Best of 2008: The 10 Best Films of the Year

Wrapping up this week's Best of 2008 series, I present my top 10 films of the year. While the first half of 2008 was somewhat weak, I managed to find some underrated gems released during that period. And I think that the year in general was not as bad as some other recent ones. It was hard enough to narrow the list down to 10, so I didn't try to rank them in anything but alphabetical order. I also list 10 additional films I feel deserve an honorable mention. You might be surprised at how wide I cast my net in deeming some of these entries as films, but I prefer to be as inclusive as possible. Of course, my list's only requirement is that the film be released in the U.S. (in a festival, at the very least) sometime in 2008. If the title is hyperlinked, you'll also be able to see what I wrote when I first reviewed it which should be interesting as I've only been blogging for about a year. Feel free to post your own list, and agree - or even better - disagree with any of my selections. Che (Roadshow Edition), director Steven Soderbergh - A gutsy attempt to shed light on a polarizing figure, Che is actually two movies that must be seen together. The first part, The Argentine, is surprisingly the more marketable, despite being the one with potential for controversy. Shot like a traditional war movie it depicts Guevara as the hero of Cuba's revolution. The second part, Guerilla, is the more damning and difficult movie. Here, Guevara is a remote and weak character, stubbornly pursuing his lost cause. Together, they give us an understanding of why he is seen as both hero and monster by so many. Un conte de Noël (A Christmas Tale), dir. Arnaud Desplechin - Desplechin's look at family dynamics is the best film I saw this year. And even though this family shares some disdain for each other, one gets the feeling that they love each other in a way that one can understand only when one is part of such a group. Bitter and warm. Elegy, dir. Isabel Coixet - This is the first time I think I ever saw a sign of the real Ben Kingsley in a performance. And it was truly fascinating to watch. The story of a womanizer and his greatest character flaws - insecurity and possessiveness - was also illuminating. The Fall, dir. Tarsem Singh - Simply the most visually stunning film I've seen since Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut. Gran Torino, dir. Clint Eastwood - From a response I wrote to a reader's criticism at Some Came Running:

Allow me to reference "The Searchers" in order to make another point, and I preface this by asserting that I am in no way elevating "Gran Torino" to the same class as that classic film. In Ford's film, John Wayne's Ethan Edwards is the protagonist, is a racist, frequently uses epithets against the Native Americans in the film, yet still musters the tolerance to work with Jeff Hunter's Martin - a half-Native American - to pursue his quarry. For about 115 minutes of its running time (and years, in the film), Edwards is committed to killing his own niece (Natalie Wood) simply for being presumably defiled by the Native Americans who kidnapped her. And then in the last few minutes, Martin convinces Edwards to let her live. Happy ending, save for Edwards extricating himself from the life he can't be a part of due to his inherent and unresolved feelings for the Native Americans. The plot remarkably tracks similarly with "Gran Torino". So why can we give Ford a pass for the "bait-and-switch" at the end of "The Searchers"? Or the comic relief that Hank Worden's Mose so jarringly injects into every scene he's in? And why can we be so cavalier towards Ethan Edwards' own racism yet admire his heroism? Is it because the fact that Ford's film is a Western it adds another layer of distance or archetypal reduction to the events in "The Searchers"? Had "Gran Torino" been a Western with Native Americans replacing the Hmong would we even be having this conversation? I found Eastwood to be unusually direct and economical in his storytelling, a relative rarity in his recent films. And I applaud the fact that he trusts us to do the heavy lifting, rather than get anymore on-the-nose than the movie is already accused of being.

In Treatment, producer and developer, Rodrigo Garcia - Yeah, I know... it's a TV series. But its curious format is what made it compelling enough to list along with these fine films. Gabriel Byrne plays a psychologist with marital problems. Each weeknight, the show would follow him with a different patient, except for Friday when he would see his own psychologist (Dianne Wiest) to discuss his relationship issues. If you only cared to follow his sessions with Patient A, you'd only have to tune in on Monday nights; Patient B on Tuesday nights, etc. But for the complete picture, and to really get to know the psychologist, you would watch all week, as one session often impacted others during the week. A series that truly demonstrates what the long form is capable of exploring. Shotgun Stories, dir. Jeff Nichols - Nothing much happens in it... externally. But the internal is what's interesting in this one, and Michael Shannon (Revolutionary Road) acutely conveys so much of the devastation that one man can cause by leaving one family to start another. The Strangers, dir. Bryan Bertino - It is a truly terrifying film in which the camera forces you to be an unwilling accomplice. Not innovative per se, but that perspective has been sorely missed in this age of "torture porn". I'm gratified to see such a style make a comeback. Synecdoche, New York, dir. Charlie Kaufman - This mindbending indie pushes the limits of how far imagination can take you on a limited budget when a writer like Kaufman is given the keys to the car. Wall·E, dir. Andrew Stanton - So many of us were touched by this film, an even more amazing feat once one remembers that the characters are computer generated robots. Honorable Mention: Burn After Reading, Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Happy-Go-Lucky, Iron Man, Rambo, Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired, L'Heure d'été (The Summer Hours), Üç Maymun (Three Monkeys), Waltz with Bashir, The Wrestler For more on the Best of 2008: Best of 2008: Animated Features Best of 2008: Performances and Creative Achievements Best of 2008: Oscar Nominations Open Thread

