Henry's Top Ten of 2009

While 2009 was a disappointing year for movies, there were some definite standouts, and the very best film of the year ranks among any other year's best...


*DISCLAIMER* - Please note that this is not my ranking of the "best" movies in terms of overall quality. This is a list of the films that most stood out for me, that I most enjoyed, and that most represent the past year in cinema. I will get to what I think the highest quality films were when I list what I believe should be nominated for the Academy Awards. That's later. These are my favorite films of 2009...

First, here is 20-11 in my ranking of the top movies of the year:

20. Antichrist

19. Public Enemies

18. Up in the Air

17. Precious

16. The Hangover

15. The Damned United

14. Up

13. Moon

12. Zombieland

11. Drag Me to Hell


Now onto the Top Ten of 2009:



10. Coraline - This movie just hit the right notes for me. I loved the animation, I really enjoyed the dark story-line, and thought the whole thing had a really good feel to it. A mature children's film, but still a children's film, and a movie that can sit proudly next to The Nightmare Before Christmas. That's saying something. (Original Review)



9. Crazy Heart - This film is all about Bridges' performance but that's enough. It's filled with solid music, good chemistry among its leads, and a predictable but effective story of redemption. An indie success. (Original Review)



8. District 9 - A movie that I wasn't quite sure what I thought of until I watched it on DVD. It really works. There's so much energy and originality in every frame that its flaws are easy to ignore. While I still don't love the action beats, the rest of it works so well, and it is easily one of the most exciting films of the year for more than just its content. The fact that it could be made on such a small budget, and could be the debut of a great filmmaker in Neill Blomkamp, makes it one of the most memorable movies of the year. (Original Review)



7. Inglourious Basterds - A real gem from Tarantino who does the best directing of his career with this World War 2 epic. While I still think Pulp Fiction is a better film, Inglourious Basterds has sequences of sheer brilliance that rival Pulp Fiction's best, and it blows Pulp Ficiton out of the water on a technical level. Christoph Waltz steals the show as the "Jew-Hunter" Colonel Landa and Melanie Laurent is impressive as a young Jewish girl out for revenge against the Nazi party. It's not a movie I will be re-watching in its entirety very often, there are too many scenes that go on for too long and don't have enough energy, but the best scenes in the film are among the best scenes of the entire decade. (Original Review)



6. Star Trek - In a year where Avatar got all the press and the buzz...Star Trek was the best science-fiction film of the year. I'm still surprised by this one. I had very little hope of liking this film and I came a way really enjoying it. It's a "winning" film as Ben might say. It's formulaic, but J.J. Abrams uses the formula perfectly, and it really is this year's Iron Man (if not quite as good). I can't recommend this film enough as a Friday night rental when we are in the dark days of cinema in January and February. I promise it will win you over. (Original Review)



5. In the Loop - The best adult comedy of the year and contains the best lines of any film in quite some time. Featuring fantastic comedic performances from Peter Capaldi, James Gandolfini, and Paul Higgins among many others, this was my favorite "find" of the year. While it's a little too long for its own good, it's always entertaining, and deserves as much attention as it can get on DVD. (Original Review)



4. Fantastic Mr. Fox - If I was surprised by Star Trek then you would have to say I was shocked by Fantastic Mr. Fox. I was not a big fan of Wes Anderson's last two films...actually I really hated his last one (The Darjeeling Limited)...but I loved his first entry into the stop-motion animation role. Fantastic Mr. Fox is retro, original, funny, actually kind of exciting...it's a total delight. (Original Review)



3. An Education - At first I thought I liked An Education so much because I saw it after an absolutely brutal run of films. Well, having seen it twice, that's not it. I loved it because it's just a great little film. Featuring a star-making lead performance from Carey Mulligan, standout performances from Peter Sarsgaard, Alfred Molina, Rosamund Pike, and Dominic Cooper, and a fantastic screenplay from Nick Hornby, this was a smart and charming movie that I enjoyed nearly every minute of. If not for a weak ending this might very well have ranked even higher on the list but, as is, it still stands as one of my very favorites of the year. (Original Review)




2. Taken - That's right. Taken. You have a problem with that? Well, then I have someone who has something they want to say:



Yes, this is my second favorite film of 2009 and definitely the most fun film of the year. I won't try to defend this film to you...you either get it or you don't. It's the best film of its kind in a very long time and any flaws it has are erased by how goddamn bad-ass the whole thing is. I loved this movie. (Original Review)



1. The Hurt Locker - This is by far the best film of 2009. It's a film that has sat very well with me and that I've reflected upon multiple times in the months since I saw it. It stands as one of the three best war movies of the decade (Black Hawk Down and Letters from Iwo Jima being the other two) and the only quality movie to tackle the Iraq war. It does so by not bothering with the politics at all. The Hurt Locker is focused solely on the soldiers and the s*** they have to deal with. An expertly directed film by Katherine Bigelow, who I expect will win Best Director, and the only truly great film of the year. Appropriately, the one image that will stick with me most from all the films of 2009 is the final shot of The Hurt Locker. (Original Review)

Well that's it for 2009. Yes, I still have some movies I'll be seeing that were released this year...Nine, The Lovely Bones, Sherlock Holmes, The White Ribbon, etc....but I felt pretty safe in posting this now. I'm sure you disagree with my rankings...I know Ben will...but I thought about this list a long time and feel pretty certain that this is the proper order for me.

