The Best Films Of 2008

As January 2009 comes to an end, it is time once again for my annual film roundup. 2008 proved to be suckier than most and as I waxed lyrical about at midyear, the reason why seems to be easy access to films. Going to the movies is no longer what it once was. Access to quality DVD rips, available online, reading critics immediately and determining not just whether to bother going to the cinema but whether to bother to wait two weeks and download it has made the actual act of watching a film something far different than it was even five years ago. Couple this with the underwhelming and lackluster product Hollywood churns out, the strike earlier this year that undoubtedly killed many intriguing and fun scripts, and the studios and distribution companies' choices of foreign films and independent movies and it feels like 2008 was a repeat of the heady mid-1990s Miramax years, crowdpleasers and foreign films, mostly European, with similar themes, similar plots, similar actors, similar similarities. Furthermore, I am getting tired of depressing 'award-worthy' movies. I know there is a lot of trouble in the world and I know themes are there to be utilized in the cinematic medium but I am so tired of lackluster, ham-handed, blunt and badly crafted films about Iraq, the power of the U.S. government, the role of U.S. media, the exploitation of women, men, children, the arts, and the third world. I'm tired of the alarming trend of 'other side of the story' movies that try to illuminate the flipside of the Holocaust, of U.S. foreign policy, of dehumanization. We have seen movies that are not really about any of these things and instead use them as a backdrop to tell stories about the lives of those they only tangentially affect. The Reader, after thinking about it, was kind of insulting. Nothing But The Truth was disingenuous. Even The Dark Knight was ostensibly not about Batman but larger societal problems. Everybody contends Heath Ledger's performance was great but the screenplay was kind of crappy, with a lame third act and not at all about the character it should have been about.

I have become so cynical about a medium I truly love. I am a true movie fanboy, not just critics' darlings but sentimental tacky crap as well, I mean, seriously, Seabiscuit makes me cry! But I had trouble compiling a best-of list this year. Still, there was enough to keep a modicum of interest and even some that are truly Blu-Ray worthy. One thing however that I was not willing to entertain was a depressing, gut-wrenching, perfectly crafted heart-tugger film that wants to makes me think as the best film of the year. Fortunately, I've tried to avoid all of them on the top 10 list and was suitably disappointed in The Reader, Milk, Revolutionary Road, Nothing But The Truth, The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button and Changling to structure my list that largely avoided Oscar favourites. This list includes every 2009 film except for Rachel Getting Married, Synecdoche New York, Flash Of Genius and Last Chance Harvey, the four credible Hollywood films I managed to not get a chance to see.

So here are my Top 10 most disappointing films of the year:

1. The Dark Knight
2. Defiance: leave it to Ed Zwick to wreck a good story. There is something about his direction that can just ruin great film topics and here again is another example of what should have been an excellent movie that floats along at a breakneck dullness, just as Glory and The Last Samurai did before.
3. Changling: maybe it is the self-importance of Eastwood lately but this was a stagey, almost hypnotically unemotional film about a child serial killer
4. Revolutionary Road: timing is somewhat to blame since Mad Men is exploring similar themes and with better writing but it is such a cold, heartless film. Even Mendes's earlier American Beauty wasn't heartless. There was warmth; this is just soul-destroying.
5. Nothing But The Truth: leave it to Rod Lurie, master of clunkiness, to blow a great opportunity to make a good film about the media and their collusion with the government and how each uses the other but after seeing this somewhat sentimental, slightly insulting look at gender politics, I much prefer Lions For Lambs or even Rendition.
6. Che: Steven Soderbergh is a cool director, but not a great one, and here he takes a clearly compelling biopic and turns it into a Telemundo miniseries. Instead of capturing the spirit of The Motorcycle Diaries, it just sort of meanders through events in Che's life, placing innocuous and clearly tiny events from his diaries ahead of major issues. It is like the revolution is a bit player in all of this. Almost like watching a documentary about Che, like Bob Dylan Don't Look Back.
7. The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button: I'm calling it as I see it, this is basically David Fincher's Forrest Gump, same strange kind of problem with the central character, same generational sweep, same types of locations, same sort of ending. And while there is plenty of whimsicalness to go around, it is pretty short on insight of anything.
8. Quantum Of Solace: lacking all the things that made Casino Royale a welcome new treat, this one sort of coasted along boring the crap out of me.
9. Miracle At St. Anna: an attempt by Spike Lee to right Eastwood's wrong and focus on the role of African-Americans in World War II. A noble attempt but a really lame film, without proper pacing, structure or a coherent message.
10. The Reader: while a worthy attempt to talk about the generation of Germans who grew up following World War II, the emotional heartstrings are pulled for us not through the young lawyer but through the 'only following orders' SS guard and so we get a conflicting story of trying to be sympathetic to people who perpetrated the Holocaust. For some reason, I have a problem with that.

Top 10 Films of the Year

10. Indiana Jones & The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull: I am in the minority on this one but I thoroughly enjoyed this fourth installment as a nice update of the series and to take us into the 1950s. It is a great link between Raiders and Last Crusade and ties up the loose ends of the series.
9. The Wrestler: The Best of the Oscar contenders, a tale made for a 1975 film about the broken down world of an ex-1980s wrestler still trying to eek out a living in contemporary New Jersey. Rourke, Tomei and Wood are excellent.
8. Recount / W.: Both are timely as they come at the end of the Bush presidency and surprisingly both show a remarkable understanding of the political process over the last 8 years, the first as a precursor to the damage unleashed in the second. Great performances abound in both.
7. Iron Man is the best Hollywood superhero movie since Spider-Man 2, solely because Robert Downey Jr. is so great in this and is one of the most unlikely fighters of justice. While it's short on plot, Downey is mesmerizing as Tony Stark and is certainly an equal this year to the Batman!
6. Tropic Thunder: Fun, fast and mocking of Hollywood, one of the best comedies to focus on the industry and at the same time tell a pretty hilarious tale. So many attempts of poking fun at Hollywood have come up short but here is one that is smart and funny.
5. Slumdog Millionaire: in a year of dehumanizing emotional violence and sad depressing pictures, this one remains uplifting but without much sentimentality to prove that sometimes critics have no choice but to champion a great film.
4. Frost/Nixon: great character study and fascinating subject matter that is less about the power of the media and politicians and more about a chess match between a deep intellectual strategist in Nixon versus a lightweight and vapid talk show host who morphs into an English Ed Murrow.
3/2/1: Three-way tie: Forgetting Sarah Marshall/Zack & Miri Make A Porno/Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist: leave it to the Apatow crowd (Jason Segal, Seth Rogen, Michael Cera) to branch out and make three excellent romantic comedies that are smart and funny. Picking up where Superbad left off, these three helmed by better directors work on a number of different levels.

Good films not quite great:

1. Milk: It could have been less conventional but this biopic shows not so much the rise of the gay power movement as the motivations of the first openly gay elected politician in America and Sean Penn, James Franco and Josh Brolin do incredible work telling Harvey Milk's story.
2. In Bruges: I had reservations at first but now see how clever and unique this movie was, using a great location and some interesting hitman introspection.
3. Doubt: Great performances but so stagey that it makes Rent feel like an Altman movie
4. Angus, Thongs and Perfect Snogging: Britain's Clueless, Gurinder "Bend It Like Beckham" Chadha kicks another goal.
5. WALL-E: I would have preferred a half hour less with little or no human spaceship and a creepy, dialogue-free Blade Runner apocalyptic life dies on planet Earth downer but hey, it's a Pixar movie!
6. Valkyrie: Can Nazis be good? Tom Cruise investigates right after this!
7. Gran Torino: Clint Eastwood as a bigot with a heart of gold. This is a stretch, still, despite the ham handedness, it's Clint being Clint. The movie your Dad really liked!
8. Harold & Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay: Gitmo angry! Gitmo denied basic rights! Truly funny follow-up to the legendary classic.
9. Frozen River/The Visitor: both of these small east coast films display remarkable performances and the subtle culture clashes in each are presented in the most human of ways. Sad movies both, highlighted by two incredible performances by Melissa Leo and Richard Jenkins
10. The Bank Job/Somers Town/Flashbacks Of A Fool/Son Of Rambow/Rocknrolla: Britain made 5 other good little movies by a collection of rising stars and veterans. All are worth seeking out but start with Angus Thongs.

And the ones that just didn't ever really take off:

1. Burn After Reading: Half a great Coen Brothers movie
2. Body Of Lies: An effective thriller weighed down by Ridley Scott trying for something deeper
3. Pride & Glory: a good cop movie, just not a great one
4. What Just Happened?: Satires of Hollywood are hit and miss, when compared to Tropic Thunder this was just ho-hum
5. The Duchess: big hair and nasty Ralph Fiennes make a period piece that is just so damn depressing

Best Documentaries:

1. Roman Polanski: Wanted & Desired
2. Gonzo: The Life & Work Of Hunter Thompson
3. Standard Operating Procedure
4. Boogie Man: The Lee Atwater Story
5. Slacker Uprising
6. I.O.U.S.A.

The Halfway Point: Best Films (So Far) Of 2008

With the decline of independent films launched into cinemas which pick up word-of-mouth and critical raves and catapult into the stratosphere, with the major studio's absolute obsession with superhero movies and franchises, with straight-to-download small films lost in the shuffle, and with an increasing lack of interest in foreign, Sundance and small films with important and topical themes, it is with some sadness we take a look back at 2008 in film.

