Movies 2011

[BainIhrno]

Well, another year of film has passed us.

 

This year I saw:

 

Hanna - 5/10: A disappointing film. Lots of weird techno music, mediocre action sequences, and didn't look that good, in my opinion of course.

 

Pirates of the Caribbean 4 - 7/10: Not necessarily that good of a film, but I had a good time watching it. I found the evangelical Christian character annoying. Good to see Johnny Depp's character interact with a new cast of characters.

 

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 - 9/10: Very good. I've shared my thoughts on this film in a previous post here on Spiderweb. To sum up, lots of emotion, great acting, good final battle, but annoyed by the happy ending. Lots of memorable quotes, as well.

 

Phineas and Ferb: Across the Second Dimension - 8/10: Yeah, I like Phineas and Ferb. The movie was actually quite good, a bit darker than the show, but playing a rock song during the big battle annoyed me. This is a TV movie, if you haven't heard of it, that's why.

 

Hugo - 7/10: A good movie, felt slow, I didn't find it that much fun, but it was still interesting to see what happened next and a decent film. Besides, the acting was great.

 

Monte Carlo - 4/10: Implausible, dumb, sexist, and hard to care about the characters. I could go into specifics about these complaints, but this film is hardly even worthy of discussion.

 

Any thoughts on what you've seen?

 

Also, some films that may be worth seeing next year:

Dark Knight Rises - not terribly excited, but might be fun

Hobbit: Unexpected Journey - should be pretty good, I like LOTR

Killing Bin Laden - about the Navy SEAL mission, might be good drama. Kathryn Bigelow (directer of the Hurt Locker) is signed on to direct.

 

But of course, the movie I really want to see is Of Good and Evil, based off the BoE scenario (the 'refuse orders' version). Yes, I know it will never happen, but hey, I can dream.

[Dantius]

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy looks quite good, but I haven't gotten around to seeing it. Ditto for Margin Call and Moneyball.

 

I say Tintin in theaters for nostalgia's sake. It was pretty much Secret of the Unicorn in movie form, so there wasn't much original content added.

 

I'm not really a big fan of watching new movies in theaters when they come out, and by the time that I decide that I've heard enough positive feedback to warrant me seeing it, it's gone.

[Actaeon]

My favorite movie of the year so far was "Midnight in Paris". I liked the subject, found the acting adequate, and shockingly enjoyed the writing and directing (Woody Allen).

 

"Moneyball" (8/10) was surprisingly good, well paced and with enough explination to keep the non-sportsfan pretty interested.

 

I found myself referencing "Crazy Stupid Love" (8/10) a great deal, which is unusual for a romance film. I thought "Blue Valentine" was better, but that came out last year. At least it was better than "The Ides of March", although that was not Ryan Gosling's fault.

 

Although I enjoyed "Hugo" (7/10), I though "The Muppets" (8/10) stole the show for family films, while "Titin" (5.5/10) was visually solid but rather overdone.

 

"Beginners" (6.5/10) and "My Idiot Brother" (6/10)were both quirky and indie, if a bit cliché. I liked "The Guard" (7/10), but I couldn't really say why.

 

"Tree of Life" (4/10) and "Atlas Shrugged" (3/10) were both way too full of themselves and unbearably preachy. The former tried too hard to be artsy, and the latter had some of the most wooden acting I've ever seen.

 

"The Conspirator" (8/10) was a lovely period piece, and I particularly liked Robin Wright's performance. "Jane Eyre" (7/10) was fine, too, but so were earlier adaptations.

 

On the quirky comedy side, I enjoyed both Cedar Rapids (5.5/10)and Win Win (6/10), as they possessed a certain amount of depth. I am, however, somewhat biased against the style.

 

Overall, an average year in cinema from my perspective. Better than some in the last decade, but not quite up to the standards of last year (King's Speech, Blue Valentine, Black Swan, Winter's Bone, etc.).

[Callie]

In order of release:

 

Drive Angry - 2/10: Nicholas Cage has clearly lost his mind and this film is cheesy and over the top.

 

Rango - 6/10: It's a bit drawn out, but otherwise enjoyable. Also, please note that using Ride of the Valkyries in the manner this movie does is an annoying cliche.