Let's hope 2010 is a stronger year.

Henry's Top Ten Worst Movies of 2009

It wasn't a strong year for film and the worst movies of the year were really awful...



What's funny is that there are some fairly highly respected films and film-makers represented on this list. Films like Gomorrah, Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans, and The Informant! were all well thought of among critics. I couldn't stand them.

Here are the "Top" Ten worst films of the year in reverse order:



10. The Box - Richard Kelly's third film, and while it was not nearly as bad as his second (the worst movie ever made: Southland Tales), The Box is still a failure of some magnitude. It has a solid premise, and the first 40 minutes are perfectly strong, but the movie ends up a complete confusing mess. This is a movie that was hostile to its audience, which is different than "challanging", and we're not given anything to hold on to. It's capably made, and interesting in some way, but still has to be on this list. (Original Review)



9. He's Just Not That Into You - Bleh. This movie was 129 minutes long. What a waste of my life. While Bride Wars was bad at least it wasn't the Ben-Hur of romantic comedies. The worst rip-off of Love Actually ever made. (Original Review)



8. The Men Who Stare At Goats - I feel like I just reviewed this so I'll just say that this is one of the most dead comedies I've seen in quite awhile. It has no life, no laughs, and no point. A hard movie to sit through. (Original Review)



7. Bruno - And this was almost impossible to sit through. Only funny here and there, a real disappointment after Borat, and downright unpleasant most of the time. Cohen's schtick got old very quickly in this film and there were multiple moments where I just wanted to leave the theater. Not because it was too graphic, or crass, but because the comedy was just not there. Awkward situations are only bearable if there is a real humor to them...and Bruno, as I said in my review, just didn't make me laugh. (Original Review)



6. Capitalism: A Love Story - All politics aside...this was just a poorly done documentary. It failed to raise interesting or salient questions, never tried to address the real root of the economic crisis, and was based on a fairly absurd and misinformed thesis. A real drop in quality for Moore, who despite being a giant ass, used to make really strong films. (Original Review)



5. Gomorrah - The second most baffling example of "a film that critics loved that was actually just crap" of the year. This movie was loved by critics (and filmmakers) and I don't know why. I saw it with seven different people and no one even thought it was okay. We all thought it was bad. Really bad. (Original Review)



4. The Informant! - Bad music, bad directing, annoying writing...an absolute hatchet job on what could have been a fun film. I really hated this movie and it's another film that I just don't understand how critics could have praised. Damon was fine, but that's as far as I would go, and the rest of the cast stunk up the joint. It's giving me a headache just thinking about this movie. (Original Review)



3. Year One - The only movie I walked out of all year. This movie was an F if there ever was one. A sad and pathetic comedy that did not have any line or scene that momentarily stopped my hatred of it. I hate Jack Black. I hate Michael Sera. I hate Year One. (Original Review)



2. Transformers: Rise of the Fallen - This was the runner-up to Year One when we voted on the worst film of the year back in October but having seen Transformers 2 again...this was far more offensive. I don't just mean the racist robots, though those are hard to believe, but it's the whole thing. And what it represents about what people are looking for in their summer films, how action is being filmed in most movies, and how bloated all hollywood films seem these days. Future generations will look back with horror at how much money this movie made. (Original Review)



1. Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans - And it's not even close. This is the film I was referring to when I said that Gomorrah was the second most baffling well reviewed film. This film is f***ing awful. There is nothing fun, or zany, or fresh about it. It sucks from the first scene and keeps sucking until the end credits. I've now watched it twice, to confirm these thoughts, and it really is one of the very worst films of the decade. And it's definitely the worst movie of the year. (Original Review)


I will put up my Top Ten Films of the year soon...

Henry Saw: Crazy Heart

A very solid little film


Crazy Heart is kind of 2009's The Wrestler...except it's actually good. It tells the story of "Bad" Blake (Jeff Bridges), a former country music superstar, who now finds himself playing in bowling alleys and dive bars after succumbing to aging and alcoholism. Bad still has it but his drinking disrupts his shows and has derailed his ability to write new songs. While doing a gig in Sante Fe, Bad meets a reporter for a local paper named Jean (Maggie Gyllenhaal), and the two start an unlikely romance. Jean is a single mother of a 4 year old boy named Buddy who Bad bonds with, and Jean and Buddy force Bad to reevaluate his drinking, his professional relationship with a former protege turned superstar named Tommy Sweet (Colin Farrel), and his life.

Jeff Bridges is the heart and soul of the movie. Bad Blake has all the charm of Bridges' most famous role (The Dude from The Big Lebowski) but with much more realistic faults. It would be easy to say that playing a heavy drinker is kind of a crutch for actors (see Nicolas Cage in Leaving Las Vegas) but Bridges avoids some big breakdown scene, or having it completely define Bad's character, and is quite effective at portraying a semi-functioning alcoholic.



Bridges is in every scene in the film and brings out the best in his co-stars. Maggie Gyllenhaal, who I've never really liked, is fairly strong here as a woman who can't help but fall in love with Bad Blake. She knows he's a bit of a wreck, and could be dangerous for her son to be around, but she hopes for the best. It is a credit to Bridges that despite the age difference we buy that Jean would fall for Bad. Bridges also interacts well with Colin Farral, who is well cast as a Kieth Urban type country star, and I completely understood their relationship despite not having too many scenes together.

