10.1 28 Weeks Later
Say what you will about the bland 2000s when it comes to cinema as a whole, but you got to give it credit for producing the most marvelous zombie films ever put to scream, er, screen. In what started a perfect monster movie idea with bad execution (sorry, but Boyle’s 28 Days Later has more problems than the zombies) has finally caught up in terms of plot mechanics, scope and, well, horror. At the top of the list of zerrific zombie movies is the frightful thunder that 28 Weeks Later hands out as it storms across topical issues such as imperialism and the West’s war on terror. That it does so without speechifying a la Romero makes it even more of a rare commodity. A zombie film with a brain… that isn’t smug. The film can be reduced to a single comparison (Children of Men with zombies), sure, and it can even be dismissed as a conceptually bloated and unnecessary sequel, but the bottom line is has to be seen before it can be dissed. It’s one of those rare zombie film’s that I would be bold enough to call “important.” That such a genre could yield something so far beyond what’s expected of it while at the same time existing as a faithful “monster movie” is a reason to watch it… again.
10.2 Hot Fuzz
While American comedies such as Knocked Up, Superbad and Juno took all the love in 07, it was Hot Fuzz that took the glory. Not a parody of cop buddy films but a fully realized story that just happens to reference everything from Leon’s pet plant in The Professional to Keanu’s overly emo shooting style in Point Break. As cops in search of a small town killer, golden boy Simon Pegg and gordo boy Nick Frost created the not only the best buddy film ever but the best hetero love story of the year. The two chums bonded, Bond-ed, and gave me a new appreciation for Timothy Dalton, not to mention Keanu Reeves’ trigger finger.
10.3 We Own the Night
Remarkable! I love James Grey’s We Own the Night for everything it is and epically everything it isn‘t–easy and typical. The story is about two brothers (Joaquin Phoenix and Mark Wahlberg) on the opposite sides of the law that… no, this isn’t The Departed. It’s a real film about crime that deals with the arduous moral struggle while still holding on to the strains of a decent, meaty action thriller. As quiet personal moments give way to stunningly shot chase sequences, the film hit me like a Paul Schrader morality trip meets an 80s action road trip. It’s clear to me now that, besides the night, crime films own 2007. Not with the sexiness of the year’s (other) great crime films (No Country, Eastern Promises, Hostel: Part II) but through complete command of the medium (I’ll put the cinematography, sound design and use of symbolism against the year’s best) and so much restraint that it’s easy to misread Grey’s film as passive or even tepid. I have a feeling that this is a classic that’ll creep up on people in the years to come. Judging from it’s cold reception it received all around, that should be a large number.
10.4 Michael Clayton
Imagine a world where John Grishem films are good, imagine a lawyer film that is more about ideals than tie wearing chases and, finally, imagine if you will a lawyer film without any major scenes set in a courtroom! That’s Michael Clayton. In the film, the titular George Clooney attempts to “manage” Tom “I am Shiva, the God of Death” Wilkenson, a hotshot lawyer for a corrupt company who goes “crazy” (or is it that he finally went sane?). Everything goes to hell in his enlightened wake but the company isn’t about to let this whistle blower blow. This moment of “holy shit” clarity amidst a world of corporate corruption provides the backdrop for a legal thriller that goes far beyond the law and does so much more than thrill. Clooney, as the lawyer equivalent to “the cleaner” from Pulp Fiction and La Femme Nikita, is as good as Clooney can be. Which, if you ask me, a decade-old fan since Out of Sight, is the poster boy for the modern movie star. Keep in mind that this is also a lawyer film in which the obligatory and usually distracting character driven subplots (Clayton’s debt, debauched business dealings, estranged sons and seedy card playing habits etc.) is just as riveting and purposeful as the film proper.
10.5 3:10 to Yuma
Yuma, YUMA, YUUUUMMMMMAAAAAAAA! Hot damn, this is how a modern Western is done. More so than everyone’s (including me) favorite piece of Oscar (master)bate No Country for Old Men, more than the academic and overrated The Assassination of Jesse James, and even more than the unfairly neglected Western known and just as quickly forgotten as Seraphim Falls. Yuma is a classical Hollywood Western about more than the West. Than gunplay. Than robberies. Than the Pinkertons, the railroads and the fugitives. As for the hookers? Sigh, them too. While the film is about more than these individual Western icons on their own, it happens to be all about them in sum.