Sadly, despite ready access to most movies whenever we want (downloads, online DVD rentals, cinema) I was remarkably uninspired this year, particularly by foreign offerings. Perhaps I, too, am just another statistic in a box office dominated cultural wasteland whose once love of and obsessive attention span for non-English cinema is now nothing more than a glint in my eye. But foreign movies this year have yet to rise to the occasion. Now that may have everything to do with the fact that even foreign movies are structured around Academy Award season. Looking back, not a single non-English film has been really worth my time, not French romantic comedies, French dark corporate intrigue, South American tales of coming of age, Swedish sturm und drang, Turkish/German dramas, or Russian experimental filmmaking. Basically, it all seems to suck. And that's a damn shame but documentaries also have been notoriously lacking this year. Documentaries on The Rolling Stones and Patti Smith failed to ignite and topical films on Iraq and so forth just feel like retreads. Unfortunately, American moviemaking, at least what is readily available in the marketplace, has been remarkable for its lameness this year. While The Hottie and the Nottie, Postal and Disaster Movie were the scuz of the barrel, this year also saw Funny Games, 10,000 B.C., What Happens In Vegas, You Don't Mess With The Zohan, Fool's Gold and Rambo. Even so-so fare was a notch below its usual summer crapness: Narnia, X-Files, Spiderwick Chronicles, Leatherheads and The Incredible Hulk sort of just sailed by and sucked. Which leaves the handful of films, both foreign and domestic, that were worthy of being watched again. And so here are the 13 films that get quiet applause for not sucking:

13. At number 13 is Woody Allen's Cassandra's Dream, which while not the most original plot, at least features impressive performances from Ewan McGregor and Colin Farrell as a pair of brothers in way over their heads.

12. Colin Farrell is not done, with his refreshing turn in In Bruges, about a pair of Irish hitmen sent to Belgium to chill after a botched killing. Its dark humour and impressive use of locales in the medieval town makes it a worthwhile dark comedy. And Brendan Gleeson gives an Oscar-worthy performance.

11. Daniel Craig also can impress in his non-Bond roles and whilst this little movie is not all it could have been, his take on aging movie stardom is good. Check him out in the small British drama Flashbacks Of A Fool.

10. Son of Rambow is another delightful British independent comedy, about an outcast and troublemaker at school in early 80s England.

9. While we all know that Jason Statham cannot act at all, he is remarkably good at standing around looking cool. This is put to good use in the 1970s-style caper flick The Bank Job, playing a lovable cockney looking for one last score.

8. Batman: The Dark Knight arrives at number 8. Why? So much overexposure and universal acclaim tended to drown out the fact that it is a pretty crappy, slightly sadistic, horror movie with a Silence of the Lambs supporting performance lifting it from a second rate superhero version of Saw to a credible follow up to Christian Bale's first installment. I still like Batman Begins more. That was a great movie.

7. Harold & Kumar Escape From Guantanamo Bay does not equal the initial great lines of the original but is a worthy follow-up, with Kal Penn kicking it into high gear as a natural and just plan funny comic. Their timing, while it may be too early to judge, has a tightness, like a multicultural Lemmon and Matthau filtered through Cheech Marin.

6. WALL-E is a film of true childhood wonderfulness, launching Pixar from a canon of post-Disney safety net with 21st century animation kids movies, into a Ghibli Studios-like ennui of loneliness and redemption that underlies the audacity and insanity of the human race. This is the first animated film from the U.S. where I actually gasped.

5. Angus, Thongs & Perfect Snogging is England's Clueless, a smart, funny and much deeper teen comedy about the hell that is high school. Set in the southwest coastal city of Eastbourne ("It's the new Brighton"), it revolves around Georgia, her best friend Jas, their two dream would-be boyfriends, and Georgia's cat Angus. Gurinder Chadha, best known for Bend It Like Beckham, is now officially the Amy Heckerling of the UK with this charmer.

4. Iron Man is the best superhero movie since Spider-Man 2, perhaps even better given that Robert Downey Jr. has become one of the most unlikely fighters of justice. While its short on plot, Downey is mesmerizing as Tony Stark and is certainly an equal this year to the Batman!

3. Indiana Jones & The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull was seen by most as a disappointment and a missed opportunity. But watch it a second time! It links so well to Raiders and Last Crusade, and combines both Spielberg's obsession with aliens and Lucas's on-screen creatures. It isn't as bad as people claim and I found it such a welcome relief in a year of utter crap!

2. Recount is an HBO film based on the disputed 2000 election in Florida as Gore and Bush square off in a bitter, mean-spirited, winner-take-all legal battle. Kevin Spacey and Tom Wilkinson are fantastic as leaders of opposing forces.

1. The best movie so far this year, IMHO, or one certainly that has generated more laughs per minute than anything else I've seen in ages is Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Jason Segal's writing and starmaking turn as a layabout TV theme composer who loses his Hollywood star girlfriend and tries to recover. It is so convincing in its relationship woes and goodheartedness. A great movie, disguised as a spring gross-out comedy!

And that's that at the beginning of August....hopefully 2008 Part 2 will be a little better. Adios, see you in January.

The 10 Best Films Of The Year, 1967-2007

40 years of films, from Bonnie & Clyde to Zodiac. And here are my Ten Best lists for the last four decades.

Top 10 Films Of 2007

1. Zodiac
2. American Gangster
3. Juno
4. No Country For Old Men
5. There Will Be Blood
6. The Assassination Of Jesse James By The Coward Robert Ford
7. The Bourne Ultimatum
8. Charlie Wilson’s War
9. Hot Fuzz
10. I'm Not There
11. Michael Clayton
12. Superbad
F. The Diving Bell & The Butterfly/The Counterfeiters/Persepolis
D. Sicko/Terror’s Advocate/Taxi To The Dark Side/No End In Sight/This Filthy World/ Oswald’s Ghost
Disappointments: Atonement/Elizabeth/The Darjeeling Limited/Into The Wild
Good: Across The Universe/3:10 To Yuma/Knocked Up/Eastern Promises/Live Free Or Die Hard/Ocean’s Thirteen/In The Valley Of Elah/Gone Baby Gone/The Brave One/We Own The Night/Control/Hallam Foe/Breach/Shooter/The Kingdom/Rendition/Lions For Lambs/Pirates 3/Spider-Man 3.
TV Shows: Californication/Life/Chuck/Dirty Sexy Money/Gossip Girl

Top 10 Films Of 2006

1. The Departed
2. Stranger Than Fiction
3. Inside Man
4. A Prairie Home Companion
5. The Last King Of Scotland
6. Casino Royale
7. V For Vendetta
8. Game 6
9. Little Miss Sunshine
10. The Good Shepherd
11. The Illusionist/The Prestige
F. Letters From Iwo Jima/The Lives Of Others/After The Wedding/Volver
D. When The Levees Broke/One Bright Shining Moment/An Inconvenient Truth/Shut Up And Sing/An Unreasonable Man/So Goes The Nation/Cocaine Cowboys
Disappointments: Babel/Dreamgirls/The Fountain/Pan’s Labyrinth/Children Of Men
Good: Rocky Balboa/Blood Diamond/Scoop/ The Queen/World Trade Center/The Good German/ Thank You For Smoking/Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest/The Da Vinci Code/Déjà Vu/We Are Marshall/Invincible/Glory Road/Notes On A Scandal
TV Shows: Dexter/30 Rock/Ugly Betty/Studio 60 On The Sunset Strip/Shark/Heroes

Top 10 Films Of 2005

1. Syriana
2. Good Night, And Good Luck
3. Munich
4. Cinderella Man
5. Elizabethtown
6. Walk The Line
7. Proof
8. A History of Violence
9. Crash
10. Sin City/Kiss Kiss Bang Bang
11. The Squid & The Whale/Match Point/Capote
F. C.R.A.Z.Y./Walk On Water
D. Bob Dylan: No Direction Home/The Aristocrats/The Last Mogul
Good: Me & You & Everyone We Know/Jarhead/Kingdom Of Heaven: Director’s Cut/Rent/Brokeback Mountain/Capote/Fever Pitch/The Constant Gardener/The 40 Year Old Virgin/The Upside Of Anger/Layer Cake/Lord Of War/An Unfinished Life
TV Shows: American Dad/The Colbert Report

Top 10 Films Of 2004

1. The Aviator
2. Collateral
3. Hotel Rwanda
4. Million Dollar Baby
5. Garden State
6. Kill Bill Vol. 2
7. Spider-Man 2
8. Melinda & Melinda
9. Silver City
10. Napoleon Dynamite/Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle
11. Undertow/The Bourne Supremacy
F. Downfall/The Motorcycle Diaries
D. Tom Dowd: The Language Of Music/Fahrenheit 9/11/Control Room
Disappointments: The Life Aquatic/I Heart Huckabees/Sideways/Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind
Good: Ocean’s Twelve/National Treasure/Before Sunset/Kinsey/Man On Fire/Miracle/Ray/The Terminal
TV Shows: Veronica Mars/Entourage

Top 10 Films Of 2003

1. Master & Commander: The Far Side Of The World
2. Love Actually
3. Mystic River
4. Angels In America
5. Lost In Translation
6. American Splendor
7. In America
8. Kill Bill Vol. 1
9. Lord Of The Rings: The Return Of The King
10. Seabiscuit
11. Shattered Glass/The Cooler
F. The Barbarian Invasions/Goodbye Lenin/Kitchen Stories
D. The Fog Of War/Easy Riders Raging Bulls/A Decade Under The Influence
Disappointments:
Good: Pirates Of The Caribbean/Anything Else/The Italian Job/The Matrix Reloaded/The Matrix Revolutions/All The Real Girls/Dirty Pretty Things/The Human Stain/Monster/Runaway Jury/The Station Agent/The Rundown/Elephant
TV Shows: Arrested Development/Chappelle's Show/Little Britain/The O.C.

