2008 Films

 I watched 78 films in 2008, and with an average rating of 6.7 I guess on average they were somewhere between mediocre and good. There was a pretty good range though, with several films rating 9 and a few 3's and 4's. The best film I watched was a 2008 film as well, and will probably be not much of a surprise to anyone.

 

21 - 6/10 *
The American President - 6/10
Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward... - 6/10
Atonement - 7/10
Batman Begins - 8/10
Blood Diamond - 7/10
Burn After Reading - 5/10 *
The Chronicals of Narnia: Prince Caspian - 6/10 *
Cloverfield - 7/10 *
The Dark Knight - 9/10 *
Dead Poets Society - 7/10
Definitely, Maybe - 6/10 *
Fantastic Four - The Rise of the Silver Surfer - 4/10
Election - 7/10
Ella Enchanted - 7/10
Enchanted - 7/10
Fail Safe - 8/10
Falling Down - 8/10
Flags of Our Fathers - 7/10
Flushed Away - 6/10
Fools Rush In - 5/10
Get Carter - 6/10
The Golden Compass - 7/10 *
Gone With the Wind - 8/10
The Good Shepherd - 4/10
Hairspray - 6/10
Hancock - 7/10 *
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban - 8/10
Hellboy - 6/10
Hellboy II: The Golden Army - 8/10 *
High Noon - 5/10
I Am Legend - 6/10
Igby Goes Down - 7/10
The Incredibles -7/10
The Illusionist - 9/10
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull - 5/10 *
Inkheart - 5/10 *
Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978) - 5/10
Iron Man - 8/10 *
Jumper - 6/10 *		Juno - 7/10
Kinky Boots - 9/10
Knocked Up - 5/10
Kung Fu Panda - 6/10 *
The Last King of Scotland - 8/10
The Last Kiss - 5/10
Leatherheads - 7/10 *
Letters from Iwo Jima - 8/10
Madagascar - 6/10
Michael Clayton - 8/10
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington - 9/10
The Muppet Christmas Carol - 8/10
Napoleon Dynamite - 3/10
No Country for Old Men - 6/10
Notes on a Scandal - 8/10
Ocean's Thirteen - 5/10
Office Space - 7/10
Over the Hedge - 5/10
Planet of the Apes (1968) - 7/10
Ratatouille - 7/10
Robin Hood (Disney) - 8/10
Run Fatboy Run - 7/10
Running With Scissors - 4/10
A Scanner Darkly - 6/10
The Science of Sleep - 6/10
Shaun of the Dead - 7/10
Smokin' Aces - 6/10
Son of Rambow - 7/10
Stardust - 9/10
Starter for 10 - 6/10
The Sting - 7/10
Stranger Than Fiction - 9/10
Swiss Family Robinson - 5/10
The Terminator - 5/10
The Third Man - 6/10
TMNT - 6/10
Transamerica - 9/10
Vertigo - 5/10
WALL-E - 9/10 *
Young Frankenstein - 4/10



By the numbers
78 films in total
67 films that were new to me
53 films via LoveFilm (really getting my money's worth from unlimited dvds, one at a time)
42 films I consider good
32 films I consider mediocre
15 from imdb's top 250 (as of Jan 1st 2008)
16 2008 films (marked with *)
12 films seen in the cinema (13 if I could both viewings of WALL-E)
6.76 average rating
6 George Clooney films
5 Films I consider bad
5 Films off the new American Film Institute top 100 films
3 Oscar winners
0 films with William H. Macy - what's going on?!


Best Film
There are a few new films with 9/10 (I don't do 10/10 on principle), many of them excellent for different reason. Transamerica and Mr Smith Goes to Washington are both very well told stories with some impressive performances. Stranger Than Fiction and The Illusionist are both odd ideas again very well told. Stardust and Kinky Boots are pure fun while Dark Knight is another excellent Batman film. My film of the year however is WALL-E, It's beautifully designed, completely adorable, laugh out loud funny and just lovely. I've seen it three times this year and would happily watch it again tonight.

Worst Film
I've watched some poor films this year but the two standouts were ones that I thought would be really good. Napoleon Dynamite is apparently a 7/10 on imdb, but I found it completely tedious and didn't even finish it. The Good Shepherd is another 7/10 on imdb which to me was just three hours of dull greyness.

Best performances
Heath Ledger was completely amazing as the Joker, blowing Christian Bale completely off the screen. Felicity Huffman was brilliant as an extremely complex character in Transamerica, and Chiwetel Ejiofor played a similarly complex character with great charm and humour in Kinky Boots. I enjoyed Will Smith's performances in I Am Legend and Hancock and as always George Clooney was wonderful in all his roles, from goofy comedy in Leatherheads to Proper Acting in Michael Clayton. Other notables - Ellen Page in Juno, Judy Dench in Notes on a Scandal, Forest Whitaker and James McAvoy in Last King of Scotland, Ken Watanabe in Letters from Iwo Jima and Robert Downey Jnr in Iron Man


Miscellaneous Awards
"Comedy Accent Awards" - In an otherwise superb film, the voice effects on Batman in the Dark Knight was ridiculously bad. Leonardo DiCaprio's accent in Blood Diamond was pretty jarring too.
"Does What it Says on the Tin Award" - Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. When your title has given away the whole plot, you don't really need the film to be nearly three hours long.
"Nice concept, shame about the writing" - Inkheart, lovely idea, plot full of mile wide holes.
"Quirky and Good" - Stranger Than Fiction
"Quirky and Crap" - Running with Scissors
"Quirky and Crap AND French" - Science of Sleep
"Not Nearly as Bad As I Expected" - Gone with the Wind
"Just as Bad as I Expected" - Fantastic Four, Rise of the Silver Surfer
"You Can Do Better (I Think)" - Katherine Heigl in Knocked Up, a miserable film with an almost offensively awful plot which is wasting her talents. At least I think she has talents..
 

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