TOP 10 OF 2018

As opposed to last year, 2018 has made it difficult for me to narrow things down to a finite ten films that I thought worthy of making my list. These kinds of lists, no matter how superfluous, would always fare better were they put together in a couple years time rather than in a rush in the last few days of the year as one is attempting to cram in all the end-of-year awards contenders being released simultaneously as well as catching up on everything that might have been missed throughout the year, but that is supposed to be really good and you don't know why you didn't watch some of these sooner. Alas, some will slip through the cracks and while I made as valiant an effort as I possibly could (I even saw Holmes & Watson yesterday-more out of an undying loyalty to Ferrell than the potential of it making my list, of course) I still managed to miss more than I would have liked to. Furthermore, there have been films with exceptional moments that might feel like glaring omissions from my favorites list given you've likely heard a lot about them over the course of the last few months that will make many others; examples include films such as Green Book, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, and The Favourite. I couldn't agree more that each of those films possess inspired moments that transcend the art form, but as a whole were they films that made an impression on me that will last, if not forever, but at least a few weeks after seeing them? Not at this point, no, though I'm suspect this might change with at least two of these.

On the other hand, there are a handful of narrative features competing for spots on my list that, on any given day, might have been in one of those top ten spots; HBO's The Tale, the Joaquin Phoenix-starrer You Were Never Really Here, Steve McQueen's Widows, what could possibly be Robert Redford's swan song in The Old Man and the Gun, as well we Bo Burnham's feature debut in Eighth Grade would round out my top fifteen at this point, but if I included documentaries on this list it would be a completely different story. The Zen Diaries of Garry Shandling, Three Identical Strangers, Whitney, Free Solo, not to mention Won't You Be My Neighbor? were all fantastic documentaries released this year where at least three of those would have made my top ten, but given the differences in the approach to filmmaking it only seems fair to highlight them outside of a traditional top ten list. Of course, going back over the year there are many regrets around films like Blindspotting, The Hate U Give, Searching, Bad Times at the El Royale, Halloween, Instant Family, Vice, Shoplifters, Love, Simon, and Hearts Beat Loud that I wish there were space for as I enjoyed each and every one of them to the extent I would genuinely label them as "great". All things considered though, please know I go into every film truly hoping to see one of the best movies of the year and the ones that follow are the ones that surprised me with their quality or surpassed every expectation I held for them. Enjoy!

Movies I Wanna See Most: Summer 2018

The summer movie season is always one of my favorite times of the year because it seems people outside those of us who consistently devour movies seem to make a big deal of what's opening in theaters each week. When it's something the masses are interested in it feels like a celebration and no matter how crappy or generic some of these movies might be that attract the masses I can't help but smile about people finding joy and excitement in the cinema. I've always attempted to find a balance between big-budget and indie fare rather than dismiss the blockbusters and only adore the smaller, more intimate movies. I like to try and think in terms of objectives and how well a movie accomplishes the objectives it sets out to accomplish by the end of the film. This seems especially critical when approaching traditional summer popcorn movies. That doesn't mean I'm necessarily more excited for Skyscraper than I am something like Hot Summer Nights, but rather that I'm interested in both for very different reasons. While neither of those titles will be on my list I would place director Brad Bird's follow-up to his 2005 Pixar juggernaut, The Incredibles II, just outside my top ten along with the likes of Rupert Wyatt's follow-up to his The Gambler re-make titled Captive State that stars John Goodman and explores the lives of beings on both sides of a conflict that has been in place for nearly a decade after an extra-terrestrial force took occupation in Chicago. The film has an August release date and was included in my most anticipated of the year as Wyatt's entry in the last Planet of the Apes trilogy is still my favorite and this film seems like a natural progression after Goodman's fantastic turn in 10 Cloverfield Lane, but the absence of any trailer or any promotional material whatsoever makes me wonder if this one might not get delayed. Elsewhere, there is The Happytime Murders from Brian Henson (son of Jim) a dark comedy about the puppet cast of an eighties children's TV show that begin to get murdered one by one, Gary Ross' (Pleasantville, The Hunger Games) take on a Steven Soderbergh heist flick with the star-studded Ocean's 8, and likely Morgan Neville's (20 feet from Stardom) documentary that explores the life, lessons, and legacy of iconic children's television host, Fred Rogers in Won't You be My Neighbor?. You won't find the likes of The Equalizer II or The First Purge on my list and none of the broad mainstream comedies such as Tag or Uncle Drew are on there despite the fact I'll no doubt end up enjoying both of them, but like I said, I'm by no means opposed to unabashed blockbusters as is evidenced in my number ten pick...

