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Movies of 2007
"Movies for No One"
(Content = me, form = Suck.com because I have not forgotten you, Suck!)
Holy cow, I forgot to write an essay about 2007 movie releases, and then a year went by! Sorry 'bout that. To sum it all up in one pithy line, 2007 was a year where the sum was not greater than the parts. It was not a stellar year in movies. It was not a pivotal year in any way whatsoever. There were good movies and bad movies, hyped movies and sleeper movies, sequels and musicals. There were movies no one even remembers coming out (e.g., "Fracture" and "Meet the Robinsons").
Still, there were good bits; enough good performances, screenplays, and such to make the Oscar nominations decent. Reviewers flailed desperately trying to give the year a theme, coming up pretty empty with things like "The betrayal of the body, decrepitude and death" (Stephen Holden), "baby boom ... [or] ... marching off to war" (Manohla Dargis being super articulate!), and "Hobbesian violence" (A.O. Scott), but I think The New York Times hit the nail on the head in an October article, about "movies for no one". I couldn't have summed it up any better.
Speaking of movie critics, this year's Special Obscurity Top Ten List prize goes, once again, to Jonathan Rosenbaum at the Chicago Reader! Congratulations! I, too, had trouble deciding which of these was the best: Casa de Lava, Where Lies Your Hidden Smile, or Colossal Youth — what a brilliant decision to name all three of them as the #1 movie of the year!
Here's what the movie calendar looked like circa 2007:
FEBRUARY has joined January as a dumping ground. (Norbit, Ghost Rider, Epic Movie, Smokin' Aces, &c.)
MARCH is the month people are desperate for a big movie, but get a crappy spectacle instead: this year it was "300."
APRIL is a new dumping ground, so now there are two. (Premonition, The Reaping, Perfect Stranger, Firehouse Dog, Redline, TMNT, Slow Burn, The Last Mimsy)
MAY is the new start of the summer season, with all the "3" movies. (Spider-Man 3, Ocean's 13, Shrek 3, Pirates 3, Bourne 3, yes, Rush Hour 3, Hairspray "iteration 3," Harry Potter 4, Die Hard 3 or 4 (have lost track))
NOVEMBER AND DECEMBER are for bad movies the studios hope you will think are good (Martian Child, Fred Claus)
JANUARY is for all the good movies that weren't actually released widely that year.
The lists
Ian's Top 10 Movies I Didn't Get Around to Seeing: Rescue Dawn Brand Upon The Brain! Away From Her Bamako Paris, Je T'aime Taxi to the Dark Side 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days The Wind That Shakes the Barley Days Of Glory (Indigènes) Joe Strummer: The Future is Unwritten A great movie, but disqualified for not coming out until 2008: The Band's Visit Other possibly good movies: Rank T-meter Title No. of Reviews 2. 100% Life of Reilly 4. 98% Ten Canoes 6. 98% Grbavica: The Land of My Dreams 7. 98% The Devil Came On Horseback 10. 96% Deep Water 11. 96% Triad Election 15. 95% 12:08 East of Bucharest 16. 95% For the Bible Tells Me So 17. 95% Nanking 19. 94% In the Shadow of the Moon 20. 94% Lake of Fire 26. 93% This Is England 27. 93% My Kid Could Paint That 31. 92% An Unreasonable Man 32. 92% Journey From The Fall 34. 91% The Savages 35. 91% God Grew Tired of Us 36. 91% Your Mommy Kills Animals 39. 90% The Italian 44. 89% Control 45. 89% Red Road 46. 89% Starter For 10 48. 89% Stephanie Daley
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List of all movies seen, 2007: