General Discussion : Cinema: 2008

[Jeb]

What films are in your Top 5 list for 2008? What films are in your bottom 5?

Top 10
1. Changeling
2. The Dark Knight
3. Wall-E
4. In Bruges
5. Vicky Cristina Barcelona

Bottom 5
5. Semi-Pro
4. Space Chimps
3. Witless Protection
2. The Love Guru
1. Meet The Spartans

[Spunkie]

Top
1. Reprise (2008) (3 rewatches, it's not going down)
2. In Bruges (2008)
3. Hellboy II: The Golden Army (2008)
4. The Dark Knight (2008)
5. Taken

Bottom
5. Speed Racer (2008)
4. Semi-Pro (2008)
3. The Happening (2008)
2. Recep Ivedik (2008)
1. Expelled: No Intelligence ... (2008)

[FitFortDanga]

Well, this is embarrassing. I've only seen five movies from 2008 so far (unless you count two Futurama movies). So... I really liked Wall-E and Encounters at the End of the World, kinda liked The Dark Knight, had mixed feelings about The Fall, and hated Iron Man. I guess I have some catching up to do.

So instead, I will do the top/bottom movies that I SAW for the first time in 2008.

Top
Satantango
Napoleon
A Moment of Innocence
Syndromes and a Century
Pakeezah

Bottom
It's a Gift
The Children Are Watching Us
Monsieur Verdoux
India Song
La Region Centrale

It was hard to narrow down my top 5, I saw a LOT of excellent movies this year.

[frederic_g54]

I'd rather wait, have a couple of films I want to see, that I think will be end up in my top 5 (films that don't come out here until early 2009, which sucks )

Bottom
...
Monsieur Verdoux ("Not quite as bad as Limelight...")
...

I guess you're not a Chaplin fan, too bad...

[Rufflesack]

Looking at my rankings of 2008 films I notice that I've rated 15 films in tier 6 or above, and only 2 below.. Probably because I haven't bought any DVDs of 2008 films yet and the movies I go to see at theatres are usually good, so I won't catch the bad films of this year until.. Next year. In any case,

Best:
1. Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog (Does this count? Not so much, I'm thinking.. I did love this though, and I can hardly imagine something more awesome than a Joss Whedon musical starring Nathan Fillion and Neal Patrick Harris.)
2. The Dark Knight
3. Forgetting Sarah Marshall (I think I'm one of the few who absolutely loved this. Jason Segel is genius. Dracula musical with puppets? If anything has more awesome-potential than the abovementioned musical, it's a Dracula puppet musical written by and starring Jason Segel.)
4. Sukiyaki Western Django
5. The Fall
6. Wall-E (Making it 6 because Dr. Horrible doesn't really count and #5 and #6 were tied anyway.)

Worst:
1. Max Payne
2. Kurt Blir Grusom (wacky Norwegian animation that was decent, but not very good.)
3. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (I actually enjoyed this a bit, but not as much as I should've.)
4. Wanted (Most mindless action I've ever seen. But hey, they bend bullets around buildings! Very watchable, if not very good.)
5. Hellboy II: The Golden Army

3-5 on my "Worst" list are in tiers 6 and 7, by the way.

[frederic_g54]

alright fine :p :

Best:

1) In Bruges
2) The Dark Knight
3) Encounters at the End of the World
4) Maman est chez le coiffeur
5) WALL·E

honorable mention: The Class (Entre les Murs)

films that I think will be in my top 5 (or top 10): The Wrestler, Låt den rätte komma in, Slumdog Millionaire, Man on Wire, Milk, Revolutionary Road

Worst (OMG, they were bad):

1) Acolytes (stupid beyond words)
2) Max Payne (favorite pc game ever, was so disappointed)
3) Vantage Point (aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah)
4) Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (aliens... nuff' said)
5) The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian (bleh...)

[HorrorMaster]

Dear oh dear...I've only seen fifteen films from this year, and six of them are short films. Coincidentally, four of my top five films are all short horror films from Fewdio productions (one of which only goes for two minutes).


Best films of 2008


1. "Cleansed" - 93

I wasn't expecting this to be so incredibly terrifying but it was. Only goes for about eight minutes, and Fewdio prove that real horror can be created in any short amount of of time if you're as skilled in the art of film-making as the two guys who direct these shorts. Chilling, stylish and horrifying.


2. "Curse" - 91

Semi-surrealistic horror short. Terrific as always.


3. "Creep" - 90

Only goes for two minutes, and basically all it is is a woman driving a car on the highway at night, talking on a cell phone, as this creepy face appears behind behind her and suddenly attacks her. Simple and creepy.


4. "Ghost Town" - 90

Didn't expect to like this and saw it on a plane, but Ricky Gervais is the funniest man alive and he was about as devastatingly hilarious in this as he has ever been. So damn funny.


