The 2nd Annual Blog Cabins End of Year Spectacular (2008)

To see the list of all of films I've seen since 2008 (save for those reviewed this week), click here. Otherwise, let the SPECTACULAR begin!!

The Five Best Films I Saw This Year (Academy Award eligible):
1. Man on Wire
2. The Dark Knight
3. Wall*E
4. Slumdog Millionaire
5. The Wrestler

The Five Films That Barely Missed "The Five Best Films I Saw This Year" List:
1. El Orfanato (The Orphange)
2. Milk
3. Waltz with Bashir
4. Iron Man
5. In Bruges

The Best of the Rest that Didn't Make Either of the Above Lists:
Tropic Thunder, Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Be Kind Rewind, Roman de Gare, The Visitor, The Fall, Hellboy II: The Golden Army, Pineapple Express, Religulous, Synecdoche, New York

The Top Five Films I Didn't Get Around to Seeing This Year (I'm Guessing):
1. Let the Right One In
2. Encounters at the End of the World
3. Snow Angels
4. Paranoid Park
5. Boy A

The Five Worst Films I Saw This Year
1. Strange Wilderness
2. The Day the Earth Stood Still
3. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
4. The Incredible Hulk
5. Street Kings

My Five Ten Favorite Performances of the Year That Won't Win Any Awards:
1. James Franco, Pineapple Express - A career-defining performance. Seriously - hate the rest of the movie if you will (I won't, but I will admit that it's spotty), but Franco is gold in it.

2. Phillippe Petit, Man on Wire - You wouldn't normally call someone's role in a documentary a "performance." But you also wouldn't normally walk on a tightrope between two buildings 1,000 feet in the air. Such is Petit.

3. Ken Jeong, Role Models - Quickly becoming my favorite character actor. He didn't just steal all of his scenes - he kidnapped them and took such good care of them that they had Stockholm Syndrome and didn't want to leave him after awhile.

4. Justin Long, Zack and Miri Make a Porno - Capping off a banner year for Mr. Long. Not onscreen for long, but memorable indeed (bonus points to "Superman" Brandon Routh" for lampooning his image as well).

5. Russel Brand, Forgetting Sarah Marshall - I wasn't the only one worried about Brand from the trailer alone - "Oh, great, here's the annoying cockney rock star." Wrong. Also stole the show, which was hard to do because Jason Segel was pretty damned appealing (when not naked).

6. Prem Kumar, Slundog Millionaire - "Who wants....to be a MILLONAIRE [sic]??" Brought a smile to my face every time he said that...

7. Dominique Pinon, Roman de Gare - The lovable grump from Amelie was the perfect poker face in this twisting, turning French thriller in which we're unsure of Pinon's character's true identity through 3/4 of the film.

8. Ralph Fiennes, In Bruges - Vulgar, nutty, and yet logical when need be - between this, The Reader and the Harry Potter flicks, Fiennes is finally becoming a favorite of mine. It was worth the wait.

9. Craig Robinson, Zack and Miri Make a Porno - He could read a Denny's menu aloud to me and I'd likely find it funny.

10. Jon Voight, Pride and Glory - Of course, Voight was awful in this battered family cop flick. But that's what I loved about him - he wasn't just bad, he was drunk and seemed to play four characters simultaneously. High comedy. Casting directors - there are other (and vastly) better actors over the age of 50 working these days. Use them. Thanks.

And a Few that Have or Will Win Some:
1. Meryl Streep, Doubt - Managed to make that ice queen from The Devil Wears Prada look like a little kitty cat. No small feat.

2. Heath Ledger, The Dark Knight - It really can't be underestimated either how great this manic performance was or how unfortunately bad his onscreen exit was. Such a sad tease for audiences.

3. Richard Jenkins, The Visitor - It's true - there were richer, tougher performances done this year (witness his three main competitors - Rourke, Penn, and Langella - for the Best Actor statue, for starters), but it was sweeter seeing a lifelong character actor such as Jenkins given the chance to be the headliner and having him knock it out of the park. A shame that much of that goodwill disappeared along with his appearance in Step Brothers.

The Five Films I Was Most Looking Forward to Last Year at This Time and the Results
1. Cloverfield - Wasn't quite worthy of the insane hype, but it was a nice blending of Blair Witch and Godzilla, produced well and marketed even better. If only the "characters" (haha) had been developed a little more. It would have been nice for us not to be cheering for the demise of our de-facto narrator, either (the camera guy).

2. Be Kind Rewind - Many hated it. A handful loved it. The rest hunt and pecked for good/bad things. I fell closer to the "loved it" crowd; sure, Jack Black was mostly annoying, the city was made into some kind of sainted object and the ending was sappy as hell, but c'mon - if you love the power of the imagination as it applies to filmmaking, then Michel Gondry has to be one of your favorite directors. The man is a visionary and is to directing what Charlie Kauffman is to screenwriting; why else do you think their partnership resulted in the best movie of this decade?

3. The Dark Knight - Last year, I said that it would be "hard to imagine this being a failure." Understatement of the year, perhaps? Safe to say that it more than lived up to the hype. - if only it had scored about $100 million more to take out Titanic from the top box office spot. With enough re-releases, I have faith it will accomplish that goal.

4. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull - Since we're looking back, in contrast I said this about Skull: "the collective hope is that it just isn't awful." So much for that. I don't even want to get started on this again.

5. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button - Meh. Certainly wasn't worth the amount of "Looking Forward To" that I had done for it.

The Five Films I'm Most Looking Forward to for Next Year
1. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince - What can I say? I'm a sucker for this popcorn franchise. Doesn't help that it was delayed by nine months.

2. Where the Wild Things Are - Famous children's book. Passion project in the works for years. The words "Directed by Spike Jonze." Starring Paul Dano, Forrest Whitaker, Catherine Keener and James Gandolfini. Yes, please.

3. Inglorius Basterds - Tarantino still has a Season Pass. Having Brad Pitt as his lead doesn't hurt.

4. 9 - Pretty big buzz for a previously unheard of film that doesn't open for nine months. Haven't seen the trailer yet? You should.

5. The Box - The quandry that was Southland Tales only makes me that much more curious to see what Richard Kelly comes up with next. The news of an original score done by Arcade Fire is just a nice perk.

Finally, Mrs. Fletch's Top 10
1. Mongol
2. Waltz with Bashir
3. Slumdog Millionaire
4. Persepolis
5. The Wrestler
6. In Bruges
7. Roman de Gare
8. Synecdoche, New York
9. Pineapple Express
10. The Savages

Honorable mentions:
"Penelope - for the most awesomely weird costuming and set design.
Forgetting Sarah Marshall - for actually making me laugh out loud."