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20.1.13

best of '12

Another year gone by and this was a pretty good movie year. There were better original movies than in the past, I believe. Even with Avengers, Bond and Dark Knight Rises as very good movies that were sequels, movies like Amazing Spiderman and Dredd brought fresh and fantastic reboots to previous film renditions. That's always a big complaint of mine; that there is no originality left in movies. That reason is why films like Looper and Moonrise Kingdom stand out so much to me. 

This is my 9th year doing my 'best of' and I will run through the criteria for this list;
  1. I need to have watched the entire movie.
    (I fell asleep during The Comedy)
  2. The movie needed to be released in theatres during the 2012 calendar year.
    (part of the reason for the delay of publishing this year was that Zero Dark Thirty came out here January 11, 2013)

Total Movies Seen; 58
(44 in '11, 57 in '10, 43 in '09, 40 in '08, 32 in '07, 55 in '06 and 53 in '05)

# of Movies I Gave 5/5; 14


Notable Movies Not Seen; 

  • Beasts of the Southern Wild
  • The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel
  • Les Misérables
  • The Master
My 10 best movies of 2012;

10. Dredd
9.  Wreck-It Ralph
8.  Chronicle
7.  Jeff Who Lives at Home
6. Cosmopolis
5. Argo
4. End of Watch
3. Looper
2. Moonrise Kingdom
1. Zero Dark Thirty

Honourable Mention

Skyfall
Dark Knight Rises
Silver Linings Playbook
Django Unchained
Lincoln
The Amazing Spiderman

List Overview
This year I considered just putting out a 10 Best list and not ranking them, but I had to stay true to my original format. 
The most difficult part of this is taking the 14 movies I rated 5/5 through the year and refining the list to 10. There is one movie on the list that I gave a 4.5 and that's Chronicle. This movie was great and I can't remember why I gave it a 4.5, but there was so much to love that I had to put it in my Top 10. Maybe I just liked the kids getting super-powers, or that it's a found-footage film shot mostly in South Africa, but the movies is just plain cool and the acting is great. It just seemed very realistic. 

Jeff Who Lives at Home should have received a lot more attention than it did. The cast was amazing in this and it was all very believable. I just think a movie starring Ed Helms and Jason Segel should get some more buzz. It's sort of like Cedar Rapids in terms of pace, setting and story, which are all very good things.
Wreck-it Ralph was easily one of the best animated movies I have ever seen. The originality of the movie alone is worthy of being on this list, but it's really one of those animated movies that doesn't feel like it is targeted at kids.  

Cosmopolis was a movie I almost hated after I watched it... but the more I thought about it, the better it became. This movie was so contained, so detailed and particular, that you couldn't do a character based movie any better. It's scope was small, but done to perfection. 

End of Watch was a powerhouse indie film and was definitely one of the best 'cop' movies I've ever watched. A lot of attention was paid to the characters and their bond, which worked so well for the style of the film. Also, the integration of the 'found footage' into the film was really cool. 

Looper and Moorise Kingdom were always battling for 1-2 until I saw Zero Dark Thirty. Looper was so original, cool and well-acted that it couldn't be denied. It was like Inception on a smaller scale (kinda). 4-7 is essentially a wash. They're all great movies and even Argo was a little better than I expected, but I didn't find them to be on the same level as my Top 3 (maybe even Top 4). There was nothing spectacular about Argo, aside from the great story and accuracy of which it was captured. Ben Affleck is just a cool, humble and honest dude. I genuinely believe he just wanted to share this story in an accurate way and he ended up with a great film.  Even that sentence would be enough to warrant The Impossible showing up here (which I did give 5/5). 

Zero Dark Thirty was such a show. It had everything except for sex. Which it didn't need. All the sex you needed was the Canaries dominating that house at the end of the movie. I can't say enough about how good it was, but when you take a 2hr47min movie and make it so perfect that you don't know how long it was, that's a thing of beauty. 
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Biggest Surprise; Dredd (check the trailer here >> )
There was so much to love about this movie. It was tight a tight and compact story, with gritty visuals and on-point characters. Everything meshed together so well. 


2nd Biggest Surprise; Moonrise Kingdom (check the trailer here >>)
I admit I was getting sick of Wes Anderson movies, but this might be his best. The story was amazing, the characters were lovable and the story was just the perfect amount of quirky. This really held the top spot for a long time. 


Honourable Explanation; In short, Amazing Spiderman, Dark Knight Rises and Skyfall were GREAT movies. I just favour originality more than these 'blockbusters'. Lincoln was really great, but Daniel Day Lewis is probably the biggest part of that. He deserves all the Best Actor Awards.
Silver Linings Playbook was very good, but I think a little overrated. Same goes for Django. 


Check here for the full list of movies I saw in 2012 >> 

I think I need to have an explicit review for each movie I see in 2013. 

1love,

D

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