Top 10 Films Of 2002

1. Minority Report
2. The 25th Hour
3. Moonlight Mile
4. Catch Me If You Can
5. Gangs Of New York
6. The Pianist
7. Far From Heaven
8. Adaptation
9. The Bourne Identity
10. Path To War
F. City Of God/Y Tu Mama Tambien/The Man Without A Past/Nine Queens/Nowhere In Africa
D. The Kid Stays In The Picture/Cinemania/Bowling For Columbine/The Trials Of Henry Kissinger
Disappointments: Punch-Drunk Love/About Schmidt
Good: Road To Perdition/Hollywood Ending/Signs/Narc/LOTR: The Two Towers/The Emperor’s Club/About A Boy/The Sum Of All Fears/Spider-Man/Red Dragon/8 Mile/Barbershop/8 Mile/Barbershop/Bend It Like Beckham/Chicago/The Grey Zone/The Quiet American/Real Women Have Curves/Solaris/Spider/Tully/The Rookie/Sunshine State

Top 10 Films Of 2001

1. The Royal Tenenbaums
2. A Beautiful Mind
3. Gosford Park
4. Ocean’s Eleven
5. Training Day
6. Ghost World
7. Donnie Darko
8. Lord Of The Rings: The Fellowship Of The Ring
9. Black Hawk Down
10. In The Bedroom
F. Amélie/Bread & Tulips/Metropolis/No Man's Land
D. Stanley Kubrick: A Life In Pictures/My Voyage To Italy/Murder On A Sunday Morning/Dogtown & Z-Boys
Disappointments: Memento/The Man Who Wasn’t There/The Yards
Good: Monster’s Ball/Mulholland Dr./Spy Game/The Curse Of The Jade Scorpion/crazy/beautiful/Bridget Jones's Diary/Conspiracy/Life As A House/Moulin Rouge!

Top 10 Films Of 2000

1. Almost Famous
2. Wonder Boys
3. High Fidelity
4. Traffic
5. O Brother, Where Art Thou?
6. Thirteen Days
7. The Contender
8. Croupier
9. Gladiator
10. Bamboozled
F. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon/Divided We Fall/With A Friend Like Harry/Lumumba
D. Sven Nykvist: Light Keeps Me Company/The Life & Times Of Hank Greenberg
Good: Best In Show/Finding Forrester/Erin Brockovich/Snatch/Pollock/Small Time Crooks/Billy Elliot/Quills/Sunshine/State & Main
TV Shows: CSI: Crime Scene Investigation/Curb Your Enthusiasm

Top 10 Films Of 1999

1. The Insider
2. Three Kings
3. Magnolia
4. American Beauty
5. Office Space
6. Dick
7. The Cider House Rules
8. The Talented Mr. Ripley
9. Sweet & Lowdown
10. Fight Club
D: One Day In September/Genghis Blues
Good: Election/Drop Dead Gorgeous/Sweet & Lowdown/The Talented Mr. Ripley/Eyes Wide Shut/Bringing Out The Dead/October Sky/Being John Malkovich/The Thomas Crown Affair/American Pie/The Hurricane/The Legend Of 1900/Liberty Heights/The Limey/The Straight Story/Summer Of Sam/Titus/The War Zone
TV Shows: The West Wing/The Sopranos/Family Guy/Freaks & Geeks/Futurama

Top 10 Films Of 1998

1. The Big Lebowski
2. Primary Colors
3. Fear & Loathing In Las Vegas
4. Bulworth
5. Rushmore
6. The Thin Red Line
7. Out Of Sight
8. Saving Private Ryan
9. Ronin
10. Shakespeare In Love
F: Life Is Beautiful/The Celebration/The Dinner Game/The Dreamlife Of Angels/Run Lola Run/Show Me Love/Central Station
D: One Day In September/Genghis Blues
Good: Celebrity/Dark City/Affliction/American History X/Enemy Of The State/Gods & Monsters/He Got Game/Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels/Pleasantville/Without Limits/Rounders/There's Something About Mary/Waking Ned Devine
TV: That '70s Show

Top 10 Films Of 1997

1. L.A. Confidential
2. Boogie Nights
3. Wag The Dog
4. Jackie Brown
5. Deconstructing Harry
6. The Castle
7. Good Will Hunting
8. The Full Monty
9. The Game
10. The Sweet Hereafter
F: Children Of Heaven
D: Waco: The Rules Of Engagement/Wild Man Blues
Good: As Good As It Gets/Sliding Doors/Chasing Amy/Contact/Donnie Brasco/Eve’s Bayou/Fever Pitch/Gattaca/George Wallace/In & Out/Lawn Dogs/Oscar & Lucinda/Ulee’s Gold/The Ice Storm
TV Shows: South Park

Top 10 Films Of 1996

1. Fargo
2. Lone Star
3. Everyone Says I Love You
4. Michael Collins
5. The English Patient
6. Jerry Maguire
7. Welcome To The Dollhouse
8. Beautiful Girls
9. The Rock
10. Secrets & Lies
F: Il Postino/Kolya
D: When We Were Kings/The Battle Over Citizen Kane/Visions Of Light
Good: Breakdown/Get On The Bus/Rosewood/Sleepers/A Time To Kill/Tin Cup/Bottle Rocket/Hard Eight/Kingpin/Mother Night/Schizopolis
TV Shows: The Daily Show

Top 10 Films Of 1995

1. Nixon
2. The Usual Suspects
3. Heat
4. Seven
5. The American President
6. Get Shorty
7. Casino
8. Apollo 13
9. Mighty Aphrodite
10. Clueless
F: Hate
D: A Personal Journey With Martin Scorsese Through American Movies
Good: Braveheart/Die Hard With A Vengeance/Leaving Las Vegas/Before Sunrise/Flirting With Disaster/Flirting With Disaster/Indictment: The McMartin Trial/Truman/Tommy Boy

Top 10 Films OF 1994

1. The Shawshank Redmeption
2. Quiz Show
3. Pulp Fiction
4. Nobody’s Fool
5. Forrest Gump
6. Clear & Present Danger
7. Bullets Over Broadway
8. Speed
9. Ed Wood
10. Swimming With Sharks
F: Trois Couleurs: Rouge/Leon/Eat Drink Man Woman
D: The War Room/Crumb
Good: Clerks/True Lies/Serial Mom
TV: Baseball/TV Nation

Top 10 Films Of 1993

1. Schindler’s List
2. The Fugitive
3. Short Cuts
4. The Firm
5. In The Line Of Fire
6. Manhattan Murder Mystery
7. Carlito’s Way
8. Dave
9. Gettysburg
10. Searching For Bobby Fischer
D: Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky & The Media
Good: The Piano/And The Band Played On/King Of The Hill/Philadelphia/The Ref/The
Thing Called Love/This Boy's Life/True Romance/What's Eating Gilbert Grape/
In The Name Of The Father/Jurassic Park
TV Shows: The X-Files/Homicide: Life On The Street

Top 10 Films Of 1992

1. The Player
2. Malcolm X
3. Unforgiven
4. Scent Of A Woman
5. Reservoir Dogs
6. Patriot Games
7. Shadows & Fog
8. Husbands & Wives
9. Glengarry Glen Ross
10. A Midnight Clear
Good: Bob Roberts/The Distinguished Gentleman/A Few Good Men/Forgotten Silver/The Public Eye/Singles
TV: The Larry Sanders Show/The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles

Top 10 Films Of 1991

1. JFK
2. The Silence Of The Lambs
3. Grand Canyon
4. The Commitments
5. Boyz N The Hood
6. Terminator 2: Judgment Day
7. Barton Fink
8. Bugsy
9. Flirting
10. City Of Hope/Class Action
Good: Hearts Of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse

Top 10 Films Of 1990

1. GoodFellas
2. The Hunt For Red October
3. Die Hard 2: Die Harder
4. Miller’s Crossing
5. True Colors
6. The Godfather Part III
7. Back To The Future Part III
8. Alice
9. Pump Up The Volume
10. Misery
F: Europa, Europa
D: American Dream
Good: The Freshman/Metropolitan/Mindwalk/Avalon/Wild At Heart
TV Shows: Seinfeld/The Civil War/Law & Order/Twin Peaks

Top 10 Films Of 1989

1. Indiana Jones & The Last Crusade
2. Do The Right Thing
3. Field Of Dreams
4. Crimes & Misdemeanors
5. Say Anything…
6. Back To The Future Part II
7. Henry V
8. Glory
9. A Dry White Season
10. Blaze/Heathers
D: Roger & Me
Good: Driving Miss Daisy
TV Shows: The Simpsons/Traffik

Top 10 Films Of 1988

1. Mississippi Burning
2. Die Hard
3. Midnight Run
4. A Fish Called Wanda
5. Another Woman
6. The Last Temptation Of Christ
7. The Accused
8. Who Framed Roger Rabbit?
9. The Accidental Tourist
10. Running On Empty
F: Grave Of The Fireflies/The Vanishing/Cinema Paradiso
Good: Crossing Delancey/Big/Bull Durham/A Child’s Christmas In Wales/A Cry In The Dark/Rain Man/Stand & Deliver/Tucker/Tanner ‘88/The Outside Chance Of Maximilian Glick/Without A Clue/Tequila Sunrise/The Milagro Beanfield War

Top 10 Films Of 1987

1. Wall Street
2. The Untouchables
3. Full Metal Jacket
4. Radio Days
5. Broadcast News
6. Empire Of The Sun
7. Matewan
8. Planes, Trains & Automobiles
9. Raising Arizona
10. The Last Emperor
F: Au Revoir, Les Enfants
D: Swimming To Cambodia
Good: September/House of Games/The Princess Bride/Shy People/The Big Easy

Top 10 Films Of 1986

1. Platoon
2. Ferris Bueller’s Day Off
3. Hannah & Her Sisters
4. Salvador
5. Hoosiers
6. Mona Lisa
7. Stand By Me
8. The Mosquito Coast
9. The Color Of Money
10. Crocodile Dundee
F: The Decline Of The American Empire/Jean de Florette/Manon Of The Spring
Good: Death Of A Salesman
TV Shows: Yes, Prime Minister/Lovejoy/Matlock

