I watched 42 of 2010's theatrical releases.  As much as I'd like to write a thoughtful dissertation on each of them, I'm too busy with my own stories (I'm revising "Every Airship Needs a Wizard" and "Painter" (aka "Black Mist," aka "In Its Place") and mailing "The Dream").  So I gave myself 10-20 minutes per movie to crank out a couple paragraphs ( Read more... )

There are a ton of movies from 2000 - 2009 that I've missed (consult this list and this list), but I have to put this up eventually.  Picks and rankings are based on nothing deeper than how I feel right now.  Don't be surprised if tomorrow I redo the ranking completely.
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With "The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans," I finally call myself done with the films of 2009.  Here's my Top Ten…or Top Eleven.

EDITED 5-10-2010:  Actually, why don't I just rank every movie I saw last year.

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“And that’s when the CHUDs came after me.” So says Homer Simpson, in describing the final mishap of his disastrous trip to New York City. The same could be said of “Babel,” the solemn and humorless new film by Alejandro González Iñárritu (“Amores Perros”), in which one disaster after another keeps mounting and mounting for our poor characters, ( Read more... )

All the President's Men (1976)
The Apartment (1960)
Assisted Living (2005)
Brazil (1985)
Breathless (1957)

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The Black Dahlia (2006)
Day of the Jackal (1973)
Devil Wears Prada (2006)
Donnie Darko (2001)
Farewell My Concubine (1993)

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Now that we’re almost halfway through 2008, I thought I should finally get around to posting my favorite movies of 2007. As always, my favorite movies usually deal with questions of religion and death because that seems to be the only way for me to feel that a movie is dealing with something close to the totality of human experience.

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Yes, every second of this movie is hilarious, as SoCal teenagers talk to each other as if they’re in a 1940s hard-bitten film noir, wrapped in drug deals, murders, and class conflict.

To wit, the “detective” asks:  “Dope runner, right?”

And “The Brain” replies:  “Big time. See The Pin pipes it from the lowest scraper for Brad Bramish to sell, ( Read more... )