PITAOE's BLOCKBUSTER AWARDS - THE WINNERS

The votes are in. Whose bringing home a Golden Pancake?

The votes are in. Earlier I posted the nominees for our first Blockbuster Awards - celebrating the biggest movies of the year. Well Ben, Sam and I independently wrote up our ballots and I tallied the score to see who the winners were. Let's start with:

Worst Film:

The Nominees:
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
The Happening
Speed Racer
The Love Guru

and the winner is


THE LOVE GURU

Now obviously this is the best film ever made so I don't understand how we could have voted it the worst of the year. It's not like this movie made me want to claw my eyes out and set them on fire. It's not like the movie made me ashamed to be a man. It's not like this movie didn't, in all probability, lead the terrorist attacks in Mumbai. I don't get it.

Runner up: Speed Racer

Funniest Movie:

Forgetting Sarah Marshall
Tropic Thunder
Pineapple Express

And the winner is


FORGETTING SARAH MARSHALL

A runaway winner with three first place votes.

Runner up: Tropic Thunder - which was second on all the ballots

Most Unintentionally Funny Moment:
Mark Wahlberg talking to a plastic plant in The Happening
"For Aslan!" - Prince Caspian
Watching Mike Myers piss away his career in The Love Guru

And the winner is

RETARD BEAR



A hotly contested vote but Aslan wins by decision. Sam though watching Mike Myers shine in Love Guru was first while Ben enjoyed Marky Mark asking a plastic plant to "say hi to your mother for me". But retarded bear wins as we all had it second or first.

Most Disappointing Movie:
Quantum of Solace
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skulls
Pineapple Express
Hancock

And the winner is


INDIANA JONES

Sam and I each had this as our number one so despite Ben putting it fourth (he had Hancock as the most disappointing) Indiana Jones is the winner. It really was a terrible film and just gets worst the second and third times you see it. A damn shame

Runner-Up: Hancock

Most Surprisingly Good:
Forgetting Sarah Marshall
Hellboy 2
Cloverfield
Wanted
Kung-Fu Panda

And the winner is


FORGETTING SARAH MARSHALL

Ben and I each had this as our number one surprise of the year. Sam had Kung-Fu Panda (which really was shockingly fun) as his number one. I mean...Ben and I both liked Superbad and Knocked up so why were we surprised? I'm not sure. Maybe we didn't think Sarah Marshall would be as funny as it was...

Runner-up: Wanted - A very worthy action movie that I thought would be just silly and bad. This ended up being a very fun movie and a good example of a dying breed - a straight up action movie.

Best Adaptation of a Comic Book:
Wanted
The Dark Knight
Iron Man
Incredible Hulk
Hellboy 2

And the winner is


THE INCREDIBLE HULK

The Hulk is a boring character. All you can do with him is have Banner on the run, fight the military, or fight another strong guy. What does this movie have Hulk do? Run, fight the military, fight another monster. The Incredible Hulk takes the only elements of the comic that works and then revels in it. The movie has a bit of a tongue in cheek tone, as if everyone knows that The Hulk sucks and if the movie works its a miricle, and that plays well for a comic book movie. The Dark Knight reached too high and Wanted is completely different from the comic. Ben had Hellboy 2 first but I thought the movie was too big and whimsical to suit the tone of the series.

Runner-Up: Iron Man - The funny thing is, the reason I didn't have this as my number one was that the comic book series has never been as good as the movie was.


Best Action Scene:
Iron Man returns to the Middle East to get some revenge
The opening fight scene against Scarecrow's goons in The Dark Knight
The chase at "Yale" in Indiana Jones 4
Hulk vs. Blonsky round 2 (the one on the college campus).
Wesley fights all the assassins at the end of Wanted.

And the winner is

IRON MAN - The first scene in this clip




Just bad-ass.

Runner-up: Hulk Vs. Blonsky

Best Scene:
Hellboy and Abe singing Barry Manilow - Hellboy 2
Joker's Pencil Trick and then talking to the gangsters - The Dark Knight
Stark and Pepper's dance - Iron Man
Wesley quits his job - Wanted
Tom Cruise Dancing at the end of Tropic Thunder
First 10 minutes of Wall*E
When you first hear the song from the Dracula musical in the bar - Forgetting Sarah Marshall

And the winner is

THE DARK KNIGHT



An easy winner.

Runner-Up: Tom Cruise dancing at the end of Tropic Thunder

Best Blockbuster:
The Dark Knight
Wall*E
Iron Man
Forgetting Sarah Marshall
Tropic Thunder

And the winner is


IRON MAN

Our Blockbuster of 2008. Dark Knight might have made more money but for us Iron Man was the most entertaining movie of the summer.

Runner-Up - Tropic Thunder

Most Anticipated Sequel of a movie from 2008:
Bond 3
Batman 3
Iron Man 2
Hulk 2
Narnia 3

And the winner is


IRON MAN 2

Not that surprising given what won Best Blockbuster.

Runner-Up - Bond 3

Most Anticipated Movie of 2009:
Wolverine
Transformers 2
Star Trek
Bruno
Angels and Demons
Terminator: Salvation
Pixar's Up
Public Enemies
GI JOE
Harry Potter: The Half-Blood Prince

And the winner is


WOLVERINE

We all had different movies as our number one but Wolverine was in all our top three. Sam is most excited for Pixar's Up, while Ben is anticipating Harry Potter: The Half-Blood Prince. I can't wait for Michael Mann's Public Enemies about John Dillinger and the efforts to catch him.

Runner-Up - Harry Potter: The Half-Blood Prince


Congrats to all the winners. We'll have our 2008: Year in Review Awards sometime next year.