It's All Too Much...

How many movies are there to see? There are too many. One need only look at my last post (from a while ago) to see how many movies from 2011 I didn’t get around to seeing in a timely manner. Although, I was able to see some of these movies in 2012. Such would be the case with Young Adult (which I really liked) and The Artist (which I liked, but was unfortunately given Best Picture).

I suppose that this is probably a challenge in any field of interest, but I feel like I am always playing catch-up when it comes to movie-watching. Perhaps it is too much to want an opinion, an experience, and (maybe even) an argument to share about any mentioned movie.

I am embarrassed to mention all the movies that I have not yet been able to see. I am especially embarrassed when I’ve had the DVDs of these movies for years. Such would be the case with Tokyo Story and The Best Years of Our Lives. But then there are all those movies that I don’t own and I’m still embarrassed admitting that I haven’t seen them. Even I don’t know how it’s possible that the only Cronenberg movie I’ve seen is A Dangerous Method (which was kinda amazing). Even the movie options for this weekend have been overwhelming.

Unlike previous weekends, there was no shuttle bus on the T to deal with; nor did I have Bye Bye Birdie rehearsal this weekend. Everything was a “go” for movie-seeing, except for homework. So, what did I do? I didn’t do anything. I didn’t get homework done, but more importantly I didn’t get any movies off my check-list. I didn’t see Ted, Sleepwalk With Me, For Ellen, or Liberal Arts. I will probably see The Master tomorrow though! So, that should be good (even though I haven’t even seen Boogie Nights yet).

Favorite Movies from 2011 (a year without the Coen brothers)

“You’ve been fooled into thinking,
That the finishin’ end is at hand.
Yet there’s no one to beat you,
No one to defeat you,
‘Cept the thoughts of yourself feeling bad.”

Bob Dylan’s “To Ramona”



Here’s the list of all the 2011 movies I saw during 2011. In order from most favorite to least favorite.

1. The Future
2. Beginners
3. Into the Abyss
4. Melancholia
5. The Tree of Life
6. Moneyball
7. Certified Copy
8. The Descendants
9. The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo
10. X-Men: First Class
11. Bridesmaids
12. Cold Weather
13. Drive
14. 50/50
15. The Ides of March
16. The Skin I Live In
17. Terri
18. Shame
19. Martha Marcy May Marlene
20. Meek's Cutoff
21. Midnight in Paris
22. Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol
23. Win Win
24. The Muppets
25. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part Two
26. Tabloid
27. Tucker & Dale vs. Evil
28. Higher Ground
29. Everything Must Go
30. Contagion
31. Crazy, Stupid Love
32. The Adventures of Tintin
33. Rango
34. Another Earth
35. Cars 2
36. Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows
37. The Green Hornet
38. Rise of the Planet of the Apes
39. Attack the Block
40. Cedar Rapids
41. 30 Minutes or Less


Am I completely satisfied with this list? Not really. But I am sure about certain parts of it. 30 Minutes or Less was absolutely my least favorite movie of the year. And The Future was absolutely my favorite. I’m not sure why Attack the Block is so low. Perhaps it is simply because the list is skewed by me seeing movies that I generally wanted to see. We’ll see...
But I will have future posts explaining reasons for my favorite movies, especially in the one through five range.

Nature vs. Grace or: Grace is Gonna Pulverize!

One of the most discussed movies of the year was certainly The Tree of Life. This is near the top of my list of favorite movies of the year. It is not perfect, but I am still finding it intriguing to think about. And it’s beautiful throughout.

The first Terrence Malick movie I saw was Days of Heaven on a DVD. I can’t say I loved it, but I certainly didn’t dislike it at all. After seeing the magnificently put-together trailer for The Tree of Life, I basically had to see it. So I did. And I went with my girlfriend Morgan and some friends of mine just happened to be there. Anyway, the movie started and it began with a female narrator telling us that there are two ways through life. There is the way of nature and the way of grace. And this statement, which made me scramble in my mind to see whether or not I agreed with it, still intrigues me.

As with any movie, there are some things that we know for certain and there are other things that we have to guess at. With The Tree of Life, we are told early on that there are two ways through life. We are then, throughout the rest of the movie, strongly convinced (or, at least, led to believe) that the better way through life is grace. After all, “Unless you love, your life will flash by.”

HERE’S MY POINT: If there is the way of love and the way of nature and love is the answer, then it would seem reasonable that nature (if it is to be believed and perceived as a conscious being) will realize someday how wrong it has been. It will realize that love is the way. This is an extremely powerful and hopeful idea that can be seen in various stories. These stories would include the defeat of “the beast” in Revelation and the scene within Terrence Malick’s The Tree of Life where the Brad Pitt character (who possibly personifies nature) is seen regretting the way in which he treated his sons, especially the one who had recently died. To me, this is the climax and one of the very best parts of this movie.