I should also mention the music, which was actually played and sung by both Bridges and Farral in the film, and it isn't half bad. I'm not a country music fan but the songs, which were written by Stephen Bruton and T-Bone Burnett, range from fine to quite catchy. The standout is Fallin & Flyin, which was supposedly Bad Blake's biggest hit, and is certainly something I will seek out on iTunes.

First time director Scott Cooper does a capable, if unremarkable, job. Nothing about the look of the film stood out but credit must go to Cooper for avoiding too many cliches, keeping the movie incredibly focused, and getting such strong performances from the whole cast. Cooper is content to trust the actors to sell the story and never falls into melodramatic territory.

In the end, Crazy Heart is all about Jeff Bridges. And despite the fact that his character does some awful things, and is a pathetic sight for most of the picture, there is something very admirable about Bad's drive to continue trying to make music and entertain crowds. There is a scene at the end between Bad and his agent that really stood out as being a nice statement on perseverance and, if not redemption, making an effort to change.



I've now seen the front-runners for the Best Actor Oscar: George Clooney in Up in the Air, Colin Firth in A Single Man, and Jeff Bridges in Crazy Heart. While none of these performances are all-time great, and it's possible that Jeremy Renner was better than any of them in The Hurt Locker, but of the big three I definitely think Bridges was the most impressive. Not because he plays an alcoholic, or plays all the music himself, but because I think he most disappeared into the role. By the end of the film I truly believed Bad Bone as a character, not as a part, and it was his story and arc that most touched me.

Grade: B+

Best Scene: That final little moment between Bad and his agent. Though the first performance of Fallin & Flyin was pretty good too.

Henry Saw: Invictus

There's stuff to like but Eastwood kind of fumbles the ball here (do they call it a fumble in rugby?)


This film is incredibly generic. Which isn't to say it's bad...it's not...in fact I think it might actually be kind of good. The problem is that there are so many heavy handed moments, major missteps with the music, and an incredibly boring final third which combine to make the film feel like a dud.

IMDB's plot description: The film tells the inspiring true story of how Nelson Mandela joined forces with the captain of South Africa's rugby team to help unite their country. Newly elected President Mandela knows his nation remains racially and economically divided in the wake of apartheid. Believing he can bring his people together through the universal language of sport, Mandela rallies South Africa's rugby team as they make their historic run to the 1995 Rugby World Cup Championship match.

Morgan Freeman plays Mandela and Matt Damon plays the captain of the Rugby team Francois Pienaar. One problem with the film is they are the only two actors worth mentioning; every other role, be it one of the President's bodyguards or the other rugby players, is just there because they have to be. Freeman and Damon are the only two characters given any kind of depth or a personality that has more than one note.



Freeman is well cast but doesn't actually impress. The role doesn't allow him to do much more than be Morgan Freeman being Nelson Mandela. You of course admire the part and the actor but not really because of anything he does in the film. I did like the moments where Mandela would be in an important meeting but all he could focus on was how the Springboks (the Rugby team) is doing. Damon is much stronger as Francois. His South African accident is great, he sells all the sports scenes, and he has a nice little moment where he visits the prison where Mandela was held for decades.

Damon is very strong in that scene, but Eastwood almost ruins it by having Francois imagine seeing Mandela in chains in the most ham-handed way possible. It's just one moment that is indicative of a lot of mistakes Eastwood makes. The music is...horrific. Just terrible. The score and the songs used are so over-the-top, and just bad, that it kept distracting me. There are multiple moments that are supposed to give you chills, which any good sports movie needs to have, but only one really clicks.

Eastwood also never explains the rules of rugby or explains how the game is played (other than letting us know there is no forward passing). While you can say it is my fault for not knowing...I don't think its realistic to think Americans know the mechanics of Rugby. Eastwood devotes the last 35 minutes of the film to recreating the final World Cup match and its just very boring. He starts by trying to inject some tension in the scene and implying there will be attempt on Mandela's life...nothing like that every happens. Then during the game there are lots of CGI crowd shots, lots of repetitive action, no big plays...kudos to Clint for staying accurate to the game but it made for a dull sequence.



Still, I did like the movie, and I am always happy to see Freeman and Damon work. It's too bad Eastwood messed up the rest of the film because this could have been a really nice blending of a political and sports film. Instead, it's really a bit of a mess, but the strong story and the two leads salvage it for me.

Grade: B

Best Scene: The crowd singing the national anthem and Damon using it to inspire his team.

Henry Saw: The Messenger

So this is the over-rated independent film of the season...


This is a film that's been getting a lot of buzz in the indie circles. Staring Ben Foster and Woody Harrelson, it's about two soldiers who are given the job of telling "N.O.K.s" (next of kins) when their loved ones have died or been killed in war. The film especially focuses on Foster's character, Staff Sergeant Will Montgomery, who was injured in battle and is forced into taking on this "mission". He doesn't like the job, it doesn't suit him, and he struggles to keep proper emotional distance from the people whose hearts he breaks, and to adjust to life back on the home front.

The film, which one could easily being re-imagined as a stage play, inter-cuts between the two soldiers breaking bad news to different families and also interacting with each other and learning more about the demons the other is facing.