5. "The Tale of Haunted Mike"- 90

Another really awesome short film from Fewdio about a guy who sells very strange and supposedly scary things online, and another guy who delivers him weird things in a box so that he can search through it to see which ones he likes. He finds an old creepy prosthetic metal arm and makes up a bizarre story that it used to belong to a little girl and sells it for $1000. But then a little girl (sort of a cross between Regan from "The Exorcist" and Samara from the "Ring" remake) starts haunting him.



Worst films of 2008


4. "Cloverfield"- 61

Not for a single second was I even remotely scared by this disappointment which even fails to rip off the infinitely superior masterpieces "The Blair Witch Project" and "28 Days Later". For a big-budget Hollywood blockbuster, the acting is some of the very worst in recent memory.

3. "Disaster Movie"- 3

I haven't actually seen it, so I can't put it ahead of "Doucheday", but I will say that it is cinematic cancer defecated out of the wretched holes of Aaron Shitzer and Jason Fuckberg - cinematic ebola viruses.

2. "Doomsday"- 8

Marshall should be thoroughly ashamed of himself for saying a big "fuck you!" to all his fans, who were wrongfully expecting another brilliant "Descent", and for disrespectfully spewing this god-awful piece of s***. Doesn't even have a "so bad it's good" redeeming factor. It's just bad.

1. "Zack and Miri Make a Porno" - 2

"Cock and Pussy Swear, Think, Eat, Drink, Live and Talk Non-Stop About Genitals, Sex and The Act of Reproduction, Then Go to a Night Club Where Superman and Some Other Guy Who Plays a Porn Star Portray Offensive Gay Stereotypes, After Which, Cock And Pussy Decide Make a Porno (Even Though There are Much More Rational Things To Do For Money, Although Then Remember Who This is Directed By And Who Stars in It and You'll Instantly Stop Worrying About it) With Some Very Contrived Attempts at Actual Seriousness and Some Boobs For the Teenage Boys" is one of the few films that has ever had the ability to make me not only physically angry at the film itself but also deeply depressed at the fact that anyone could like - and make - this putrid, pathetic piece of worthless, ridiculously-horny and hormone-drenched horse s****. It is a homophobic stoner's wet dream; a non-stop orgy of stupid homophobic frat boys talking about "f****** vaginas" and saying "fuck" every -3.120154 seconds. Honest to god this one of the absolute worst movies I've ever had to endure, ever. To Kevin Smith: please, for the love of god and all that is holy, put your erect penis back in your pants, look at yourself in the mirror, realise that you're no longer an adolescent, and grow the fat f*** up. And to Seth Rogen and anyone who thinks he's "the funniest man in the universe": rent "Airplane!" and "The Naked Gun", buy some tissues, and cry your talentless heart out in despair over the mere sight of actual comedy.

[Lostie]

Hard list to do.

[Philip]

It is a homophobic stoner's wet dream; a non-stop orgy of stupid homophobic frat boys talking about "f****** vaginas" and saying "fuck" every -3.120154 seconds. Honest to god this one of the absolute worst movies I've ever had to endure, ever. To Kevin Smith: please, for the love of god and all that is holy, put your erect penis back in your pants, look at yourself in the mirror, realise that you're no longer an adolescent, and grow the fat f*** up. And to Seth Rogen and anyone who thinks he's "the funniest man in the universe": rent "Airplane!" and "The Naked Gun", buy some tissues, and cry your talentless heart out in despair over the mere sight of actual comedy.

Wow... I'm not sure I dare opening my mouth now. As I've only seen nine movies from 2008 and a the worst and best list then should contain the same movies, I probably shouldn't either. But I'll make some honorable mentions.

Best:
Vicky Christina Barcelona Allen shows that he can still handle himself. Loved Christopher Evan Welch's narrating, reminded me of Hugh Ross's narrating in The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford which I hold as the best narrating in movie history.

Let the Right One In (Although the correct title should be "Let the Right One Slip In" since the book it's based on is named after the Morrisey song. Trivia fact.) An unusually successful book adaption with fantastic photography. Involving Ajvide Lindqvist in the script writing was a great move, the man knows to play on our fear of what hides inside us. The final pool scene is just a terrific piece of cinema. However, the choice of J. J. Abrams for the remake is a choice that can only lead to very bad things.

Worst:
21 Horrible, horrible, horrible! I especially dreaded the scene when the MIT professor was impressed with his student solving a high school level problem.

Untracable Without a doubt the year's biggest letdown. There were just so many angles to use! The concept of collective guilt, the effects of free information for all, the rise of the snuff film as a more accepted part of entertainment... Instead they throw it away and turn it into Hollywood action were the bad guy "hacks" the car.

[ArctificiaL]

Top
1. Cloverfield
2. The Dark Knight
3. The Happening
4. In Bruges
5. Definitely, Maybe


Bottom
5. Transsiberian
4. Insanitarium
3. Hancock
2. Be Kind Rewind
1. Wanted