Directed by the otherwise hacky James Mangold, 3:10 to Yuma is all about making that fateful train on time, which makes this film, like, The Lord of the Rings of Westerns. Coolness! The film also claims its stake as one of the very best Elmore Leonard (an all time favorite author of mine) adaptations. This simply stated morality tale (epic in scope, personal in tone) is made by its cast of characters. In yet another exemplary performance, the film stars Christian Bale as the “honest livin” rancher that is charged to help send superstar fugitive, a seductive Russell Crowe (doing his penance and doin’ it right) to the hanging block a few towns over. Two of the best supporting performances of the year also join in the fun. Ben Foster as the wishy-washy gunfighter (gayer than Brando in One Eyed Jacks I reckon) leaving a trail of dead on route to rescue his hero from the fellowship of lawmen steals the show while the little known but enormously talented Dallas Roberts plays the railroad man in charge of this easier-said-than-done endeavor. Yuma fires on all cylinders with crisp-cool dialogue, hot-ass action and a stone-cold sense of humanity.
10.6 The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
The brilliant subject and the talented director.
The Rest of the Best
Black Book
This is the resistance film that The Good German tried to be last year and Lust, Caution tried to be this year. The fact remains that Paul Verhoeven is one of my favorite directors. Life is too short and I can no longer pretend he isn’t. Ironically the fact
that, by all accounts, he’s finally made himself a “great,” list-worthy film doesn’t deter me in that line of thinking. Black Book is at once a well drawn and beautifully shot story on par with other great WWII side-stories like Army of Shadows. Playing a Jewess infiltrating the Nazi elite (and looking like Christina Aguilera in the process), lead actress Carice van Houten takes command of a part that is thankfully more Ingrid Bergman-Casablanca than Cate Blanchette-Charlotte Grey. As a bonus, imagine if Casablanca had boobs! The classic in tone/modern in temperament tone may throw some off but I was hooked by the undercover/under covers plot that required this heroine to dive head first in a hot-BED of Nazi naughtiness. About war criminals, Nazi sympathizers, and a woman prostituting herself for the good of mankind (never thought I would say that), the film is at once a sparkling throwback to the résistance films of old with all the edge, violence and pervyness that I’ve come to expect from Verhoeven.
Paprika
Every year an anime lands a slot on my list. Not by accident, mind you, it’s just that the Japanese animated tradition is as vital as any national cinema in existence. Showing no sign of slowing, Satoshi Kon (Millennium Actress) has made another curious masterpiece. Using a Metz-ian film approach the story implies that cinema is the keyhole into our dreams and proceeds to journey there with the audience. A rich detective film about the recovery of a dangerous “dream machine,” the uncompromising Paprika proves that anime doesn’t have to pander to kids or teens (it’s similar to Ratatouille in that respect). Rather, this intellectual thriller concerns itself with story and narrative explorations; one of those rare animes that appeals to art house nerds! Pixel by pixel, this spice of a film picks apart the subconscious and plunges, rather than stumbles, down the rabbit hole. The film’s a mess and that’s exactly why I love it. You know how I know: because I watch a film like Paprika and think: if Fellini were alive today and Japanese he wouldn’t even bother with that live action crap. He would make Paprika.
Fido
After a excellent showings by 28 Weeks Later and Resident Evil: Extinction, the zombies just keep on coming. And chewing. This time they get mixed up in a warped version of Pleasantville for the zombie crowd. This 50s era social parable reimagines our post-World War II America as a post-World War Zombie America. Now that’s my kind of history! As a retro horror-comedy, Fido explores the “containment” and enslavement of a “subhuman” zombie lower class in a swank suburban town where ownership of shock-collar equipped zombies become the ultimate status symbol. So… Capitalism + Imperialism = Zombism. This isn’t a new concept exactly but what is new and exciting is how much more deeply the film probes this interesting concept. Resident Evil: Extinction, for instance, merely referenced the theoretical parameters of a zombie working class; this film takes a throw-away reference like that and fully renders it!
