First I'll have to remember the movies I've watched that were released this year...
The Avengers,
The Dark Knight Rises,
Looper,
Cloud Atlas,
The Hobbit,
The Grey,
Chronicle,
Ghost Rider 2,
The Hunger Games,
American Reunion,
Brave, and
Amazing Spider-Man.
That's actually slightly more than I expected.
[HEADING=1]#5[/HEADING]
[HEADING=2]The Grey[/HEADING]
A psychological survival-thriller starring Liam Neeson, what it lacked in transparency about the character portrayed by Neeson it more than made up for in the characterization of the entire ensemble cast. It made the best of a relatively small budget, and packed the atmosphere in tight to its two-hour run-time, with an ample balance between tense chase sequences and quiet character-building segments.
[HEADING=1]#4[/HEADING]
[HEADING=2]Chronicle[/HEADING]
Another of those 'shaky-cam' 'found-footage' style movies,
Chronicle presented an interesting look at how suddenly gaining super-powers might affect a small group of high-school students. A short running time makes it feel like it ends much sooner than it should have, considering how long it spends building up to the actual conflict, but the character interaction is top-notch and the way that it presents the narrative is a very interesting take on the super-hero genre of films.
[HEADING=1]#3[/HEADING]
[HEADING=2]Looper[/HEADING]
Now, I honestly couldn't tell you what I expected when I went in to see this film, but it wasn't what I got. Based around conspiracies, time-travel, and underground corporations,
Looper presented a new dynamic on the "seasoned veteran meets bright-eyed, bushy-tailed underling" by actually subverting the trope entirely. Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Bruce Willis play against each other just as much as they do with, and it meshes together very well. A few plot-points aren't explained well (you could be forgiven for completely missing that the biggest twist is actually coming, as the plot-point that establishes it is introduced within the first few minutes of the film and almost entirely glossed over during the rest of it), but the pacing never outstays its welcome.
[HEADING=1]#2[/HEADING]
[HEADING=2]The Hobbit[/HEADING]
An Unexpected Journey, it certainly was. Peter Jackson's follow-up to the original
Lord of the Rings trilogy has finally set underway, ten years after he set the world of film on fire. Inevitably,
The Hobbit will gather comparisons to Jackson's earlier work, but while it certainly evokes the same feeling of Middle-Earth it is neither trying nor needs to be
The Lord of the Rings. While it never breaks free of the trappings imposed by the legacy of
The Lord of the Rings, it manages to capture the lighthearted feeling of
The Hobbit's story and the rather extensive running time on top of the fact that
The Hobbit is being broken into three separate parts mean that
An Unexpected Journey is allowed the ability to incorporate many elements from the original story that may otherwise have been cut out.
[HEADING=1]#1[/HEADING]
[HEADING=2]Cloud Atlas[/HEADING]
See it. No, really.
Visually vivacious, intellectually inspiring, aggressively ambitious,
Cloud Atlas is more than just a good film. It's an achievement in film-making and film narratives, with a cast that perform wonderfully, and a tone that can switch from light slap-stick comedy to science-fiction thriller in the blink of an eye without ever feeling out of place.
Honorable mentions go to #8:
Amazing Spider-Man (which only really stumbles for me because The Lizard's actual story is ridiculous and drags down the rest of the narrative that had been rather strong up until that point); #7:
The Avengers; #6:
The Dark Knight Rises.
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