The film is based purely on the performances...and while they're solid throughout...I never fully believed the two main actors. Foster, who was very good in 3:10 to Yuma, is receiving a lot of positive press for his work here and I just don't really see it. He's fine, and its a very hard role to play, but I was hardly blown away. He's serviceable...but too often did I feel like one of his scenes was way too rehearsed or that he was reciting a speech more than really acting it. Harrelson is slightly better but has a more stereotypical, and less interesting, character to work with. Samantha Morton co-stars as one of the notified relatives of a dead soldier, and though she's always good, I found her character incredibly hard to buy. The standout in the movie is Steve Buscemi, who appears in two upsetting scenes as one of the next of kins, and who really impressed me in the very little time he had on screen.

The direction from first-timer Oren Moverman is fine, if a little obvious at times, and doesn't seem to get as much out of his script as a more experienced director might have. This film deals with some of the same issues as the last moments of The Hurt Locker, but what that film did perfectly in 5 minutes, this film fumbles for over 100.



I don't think this is really a movie worth seeking out. It's dealing with some interesting issues, and is a very strong concept for a movie (or book, or play) but never fully came together as a coherent piece. Too many scenes felt forced, or deliberate, and I ultimately didn't care about where the characters ended up.

Grade: C+

Best Scene: The first Steve Buscemi sequence...

Henry Saw: Precious

One of the worst directed good movies I've ever seen...


Precious is good in spite of its director Lee Daniels. The film, based on a novel by Sapphire, succeeds due to how strong the acting is from the entire cast. While I suppose some credit must go to Daniels for nurturing an environment where his cast could give such great performances, a lot of Daniels' stylistic choices were questionable at best and fairly distracting at worst, and he does little to help serve the story. Still, those performances tower over Daniels' faults, and Mo'Nique especially deserves all the praise she's been getting and the awards she will be recieving.

Precious is based on a novel called Push (they had to change the title for the film due a terrible science fiction movie called "Push" that was released in 2008) is about an overweight, black, teenage girl named Precious (Gabourey Sidibe) living in the slums of New York City during the late 1980's. Precious lives alone with her mother Mary who abuses Precious and blames her for causing her husband to leave. We learn that Precious was raped, and twice impregnated, by her father, yet Mary claims that Precious stole her man. Precious' first child was born disabled, they name it Mongo, and Precious is forced to leave school due to being pregnant with her second.



Precious enrolls in an alternative school, where she meets a new teacher named Miss Rain (Paula Patton), who inspires her to try to better her life. Precious also starts meeting with a social worker (Mariah Carey) with whom she struggles to discuss her home life and her history of being abused. A cacophony of miseries strike Precious but she finds her way and forges a new life.

I've actually read the novel, so the story wasn't as shocking or as brutal to me as I've heard it is for others, but it is still a difficult movie to watch. The movies aren't very similar, but one could compare Precious to Requiem For A Dream in that both are taxing and take a lot of effort to sit through because of how miserable their characters are. Sapphire was a social worker and wrote Push with multiple cases that she had encountered in mind. So Precious, while being a fairly realistic and possible, is not based on a true story. It's based on true stories, and it seems important to remember that when watching the film.

The movie only works because of how amazing the performances are. In the title role Gabourey Sidibe shines. It's a hard part, Precious is kind of a passive protagonist, but Sidibe brings a lot of humanity to the role. She completely sells the character and the horrible situations she finds herself in. It would be easy to overlook Sidibe's acting, because she's an unknown, and she fully inhabits the part, but she deserves praise for carrying this movie. Paula Patton is decent as the teacher who changes Precious' life. Patton is one of the most beautiful actresses working, so by no fault of her own it is slightly distracting whenever she's on screen, but she's well cast as the woman who most represents hope for for Precious.



Mariah Carey disappears into her role as Ms. Weiss. I was, to be honest, shocked at how good Carey was. Outside of the very first shot of Ms. Weiss, I never was taken out of the film by thinking "That's Mariah Carey", and Carey is an integral part of the best scene in the film.

And then there's Mo'Nique. All the praise you've probably read about Mo'Nique is well deserved. I don't know how she did it, she's a crass comedian and this is her first dramatic role, but she created one of the most despicable (yet believable) villains of all time. And her scene at the end of the film, where she tries to explain her actions, is one of the most captivating and upsetting scenes I've seen in quite some time. Mo'Nique deserves the Best Supporting Actress award...and I think she'll get it.



So I have nothing but praise for the actors in the film...unfortunately Lee Daniels struggles in adapting the novel. In the book, written from Precious' point of view, we learn how she wishes she was a beautiful white model, or popular, or loved by someone. Daniels tries to represent this by cutting in shots of Sidibe on a runway, looking cleaned up, and strutting her stuff. Or looking in the mirror and seeing a pretty white woman as her reflection. All these touches were very showy and took me out of the film. Daniels makes a lot of choices, that to be fair are in service of the novel, but which come off as redundant and distracting.

So Precious is a film well worth seeing. I'm not sure I want to watch it again any time soon...but everyone should see it once. It's a very good film, and features some remarkable performances, but falls just short of "great" because of its direction.

Grade: B+

Best Scene: The final scene between Precious, Mary, and Ms. Weiss.

Henry Saw: Avatar

You have to see this movie...in theaters...


Let's get this out of the way: You must see Avatar. On the big screen. In 3D (if possible). I don't care how cynical you are about the hype, how much you dislike recent "event" movies or James Cameron's last film Titanic...I don't care. You must see this movie in theaters. Because if you wait to see it on DVD you may as well not see it at all. And that's because Avatar isn't actually that good...

