I watched one-hundred and sixty-one movies in the year. Here are my top and bottom picks for the year. This is based simply on the movies I watched this year, not on what was released this year.
Check out the 2014 Year-end review.
My favorite scene from this year: Grandma from Legion (Warning- NSFW)
The Top 13 of 2015:
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| The Human Condition Part 1 - The difficulties of an idealist. |
The Human Condition I: No Greater Love aka Ningen no jôken (1959)
The Human Condition II: Road to Eternity aka Ningen no jôken (1959)
The Human Condition III: A Soldier's Prayer aka Ningen no jôken (1961)
While Kaji is against the war, he is afraid to conscientiously object. He avoids being drafted initially, but then is forced into boot camp and then the travesties of war. In the field, Kaji leads a group of civilians and soldiers, eventually captured as a POW.
The Human Condition is a trilogy totaling ten hours. It's a bit long for a movie, veering into mini-series territory. Yes this is in black and white, yes it has subtitles, with that said it's still very good, and it doesn't seem dated. Itfocuses on characters and the story. Kaji's morals get in the way and make life more difficult. It would be easy to give in, but Kaji doesn't. He wants to treat even his enemies like humans.
It probes some of the same questions as Full Metal Jacket, the duality of man, peace, war, love, and brutality. I prefer Part II over the first, and the third is just heartbreaking and much darker. The writing and story of the trilogy is amazing, creating a compelling experience.
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| Inside Out - Incredible story, incredible world building. |
Watch Inside Out
When Riley and her family move to San Francisco, her emotions are in for wild ride as they deal with the change.
Inside Out features incredible and clever world building. It's presented as a kids movie, but it explains how our minds work with simple and creative examples. Nearly every scene has subtle humor in the background that's goes unnoticed, like control panels that grow increasingly complex as we age. I like the depiction of memories as glowing orbs. This movie rewrites that trope that our minds are like a warehouse stuffed with filing cabinets or a corridor with many doors. It's a movie that easily entertains kids, but gives adults a discussion point. It's an ingenious expression of how are minds look and function.
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| Ex Machina - The horror when you stare into the face of A.I. |
Watch Ex Machina
Caleb wins a contest to spend a week with the CEO of Blue book, Nathan. Caleb soon realizes his task is to test an A.I., Eva, developed by Nathan. Reality becomes obscured for Caleb as he marvels at Eva, and begins to think Nathan is lying to him about what's really happening.
This movie is impressive from the start with good direction and production values, backed by a very solid script. Oscar Isaac is impressive alternating between domineering, brooding, and cheerful.
Everything about this movie works in tandem to create a well crafted experience. It's part thriller and mystery, with traces of romance. Full of misdirection and intrigue, some clues you'll pick up on, others you will miss. The three main characters are in a triangle of deception. Which character can we trust?
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| The Drop - A subtle movie that showcases Tom Hardy's acting ability. |
Watch The Drop
When the bar Tom Hardy and James Gandolfini run is robbed, cops and criminals both start digging for details.
The Drop has a great cast with James Gandolfini, Tom Hardy, and Noomi Rapace, which is bolstered by solid writing. The story evolves well without relying on exposition. The atmosphere really feeds into the story and characters. The main setting is a seedy bar frequented by criminal elements. The story has a measured pace and each character has a distinct plight. Tom Hardy is impressive. He can completely embody another persona. It's a great looking movie from production to camera angles.
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| Spartacus - The scale and scope is matched by the quality. |
Watch Spartacus
Spartacus leads a slave revolt from a Gladiator school, planning to sail away from Rome with his army of freed slaves. Before reaching the coast, they must defeat the opposing armies of Rome.
Helmed by my favorite director, Stanley Kubrick, Spartacus is a sweeping, grand epic starring Kirk Douglas. It doesn't feel like a Kubrick film. It lacks a timeless quality present any many Kubrick films. While it doesn't diminish the impact, it possesses the sensibilities of an older movie. It's similar to Gladiator, but with much more depth and size to the story. The scale is simply stunning many times over. Long sweeping shots of armies and landscapes abound. This is without relying on video effects making it all the more impressive. "I am Spartacus." is an amazing line in an amazing sequence.
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| Mad Max: Fury Road - The must see action movie. |
Watch Mad Max: Fury Road
After escaping the Citadel, Mad Max becomes a key part in Furiosa's betrayal of the overlord Immorten Joe.
The movie is incredible. It's an action movie game changer. It avoids the pitfalls, mistakes, and cliches of many other action movies. Charlize Theron and Tom Hardy do a great job in understated performances. It's Theron's character Furiosa's story more than it it Mad Max's. Production design is top notch. All of the vehicles look superb, as does the cinematography. The story is solid and logical. I immediately wanted to watch it again, and that doesn't happen often.Simply incredible.
