2010: A lot, yet a little

Goodbye Duckies, t'was a fun holiday season. The presents, the yums, the family... I love the holiday season. Maybe my favorite part of the year ending is year in review shows. We did one at work for news stories and one for our movie reviews; the 2010 CRI Film Review Extravaganza. I'm pretty proud of the Extravaganza, I made all the graphics and wrote a good portion of the script. The sad part about it is we only review movies that come to Oskaloosa's Penn Centre Theater.

So considering I can't review everything for CRI, I decided to take to the Blogosphere with my favorites of the year. So without further adieu...

P@'s Top 10 Films of 2010 (that I've seen)

#1 - Black Swan

Such a head trip. Loved the acting, the cinematography, the twists... Darren Aronofsky returned to what I deem his "General Sherman" style of direction (in the civil war Sherman pretty much won the war by destroying every little thing in his path on his "march to the sea"). Aronofsky takes all their senses by storm and it works on every level. No film drowned me in thought about its content more than Black Swan. Loved it.

#2 - The American

George Clooney's slowburn assassin flick is absolutely beautiful. I don't know how I've missed out on Director Anton Corbijn's work. His last film Control completely flew under my radar and turns out people are in love with it. Been meaning to see it for about 3 years. This film kind of embodies Clooney's style. Cool, mysterious, and oozing oldschool hollywood charm.

A funny little sidenote: George Clooney, Brad Pitt, and Matt Damon seem to be pretty good friends. Oceans 13 they just seemed to be 3 good buds having a great time together on camera. All 3 of them have made Spy/stealth killer films; Pitt - Spy Games, Mr. & Mrs. Smith; Damon - The Bourne Trilogy, and now Clooney with The American. Each of those films seem to be their main actors style, not sure which one I enjoy the most... but all those films fill a need in my cinema jigsaw puzzle.

#3 - Scott Pilgrim vs. The World

This could have been my favorite of the year. Saw this on opening night and was geeked beyond belief after it ended. Fits perfectly into Director Edgar Wright's filmography. Problem is its re-watch power isn't the same Hot Fuzz; you find something new in Hot Fuzz with each watch... Scott Pilgrim for some reason doesn't get there. I think its cause Hot Fuzz goes meta from start to finish where as Pilgrim is kind of a surface level romp of fun.

#4 - 127 Hours

James Franco gives the best performance of the year in my opinion which must have been some damn hard work because he has roughly an hour and half of alone screen time to keep you engaged. Danny Boyles direction makes what could have been a mind melting scarefest into a frantic-fun film. Only problem, I'm not sure if that's the approach this source material deserves. Think I might have enjoyed the film more if more of the screen time was spent surviving the situation.

#5 - Inception

Hype built this thing to be Metropolis or Citizen Kane for the new millenium, something that people will point to for generations as a legend on the mount olympus of filmmaking, well... it's really good... but its not the best thing I've ever seen. I've argued whats wrong with this film too many times. With all of its flaws I still think its a magnificent film. Top 5 is pretty good, can't wait to see Nolan's next.

One-liners for the rest.

#6 - The Other Guys

Ferrell is finally funny again, Wahlberg finally shows me he is worth paying for, and damn this thing is funny.

#7 - Catfish

What a ride, so many things to take from this "documentary" but if you want to know, you gotta see it.

#8 - Toy Story 3

Great conclusion for these guys, it did make me cry, but it is not my favorite Pixar film.

#9 - Get Low

Really good, great cinemtography, Murray is better than Steve Zissou, but not quite Rushmore.

#10 - Machete

Bad ass and hilarious.

On the whole I found the films this year disappointing. Only Black Swan and Scott Pilgrim vs. the World lived up to my expectations and the American kind of snuck up out of nowhere on me. You might have noticed some films were completely off my list... well check out all the films I've missed.

Babies

Biutiful

Blue Valentine

Buried

Casino Jack

The Company Men

The Crazies

Despicable Me

Devil

Dinner for Schmucks

Due Date

Enter the Void

Exit Thru the Gift Shop

Fair Game

Four Lions

Freakonomics

The Ghost Writer

The Girl (swedish trilogy)

Greenberg

Gulliver's Travel

Hereafter

Howl

I Love You, Phillip Morris

The Illusionist ( L'illusionniste)

Inside Job

The King's Speech

The Kid's Are All Right

Knight & Day

Let Me In

Micmacs

Never Let Me Go

Nowhere Boy

Please Give

Red

Restrepo

The Social Network

Somewhere

Splice

The Tillman Story

The Tourist

The Town

Tucker and Dale vs Evil

Unstoppable

Valhalla Rising

Winnebago Man

Winters Bone

Zonad From Space

So many, and a lot of good ones. Luckily the Social Network is coming out on DVD this week and I Love You Phillip Morris in town. Hopefully I can see all the "good" ones before the oscars. In case you wanna know, here's how I ranked the other films I saw this year.

#11 - Kick-Ass

#12 - Tangled

#13 - Legends ofthe Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole

#14 - The Fighter

#15 - Megamind

#16 - How To Train Your Dragon

#17 - Book of Eli

#18 - Tron: Legacy

#19 - The A Team

#20 - The Last Exorcism

#21 - Iron Man 2

#22 - Shutter Island

#23 - Shrek Forever After

#24 - Sorcerer's Apprentice

#25 - Clash of the Titans

#26 - Expendables

#27 - Secratariat

#28 - Easy A

#29 - The Last Airbender

#30 - Cop Out

#31 - Diary of a Wimpy Kid

#32 - Grown Ups

#33 - Cats & Dogs 2

#34 - Vampires Suck

If you ever have an opportunity to get a job that pays you to see films TAKE IT! There were truly only 2 films that made me want to burn the theater down. Check ya later, peace!