Directed by the virtually unknown Andrew Currie, the film is about a pet zombie named Fido (played with great passion and a far from dead pizazz by Scotsmen Billy Connolly) that enters into a maladjusted family as a high priced zombie butler. As developed as Romero’s famous “Bub” zombie from the seminal “Day of the Dead,” this creature grows, learns, feels and has a good influence on the mother and son who are desperately looking for a husband and father figure (yes, the sexual connotation between mother and zombie suitor are there). Talks of zombie wars of yore and a vast zombie wasteland that lies just outside of the fenced-off city walls by the corporate minded villain and WWZ veteran (Henry Czerny) give the film a vivid sense of time and place. Not quite an action film and not quite horror, the nuanced Fido represents yet another vibrant entry into the thriving zombie genre. This one is not be missed.
Margot at the Wedding
A dying tree acts as the focal point of this film about a two sisters reuniting at the old family home for a wedding. The tree’s roots are rotting and spreading into the neighbors yard, killing their plants. The fate of the tree is to be violently cut and severed. When death finally comes to the tree, it falls on the tent that was to be used for the wedding. This reminds me of a joke from Seinfeld where Jerry pronounces that Elaine “came from a broken home… literally a tree fell on it.” But the home in this film is not as broken as its characters, who make little to no effort to mask their contempt for each other. The hostility these characters feel is so palpable that their contentious glairs practically implicate the audience as well. Characters will say things like “I can’t stand her” right in front of the “her” in question.
Having made the classic Allen-esq The Squid and the Whale writer/director Noah Baumbach has a special fondness for depicting families that are falling apart or, in tree terms, rotting from the inside for years and years and years until… snap! But it would be easy to dismiss this story as some cynical Sundance poopoo (The Savages anybody?) that exploits troubles to support its sitcom set-ups (sorry, I’m also having a Little Miss Sunshine flashback).
Nicole Kidman stars as the title character who travels with her son to the house that her sister inherited from mother. Shot with a home video/8mm veneer, it becomes clear that Noah doesn’t do dysfunctional family movies, he does movies about families that happen to be dysfunctional. Subtle, but there’s a difference. He also has the most amazing way of depicting otherwise intelligent characters talking to children in the most shockingly frank of ways. “Malcolm was raped by his male baby sitter” the family throws out in front of tots and toddlers as if they were asking to pass the salt. Baumbach in not trying to shock his audience and as such I find his high-minded approach to such low-minded character interactions refreshing.
The cast: Nicole Kidman looks… human again. Here is an actress that shines and glows when not playing spectacular (The Hours, Birth) and is dull and unconvincing when she does just that (Bewitched, The Stepford Wives). Jack Black, rocking his School of Rock persona big time, plays the man who is to marry Margot’s sister. There’s one small problem, “I haven’t had that thing yet where you realize you’re not the most important thing in the world” he tells Margot in a moment of sorta-truth. And of course Jennifer Jason Lee, playing the world weary bride that also has a lot of growing up to do, does nothing to disprove that rumor that she’s one of our most underrated actresses. More than almost any film last year, this film just couldn’t connect with audiences or critics. Margot, the poor dear, apparently missed out on the wedding completely but don’t let that stop you from going.
Paris J’Taime
I love I Love Paris for bring the anthology film back and love it even more for an unwieldy spirit that soars higher above the Parisian sky than Amelie could have ever dreamed.
Juno
A film… I list… against my better judgment. A perfectly fine film. A perfectly fun film, too, if you approach Juno as Knocked Up from the woman’s perspective; which is great because Knocked Up is inept commercial trickery with no idea (or no care for) who its audience is. This film not only does, but found new audiences than intended: adults! One shining example is that this film actually uses the word “abortion” rather than “smichmortion” (a la Knocked Up) to address one of many options available to a young woman. Bravo, brave souls, for actually using a real word in a real context in an American comedy of all things.