I tend to agree with Jim Emerson’s numerous statements about how the ending scenes on the beach were anticlimactic and seemed clichéd. Scene by scene, this movie is brilliant in how it is edited together. It’s amazing to watch how one shot flows into the next. However, the structure of the entire movie leaves something to be desired. I say this not only because of how the ending is somewhat disappointing, but also because the climax of the movie (where Brad Pitt’s character regrets his earlier actions) takes place too early. I don’t mind that there isn’t a huge musical score to show how big a deal this is, but I do mind that it gets lost in the rest of the movie by taking place too early. I would have preferred this movie to have been different, but I’m not sure how except to say that perhaps the climax (as I see it) and the scenes at the heavenly beach should have been placed differently. There’s something lacking in this movie and I’m not talking about plot. That's right, no mercy.

Favorite Movies of 2009! (I'm aware it's 2011)

I am currently in the process of trying to finalize my list of my favorite movies of 2011. Of course, this is ridiculous as the year is not even over and I have not yet seen all the movies worth seeing (but that’s always difficult anyway). My main frustration with list-making is that it is so confusing as to when some movies should be considered as being from one year or another. This is especially true for me with the following movies: And Everything Is Going Fine, A Prophet, The Beaches of Agnes, The White Ribbon, and Broken Embraces. Sometimes I’m not sure why I’m getting confused. In many cases, the problem is me seeing a foreign movie as soon as it was released in the United States even though it’s considered a movie from the previous year. So, that’s frustrating.

Anywho, here’s the story of me and my list of my favorite movies of 2009. Someday, I’ll get a list about 2011 out there.

In early 2010, Blake Marshall approached me to start a podcast with him. This never really developed into much, but it was a nice idea. Anyway, we attempted to record a discussion between us in which we revealed our top ten lists of 2009 movies. Most of this discussion was not usable for a podcast since there was too much background noise due to the recording system and since I was making jokes that would ruin Blake’s serious movie critic persona. While I don’t agree with everything on my list in the way I made it, I still don’t think it would need too much adjustment. Here is the list as I made it back in January 2010. You’ll notice that it includes 14 films and that is has my original notes that I made for the podcast.

1. A Serious Man
What do you have to count on? What is it all for? How can you be sure of anything? Don’t you want someone to love? The stress of life. He gets some strength by knowing that Arthur is worse off.

2. Inglourious Basterds
Very Hitchcockian to me. Absolutley great direction. Very well scripted but it didn’t quite move me or make me think deeply about anything. Action that doesn’t leave you disappointed.

3. Up in the Air
Although this is not exactly a feminist movie and that monologue about being alone didn’t quite work. (It should have been about sharing memories… if someone’s not there, they do not care). Powerful images of the recession and it is really about that conflict between wanting to be alone and wanting to take part in life with other people. The ending is the correct ending. He didn’t particularly deserve to be happy, nor unhappy, so why should he get something great if he is firing people who have done anything to deserve a firing. Soundtrack.

4. The Hurt Locker

5. Up
The kid has dreams. The montage of the couple.
The stress of being old. Going up into the sky with balloons. Nearly a perfect short movie at this point. The rest is decent.

6. Zombieland
Some of the biggest laughs I had all year. Bill Murray. Twinkies. The chemistry between Woody Harrelson and Jesse Eisenberg was tremendous. Just really funny and there’s needs to be a place for comedy.

7. The Informant!
Didn’t pull you through quite as much as it should have, but I was always interested. Matt Damon’s best performance? Joel McHale was really good.

8. An Education
Being swept away. This movie shows being swept away and how that can both be freeing and dangerous (since you become easily convinced to go along with anything in connection with it).

9. Fantastic Mr. Fox
Half of this movie is really close to the published book. Apparently, this movie was also inspired by unpublished manuscripts too. The first half is great. The second half is a little harder to get into. Themes come back around again and connect. It still feels like this is two movies in one.

10. Where the Wild Things Are
Great scenes of childhood. A great beginning. Became like a really well-written play. But, despite having great visuals, it never really showed in a purely visual sense what themes it was playing. Although, I guess he did go back into the womb at one point. I found the ending (when he left the island) more moving than I thought it was going to be.

11. (500) Days of Summer
12. Funny People
13. Coraline
14. Adventureland

As always, top ten (or fourteen or twenty or whatever) lists are never completely satisfying but always intriguing. If I had to redesign my 2009 list, I guess it would look something like this:

1. A Serious Man
2. Inglourious Basterds
3. Up
4. The Informant!
5. Fantastic Mr. Fox
6. Up in the Air
7. Coraline
8. Adventureland
9. An Education
10. Where the Wild Things Are
11. Funny People

Oh, and as a side note, Blake’s favorite movie from 2009 was Inglourious Basterds.