Best Movies of 2007

MOVIES:

The team of Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost came back in 2007 *guys who did Shaun of the Dead and Spaced, which is an awesome nerdy show that everyone should check out* for a cop/action/comedy film called Hot Fuzz. Unfortunately i did not get a chance to catch this movie in the theaters and had to wait for the DVD release. I was pleasantly surprised with this film, it had the same shots that we are already use to and expect from Edgar Wright; not that there is anything wrong with that. A well written script from Simon and Edgar but i must admit that my biggest quarrel with this movie was the quick change of pace that movie turned into towards the end. I mean you kind of expected it to but it happened way too quickly for my taste. I still give it a high recommendation as just a real fun action comedy film.


This year, we were graced with another Wes Anderson film, The Darjeeling Limited. Going into this film, i wasn't expecting much but another Wes Anderson film and i got exactly what i expected. Just a colorful, well shot film with a good message even though i feel most of his films seem the same to me, with the message of a group of people or person trying to find themselves in a "different" type of situation. This one on the other hand stood out to me for some reason though. A great cast was involved with Adrian Brody, Own Wilson and Jason Schwartzman who all three did a great job with it. This movie also had a prequel to it of some sorts, Hotel Chelavier released exclusively on ITunes, it was a nice little short with Jason Schwartzman and Natalie Portman, in which they show her ass! booyah! anyway, the short really isn't necessary to the film but Schwartzman and Portman speaks one of my favorite lines of dialog ever spoken in a film

Jack's Ex Girlfriend "Whatever happens in the end, I don't wanna lose you as my friend."
Jack " I promise, I will never be your friend. No matter what. Ever."


Ryan Gosling, what a hot dude, well not really but my first exposure to the actor was Half Nelson, which i wasn't a big fan of, had a lot of potential i thought but didn't follow through. Never saw The Notebook either but his latest film Lars and the Real Girl i did get a chance to see and LOVED. The story it self seems quite outlandish and i can see that but its put together very well and told in a touching manner. The crowd me and my friend saw it with though had no idea what was going on though and were laughing at parts that were suppose to be serious, like i said yeah some things do seem out of the norm but that wasn't the point. Not my favorite movie of 2007 but still a good watch.

Another film i didn't get a chance to watch until it came out on DVD but i am real glad i got a chance to see it, Black Sheep. A great gory comedy from our favorite place, New Zealand, home of Peter Jackson and Flight of the Conchords. This film is awesome plain and simple. The special effects are fucking badass, actually Peter Jackons WETA studios did the special effects for this film. But its basically about genetically engineered killer sheep. How can you go wrong? You really cant, trust me.

"This is a Go-Go, Not a Cry-Cry", a line spoken by Skip in Robert Rodriguez' Planet Terror released in April of 2007. Essentially, a Grindhouse film is an exploitation film, a movie that has the intention of exciting the audience by simple and mindless fun and action and that is EXACTLY what Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarentino achieved with their release of Planet Terror and Death Proof. These films really show how much these directors have grown into their own style and just had a lot of fun making these films. We start off with Planet Terror, just a well constructed film that is goretastic and just fun, i guess i cant say that enough. Special effects are great and is a movie that should not be taken seriously and viewed as a wild ride. Death Proof is a film that a lot of people seemed to hate, but after viewing this film, it feels like a Tarentino film, up and down and all the way through, from the long dialog scenes to the typical shots of feet, people may feel that the pacing on this movie just doesn't feel right and its way too slow, and I can see why people may not like this film, but being a big fan of the dialog, I fucking loved it. I thought that the stunts were amazing, all the actors including Kurt Russell were on top of their game and the ending really sealed the deal for me. Both of these films have one of the greatest soundtracks that ive heard all year, from the jazzy feel in Death Proof to the Horns in Planet Terror, just well constructed music done by Rodriguez.

