3 Jan
2015 is off and kicking, already delivering quality movies and videogames right here in Australia less than a week in! It’s going to be an incredible year for entertainment media, but if you missed any of my countdowns wrapping up the year that was 2014, here are the links to every one:
.
22 Dec
Last year I began my year-end countdowns with a list of a more negative flavour than the stuff I’m usually inclined to write, but it received a pretty substantial amount of attention (who knew?) and was a refreshing challenge to put together, so here we are with its 2014 return. I present my opinion on the top 10 entertainment media disappointments of 2014.
In the early months of the year, I didn’t have much of a list building. Almost every widely anticipated movie proved to exceed expectations rather than dip below them, and as for videogames, despite a relative six month drought of major releases, there was always something good to play. Then, in the second half of 2014, things started to unravel, with huge, emotionally charged media stories abounding over controversial issues. They were mostly gaming related, which stung a bit, but that was fine with me in at least one department, as it ensured I wouldn’t have to think up a new type of list for 2014. Here we go.
One could make the point that no movie of 2014 felt the weight of expectation more than Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar. Many people, myself included, waited with baited breath for more details to be revealed about the sci-fi epic following a highly cryptic opening teaser and an even less transparent first trailer. Few would disagree that Nolan’s highly impressive track record justified the kind of hype afforded to Interstellar, but when the disappointing first wave of reviews came through for the American release of the film, that hype backfired. Then, as my free time began to dissipate due to new commitments, a lot of my friends started to see it without me, and several of them raved about it. So my hopes were raised again – then I saw it myself. While I do think Interstellar is a good movie, even a very good one, I just can’t get past its messy attempts at sentimentality which, for me, place it below every other (admittedly excellent) Nolan movie thus far. It’s a compliment to the director, really.
.
22 Aug
Well, would you look at that. The release of Guardians of the Galaxy means there are now ten movies out in the wild from Marvel Studios. You know what that means…
Here’s my personal ranking of the films, from my least to most favourite. You will probably disagree. Mild plot spoilers might follow.
.
In truth it’s been a while since I saw this one, but I don’t really have much interest in seeing it again, which probably explains why it’s at the bottom of my list. The Incredible Hulk is not a bad movie, and it’s certainly better than the Eric Bana – Ang Lee green monster movie from 2003. Tim Roth makes a cool bad guy and that bit at the end turns out to be critical to the Marvel Cinematic Universe as a whole, but the film’s dark, gritty tone means it is missing much of the sense of fun that makes the rest of the Marvel Studios movies so memorable.
31 May
Dat font tho. Thanks, Google.
For the last two years on this blog I have backed up my excitement for the entertainment media offerings of the month of June by writing down some of said offerings in a dedicated post. While this year’s version of the month doesn’t look quite as good in this department as, say, last year’s, when The Last of Us and Animal Crossing: New Leaf dropped on consecutive days, I’m still able to bring together ten releases for which I am suitably keen. I would be jumping out of my skin waiting for June to come around even without any of these – the FIFA World Cup is nearly here, after all – but they just make the idea of the month even sweeter. Here are ten of the things that will be available to us this June (in chronological order): Continue reading
3 Feb
Here we go again, with another bumper edition of pure, distilled anticipation.
Ah, 2014. How you promise such great excuses for us to use up our hard-earned time and money. Indeed, with another typically uneventful (though wonderfully relaxing) January out of the way, it’s as good a time as any to talk about what I personally am most eagerly awaiting this year. Some of these things will be disappointing, I have no doubt, but I have reason to believe most of them will live up to the hype. So exciting are the gaming and movie offerings of 2014 that I have had to expand my third annual anticipation list article to include multiple honorable mentions. I’ve also thrown some applicable trailers onto this page, because people seem to like something to look at. Here we go.
MOVIES
10. Mockingjay Part One
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BfECBVo3C-g
My excitement for the next movie in the blockbuster Hunger Games franchise is tempered by the general track record of novel adaptations that insist on splitting into two parts. It’s pretty well documented that “Part I”s tend to be a little on the unfulfilling side, as they are only ever one half of a whole story. Having said that, given the surprising quality of the Catching Fire adaptation, I’m keen to see how Francis Lawrence and co. treat the very heavy Mockingjay story.
