Post by rra on Dec 31, 2007 14:39:54 GMT -5
To put it another way, my Top Ten will be my official ballot that I'll cast as my vote for the WrestleCrap Top Ten Movies of 2007 contest.
There was so many quality-sounding movies I wanted to see, but you gotta cut somewhere. So here on the last day of '07, I've got my list down, and ready to cast. It's locked for the contest that ends on saturday.
So let's get it on......but first, for the runner-ups, a brief spotlight of attention from yours truely:
RRA's "Close But No Cigar"
All these movies were on my Top Ten at one point or another, but simply failed to make the final cut. But they deserve some praise, and are worth checking out.
HOT FUZZ - If there was a 11th placement on my list, this is it. We've had many (bad) movies before that were parodies of cop-action cinema, but HOT FUZZ is not only drop-dead hilarious, director Edgar Wright also surprisingly is a good action filmmaker. Simon Pegg is surprisingly great as the cliche tough-as-nails perfect cop, and hey....James Bond is the villain.
What other excuse you need to watch it?
WE OWN THE NIGHT - Critics trashed this movie as a PRINCE OF THE CITY-wannabe, and I'm thinking, "well, that's the point!"
Writer/Director James Gray churns out not the most original street cinema tale, but its a moving "little" picture about an apathic man deciding to do the right thing when his brother is shot. One only hopes this will find a following on DVD, like Michael Cimino's YEAR OF THE DRAGON and Abel Ferrera's KING OF NEW YORK did on Home Video.
SMOKIN' ACES - I still don't get the hate at this movie, I really don't. Maybe people hate that despite the bonzai-warfare that is waged on a Las Vegas casino, the result is irrelevant...and I dig that. It's the Anti-SHOOT'EM UP.
But what makes Joe Carnahan's opus work is the quiet ending, where Ryan Reynolds pulls off a rare feat...he shines.
THE KINGDOM - Director Peter Berg shoots a compelling action/drama about a FBI team stuck in the cross-hairs of terrorists and uncooperative Saudi Arabian authorities. Critics called this "RAMBO-stylized patriotic stupidity," and it makes me wonder if they even saw this movie.
Along with William Friedkin's TO LIVE & DIE IN L.A., the best Michael Mann movies to be never shot by Michael Mann.
RATATOUILLE - I learned a valuable lesson: Never count out Brad Bird. He takes a really crappy-sounding premise, the sort of plot-sketch that's been used for countlessly bad animated movies, all based around the "Just Believe in Yourself" nonsense.....and makes it work!
A charming triumph for PIXAR after the wreck that was CARS, this will win the Best Animation Oscar, and save for maybe PERSOPOLIS, it probably deserves it.
THE SIMPSONS MOVIE - We waited some 15 years for this, and were discouraged by the mediocre quality of the TV series in recent years.
This movie tries to be a throwback to the series' "Golden Age" of Seasons 3 through 7, and I certainly laughed at the movie as if it came from that epoch. Not as good mind you, but I laughed...which I haven't at the Simpsons in a good long time.
GONE BABY GONE - Ben Affleck's spectacular directorial debut that works initially as a well-shot police procedural, then turns into a moral dilemma. It's ending shouldn't have worked, but it does because of Affleck and his little brother, lead man Casey Affleck.
I used to hate Affleck for fun, but with this and HOLLYWOODLAND, he's made his comeback, and atoned for his war crimes like REINDEER GAMES and SURVIVING CHRISTMAS.
MICHAEL CLAYTON - Who knew that a scriptwriter of the BOURNE action series could shoot such a compelling drama with great acting?
Tony Gilroy makes his directorial debut in helming a lawyer in George Clooney, who is forced to face the demons of his occupation by his mentor Tom Wilkinson....and is given a choice to do the right thing and help his law firm seal a lawsuit settlement....or do the wrong thing in doing the right thing by helping the victims.
Tilda Swinton deserves an Oscar nod for Best Supporting Actress. What a bitch of a monster.
RESCUE DAWN - If anybody else but the Mad Man German Werner Herzog, this would have come off as a corny flag-waving melodrama. Instead, he and lead actor Christian Bale produce a compelling drama about fighter pilot trying to escape a hellish Viet Cong POW camp, and keep his sanity.
Freshly apolitical that should have been fully embraced by the American right-wingers, as well by the left. Bale and co-star Steve Zahn deserve serious acting consideration, but they won't because they're not gimmicky-enough roles, nor are they Will Smith.
WAR - Pure action-junk that hopelessly rips-off HEAT and YOJIMBO, but fully satisfying for an action junkie like me, and is to action cinema like a greasy-ass cheeseburger is for me: Kills my Cholesterol, but damn its delicious.