 

Battle: Los Angeles - 1/10: If you asked me to name the worst films I had ever seen this would be one of them. The acting is atrocious and the aliens look ridiculous. It's also incredibly boring. It'd be kind of like watching Full Metal Jacket but with Barney instead of Sergeant Hartman and poorly drawn cardboard cutouts in place of actual soldiers.

 

Hanna - 7/10: I liked the fairytale-like element to the movie and the action sequences were well-shot. The plot is a bit confusing though.

 

The Beaver - 9/10: The film has superb acting, which more than compensates for the odd premise. It skillfully alternates between comic relief and drama. There's nothing quite like it.

 

Bridesmaids - 8/10: Who would of thought that a chick flick could be so funny?

 

X-Men: First Class - 6/10: Meh, it was entertaining overall but there were a few problems. Why does Mystique suddenly side with Magneto? Also, it's outrageous that films still throw in black characters who exist purely for the purpose of being killed off.

 

Super 8: 5/10 - Disappointing. If your movie has a conspiracy involving the US government you need to explain it better. Some of the acting is lacking, and what in the world is up with the alien?

 

Another Earth: 6/10 - An interesting play of emotions but could anyone explain the ending?

 

Cowboys and Aliens: 3/10 - If you judged this by its cover then you were right. Lots of Western cliches, cheesy death scenes, subpar acting, and a spaceship explosion that looks suspiciously like the Challenger.

 

Contagion: 5/10 - Umm...no. This movie was way too predictable and the ending is totally not satisfying.

 

A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas: 2/10 - My friends insisted I come along and see this. Not taking movie suggestions from said friends again.

 

Hugo: 7/10 - It's a bit long but still fun. This is the first time I felt 3D was actually worth it too. Martin Scorcese has better movies though (i.e. Taxi Driver).

[nikki.]

Probably the best film I saw in the cinema this year was Arrietty. Whilst not as good as other Studio Ghibli releases, visually it was as stunning as anything else they've released, and I really liked the emphasis on Arrietty and the kid's relationship (which is pretty much missing from the other adaptations of The Borrowers I've seen).

 

Paul was pretty excellent - I love Pegg and Frost, and Bateman ("him?"), so of course I was going to like it anyway, but it was actually genuinely funny too, so that's a bonus.

 

Didn't see The Inbetweeners Movie in the cinema, but I've seen it since, and if you liked the TV series, it's certainly worth a watch. Erm... Oh! Captain America and Hall Pass were pretty mediocre so I shouldn't have seen those.

 

I'm sure I've seen more, but I don't remember, so I'll wait for more people to post in the thread.

 

Edit: Oh! My friend Issy went on about Sucker Punch so much that I went to see that with her too. And it was awful. So yeah.

[Callie]

Originally Posted By: Nikki

I'm sure I've seen more, but I don't remember, so I'll wait for more people to post in the thread.

Wikipedia has a nice list of films released this year. I would only remember a handful of movies I've seen otherwise.

[Men are from Slars]

This was an exceptionally bad year for mainstream films, even by Hollywood standards. With the exception of the first half of Captain America, which I watched at work, I don't think I've seen any of these, and that's just fine with me.

[nikki.]

Oh, thanks. I looked at IMDB, but the 8000+ entries turned me off.

 

From that, I've seen Battlefied: Los Angeles, Midnight in Paris (how did I miss that, since Actaeon mentioned it?), and Burke and Hare. Of those, only MiP was worth watching.

 

I haven't seen The Rum Diary yet, but I really should because it's my favourite book. Oh well. It should be out on DVD soonish.

[Dikiyoba]

Pirates of the Caribbean 4: Terrible. I didn't even like the soundtrack, which was the main reason I went to see it.

 

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2: Meh. Part 1 was better.

 

Cars 2: Good, which surprised Dikiyoba since Dikiyoba didn't like the first one all that much.

[Dintiradan]

Turns out the only 2011 movie I watched was The King's Speech (on DVD, didn't go to the theatres). Was alright, but what bothered me was how George VI was portrayed as being against appeasement from the beginning.

