My Top 10 of 2008 (Finally)

Yes, I know it's already halfway through February. But it took me a while to see all the movies that I had a desire to see before I made this list. For your information, I completely skipped Benjamin Button, The Reader, and Milk - so while they may be Oscar favorites, I think they all looked fairly boring. You want to read what made my cut? The answer lies below...

10. Cassandra's Dream - This Woody Allen flick captured my attention from the very beginning and held it the entire way through. With great performances by Ewan McGregor, Colin Farrell, and Tom Wilkinson, this one earned its way past some solid movies to make it onto this list.

9. Rambo - The triumphant return of Stallone to the big screen after Rocky Balboa was worth the wait for Rambo fans. This installment in the franchise was ridiculously light on plot, but holy-crap heavy on the action. I've never seen so much graphic violence in a movie that doesn't feature massive army battles against each other, ala Braveheart and Lord of the Rings.

8. WALL*E - Pixar's animated flick was a great mix of social commentary and charming love story. If you haven't seen this yet, do yourself a favor and check it out. I was hesitant at first, but as you can tell, it was good enough to hold down the ocho slot.

7. Speed Racer - Yes, I am one of about four people who actually enjoyed this. I thought the Wachowski's did a great job with it, and the casting was admirable all the way around. A fun movie that dazzles with some ridiculous special effects.

6. Gran Torino - Eastwood's supposed final acting performance is one for the history books, capping off a phenomenal career for one of the few remaining living legends of Hollywood. Sure, the movie has its problems (bad acting from everyone else, pacing issues, etc), but all that falls to the wayside as we see Clint snarl and grunt his way through this movie as the racist war vet Walt Kowalski.

5. In Bruges - I said it before, and I'll reiterate: I've never seen a movie like In Bruges before. In a world where Candy Land, Ouiji Board, Monopoly, and Stretch Armstrong toys and board games are in production for major releases, the originality that In Bruges brought to the screen was amazingly refreshing and gives me hope in the industry yet. Colin Farrell delivers what I think is his best performance so far in his career.

4. Iron Man - 2008 was RDJ's year, and most people won't forget it any time soon. The comeback kid nearly stole the summer as the Marvel superhero, but it was the time when he was Tony Stark on screen that was most enjoyable to me. A great film with a talented supporting cast (Howard, Bridges, Paltrow) and a big hit for director Jon Favreau. Here's hoping the upcoming sequel is more "X2" and less "Punisher: War Zone."

3. Cloverfield - I freaking love this movie. I can't tell you how excited I was when I first read it, but you can go back and re-read my review of it to get a little sense of how much it impacted me on my first viewing. I've seen it one or two times since, and it still is as fantastic as the first time around. One of the best online marketing campaigns I've ever witnessed, great buzz going in, and a surprisingly successful January release with a cast of unknowns. Please don't make a sequel (it better be amazing if you do).

2. The Dark Knight - I was just thinking about this movie today, actually. A beacon of light and the lighthouse which guides all future comic-book films, The Dark Knight was a magnificent achievement that runs slightly long but you still don't want it to end.

1. Slumdog Millionaire - It wasn't even a contest. Just as Wristcutters firmly placed itself atop my list of 2007, Slumdog jumped to the number one slot and couldn't be tipped. The joy and exhuberance with which this film was shot and acted was amazing to watch, and the script was solid and (most importantly) original. Please go see it if you haven't yet - if you have a soul, you won't regret it.

There were some other flicks that I enjoyed in 2008, but the ones that made the list won the battle in the end. Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Quarantine, The Wrestler, Appaloosa, Revolutionary Road, Pride and Glory, Eagle Eye, and some others were all runners up but couldn't quite break out. What were some of your favorites? Hit me up in the comment section. Until next time...

2 Fast 2 Furious

The problems with 2 Fast 2 Furious begin with the title and trickle down from there. The movie isn't nearly as fun as it should/could be, and what little originality and passion the first film displayed is stifled here by a new director, new cast, and writers who were clearly just trying to cash in on the unexpected success of a new trend.

2 Fast 2 Furious

Director: John Singleton

Starring: Paul Walker, Tyrese Gibson, Ludacris, Devon Aoki, Eva Mendes

Don't get me wrong - John Singleton has done some quality stuff in his career. He was the youngest director nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture at age 23 for his debut film Boyz N The Hood (which I've never seen). But I'm thinking primarily of Four Brothers, the 2004 Mark Wahlberg flick he directed, and Hustle and Flow, which he financed with director Craig Brewer. It seems to me like he suffered from the same greed of the writers when it came to this project - trying to cash in on a franchise before it completely bites the dust. Singleton tries to get flashy on occasion and flips the camera upside down multiple times throughout this movie, but it just ends up being annoying instead of cool. The rest of it (dialogue, street races, everything) is done without an ounce of originality - almost like a Brett Ratner movie. Everything is very straightforward and expected. The style from the first film has been sapped dry. I know we shouldn't expect much from a movie like this, but at least he could have followed the example of Rob Cohen and filmed the races in a way that makes it borderline-interesting for the audiences to endure.

