures and
extensions of the moral choices we are making now with our technology. District 9 is great because while it does
have good special effects (those weapons are frickin’ awesome!) and great
acting, this movie is ultimately a social commentary. Aliens arrive on Earth, but end up being put
into a ghetto in South Africa that looks a lot like, well, the real ghettos in
South Africa. The heart of the movie is
the lead actor, Sharlto Copley, who I’d never heard of before, and he gives
what I thought might’ve been the best performance in any movie all year. His transformation from weasely bureaucrat to
something completely different is spectacular.
If you like sci-fi movies at all, you should love this one.
9. The Road
– I’m not sure if I loved this movie because I loved the book so much, or
because the movie itself was really good.
The book, by Cormac McCarthy, is one of my favorites. It paints a stark, post-apocalyptic world
where we’re never told what destroyed the world, we just know that there isn’t
much left. The setting and the story are
harsh, stark, and hard to watch at times.
But what made the story (and the movie) so great for me is the
relationship between the father and son trying to survive in the world. Literally everything else in the world that
is good has been stripped away, but their relationship and love for each other
keeps them alive. Somehow the story
manages to be tragic and depressing and beautiful and hopeful at the same time.
8. Up In
The Air – There isn’t a better movie star right now than George
Clooney. He has it. Women think he’s
attractive. He seems like the kind of
guy that it would be fun to hang out and have a beer with. He has an incredible charisma that just
lights up the screen in whatever role he plays.
In the wrong hands this movie could have been a snooze fest, but with
Clooney and a great supporting cast it ended up being a deserving Best Picture
nominee.
7. Where
the Wild Things Are – At #12 I said that Up was my favorite kid’s movie of
the year, but I have this one ranked at #7.
That’s because this isn’t a kid’s movie.
Yes, it is based on one of the greatest kid’s books of all time, but I
went to see it without my kids, and I don’t think they would’ve liked it if
they had seen it. Visually, it is
incredible, and I felt like they did a great job of re-creating the world of
the Wild Things. The film works on a
couple of levels, but ultimately the story is about Max’s imagination, and
every one of the Wild Things represents some aspect of Max’s personality or
someone that is an important part of his life.
This isn’t a movie for kids, but rather a movie for the parents who have
read Where the Wild Things Are to their own kids.
6. Sugar
– This movie is directed by the same people that made Half Nelson. It is the story of a baseball player from the
Dominican Republic, and his journey trying to make it to the big leagues. This was probably my favorite sports movie of
the past 10 years, but you certainly don’t have to be a sports fan to enjoy
it. This is a story about immigration,
it is a story about pursuing your dreams, and I think it is safe to say that it
is different than almost any other baseball movie I’ve ever seen. It’s not a true story, but it almost feels
like you are watching a documentary it feels so real.
5. Waltz
With Bashir – This is an animated movie and sort of a documentary. The film follows the director’s journey to
uncover what happened one night in 1982 when militia members slaughtered 3,000
Palestinian refugees in Beirut. The
director was one of the soldiers that night, but two decades later he can’t
remember what happened. Through a series
of interviews and surreal flashbacks he uncovers what happened and will haunt
him for the rest of his life. Not the
kind of film you watch on family movie night, but this is an incredible
movie.
4.
Zombieland – If my number one movie goes down as the funniest movie of the
year, this one goes down as the most fun.
It’s a movie that doesn’t take itself seriously, and keeps you smiling
the whole time. I think zombies have
replaced vampires as my new favorite monsters.
Don’t go into this expecting a great piece of cinema (and really, with a
name like Zombieland, who would?) and you will be entertained from start to
finish. The celebrity zombie cameo alone
makes this movie worth watching.
3. Moon
– At #2 on my list is one of the most spectacular, expensive, visually stunning
science fiction movies ever made. This
one, while being a science fiction movie, is the exact opposite. It is a stark film that has no special
effects and really only one actor, Sam Rockwell. Mysterious, creepy, suspenseful, and even a
little poignant, this movie goes down as the most pleasant surprise of the
year. Rockwell plays a guy working at a
remote station on the moon, and other than that, I don’t want to say any more
about the plot because it is great going in knowing nothing about the
movie. Great stuff.
2. Avatar
– I have some reservations about putting this movie so high on my list. It’s probably the same reason it didn’t win
best picture. The story, while
entertaining, is pretty run of the mill.
But it was entertaining. And to worry too much about the story misses
the point – this was a movie visually unlike anything we have ever seen. Every decade or so we get a science fiction
movie that redefines special effects, and changes the way movies are made. After Star Wars and The Matrix, there were countless
movies that imitated their look and their style. I have no doubt that this will be that movie
for the next decade. The world of Avatar
was so incredible to look at I felt like my jaw was on the floor for half the
movie. The 3-D effects and creativity of
the creatures and world were so spectacular it was hard to believe.
1 The
Hangover.– For the past year at school we’ve seen numerous skits copying
the storyline from this movie. We’ve
seen Mayfete lines taken from the script.
People quote the movie all the time, and when I was collecting money for
our class field trip this year, I had more than one student ask me if I was
keeping the money for a trip to Vegas.
Why? Because this was not only
the most quoted but also the funniest movie of the year. Borat was the last movie that made me laugh
this hard this frequently. Zach
Gallifinakis has taken the throne from Will Ferrell for me of funniest guy
alive. This is not a great film. It is not especially unique or creative. But I love funny movies, and this was the
funniest one I’ve seen in years.
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