Top Ten Movies of 2008 – Erin Nolan Edition
Erin Nolan December 22, 2008
It’s just my luck that my first chance to write a year-end top ten list for Film.com would come in 2008 — a year that some have dubbed as one of the worst years for movies ever. By the end of the summer, movie fans were so starved for hits that we were willing to recognize Beverly Hills Chihuahua as our savior! But while I’m sure future generations will laugh at us for making that one a success, I hope they’ll also still be watching these ten movies, which would’ve deserved recognition in any year:
10. Young@Heart
This documentary about a senior citizen chorus that takes on the music of everyone from James Brown to Sonic Youth is a little too cutesy for its own good at times. (The music videos are a bit much.) But the openness of these seniors to adapt to the whims of their tireless director — and their willingness to press on and perform despite numerous health problems and the constant threat of losing friends — is truly inspiring. Chorus member Fred Knittle’s dignified and heart-wrenching performance of Coldplay’s “Fix You,” complete with an oxygen tank at his side and the memory of his recently deceased duet partner looming, is hands down the most moving musical performance captured on film this year.
This movie would’ve ranked higher on the list if I’d found even a second of it to be entertaining. Truthfully, many of the ugly scenes of family drama in this movie made me want to run screaming from the theater. But the next day, I realized that was only because it had done that good a job at displaying the brutal truth about how hard it can be to just exist in a family.
Jason Segel graduated from a stock player in the Apatow gang to screenwriter and leading man in this funny and touching romantic comedy. But this movie’s great gift to the American public was introducing us to the truly hilarious Russell Brand.
Robert Downey Jr. was pretty hilarious in this one. It’s always fun to see big Hollywood stars like Ben Stiller, Jack Black and even Tom Cruise satirize their own industry with such gusto. This was both the crudest and the sharpest comedy of the year.
It can’t beat The Dark Knight in terms of scope or ambition, but Iron Man is still a superhero movie that raised the bar for the entire genre. The Dark Knight was an incredibly inventive take on an already beloved franchise, but Robert Downey Jr.‘s charismatic performance made Iron Man a brand new pop culture icon.
Only a studio with as flawless a track record as Pixar could get away with producing a near-silent space opera robot romance with an underlying message about environmental responsibility. Yet WALL-E works because the Pixar crew understands the limitlessness of a child’s imagination — and that there are many children in this world who loved The Red Balloon as much as they loved Star Wars, and that some of these kids even loved An Inconvenient Truth.
You have to admire Baz Luhrmann‘s commitment to spectacle. In Australia he’s created a sweeping epic in the tradition of Gone with the Wind, complete with stampeding cattle, a World War 2 air raid and passionate kisses in the rain. Nicole Kidman gives her best performance in years, Hugh Jackman proves that whole Sexiest Man Alive thing was no fluke, and Luhrmann dares you to believe in the magic of the movies again.
It’s strange to think of a movie as a fairy tale when it features its main character suffering electro-shock torture in its first five minutes. But 18-year-old orphan Jamal Malik is a true Cinderella, and the entire world is his wicked stepmother. Some people may roll their eyes at the many extraordinary plot conveniences of Slumdog, but there’s no denying its visual splendor and heartfelt performances, or the power of its message — that even the worst of life’s experiences enrich our lives, sometimes quite literally.
Gus van Sant‘s poignant and politically charged biopic of Harvey Milk, the first openly gay man to be elected to public office in the United States, is a riveting look at a very specific time and place in history, as well as the timeliest piece of art I’ve seen this year. In the film’s climactic third act Harvey fights tirelessly to defeat a piece of legislation that would make it legal to fire teachers based on their sexual orientation. It’s a battle for human rights that anyone, gay or straight, can relate to. If I happened to be a high school teacher today, Milk is a film I’d urge all of my students to see.
What is the true nature of humanity? What keeps society from spinning into chaos in the face of adversity? These are not the types of questions you’d ever expect a superhero flick to tackle, at least not with any real depth. But Christopher Nolan‘s sequel to Batman Begins is the year’s most compelling psychological thriller. Not to mention the most riveting crime drama. It also contains the most thrilling action sequences of the blockbuster season and the most iconic performance of the year. It’s not just the villains of Gotham City who should fear this Batman — the year’s crop of Oscar hopefuls should be shaking in their boots, too.
Tags: australia, milk, the dark knight
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