9. Wish I Was Here
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B3nAw_WtIuY
Whether you happen to be a lover or a hater of what Zach Braff did through the Kickstarter website to help his latest film stick to his vision, I can quite confidently say that I am the former. So much so, in fact, that I was one of the 47 thousand-odd backers who gave money to the project. I was a huge fan of Braff’s last writer-director effort, 2004’s Garden State, and the promise of Wish I Was Here serving as a pseudo-sequel to the decade-old indie gem is too hard to pass up. Hopefully it doesn’t suck.
8. Big Hero 6
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YmHY6pTE3o
We don’t know an awful lot about Big Hero 6 yet – only that it is based on a neglected Marvel superhero license, set in a hybrid between San Francisco and Tokyo, will be released at the end of the year, and most importantly, comes from the same wide pool of talent that gave us Tangled, Wreck-It Ralph and Frozen. Expectations will be high for Disney’s intriguing next animation house effort.
7. How to Train Your Dragon 2
Speaking of high expectations, Disney’s number 1 competitor for animated movie supremacy is looking to come out firing in 2014 with the much-anticipated sequel to its super-charming 2010 hit How to Train Your Dragon. The trailers seem to indicate some real character growth across the board, as well as what appears to be a rather unconventional narrative structure for a family movie like this. But then again, you should never trust a trailer.
6. Captain America: The Winter Soldier
The next film in Marvel Studios’ ongoing lead-up to The Avengers 2 is being marketed as somewhat of an Avengers film itself, an “Avengers 1.5” if you will, considering the focus its trailers place on shots of the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier, Nick Fury and Black Widow. But far from being the distraction it was in Iron Man 2, this choice of direction actually adds to the appeal of the movie to me, as I happen to regard Cap as the least interesting of the four main movie Avengers. Add the appearance of characters like Falcon and, of course, the Winter Soldier himself, and you can consider me hyped.
31 Dec
Here we are at the last list. It’s been an amazing year.
A combination of a resolution to finish more videogames, saving for a trip to Japan and a general aversion to piracy meant I perhaps didn’t see as many movies as I may have liked to in 2013. Though I did catch a smaller movie or two throughout the year, as a general rule I only saw films many people were having conversations about – all of which means I watched more than enough movies to put together a list several times as long as this one, but said list is missing movies like Spring Breakers, Pain & Gain, The Bling Ring and Cloud Atlas. Also, because we live in Australia and for some reason still have to wait much longer for many big American films than we do even for videogames, this list is missing movies like 12 Years a Slave and The Wolf of Wall Street because they aren’t out here yet. That also means movies released stateside in 2012 may count here because they actually came out down under this year. Finally, as with my games list, any review scores I gave out at the time of a movie’s release don’t necessarily count towards the order of the final list.
Now that all that is out of the way, let’s finish this thing:
Giant robots punch giant aliens in this movie and that is pretty much all you need to know, other than that it’s helmed by acclaimed director Guillermo del Toro. The Mexican has a strong connection to the world of Japanese anime, having been raised on the stuff, and his passion for the larger-than-life storylines of the likes of Neon Genesis Evangelion is obvious in his affectionate homage to all things kaiju and beyond. The characters of Pacific Rim are hammy cartoons that prove to be endlessly entertaining to watch (although some of their accents could stand to be a bit more believable) and most of all the lengthy fight scenes look absolutely stunning. Let go of your preconceptions, relax and watch this movie if you haven’t already.
FULL REVIEW: HERE
19 Mar
Here are two more lists for you to disagree with at your leisure.
So just over a year ago year I got all excited about the pile of new movies and games that were coming out in 2012 and posted a pair of top ten lists to order my anticipation. As it turned out, I didn’t even end up watching some of the movies on the list and an embarrassing amount of the games I wrote about didn’t even come out in 2012. Here’s hoping I’ll be a little more accurate with this year’s equivalent.
For the sake of neatness, I’ll only count movies/games that are coming out after the month of March has run its course.
