Best Films of '07

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You know what a wasteland Central Florida is for any type of arthouse film...
 
lazarus said:
Am I the only one who saw Youth Without Youth?

Will anyone else even get a chance to?

That sucks.

By the time I got back to DC this year, it was only playing in one theater, and only 1 or 2 showings per day. And it only stayed there for a couple weeks.

You can imagine how sad that made me.
 
I never say, "Youth Without Youth" because I kept reading and seeing that it was bad; did you like it?

I'd say the best films of 2007 are "Michael Clayton" and "Atonement"; I can't remember the first several months of the year, though.

The documentary "My Kid Could Paint That" was really interesting; wonderful.

"Before the Devil Knows You're Dead" was really good. Some wonderful acting and a good story, despite a very poor set of roles for women in it.

"Charlie Wilson's War" was light-hearted, so you can enjoy it on that level, and it had some great political commentary toward the end which I hope the American people will take to heart.

"The Savages" had some very dramatically realistic relationships, and I particularly identified with the Laura Liney character. Much better than the director's previous effort "The Squid and the Whale", which felt gross (smearing semen on books), and forced into making the dad almost a caricature in his self-absorption, though I detected hints of my older brother in him.

"4 Months, 2 Days,...", etc is not that great; it's realistically performed, but I didn't enjoy the story much, though I did gain a sense of the hardship of women, especially in such a legal/political system.

I was extremely disappointed in "No Country For Old Men", which was bleak and unsatisfying and not realistic or helpful in explaining the killer's motivations, psychotic or not; it felt like a Republican propaganda film with mostly good old southern boys and dangerous Hispanics. It just really upset me dramatically, and was very disturbing.

"There Will Be Blood" was extremely well-acted and quite good, but not great. At least, unlike "No Country For Old Men" which was like a preposterous nightmare, I felt like I was getting to know something honest about the human condition.

I found "Into the Wild" only okay with a very annoying central character. Still, it had some nice criticism of his supposedly spiritual journey. Didn't enjoy the film, though.

"La Vie En Rose" was well-acted but painful to watch.

The summer blockbusters were awful, as usual; I think this summer could be different with The X-Files and Batman.

Here's what I wrote about "Eastern Promises":
I saw this and I was extremely disappointed, after all the praise. I don't think I'll EVER watch another David Cronenberg film again. They're too wierd and violent and sensationalistic -- at least the ones I've seen. I remember wanting to see "Spyder" because it starred Ralph Fiennes and especially John Neville because he had been on The X-Files (Not the best reason; I know.) all through undergrad because I couldn't see it in the cinema because no one would go with me (I now go alone if I have to) or I didn't have time, and then found it impossible to find at many video stores. I finally saw it and didn't find it anything special. It was just a thriller. Same with "History of Violence" and its cliche TV movie plot, and now with this film.

None of the characters feel very real. It felt like a typically low-budget Canadian film (and I guess it was in part) that tried to make up for its unAmericanness with sensationalism and melodrama; Atom Egoyan films and Sarah Polley's directorial debut "Away from Her" do this, too, though they're far more pretentious. I just didn't really like the characters. Some of the dialogue and especially the way characters related to each other and moved was very stiff. Maybe he meant it that way or thought it was cool. All I know is that it so full of its own heavy self-seriousness and thought it was much more moving than it was,
from Naomi Watts' connection to a child because she'd had a miscarriage to especially the stereotypical Eastern European mother who died's monologue. The prostitute scene was unnecessarily sensationalistic, too, and the generosity Viggo showed her after the emotionless screw was something I'd already read almost a decade ago with more believability from a piece of X-Files fan fiction, in which a horny Mulder has sex with a prostitute that looks like Scully (even calling her Scully) before coldly giving her the plentiful amount of money he had in his wallet which would allow her to not work for a month.