Jason Reitman’s sophomoric effort is also far less smug than his Thank You For Smoking. Notice I said less smug. His titular (emph. the first three letters please) lead character and shooting script (by the getting-to-be-annoying Diablo Cody) crashes head first into the smug train and damn near derails it. Enter Ellen Page, the beyond-Ghost Worldly vamp who gets knocked up then knock knock jokes her way through what becomes a surprisingly heartfelt story filled friends, family and an ass-load of irony. The uber-stylized dialogue young Juno utters acts as a double-edged sword however. There are wonderful nuggets of wry teenage humor that regaled my ears (Page’s Germanicized reading of “Gerta Rauss” got the biggest laugh and her long winded interactions with the adopting father rocks, literally) but also some strong doses of sonic poison (“I’m pregnant” Juno says, to which her BFF responds with the cringe worthy line “honest to blog?!”). Speaking of sonic, the fact that Juno, a 16-year-old mind you, knows enough NOT to like Sonic Youth but digs, instead, on the hipster likes of the Stooges and Dario Argeno horror films rather than, say, Panic! At the Disco and Saw only highlights the extreme degree of artifice at play with this story. Yet, still, play is a word that stands out. That it plays so earnestly, and with so much to back that play up with made Juno hard for me to reject. I guess going against my judgment is just what the (OBGYNO) doctor ordered.
My Best Friend
The film that proves that traditional situation comedies are very much alive. They’re just not coming from America anymore. I suppose it helps that the bringer of life is also one of the best scenarists on the planet: Patrice Laconte, who, in his focus on story and character instead of formalism (rare for a Parisian), tells a classic, no BSing story about a man (Daniel Auteuil) without friends who struggles learn what it means to have them. If that Scroogey plot tick sounds arch, it is! But, guess, what so were Preston Sturges films and that didn’t make me love those film any less. Nothing groundbreaking springs from this soft and sweet material but if you want to see the ground break check out my number one of the year, There Will Be Blood. If you want laid back fun instead, cozy up to this film and you just may find yourself a new best friend.
Lady Chatterley
France lands another spot again! Adapted from the DH Lawrence novel, here is a film that is sensual in all, um, senses of the word. I think it even invents a few new usages for that word. Lady Chatterley, it should be noted, was the 2007 film that got us film geeks all hot and bothered and blogging (about being hot and bothered). Everyone seems to be talking about the sex in this movie and who can blame them? This film reinvents sex. Or, rather, refines sex with the grander ambitious of capturing the aura of sexuality as much as the literal act–taking great pleasure in depicting both by the way.
Imagine a languid BBC movie… in French… with a lot of sex. While the intimate relations are steamy and su
ch, what really got me going is director Pascale Ferran’s sublime communion with nature. That makes this film a fine counterpart to Thailand’s Syndromes and a Century. Our heroine, the Lady Constance (Marina Hands), heads into the wild for an adulterous tryst in her estate’s Sacred Shed of Sex and, here, the film itself captures the feeling of taking a long walk in the woods during the boring summer hours. What stands out is how simple acts such as the putting on and taking off of cloths takes on worlds of meanings beyond just the image. Even a simple caress can resonate with hair raising cadence. There’s nothing crude about this film, either. The nudity comes across as natural as a naked baby while the sex in question is tender and artful before it is ever “hot.” As the Lady and her lover, the house gardener (Jean-Louis Coullo’ch), spend what seem like hours gazing at each other, Lady Chatterley taught me to appreciate films, especially literary adaptations, that manage to be more about what you see and feel than what is said and spoken (this is not an intellectual story either). While virtuous in its own right, the year’s other talked about film that involves secret sex romps, Atonement, is the diametric opposite in that it’s all and only about what is said. By contrast, this minimalist story (winner of the César for Best Picture) plays it loose, but plays it pretty.
Hostel: Part II
Worst of the year, this; Eli Roth sucks, that. And that was just from fans of the first Hostel! 
Criminally misunderstood, this killer thriller is among the most thoughtful films of the year… and you can stop lau
ghing because I’m serious. Dead serious, hahahahaha. Seriously, Roth’s film not only goes deeper into the series’ exploration of the murderous side of globalism and international commerce (where flesh is literally bought and sold on the open marketplace) but does so with great style and a gory sheen of steady-focus sobriety and, okay, exploitation too. With two great performances by Richard Burgi as the maniac businessman who signs up with his “everyman” buddy for a weekend of knife wielding “fun” (a star-making turn by Roger Bart), the criminals in this snuff gorno take center stage. And instead of getting the hook off the stage, they give it. While murdered teens are still featured, this unexpected emphasis on ordinary evil, the soccer dad next door as it were, elevates the scope of what might otherwise have been a myopic series that previously focused on American greed but now is brave enough to attack, quite literally, the root of the problem.