Except that it's amazing. That's what makes this film so hard to write about...it's one of the most visually astounding movies I've ever seen. I was, and still am, really weary of the idea that 3D is the future of cinema. I still don't like wearing the glasses, I still find focusing on the image more taxing than watching a normal film, and I've never before felt like a movie I've seen in 3D was enhanced by the process...until now. Avatar really is the future of cinema whether I like it or not. And for now...how can I not like it?



Before I go further here is a quick plot summary via IMDB: When his brother is killed in battle, paraplegic Marine Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) decides to take his place in a mission on the distant world of Pandora. There he learns of greedy corporate figurehead Parker Selfridge's (Giovanni Ribisi) intentions of driving off the native humanoid "Na'vi" in order to mine for the precious material scattered throughout their rich woodland. In exchange for the spinal surgery that will fix his legs, Jake gathers intel for the cooperating military unit spearheaded by gung-ho Colonel Quaritch Stephen Lang), while simultaneously attempting to infiltrate the Na'vi people with the use of an "avatar" identity. While Jake begins to bond with the native tribe and quickly falls in love with the beautiful alien Neytiri (Zoe Saldana), the restless Colonel moves forward with his ruthless extermination tactics, forcing the soldier to take a stand - and fight back in an epic battle for the fate of Pandora. (Not mentioned in this description is Sigourney Weaver's role of Dr. Grace Augustine, the head of the Avatar program, who is committed to a peaceful alliace with the Na'vi.)

It's hard to describe how fantastic Avatar is visually. From the very first shot, a single drop of water hovering over our protagonist, I was blown away. The 3D effects in this film are only used to put you into the world of the film. It's never showy, it never has a yo-yo coming out of the screen at you, it's only there to serve the film. There are sequences where our heroes are flying on top of winged beasts that are more beautiful and more thrilling than any ride at Disney World. The best thing I can say about the 3D is how often I forgot that the film was in 3D; that's how immersive it is.

It's not just the 3D that astonishes...the CGI and motion capture work is also the best I've ever seen. Outside of a few of the animals (who are all well designed but not that real looking), and the battle suits that the evil soldiers end up using, almost everything in the movie seemed photo realistic. There is more creativity and skill in this film, at least in its design and execution, than in just about any movie I've ever seen. There is one scene where Jake (in his Na'vi avatar) and Neytiri kiss...and no one in the theater laughed. Two 9 foot tall blue things kiss on screen and it doesn't look ridiculous. That's impressive.

Then there is big battle scene which can only be compared, in terms of scale and ambition, with the battle scenes of The Return of the King. I was debating with Ben which of these two films was more visually impressive and the fact that we can even have that debate, when one considers how unbeatable The Return of the King seemed at the time, is high praise for Avatar. Cameron was inspired to get back into film-making after watching the Lord of the Rings and he's made a movie that, in terms of its look, is right up there with Peter Jackson's masterpiece.



So I could go on and on and on about how much you MUST see Avatar in theaters (again, in 3D if possible). It's easily the most "impressive" film since Return of the King, it's a landmark achievement, and I would love to just stop right here and give the movie an easy "A".

Unfortunately...the movie has a plot. And it's a really derivative and lame one. The film is exactly what it looked like in the trailers: Dances with Wolves meets Ferngully meets bizarro Aliens (Cameron's true masterpiece and my favorite film of all time). Not one thing that happens in the film is surprising, even beyond the fact that we all know the hero will win, but down to the fact that I could predict what would happen scene to scene.

Also, not one character, save perhaps Zoe Saldana's Neytiri, is in any way compelling. Jake Sully is an incredibly bland hero who struggles to hide his Australian accent. The villain, Colonel Quaritch, is one of the most one-note, generic, and boring villains I've ever seen in a major film. He wants to kill the Na'vi because....because. He has no motivation, no depth...every scene with him is painful to watch. Giovanni Ribisi is just playing a lamer version of Paul Reiser's character in Aliens. Sigourney Weaver is solid, I was always happy when she was on screen, but I can't promise that isn't because she's Ripley. I'm always happy to see Sigourney Weaver on screen. In fact, I kept waiting for her to push Worthington aside and declare "Move over boy...I've got this."



Only Saldana, who never "appears" on screen, stands out. She's the only one of the Na'vi we meet who actually feels both alien and completely relatable. True, a great deal of the credit must go to the animators, but Saldana can be very proud of her contribution to the film.

And then there's the script. Holy lord the script. Avatar contains some of the worst writing we've seen since Star Wars: Attack of the Clones (Episode 2). Lines like "Yeah, who's bad?!", or "Bring the pain!", or "You're not the only one with a gun bitch", or the repeated use of "I see you" as a romantic device...ugh. UGH. There were multiple moments where the dialogue was so bad that it took me out of the film. As hard as it is to describe how great the visuals are, it is equally difficult to describe how bad the script is at times. It's never boring (the film looks to good to ever be dull) but I'm just not sure the movie will work on the small screen. The plot is in no way compelling and the action, though visually perfect, is not that exciting. Partially because we don't really care about the characters and partially because the choreography just isn't that great.

Also, and this is admiringly a personal thing, but the amount of times I was reminded of Aliens was very jarring. There are characters in Avatar that are flat versions of Aliens' characters (For example, Michelle Rodriguez shows up as the worst carbon copy of Vasquez ever). There are musical cues that are, I think literally, right out of Aliens. And the big final fight is between a human in a big mech suit versus an alien...I mean really.