Top 10 Films Of 1985

1. Back To The Future
2. To Live & Die In L.A.
3. Cry Freedom
4. The Purple Rose of Cairo
5. The Breakfast Club
6. Blood Simple
7. The Falcon & The Snowman
8. Secret Honor
9. Pale Rider
10. The Goonies
F: My Life As A Dog/Ran
TV Shows: The Equalizer
Good: Clue/Joshua Then & Now/Silverado/Lost In America/The Color Purple

Top 10 Films Of 1984

1. The Killing Fields
2. Broadway Danny Rose
3. Once Upon A Time In America
4. Amadeus
5. The Natural
6. Romancing The Stone
7. Indiana Jones & The Temple Of Doom
8. Under The Volcano
9. This Is Spinal Tap
10. The Cotton Club
F: The Wannsee Conference
D: Stop Making Sense/The Times Of Harvey Milk

Top 10 Films Of 1983

1. The Right Stuff
2. Scarface
3. Star Wars Episode VI: Return Of The Jedi
4. Monty Python’s Life Of Brian
5. Zelig
6. A Christmas Story
7. Local Hero
8. Trading Places
9. Under Fire
10. The Big Chill
F: Fanny & Alexander

Top 10 Films Of 1982

1. Blade Runner
2. E.T.
3. A Midsummer Night’s Sex Comedy
4. The Verdict
5. The Year Of Living Dangerously
6. Sophie’s Choice
7. Tootsie
8. Fast Times At Ridgemont High
9. Gandhi
10. My Favorite Year
F: Fitzcarraldo
Good: Shoot The Moon/The World According To Garp

Top 10 Films Of 1981

1. Raiders Of The Lost Ark
2. Reds
3. Prince Of The City
4. Body Heat
5. Blow Out
6. Gallipoli
7. Thief
8. My Dinner With Andre
9. On Golden Pond
10. Atlantic City
F: Das Boot/Diva
Good: Absence Of Malice/Fort Apache, The Bronx/Chariots Of Fire/Ragtime

Top 10 Films Of 1980

1. The Shining
2. Raging Bull
3. Being There
4. Ordinary People
5. Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back
6. Stardust Memories
7. The Elephant Man
8. The Great Santini
9. The Long Good Friday
10. The Blues Brothers/Caddyshack/Airplane!
F: The Sweater
Good: The Stunt Man/Melvin & Howard/The Long Riders/Hopscotch/Breaker Morant/The Return Of The Secaucus 7
TV Shows: Yes, Minister/Magnum, P.I.

Top 10 Films Of 1979

1. Manhattan
2. Apocalypse Now
3. Being There
4. The Deer Hunter
5. Kramer Vs. Kramer
6. The China Syndrome
7. Breaking Away
8. The In-Laws
9. Time After Time
10. Going In Style
D: The Kids Are Alright
Good: And Justice For All…/Escape From Alcatraz/Saint Jack/Hardcore/Quadrophenia

Top 10 Films Of 1978

1. Days Of Heaven
2. Interiors
3. Straight Time
4. The Buddy Holly Story
5. Midnight Express
6. The Big Fix
7. Blue Collar
8. Superman
9. An Unmarried Woman
10. Coming Home
D: The Last Waltz

Top 10 Films Of 1977

1. Annie Hall
2. Sorcerer
3. Close Encounters Of The Third Kind
4. Star Wars
5. 3 Women
6. Killer Of Sheep
7. Slap Shot
8. The Last Wave
9. The Goodbye Girl
10. 10 Rillington Place
F: Stroszek

Top 10 Films Of 1976

1. All The President's Men
2. Network
3. Taxi Driver
4. Marathon Man
5. The Front
6. Rocky
7. Silent Movie
8. The Bad News Bears
9. The Enforcer
10. Buffalo Bill & The Indians, Or Sitting Bull’s History Lesson/The Outlaw Josey Wales
D: Harlan County, U.S.A.

Top 10 Films Of 1975

1. One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest
2. Night Moves
3. Jaws
4. The Man Who Would Be King
5. French Connection II
6. Nashville
7. Three Days Of The Condor
8. Love & Death
9. Barry Lyndon
10. Dog Day Afternoon
Good: Monty Python & The Holy Grail/Shampoo/Bite The Bullet/Give Em Hell, Harry!/The Man In The Glass Booth/The Passenger/Picnic At Hanging Rock/Smile/The Sunshine Boys/The Wilby Conspiracy
TV Shows: Saturday Night Live

Top 10 Films Of 1974

1. Chinatown
2. The Godfather Part II
3. The Parallax View
4. The Conversation
5. California Split
6. Harry & Tonto
7. Blazing Saddles
8. Young Frankenstein
9. Lenny
10. Badlands
D: Hearts & Minds
F: Ali: Fear Eats The Soul/And Now My Love/Lacombe Lucien/The Enigma Of Kaspar Hauser/The Clockmaker
Good: Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore/The Apprenticeship Of Duddy Kravitz/Bring Me The Head Of Alfredo Garcia/Conrack/Death Wish/The Gambler/The Great Gatsby/The Sugarland Express/The Taking Of Pelham One Two Three/Thunderbolt & Lightfoot
TV Shows: The Rockford Files

Top 10 Films Of 1973

1. The Sting
2. The Exorcist
3. The Long Goodbye
4. The Day Of The Jackal
5. Sleeper
6. Serpico
7. Mean Streets
8. American Graffiti
9. O Lucky Man!
10. The Iceman Cometh
F: Scenes From A Marriage
Good: Charley Varrick/The Day Of The Dolphin/Don't Look Now/The Friends Of Eddie Coyle/The Iceman Cometh/The Last American Hero/The Last Detail/The Last Of Sheila/
Magnum Force/My Name Is Nobody/Paper Moon/Papillon/Robin Hood/Save The Tiger/Scarecrow/Soylent Green

Top 10 Films Of 1972

1. The Godfather
2. The Candidate
3. Deliverance
4. Fat City
5. Play It Again, Sam
6. The Hot Rock
7. Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Sex* (*But Were Afraid To Ask)
8. Prime Cut
9. Sounder
10. The Life & Times Of Judge Roy Bean
F: Solaris/Aguirre, The Wrath Of God/Cries & Whispers
Good: Sleuth/What's Up, Doc?/The King Of Marvin Gardens

Top 10 Films Of 1971

1. The French Connection
2. The Hospital
3. McCabe & Mrs. Miller
4. Get Carter
5. A Clockwork Orange
6. Bananas
7. Dirty Harry
8. Klute
9. The Last Picture Show
10. Straw Dogs
F: Murmur Of The Heart
Good: The Anderson Tapes/Duel/A Fistful Of Dynamite/Harold & Maude/The Hired Hand/Shaft/Sometimes A Great Notion

Top 10 Films Of 1970

1. M*A*S*H
2. Patton
3. Catch-22
4. Five Easy Pieces
5. Performance
6. Start The Revolution Without Me
7. I Never Sang For My Father
8. Little Big Man
9. Ryan’s Daughter
10. I Walk The Line
F: The Garden Of The Finzi-Continis/Le Cercle Rouge/The Conformist
D: Gimme Shelter/Woodstock

Top 10 Films Of 1969

1. Midnight Cowboy
2. Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid
3. The Italian Job
4. Take The Money & Run
5. if….
6. Easy Rider/Medium Cool
7. Goodbye, Columbus
8. Downhill Racer
9. They Shoot Horses Don’t They?
10. The Wild Bunch
F: Z/Le Boucher/The Sorrow & The Pity/War & Peace
Good: Kes/Rachel, Rachel
TV Shows: Monty Python's Flying Circus

Top 10 Films Of 1968

1. Once Upon A Time In The West
2. Bullitt
3. 2001: A Space Odyssey
4. The Producers
5. The Swimmer
6. Rosemary’s Baby
7. The Odd Couple
8. Pretty Poison
9. Targets
10. The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter/Charly

Top 10 Films Of 1967

1. Bonnie & Clyde
2. The Good, The Bad & The Ugly
3. In The Heat Of The Night
4. Cool Hand Luke
5. The Dirty Dozen
6. The President’s Analyst
7. The Graduate
8. Point Blank
9. In Cold Blood
10. Blow Up
F: Le Samourai/The Battle Of Algiers
D: Don't Look Back: Bob Dylan
Good: Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner/To Sir, With Love

The Top 50 & Counting Films Of All Time

As an avid movie lover, this list took awhile to compile, but basically it represents what I like about films. One thing I've learned is that a handful of influential film critics do know what they are talking about, but unfortunately they tend not to understand that a lot of people just like to watch fun and exciting movies over and over again. A film like Clint Eastwood's Million Dollar Baby is a great, critically acclaimed movie, but have I sat down and watched it since it was in theaters....no. It's heart-wrenching and difficult to sit through. That said, Sahara, which was critically panned and isn't very good, at least holds my attention and because we got the DVD for $3 at Blockbuster one day, we've watched it probably six times since it was in cinemas. So what I tried to do with this list was balance my love of critically acclaimed movies, the ones we can analyze and discuss, with ones that are just a sheer joy to watch over and over again. It represents, as close as I can get, the movies I feel are BLU-RAY worthy, that is, I'd spend some money on upgrading them to high-definition discs so I could watch again and again. Of course it is skewed by my prejudices, namely, films about politics, American movies (because although I love foreign films, I can't sit through subtitles constantly, I just don't have the attention span), and my favourite directors, most notably Marty Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, Francis Ford Coppola and Woody Allen. I also have a soft spot for sentimental tacky crap, to use Jack Black's words from High Fidelity, and throw in one or two tearjerkers. So here is my list:

