Review: 2011 A YEAR IN REVIEW & THE TOP TEN AND A HALF

           2011 is one of the best, and oddest film years in recent memory. On one hand, while there were numerous great films year round, none of them particularly sticks out the way something like Slumdog Millionaire, Avatar, Inglourious Basterds, Inception, Toy Story 3, all did in the last few years. In terms of big movies it was actually a very poor year; there was a record number of sequels, threequels, fourthquels, fifthquels and prequels; 27 in total, not including remakes. There was even an octoquel. But besides that said eighth Harry Potter Film that we waited a decade for none were memorable, and at least two were essentially a remake of the previous installment (Hangover 2 and Transformers 3).

            And yet at the same time there was a major breakthrough in independent filmmaking. For the past few years online movie watching, particularly Netflix, has brought the realization that the market for such films is huge; it is just not as big as the market for Avatar. Nevertheless Indie films can use a limited release as a form of promotion, and earn their money back, off theaters. Either on iTunes, Redbox, Netflix, DVD sales, whatever. And thus the public’s legal accessibility to such films has greatly increased.

            It has been an interesting year; and to top it off it might be the first time that a silent movie takes Best Picture, since the first Academy Awards were held. Anyways, here is our Top Ten and a half for 2011, presented in no particular order besides alphabetical:

Review: FALL/WINTER 2011

            So once again it is January and usually we end up writing a top-ten column like every other movie blog out there. However, this year I’ve been writing a top-five column for every season of the year (you can check the spring and summer column here and here). So I guess it is time to review this years Fall/Winter season. I am grouping the fall/winter into a single column for a few reasons: firstly, because the Spring and Summer seasons were each four months long, so the third season should also be four months, and secondly because the Holiday/winter/Award season is usually only attributed to the month between Thanksgiving and Christmas, and it would be insane to cram a whole season of movie watching into one month. Thus we have the fall/winter season of 2011 here.

Review: HUGO

So, Scorsese decided to direct a kid’s movie… when I first saw the trailer for Hugo I wasn’t quite sure what to think of this fact. It looked like a Spielberg movie, a big budget, techno-family epic, and in 3D!!! What was Marty, the Gangster Priest, the King of Gritty, the man with more four-letter words in his movies than an entire season of South Park combined doing? Was he back on coke perhaps? Amazingly the result was a film very different from any of his previous films, and yet very much like them at the same time; this is not a children’s movie by Scorsese but a Scorsese movie for children.