Scots Taffer on 14/12/2009 at 04:15

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It used to be that we got to the end of a year and I had a top ten pretty neatly tied up… I’m not sure if it’s Hollywood release schedules that are changing that now pitches a bunch of movies towards the end of the year on the Australian side, or if the quality output is just waning somewhat, but I’m struggling to make a proper “Top Ten” and instead resort to categorising the releases instead.


Cream of the Crop

A Serious Man
It takes serious balls after the critically acclaimed and relentlessly bleak thriller No Country and the well received narcissistic farce Burn After Reading to take a step back and make a deeply personal film. But if there’s anyone who can do it and pull it off, it’s the Coens. They combine the same blackly comic perspective on the absurdity of life and a sense of impending doom from their recent films coming to bear on their experiences growing up in a Jewish household in the 1960’s Midwest.

Up
Pixar is becoming as dependable as the arrival of Santa and Christmas Jingles in the month of December. Their output is so consistently high that I’m beginning to worry about the inevitable critical backlash they are storing up for their next Cars-like misstep. Up is pure whimsy and in any other animation studios hands, it’d be silly and funny but forgettable, but Pixar know better. They understand that what makes their stories live and breathe is the human element. They breathlessly speed through forty or so years of married life in about four minutes and handle it with such deftness that you can only marvel and be moved. It immediately sets a strong emotional core for the movie and it’s why we care when the whimsical story reaches its conclusion.

Milk ('09 release in Aus)
As compelling a true life story as you can get with a bugnuts fucking crazy ending that is truly shocking when you consider the positions of the men involved, what was at stake and what it appeared to be caused by. I’ve been a Sean Penn detractor for a while, between going full retard in I Am Sam and hamming it up in Mystic River I’ve never had much respect for his acting chops but he is Harvey Milk – the mannerisms, voice, passion and underdog charisma he brings to the character are amazing to watch.

The International
I rate this higher than most it seems (only 58% fresh on RT) but its combination of breathless pacing, globetrotting conspiracy theories on the hot button topic of war profiteering, exhilarating action set-pieces and solid acting from Clive (Naomi is given nothing to work with) makes this one of my quiet favourites of the year.

Star Trek
Ignoring lens flares and the convoluted plot which features more holes than a rip in the space-time continuum and convenience than an entire star system full of 7-Elevens, Abrams managed to reboot Star Trek as successfully as Nolan relaunched the Batman franchise and we all know how well that continued. Now that they’ve successfully retconned the characters and universe, I’m really intrigued to see where they go with this.

Drag Me To Hell
Balls to the wall crazy Raimi, you jump and flinch at the start of the scare and are laughing your ass off by the end of it. Totally unhinged all the way and great ending.

(http://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?p=1952723#post1952723) In The Loop

Solid, But Somewhat Lacking in Greatness

The Watchmen
A flawed but visually astounding adaptation of the seminal graphic novel. There isn’t enough meat to the relationships they frame in the different segments of the story for us to really care about them at the climax and the climax itself is neutered of its true devastation, which robs the movie of any emotional shock value. However there’s a great central performances here from Jackie Earle Haley as Rorschach and the sequences featuring Dr Manhattan are pure cinematic spectacle.

District 9
Fantastic pseudo-doc intro into a gritty and grounded sci-fi action movie that nearly worked for me, if only they’d spent a little more time making Wikus and his motivations understandable then I wouldn’t have felt like the third act heroics were a complete turnaround from his selfish racist asshole persona.

Moon
This was a nice atmospheric piece that doesn’t develop its central twist enough to leave anything to take away from it. The acting, setting and premise were all great, but there’s a sense of something missing – perhaps motivation and direction once the truths of the story are revealed – and we are left to meander in the atmosphere already created.

Public Enemies
Mann returns with a crime flick that wants to be epic but feels too small. Depp plays Dillinger well but the script keeps him at arm's length, more of an enigmatic mystery rather than a man. The camerawork wasn't nearly as distracting as I expected, though it did lend an air of cheapness to the whole affair.

500 Days of Summer
A charming and quirky comedy that’s totally not romantic, man! It’s realistic! Yeah… I found that the central premise was a bit flimsy but the non-linear narrative was nicely done and there were some fun moments, quite forgettable though.

Bruno
This suffered from being too staged, constantly slumming in tone for shock-value and featuring downright incongruous sequences back to back. There are some big laughs to be found but less funny overall than Borat. Disappointing.