Anyway, I might have more thoughts after I've had some time to think about the film some more, and I apologize for the kind of rambling nature of this review, but I've really never experienced this kind of dichotomy with a film before. I completely recommend it - again you really should see this film ASAP - but I also think it was flawed in a fairly serious way. So believe the hype: Avatar really does bring the "awe" back to movie going (I guess it was on a 6 year vacation after Return of the King) and it offers an experience in the theater that I've never had before; yet I can't say that the movie is actually that good due to the horrible script. While the story offers the framework and set-up for Cameron to go wild with his effects crew, it's also fascinatingly uninteresting, and filled with some of the cheesiest dialogue I've heard in quite some time.

So if Avatar gets an A+ for it's visuals and innovation...and a C for it's plot, dialogue, and "acting"...then overall...

Grade: B

Best Scene: I'm tempted to say the opening moments when I was immediately sold on the look and 3D...or the scenes of Jake's avatar flying on a winged creature on Pandora...but I'll say the battle scene (even if it wasn't all I hoped it would be) just because of the size and scale that Cameron was working on.


P.S.: So after writing this up I went and checked out what other critics had to say and found a lot of forgiving reviews of the hackneyed plot and bad dialogue because the movie is just so amazing to look at. For a review that captures some of what I've tried, and probably failed, to say here please check out Tom Maurstad's review from The Dallas Morning News. (I swear I came up with the blending of the two letter grades thing before reading this)

P.P.S.: I tried really hard not to compare this movie to Aliens throughout the review; that wouldn't really be fair. While it's hard not to think of due to Cameron directing both films, and the fact that Avatar has many elements that are so reminiscent of his 1986 classic, it would be asking too much for Cameron to have made two films as good as Aliens. Still, I wish he could have remembered why that movie is so great, and given us characters and moments in Avatar that we cared about like we did in Aliens, rather than seemingly focusing solely on Avatar's look and technological advancements.

I also tried to avoid comparing it to Titanic because that is such a polarizing film. It is worth mentioning, however, that Titanic is a movie that worked very well on the big screen. No matter what anyone says now, Titanic was a massive achievement and one of the more memorable nights at the cinema in my life. But what do people (rightfully) think of Titanic now that it is 12 years old and only available on DVD...?

Henry Saw: A Single Man

This didn't quite work...


A Single Man is one of the more highly praised independent films of the year. Written and directed by first time director Tom Ford (a known name in the fashion industry), and adapted from a book by Christopher Isherwood, A Single Man tells the story of a day in the life of an English, homosexual, college professor named George Falconer (Colin Firth) who plans to kill himself at the end of that day. During the day we see George reminisce about his dead lover Jim (Matthew Goode), make a connection with one his students named Kenny (Nicholas Hoult) at the small California university where he teaches, and have dinner and drinks with his best friend Charley (Julianne Moore).

A Single Man, if it is anything, is a character study. There's not much plot here, though there is more than in the novel where George isn't considering suicide and it just covers a routine day in George's life, and the film isn't apologetic for that. It moves at a very deliberate pace, with the specific intent of getting us inside George's head, and never tries to force action into a story that has no room for it.

As this is a character study, the bulk of the responsibility falls to Ford and Firth to make us care about, and understand, George. They both do their jobs admirably. Because of Ford's fashion background I was worried that the whole film would feel too precious; that each shot would seem too staged and overly artful. I thought the film would be all style and no substance. While the movie does look great, though perhaps not as unique or interesting as I might have hoped, Ford does keep George's story front and center. All the stylistic flourishes are there to better portray how George sees the world or where his mind is wandering.

Ford does do some interesting things with the camera that, for me, vacillated between clever and irritating. He changes the color of the film stock quite often. Sometimes it's as small a change as intensifying the blue color of Kenny's blue eyes to show how beautiful they are to George. In other instances Ford intensifies all the colors on the screen, or completely drains the scene of any color whatsoever, depending on what George is going through at that moment. Ford also edits in a lot of cutaway shots to show what George is looking at and focused on even when a separate conversation is occurring. I found this particular technique to be overused and unnecessary.



Overall one would have to say that Ford's directorial debut is solid, and shows a lot of potential, but doesn't show enough vibrancy. A Single Man's lack of action does not mean that the film can't have a vitality or lusciousness that Ford's film lacks. When the film works best it is not because of Ford's direction but because of the strong performances from some of the cast.

Colin Firth is getting a lot of Oscar buzz for this part and I can understand why. He is barely recognizable as George. He sells the depression of the character while also making clear that this used to be a man of great wit and reserved silliness. Sometimes the script or his co-stars let him down (we'll get to that) but Firth is excellent throughout. Whether it is lecturing his class on an issue they can barely understand (though we all catch on perfectly), or flirting with a Spanish gigolo, Firth makes us believe in George, his grief, and his desire to be free of that pain.



The film is most "alive" in the flashback scenes between George and Jim. There is a real warmth and comfort to Colin Firth and Matthew Goode's interaction and their dialogue. The bulk of the movie is about how depressed George is over Jim's death so we have to understand that pain. Goode, an actor I run hot and cold on (he was the brother in Match Point and Ozymandias in Watchmen), is really good in his small amount of screen time. He does a perfect American accent, adds a grounded presence in a film populated by characters dealing with extreme emotions, and makes us understand why George would be so affected by his sudden death.