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| A Most Violent Year -The American dream. |
Watch A Most Violent Year
In 1981, an ambitious businessman fights to save his business from criminals, peers, and the DA in New York's most dangerous year in recorded history.
It's engrossing and never boring. The production is spot on, capturing the '80s perfectly. The characters are well written and the story is refreshing. So many movies depict an illegal means to win, this is the complete opposite when everyone around the protagonist is committing crimes, he resolves to refrain. When the odds are against him, he ensures his success at his own loss. His dubious past, only hinted upon, is what helps make him a good character because he is conflicted. He is trying to make up for his past transgressions. The cinematography must be mentioned because it is very good.
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| Whiplash - Perform until it hurts. |
Watch Whiplash
An ambitious student set on becoming one of the greatest drummers collides with a professor determined to develop talent by pushing students beyond all reasonable measures.
Engrossing from the start, with a blistering tempo before it lets up. JK Simmons is amazing. How far do you push yourself without breaking? The ending is a complete culmination of all the events leading up to it. Has Andrew lost it or has he finally impressed his teacher. It's a stunning ending.
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| Nightcrawler - Decidedly dark, impossible to look away. |
Watch Nightcrawler
With few prospects, Lou Bloom delves into crime journalism. Chasing sirens for a potential payday, unscrupulous Lou becomes a successful freelance cameraman.
Nightcrawler, is impressive writing and directing. It builds steadily from start to finish with an unrelenting climax, boasting excellent cinematography. Like morbid curiosity, you can't turn away. The protagonist is unpredictable and aloof, played perfectly by Jake Gyllenhaal. The movie is riveting, rebuking the news industry and the viewers.
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| Predestination - Does he choose to pour the beer or is he destined to pour the beer. |
Watch Predestination
A barkeep is more than he seems when he promises a patron the chance to exact revenge on the person that ruined her life.
Predestination is a great movie full of twists, turns, and loops. It's solid sci-fi that doesn't need the disclaimer of being good for a sci-fi film. It stands on it's own while being fairly straightforward. The story is phenomenal. It's a mind bender that ends up being explained exceptionally well.
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| Boyhood - Life passing before your eyes. |
Watch Boyhood
Over the course of twelve years, Mason grows up. The movie was filmed over twelve years to accurately capture the ages of the actors.
The scope and scale of this movie is mesmerizing in of itself, twelve years in the making. The problem with movies that capture the passage of time is that actors look too old or too young and it's never authentic. This is authentic, touching, and real. It captures the ups and downs, and it's amazing to watch it unfold. It's a landmark production. From the first shot to the last, I can't imagine changing a single thing.
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| Gone Girl - No one is a media darling forever. |
Watch Gone Girl
Nick Dunn comes home to find his wife missing. Becoming a suspect during the investigation, he just wants to find his wife.
A well crafted and well executed film. The directing is excellent, as is the casting. The story and pacing really shine. It's a great commentary on media, public opinion, and even marriage. What happens when someone is thrown into the spotlight? Just as public opinion can sway, so does your opinion of the characters. The movie keeps you guessing, even when you think you've got it figured out.
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| Short Term 12 - Compelling characters make this a must see. |
Watch Short Term 12
Counselors and teens face troubles at a foster care facility.
It's got a very good introduction. You really get a feel for the characters in just a few minutes. The subject matter makes for a very heavy movie, but that also makes it real. It's a great concept, with good writing and plot.
The Bottom 11 of 2015:
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| Poltergeist - An unnecessary remake. |
Watch Poltergeist
A family buys a house, but they don't realize it's built on top of a cemetery until the walls are shaking, the earth is quaking, and their minds are aching. They (and the house) shook all night long.
There is no good reason to see this movie. Things didn't sound right or there was too much noise for an action. I usually don't even notice sound, but this was obnoxious.
When you have to rely on dumb decisions from characters, the writing is troubled. I don't get why the movie relies on dumb decisions, when smart decisions that made sense could have been utilized.
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| The Ridiculous 6 - It's just not funny. |
Watch The Ridiculous 6
Adam Sandler is one of six half brothers who band together to find and then save their father.
The problem is this movie is a comedy that's not funny. The movie tells us jokes are funny, continually referencing them and laughing at them. The movie sets up many jokes, failing to execute and hoping the set up is enough. It's not.
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| The Loft - Hitchcock this isn't. Far, far from it. |
Watch The Loft
Five married men share a secret loft apartment. When they discover a dead body, the suspicions begin to fly.
This movie has a lot of potential that was completely wasted. It's clumsy. Clumsy is the word from the directing to the writing, from beginning to end. It's a group of good actors without enough to work with. It has no suspense and a lot of unnecessary surprises. The ending goes off the rails, becoming nearly incoherent and utterly ridiculous with multiple twists one after another.