These elements could have worked better if given more subtlety, but they were handled so poorly I just found their use contrived, convoluted, and silly. The way the Russian mobster cried over having to kill the baby instead of killing it wasn't terribly believable, and him turning out gay and not "evil" wasn't exactly a mind-blowing moment, though you could tell it was meant to be.

The fight scene was good for a Canadian film but predictable. You could tell they weren't going to stab him as the "bad guys" actions slowed when approaching Viggo's body with a blade; it must have been very hard for him to do stunt work around even a fake blade for fear of being cut, though.

I don't care what future critics say, I'm done with David Cronenberg.

Anyway, if the rest of you like it, good and I don't mean to hurt the feelings of anyone who loved it; at least you didn't feel you wasted your time or money. I DID think it was better than history of violence and a few twists were entertaining.
 
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Muldfeld said:
The prostitute scene was unnecessarily sensationalistic, too, and the generosity Viggo showed her after the emotionless screw was something I'd already read almost a decade ago with more believability from a piece of X-Files fan fiction, in which a horny Mulder has sex with a prostitute that looks like Scully (even calling her Scully) before coldly giving her the plentiful amount of money he had in his wallet which would allow her to not work for a month.

dude... what?
 
Muldfeld said:
[...]it felt like a Republican propaganda film with mostly good old southern boys and dangerous Hispanics.

I haven't seen the film yet, so please clarify. Are these Hispanics dangerous because they pretend to be married when they're actually living together?

Thanks in advance.
 
Is it just me, or does it seem like some of the "crazy" has started to spill over from all the other parts of the forum into the Lemonade Stand?
 
I'm a dangerous Hispanic
dancer.gif
 
elevated_u2_fan said:


dude... what?
It's true. I read that years ago; it was meant to be funny.
Lancemc said:
Is it just me, or does it seem like some of the "crazy" has started to spill over from all the other parts of the forum into the Lemonade Stand?
You know what? That hurts and it's not fair. If you disagree, just say so and why, but don't partake in this incredibly juvenile bullying that's so popular around here. Do you really think it makes you cool to treat people like that? Are you a Dalton wannabe?

I also really enjoyed "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford"; I knew it was slow, based on the reviews, but I thought it looked really nice and had a wonderful realistic complexity about it. I especially liked how Jesse's humanity and sense of guilt didn't prevent him from doing terrible things. This is much more akin to violence in our society. It doesn't come from evil or psychopathic people, but very human ones who can't/won't stop themselves in time; it doesn't mean they don't feel badly.

BonoManiac said:


I haven't seen the film yet, so please clarify. Are these Hispanics dangerous because they pretend to be married when they're actually living together?

Thanks in advance.
Well, no. That wouldn't be dangerous; just illegal. It's an odd film because the white southerners are kind of caricatures, but they're positive ones. You don't really get a sense of what drives them; they felt mostly like self-consciously quaint people, much like the mid-Westerners in "Fargo".
 
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Muldfeld said:
I never say, "Youth Without Youth" because I kept reading and seeing that it was bad; did you like it?

Yes, I loved it. It's really out there, most of the film comes off like a fever dream, but it's very original.

"The Savages" had some very dramatically realistic relationships, and I particularly identified with the Laura Liney character. Much better than the director's previous effort "The Squid and the Whale", which felt gross (smearing semen on books), and forced into making the dad almost a caricature in his self-absorption, though I detected hints of my older brother in him.

For the record, you have your directors mixed up. The Savages was written and directed by Tamara Jenkins, who hasn't made a film in almost 10 years, the last being Slums of Beverly Hills (with Natasha Lyonne & Alan Arkin). The Squid & The Whale was written and directed by Noah Baumbach, whose new film last year was Margot At The Wedding (with Nicole Kidman & Jennifer Jason Leigh). I haven't seen either film so I can't comment on either.

You should definitely post a ballot for the Interference Movie Awards at some point, even if people are disagreeing with some of your opinions on these films.
 
Out of interest what would people rank as the worst of 2007?

