Top 10 lists seem to be such an odd and curious item of pop culture. So gregarious yet necessary at the same time. i mean, truly, how can one film be considered "better" than another, when it all comes down to are a series of subjective components? For example, a favoured genre will definitely appeal more than another. Or one's time and place of viewing, along with the company (or solitude) involved. A person's moment in life can seriously affect the way a film is interpreted, enjoyed and connected to at some level, (as evidenced by the run of children's animated films that have dominated my most recent Top 10 lists).
That being said, there's often no denying whether a film is good or bad. Even if we see only 24 movies (which was the number of movies i saw in 2010 in theatres, on new release Blu-ray/DVD, or first run Movie Network premieres, by far the lowest amount i've seen in all my time writing reviews), we can usually agree on the good merits of a movie, while lambasting the worst of the worst. But to say one film ranks higher than another, is just pure silliness. SO without further adieu, please enjoy my pretentiousness, the Top 10 Films of 2010...
10.
Salt; Crazy action Bourne style, Jolie provides refreshing twist. Bring on more amazing ludicrous MacGyver stunts in this franchise to be.
9.
Tangled; Made for the Stage w/classic Disney musical numbers mixed with a bit of Spamalot fun. Sweeping action & spectacular animation.
8.
How to Train Your Dragon; well worth the time spent, visually entertaining, great work on the dragon varieties, good for the whole fam.
7.
Alice in Wonderland; typical Burton, in both a good way and bad way, neat visuals and set design, loses steam at points, but lots o fun.
6.
Magic and Bird: A Courtship Of Rivals; fascinating doc on 2 of b-ball's greats, no matter where your loyalties lie, you will root for both!
5.
Scott Pilgrim vs. The World; Edgar Wright superbly spoofed two genres, now has created his own: Video Game Comic Book genre, FANTASTIC!!
4.
It Might Get Loud; Really cool premise, purely awesome entertainment to see Page, Edge and Jack White sit around, play and talk music.
3.
Despicable Me; Fun, but a bit slow to start, good voice work (Borat springs to mind), silly minions steal the movie, great music track.
2.
Exit Through the Gift Shop; Insanely brilliant, bizarre & artistically profound. Thought provoking view of street art from many lenses.
and the number one film of 2010 is...
1.
Inception; A dream come true for lovers of fine films, filled with novel ideas, visual wonderment. A real heist of the mind. Stunning!
Honourable mentions: Avatar, Oceans, Babies, The Kids are Alright, Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows Part One, The Other Guys, Iron Man 2
The fact that i only managed to watch 24 movies in 2010 may reflect a rather poor year of offerings from the world of film. Or it may just suggest i am a little more discerning in my movie going, or basically way too busy to sit down and enjoy a film. A by-product of this is the fact that even though 2010 won't be remembered as a banner year in the movie industry, the number of real stinkers, movies that were plain outright horrible, was actually down from year's past. Maybe i managed to miss them, or maybe i just wouldn't let my daughter's whims be fulfilled (i'm looking at you, Beverly Hills Chihuahua), but the following five worst films pale in comparison to the atrocities that have made up the worst films in the past. Each one has some redeeming quality, and appear here as the worst 5 of the 24 films i did see.
The Top 5 Worst films of 2010 are...
5.
The Sorcerer's Apprentice; Cage and Molina make magic happen, until it all goes POOF!! in the 2nd half, Bruckheimer formula blows again.
4.
Couples Retreat; Great to see Favreau and Vaughn together again, some big laughs, beautiful locale, but disappointingly unfunny overall.
3.
Toy Story 3; Fitting farewell for the toys, even though it's a full length video game designed 2 sell more merchandise. Pixar sells out.
2.
Nanny McPhee Returns; British tripe w/an overly intrusive score and actors i'd rather be watching in Harry Potter, cloyingly annoying.
and the Worst movie of 2010 is...
1.
Gulliver's Travels; Lame, overblown, wastes advantage of 3D to show off scale F/X, feel sorry for Blunt & Segel, Black gives a few laughs.
Please feel free to leave a rebuttal, or check the thumbs up/thumbs down/agree/disagree boxes. Let the debate begin...
3 comments:
NOTE: This year, i made the decision to provide Twitter sized reviews. This was to ensure that not only would the reviews be more timely, seeing as i could write them on my cell phone immediately after leaving the theatre, but also that people might actually read them, being 140 characters and all.
i have a vision of a friend, standing in line to purchase a movie ticket, when their phone goes off. It's a message from my Twitter feed (@joejameskireel). The friend reads it, steps up to the counter, and instead of buying a ticket to Gulliver's Travels, opts instead for Black Swan or The Fighter. Another $10 saved!!
(It's more likely that should this occurrence ever actually take place, the receiver of the message will glance at the Twitter review, shake their head accordingly, shrug their shoulders and say, "What does he know? He put Shoot 'em Up in his Top 10! Two tickets for Yogi Bear please.")
SO, in accordance with this year's theme of brevity, i offered merely a list. i look forward to fleshing out these selections through the comments or rebuttals you may have. i also would like to hear your opinion about the review lengths. Is it better? Was the old way better? What's good/bad about either? Do you even care? Let me know by posting a comment.
watched Inception last night and found it weird and hard to follow. Personally I would have put The Social Network as numero uno...upgraded to an A+ if not for the darkness and background music/noise. I liked the snappy fast paced dialogue and the cuteness of Jesse as Mark, no matter what he was labelled as. Like Kevin Spacey said, and asked why aren't there movies made today like in the past..i.e. Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolfe, or Carnel Knowledge, or Catch 22, forgot the fourth one he mentioned....well they are he said with The Social Network. So Joe does that mean it can be compared to those? is it the dialogue?
You mustn't be the only one who had a problem with Inception, seeing as the Academy and the Globes ignored it. i'm okay with that; Stanley Kubrick was never an awards magnet and he gave us some of the most innovative and creative films ever. i don't think Nolan will mind being in that company.
Funny that you mention the "noise" in The Social Network. That "noise" won a Globe, and i could foresee an Oscar. i think it was integral (along with the dialogue) to make the movie feel upbeat and fast paced, even though very little actually happens. As for the darkness, i just think that's Fincher's style, and how he likes to light his films. Again, not everyone's cup of tea.
Sadly, i am not too familiar with those films you listed. i've seen Virginia Wolfe, and that would definitely fall into what you said, a great dialogue film. But that was a play, so the dialogue was key before it even became a movie. When did Spacey say those comments? i like him.
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