VALERIAN AND THE CITY OF A THOUSAND PLANETS Review

It's all about context, people. As an individual who thoroughly enjoys and kind of revels in the imagining of what's beyond our own solar system and, by default, creating something unique and fascinating out of that imagination I am always intrigued by something that looks like Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets. Intrigued being the key word here as there is always the potential for such an experiment or endeavor of such imagination to go off the rails in ways that it can't maintain or doesn't think through. With Valerian, director Luc Besson (The Fifth Element, Lucy) has adapted a French science fiction comic series that is no doubt close to his French heart, but while Valérian and Laureline (which would have seemingly been a better, simpler title) was first published in Pilote magazine in 1967 and went on to become one of the top five biggest selling Franco-Belgian comics titles for its publisher, Dargaud, one has to wonder if Besson's vision is what original creators Pierre Christin and Jean-Claude Mézières imagined their imaginations becoming some fifty years later. I've never read the source material and this may very well be in line with exactly the kind of style and tone Christin and Mézières utilized in their original stories, but one has to wonder about the purpose of style and tone then and the purpose of as much now. Is the more irreverent and frankly, rather goofy tone in response to other science-fiction adventures being more serious or was that how it was originally intended to be read? With something of a farcical quality to it? I'm sure someone on the internet will be more than happy to oblige my curiosity with a detailed answer, but the fact of the matter is it doesn't really matter what the original intent was or how well or not well Besson has adapted the material because we're here now-in a post-Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets world that just so happens to exist in the same world that is post-Star Wars, and post-Guardians of the Galaxy, and hell, even post-John Carter so what is it about Valerian that differentiates itself and does it differentiate for better or worse? For me, Valerian is a step in the wrong and a rather bizarre direction. Sure, it has some interesting visual ideas and some fun sequences, but with dialogue this bad, a rather hackneyed story that attempts to disguise itself by accentuating its bizarre elements, and a completely miscast Dane DeHaan I can't help but to feel Valerian might have been better off left on the page than having come alive only to find itself dead in the water so soon after.

Teaser Trailer for VALERIAN AND THE CITY OF A THOUSAND PLANETS

EuropaCorp has released the first trailer for director Luc Besson's (The Fifth Element, Lucy) sci-fi epic that looks to be one of the few original offerings next summer. Based on a long-running French comic Valérian and Laureline that was first published in 1967 Besson and his film have apparently "advanced" the material into a contemporary, unique and epic science fiction saga where the titular Valerian (Dane DeHaan) and Laureline (Cara Delevingne) are special operatives for the government of the human territories who are charged with maintaining order throughout the universe. Given the amount of nonsense that may sound like to some this teaser looks especially intriguing on a visual scale as we don't get too many story elements given it is, in fact, a teaser trailer. That said, I'm in for this weird mix of Besson's own Fifth Element (one can sense the similar production design in the cityscapes) and Guardians of the Galaxy. That more recent comparison will likely come to the mind of most movie-goers under the age of twenty-five as the trailer is accompanied by a classic pop song in the form of the Beatles, "Because," with the amount of strange creatures and space battles being more than reminiscent of that Marvel film. Of course, GotG fans will get their cake the first weekend of the summer movie season and with Valerian going head to head with Chis Nolan's Dunkirk opening weekend I'm curious to see how this $180-million epic is able to do. That said, the comparisons to James Gunn's film are likely only valid in terms of marketing as Besson has such a particular set of tendencies it's hard to imagine the final product resembling something as board room mandated as a Marvel movie. No matter the outcome and despite the fact I'll still be more anxious to see Dunkirk opening weekend I look forward to the potential this holds and hold out hope for something more along the lines of what Besson has crafted before rather than a Jupiter Ascending déjà vu. Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets also stars Clive Owen, Rihanna, Ethan Hawke, John Goodman, Herbie Hancock, Kris Wu, and opens on July 21st, 2017.

THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN Review

The Magnificent Seven, the re-make of the 1960 John Sturges film starring Yul Brynner and Steve McQueen, from director Antoine Fuqua (Training Day, The Equalizer) accomplishes exactly what it intends to be. This is pure popcorn entertainment meant to capitalize on the combination of brand awareness and the popularity of the actors it has on its roster. That said, it takes full advantage of those aspects while delivering a wholly satisfying blockbuster western. It is difficult even, to take away from what is being accomplished within this pure Hollywood product as its only ambition is clearly to deliver something of an updated mythos on the story of seven exceptionally skilled sharpshooters and little more. Given the Sturges film itself was a re-make of director Akira Kurosawa's 1954 film, Seven Samurai, that supplanted the story of a poor village under attack by bandits who recruited seven samurai warriors to help defend their village with an oppressed Mexican village that assembles seven gunfighters to help defend their homes from outlaws relays the idea this particular story is one that can easily be adapted for new ages, new circumstances, and with new relevance. And so, why re-make The Magnificent Seven once again? It seems as though Fuqua, while not having a complete answer, mostly intends to use MGM's idea to raid their classics catalog by allowing him to lend more context to and highlight more of the race relations that were taking place in the late 19th century than might have been approved of in 1960. In light of such a re-framing of history as people see it through pop culture (which is never a good place to rely on for your history, not in 1960 and not now) Fuqua has cast frequent collaborator Denzel Washington in the lead role or the equivalent of what Brynner played in the original. Filling out the titular seven we also have a Mexican in Vasquez (Manuel Garcia-Ruflo), a Korean in Billy Rocks (Byung-hun Lee), and a Native American in Red Harvest (Martin Sensmeier) with the remainder of the crew filling out the tall white man quota with the likes of Chris Pratt, Ethan Hawke, and Vincent D'Onforio. Whether Fuqua's version of these events takes advantage of such changes and actually pulls insight or interesting dynamics from these updates is another thing as the 2016 The Magnificent Seven doesn't stand to get too weighty or theoretical, but instead it simply puts these ideas out there for audiences to recognize while at the same time making these characters so bluntly badass that boxes such as ethnicity hardly seem to matter. Whether this works in favor or against the reasoning for this movie to exist is a conversation to be had, but as far as I'm concerned Fuqua's film is so relentlessly entertaining and such a fun experience there need be no greater reason for its existence.

MAGGIE'S PLAN Review

Maggie's plan is a little bit of a gimmick and that is to say the plan that our titular character comes up with and not the film itself. Despite the credentials of the cast and creators what we get in this new film from writer/director Rebecca Miller (The Ballad of Jack and Rose) is something akin to a Noah Baumbach picture (and therefore, by default, a Woody Allen picture) with more of a plot device to drive the characters rather than that of an engaging premise. The titular plan though, as gimmicky as it can sometimes feel, isn't the star of the movie and thus is what saves Maggie's Plan from completely discrediting itself instead allowing it to turn into the insightful, funny, and rather poignant piece it always seemed destined to be based on those aforementioned credentials. When it comes to smaller, independent features that focus largely on intellectuals and their need to create drama and conflict so as to drive their own creativity most can be pretentious without holding any actual water no matter how compelling or precise the dialogue. Maggie's Plan walks this line skillfully, beginning as a film that would fall squarely into the genre of "artists supposedly making great art based on their own lives that we now find appealing because we're watching a movie about them," but somehow manages to become more about the characters than the thickening plot that is driving them. It's a very "movie-like" set-up for a movie that doesn't feel as artificial as said set-up. That isn't to say Maggie's Plan should be one thing because it seems like it should be (a talkie indie drama), but that it turns out it very much does want to be a certain type of thing (a talkie indie drama) as well as a few other things (a screwball/melodrama) that makes the final product feel forced if not still mostly coherent. As stated earlier though, it is not the plotting or even the sometimes strained dialogue that is the driving force behind the film, but rather the people who begin as archetypal academics and are humanized due largely to their ideas and self-awareness (or lack thereof) to such an extent that by the end of the film it's easy to forgive the bipolar tone their movie carries.

Teaser Trailer for THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN Starring Denzel Washington