Best of 2008: Oscar Nominations Open Thread

I would like to hear your thoughts on the Oscar nominations announced this morning. Listed below are the nominees. Please leave your opinion in the comments section. I'll join in with my own once we get the ball rolling. Performance by an actor in a leading role Richard Jenkins in The Visitor Frank Langella in Frost/Nixon Sean Penn in Milk Brad Pitt in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler Performance by an actor in a supporting role Josh Brolin in Milk Robert Downey Jr. in Tropic Thunder Philip Seymour Hoffman in Doubt Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight Michael Shannon in Revolutionary Road Performance by an actress in a leading role Anne Hathaway in Rachel Getting Married Angelina Jolie in Changeling Melissa Leo in Frozen River Meryl Streep in Doubt Kate Winslet in The Reader Performance by an actress in a supporting role Amy Adams in Doubt Penélope Cruz in Vicky Cristina Barcelona Viola Davis in Doubt Taraji P. Henson in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button Marisa Tomei in The Wrestler Best animated feature film of the year Bolt, Chris Williams and Byron Howard Kung Fu Panda, John Stevenson and Mark Osborne WALL-E, Andrew Stanton Achievement in art direction Changeling, Art Direction: James J. Murakami, Set Decoration: Gary Fettis The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Art Direction: Donald Graham Burt, Set Decoration: Victor J. Zolfo The Dark Knight, Art Direction: Nathan Crowley, Set Decoration: Peter Lando The Duchess, Art Direction: Michael Carlin, Set Decoration: Rebecca Alleway Revolutionary Road, Art Direction: Kristi Zea, Set Decoration: Debra Schutt Achievement in cinematography Changeling, Tom Stern The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Claudio Miranda The Dark Knight, Wally Pfister The Reader, Chris Menges and Roger Deakins Slumdog Millionaire, Anthony Dod Mantle Achievement in costume design Australia, Catherine Martin The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Jacqueline West The Duchess, Michael O’Connor Milk, Danny Glicker Revolutionary Road, Albert Wolsky Achievement in directing The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, David Fincher Frost/Nixon, Ron Howard Milk, Gus Van Sant The Reader, Stephen Daldry Slumdog Millionaire, Danny Boyle Best documentary feature The Betrayal (Nerakhoon), Ellen Kuras and Thavisouk Phrasavath Encounters at the End of the World, Werner Herzog and Henry Kaiser The Garden, Scott Hamilton Kennedy Man on Wire, James Marsh and Simon Chinn Trouble the Water, Tia Lessin and Carl Deal Best documentary short subject The Conscience of Nhem En, Steven Okazaki The Final Inch, Irene Taylor Brodsky and Tom Grant Smile Pinki, Megan Mylan The Witness - From the Balcony of Room 306, Adam Pertofsky and Margaret Hyde Achievement in film editing The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Kirk Baxter and Angus Wall The Dark Knight, Lee Smith Frost/Nixon, Mike Hill and Dan Hanley Milk, Elliot Graham Slumdog Millionaire, Chris Dickens Best foreign language film of the year The Baader Meinhof Complex, Germany The Class, France Departures, Japan Revanche, Austria Waltz with Bashir, Israel Achievement in makeup The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Greg Cannom The Dark Knight, John Caglione, Jr. and Conor O’Sullivan Hellboy II: The Golden Army, Mike Elizalde and Thom Floutz Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original score) The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Alexandre Desplat Defiance, James Newton Howard Milk, Danny Elfman Slumdog Millionaire, A.R. Rahman WALL-E, Thomas Newman Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original song) “Down to Earth” from WALL-E, Music by Peter Gabriel and Thomas Newman, Lyric by Peter Gabriel “Jai Ho” from Slumdog Millionaire, Music by A.R. Rahman, Lyric by Gulzar “O Saya” from Slumdog Millionaire, Music and Lyric by A.R. Rahman and Maya Arulpragasam Best motion picture of the year The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Kathleen Kennedy, Frank Marshall and Ceán Chaffin, Producers Frost/Nixon, Brian Grazer, Ron Howard and Eric Fellner, Producers Milk, A Groundswell and Jinks/Cohen Company Production, Dan Jinks and Bruce Cohen, Producers The Reader, Nominees to be determined Slumdog Millionaire, Christian Colson, Producer Best animated short film La Maison en Petits Cubes, Kunio Kato Lavatory - Lovestory, Konstantin Bronzit Oktapodi, Emud Mokhberi and Thierry Marchand Presto, Doug Sweetland This Way Up, Alan Smith and Adam Foulkes Best live action short film Auf der Strecke (On the Line), Reto Caffi Manon on the Asphalt, Elizabeth Marre and Olivier Pont New Boy, Steph Green and Tamara Anghie The Pig, Tivi Magnusson and Dorte Høgh Spielzeugland (Toyland), Jochen Alexander Freydank Achievement in sound editing The Dark Knight, Richard King Iron Man, Frank Eulner and Christopher Boyes Slumdog Millionaire, Tom Sayers WALL-E, Ben Burtt and Matthew Wood Wanted, Wylie Stateman Achievement in sound mixing The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, David Parker, Michael Semanick, Ren Klyce and Mark Weingarten The Dark Knight, Lora Hirschberg, Gary Rizzo and Ed Novick Slumdog Millionaire, Ian Tapp, Richard Pryke and Resul Pookutty WALL-E, Tom Myers, Michael Semanick and Ben Burtt Wanted, Chris Jenkins, Frank A. Montaño and Petr Forejt Achievement in visual effects The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Eric Barba, Steve Preeg, Burt Dalton and Craig Barron The Dark Knight, Nick Davis, Chris Corbould, Tim Webber and Paul Franklin Iron Man, John Nelson, Ben Snow, Dan Sudick and Shane Mahan Adapted screenplay The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Screenplay by Eric Roth, Screen story by Eric Roth and Robin Swicord Doubt, Written by John Patrick Shanley Frost/Nixon, Screenplay by Peter Morgan The Reader, Screenplay by David Hare Slumdog Millionaire, Screenplay by Simon Beaufoy Original screenplay Frozen River, Written by Courtney Hunt Happy-Go-Lucky, Written by Mike Leigh In Bruges, Written by Martin McDonagh Milk, Written by Dustin Lance Black WALL-E, Screenplay by Andrew Stanton, Jim Reardon, Original story by Andrew Stanton, Pete Docter For more on the Best of 2008: Best of 2008: Animated Features Best of 2008: Performances and Creative Achievements Best of 2008: The 10 Best Films of the Year