There was so many quality-sounding movies I wanted to see, but you gotta cut somewhere. So here on the last day of '07, I've got my list down, and ready to cast. It's locked for the contest that ends on saturday.
So let's get it on......but first, for the runner-ups, a brief spotlight of attention from yours truely:
RRA's "Close But No Cigar"
All these movies were on my Top Ten at one point or another, but simply failed to make the final cut. But they deserve some praise, and are worth checking out.
HOT FUZZ - If there was a 11th placement on my list, this is it. We've had many (bad) movies before that were parodies of cop-action cinema, but HOT FUZZ is not only drop-dead hilarious, director Edgar Wright also surprisingly is a good action filmmaker. Simon Pegg is surprisingly great as the cliche tough-as-nails perfect cop, and hey....James Bond is the villain.
What other excuse you need to watch it?
WE OWN THE NIGHT - Critics trashed this movie as a PRINCE OF THE CITY-wannabe, and I'm thinking, "well, that's the point!"
Writer/Director James Gray churns out not the most original street cinema tale, but its a moving "little" picture about an apathic man deciding to do the right thing when his brother is shot. One only hopes this will find a following on DVD, like Michael Cimino's YEAR OF THE DRAGON and Abel Ferrera's KING OF NEW YORK did on Home Video.
SMOKIN' ACES - I still don't get the hate at this movie, I really don't. Maybe people hate that despite the bonzai-warfare that is waged on a Las Vegas casino, the result is irrelevant...and I dig that. It's the Anti-SHOOT'EM UP.
But what makes Joe Carnahan's opus work is the quiet ending, where Ryan Reynolds pulls off a rare feat...he shines.
THE KINGDOM - Director Peter Berg shoots a compelling action/drama about a FBI team stuck in the cross-hairs of terrorists and uncooperative Saudi Arabian authorities. Critics called this "RAMBO-stylized patriotic stupidity," and it makes me wonder if they even saw this movie.
Along with William Friedkin's TO LIVE & DIE IN L.A., the best Michael Mann movies to be never shot by Michael Mann.
RATATOUILLE - I learned a valuable lesson: Never count out Brad Bird. He takes a really crappy-sounding premise, the sort of plot-sketch that's been used for countlessly bad animated movies, all based around the "Just Believe in Yourself" nonsense.....and makes it work!
A charming triumph for PIXAR after the wreck that was CARS, this will win the Best Animation Oscar, and save for maybe PERSOPOLIS, it probably deserves it.
THE SIMPSONS MOVIE - We waited some 15 years for this, and were discouraged by the mediocre quality of the TV series in recent years.
This movie tries to be a throwback to the series' "Golden Age" of Seasons 3 through 7, and I certainly laughed at the movie as if it came from that epoch. Not as good mind you, but I laughed...which I haven't at the Simpsons in a good long time.
GONE BABY GONE - Ben Affleck's spectacular directorial debut that works initially as a well-shot police procedural, then turns into a moral dilemma. It's ending shouldn't have worked, but it does because of Affleck and his little brother, lead man Casey Affleck.
I used to hate Affleck for fun, but with this and HOLLYWOODLAND, he's made his comeback, and atoned for his war crimes like REINDEER GAMES and SURVIVING CHRISTMAS.
MICHAEL CLAYTON - Who knew that a scriptwriter of the BOURNE action series could shoot such a compelling drama with great acting?
Tony Gilroy makes his directorial debut in helming a lawyer in George Clooney, who is forced to face the demons of his occupation by his mentor Tom Wilkinson....and is given a choice to do the right thing and help his law firm seal a lawsuit settlement....or do the wrong thing in doing the right thing by helping the victims.
Tilda Swinton deserves an Oscar nod for Best Supporting Actress. What a bitch of a monster.
RESCUE DAWN - If anybody else but the Mad Man German Werner Herzog, this would have come off as a corny flag-waving melodrama. Instead, he and lead actor Christian Bale produce a compelling drama about fighter pilot trying to escape a hellish Viet Cong POW camp, and keep his sanity.
Freshly apolitical that should have been fully embraced by the American right-wingers, as well by the left. Bale and co-star Steve Zahn deserve serious acting consideration, but they won't because they're not gimmicky-enough roles, nor are they Will Smith.
WAR - Pure action-junk that hopelessly rips-off HEAT and YOJIMBO, but fully satisfying for an action junkie like me, and is to action cinema like a greasy-ass cheeseburger is for me: Kills my Cholesterol, but damn its delicious.
I know, amazing isn't it? For some NYC elite pricks, unless your ending is demoralizing, where everyone dies and raped, and villains get away, its a "Hollywood Ending."