Antoine Fuqua has become something of a reliable, but still very interesting director save for the occasional Olympus Has Fallen, but even that film had its own set of charms. Following Training Day, which put him on the map and on the road to bigger things, Fuqua turned in a few standard genre films and the obligatory brand recognition blockbuster than never took off before returning to the arena that garnered him attention in the first place. The complicated and arguably underrated Brooklyn's Finest let audiences know (or those that saw it) that this was a man with a certain vision and, at the very least, a deep respect for character and story. With Olympus giving the director a little more creative leeway Fuqua teamed up with Denzel Washington once again for the steady and precise Equalizer which turned out better than it had any right to be. While Southpaw wasn't all I'd hoped for it looks as if Fuqua could really be in his element with his new film, a remake of the 1960 classic The Magnificent Seven. Re-teaming once again with Washington and having well-regarded screenwriters John Lee Hancock (The Blind Side) and Nic Pizzolatto (True Detective) adapt the screenplay from Akira Kurosawa's original Seven Samurai script there is certainly reason to be excited for the potential this remake holds. The IMDB page for Fuqua's film doesn't give William Roberts, who adapted Kurosawa's film for the 1960 film, any credit. And so, what this might mean we're getting in terms of Fuqua's film is anyone's guess, but with this first glimpse it seems Fuqua is staying very much within his own stylistic wheelhouse, but in bringing that to the Western terrain we could be in for something very cool if not exactly unique. The Magnificent Seven also stars Chris Pratt, Ethan Hawke, Vincent D’Onofrio, Byung-Hun Lee, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, Martin Sensmeier, Peter Sarsgaard, Haley Bennett, Matt Bomer, Cam Gigandet, Vinnie Jones, Sean Bridgers and opens in theaters on September 23rd.

REGRESSION Review

Ethan Hawke seems like the type of actor who does as much work as he can no matter the genre, or the paycheck simply because he loves the idea that he gets to make movies for a living. What's it matter, really? He can justify it all by saying one never knows what will catch on and he'd be right. After all, he made a low budget horror flick in The Purge three years ago that will see its third installment be released this year. Of course, it was also around this time that Hawke began to seem to give into the temptations of making more pure genre flicks outside of what is largely an independent filmography. With Sinister, Getaway, and what feels like a handful of direct to DVD releases Hawke has become the actor we wouldn't be surprised to see turn up in anything. His presence no longer signals whether what we're watching might be a horrible film or a near masterpiece as he's arguably starred in films on either end of that spectrum. With Regression the actor wanders back to the territory of the horror genre with what are nothing but honorable intentions, but unfortunately that willingness to commit to almost anything lets him down here. Written and directed by Alejandro Amenábar, who shared those same duties on both 2001's The Others and 2004's The Sea Inside that garnered him a barrage of rave reviews and what was undoubtedly a large amount of good will and momentum, Regression is inspired by a rise in the suspicion of Satanic cult-related activities in the early nineties and how such acts began making their way into the mainstream as well as what were apparently many a police investigations. Of course, through this guise the narrative feels all the more familiar given the number of horror films we've seen that get their "in" through a tortured official investigating these claims that are always scoffed at initially. While Amenábar certainly has an interesting approach to this type of story it might have aided his film even more had he come at it from a different perspective. As it is, there are both some beautifully haunting and cringingly cheap images on display with a few cool period details, but ultimately we've seen this all before and in much better, more effective fashions.

PREDESTINATION Review

The music in the first scene sets the tone for what we should settle in to suspect from most movies. Predestination sets an immediately familiar tone that hooks us into a comfort zone of action/thrillers we've seen time and time again. I was completely game as it is more than you can hope for when it comes to the gloom that typically hangs over January releases. It quickly becomes evident though that this isn't anything we've necessarily come to experience before despite the abundance of time travel movies over the last few years. It becomes clear from the outset this will be a layered time travel story given the literal bang it opens with and then with how it travels back introducing to us the procedural nature of the story. We are immediately hooked and we are taken in, not by the cheap and cheesy special effects that you somewhat expect from a movie like this given the outside influences and circumstances of its genre, release time and even the presence of Ethan Hawke. Rather, Predestination is not really an action film or special effects bonanza in that much of what one might consider "special effects" seem to be done in camera and in very basic, practical ways that work with the overall style of the piece. This is very much a science fiction film concerning decisions and conversations around those decisions that create motivation, justification, explanation while most importantly developing characters we care about and a sympathy that goes a long way when things begin to really unravel. In essence, I guess you could say this is more of a character study than anything else with the hook being that this character can travel through time and, in many ways, dictate the outcome of their own life depending on what they feel they need in order to create meaning from this existence. There is a lot of interesting stuff going on here and plenty of questions to ponder as things move swiftly along, but I also began to ask myself if this was indeed as entrancing as it seemed or if it was just kind of farcical. I couldn't tell, I'm still not sure if I can, but while I was watching I was certainly fascinated and consistently intrigued, meaning the movie did its job and did it well.