MOVIES
10. jOBS (Teaser)
I’m curious, OK? I don’t actually think Ashton Kutcher is the worst guy in the world and, even if his turn as the late great Steve Jobs sucks, this movie is still going to be talked about quite a bit and I want in on that conversation.
9. World War Z (Trailer)
Zombie movies can be great, they can be decent, or they can be so bad they’re good. In my lifetime I have never come across one that is just bad, and so I will happily watch the eerie World War Z when it hits.
8. The Great Gatsby (Trailer)
Baz Luhramann’s latest pulls out so many Moulin Rouge stops in its trailers that it kinda demands to be watched on style factor alone. Which I suppose is Luhrmann’s deal in the first place. Leo DiCaprio and Michelle Williams sweeten the deal.
7. Pacific Rim (Trailer)
On face value I can’t really believe that this movie is actually happening. It looks like Battleship meets Real Steel, and while the latter movie was surprisingly decent, the former, well, it kinda sucked. Everything changes, of course, when you realise that Guillermo del Toro is directing. Colour me hyped.
6. Despicable Me 2 (Teaser)
If there was ever a non-Disney, non-Dreamworks animated feature that surprised me enough for me to rate it among my favourite animated movies of all time, it’s the hilarious and heartfelt Despicable Me from Illumination Entertainment. Now a sequel is well on the way and while it will struggle to top the first one, you can bet I’ll be at the cinemas in week one to make that call for myself.
29 Dec
Somehow we arrive at the end of ten days of top ten lists, one hundred “things” in all. This is the last one; the ten absolute best movies I have seen this year. It was a fantastic year for the big screen, as while there were plenty of indie efforts worth writing home about, many of the blockbusters really stepped up their game in a big way. The unexpected, record-smashing success of one film in particular may have altered the way big studios think about their intellectual properties and release schedules for good.
I don’t profess to having seen all the movies that came out in 2012; heck, I didn’t even see all the movies I wanted to see in 2012. But I did see more than enough of them to make this list a tough one to put together. One thing I noticed about the list after I had finally decided on an order is how weird it looks to see so many movies on it that came out in the first two months of the year; that was so long ago it almost feels like they didn’t release this year at all. The odd thing about living in Australia is that we usually only get movies released late in any given year Stateside early in the next one, which means the majority of movie websites on the internet would have already discussed some of these big screen gems 12 months ago. But I’ll take what I’m given and I was given a lot of good movies in 2012.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hR-kP-olcpM
The golden world of Hugo won much attention during last year’s award season for its brilliantly understated use of 3D (look how far we’ve come in 12 months – where is the talk of 3D now?), but that isn’t what made it stand out. Hugo is a heartfelt story appropriate for all ages and its affection for Hollywood’s early history is palpable, particularly in the second half of the story. The sentiment never comes off as cheesy, which could easily have been the case, and the whole film is all the more remarkable given it was directed by gangster film veteran Martin Scorcese.
25 Nov
And so it is that all of the top ten movies I was most looking forward to at the beginning of the year have been released. Well, all except one. Here’s a look back at those ten.
2012 has been an amazing year for movies so far, with several blockbusters breaking all kinds of records, and we still have a month to go! I can’t remember a Boxing Day release line-up as incredible as the one we Aussies have lined up for us this year, plus there’s a new Bond film that has just hit. It’s going to be a crazy summer.
But before that all plays out before us, it’s about time to look back at that list I posted back in February, wherein I rolled out a list of my top ten most anticipated films of the year:
13 Mar
Over the last few years I have been undertaking to watch and review 100 movies for the first time every 365 days, in an effort to get “more cultured”. I started at the end of 2009 with a strained attempt to remember everything I had watched that year (only reaching 50), then began in earnest in 2010. I published the lists on Facebook and if you’re interested you can skim through them using the following links.
You can check out that half-hearted 2009 effort here, the fragmented 2010 project here and here, and the complete 2011 list here.
This year I’m only up to twelve movies and we are already in March. Best get a move on. My first proper film review for Vagrant Rant goes up tomorrow!
Vagrant Rant 