This year, I broke it down by month to make it easier to read, and also to see how the trends went. I started off really strong, but then Java Bean happened. Three movies in September… THREE!!
**The Key, which I forgot to add when I first published this.
(#) Movie I saw in the theater. [#] Movie I saw for the first time. E# Movies I watched with Emily. B# Movies I watched with Brian.
See them all after the jump.
Every year, I post the movies I should have watched, but didn’t. For one reason or another, I just missed these ones. It’s really just my way of making a list of movies I missed so that I remember to check them out soon. This year, I helped myself out by checking out a bunch of ‘Best of 2011’ lists to find some gems I missed altogether.
Here are 20 movies I should have watched this year. As always, in no particular order. Please add to the list, or tell me what you thought of movies I put on the list that you’ve already seen. Please. Pretty please. Someone comment!!
See them after the jump.
That’s right, losers. Richard Marx lyrics. Now that song can be stuck in the heads of anyone old enough to remember it.
Anyway, last year’s ‘most excited’ list was remarkably hit or miss. This year’s probably will be as well. To keep that at least a bit more under control, I’m only going to do the first half of the year, with another list to come heading into July.
Also, as always, there will be great movies I just don’t know about yet, so if you see a glaring omission, holla at’cha boy.
First off, the movies I am undoubtedly excited about, to varying extremes.
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1. Chronicle – February 3rd
Seattle. Super powers. Salisbury Steaks. Okay, so that last bit was just for alliteration. However, Seattle and supes is enough to get me excited, even if the found footage thing is a little (or a lot) old by now. Movies like the original [REC] show the medium does have life in the right hands. Let’s hope that’s the case here.
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2. The Secret World of Arrietty – February 17th
Screenplay by Hayao Miyazaki. That’s all that needs to be written. Case closed.
Okay, so he didn’t direct it. Still, I’m in.
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See the rest after the jump. Continue Reading →
Wow. Quite the Alien/Aliens vibe here. I wonder what new things it will bring to the table.
/ sorrow found me when i was young / sorrow waited, sorrow won / sorrow, they put me on the pill / it’s in my honey, it’s in my milk /
No editing, just stream of consciousness. Away we go.
Depression is a difficult thing to write about, but it’s also the primary thing I have going on in my life most times. Most often, I don’t even tell my closest friends what’s going on with my depression, aside from broad strokes and generalities. I just don’t know how to get into it. I think I should write more personally on this blog from time to time. I’m not sure anyone actually reads this blog anymore, but I suppose there is some value in writing just for me, even if I’m the only one who actually checks in with my words. If I am in fact going to write more personally from time to time, that means writing about depression. Who knows, maybe this will be the only time I do something like this, but I think it’s what I need at the moment, so here it is.
Depression is so many things. I think when people hear someone say they struggle with depression they think it means they are really sad a lot of the time. That’s true. It’s also just a tiny part of what depression really is. I think in some ways it is different for everyone who struggles with it, but for me it includes things like overwhelming, bone-tired exhaustion and insomnia. How do you like that for a kick in the nuts?
It somehow works in my brain chemistry and makes it impossible for me to believe deep down that people value me or want me around. It feeds off of negative thoughts and keeps the positive ones from getting any traction. Self doubt, fear of rejection, social anxiety, certainty people dislike me… all par for the course. I know, everyone deals with these things, but not to the point that every positive thing is poisoned by them. Like Matty B and The National sing it, /it’s in my honey / it’s in my milk /
From what I understand, depression can hit people in different places in their body. Mine hits me all over, because it is often impossible for me to rest, surrender, feel safe. etc. However, primarily my depression hits me in the middle of my chest, like a vice. It’s like two large, strong hands gripping my heart and squeezing. My soul feels like it resides in my chest, and that soul always feels like its trying to breathe through a wet blanket.
I walk around all the time pretending things aren’t falling apart, but I’m always on the edge of falling apart. Sometimes I just flat out fall apart, but most of the time I can hide it. Right now, things in my life actually are falling apart. School is falling by the wayside because I need to work full time, and part of what it means for me to carry this depression is that I never have a remainder. I hear of people who work full time and then come home and do school work. I’m lucky when I can come home and watch a movie. I know, it’s pathetic. But, it’s me.