Best of 2008: Performances and Creative Achievements

As I continue reviewing the best that cinema had to offer in 2008, I'd like to pause before listing the 10 best movies of the year this Friday, and reflect on some individual achievements today. Best Actor: Mickey Rourke, The Wrestler - It is a bravura performance that reveals enough about Rourke to dispel any questions about the limitations of his expressiveness due to the punishment his face has taken over the years. Best Actress: Meryl Streep, Doubt - Streep is so convincing that she convinced her writer/director to rethink the point of his Iraq war parable. Best Supporting Actor: Heath Ledger, The Dark Knight - Some wonder whether this performance would be awarded the amount of recognition it has received if Ledger hadn't died. But even if the spectre of his death did not haunt the film at its edges, it would still be the spookiest submergence of an actor's personality in a role that I've seen all year. Best Supporting Actress: Chiara Mastroianni, Un conte de Noël (A Christmas Tale) - Mastroianni charms the viewer with her portrayal of Sylvia, the beguiling daughter-in-law that discovers her life might have been different had she known earlier that two of her husband's relatives competed amongst themselves to win her heart. Even resignation to being a housewife is not enough to mask her incandescence, not an easy achievement when sharing the screen with her legendary mother - the great Catherine Deneuve. Best Ensemble Cast: The cast of Rachel Getting Married - Whatever my problems with its phony setting, Anne Hathaway's tour-de-force performance is still not enough to steal the spotlight from the rest of this film's supporting players. Bill Irwin and Debra Winger - playing her divorced parents - and Rosemarie DeWitt as the titular older sister Rachel give raw improvisatory performances that illustrate the love and recriminations that bind a family. And even the minor players in the film seem to have a life beyond the confines of the movie. Best Newcomer: Laura Ramsey, The Ruins - In what could have been the thankless role of whining victim that seems to always be the center of attention during the early parts of a horror film, Ramsey instead gets sympathy for refusing to play the character as weak. With more spunk than any of her fellow monster fodder, Ramsey's character manages to be the one that the viewer can most identify with in this surprisingly effective, underrated thriller. Best Comeback: Mickey Rourke, The Wrestler - My own review for the film points out how it's not really a comeback if you haven't gone anywhere. And Rourke has been very present and engaged in his career for quite a few years, now. But let's just say that Hollywood has finally let him out of the doghouse. Be glad that he is now more marketable than ever, and he can start playing some leads again. Best Animated Film: Wall·E - I talked about this film in Monday's post, but I'll reiterate. This one is strong enough to be counted alongside some strong competition for best movie of the year. Best Documentary: Waltz with Bashir - A documentary that is totally justified in its animated presentation. The truth being revealed here is not about the Israeli director's involvement in a disturbing attack on Lebanese. It is about how his mind fails to reconcile his participation in the attack with his own opinion of the violence he's capable of. Best Foreign Language Film: Un conte de Noël (A Christmas Tale) - Desplechin captures everything that drives this traditionally American genre, the family reunion film; adapts it with an eye to French sensibilities; remembers to give it visual and aural flourishes; and does it in a completely realistic way. Aside from its performances, Demme's Rachel Getting Married compares pretty poorly to this film. Best Cinematography: Colin Watkinson, The Fall - A stunning visual achievement that eschews CGI marvels