 

I might give Tintin a go: The Secret of the Unicorn is probably my favourite Tintin book. Though I'm a bit apprehensive: have the characters been 'Hollywoodized'?

[nikki.]

Originally Posted By: HOUSE of S

This was an exceptionally bad year for mainstream films, even by Hollywood standards. With the exception of the first half of Captain America, which I watched at work, I don't think I've seen any of these, and that's just fine with me.

Arrietty was a perfectly fine film. It isn't my favourite Ghibli film, but it's certainly leap-frogged quite a few I hold in high esteem.

(As an aside, From up on Poppy Hill hasn't got quite as many good reviews (and I haven't seen it yet, since it was only released in Japan this year), but that's another film that I really want to see.)

I know it's not mainstream, or even Hollywood, but it's there.

[Alorael at Large]

I think the only films I saw this year were on airplanes. The only one from this year was The Adjustment Bureau, which was moderately interesting in concept and uninteresting in execution.

 

—Alorael, who should amend that, actually. He also watched one movie on DVD. It was the Swedish (original) version of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, which was a good adaptation. And he thinks this is the fewest movies he's ever seen in a year.

[Tyranicus]

Originally Posted By: Dintiradan

I might give Tintin a go: The Secret of the Unicorn is probably my favourite Tintin book. Though I'm a bit apprehensive: have the characters been 'Hollywoodized'?

I haven't seen the movie, but my problem with the trailer is that Tintin's nose is shaped like a normal nose.

[Actaeon]

How do you find out if a movie is mainstream or not? I generally just chose films by rottentomatoes or by the advice of the people that own the movie theatre. Since I haven't heard of most of Excalibur's, I gather that is not a reliable method.

[Goldengirl]

The Adjustment Bureau had a decent idea, but the implementation of the idea in the film could have been better. The ending really ruined it, for me.

 

Rango was good, for a cartoon kid's movie, but not great.

 

Paul surprised me. The trailer really undersold this film - I thought it was going to be terrible, but it turned out to actually be quite decent and funny.

 

As far as horror movies goes, Insidious is excellent. Clearly operating on a low budget (hence the not-great graphics) it still created an atmosphere of terror with a pretty good plot. That the movie continued after the first potential ending to throw in an even better twist was great, and the real ending was perfect. For anyone who likes horror movies, I would highly recommend it.

 

Water for Elephants was okay. Pretty typical animal-centered movie, nothing particularly good or bad about it.

 

Bridesmaids was surprisingly good. I should have suspected a Kristen Wiig movie would be of this quality. Funny (outrageously so), and dramatic all at the same time, it gets my approval.

 

As far as Pirates of the Caribbean goes, it was better than the fourth Indiana Jones, which was what I was comparing it to as I went it. As far as a standalone film goes, it was good, but it suffered on comparison to the previous trilogy.

 

Green Lantern was your standard superhero flick. It's of a standard level for the genre. I felt the same way about The Three Musketeers, except it's obviously not a superhero flick.

 

Harry Potter 7 pt. 2 was good, but definitely not the best of the films. The final fight scene between Harry and Voldermort was disappointing, and the reworking of the appendix left me upset. Still a good movie, though, obviously.

 

Just got back from Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows. It's better than the original, and I quite liked the original. The soundtrack is still of great quality, as well.

[Nicothodes]

I absolutely detested The Adjustment Bureau, not just for the horribly handled plot (for example, the supernatural elements were very poorly handled and it ended up feeling like a heavy-handed religion plot), but also because I detested the main characters. The only character I felt sorry for never had a line. The female lead had left him because she didn't want to marry him, agreed to marry him a year later, and then abandons him in the courthouse 5 minutes before they do. He doesn't even have any friends or family with him. Poor guy.

 

Paul was very good. I didn't like it as much as Shaun of the Dead or Hot Fuzz, but I'd still watch it again.

 

Source Code frustrated me because of the end. There was an excellent place to end it, a decent, slightly less depressing place to end it, but they kept going and ended the movie on a paradox just because they wanted everyone to live.

 

I really liked The King's Speech, especially since I love when Colin Firth does non-romantic comedy roles. It makes me remember that he is an excellent actor.

