In August of 2010, I made a list of the movies I had to see before the end of the year after reading Entertainment Weekly’s Fall/Winter movie preview edition. I ranked 15 films in order. #1 was Ben Affleck’s The Town, which has turned out to be my favorite movie (as of 2011). #2 was Buried, which starred Ryan Reynolds. This movie, which I did not see in the theatre, was one of the biggest wastes of two hours of my life. And #3 was The Company Men, which starred 4 Academy Award winners. The release date of The Company Men kept getting pushed back further and further, and while its limited release date was in very late December, the vast majority didn’t have a chance to see it until 2011. By then, my list had changed based on the Oscar Buzz and the lukewarm reviews of The Company Men. I finally was able to check the movie out on Netflix. Based on the film I had seen since my initial list, The Company Men would have still made the top 15, but it would have been closer to the 12-15 range rather than the 1-3 range. To further digress into my poor list, Little Fockers was #4, Unstoppable #5, and The American #6. The movies I liked most were The Social Network (initially #7) and Blue Valentine (initially #8). The Fighter (initially #10), 127 Hours (initially #11), Love & Other Drugs (initially #13), as well as True Grit, Rabbit Hole, Black Swan, and The King’s Speech (both of which I did not even rank).
All posts by bryanbuser
Date Night (2010)
I’m not the biggest fan of romantic comedies despite what my VHS movie collection of the 1990s might suggest. I’ll be the first to admit that despite all of the crappy romantic comedies (i.e., just about every Ashton Kutcher movie), there are some good ones. I’m a big fan of movies like (500) Days of Summer, Notting Hill, and The Money Pit. Date Night falls right in line with those movies. The most significant difference between Date Night and the other three is that it’s not quite as heavy. Not that the three movies that I just mentioned are by any means downers, but they do have slightly more sentimental moments than Date Night.
Crazy Heart (2009)
Roger Ebert said it best in his review of Crazy Heart about lead actor Jeff Bridges’ performance when he said, “The notion of a broke-down, boozy country singer is an archetype in pop culture. We’ve seen this story before. The difference is, Bad Blake makes us believe it happened to him.” It’s such a simple statement, but so true. Bridges (Tron, The Big Lebowski) gives the performance of his legendary career and, rightfully so, his first Academy Award win. He is the highlight of a very good, albeit flawed, movie.
Predators (2010)
My oh my, Adrien Brody, what has become of your career? Since winning the Best Actor Academy Award in 2002 for his role as Wladyslaw Szpilman in The Pianist, Brody’s career has been hit or miss. His successes were The Village (2004), the under-appreciated The Jacket (2005), and the blockbuster remake King Kong (2002). Brody has also had starring roles in such box office failures as Hollywoodland (2006 – $14.3 million box office revenue), The Darjeeling Limited (2007 – $11.7 million), Cadillac Man (2008 $8.1 million), and The Brothers Bloom (2008 – $3.5 million). In 2010, Brody had five movies set for release. Two of those films have been completed but have since been shelved. A third (The Experiment) went straight to DVD. A fourth (Splice) made just $17 million at the box office. The fifth, Predators, grossed $52 million but would have earned that money regardless of Brody’s presence.
A Clockwork Orange (1971)
It is hard to add a lot of new insight to a movie that has been reviewed thousands upon thousands of times and is liked so much that it is ranked #46 in the AFI’s Top 100 List of Greatest Movies. With that said, most reviews of A Clockwork Orange were written in 1971, when the movie was released. I watched this movie for the first time in 2011, 12 years after the death of its director, Stanley Kubrick (The Shining, Full Metal Jacket). To date, this will be the oldest movie that I have reviewed.