{"id":5661,"date":"2010-12-31T22:00:48","date_gmt":"2011-01-01T03:00:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/?p=5661"},"modified":"2011-01-01T02:08:04","modified_gmt":"2011-01-01T07:08:04","slug":"2010-in-movies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/?p=5661","title":{"rendered":"2010 in movies"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a><\/p>\n

I watched 61 movies<\/a> this year. It’s often easier, and maybe more fun, talking about the movies that I hated, or that didn’t work, than the “best” movies of any given year. So, with that in mind, here are some dishonorable mentions for 2010:<\/p>\n

1. Daybreakers<\/a><\/p>\n

As I wrote back in January<\/a>:<\/p>\n

It has an intriguing premise, and a well imagined world in its vampire society that comments nicely on our own, but it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s boring and badly plotted as a story. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s inventive visually, until it starts just being annoying visually, and by the end I was just looking for the door. If it had been the movie like it seemed it was going to be in its first twenty minutes, however, it could have been something.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

2. Murderland<\/a><\/p>\n

A British TV miniseries, which I didn’t think was all that great back in March<\/a>. I watched it mostly for Robbie Coltrane, who I’ve liked quite a lot before, but who’s largely wasted. I’m including it here because, since then, I had completely<\/i> forgotten it. I had to look it up just to remember what it was about.<\/p>\n

3. Jennifer’s Body<\/a><\/p>\n

Dear lord, was this an awful train wreck of a movie.<\/p>\n

4. G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra<\/a><\/p>\n

One of the worst movies I saw this year, but also, perversely, one of my biggest guilty pleasures. I had an absolute blast live-tweeting the experience<\/a> — “There is no CGI in Team.” — and I don’t care what anybody says, I would willingly watch that movie again. But it is<\/i> unspeakably stupid.<\/p>\n

5. Survival of the Dead<\/a><\/p>\n

Oh, how it pains me to include a George Romero zombie film on this list. Lord knows I defended him, through Land of the Dead<\/i> and Diary of the Dead<\/i> both, but this is just him going through the motions — and not particularly well. What makes the best of Romero’s zombie films work is that, beneath the gore and shambling corpses, he has something socially relevant to say. Here, not so as you would notice.<\/p>\n

6. Resident Evil: Apocalypse<\/a><\/p>\n

This could have been another guilty pleasure, had it not been so stingy on the pleasure. As I wrote back in October<\/a>, I found it aggressively mediocre more than anything else.<\/p>\n

7. Funny People<\/a><\/p>\n

Not a terrible movie — in fact, there’s a fair amount to like about it — but ultimately it’s a disappointing mess that never figures out what it wants to do, or be. I don’t think I’ve ever longed for a movie to be more<\/i> formulaic, but this really needed something<\/i> guiding its course.<\/p>\n

8. MacGruber<\/a><\/p>\n

Again, not a terrible<\/i> movie. Some scattered parts of it even edge right up to brilliance. But so<\/i> disappointing, and for long stretches not particularly funny<\/i>. There’s a difference between parodying something and fetishizing it, and MacGruber<\/i> falls too often on the wrong side of that equation.<\/p>\n

9. Dr. Phibes Rises Again<\/a><\/p>\n

The original was great fun<\/a>, but, aside from one or two very brief moments, this sequel was just a tedious mess.<\/p>\n

10. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo<\/a> and Iron Man 2<\/a><\/p>\n

Again, not terrible — with few exceptions, all noted above, I didn’t really see<\/i> a lot of terrible movies this year — but both quite disappointing. The former in pretty much all the same ways as the disappointing novel; the latter mostly just because it almost never slows down from setting up future movie franchises to be its own movie.<\/p>\n

But, if you’re really wondering, the best<\/i> movies I saw this year probably were:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. The Hurt Locker<\/a><\/li>\n
  2. Up in the Air<\/a><\/li>\n
  3. A Serious Man<\/a><\/li>\n
  4. Inception<\/a><\/li>\n
  5. Shutter Island<\/a><\/li>\n
  6. Mother<\/a><\/li>\n
  7. Scott Pilgrim vs. the World<\/a><\/li>\n
  8. Winter’s Bone<\/a><\/li>\n
  9. Exit Through the Gift Shop<\/a><\/i>\n
  10. The Bicycle Thief<\/a><\/li>\n
  11. True Grit<\/a><\/li>\n
  12. Rashomon<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    No real order, beyond maybe the order in which I watched them. Honorable mentions — maybe too many to mention — to Moon, The Signal, The Crazies<\/em> (the remake), Passing Strange, Paranormal Activity, The House of the Devil, Pontypool, The Abominable Dr. Phibes<\/em> (the original), Temple Grandin, Ondine, Ink, District 9, The Informant!, In the Loop<\/em>, and The Human Centipede<\/em> — the last if only for not being as terrible as I thought it would be. (And being a whole lot of fun to live-tweet with friends<\/a>.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    I watched 61 movies this year. It’s often easier, and maybe more fun, talking about the movies that I hated, or that didn’t work, than the “best” movies of any given year. So, with that in mind, here are some dishonorable mentions for 2010: 1. Daybreakers As I wrote back in January: It has an … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[14,28],"class_list":["post-5661","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-movies","tag-personal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5661"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5661"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5661\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5661"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5661"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unreality.net\/weblog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5661"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}