My official Best List of 2010 (six months late)

If you want to see the list I've made for my Top 10 list for 2010, here it is.

Apparently I felt like that list meant I've seen less movies than I had this year. The reason is because I'd had final exams at school and that delayed my time to watch the movies I'm interested in or like to see. And also because most of the films released last year was already released in Australia this year. So here's my official Best/Worst list of 2010 counting the five best and the five very worst films.


Honourable mentions/ #6 movies
Greenberg, Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World, The King's Speech, Green Zone, Animal Kingdom, The Fighter, Toy Story 3 (it's not the best Pixar has to offer us but its tolerable), The Town, Black Swan


2010 Watchlist
Easy A, Get Him To The Greek, Exit Through The Gift Shop, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, I Love You Phillip Morris, Blue Valentine
__________________________________________________________________________________


5. Kick Ass

It was a hard spot for me to decide. It was either Kick Ass or Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World. Scott Pilgrim was a visual wonderland hooking you into a the experience of comic books, indie music, 8 bit videogaming and clever pop culture references. Kick Ass gets 5th spot not because it doesn't have the distinct look of Scott Pilgrim, but because it's bloody hiliarious. Kick Ass is the story of a teenage comic book reader transforming himself into a DIY superhero whose only powers are wielding batons. But he'd faced deadly consequences and meets a daddy-daughter duo also a superhero vigilante and are better than him. What makes Kick Ass works is that this brings all of the great super films and mixed it with violent satire that's refreshing. With Aaron Johnson being this Peter Parker knockoff you should applaud, Chloe Moretz steals the show playing Hit-Girl a girl who takes an appetite for destruction for justice, you'll laugh until the film literally hurts. Moretz is a revelation and should be lauded for taking risks here, not panned because she's eleven. It's a graphic novel adaptation that should be graphic for the faint-hearted, but at the same time, poignant at heart.

4. Winter's Bone

Just a few days ago, I decided to pick this film up so I can finish all of the Best Picture nominees. Winter's Bone may be an average arthouse film that is only seen by few people, but for every film lover or person who loves critically acclaimed films, it's a must see. 

A tale of a young girl named Ree Dolly living in the Ozarks who's looking after her younger siblings because her mother is catatonic and her father's a methhead. When Ree discovers her dad hadn't shown up to his trial, she decides to search for him. During her journey she encounters ghastly people who brings mysteries surrounding her Dad including her uncle Teardrop and during that she face certain consequences from these people. 

This film is beautifully tragic and it's visually gritty considering the environment of the Ozarks malnourished with poverty and underground drug labs. Well-directed by Debra Granik who brings the importance of the themes of determination, poverty and family into this quiet yet richly detailed crime thriller. Winter's Bone is then lifted up by Jennifer Lawrence's powerful performance as the heroine of the story and more put forward is John Hawkes' fierce uncle.

3. 127 Hours

127 Hours brings in the greatest depth of a normal person I've ever seen. It's a kinetic and visual experience from Danny Boyle that is also beautifully edited. 127 Hours is the story of survival, a matter of life and death for real life adventurer Aron Ralston. As you should know, it's the biographical story of the guy while being stuck on a rock. It's James Franco bravuva and sensational performance that has me convinced it's one of the best performances I've ever seen in a film. He's brings a variety of emotions from cheerful to lonely. The climax (which should be obvious) brings tension that's gripping and determined. For those who assume this film is just seeing a guy cuts his arm off, please look at it further. It's a life story.

2. The Social Network

Many films are known for their subject matter just before and after they're nominated for bazillions of Oscars. Brokeback Mountain (a movie about a gay romance), Slumdog Millionaire (Indian guy on Millionaire), The Hurt Locker (movie about the Iraq War) and now we have The Social Network, a movie about Facebook. As much as people would assume that a Facebook movie is lame or boring, apparently it knocked the hell out of every professional critic. The subject matter doesn't deal with Facebook. More so, it matters on the human relationships regarding ordinary people who helped defined our time.

The Social Network focuses on Mark Zuckerberg, after being dumped by his girlfriend and from forming a revenge blog, decides to build Facebook, an online social network he thinks would refreshes the entire "social experience"to a new level. Since the inception of Facebook, he is brought to lawsuits and a loss of friendship with Eduardo Saverin.

The Social Network is a simple story of friendship, loyalty and betrayal according to screenwriter Aaron Sorkin. Through Sorkin's stylish, witty screenplay, David Fincher's cold yet visceral direction and Trent Reznor's mesmerising score, these aspects manage to pull you in and for the better, make this film work to a higher level. Kudos to Jesse Eisenberg who plays the ironic characterization of Mark Zuckerberg and Andrew Garfield as the possibly flawless Eduardo Saverin who get screwed the most. It should've been Best Picture at the Oscars, but sooner or later, it will be a classic. 