1. All The President’s Men – Alan J. Pakula
2. Chinatown – Roman Polanski
3. The French Connection – William Friedkin
4. Schindler’s List – Steven Spielberg
5. Almost Famous – Cameron Crowe
6. Dr. Strangelove – Stanley Kubrick
7. JFK – Oliver Stone
8. Annie Hall – Woody Allen
9. Manhattan – Woody Allen
10. Wonder Boys – Curtis Hanson
11. Indiana Jones & The Last Crusade – Steven Spielberg
12. The Killing Fields – Roland Joffe
13. The Shawshank Redemption – Frank Darabont
14. The Godfather I & II – Francis Ford Coppola
15. Citizen Kane – Orson Welles
16. The Silence Of The Lambs – Jonathan Demme
17. L.A. Confidential – Curtis Hanson
18. Nixon – Oliver Stone
19. The Big Lebowski – Coen Brothers
20. Network – Sidney Lumet
21. High Fidelity – Stephen Frears
22. The Royal Tenenbaums – Wes Anderson
23. The Departed (Blu-Ray) – Martin Scorsese
24. The Usual Suspects (Blu-Ray) – Bryan Singer
25. Field Of Dreams – Phil Alden Robinson
26. The Insider – Michael Mann
27. Primary Colors – Mike Nichols
28. Lawrence Of Arabia – David Lean
29. Casablanca – Michael Curtiz
30. GoodFellas (Blu-Ray) – Martin Scorsese
31. Traffic – Steven Soderbergh
32. The Third Man – Carol Reed
33. Apocalypse Now – Francis Ford Coppola
34. The Right Stuff – Philip Kaufman
35. The Player – Robert Altman
36. Syriana (Blu-Ray) – Stephen Gaghan
37. Mississippi Burning – Alan Parker
38. The Parallax View – Alan J. Pakula
39. Master & Commander: The Far Side Of The World – Peter Weir
40. Zodiac – David Fincher
41. Quiz Show – Robert Redford
42. Fargo – Coen Brothers
43. The Aviator (Blu-Ray) – Martin Scorsese
44. Taxi Driver – Martin Scorsese
45. Boogie Nights – Paul Thomas Anderson
46. 12 Angry Men – Sidney Lumet
47. Fear & Loathing In Las Vegas – Terry Gilliam
48. Do The Right Thing – Spike Lee
49. My Life As A Dog – Lasse Hallstrom
50. Munich – Steven Spielberg/Good Night & Good Luck (Blu-Ray) – George Clooney/Raiders Of The Lost Ark – Steven Spielberg/To Live & Die In L.A. – William Friedkin/The Fugitive (Blu-Ray) – Andrew Davis/The Hunt For Red October – John McTiernan/Minority Report – Steven Spielberg/Three Kings – David O. Russell /Magnolia – Paul Thomas Anderson/American Gangster – Ridley Scott/Lone Star - John Sayles/The Conversation - Francis Ford Coppola/Broadway Danny Rose - Woody Allen/Fanny & Alexander - Ingmar Bergman/Night Moves - Arthur Penn/M*A*S*H - Robert Altman/One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest - Milos Forman/Mr. Smith Goes To Washington - Frank Capra/Seven Samurai - Akira Kurosawa/Thirteen Days - Roger Donaldson/Heat - Michael Mann/Patton - Franklin J. Schaffner/The Sting - George Roy Hill

The Films Of 2007

Well, another year of films, another series of disappointments, lots of crap, some gems but once again Hollywood spends the money on crappy films, mundane franchises (Spider Man 3, I’m talking to you!), cheesy family and teenage entertainment, and seems obsessed with celebrity gossip, and not even good celebrities! Still, there were some great films. Here’s the best and worst of 2007.

I begin with the caveat, the films unseen by me include a handful, namely, Man In The Chair, Lake Of Fire and Darfur Now.

The 10 best films of the year:

12. Michael Clayton. I recognized the genius of this film early, pointing out the lengths corporations will go to in order to protect their own interests. 3 outstanding acting performances do justice to an excellent screenplay.
11. 3:10 To Yuma. James Mangold is quietly becoming one of the best directors around and this remake of the Glenn Ford/Van Heflin western is a treat and a stylish and effective thriller.
10. I’m Not There. The film captures both Dylan’s personas and some of his most irascible song characters. The genius of the film however is Haynes’s non-linear approach to Dylan, treating the 6 characters as interwoven AND chronological.
9. Hot Fuzz. The best pure comedy of the year. Simon Pegg’s comic timing deserves an OBE. The banter is awesome and gets better with each viewing.
8. Charlie Wilson’s War. Ignored a bit but this was a funny and terribly realistic look at both Texas politics, Reagan-era Washington and American interference in the conflict zones of the world. It was a subtle but effective condemnation of what Ron Paul has been railing against this year, which is simply, America…get out.
7. The Bourne Ultimatum. Best pure thriller in many a year, Paul Greengrass somehow manages to make a British art flick inside a conventional plot. It was smart, dark, and fully satisfying.
6. The Assassination Of Jesse James By The Coward Robert Ford. A meditation of celebrity, on mythology, and on the American dream, as well as a damn fine winter western.
4/5. No Country For Old Men/There Will Be Blood. Yes both were excellent, well-shot, well-acted. But these are extremely difficult films even for me, who watches Munich with some regularity. No Country wasn’t quite as good as Fargo and Blood not on the same par with Boogie Nights or Magnolia, but time may treat them as the classics they instantly seem to be, especially among critics.
3. Juno. The smartest and most iconic film of the year, turning Ellen Page into her generation’s greatest character yet. Great acting, great screenplay.
2. American Gangster. This was a tough one but Ridley Scott's film about drug trafficking in New York came a close second because it taught me not only about why Frank Lucas might be a hero to people, but how a man like him was able to succeed (for a time) despite the massive system against him. I don’t condone what he did, but he did it so well. Richie caught him only because he became totally obsessed.
1. Zodiac. David Fincher, like contemporaries Paul Thomas Anderson and Steven Soderbergh, works best when given a sizeable budget and a large canvas with which to work his magic. Zodiac is his best film, a riveting and brilliant dissection of the famous Zodiac murders in the San Francisco Bay area, and decidedly the best of a very good selection of fine films of 2007.

The 10 next best films of the year:

21. Pirates 3/Spider-Man 3/National Treasure 2. Less than stellar sequels for these franchises but somewhat satisfying nonetheless. Hey, stop bitching, I put them at number 20.
20. The Kingdom/Rendition/Lions For Lambs. The three Iraq films are all strong, all smart, and all deserved better press coverage but it is so hard to do a war movie in a time of war that isn’t just jingoistic or isn’t just a ham handed polemic. Kudos for trying.
19. Breach/Shooter. Both movies are about traitors in the U.S. government, one real, one fake, both good.
18. Hallam Foe/Control. Out of the UK came two great films, the first about an oddball Scottish kid who finds love in the windows of Edinburgh, the second about the rise and downfall of Ian Curtis, lead singer of Joy Division.
17. In The Valley Of Elah/Gone Baby Gone/The Brave One/We Own The Night. Four policiers and crime films that made me think, made me question moral choices, and made me glad I am not a cop.
16. Eastern Promises. Is this the year of Canadians in movies or what (Page, Rogen, Cera), David Cronenberg’s tough and brutal understanding of the Russian mob is diabolical but has a heart.
15. Live Free Or Die Hard/Ocean’s Thirteen. Nice returns to form for both franchises.
14. Superbad/Knocked Up. Equally toilet humor filled genius. Leave it to a bunch of Canadians to make some funny funny movies. Superbad slightly superior because of the 14th and Granville reference!
13. Across The Universe. My alternate top ten pick, this was a sublime musical that exceeded expectations, made me cry, and didn’t dumb down the Beatles nor John Lennon’s simple personal belief about war and revolution during a time of upheaval. DVD would have been perfect if they had lifted the 5 minute maharishi montage from Walk Hard as an extra!

The 10 really good but not quite spectacular films of the year:

30. Waitress/The Lookout. Three tales of America, where the protagonists are lost and need a break and catch them.
29. Once/Hairspray. Two musical entries, one real on the streets of Dublin, the other fake on the streets of Baltimore. Both were entertaining.
28. The Kite Runner. Slightly melodramatic but exciting and well-acted especially by the kids.
27. Into The Wild. While it was awesome to look at, and the Hal Holbrook character fantastic, this guy was quite naïve in how a non-commercial world would ultimately treat him.
26. The Darjeeling Limited. Quirky but spotty in parts
25. Grindhouse. A nice exercise in style if overtly and offensively misogynistic.
24. The Hoax/The Hunting Party. 2 Richard Gere movies that were extraordinarily well done.
23. The Simpsons Movie. Loved it, its jokes, its continued cultural presence.
22. The Great Debaters/Starting Out In The Evening/The Savages. It is sentimental but it is such a great story and nicely directed by Denzel, an Antwone Fisher about debating. The second is a quiet small movie about New York literary types. The third in a similar vein about smart New Yorkers trying to get their father through the twilight of his life.

The best foreign films and documentaries of the year:

1. No End In Sight
2. The Counterfeiters
3. This Filthy World
4. Sicko
5. Joe Strummer: The Future Is Unwritten
6. In The Shadow Of The Moon
7. Oswald’s Ghost/Taxi To The Dark Side/Jimmy Carter: Man From Plains
8. La Vie En Rose/Blame It On Fidel/My Best Friend/2 Days In Paris
9. Crazy Love/Brando/The King Of Kong/The 11th Houe
10. Lust, Caution

The ten best television shows of the year (new ones):

1. Californication
2. Life
3. Dirty Sexy Money
4. Chuck
5. Gossip Girl
6. The Tudors
7. Aliens In America
8. Mad Men
9. Reaper
10. The Company

The 10 good but not really great movies of the year:

31. Stardust/Lars & The Real Girl/The Namesake/Southland Tales
32. Ratatouille
33. Before The Devil Knows You’re Dead
34. Lucky You
35. Mr. Brooks
36. Away From Her
37. Talk To Me
38. Shoot Em Up/Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story
39. Starter For Ten
40. Longford

The 10 worst films of the year:

1. I Know Who Killed Me. How about yourself Lindsay Lohan, with your appallingly bad acting.
2. Norbit. Hell, it cost him an Oscar, it was that bad.
3. Epic Movie. Not funny, not any good.
4. Good Luck Chuck. Dane Cook is just an idiot.
5. The Number 23. Let’s hope it’s the final of Jim Carrey’s really bad movies.
6. Captivity. Roland Joffe, just an awful run that began with Fat Man and Little Boy.
7. Ghost Rider/Next. These Nic Cage movies sucked on a number of levels.
8. The Nines. This was one trippy waste of time. I really dislike Ryan Reynolds.
9. Perfect Stranger. A perfectly horrible thriller.
10. September Dawn. This was a disturbing, hateful little movie.