BOYHOOD Review

As Richard Linklater's twelve-year journey to document the human experience in our most formative of years comes to a close its main subject literally stares into an indeterminable distance and metaphorically across a horizon of endless possibilities. There is something serene about this final note, something not so much uplifting as it is promising though I suppose the promise of possibilities could stimulate such optimistic feelings. To be honest, it feels somewhat intimidating to even try and craft a response or essay around the epic that is Boyhood. There is a distinct looseness to the project that doesn't adhere it to the serious, more prestigious films that have been straddled with the title of epic, yet it is most definitely that. Filmed over the course of twelve years using the same actors Linklater has pieced this unique project together as he went along, letting it develop naturally and in this organic sense of what life is, where it's going and what it becomes Boyhood feels wholly unique in a way no other film can touch. The question though was always going to be if whether or not the final product of what the film turned out to be might ever match the ambition of the idea behind it. As much as I feel intimidated by the film and everything it represents that I in no possible way could hope to capture in a few short paragraphs was still worried it wouldn't be all it was built up to be. There was such praise, such interest, such unanimous passion for this film that it felt it would be a crime to take any issue with it. As the film began to roll and the groove became recognizable though I could only hope it proved in some way to surpass what I thought might unfold, that it might take me by storm and bring me into what everyone else was seeing. Needless to say, I think I understand where they are all coming from. As that aforementioned final scene is let loose upon us and we know the end is near it all begins to sink in, what we have just experienced. There isn't a particularly significant story at play here, but it is meaningful in that every person in the audience can in some way relate to one of the characters, situations or emotions that unfold through the life of Mason and in turn we feel a part of this film. A transcendent experience, more than any numbing or even thought-provoking entertainment could provide.

Worst Films of 2013

I usually include my least favorite films of the year at the bottom of my top 10 list but seeing as I will not be able to compile my top ten list this year until after January 10th (due to not having the opportunity to screen Her, Inside Llewyn Davis, August: Osage County or Lone Survivor until then) I am going ahead with publishing them separately this year. I feel out of the loop slightly as most critics have already put forth their top 10 lists but these are the drawbacks of living in a small market where you don’t get Nebraska until December 20th. In clearing that up, I don’t like to seek out movies that I think will be horrible, or even bad. I try to look for redeeming qualities in each and every film I see and these are the few this year I just couldn’t really get over or found them to be more disappointing than rewarding. Many of them were downright irritating given the potential they carried whether in cast or in filmmakers/writers. I didn’t get around to seeing many of the obvious choices such as Texas Chainsaw 3D, A Haunted House or Safe Haven and have included an alternate list of five films that are more easy targets for a list such as this rather than being as horrible as they have been made out to be by critical and box office reception. I won't get ridiculous and make a list of movies that weren't everything I wanted them to be, most falling into that category were still decent films even if they didn't meet my personal expectations. Still, while I even hesitate to make a list of what I consider some of the worse films this year as many of you who bother to look at these kinds of lists know what wasn't good and it seems pointless to single them out again, thus there were a few I took issue with and thought were given more praise than they deserved while not impressing me in the least. With that in mind, here are my top ten least favorite movies I saw this year...

GETAWAY Review

Courtney Solomon is no Justin Lin. Solomon could hardly even be considered a player at all in the action genre as he's only made three films and the first was 2000's Dungeons & Dragons adaptation that I never saw because I was both too young to care about it at the time and would have likely been massively confused if I had. I never played the game and the current 10% tomatometer score doesn't bode well for it either, but what really put the anticipation in the can for Getaway was knowing that Solomon also directed 2005's An American Haunting. I remember taking a date to that film and apologizing for how bad it turned out to be because it was my idea to go see it. With this third feature the director has made one of those films where all of the action revolves around a certain set of people locked into one location. This certainly might make things easier from a production standpoint as you don't have to deal with a ton of location scouting or all of the dynamics that go into orchestrating a production with a large cast involved, but when your location of confinement is on wheels there seems a much more complex scheme to choreograph and Getaway never seems to take advantage of its circumstances other than to feed us corny dialogue and messily shot action sequences that seem more thrown together than thought out. To be honest, there wasn't much expectation going into the film, but when you have such a simple premise and what seems to be outlandish execution paired with the fact that actors with the caliber of Ethan Hawke and the rising star of Selena Gomez presumably seeing something in the project you hope it might prove to be a fun, if not distracting experience. And yet, there isn't even an intentionally campy vibe to the project as it, for all intents and purposes, is as serious as a heart attack and with that tone does little to add fun to the predictable and lacking story that can't even sustain the brief hour and a half running time.