We saw this before our screening of Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows. Good lord, why can’t this movie come out right now?!?
Sadly, I missed the trailers for this somehow, but thanks to the Golden Globes I’ve discovered another source of Jean Dujardin goodness. I can’t wait until the 23rd when this releases in Seattle.
In case you’ve forgotten, or perhaps never knew, I don’t like doing a straightforward list of my ten or twenty favorite movies. Instead, I prefer to do a bunch of lists of my favorite things from films and movies this year, superlatives.
The lists always change from year to year, but two that never fade away are the ones I view as the anchors of the whole shebang: the heroes and the villains. Whether they are straightforward and formulaic, or postmodern and extraordinary, a movie usually has a tussle between the good and the not so good.
All entries contain varying levels of spoilers. Read at your own risk.
As always, the list has no particular order. And my favorite heroes are…..
1. The Driver – Drive
The Driver is a far more violent character than most would expect for me to choose as one of my heroes. Usually, when a guy goes about trying to kill the “bad guys” in order to save the day, they rank outside the hero category in my book because I am tired to death of the myth of redemptive violence.
The reason Driver makes it is because the myth of redemptive violence is turned on its head. This film doesn’t pretend that The Driver isn’t taking darkness onto his own soul to bring an end to the film’s villains. He willingly takes darkness onto himself in order to protect the innocent people he cares about, but loses them in the process. There is a scene in the film I alluded to when I wrote about this film in the past, where The Driver stomps a man to death, and in that scene, without a word, we realize that he will never be with the woman he loves. One kiss, and then he took violence into himself because it was the only way he knew to let the family he cared so much about live in the sunshine. You can agree or disagree with his decisions, but his motives were clear, and in my opinion, heroic.
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2. The Boys – Attack the Block
I LOVE this movie. I’ve seen it twice now (along with Hanna, Source Code, and Super 8), and both times I fell in love with a funny, smart, engaging film that deals with serious subtext, while never taking the primary text too seriously. I want to celebrate all of the boys in the film, because when shit gets real, they step up to defend their neighborhood and the people they care about.
However, it’s the narrative focus on Moses, the gang’s leader, which makes the film go. Through him we are able to understand his decisions without ever allowing him to shirk responsibility for them, and he never tries to shirk them. He stands up and does what needs to be done, even when that means it may cost him his life. His dramatic hero sequence from the climax of the film is one of my very favorite scenes of the year.
I would give my left testicle for a sequel, in which it’s a few years later, the monsters have invaded on a larger scale, and Moses is humanity’s best hope of deliverance. It’s too perfect. Come on, folks… make this happen!
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3. The Boys – Super 8
I also LOVE this movie. The boys in this are heroes for the same reason as the hilarious gang from Attack the Block. When shit gets real, they stand up and risk life and limb to defend the people they care about.
Sure, it turns out the alien is just misunderstood and mistreated, but they didn’t know that going into it. They just saw said alien taking out soldiers with no remorse. Yet, when someone is in danger, they may not all make it into the lair of the beast, but they are all willing to go there to save their friend’s life.
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4. Kermit the Frog
There isn’t much to say. You either get it or you don’t. Kermit has been one of my heroes for my entire remembered life. The message that you can be understated, a little crazy some of the time, a lot melancholy most of the time, and still bring hope and laughter to others, is a message I sure want to believe is true. If not, I’m sort of screwed.
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5. Hanna – Hanna
The real hero is Saoirse Ronan for her performance as a brutally well-trained killing machine trying to learn how to be a teenage girl. Watching her face, it’s impossible to believe she isn’t really a sheltered super-soldier seeing the world for the first time.
This girl is the real deal, and her performance is such a giant part of what makes this superb film so beautiful.
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6. Cpt. Colter Stevens – Source Code
Even with the Quantum Leap awesomeness set aside, I really did enjoy this movie. In large part this was because I really pulled for Colter Stevens to succeed. I wanted good things to happen to him. A character and performance that reminded me that I actually really like Jake Gyllenhaal is nothing to sneeze at. By the way, what the hell does that phrase mean? Does it mean, I’m not allergic to liking Jake Gyllenhaal? Well, I’m not, I will not sneeze at a hero that saves the day both in the film and in my appreciation of the acting endeavors of Mr. Darko.