The 10 most disappointing films of the year:

1. Smokin’ Aces. Narc was really good and this follow-up didn’t work at all.
2. Elizabeth: The Golden Age. The movie sucked.
3. Margot At The Wedding/Youth Without Youth. Where Squid was cool and dark, this is just awful. And Coppola directs a complete misfire and remarkably incomprehensible movie.
3. I Am Legend. It wasn’t even as good as The Omega Man
4. Atonement. It just didn’t really do it for me, I guess any movie that makes you feel like it could have let you in on that secret 2 hours earlier seems like a waste of time
5. The Golden Compass. Fell flat in comparison to its fellow franchises.
6. The Bucket List. Not very deep and not very convincing.
7. The Invasion. Nicole Kidman had a bad year.
8. Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium. Again, flat and not very fun.
9. 300. Too cartoony for its own good, too small an epic.
10. Sweeney Todd. Should have been much better but just sort of sucked.
11. A Mighty Heart/Rescue Dawn/Things We Lost In The Fire/Goya’s Ghosts/Sleuth/Reign Over Me/Trade/Freedom Writers/Transformers/Dan In Real Life/Paranoid Park/He Was A Quiet Man/King Of California/Slipstream/Silk

Music In The 21st Century: From Napster to iTunes to Torrents and Everything In Between

It’s been awhile since I’ve posted anything but I figure as we enter the savage year of our lord 2008, it might be a good time to summarize what has happened in the last 9 years of music, well, rock music at least, that popular art form the kids seem to like. I recall back in the day, I guess, the summer of 1999 when I was trekking through Europe with my friend Barb, hearing the last vestiges of 20th century music. It was a strange transition year in many ways. The seminal albums of the post-punk, alternative, grunge and Britpop genres had all been released, from Nirvana’s Nevermind in 1991, U2’s Achtung Baby the same year, R.E.M.’s Automatic For The People in 1992, Pearl Jam’s Ten in 1992, Blur’s Parklife in 1994, Oasis’s What’s The Story Morning Glory in 1995, Beck’s Odelay in 1996, and Radiohead’s OK Computer in 1997. By the summer of 1999, Kurt Cobain and 2Pac were dead, the anthems of summer, like The Verve’s Bittersweet Symphony, Oasis’s Wonderwall and Blur’s Song 2 had been put on compilations with other party songs like Come On Eileen, and everybody had had enough of each year’s adult alternative pop rock album that connects with the public and then you can find the following year in the $1 bin at your local pawn shop. For those who remember, we survived, in chronological order, Hootie & The Blowfish, Counting Crows, Dave Matthews Band and The Wallflowers, not to be outdone in the 21st century by John Mayer and Coldplay. Blech!!! So as I was traveling from Brussels to Berlin, everywhere I turned I heard nothing but Moby. Moby, Moby, Moby, the culmination of the Chemical Brothers and Fatboy Slim being toned down and filtered into a nice background soundtrack for the masses. You’re too old, it’s over, nobody listens to techno. I returned to Canada to discover that you really didn’t need to buy music any more, you could just get inferior rips off the internet and for those of us who dropped $15 on Urban Hymns or Crash or Be Here Now or New Adventures In Hi-Fi or Zooropa could get the hits and turn down the suck without it costing a dime. But Napster had a weird effect, it made us all deeply cynical about music. 1999 wasn’t a particularly good year for music that changed the world. If you couldn’t quite appreciate Rage Against The Machine, Beck’s new sound, or a white rap artist from Detroit, it was pretty much a vapid wasteland that year. So with I don’t want no scrubs and hit me baby one more time ushering in the new millennium, I really didn’t see much of a future for rock n roll. And my fears were realized in 2000…

In a year when a Madonna album was critically acclaimed, it didn’t bode well. All That You Can’t Leave Behind wasn’t U2 at its best, Radiohead, despite the almost religious-like worship of its fans, produced Kid-A which sounded to me like OK Computer b-sides, and when Nelly and Outkast are the hitmakers, I felt so out of the loop. Like, what happened to any kind of music I could really really enjoy. Only The Marshall Mathers L.P. was truly kind of cool, and even that you had to take with a grain of salt because nobody knew if Eminem was a cultural phenomenon or got lucky because he was Caucasian. But a strange thing happened in 2000. Quietly, a bunch of alternative-country musicians helped kickstart the indie revolution. The O Brother Where Art Thou soundtrack made me appreciate old-timey Appalachian and delta bluegrass, Neko Case made me love that an honest to goodness country singer could emerge from Washington state, and Ryan Adams, on his first solo album, Heartbreaker, made it cool to wear a checkered shirt and not kowtow to Nashville. Those three albums strangely allowed people like me to BUY music again. David Gray took John Mayer to a more ethereal simplicity, taking over the adult alternative mantle that year too.

But it would be 2001, when two seminal albums made indie rock awesome. The Strokes with Is This It and The Shins with Oh Inverted World. The Strokes made it all right to rock again. The shunned studio pyrotechnics, keyboard wizardry, and beats. It was a clarion call to actually make something real. But they also couldn’t replicate that sound again and did the same thing as every other band has done, turn to strange producers, overloaded production, too much underbrush, and take something as great as a 3 minute rock song, and turn it into something complex, not very fun, and when it comes right down to a tone-deaf, non-musical fan, just kind of shitty. The Shins brought melody back in angular jangly pop and their cryptic New Mexican lyrics recalled early R.E.M. fused through a much better pop sensibility, which would coalesce with all of us loving them a few years later on the Garden State soundtrack.

2002 was the post-9/11 year and only Springsteen was able to capture that fucked up time with his remarkable return to form The Rising. The best album of the year by a longshot in a year that spawned Norah Jones crooning to us, Coldplay warbling their U2-lite commercial pap, and Eminem recycling his previous album. It also included the first decent offerings from Brendan Benson and Rilo Kiley, all taking indie rock in different directions, but too quietly to really get on the radar yet.

2003 was really the year of indie music taking over. The White Stripes rocked us with Seven Nation Army, and also made videos cool again, The Postal Service made the best of odd sounds in the studio and created a wonderful soundscape and Death Cab For Cutie finally hit it big with Transatlanticism, making the Pacific Northwest a center again for music, albeit muted, more melodic and less angry, strangely not definitive for its time. Like The Strokes, Kings Of Leon brought rock back for 15 minutes before being sucked into overproduction. Jesse Malin, Fountains Of Wayne and The Fiery Furnaces also took steps to make rock fun again, weird songs, cool hooks, all great ditties in the background that year. But the album that year was The Shins follow-up Chutes Too Narrow, perhaps the best distillation of their sound.

2004 was perhaps the best year for music in this new century. Green Day made a concept record that was brilliant, Kanye West made it OK to be middle class and black and palatable and relative to white guys (even from Canada), The Killers made the best David Bowie album in 30 years, Modest Mouse made an anthem for the ages, Franz Ferdinand made the best UK rock record in 20 years, Steve Earle made a great anti-war record, and Rilo Kiley combined Hollywood and angst, and did it way better than a Sofia Coppola movie.

2005 brought us some more focused music from Drive-By Truckers, perhaps America’s most underrated band, Ben Folds returned to form with Songs For Silverman, particularly the brilliant Late, a tribute to the late Elliott Smith. Bright Eyes finally held together a group of songs that worked, with Wide Awake, It’s Morning, Sufjan Stevens told great tales of sadness and history with Illinoise, Ben Lee brought quirky pop back with Awake Is The New Sleep, Brendan Benson channeled his music into a fine pop record with The Alternative To Love, and The Clientele made soundscapes palatable that summer. Ryan Adams and Death Cab kept indie alive, if a bit disappointing in their follow ups but the album of the year was Franz Ferdinand’s sophomore effort, You Could Have It So Much Better, a brilliant and musically adventurous rock record with Kanye following his debut with a great sophomore effort. And although the Garden State soundtrack got indie rock right, Cameron Crowe’s Elizabethtown soundtrack collected some great gems in the indiesphere.

2006 and 2007 have not been as exciting musically. The Raconteurs got the summer hit right, and Jenny Lewis made a great solo record, Springsteen brought back political folk, and Dylan made a third straight Americana record, his best streak since the late 60s. But the album of the year, perhaps the decade was Boys & Girls In America by The Hold Steady, the best American rock record in my memory, and a perfect follow-up to their solid sophomore effort Separation Sunday. 2007 has also been disappointing, The Shins, Rilo Kiley and Kanye West all made third albums that weren’t as successful as previous efforts. Bruce Springsteen made his best rock record since The River with Magic. But 2007 belonged to an NYC singer/songwriter representing the borough of Queens, Jesse Malin, whose Glitter In The Gutter channeled his punk sensibilities and his great lyrical sense into a great rock record.

