Monday, February 21, 2011

Smashing Through the Flood Gates: The Best Movies of 2010



The first year of the decade is down, and after a rather rocky start, the movie year turned out to be something special. It's the first movie year since 2007 where I've had a great deal of trouble putting my top five in order (it literally took about three days). The best movies of the year each impressed me visually, but even more so, they each found a way to say something about where we were in 2010, for better or for worse. If I don't feel like I need to say more about it than that, it's not because I'm lazy. Hell, I want you to watch these movies so you can ask me why I loved it when you hated it and vise versa. The flood gates of the new decade in film have been opened, and after the interesting progression of the last decade, it'll be fascinating to see how this one pans out. Hope to see you there.

-Lee

Dishonorable Mentions: Alice in Wonderland, Cemetery Junction, Green Zone, Leaves of Grass, The Losers, MacGruber, Micmacs, and A Nightmare on Elm Street.

Honorable Mentions: The A-Team, Best Worst Movie, The Book of Eli, Buried, Cyrus, Everyone Else, The Expendables, Faster, Greenberg, Hot Tub Time Machine, The Human Centipede (First Sequence), Jackass 3D, The Last Exorcism, Mother, Paranormal Activity 2, Piranha 3D, Somewhere, The Town, Wild Grass, Winter's Bone, and Youth in Revolt.

20-11

20) The Crazies dir. Breck Eisner
19) Valhalla Rising dir. Nicolas Winding Refn
18) Shutter Island dir. Martin Scorsese
17) The Illusionist (L'illusionniste) dir. Sylvain Chomet
16) Animal Kingdom dir. David Michôd
15) The Kids Are All Right dir. Lisa Cholodenko
14) Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 dir. David Yates
13) Kick-Ass dir. Matthew Vaughn
12) Blue Valentine dir. Derek Cianfrance
11) Vengeance dir. Johnnie To

The Top Ten


10) Exit Through the Gift Shop dir. Banksy




9) Dogtooth dir. Giorgos Lanthimos




8) Let Me In dir. Matt Reeves




7) I Am Love (Io sono l'amore) dir. Luca Guadagnino




6) The American dir. Anton Corbijn




5) True Grit dir. Joel and Ethan Coen




4) Black Swan dir. Darren Aronofsky




3) Scott Pilgrim vs. the World dir. Edgar Wright




2) Toy Story 3 dir. Lee Unkrich




1) The Social Network dir. David Fincher



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