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| Left Behind - Why did Nic Cage star in this? Why was this movie ever made? These are the big questions the movie begs us to ask. |
Watch Left Behind
Thousands of people vanish instantly. Those left behind must fight the chaos to survive. In summary, Nic Cage spends the entire movie trying to land a plane. Spoiler, he does.
How quickly did I realize this wouldn't be good? Within the first few seconds as I heard the score. It's like a bad made for television movie. I was hoping for the crazy Nic Cage we know and love. Crazy Cage did not make an appearance. The movie is incredibly hokey from the start reinforced by the sub-par production values. I'm amazed this was made. I double checked to confirm a movie of this poor quality was actually released in theaters. It was! I was hoping the plane would crash just to end the movie.
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| Alien Nation - A terrible, sci-fi knock off of Lethal Weapon. |
Watch Alien Nation
Humanoid aliens landed and now live and work beside humans. A human police detective and alien are paired together to work on a case with far reaching implications.
It's a buddy-cop movie at it's core. It's similar to Lethal Weapon in that there are two cops and a villain. The difference? Lethal Weapon is good. The characters are incredibly boring and the plot didn't start until two-thirds of the way in. The plot contrivances propel the plot forward at the expense of being believable.
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| 7 Days in Hell - Not only the title but how you feel while watching. |
A fictional documentary about a seven day long tennis match between two greats played by Andy Samberg and Kit Harrington.
So very disappointing. Movies seem to operate on the principle that when you run out of clever jokes, you resort to raunchiness. This 'movie' ran out of clever jokes ten minutes in. Being crass in an attempt to parade as a joke or for shock value is never funny to me. Harrington's character was so one dimensional it felt like a placeholder for a real character they hoped to develop.
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| Jupiter Ascending - Yes, those are flying boots. |
Watch Jupiter Ascending
Jupiter Jones wakes every morning wishing her life were different. When bounty hunters attempt to kidnap her, it's revealed she is intergalactic royalty and heiress of the planet Earth.
The main problem with the movie is that too many ideas are crammed into one movie without a sufficient amount of detail or exploration.The purpose of many plot points are just to push the plot forward without conforming to logical sense. If you are hoping for the Wachowskis to make another The Matrix like Mila Kunia and Channing Tatum may have, your hope is misplaced.
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| Lucy - How did they find enough people that thought this would be good to even make it? |
Watch Lucy
When a bag of drugs ruptures inside Scarlett Johannson's stomach it unlocks her brain's full capacity.
The smarter she got in the movie, the dumber I felt. It seems like a neat concept, but the potential is squandered. Anything fun or intriguing is abandoned for contrivance and nonsense. An action movie needs good fight scenes, a person or world to save, and a solid conclusion. These items were absent from Lucy.
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| Godzilla - That thriller Mr. Zilla, the savior of the cities. |
Godzilla fights giant spiders in this unnecessary addition to the Godzilla franchise.
The writing is surprisingly bad. Godzilla is a vehicles ostensibly created just to showcase a CGI Godzilla. It's illogical that the main character would ever wind up in such a predicament. The military has a chain of command, yet somehow this is the soldier we can send to fight a monster.
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| Blackhat - I too was waiting for that moment that never came. |
Watch Blackhat
Chris Hemsworth, a hacker, will gain freedom from jail if he can stop a paper thin villain from destruction and robbery.
It's not well written. That and Mann is an action film director heading a movie with little action. To its shame, he movie boasts a cheesy romance, tons of exposition, a first time writer, and a ridiculous plot.
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| Maps to Our Stars -Interesting concept that never takes off. |
Watch Maps to the Stars
Agatha, mentally deluded and estranged from her family, returns to Hollywood to see her family and brother who is now a famous child actor just out of rehab. She works as a personal assistant for a woman who is a client of her fathers and is desperate to act again despite lingering mommy issues.
It's not as funny as I anticipated and quickly subverted my expectations with a jump to something along the lines of The Sixth Sense. It seemed a clumsy addition that would later serve the climax. Maybe the ensemble cast impossibly linked adds to the joke, but the problem is that the joke never quite lands. The constant name dropping is in turn immersive and annoying. It's trying to satirize Hollywood, but comes across as pretentious. It paints an extremely dark picture of Hollywood, which may be the point, but I never have a reason to care.
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| 300: Rise of an Empire - It's like 300, but unnecessary. |
Watch 300: Rise of an Empire
Themistokles must repel Artemisia and the Persian forces led by mortal-turned-god Xerxes.
Another unnecessary sequel. While the original 300 pushed style over substance, this movie has both less style and less substance. The creators tried so hard to recapture the first movie that they set this during the exact same time period. The first movie while stylistically unique had a compelling story, and this simply isn't and doesn't.
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