It’s been a while since anyone asked me for a Ten-Best movie list and if I were still regularly paid for going to movies, I would have one piping hot. It’s been a peripatetic year, however, and I’ve been a peripatetic sorta person lately. So I haven’t been as up-to-date on new stuff as I used to be.
Do I wish I still were? Another question for another time. I’m dying to definitively answer that one to myself. Definitively, that is.
Nevertheless, people still ask me what I’ve seen & whether I liked it or not. Clock’s ticking on the end of 2011 & as I note below, I still haven’t seen everything I’ve needed/wanted to see. So I shall reply in the following manner. (This is as of Dec. 27, 2011, by the by):
MOVIES I WOULD PAIR IN A HYPOTHETICAL DOUBLE-FEATURE IN A HYPTOTHETICAL REPERTORY THEATER SHOWING HOW THINGS GOT SO MESSED UP & HOW WE FEEL ABOUT IT NOW:
“Margin Call” & “Take Shelter”
MOVIES THAT WERE BETTER THAN I EXPECTED:
“Melancholia,” “Submarine,” “The Lincoln Lawyer,” “Rise of the Planet of the Apes,” “Beginners,” “The Adventures of Tintin”
MOVIES THAT WEREN’T QUITE AS GOOD AS ADVERTISED (OR REVIEWED):
“Bridesmaids,” “Tabloid,” “The Ides of March,” “Drive” (but Albert Brooks made up for a lot), “J. Edgar” (Did NOT know until now that Hoover had a Massachusetts accent…Whoda thunk?)
MOVIES THAT FULFILLED ADVANCE HOPES; SOME MORE SO THAN OTHERS:
“Tinker, Tailor, Soldier Spy,” “Moneyball”, “The Trip”, “The Descendants,” “Super 8”
ODDLY UNDERRATED BLOCKBUSTERS:
“Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2,” “Captain America: The First Avenger,” “Thor,” “Midnight in Paris” (longtime – as in jaded – Woody watchers think he got lucky, at best.)
ODDBALL WONDERS PEOPLE AREN’T TALKING ENOUGH ABOUT:
“Cold Weather,” “Poetry,” “Meek’s Cutoff,” “The Arbors”
MY FAVORITE SUBGENRE OF THE YEAR: THE RETRO DOC:
“George Harrison: Living in the Material World,” “The Black Power Mixtape,” “Bobby Fischer Against the World,” “Beats, Rhymes & Life: The Travels of a Tribe Called Quest”
HOW COULD I HAVE FORGOTTEN ABOUT…(?!):
“Uncle Boomie Who Can Recall His Past Lives”
NOT AS BAD AS I ANTICIPATED, BUT STILL PROBLEMATIC:
“The Help”
I’M STILL NOT SURE ABOUT (BUT CAN’T BRING MYSELF TO DISMISS):
“The Tree of Life,” “Nostalgia for the Light”
AND I STILL HAVEN’T SEEN (BUT WILL SOON, I PROMISE):
“Hugo,” “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close,” “Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol,” “The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo,” “Margaret,” “Pina,” “Le Havre,”