Death At A Funeral was a movie I was lucky enough to see, and is one movie I am very glad I got the chance to see. To me it seemed like it was going to be a sleeper hit until i saw that it was playing at our local "indie" theater for over 2 months, i was wrong. Death is a dark British comedy directed by Frank Oz. This movie was hands down, one of the funniest movies ive seen this year, I haven't laughed this hard in a theater in awhile, sure some of the humor seems lowbrow at times, like the scene with the shit on his hands but it almost had me in the aisle laughing, the performances by Alan Tudyk on ecstasy was priceless. Not much more to say about this film but if you get a chance, check it out, well worth your money.

Have you ever wanted to beat the 874,300 high score on Donkey Kong set back in 1982 by Billy Mitchell? Yeah, me neither but Steve Wiebe did and it was documented by Seth Gordon in one of my favorite documentaries of 2007. This film follows Steve as he tries to break Billy's score on his Donkey Kong arcade machine in his garage. You might think, WOW, that sounds terrible and boring. Its not, it actually shows the side of people that you'll never get to see and how intense people will get just to make sure Billy's score never gets beaten. Billy comes off as a complete dick in this film and at times you really feel sorry for Steve and trouble he has to go through and obstacles he has from the people who defend Billy to the death. This is a must see, even if you do not like video games, or documentaries, it is just a great underdog story.

The Coen brothers have been known to make unorthodox films from time to time. From great films like Fargo, Raising Arizona, The Big Lebowski and Millers Crossing they cross over to No Country For Old Men, one of the best films of 2007. This film takes the normal format you may follow for making a film and tear it up and throw it away. It is like nothing you've ever seen before from amazing dialog scenes with Tommy Lee Jones and Josh Brolin to an Oscar award winning performance by Javier Bardem. Bardem plays one of the most sadistic fucks ive seen on screen in a long time and just knocks it out of the park. The way the movie was shot was just perfect and felt very dark and gritty. The pacing can throw a lot of people off as it is slow at times but it feels right in the film. The ending was a big turn off for a lot of people and the theater I saw it in, theater goers actually said out loud, "WHAT THE FUCK" when it ended, I just wanted to stand up and applaud such a good ending the film.

One of the biggest surprises of 2007 was Gone Baby Gone, I saw a preview for it and being a big crime noir fan I was thinking, "Wow, this looks really good" Then I saw that it was written and directed by Ben Affleck and I questioned that, because its Ben Affleck, Gigli people, Gigli. One Sunday evening I was bored and decided to head to the movies, only thing worthwhile playing was Gone Baby Gone, so I said fuck it; I walked in, only person in the theater at a 10:20 showing of Sunday night. One hour and fifty minutes later, I was in love and almost tears. This movie completely blew me away, from the dark and gritty streets of Boston shown so well by Affleck and unbelievable performance by his brother Casey. You have Ed Harris playing a scummy cop which is seems to play best and pulls off very well and another great performance by Morgan Freeman, of course it doesn't hurt that they have a very well written script to work with. The last half hour of this movie I think was what sold me on it, I am not going to spoil it but it was so emotional, you could really feel the pain that everyone was feeling. I think that it was probably one of the strongest and most powerful endings in any film that ive seen in awhile and actually left me a little misty in the eyes, its ok, im man enough to admit it. Well im not really man enough but im ok with it.

I was told by many people that Children of Men came out this year, well i saw it last year so unfortunately by a rule of thumb i cannot count it but if i did, it would be my 1 pick for movie of the year. SEE THIS FILM! It is everything that you want from a movie going experience plus more.

Honorable mentions include: Eastern Promises, 300, Knocked Up, The Simpsons movie, 30 Days of Night *soundtrack alone is worth it*, Reign Over Me

My dud of 2007 award goes to Rob Zombies Halloween remake; I have never wanted to walk out of a movie as bad as I wanted to walk out of that movie. Complete shit. I can't even talk about this film anymore without vomit trying to come back up. Some other stinkers this year include Spider-Man 3, Fantastic Four 2: Rise of the Silver Surfer, Superbad.