also…
Guilty Pleasure Pick: 3s
Spider-Man 3, Pirates 3, Resident Evil 3 and 300
Why? Becaus… How?! Wellllllll, becau… Dude! I know, shut up, this was the year of bearable Hollywood sequels. The year that Hollywood broke my will apparently and had me actually enjoying its frivolous fare for once. What’s more impressive is that while I hate many of the series listed here, their respective third entries managed to rise up beyond the shadow of expectations; even Shrek 3 and Ocean’s 13 weren’t horrible for a change. Rush Hour 3, however, sucked harder than ever and, as Ratner’s third “third” (after Red Dragon and X-Men 3), the three-strikes Rat Man drops as many thirds as he does turds. Anyway, each fil
m listed here represents a marked sign of series growth and, more importantly, genuine fun escapist Hollywood romps that avoid getting all serious and game-face-y. Instead, these looser and more likable entries display frivolous senses of humor about themselves and their fandoms. Where Shrek puts on a show about Shrek, Spider-Man tells his annoying gf-git to take a hike so he (and we) can enjoy the fun side of superhero-dom while Alice from Resident Evil does her part by fighting the Awesomeness that is zombie crows. Above them all, Pirates embraces the silly and surreal unlike any other mainstream third. As for 300, well, it’s a cheat to put it on this list but it’s the most iconic film with a three in the title since Alien3.
Unguilty Pleasure Pick
Atonement
That typewriter music! That framing device! That green dress! That letter carrying the most devastating and life altering c-word payload in the history of film. And, geesh, have non-CGI battlefield tracking shots ever looked better?! Atonement astounds. It’s what I look for in literary adaptations; humor, style, sex and invention. Sure it indulges in mid 90s period movie pretensions, but it’s supposed to! The film’s flashback/flash forward/flash ,er, middle metanarrative had a mixed effect at first but, soon after, had me reading the film in a whole different way. Provoked into a thought, I looked at the story as a literary fabrication and, thus, it’s flaws (the overwrought love story for one) was promptly turned into something of an asset. The only thing that keeps this film from a higher placing is the seen-it-been-there WWII section of the film where a trio of soldiers aimlessly walk, talk and bleed. After Pride & Prejudice I though director Joe Wright to be a master and, today, a certified master. Small visual touches like focus shifts, blurs, lens flairs, camera twitches, and the now-signature significance Wright places upon close-ups of hands only cement this director as a legend in the making–of his making. So much so that I’m eager to claim Wright as the first true 21st century auteur with a proviso that this title can also refer to that other Brit with the last name of Wright; Edgar Wright of Hot Fuzz fame.
David Lynch Makes Quinoa
The most fascinating DVD extra since I saw David Cronenberg getting a haircut on the History of Violence DVD, this entry on my list is featured on one of the best films last year, Inland Empire. The amazing short film features director David Lynch acting the part of his usual retarded genus self. “Quinoa is something I like to have for dinner every chance I get…” he states with a too-steady tone, “you start with a pan and I’m going to go over now and fill this pan at the sink with fresh water…” okay, still with me? Then “I’m going to set this pan on the stove and light the flame…” Lynch continues to go step by step in his first ever cooking show that rivals even his weather reports. As the Lynch-man labors with a mixture of love, hunger and excruciating detail, the effect is blisteringly fascinating and enjoyable. Especially when the food is simmering and Lynch has a few minutes to kill so he goes out for a smoke and tickles his audience with a story about a midnight train from Greece to Yugoslavia during a “moonless night.” All the while, strange mood music plays. Sensing the simmering food, Lynch snaps out of his Shaman-like storytelling session and says, “What time is it?… 7:50? Okay, let me know when it’s 7:52″ …awkward pause… “uh, Alfredo made all these windows by hand… all this metal…”, “It’s 7:51!” a voice interrupts. Lynch then runs back to the kitchen, finishes the food and goes step-by-step on how to clean the pan with “soap and water.” Cut to Lynch finishing his dinner. “Man! That is so good!” My words exactly.