for actual in-camera artistry. Best Original Score: Grégoire Hetzel, Un conte de Noël (A Christmas Tale) - The lush score serves as a warm counterpoint to the sharp squabbling that pervades this film. Best Original Song: Bruce Springsteen, The Wrestler - The devastatingly tragic Randy "The Ram" Robinson is captured by this simple lyric, "...Then you've seen me, I always leave with less than I had before..." Best Visual Effects: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button - Truly supporting the story, the effects are marvelously picaresque when depicting Button's travels, and unusually subtle when illustrating his gradual decline into youth. Best Adapted Screenplay: Nicholas Meyer, Elegy - Best known for his Star Trek films, Meyer succeeds at adapting Philip Roth, an author whose sensibility has been notoriously difficult to capture. Based on The Dying Animal, the film is an example of Meyer's theory on the central appeal of a movie, "A good story to me is one that, after I’ve told it to you, you understand why I wanted to tell it.” Best Original Screenplay: Charlie Kaufman, Synecdoche, New York - Kaufman's creations are always wildly original. But this movie consistently inverts expectations in a way that would both impress and confound screenwriting teacher Robert McKee (the real-life one, not the Brian Cox character from Adaptation). A downbeat look at one artist's impulse to make a mark in life that celebrates the mundane and condemns the obsessive pursuit of creative accomplishment. Best Director: Steven Soderbergh, Che (Roadshow Version) - Soderbergh takes pains to present an objective film about a controversial historical figure in the most unexpected way possible. He makes two movies about him. The first part, The Argentine, builds Guevara up to be a revolutionary hero. The second part, Guerilla, tears him down by demonstrating his arrogance and remoteness towards his comrades. Together, they form a well-rounded look at why Guevara is both glorified and demonized. On Friday, I'll post my top 10 films of the year. But because I don't want to address the following in that post, here are the worst films I saw this year, in alphabetical order: A Corte do Norte (The Northern Land), dir. João Botelho - Visually sumptuous, but pretentious to the extreme, this Portuguese film was stultifyingly boring. Flawless, dir. Michael Radford - Demi Moore should never play a Brit again, but especially not in a period drama opposite Michael Caine. Hounddog, dir. Deborah Kampmeier - Dakota Fanning should never be raped in a film again, but especially not in a period drama that pretends it has something important to say about exploiting children. Pineapple Express, dir. David Gordon Green - I admire David Gordon Green's films. Judd Apatow's films make me howl with laughter. But David Gordon Green directing a Judd Apatow film? Not so much. Slumdog Millionaire, dir. Danny Boyle - That Gran Torino is being accused of racism for wearing its controversy on its sleeve while Boyle's celebrated film is practically drowning in white ethnocentric prejudice is the real crime. For more on the Best of 2008: Best of 2008: Animated Features Best of 2008: Oscar Nominations Open Thread Best of 2008: The 10 Best Films of the Year

Best of 2008: Animated Features

by Tony Dayoub



This week I'll review the best that cinema in 2008 had to offer. On Wednesday, I'll highlight specific performances and creative achievements. Thursday shall bring an announcement of the Oscar nominations from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which I'll cover here. I hope to get some reaction from you readers. And Friday, I'll wrap up the series with my own list of top 10 films of the year, many of which will not be acknowledged by Oscar, I'm sure. Today's first entry will address a film genre I only barely reviewed this year despite having seen and enjoyed most of them - animated features.