The other co-stars aren't nearly as good. Julianne Moore, an actress who has always annoyed me, continues that trend here. She's getting rave reviews as George's best friend and confidant Charley, a former lover who comforted him after hearing about Jim's death, and who still has feelings for George despite knowing he's gay. While she does bring a nice amount of energy to an otherwise sedate film, and has a good moment where she almost dismisses George and Jim's relationship entirely, she's also just irritating. Her laugh, her bad English accent (Charley is supposed to be an old friend from London who followed Jim to L.A.), and her rapid mood swings were more exhausting than exhilarating. She does bring out more charm from Firth than he's allowed to show in the rest of the film but I do not understand the buzz for Moore's performance.

Nicholas Hoult plays Kenny, a handsome student who becomes infatuated with George, and is the worst actor in the film. While he's very good-looking, it is in a Calvin Kline model way, and he is a constant reminder of Ford's other career. I kept waiting for a shot of Hoult with no shirt on and dripping wet like one might see on a billboard in Soho (and guess what...we get that shot). Also, his character Kenny is suppose to represent hope and kindness for George but he comes off as creepy and slutty. The first interaction they have is convincing, an awkward conversation on campus where neither can really say what they're thinking, but every scene after that had the wrong tone due to Hoult's portrayal (and Ford's direction). He also has zero chemistry with Firth so both struggle to convince us that there is something there.

The weakest major aspect of the film is the script. While some scenes are excellently constructed like the conversation with George and the Spanish Gigolo, or all the scenes with George and Jim, most have a strange forced feeling to them. None of the flirtation between George and Kenny works and the major scene with Charley is filled with dialogue that doesn't sound natural. The pace of the film is also labored; despite being a short film (101 minutes) it feels much longer. While some of that is the editor's fault, and the basic nature of the plot (a man goes through his day with suicide as the goal), the script doesn't pepper in enough tension or emotion to keep us engrossed.



All in all this is a film that's worth seeing - any movie by a new "auteur" and featuring a strong central performance is worth seeing - but I really didn't like it very much. It's strangely forgettable and while the mood is convincing, the actual character interaction is not, and one wonders if a movie focused on George and Jim's romance might not have been the stronger film. The ending is also weak, a cop-out of sorts, and I don't think it has the significance Ford thought it had. Firth is good here, really good in some scenes, but he's probably not heartbreaking enough. There are also too many scenes where Ford tries to get us inside his head by showing us flashes of things instead of trusting Firth to show us in his acting. Firth deserves the Oscar nod he will get...but I'm not sure he was any better than Clooney was in Up in the Air...and I'm not sure either of them deserve to win the award.

Also, there was a weird cameo from Jon Hamm in the film that, given the setting of this movie and of Mad Men, was a very weird call.

Grade: B-

Best Scene: The scene outside a liquor store between Jim and a Spanish Gigolo who "looks better than James Dean."

Henry Saw: Me and Orson Welles

Not...bad


Me and Orson Wells, the new film by Richard Linklater (the director behind Dazed and Confused, Before Sunrise/Sunset, and The School of Rock) is a minor movie but which entertains for its 114 minute running time.

The film tells the story of an 18 year old high school senior named Richard (High School Musical's Zac Efron) who wants to become a New York theater actor. One day, while walking around Manhattan's theater district, Richard meets the Mercury Theatre company players including Joseph Cotten, John Houseman, and Orson Welles (Christian McKay). Richard is able to convince Welles to cast him in a small part in Welles' soon to be opened production of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar. What follows for Richard is a whirlwind week in which he finds his first love, learns about women from Joseph Cotton, and everything else he needs to know about the entertainment business from Orson Welles.



The main reason to see this film is McKay's performance as Orson Welles. McKay gives the best performance of Welles I've ever seen on screen. He's better than Liev Schreiber in RKO-281, Angus Macfadyen in Cradle Will Rock, Vincent D'Onofrio in Ed Wood (with Maurice LaMarche doing the voice), etc. Saying that he's just the best "Welles" of all time isn't going far enough. McKay is really strong here in capturing a man who knows what a creative genius he is, and arrogant about it, while still showing a clear love for what he's doing and some of those around him.

There's a scene in Citizen Kane where Kane is talking to his step-father about how much money his newspaper is losing and Kane says, "You're right, I did lose a million dollars last year. I expect to lose a million dollars this year. I expect to lose a million dollars next year. You know, Mr. Thatcher, at the rate of a million dollars a year, I'll have to close this place in... 60 years." Welles gives a devilish smile on the last line and I have a feeling McKay must have watched that scene on repeat because he nails that look throughout the film.

Which is not to say that McKay is doing an imitation (though of course there's some of that). He adds nuance and idiosyncrasies to the part, which help it feel very real, while also playing it larger than life, as is appropriate for Welles. Unlike Ray or Capote, which featured acting that I thought was more imitation than performance, it helps that Welles is a supporting character in this film. When it does feel like McKay is playing it too over the top, we can understand it as how Welles is seen through our protagonist's eyes, and how we see Welles today.



Speaking of our main character...Efron isn't bad in the film. He's not very good, and he's acted off the screen by McKay and Claire Danes, but he has the right amount of callowness and enthusiasm for the part. Danes, who is always boring but good, stands out here in a well written part. I also enjoyed James Tupper's Joe Cotten as he plays him as both a cad and a decent person all in one.

