On my old blog I used to (I may have done it about two or three years running) always write up a list of films I was looking forward to over the coming year, and then review the previous year's list of most anticipated films and see if they lived up to my own, personal hype. I'm going to continue that centuries old tradition here for the sake of clinging onto the past. But I shall divvy it up into two posts, the first will review my 'Most Anticipated Films of 2008' and the second shall be my all new list of films. So, without furtherado let's jump in the way back machine and see what I was looking forward to at the end of 2007...
1. Blindness (dir. Fernando Meirelles)
My most anticipated film ended up being the last film I saw at the cinema in 2008, and though it was a well made, brilliantly acted film that stuck very closely to Jose Saramago's masterwork of a novel, it just lacked enough of an impact to really make it feel essential; and where many people spoke of it being too bleak I didn't feel it was quite bleak enough! It sits in the same category as 'Children of Men' but has nowhere near the wallop of that masterpiece.
2. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (dir. Steven Spielberg)
A huge dissapointment. I do want to give it one last spin on DVD before putting the final nail on my opinion; this was the first Indy film I saw at the cinema and was a garish, poorly plotted, muddled and CG-saturated affair that had a tiny handful of good bits, but was generally quite embarassing.
3. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (dir. Julian Schnabel)
An incredible, visceral, beautiful, emotive film that keeps growing in my conciousness as a truly special movie that I want to point other people towards and Mathieu Almaric deserved much more recognition than he got for an amazing performance; amazing in how much he conveys doing so little.
4. There Will Be Blood (dir. P.T. Anderson)
Anderson evolved as a director with this, I am curious as to his next move; but this is a film that shall last.
5. Persepolis (dir. Vincent Paronnaud, Marjane Satrapi)
This got nudged aside at the last minute by Waltz With Bashir for the 'coveted' title of best animated film of the year, but it's still a fascinating, individual and personal tale brilliantly told and drawn.
6. The Dark Knight (dir. Christopher Nolan)
Highly enjoyable with some great performance, but really I felt like this was a strange mash-up of 'Batman Returns' and 'Heat' and whilst that seemed to be what many people wanted, it wasn't quite the mind-blowing experience many others thought it to be.
7. Teeth (dir. Mitchell Lichtenstein)
I've been harping on about this being 'the modern Heathers', it's a exploitational tale told in a smart, restrained and often surreal way. It's blackly comic, bold and confrontational, with scenes shifting style at will. It sparked a small whimper of debate, but I think it will have legs on DVD.
8. Be Kind Rewind (dir. Michel Gondry)
A very uneven film, yet highly watchable thanks to Mos Def's charismatic leading turn and Gondry's lo-fi visual kinetics. A bit of fluff inbetween, I expect, better work from Gondry.
9. Son of Rambow (dir. Garth Jennings)
Absolutely charming love-letter to the 80s, cinema, childhood and the power of the imagination with some of the best child performances in a while and some delightfully barmy sequences; Will Proudfoot's first bonkers imagining post-Rambo always makes me grin like a loon. Garth Jennings really captured the flighty, crazy logic of a young boy's imagination.
10. No Country For Old Men / Burn After Reading (dir. The Coen Brothers)
No Country... was a great, stark thriller very similar to the Coen's earliest film, Blood Simple. Burn After Reading was a messy, misjudged, awkward, starry 'comedy' more akin to recent dissapointments like Intolerable Cruelty.
11. Tropic Thunder (dir. Ben Stiller)
A bit of a mess, only Downey Jr. really seemed to get a hook on his character and the film ran with that in the marketting department. Otherwise it has moments, but isn't as inspired overall as Zoolander.
12. Jumper (dir. Doug Liman)
Much like the first X-Men film this feels very incomplete, I wouldn't object to a sequel as there was a story just starting to take shape here. Hayden Christensen wasn't unbearable, but the film was stolen by Jamie Bell's far superior co-jumper.
13. Wall-E (dir. Andrew Stanton)
A great film, but not quite the incendiary re-shaping of the way we perceive animation that I was expecting... the satire, similar in ways to Mike Judge's Idiocracy was a nice, dark touch in a surprisingly sweet film.
14. Synedoche, New York (dir. Charlie Kaufman)
Released in 2009.
15. The Happening (dir. M. Night Shyamalan)
My word, this was a terrible film. I look forward to renting this with some friends, drinking a lot, eating pizzas and hopefully laughing our heads off. Because watching this in the cinema was a painful, baffling experience.
16. Inkheart (dir. Iain Softley)
A very book bound movie, adapted, as it was, from a novel; this doesn't managed to reshape its source material into a compelling film, but does have a good share of ideas and a really great performance by Paul Bettany.
17. Where the Wild Things Are (dir. Spike Jonze)
Released in 2009 (hopefully)!
18. Hellboy 2: The Golden Army (dir. Guillermo Del Toro)
Upped the monster quota and had some grander, better set-pieces that the first film, this kind of fudged it in the emotional and story stakes with some real gaping plot-holes and some awkward character arcs.
19. Dante 01 (dir. Marc Caro)
This went straight to video and I still haven't got around to watching it...
20. Coraline (dir. Henry Selick)
Released in 2009.
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