The script, written by the quick rising duo of Michael Brandt and Derek Haas (2007's 3:10 to Yuma, Wanted), lacks all the elements that made the first film enjoyable: solid relationships among the characters, a slight sense of mystery, and races that actually mean something. Aside from missing these critical pieces, they seemed to have replaced them with tired cliches and an absoultely useless villain. Sometimes villains don't need to be as epic as Emperor Palpatine from Star Wars - just look at Taken and Statham's Transporter series. In these types of movies, it's more about watching the main character wreck henchman after henchman in new and creative ways; we don't necessarily care about a "final battle" with an ultimate bad guy (though it's a nice bonus when done correctly). Where 2F2F miserably fails is that it doesn't seem to understand this relationship and therefore gives us very little worthwhile action AND a crappy villain. Brilliant.

It would take forever to count all the cliches found in this movie, so I'll just list a few of the most unforgivable*. We've got the girl who goes undercover but is romantically linked to the bad guy, the Thomas Crown Affair trick with the scattering of cars at the end, the bitter cop who thinks they've all gone too far, and the infamous "ramp a car onto a moving boat." Some of these are excusable when separated, but add them together in the same film and you'll get disastrous results most of the time. Again, it takes a certain kind of movie to pull off ramping a car onto a boat. Starsky and Hutch? Sure, because it's fun and ridiculous. 2 Fast 2 Furious? This movie doesn't have the right kind of vibe to be able to successfully execute a move like that - they were pushing it with the "stare and drive" scene.

The film definitely isn't helped by its actors, who are about as interesting as a dried pile of sloth dung. On one level, it's not fully their fault - the script truly is awful, so they don't have much to work with. But on the other hand, you're getting paid to deliver lines - the least you could do is recite them with some conviction. Eva Mendes was dreadful in an early role, Tyrese drove the "angry black man" stereotype into the ground, Ludacris was almost unwatchable (as he was in Hustle and Flow), and Paul Walker lost the intensity he had in the first film. Without a comparably ridiculous presence like Diesel to play off, Walker falls short and the main hero of the story becomes an unlikeable character. Not to mention the fact that he committed a major crime at the end of the last film and the cops are willing to wipe his slate clean if he helps them with this mission, and then after they complete it, he and his ex-con partner STEAL MONEY and walk away. They do all this while referring to each other as "bre" and "cuh" at a rate of three or four times per sentence. Stay away from the ad-libs, guys. There was no chemistry between these supposed "old friends," and the movie suffered dramatically because of it.

As far as I noticed, there were only two original aspects of this movie. One, a torture scene in a club, features the main villain (some d-bag named Carter Verone) strong-arming a cop into giving him a "window" for his henchmen to race through to deliver drugs near the end of the movie. While the cop is held down, Verone places a live rat on his exposed stomach. He then places a metal champagne container over the rat, trapping it inside, and lights it on fire with a blowtorch. This causes the rat to start clawing and eating his way into the cop's flesh, causing a considerable amount of discomfort. Don't worry, he caves in and they let him go without too much bloodshed. But I'll give them credit for originality in that department. The second instance is in the form of an invention that doesn't exist - a projectile clamp that shoots from a gun and attaches itself to a car, shocks it with an electric jolt, and shuts down the engine remotely (pictured above). I'm not even sure such a thing is possible to build in the real world, but it seemed like it fit in well with the rest of the crap in this movie.

Overall, I'd say stay away from this flick and just watch the first one again. The new movie due out this summer, called Fast and Furious, actually takes place between this film and the next one, The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift. So at the most we can hope the series returns to the fun it had with the first installment, and at the very least we know there's going to be a cameo from Tyrese in it. Stay tuned for a review of Tokyo Drift next month, and then a review of the new film in April when it hits theaters. Until next time...

*These cliches aren't really unforgiveable - in fact, they're fairly commonplace. I just wanted to link to that video.

What I've Been Watching, Episode 2

What I've Been Watching, Episode 2 from Ben Pearson on Vimeo.

Take Three, February Style

It's a new month, and that means it's time for a new edition of Take Three. Thanks to an outpouring of comments from a few readers last time around, we've got enough categories to keep this series alive.

Best Movie Musicals of the Past 10 Years
1. Dr. Horrible's Sing-A-Long Blog

2. The Phantom of the Opera

3. South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut

Worst Eddie Murphy Movies That I'll Never See

1. Norbit

2. Meet Dave

3. Daddy Day Care

Movies That Need Sequels or Prequels

1. Swordfish (sequel)

2. Tombstone (prequel)

3. Crank (prequel)

Most Obvious Product Placements

1. I, Robot

2. E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial

3. Demolition Man

Best Movies That Have Their Own Theme Park Ride

1. Back To The Future

2. Jurassic Park

3. Toy Story

Funniest Spoof Movies

1. Airplane!

2. Hot Shots

3. Spaceballs

Best Ben Stiller Non-Comedy Movies

1. Keeping the Faith

2. Along Came Polly (more rom-com than comedy)

3. (I've got nothing. I was stretching it for Along Came Polly. Tough category.)

Movies That Should Have Their Own Video Game

1. Dirty Harry: The Game

2. Bruce Almighty: Free Reign

3. Point Break: Bodhi's Back

Video Games That Should Be Movies
1. Uncharted: Drake's Fortune
2. Dead To Rights
3. Assassin's Creed

Best Fight Scene

1. The Protector

2. Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgandy

3. Equilibrium

Most Action Per Minute In A Domestic Film

1. The Bourne Identity

2. Wanted

3. Rambo

That'll wrap it up for this month's Take Three. Got an idea for a category you would like to see featured? Throw it down in the comments section, and let's keep this train rolling. Until next time...