TV Movie
Battlestar Galactica: Razor
::slips in without anyone noticing::
Best Mainstream Children’s Film
Ratatouille
Amazingly, Ratatouille doesn’t bluey. It isn’t hooey and’s not overly gooey. Written to chewy perfection by Brad Birdie, the film has a wonderfully crafted story that favors peachy over preachy. Made for the filmic foodie, Ratatouille, in factatoullie, is the first good Pixar film since Toy Stooey.
Documentary of the Year
No End In Sight
In a year cluttered with way too many blunt and bulky Iraq films and disposable Iraq docs, “No End” emerges as the most important film of the year. “This is the story of America’s invasion of Iraq” the film goes. And, well, it sure is. Sadly, this straightforward, no frills “story” should be essential viewing for every English-speaking American. Positioned in a different context, our Government’s inconceivably stupid organizational blunders that are systematically documented here (disbanding the Iraq army, allowing weapons caches to go unchecked, etc., etc., etc., etc., etc.) would be viewed as a Dr. Strangelove-esq comedy. In the context of this film, it’s a tragedy. While I may view the people in charge of this botched invasion as war criminals (“stuff happens!” Rumsfield screams to a warm and receptive media), the film let me come to that conclusion on my own, and in my own terms. The closing words, “that makes me angry” spoken by a soldier echo loud and clear. Fact is, this film made me angry too. Mad at my country, mad at our need to deal with in Middle East in any way shape or form and mad at the people of Iraq. The film makes my list because anger is the first actual feeling (other than hopeless apathy) I have felt towards this American endeavor in years. The facts –and, yes, they ARE facts– speak for themselves.
and finally…
The Best Moment of the Year
It’s called a genre flip. Or, at least, I’m calling it that for lack of a better term. Like a frog changing sexes for the hell of it, this rarest of Hollywood events occurs when the film you’re watching undergoes such a radical shift in tone that it no longer resembles the genre you paid to see-when you see as many films as I do you begin to respect the ones the genuinely surprise you. The big reveal of a villain in Danny Boyle’s Sunshine easily claims its status as the best moment of the year. Many were turned off by an abrasive horror element, or what I like to call “The Sun-Shining,” that literally reared its ugly head in the third act when a sun soaked “monster” hijacks not only the spaceship but the realism of this astronauts-in-space-trying-to-save-Earth story. The shock of this is as momentous and as if, say, Apollo 13 decided to turn into Alien. Like 2001: A Space Odyssey and last year’s daring The Fountain, this is studio made science fiction filmmaking at its cerebral highest and, sadly, underrated lowest. Execs are usually too afraid (or spineless) to release something divisive to audiences. Not this time. Sunshine also happens to be one of the first true science fiction films that’s pro science as the villain embodies earth damning traits of fundamentalism that seek to send humanity back into the darkness. And that’s no metaphor either, this fire-breathing zealot literally wants to do that! I’m now convinced that the modern science-fiction film isn’t dead, it was just taking a hyperspace nap until Sunshine woke it up.
- The hyper-realistic Sunshine takes a turn for the worst–which is for the best. Oh, the horror!
- The cut-to-black-heard-round-the-world Sopranos ending.
- Russel Crowe whistles in the last shot of 3:10 to Yuma. A getaway?
- The wordless opening of There Will Be Blood. The image of man penetrating nature will not be forgotten. Indeed, cannot be forgotten.
- A piece of gym equipment from the past known as the Insane-O-Flex sings “I like your booty, but I’m not gay!” as it destroys New Jersey, Godzilla-style in Aqua Teen Hunger Force.
- Statue Man Alert! Last spotted dead (frozen in a moment of panic) in Hot Fuzz.
- Being a total nerd, Stunt Man Mike devourers the “nacho grande” animal style in Death Proof. Tarantino captures all the action in close-ups.
- The good bad guy turns into a bad bad guy in Hostel II. (cooler than it sounds)
- All the not-so-subtle ass slapping in Eastern Promises at the hands of Vincent Cassel.
- A major character gets zombified in 28 Weeks Later.
- Ellen Page’s Germanized line reading of “Gerta Rauss” in Juno.
- And finally… this was the year that Peter Parker finally told Mary Jane to shut the hellz up. What a year!
Comments
Leave a comment Trackback