Nothing on the horizon seems to be all that promising however, and as I look back and reminisce through my iPod, through 10 years of music, the soundtrack of my life if you will, I can’t help feel that it was never as good as the eras before it, not as good as the 60s and 70s, not even the 80s, maybe as good as the 90s. And I’m not sure if this is how we digest music now and then, or whether my ear has changed, or whether the industry has completely changed. When I was 15, I would hear a song on the radio, check out what Rolling Stone or Spin said about it, maybe buy it, maybe tape it off the radio, maybe tape it from a friend, maybe trade for it if it was used. When I was 22, we could spend 4 hours downloading one song, usually of horrible quality and questionable legality. When I was 27, torrents began to take over the illegal downloading, again of inferior quality, which was sort of taken up by iTunes, giving you 192 kpbs versions of less-than-full quality CD rips. The whole era changed how we conceive music, hear a song, either on the radio, on a TV show, in a movie, on a commercial, and download it. If we really like it, buy the album. If we don’t love it, download it. If we want to support them, go to the live show and buy the album. If they are Paul McCartney or Mick Jagger, steal it or burn it because what the hell, they have loads of cash to spare. The big problem with this era is that unless you had the cash to buy vinyl, or step it up and get the ill-conceived formats of SACD and DVD-Audio, the sound of music suffered, to a tinny, cruddy format to squeeze on to your iPod. The ocular (from CDs and liner notes and album covers) and the sonic (from the quality sound of CDs) joy of music was recast to good headphones and inferior copies. And I think this led directly to the steady decline of investment, by the major labels, and by the indie labels, in conceptualizing and supporting good albums. The single means everything, and few singers and few bands take the time to craft something of a lasting nature, in terms of album rock. And what’s more, those that do, often become so self-indulgent that after early success, you wonder what the hell they were doing when their fourth album is barely decipherable beneath the engineered beats, the Bollywood and drum n bass influences, the muffled vocals, the fuzzed out guitar, the synth layers, and the pre-recorded drum tracks, making dare I say it, album rock all sound like a misconceived Peter Gabriel album.

I leave you with these thoughts: good music is out there, and in many ways it’s easier to find, but you have to sort through a lot of crap to get to it, even what Pitchfork and bloggers say is good, even what you think ought to be good, even if it is your favourite artist. The music industry has been behind the curve for so long, the lawsuits against fans downloading music, the bands and musicians with the least to lose (Metallica) bitching about artistic freedom and copyright implications, the new and great and interesting bands not getting any investment to produce great albums, and the fans ultimately not giving a shit because they don’t need to buy the filler any more, just get me that catchy song for 99 cents from iTunes. Further, artists have resorted to intriguing ways of selling their albums, Prince put his in newspapers, Radiohead told people to pay what they like for it. People want to make good music, but what the major labels feed us is often such derivative crap that it even pales in comparison to every era of music before it. There needs to be a balance somewhere, but when and where that will be is uncertain. The death rattle of rock n roll is always around the corner…

The Films Of 2006: A Year In Review

It's time once again for Jamie's annual film roundup. What was good, what was lame, what was crap and what was genius. Let me preface my meditations with the caveat that most of this year's movies, the American studio ones, the art house indie ones, the subtitled international ones, the made-for-cable ones and the documentaries, were largely crap. After a return to form year, with last year's excellent crop of movies, brilliant performances and unexpected surprises, 2006 will be remembered as a year awful short on high praise.

I should note that there are still a few movies I have not seen. These include The Lives Of Others, Days Of Glory, Infamous, Notes On A Scandal, Venus, Inland Empire, 10 Items Or Less, Breaking and Entering, Miss Potter and Black Book. So without further adieu, I give you the 2006 year in review:

The Worst Movies Of The Year

This category can include a lot of films but to be really bad, you can't just be Big Momma's House 2 or even Basic Instinct 2. Those movies are already going to suck, before you even see them. No, to truly be a bad movie, it has to be one you might actually WANT to see. And so here are the lamest films of the year:

1. Apocalypto. Now, maybe I just hate Mel Gibson but I thought he was an interesting filmmaker, what with Braveheart. But this Mayan tragedy is a veiled and not-to-subtly racist film that depicts Mayan society, that of the creators of the calendar and an early advanced civilization, as bloodthirsty savages. The closing shot with our hero trying to escape and glimpsing the European ships en route to his homeland is so ham-handed that it made me want to gag. Mel, you are an insult to moviemaking right now. To redeem yourself, I think you need to play a Nazi who gets what's coming to him.

2. The Pink Panther. As many of you know, I hate Steve Martin. Crappy actor and an unfunny jackass. This is a travesty.

3. Lady In The Water. Signs was good. The Sixth Sense was ok. Unbreakable, meh. The Village, pretty lame. This was just a disaster. M. Night Shyamalan, the game's over.

4. The Black Dahlia. Oh my god, how did this get made. First, it just destroys James Ellroy's novel. Second, Josh Hartnett is just a pathetic leading man. But it is De Palma who just destroys what could have been a good movie.

5. You, Me and Dupree. OK. this review counts for the next 3 as well. Owen Wilson, Ben Stiller, Vince Vaughn and Luke Wilson are good comedians at times. They are also propped up by Wes Anderson and good screenplays. This year however, they starred in vehicles that sucked. Dupree = Owen Wilson = barf

6. Night At The Museum = Stiller = shoot me

7. The Break-Up = Vaughn = lametacular

8. My Super Ex-Girlfriend = Luke Wilson = slightly less lamer than the others but definitely suckfilled.

9. Fur/Manderlay. OK, these are two Nicole Kidman movies. She is the world's most over rated actress. Fur is just all so over-the-top and her portrayal of this photographer makes me want to puke. But not as much as being Lars Von Trier's muse (in Dogville) isn't helping her career and his dated diatribe windbag crap against America is wearing thin. I'm as hate-filled about US foreign policy as the next liberal, but Von Trier is a total self-indulgent asshole and this latest allegory about American slavery is just plain insulting.

10. All The King's Men. How to butcher a great novel, well, get James Carville, architect of Bill Clinton's election victory, as producer, select a brilliant cast and then drop the lamest script on them. This one sucked from the start.

The Most Disappointing Movies Of The Year

These ones weren't horrible, so to speak, but they lacked something and you felt like you wanted your $7 back.

1. Babel. COME ON, this might be the best picture winner! Give me a freaking break. The stories are so disconnected that connecting them is simply a film device. The director's underlying notions of chance and the inability of the world to speak a common language is a bit of a stretch in connection stories set in Morocco, Mexico, Japan and California. Instead of reaching an ultimate conclusion that satisfies any filmgoer, everything is left unfulfilled. I was most disappointed and I know I'm not alone. But there will be others who will insist on its brilliance.

2. Borat. OK, it had its moments, but again, I live in the United States. You don't have to make them look like idiots, if you know what I mean. If I hadn't seen all the Borat skits on Ali G, maybe this would have been better.

3. United 93. Again, it's almost sacrilegious to criticize this film but come on, it was a depressing and horrible event and without the depth and philosophical underpinnings of say, Spielberg's Munich, this is just a live action re-creation of this flight. Using no name actors simply made it credible but Greengrass is still a hack and will be until he makes a film that doesn't disappoint.

4. Running With Scissors. It's long and tedious and yes this kid had crazy parents and weird guardians but it all feels too much like Terry Gilliam directed it without a script to propel it to an ending. And Annette Bening just recreates her American Beauty character in another off form.

5. Marie Antoinette. This one just floated on for two hours and when it ended, I wondered where the director of Lost In Translation disappeared to?

6. Man Of The Year. Should have been much better. Great concept ruined by a crappy script and for once, not by Robin Williams who actually creates something kind of interesting here. Ah, too bad.

7. The Fountain. 6 years in the making and Darren Aronofsky proves that he is kind of a twee weirdo but not really a very good director. I got that impression back when Requiem For A Dream was considered so amazing.

8. Dreamgirls. It needed some continuity. Don't get me wrong, I liked it, I just didn't see what the big deal is all about.

9. Flags Of Our Fathers. Like the Mel Gibson vehicle a few years back We Were Soldiers, this film doesn't ring true. It wasn't a bad movie, it just told a story that was simply not interesting and got bogged down in the lives of men used by their government. Believe me, there are better stories of Americans being exploited by their government.

10. A Good Year. This one just fell flat. I like Russell Crowe, I think he is a great actor but this one just didn't gel the way his impressive streak of earlier films had.

The Documentaries

All of them are good, some are great

1. When The Levees Broke: A Requiem In Four Acts
2. One Bright Shining Moment: The Forgotten Summer Of George McGovern
3. An Inconvenient Truth
4. Shut Up And Sing
5. An Unreasonable Man

The above four are great documentaries with Spike Lee's documentary perhaps the best film of the year.

6. Sarah Silverman: Jesus Is Magic/Dave Chappelle's Block Party
7. An Evening With Kevin Smith 2: Evening Harder
8. Cocaine Cowboys
9. Wordplay
10. Who Killed The Electric Car?/Al Franken: God Spoke
11. Why We Fight?/The Ground Truth/Iraq For Sale/The Road To Guantanamo/The War Tapes

These ones are good, and the 5 Iraq docs are all interesting and difficult to stomach.

The Foreign Films

I love movies in languages other than English because the stories are so bizarre, different and just plain weird sometimes. Here are the best foreign films of the year, an unfortunately weak year, save for the fact that I have not seen Days Of Glory, Algeria's WWII film, and The Lives Of Others which sounds like the best foreign film of the year:

1. The Lives Of Others
2. Volver
3. After The Wedding
4. Days Of Glory
5. Pan's Labyrinth
6. Bon Cop Bad Cop
7. The Death Of Mr. Lazarescu
8. House Of Sand

Recommended But With A Moderate Thumbs Up

These are movies that make good rentals but didn't set the world on fire

1. The History Boys
2. A Scanner Darkly
3. Akeelah And The Bee
4. Tristram Shandy: A Cock And Bull Story
5. The World's Fastest Indian
6. The Pursuit Of Happyness
7. Little Children
8. Shortbus
9. Children Of Men
10. Art School Confidential
11. Lucky Number Slevin
12. Renaissance
13. Hard Candy
14. Half Nelson
15. Down In The Valley
16. Clerks 2
17. Idiocracy
18. Ask The Dust
19. For Your Consideration
20. The Rocket

The Unexpected Surprises

These can be films that I thought were going to suck but didn't, sequels that lived up to originals, and just plain why am I watching this oh wait, this isn't bad at all

1-3. We Are Marshall/Invincible/Glory Road: I am a sucker for sports movies but these three are great, taking place in West Virginia, Philly and West Texas. And Matt McCaugnahay, Mark Wahlberg and Josh Lucas are all fantastic. Man, I love these movies. I am TOTALLY the guy who would've cried my eyes out if I was alive when Brian's Song came on television back in 1971!

