Hullo friendos,
Gar here in what will (hopefully) be the first of many blog entries. Those of you who know me well, probably know that the title of my blog - "You're Gonna Need a Bigger Blog" - is lovingly ripped from my favorite film, "Jaws." And films are exactly what I will be writing about. Since we're just over a week into the new year, I thought I might start things off with my top 10 most-anticipated films of 2009...
10. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Dir. David Yates)
Director David Yates received something of a critical drubbing for his work on the last Potter film, Order of the Phoenix. I'm not sure why. After Alfonso Cuaron's Prisoner of Azkaban, I thought it was the most visionary of the series. Yates certainly got strong performances out of his young cast, though they've admittedly had quite some time to grow into the roles. Roger Ebert complained that the film took itself too seriously. Nevermind the dramatic necessity to go darker as the series progresses, but I thought there was a good deal of humor. More than any of the other Potter films, it made me yearn to see what would happen next.
9. Nine (Dir. Rob Marshall)
My ninth entry (haha) is based on a stage musical by the same name, and the musical is based on Federico Fellini's 8 1/2, which is one of the most respected films to come out of Europe. Rob Marshall directs. I really responded to his crisp, razzle-dazzle 'um (double haha) direction of Chicago. He and Baz Luhrmann (Moulin Rouge!) are certainly responsible for the recent resurgence in film musicals (though I can't say as any of their successors have helped in keeping the trend alive). Marshall has assembled a large cast that's almost unsurpassed in its quality: Daniel Day-Lewis, Marion Cotillard, Penelope Cruz, Nicole Kidman, Judi Dench and Sophia Loren. So why is the film ranked so low? Did I mention that Fergie also stars?
8. The Road (Dir. John Hillcoat)
Last year, I had the great pleasure of reading the Cormac McCarthy novel on which this film is based. Viggo Mortensen stars, and he's certainly had quite the string of successes since playing Aragorn in The Lord of the Rings. His talents won me over with his turn in David Cronenberg's Eastern Promises. On a special note, the film was shot around Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. A news article on the shoot quoted the director or one of the producers as saying that that area of PA has some beautiful post-apocalyptic scenery. As someone who hails from Pennsylvania, I'm not sure whether that's compliment or a put-down.
7. The Lovely Bones (Dir. Peter Jackson)
Peter Jackson certainly has both talent and passion to spare, though I wouldn't quite call myself a disciple. His films tend to be overwrought by half. Granted, I've only seen The Lord of the Rings and his King Kong remake. It's going to be interesting to see how he handles a smaller and presumably more intimate film. Again, there's an impressive cast: Rachel Weisz, Mark Wahlberg, Susan Sarandon, Stanley Tucci and Saoirse Ronan.
6. Avatar (Dir. James Cameron)
After a 12 year feature-film hiatus, James Cameron is back! I don't know that a whole lot of information has come out about the film. IMDb's plot summary reads: "In the future...a paraplegic war veteran is brought to another planet, Pandora, which is inhabited by...a humanoid race...those from Earth find themselves at odds with each other and the local culture." Cameron's involvement is enough for me. His work informed my early filmgoing experiences. I hold him responsible - along with a couple other filmmakers - for shaping my passions and my going to film school.
5. Inglorious Bastards (Dir. Quentin Tarantino)
Lately, Tarantino's work has taken a turn toward the wordy, over-long and generally self-indulgent. Though I still find him to be an exciting and engaging filmmaker. Just as Kill Bill was a sizeable logistic and ambitious leap from Pulp Fiction and Jackie Brown, Inglorious Bastards promises to be another great leap forward. It tells the story of a group of WWII Jewish soldiers who are hunting for Nazi scalps. That's pretty damn sick, and I fully expect Tarantino to bring his A-game - idiosyncrasies and all. Plus, he's got legendary film composer Ennio Morricone to do the score.
4. Public Enemies (Dir. Michael Mann)
Anyone who has spent any substantive time talking film with me knows that I love gangster films. Especially period gangster films. Public Enemies concerns federal agent Melvin Purvis (Christian Bale) and his pursuit of the gangster John Dillinger (Johnny Depp) during the 1930's. I didn't particularly care for Michael Mann's Miami Vice, but there's no getting around the fact that he knows how to put a film together. The Insider, Heat, Collateral, etc. He's got two dynamite actors with Bale and Depp, as well.
3. Up (Dir. Pete Docter & Bob Peterson)
Though Pixar Animation Studio has dabbled in disappointments, as far as I'm concerned, they have yet to make an outright bad film. Up looks to be another home-run (or at least a triple) from my favorite studio. It's about a man, nearly 80, who ties thousands of balloons to his house with the intention of floating to South America. Once air born, he finds a young boy has stowed away. What's interesting about Pixar is that their stories are taking baby steps toward riskier territory. Their first feature film, Toy Story, had recognizable celebrity voices, and being that it was about toys that come to life, the merchandisers must have been laughing their way to the bank. Thirteen years and eight movies later, they produced WALL-E, a film wherein the first 30 minutes are dialogue-free and the two main characters are robots which bare very little resemblance to humans. Now, they have a film where the protagonist is a grumpy senior citizen. No cuddly robots or talking animals. It seems to me that that will present an interesting marketing challenge, though I expect the young stowaway is intended to dilute some of those concerns.
2. Shutter Island (Dir. Martin Scorsese)
Suspense films represent another genre staple for me. Scorsese follows his instant classic, white-knuckler, The Departed with another crime thriller. I've surveyed some pretty strong casts thus far, but this one is absolutely stacked: Leonardo DiCaprio, Mark Ruffalo, Ben Kingsley, Emily Mortimer, Michelle Williams, Max von Sydow, Jackie Earle Haley, Patricia Clarkson and Ted Levine. Based on a Dennis Lehane novel (author of Mystic River), the film will chronicle two U.S. Marshals as they search for an escaped murderess on Shutter Island. I guess the only reason this film isn't number one is that the plot contains a pretty big conceit - the murderess escapes from confinement when a storm hits her institution.
1. Green Zone (Dir. Paul Greengrass)
There have been a lot of overtly 9/11 themed films. I frankly haven't seen many, because they seemed preachy or exploitative or some combination of both. The few that I have seen have confirmed my suspicions. Greengrass's United 93 certainly bucked the trend, though. It's at once a sprawling film, yet he and his writers expertly manage to distill the events of that day into a 90-minute narrative. The final 20 to 30 minutes are forever etched into my memory, a cinematic envisioning of pure chaos capped by a final moment that was best described by film critic Peter Travers, "At the end, he [Greengrass] imagines a sea of arms reaching into that cockpit in a way that redefines heroism. Far from being exploitative, the effect is inspiring: This is the best of us." With Green Zone, a film about U.S. soldiers searching for WMD's, I'm expecting more of the same. The docu-drama style of shooting that Greengrass has mastered, chaotic yet structured. He's an intelligent filmmaker yet never pandering. Moving but not sensational or sentimental. Heart-pounding, but never through cheap thrills. Matt Damon stars, and that's also not a bad thing.
Here's to a great year at the movies!