Linklater does a solid job of evoking the time and place. Everything looks a little clean and new, but again, that could be because we are seeing the world through Richard's excited eyes. Linklater doesn't overreach his grasp and stays focused on the main plot. Also, at the end, he knows when to leave Welles behind (though he gets a great final line) and focus on wrapping up the story of our main character.



I don't strongly recommend the film, it's not essential viewing unless you are a big fan of 1930's theater or Welles himself, but I won't knock the film either. It's perfectly pleasant, moves at a quick pace, and features a great supporting role. I know Christian McKay doesn't quite deserve to win the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor (That's Christoph Waltz' to win) but McKay should definitely be in the running.

Grade: B

Best Scene: When Welles explodes at a stage hand...


P.S. Sorry I have to include some footage of my favorite version of Orson Welles of all time. From The Critic:

Screen Actors Guild Award Nominations announced:

Inglourious Basterds, Precious, and The Hurt Locker lead the pack


Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Leading Role:

Jeff Bridges, Crazy Heart
George Clooney, Up In The Air
Colin Firth, A Single Man
Morgan Freeman, Invictus
Jeremy Renner, The Hurt Locker

Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role:

Sandra Bullock, The Blind Side
Helen Mirren, The Last Station
Carey Mulligan, An Education
Gabourey Sidibe, Precious: Based On The Novel ‘Push’ By Sapphire
Meryl Streep, Julie & Julia

Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Supporting Role:

Matt Damon, Invictus
Woody Harrelson, The Messenger
Christopher Plummer, The Last Station
Stanley Tucci, The Lovely Bones
Christoph Waltz, Inglourious Basterds

Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role:

Penélope Cruz, Nine
Vera Farmiga, Up In The Air
Anna Kendrick, Up In The Air
Diane Kruger, Inglourious Basterds
Mo’nique, Precious: Based On The Novel ‘Push’ By Sapphire

Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture:

An Education (Dominic Cooper, Alfred Molina, Carey Mulligan, Rosamund Pike, Peter Sarsgaard, Emma Thompson, Olivia Williams)

The Hurt Locker (Christian Camargo, Brian Geraghty, Evangeline Lilly, Anthony Mackie, Jeremy Renner)

Inglourious Basterds (Daniel Bruhl, August Diehl, Julie Dreyfus, Michael Fassbender, Sylvester Groth, Jacky Ido, Diane Kruger, Mélanie Laurent, Denis Menochet, Mike Myers, Brad Pitt , Eli Roth, Til Schweiger, Rod Taylor, Christoph Waltz, Martin Wuttke)

Nine (Marion Cotillard, Penélope Cruz, Daniel Day-Lewis, Judi Dench, Fergie, Kate Hudson, Nicole Kidman, Sophia Loren)

Precious: Based On The Novel “Push” By Sapphire (Mariah Carey, Lenny Kravitz, Mo’nique, Paula Patton, Sherri Shepherd, Gabourey Sidibe)

Henry Saw: The Men Who Stare At Goats

This stunk. Big time.



I've said it before and I'll say it again...there are few things worse than a bad, unfunny, comedy. That's exactly what this P.O.S. movie is. I guess it is supposed to be in the same genre as Catch-22 and Dr. Strangelove...maybe...but where those works are quite clever and satirical, The Men Who Stare at Goats is devoid of wit, or commentary, or anything to offer to the world. It's a mess.

IMDB's plot description: A reporter (Ewan McGregor), trying to lose himself in the romance of war after his marriage fails, gets more than he bargains for when he meets a special forces agent (George Clooney) who reveals the existence of a secret, psychic military unit whose goal is to end war as we know it. The founder of the unit (Jeff Bridges) has gone missing and the trail leads to another psychic soldier (Kevin Spacey) who has distorted the mission to serve his own ends...

I don't even know where to start...I wanna get this over with and get this stupid movie out of my mind so let's do this lightning round style:

- Ewan McGregor should never have left Scotland (or Danny Boyle). It's just never really clicked for him in Hollywood. Yeah, he works wonderfully as young Albert Finney in Big Fish...but that's about it. He's the worst actor in Black Hawk Down (lord that accent...), the Star Wars thing was a bit of a bust (though at least he was having fun), and he's made a super amount of bad movies (Moulin Rouge!, Eye of the Beholder, Down With Love, The Island, Stay, Deception, Angels and Demons, Amelia...that's a lot of badness). TMWSAG can go right onto that list.

- I like that George Clooney is willing to do the odd-ball part every now and then but he's just bad here. The script let's him down and it doesn't really play to the kind of humor he is good at. While Clooney is the best part of the film...he still can't even begin to salvage it.

- Jeff Bridges is just playing a version of "The Dude" but if he was in the military. Ha. Ha. Ha. It's obvious and it's tired. Bridges is always likable but this casting was just so blatant that it's all I could think about.

- Kevin Spacey...what the hell happened to Kevin Spacey? The only good thing he's done since American Beauty was some voice work in this past summer's Moon.



So the four principles are bad, the script is pedestrian (how someone thought this was actually funny is beyond me), and the direction by Grant Heslov is mildly irritating...there is no reason to see this movie. Ever.

Grade: D-

Best Scene: Jeff Bridges pretending to be a vicious drill instructor but then telling all his men to dance.