BEFORE MIDNIGHT Review

I can remember in 2004 when there seemed to be an unsettling amount of nervousness and excitement leading up to the premiere of Before Sunset. I was seventeen at the time and had not become as well acquainted with indie films or smaller, art house projects that were gaining recognition which in turn meant I had not seen the original film, 1995's Before Sunrise, that spawned this follow-up nine years later. Even though I'd heard much about Before Sunset that year and recognized Ethan Hawke from countless other movies I never made it around to seeing what all the fuss was about. I still had not at the beginning of this year and then I began to hear that same level of unique excitement that started to build when it was rumored that director Richard Linklater and both Hawke and co-star Julie Delpy were hard at work scouting locations for a third installment in their relationship evaluation trilogy. As it turned out the stars and director weren't simply looking for locations, but had indeed shot the third installment and as I now try to expose myself to as many facets of film as possible I felt a responsibility to catch up on what I was missing and what everyone else was talking about. This has led to an experience where I've come to know Hawke's Jesse and Delpy's Celine over a matter of two decades in less than a few weeks. It is at some level unnerving as you can literally see the way in which people age and relationships change, while it isn't until this latest installment, Before Midnight, that we get to see the effects of these characters having been in a relationship for some time now. The fact this film would exist might confirm what eventually happened after the cliffhanger at the end of Before Sunset as I assume Linklater and his crew would realize they couldn't repeat themselves by simply having Jesse and Celine meet up for a few hours and catch up with one another again. Lucky for us, this is true in that Jesse never caught that plane and instead stayed and started a family with Celine which has now evolved into a much more recognizable relationship than the type of fantasy, star-crossed lovers ordeal the first two films presented. I understand the appeal of these films and have truly come to feel as if I know these people, which is good considering the content of the conversations they have this time around.

THE PURGE Review

When Ethan Hawke showed up in last years legitimately scary Sinister I was happy to see the actor branch out slightly and give the genre picture a go. I was also glad he paired with the director of one of my other favorite scary movies of the last ten years, The Exorcism of Emily Rose. Upon seeing the first trailers and promotional materials for The Purge though I thought he might have jumped in head first too quickly and began splurging on the kinds of roles in the kinds of movies that might eventually end up in the five dollar bin. While this second trip into scary movie-land is not as intriguing or mysterious as the aforementioned Sinister it has an interesting enough premise to draw people towards it (and the creepy, over exaggerated face masks are always a plus in home invasion thrillers). Director James DeMonaco, who has only directed one previous feature before this, has also composed a script that contains a fair amount of potential in the points it is trying to make and the message it is trying to get across, but unfortunately we never really see any of the gritty realities of this new found way of life. No, instead of diving into that real potential the film could have brought to the experience it instead quickly dissolves into that standard home invasion film where we see every plot twist coming and every supposed scare is as obvious as how this whole thing is going to end up. There were times the movie almost had me fooled, had me thinking it was going to go a different way, but heaven forbid it do such a thing as to dare to make the audience unhappy. This timid nature ultimately results in the most typical conclusion led up to by the least surprising and least effective set of circumstances. Worse than all of this is the fact there are no likable characters here. We don't like our supposed protagonists from the beginning because they've succumbed to this annual event that makes little sense and we don't like their kids or their new enemies because they all make dumb decisions. In the end, there is only one word that comes to mind when I reflect on what this turned out to be: pointless.  

SINISTER Review

It has become like a bad joke to get hooked into horror films rolled out by the studios no matter what time of year they come out, but the ones looking like nothing more than cash cows usually show up around this time of year. They never live up to much and if anything inspire more laughs and mocks at the bad acting than they do provide authentic fear or at least a few jump scares. I like scary movies though, and I love the atmosphere they can provide when done right. Thus, I get suckered into them more often than I probably should. In 2005, after becoming pretty well acquainted with the tricks of the trade it was a refreshing piece of contemporary horror mixed with the tired genre of the exorcism films that made me trust in modern horror movies. In The Exorcism of Emily Rose watching the scary stuff mixed with the courtroom drama inspired a new sense of investment in the material and I was surprised to find a first time director behind such well developed characters and a story that explored a very effective way of getting across a very scary situation. Needless to say, when I heard that same director, Scott Derrickson, was returning to the horror genre after a disappointing follow up in The Day the Earth Stood Still remake I was hoping for something that would again rejuvenate the failing genre. Though I will say 2012 has been pretty steady when it comes to its scary movie offerings (Woman In Black, Cabin in the Woods) I was looking forward to Sinister the most and it certainly didn't disappoint in being one of the best modern horror movies of the past few years.