Top Ten Movies of 2010

Caveat: This list was made without seeing True Grit and The Tempest. Both of which I really look forward to. The list is also based on European release times, so I think that technically Shutter Island was released in 2009 in the States.

Worst of the Year:

The American with George Clooney. As nice as he is to look at, an hour and a half of George mumbling and looking distressed without much of anything else going on was just flat boring. To add the morose and lagging timing so prevelant in European cinema, they called it dramatic irony. The Italians can keep this disaster.

Harry Potter's Hollow Whatever. We run and do stuff!...for five minutes....then we run to the forest and talk about how we should do stuff for twenty minutes. Over and Over and Over again. *face palm* It was like the extended Hobbit erotica director's cut of Return of the King without Aragorn.


10. Dispicable Me

Belly laughts, cuteness, belly laughs, cuteness. I prize real laughter these days...and there was buckets of laughs in this movie. Way more than Toy Story 3.

A super villian adopts three girls as a means to his feindish plot.

9. Eat Pray Love

Wow. I don't know why this one didn't get better press. Julia Roberts was excellent as was Javier Bardem. Oh, if we could all take a year and three countries to go on a journey of self. Each setting was also such a lovely character as is everyone you come across in this film.

A disenchanted woman seeks self enlightment by way of Italy, India and Bali.



8. Prince of Persia

Okay, maybe a little chinzy, but you know what, this was a fun fucking adventure. Bottom line. And of all the poxy adventures released this year from Tron to the Clash of the Titans, to Harry Potter and Nick Cage with a bad hairline, this was premium on story, effects, pace and actors.

The adopted son of a Persian King is accused of killing his father. Chaos, magic and swordfights.

 

 

7. Restrepo

I left the movie thinking to myself, 'What on earth is the point?' A powerful documentary following the 15 month deployment of US troops into Afghantistan. Overall, it's pretty sanitized as far as actual combat is concerned - but the hard fact of these men coming home with the 1000-mile stare from an engagement that seems to have no real purpose, no real support and absolutely nothing to gain for anybody - the country, the people or the troops. The humanity portrayed and the soliders you meet in this documentary will stay with you though.

6. Coco Chanel and Igor Stravinsky

The true story of the affair between French clothes designer Chanel and Russsian composer Stravinsky in Bohemian Paris.

Frankly, this is kinda like literature - the rare exception to where the story is secondary to the utterly beautiful composition. Each frame of this movie is a work of art. The lighting, the colors, the settings, the angles and the beautiful main characters. Everything is posed, meticulous and exacting for the very specific purpose of making each shot beautiful. As such I enjoyed it tremendously.



5. Unthinkable

What an amazing, tense, horrifying film. The ONLY annoying thing with this movie was how badly they dressed Carrie Anne Moss. I wasn't looking for Matrix Leather, but frumpy ill fitting, baggy clothes detracted from her acting and interrupted an otherwise perfect script. Much like The Nuremburg Trials - you as the viewer decide about your own sense of morality and how far it stretches. Yeah and Sam Jackson's proposterous acting method was perfect for this role.

An FBI investigator witnesses the attempts to get the information from a terrorist on the location of three nuclear bombs.



4. Devil

M.Night Shymalanlanlan finally writes a GREAT movie again and no one notices!!! He set the stage way back for his movies to get the heavy scrutiny for the subtle clues that lead to the end. Unfortunately, he failed repeatedly since his One Amazing Movie. This film should have been his follow up.

Five people are stuck in an elevator. One of them is the Devil.

 

 

3. Black Swan

Aronofsky is a film maker of a particular caliber. His artistic eye and capacity to direct beautiful movies was clear back in the days of Pi and Requiem. I admit to being really skeptical that he decided to do a ballerina movie. Because, ummm, it's a ballerina movie. A ballerina movie that stood in the way of him teaming up with Hugh Jackman again (from The Fountain) and doing something amazing with the Wolverine franchise.

But this wasn't your average, every day chick flick. This was a story about a story wrapped in a story and from it all sprang the absolute role of a lifetime for Natalie Portman. Single minded perfectionism in any form of art brings about a loss of disctinction between reality and that goal of perfectionism. The way this was captured between a stunted and sheltered mama's girl and a bisexual sexpot was quite unlike anything you can generally see at the movies.

The score of this film was the best of the year.

2. Shutter Island

I saw Shutter Island literally within days of posting my 2009 list. Wow - what a powerhouse script and cast. DiCaprio, gotta hand it to him, he knows how to pick 'em. The movie was a brilliant head fuck.

Two marshalls investigate a mental hospital to find a missing patient.



1. Inception

I've only watched it once. It's a hell of an investment and worth every penny. Chris Nolan just can't do wrong. The cast, the action and, most espeically the story, all respected the fact I am an intelligent human being who likes to mull over my own conclusions.

The power to plant a suggestion in the world of the subsconcious frames the plot of a group of people who infiltrate dreams to steal secrets.