4. Trust The Man: A wonderful little movie about two couples struggling with their relationships. Maggie Gyllenhaal, Billy Crudup and David Duchovny are great.

5. Brick: This amazing but dark film takes film noir and detective dialogue and translates it to high school. With the best young actor out there, Joseph Gordon-Levitt

6. Bobby: Who would have thought that Emilio Estevez would actually have a good movie in him. Sure it has some weak moments but for the most part, this is a wonderful tribute to one of my heroes, namely Robert F. Kennedy.

7.Sherrybaby: Maggie Gyllenhaal is the best actress this year. She gives such a dynamite performance here in a very depressing but smart and challenging film about a single mother released from prison

8. Catch A Fire: A great little film about South African apartheid starring Derek Luke and Tim Robbins

9. Déjà Vu: Who would have thought this Jerry Bruckheimer/Tony Scott film for Denzel Washington would actually be so much fun. Yes, it's ludicrous but who cares...nobody can walk through a crime scene and look more awesome than Denzel!

10-11. Superman Returns/The Devil Wears Prada: Two fun, good popcorn movies that did not disappoint. I thought they would suck but they did not!

Almost Greatness: 10 Films That Were Excellent But Just A Notch Shy Of Greatness

1. Rocky Balboa: I expected so little from this movie that I came in all set to laugh inappropriately that I wound up LOVING this movie. This is the popcorn film of the year bar none! Best Rocky since Rocky but I think better because Stallone plays it with a little wit and a good sense of humour. Never thought this would make the Top 50 but here it is!

2. Letters From Iwo Jima: The best foreign language film and the best World War II movie since The Thin Red Line. Eastwood's cinematographer uses wonderful shades of black to expose the horror of war.

3. Blood Diamond: Leo and Djimon are excellent in this Ed Zwick action movie about getting away from the bad guys in diamond-torn West Africa.

4. Scoop: Yes, I love Woody Allen and this cute romp in England is funny and made me laugh. Ian McShane is great!

5. The Queen: Mesmerizing performances by Helen Mirren and Michael Sheen make this docudrama a great exercise in bringing contemporary figures of history to the screen.

6. World Trade Center: While many disliked this film, I thought it was a really exciting movie with great acting from Maggie Gyllenhaal and Michael Pena. Oliver Stone proved that he could return to form.

7. The Good German: More of an exercise in style than substance but still, seeing Clooney, Blanchett and Maguire in Third Man-esque black and white demonstrates Steven Soderbergh's love of old films and his skill as a master craftsman.

8. Thank You For Smoking: A great satire about lobbyists and a funny comedy about how a man who does something quite abhorrent actually lives with himself at night!

9-10. Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest/The Da Vinci Code: Two fun, good popcorn movies that did not disappoint. Even The Da Vinci Code contains enough thrills to get you excited.

The 12 Best Films of 2006 (in descending order to heighten your anticipation)

12. The Good Shepherd: Hypnotic and interesting but a bit long. Definitely one that requires a couple viewings to truly appreciate. But the CIA is such a fascinating subject that it is really an eye-opener to watch such a restrained and informative movie.

10-11. The Illusionist and The Prestige: Both these films about magic and sleight of hand were a lot of fun. They also contained some of the most spellbinding cinematography this year. Kudos to Wally Pfister and Dick Pope! As my brother Scott would say, I liked them both equally!

9. Little Miss Sunshine: OK, slightly over-hyped but hey, it's a great movie with wonderful performances by Alan Arkin and Steve Carell.

8. Game 6: This little drama about a New York playwright who loves the Boston Red Sox plays itself out during the 6th game of the 1986 World Series, perhaps the first memory I have of crying because of heartache! Michael Keaton is excellent in this movie and Don DeLillo's script is a riot, dark and intellectual.

7. Casino Royale: The Best Bond movie since Connery's 1960s stint. Fabulous popcorn movie.

6. V For Vendetta: Sure it wasn't perfect but this is a great movie, come on, it's so wonderful to have a sci fi film where they fight fascists! Because that's what you are supposed to fight dammit!

5. The Last King Of Scotland: This movie has stuck with me for so long. Forest Whitaker is the best actor this year, no doubt about it, but James McAvoy is also phenomenal in this claustrophobic and intense drama about Idi Amin. Great movie

4. A Prairie Home Companion: Robert Altman's swan song as it were as he passed away this year but a wonderful ensemble film that celebrates Garrison Keillor and the Fitzgerald Theater in St. Paul, Minnesota. GO GOPHERS!

3. Inside Man: Spike Lee had two amazing films this year and this was the most exciting little bank heist on screen in a long time. Clive and Denzel were great. Highly watchable repeatedly!

2. Stranger Than Fiction: It has taken me a long time to warm to Will Ferrell but he is fantastic in this movie about what happens when a writer imagines a character who actually exists. Best screenplay of the year too!

1. The Departed: Well, it better be Marty Scorsese's year because this is by far, the best film of the year. A genre thriller that gives us some Scorsese trademarks but makes it the most fun you can have when almost everybody gets bullets in the brain! A great great movie, perhaps the best movie in 5 or 6 years, since the year 2000, which had maybe 4 brilliant movies come out.

But She Wasn't All That Great Of A Girlfriend: The Hold Steady & The Recapturing Of American Rock N Roll

Those of you know me know two things. I bitch a lot and most days I still listen to Bruce Springsteen. If I could sing and could make my guitar talk, I'd be a combination of Springsteen, that earnest guilt-ridden Jersey Shore euphoria and Paul Westerberg, drunken hedonistic crisp autumn Twin Cities rock, and then turn it up a few notches. Since I stayed on my ass, and let the demons of political science overtake me, my prayers and fantasties have been answered by the Hold Steady. Three albums on, this Twin Cities via Brooklyn band is the best rock and roll band in America. Coming at you only a week after The Killers' Sam's Town, the biggest sophmoric flop of all time, a labored, stilted, dull attempt at sounding like Born To Run whereupon a second listen they sound far closer to Rick Springfield, The Hold Steady actually make a Born To Run-like record, but they slam it out of the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome with some remarkably faithful Replacements-esque riffs and balls to the wall anger. Bottom line: what a great fucking record. If you'd heard me this summer, I was biotching that iTunes music store had killed album rock. And then The Hold Steady restore my faith. The beauty of this band is that they understand WHY they love music and they write about it, and in the process have made a record that you can just sit back and listen to as a busting out of your stereo rock record that you might think was recorded in a Minneapolis hotel room in 1982, and then when you listen that secod time to the words, you find that they are remakably about ALL OF US, yeah, you and me, and our friends, a collection of smart asses, irony-laden disappointments, underachievers, do-gooders and assholes, and then people who just don't give a fuck. It's about all of us, which makes it universal, well, universal at least for a white UMC kid who went to graduate school and is feeling like he got fucked over. The Hold Steady is the soundtrack of my life at this particular moment in my life, one that I can't wait to share with my girlfriend. I as Schmalz knows, I don't like to give up my secret music loves. Sure I'll chat you up on Bob Dylan's entire catalogue, bhut don't even talk to me about The Fiery Furnances or Springsteen B-Sides or The 'Mats...THEIR MINE. I want The Hold Steady to be as well, but they are just toooo good not to share with everybody. The album is called Boys and Girls of America, it kicks things off with the best track "Stuck Between Stations". It's about all of our fucked up lives and the narrator, adopting Kerouac's Sal Paradise epitaph for American youth, lead singer Craig Finn just rips into our twentysomething years with reckless abandon, covering suicide, sex disguised as love, even love of sports teams and it's like an extra track from Let It Be and then it morphs into an authentic Rosalita-like Jersey swamp songscape....THESE TWIN CITIES KISSES THEY SOUND LIKE CLICKS AND HISSES! Oh my God, I wish I'd written that! And then it's like Roy Bittan takes over on piano, and then Bob Stinson plays guitar, it's like Paul Westerberg and The E Street Band or Bruce Springsteen and the Replacements! It's just so fucking awesome. And that's just the first track.

Track 2, Chips Ahoy! is a about a girl who can predict horse races, keeping her sort-of boyfriend in drug money, but she doesn't seem to enjoy the relationship or her uncanny ability to call a trifecta at the track. How am I supposed to know that you're high if you won't even dance....it's less about drugs than about being completely unfulfilled in life. Oh, but it rocks, it's straight out of Westerbergian zeitgeist.

Track 3 is called Hot Soft Light which should have been Track 2 on Jailbreak sandwished between the title track in The Boys Are Back In Town, the guitar is so faithful to Thin Lizzy that it may as well have been recorded in the mid-70s, and then it's like the second side of the first record of the Spiringsteen Live 75-85 with some brilliant callout to a non-existant crowd. It's one o the best live tracks that's not actually live, it just feels like you are right there.

Oh man, it's late, it just keeps going and going, every song is solid, you'll find new stuff in the 8 tracks, it never disappoints from the Hammond B-3 in the middle of a song about liquor runs in between two songs about getting high in your basement, like this pretty much covers everything from the time you were 15 through your 31st year. Best band in America, you better fuckin believe it.

Jamie