Friday, December 26, 2008

20 Best Movies of 2008

20 Best Movies of 2008 -- A movie year too abundant in good and great films (46 you should definately see!) for just a top 10.

1. Rachel Getting Married (Jonathan Demme)
2. The Witnesses (Andre Techine)
3. Happy-Go-Lucky (Mike Leigh)
4. CJ7 (Stephen Chow)
5. My Blueberry Nights (Wong Kar Wai)
6. Romance of Astree and Celadon (Eric Rohmer)
7. Gunnin' For That #1 Spot (Adam Yauch)
8. Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull (Steven Spielberg)
9. Chaos Theory (Marcos Siega)
10. The Wedding Director (Marco Bellocchio)
11. Burn After Reading (The Coen Brothers)
12. Never Back Down (Jeff Wadlow)
13. Transporter 3 (Olivier Megaton)
14. Cadillac Records (Darnell Martin)
15. Twilight (Catherine Hardwicke)
16. Battle For Haditha (Nick Broomfield)
17. My Brother Is An Only Child (Daniele Luchetti)
18. Death Race (Paul W.S. Anderson)
19. Roman De Gare (Claude Lelouch)
20. W. (Oliver Stone)

Runners Up (Alphabetical) (10):

Aleksandra (Aleksandr Sokurov), Be Kind Rewind (Michel Gondry), First Sunday (David E. Talbert), Frontrunners (Caroline Suh), Hamlet 2 (Andrew Fleming), Meet Dave (Brian Robbins), Noah’s Arc: Jumping the Broom (Patrik-Ian Polk), Rocknrolla (Guy Ritchie), Shotgun Stories (Jeff Nichols), The Wackness (Jonathan Levine)

Good! - Reasons To Go To The Movies (Alphabetical) (16):

Before I Forget (Jacques Nolot), Bedtime Stories (Adam Shankman), Bonneville (Christopher N. Rowley), Chris & Don: A Love Story (Tina Mascara / Guido Santi), Dark Matter (Shi-Zheng Chen), Flawless (Michael Radford), The Foot Fist Way (Jody Hill), Forbidden Kingdom (Rob Minkoff), How She Move (Ian Iqbal Rashid), Max Payne (John Moore), My Winnipeg (Guy Maddin), Role Models (David Wain), Swing Vote (Joshua Michael Stern), Tropic Thunder (Ben Stiller), War, Inc. (Joshua Seftel), What Happens In Vegas (Tom Vaughan)

Well-Meaning / Has Redeeming Value (Alphabetical) (12):

10,000 BC (Roland Emmerich), Derek (Isaac Julien), The Family That Preys (Tyler Perry), Forever Strong (Ryan Little), Get Smart (Peter Segal), House Bunny (Fred Wolf), The Life Before Her Eyes (Vadim Perelman), Mamma Mia! (Phyllida Lloyd), Shelter (Jonah Markowitz), U2 3D (Catherine Owens / Mark Pellington), Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins (Malcolm D. Lee), You Don't Mess With The Zohan (Dennis Dugan)

Bad (Alphabetical) (6):

Frontier(s) (Xavier Gens), The Last Mistress (Catherine Breillat), Sex & The City (Michael Patrick King), The Spiderwick Chronicles (Mark Waters), Step Up 2: The Streets (Jon Chu), Stop-Loss (Kimberly Pierce)

Atrocities (Worst to Least Worst) (10)

1. 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days (Cristian Mungiu)
(tie)
1. Wall-E (Andrew Stanton)
2. The Dark Knight (Christopher Nolan)
(tie)
2. Wanted (Timur Bekmambetov)
5. Savage Grace (Tom Kalin)
6. Mister Lonely (Harmony Korine)
7. Paranoid Park (Gus Van Sant)
8. Snow Angels (David Gordon Green)
9. Flight of the Red Balloon (Hsiao-hsien Hou)
10. Another Gay Sequel: Gays Gone Wild (Todd Stephens)

4 Comments:

Blogger JeffZan said...

Love it, Love it! Hope you can post the reviews of these and last year's movies. I learned alot of from them and Armond's too. Thanks!

12/27/2008 6:20 AM  
Blogger JeffZan said...

The most interesting pick for an atrocity is Wall-E. I like it a bit, but what horrible about it? Armond didn't review it either, but I guess a genuine kid movie is a rarity these day. Otherwise, some of the movies on the list I found amazing. Your #1 pick is good though overrated like most these days. Loved #8, 11 and 3. The Dark Knight make sense for an atrocity due to the fact it's as unpleasureable slick as Heath Ledger performance. Love the updates you'll make on these movies.

12/27/2008 10:35 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

You are sure you're not a clone of armond white?
such an degree of agreement I have not met in 40 years.
I think it's a phenomenon you won't find in the whole world.

2/07/2009 10:44 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

This is plausibly White's list rearranged. This is an extreme position, whereas I simply admire White, w/o feeling I must adopt his very uniquely developed aesthetic tastes. Are you and White exactly the same in this area?

This is an extreme position. It's okay for White to be wrong some of the time. It's okay to disagree.

I would suggest seeing films outside of White's radar, so that you might offset/disguise your fanaticism when it comes to year-end lists.

9/15/2009 4:38 PM  

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