 

I think the visuals in Hanna were the only reason to watch it. The plot was all over the place, and it felt like it was going "hey look, we're referencing fairytales, recognise this? aren't we clever? have you worked out where this is from yet? huh? huh?" the whole time. That said, it was very pretty, especially at the beginning.

 

I didn't have much of a problem with the vagueness of the alien in Super 8. The main characters weren't people who would have known about it or been told what was going on, so the hints to the history that I was given were enough for me.

 

I wanted to like Cowboys and Aliens more than I did. It had some really good acting, but the character of Ella was awful, with awful acting. I blame the character's existence for the resulting ridiculousness of the plot. It would have been more interesting if they didn't bring in a different type of alien to explain everything.

 

The Help was a very Hallmark-y look at race relations that ignored the fact that it didn't show the book it was centred around affecting any change, and left many characters in serious danger.

 

30 Minutes or Less was a movie I really wanted to be good because I loved Zombieland, but it was terrible. I figured out how the whole plot could have been avoided in the first 10 minutes (call the police, explain the situation, and arrange to meet somewhere normal with an officer in plain clothes, done), and the rest of movie was boring and not funny.

 

See Nikki's post for The Inbetweeners. He is right.

 

Also, wow, I watched more movies this year than I thought.

[Dintiradan]

(Haven't watched Source Code, but I feel really sorry for the fictional programmers who worked on it. "Have you pulled the latest source code for Source Code?" "No, I'm still compiling Compiling."

has

worse,

.)

[Trenton.]

I don't have time *cough*ormoney*cough* to go to the movies all the time. So, I just cook a bag of popcorn, take a seat in my favorite chair, and went to the free disney movies on demand channel.

 

Of course, I had pirates of the carrabian 4 running while I was on the computer, and I glanced at it like, four times. Does that count?

[The Mystic]

The only movie I saw was Harry Potter #7, part 2, and then only after it came out on DVD; it was okay, I guess, though definitely not the best in the series. Sure, the special effects were good, but the fight scenes (especially the last one between Harry and Voldemort) were a bit gratuitous, and the epilogue (in both the book and the movie) sucked.

Originally Posted By: Dikiyoba

Cars 2: Good, which surprised Dikiyoba since Dikiyoba didn't like the first one all that much.

I haven't seen Cars 2 yet, but the first is a bit more enjoyable if you understand most (or all) of the car-related puns.

[Dintiradan]

I shouldn't judge Cars 2 since I've only seen ~10 minutes of it, but... who am I kidding, of course I'm gonna judge it!

 

Up until Cars 2, Pixar was able to avoid a pitfall a lot of other animation studios keep falling into: taking a human story with human characters, and just turning the humans into something else. Monsters, Inc. had to be about monsters in your closet, or it wouldn't have worked. The Toy Story movies had to be about toys (or appliances), or it wouldn't have worked. Arguably this wasn't the case for A Bug's Life or Finding Nemo, though in both films the setting has an affect on the story.

 

It works in Cars as well; after all, it's about the main character trying to make it to some race. Besides, the movie also deals with Americana and Route 66. The cynic in me feels that anthropomorphic cars were only chosen because they knew they'd make a killing in merchandising, but whatever...

 

But Cars 2? If you wanted to make a Bond film that bad, why not just make a Bond film?

[Lilith]

Originally Posted By: Dintiradan

It works in Cars as well; after all, it's about the main character trying to make it to some race. Besides, the movie also deals with Americana and Route 66. The cynic in me feels that anthropomorphic cars were only chosen because they knew they'd make a killing in merchandising, but whatever...

the story i've heard is that there's some dude high up in Pixar who's a huge car nerd and the Cars franchise is basically his pet project

[Dikiyoba]

Originally Posted By: Dintiradan

But Cars 2? If you wanted to make a Bond film that bad, why not just make a Bond film?

Honestly, the plot of Cars 2 could have been stripped of its Bondsesque elements easier than it could have been given to a non-car cast.

Dikiyoba.

[Actaeon]

Sorry to be a necromancer, but I'm curious as to whether anyone here has seen "The Artist". I've heard a lot of hype.