1. Inception

Here's proof that the summer of 2010 was not a bummer. Inception is a blockbuster that shows its artistic value over its need to make profit. Inception is almost every reason you go to movies for a good time. It's entertaining, make you think and believe you're in something that has never been seen before. It adds new meaning of science fiction. Enough said, if you want more click here

The Last Airbender

The Last Airbender


D- (1.4)

The Last Airbender should be recalled The Last Thing We Would See From M. Night Shyamalan because this is not only a poorly executed adaptation of a TV Series, but also just messed up with a director who just committed career suicide by ruining a once beloved cartoon. Or there should I say one of the worst movies of theis century. Even Armond White didn't like it from the start.

Honestly of all the cartoons I've seen in my current age along with Arthur and Phineas & Ferb, Avatar: The Last Airbender was a cartoon that I absolutely enjoyed. It was a cartoon that has Asian mythology and martial arts suited with Western audiences. But I only watched the first season in which this movie was based on and The Last Airbender had bit the hand.

To tell you the story, it's about two children Katara and Sokka whose powers could use water as their weapon discovered a 12 year old kid in an iceberg near their place. His name is Aang (by the way why the f**k do they call him Aung) played by Noah Ringer, and he is as the title suggest the last living Airbender who can use air as his powers. The Fire Nation led by Prince Zuko (Dev Patel) who had conquered almost everything in the Spirit World, wants the Airbender who is the Avatar, a sorcerer who can master Earth, Water, Air and Fire. Katara and Sokka helps out Aang's quest to master all of these elements so he can defeat the Fire Nation.

Did M Night Shyamalan got paid $72 million to f**k up everything up? On the screen. You know I can tell you that Shyamalan is a huge fan of the show and he wanted to direct this movie because his daughter was a huge fan of the show as well and was intrigued of how big of a fan she is. However anything that was great about the cartoon from Nickeloneon is left out of the movie and I think that Shyamalan wants to put a huge stamp in this movie. And does he ever. Because of that, not only does it appalled me that they destroyed the whole reputation of the cartoon, but the creators of the show still approve of this. The direction of the movie was truly lazy. I was going to give a pass to Shyamalan cos I haven't seen any of his movies The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable or The Happening which were critically panned.

The acting is just utterly terrible. Noah Ringer who plays Aang is awful as he had shown no emotion to his character. So are the people who played Katara and Sokka. They never show any sort of emotion at all. The worst of them all is Aasif Mandvi who plays Admiral Zhao who just irritates me because he doesn't show any personality of Zhao. The only performance that almost matches its character is Dev Patel from Slumdog Millionaire who plays Prince Zuko. He portrays the same person Zuko was in the cartoon but he's given no dialogue and I can't even help seeing him glare at the camera. However the only great performance I could hand compliments to was Cliff Curtis as Uncle Iroh (his part would've been played by Ben Kingsley) who has most of the movie's humor but couldn't deliver it well.

The cast would've been better if the script written by Shyamalan was improved but the question is why this kind of cast is put in to this movie when most of the characters that originates from the cartoon are almost Asian (Water Tribe was a mixture of Asian and Inuit, the rest of the elements are all of the Asian race especailly Fire which is specifically Chinese) while the rest of the characters are White or Indian. The Water Tribe are all Whites while the rest of the Fire Nation is Indian. That just offends me.

One of the great things about Avatar: The Last Airbender is the level of comic relief. Aang, Sokka and a dude named Uncle Iroh delivers a sense of charm into the humor of the cartoon. Where as this, that is gone. The reason why Aang sucked is because he's joyless. The reason why Uncle Iroh sucked is because he feels bored. THe reason why Sokka is terrible is because he has no sense of humour.

I believe that this movie went along with the script too much. This is based on the first season of the show and the script felt so rushed that there were many holes based on plot and logic all crammed into 99 minutes of film.

The visuals are not as eye popping as it is. The 3D just reflects how everything sucks and in the first seventy seconds they get to throw everything at you and because of the effects I just felt bored.

And can you believe it. The ending is a set up for episode two. I can't imagine what despicable ways M Night Shylamalan would be putting in that sequel. Shyamalan had counter argued that no one appreciated his style and art he has put into his movie. Well to Mr. Shyamalan. The art that you put in this movie is nowhere between Picasso or Monet. This is might have been below Dali under surrealism. No. It isn't.

It's not that your movies are bad, but if people can watch their movies for the following reasons they wanted to watch it, then they should forget about you for a year or two.

If you want a movie completely opposite of this movie, see Inception. But if you want to watch a movie with amazing flashy special effects with choreography, see Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World. Because if you people are still liking this movie, I don't know what kind of taste do you have in movies.