Montages of Cement or Paint Drying would be more Entertaining

Note: I seem to come down hardest year on year with comedies that miss the mark (for me), but it seems like mediocre action movies can actually achieve what they set out to do by having some bloody reasonable action, whereas so many comedies are just flat out unfunny or plumb depths that other comedies have either perfected or run into the ground.

The Hangover
Wouldn’t it be funny if a bunch of guys on a bachelor party in Vegas couldn’t – No, if only.
One or two worthwhile scenes cannot redeem this ridiculously slow comedy.

Extract
This movie just lacks laughs from start to finish. I think I chuckled at Gene Simmons asking Jason Batemen to put his testicles in the doorway so that he could slam shut on them to settle the lawsuit they were pursuing, but that was about it. Genuinely unfunny, boring shit.


So Bad they’re Sort Of on the Good Side again

Note: New category for me, I guess there are films that fall into this zone every year. In isolation, they are bad movies but with a view that they provide something better than their simply “bad” counterparts but not really offering anything worth contemplating or “better than average”, I thought it was worth segregating them out.

Taken
Featuring Liam Fucking Neeson as a badass special op of some description, who cares really because all you need to know is that bad Euros stole his daughter and he’s going to Fuck Them Up, but not before a whole lot of crash boom bang and the clichés keep on piling up until a critical mass is reached in the ludicrous finale. Braindead but fun.

2012
Silly noisy destructoporn with John Cusack and a cast of thousands with about ten minutes worth of character development between them all running away from floods, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, walls of flame, falling buildings, tsunamis, giant donuts and flying giraffes.

Terminator Salvation
Brain-spasmingly stupid non-starter of a Franchise reanimation starring a Christian Bale still in Batman Voice Mode as a John Connor so robotic I thought they’d kept the original leaked ending. That said, it featured a few decent action set-pieces and induced a few eye-rolling groaners of references to the original movies. So not an entire waste of time… but almost.


Contenders waiting in the wings:
The Informant!
Gomorrah
Avatar
The Lovely Bones
The Hurt Locker ('09 release in Aus)
Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call, New Orleans
Inglorious Basterds
The Road
World’s Greatest Dad
State of Play
Where the Wild Things Are
Public Enemies
Cold Souls
Up in the Air
Drag Me To Hell

I'm looking to see as many of these in the next few weeks that I can.

henke on 14/12/2009 at 15:28

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Great / Future favourite:
Inglorious Basterds
Best night at the movies I've ever had. Expecting the DVD for christmas. :)

Good:
Where The Wild Things Are
Drag Me To Hell
Moon
District 9
Watchmen
Avatar
Up

Decent:
Public Enemies
Star Trek
Taken

Still to see:
Big Fan
A Serious Man
The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus
The Men Who Stare At Goats
Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call, New Orleans
The Hurt Locker
The Road


heh heh heh

stake

rachel on 14/12/2009 at 20:24

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I thought The Hangover was pretty decent but if I pick a comedy in my top ten I'll pick I love you, Man. That one was near-perfect.

bukary on 14/12/2009 at 22:30

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You really think that The Hangover or The Taking of Pelham is better than e.g. Gran Torino? :weird:

Tocky on 15/12/2009 at 02:10

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1.Gran Torino- I think you have to be American and understand gangs and thugs and what it means to be a man and stuff to like this one. Don't struggle too hard on it if you don't, just go powder your pussy.

2.Paranormal Activity- Scary shit. Opens up that crack between real and unreal just enough for something nasty to slip through.

3.District 9- This rates just for the concept and might not rate so high if I had seen more movies this year. The material was engrossing in it's newness alone. Eh, if you don't count the ending.

4.Taken- Old style fuckemup. Sure it wasn't quite believable but then Casino Royale had Bond injesting poison which had an antidote FS. The impetus was understandable though and the action sharp which is all this style requires. Character development doesn't happen. It just keeps you on edge.

That's about it for what I've seen. Benjamin Buttons bored bejesus out of me and I like Fitzgerald. He must have needed money for booze when he wrote that. Predictable as hell but enjoyable at first. Just not enough to keep the concept going. I laughed at Drag me to Hell and I wanted to be scared. Formulaic and boring. How the hell do you make gypsy curses and the pathos of kittykilling funny? Apparently they knew how.