From what I saw I'd go with Ocean's 13, 300 and Bobby.
 
monkeyskin said:
Out of interest what would people rank as the worst of 2007?

From what I saw I'd go with Ocean's 13, 300 and Bobby.


I tend to not see bad films. Once in a while I'll take a chance (I Am Legend, which wasn't bad), but I know what to avoid.

I enjoyed 300 for its design and compositions, even if it was fairly shallow. It was still an experimental and groundbreaking film for its use of greenscreen.

Ocean's 13 was inferior to the other 2, but the Casey Affleck/Mexican labor movement scenes alone made it worth the price of the ticket. Clooney getting caught crying while watching Oprah by Brad Pitt was pretty great too. God, Al Pacino is awful.
 
Well I try and avoid the crud myself but every now and then I unfortunately see some sub-par stuff.

I honestly can't defend 300 one bit. Sky Captain... and Sin City got there first with mainly green screen sets and I felt Sin City to be vastly superior. The constant slow-mo in 300 began to grate pretty quick too, although it was funny during the sex scene for that slow-mo breast jiggle.

And apart from the parts you mentioned I found Ocean's 13 to be utterly boring. A shame as I love the first one, it's so effortlessly fun.
 
Yes, Sin City and Sky Captain were both better. But I still think Zack Snyder's got a great eye, and I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt with his now-filming Watchmen adaptation. Hopefully he will match the much-deeper source material, and it sounds like he is going to be VERY faithful to it.

Ocean's 11 is effortlessly fun. I thought 12 had a bit more to it, as it was doing a lot of French New Wave riffing, and is a little 'fuck you' to the audience in that the main players are sitting in a prison cell during the climax of the film, subverting the cliches of the heist film genre. The final shot, a freeze frame close-up of Catherine Zeta Jones, is way more sublime than it should have been for this type of film (franchise sequel).
 
lazarus said:


Yes, I loved it. It's really out there, most of the film comes off like a fever dream, but it's very original.



For the record, you have your directors mixed up. The Savages was written and directed by Tamara Jenkins, who hasn't made a film in almost 10 years, the last being Slums of Beverly Hills (with Natasha Lyonne & Alan Arkin). The Squid & The Whale was written and directed by Noah Baumbach, whose new film last year was Margot At The Wedding (with Nicole Kidman & Jennifer Jason Leigh). I haven't seen either film so I can't comment on either.

You should definitely post a ballot for the Interference Movie Awards at some point, even if people are disagreeing with some of your opinions on these films.

Thanks. I guess I confused the info I got from Ebert and Roeper. And thanks very much for the encouragement. I'll make sure to rent "Youth Without Youth"; it's left my local cinema a few weeks ago, unfortunately.
 
monkeyskin said:
Out of interest what would people rank as the worst of 2007?

From what I saw I'd go with Ocean's 13, 300 and Bobby.
I had a feeling Bobby would be bad; I just can't take Emilio Estevez seriously enough to think he's not going to make some typical Kennedy myth type film. I'm still curious, though.

I thought Ocean's 13 was much better than Ocean's 12, but I gave up on expecting much after the disappointment that was Ocean's 11. I had a decent time.

I'd say Transformers is the worst one I've seen. Not entertaining in any way other than the softcore element of that cheesy girl's physique.
 
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Are you capable of speaking about a female without using some sort of perjorative term?

And do not tell me I'm being a bully or being unfair or trying to be cool. You love film and TV and even though some of your opinions are perplexing to me, I still respect your love of the genres. I just have read a lot of your posts, and you strike me as a misogynist, and after a while, it grates.
 
Well considering the way women are represented in genre films and TV, it's not surprising. They're jerk-off fantasies, skanks, or both.

And then there's President Roslin.
 
Uhh, I don't think it's 2 hours of new stuff. From what I read there's a 1-hour recap special, a repeat of last season's finale, and then the new episode.

But I could be wrong.
 
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