Top Ten of 2006

[Sabin]

Here's where I stand now. Much to see, and yet my pledge to stay as much away from vacuous blockbusters as possible clearly didn't stand.

****
1. Army of Shadows

***1/2
2. Brick
3. L'Enfant
4. The Proposition
5. Slither
6. A Prairie Home Companion
7. Neil Young: Heart of Gold

***
8. A Scanner Darkly (destined to go up on second viewing)
9. Inside Man

**1/2
10. Superman Returns
11. Cars
12. Thank You for Smoking
13. Clerks 2
14. Mission: Impossible -- 3

**
15. Little Miss Sunshine
16. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
17. X-Men: The Last Stand
18. Scoop

*1/2
19. Art School Confidential
20. Lady in the Water
21. The Da Vinci Code

N/A (missed the apparently "cool" opening ten minutes, and apparently the only other "cool" five minutes in the film. Either way, no desire to sit through those "Wacky Subtitles" again)
22. Nightwatch

[Eric]

C.R.A.Z.Y. just went onto my Netflix list. A love/hate gay movie is surely preferable to another lukewarm, wan gay movie.

[Precious Doll]

4.5/5

Tristram Shandy: A C o c k and Bull Story (Michael Winterbottom)

4/5

The Child (Luc & Jean-Pierre Dardenne)
Jindabyne (Ray Lawrence)
**Manderlay (Lars Von Trier)
Sisters in Law (Kim Longinotto & Florence Ayisi)
Sophie Scholl: The Final Days (Marc Rothemund)
Sympathy for Lady Vengeance (Park Onan-Wook)
Time to Leave (Francois Ozon)

3.5/5
The Devil and Daniel Johnston (Jeff Feuerzeig)
**Factotum (Bent Hamer)
The Hills Have Eyes (Alexandre Aja)
**House of Sand (Andrucha Waddington)
Neil Young: Heart of Gold (Jonathan Demme)
Old Joy (Kelly Reichardt)
The Road to Guantanamo (Michael Winterbottom & Mat Whitecross)
**Romance and Cigarettes (John Turturro)
Superman Returns (Bryan Singer)
Ten Canoes (Rolf De Heer & Peter Djigir)
Three Times (Hsiao-hsien Hou)
United 93 (Peter Greeengrass)

3/5
American Dreamz (Paul Weitz)
Color Me Kubrick (Brian Cook)
**Hoodwinked (Cory Edwards, Todd Edwards & Tony Leech)
Lonesome Jim (Steve Buscemi)
Nanny McPhee (Kirk Jones)
V for Vendetta (James McTeigue)
Wah-Wah (Richard E Grant)
Water (Deepak Mehta)

2.5/5
An Inconvenient Truth (Davis Guggenheim)
The Benchwarmers (Dennis Dugan)
Confetti (Debbie Isitt)
Failure to Launch (Tom Dey)
Friends with Money (Nicole Holofcener)
The Inside Man (Spike Lee)
Reeker (Dave Payne)
Scary Movie 4 (David Zucker)

2/5
Big Momma’s House 2 (John Whitesell)
The Breakup (Payton Reed)
Cars (John Lasseter)
Click (Frank Coraci)
Date Movie (Jason Friedberg & Aaron Seltzer)
Just My Luck (Donald Petrie)
The King (James Marsh)
Last Holiday (Wayne Wang)
Little Man (Keenen Ivory Wayans)
Little Miss Sunshine (Jonathan Dayton & Valerie Farit)
**Miami Vice (Michael Mann)
My Super Ex-Girlfriend (Ivan Reitman)
Pirates of the Caribbean 2 (Gore Verbinski)
Over the Hedge (Tim Johnson & Karey Kirkpatrick)
The Pink Panther (Shawn Levy)
Poseidon (Wolfgang Petersen)
RV (Barry Sonnenfeld)
River Queen (Vincent Ward)
Slither (James Gunn)
Tristan and Isolde (Kevin Reynolds)
Underworld 2: Evolution (Len Wiseman)

1.5/5
The Da Vinci Code (Ron Howard)
The Descent (Neil Marshall)
Firewall (Richard Loncraine)
Hostel (Ali Roth)
Kidulthood (Menhaj Huda)
When a Stranger Calls (Simon West)
You, Me and Dupree (Anthony & Joe Russo)

1/5
Basic Instinct 2 (Michael Caton-Jones)
Eight Below (Frank Marshall)
Hard Candy (David Slade)
Imagine Me and You (Ol Parker)
The Lake House (Alejandro Agresti)
Omen 666 (John Moore)
One to One (Annette K Olesen)
16 Blocks (Richard Donner)
Stick It (Jessica Bielinski)
X-Men 3: Last Stand (Brett Ratner)

½/5
C.R.A.Z.Y. (Jean-Marc Vallee)
Mission Impossible 3 (J J Abrams)
No. 2 (Toa Fraser)
The Sentinel (Clark Johnson)

[Penelope]

I can't believe I forgot Pirates 2! I'm updating the list to reflect it's inclusion.... Actually, I don't have the time, so let's just say it's at #6, above Prada, with ** 1/2 stars.

[anonymous1980]

United 93 (Paul Greengrass) - ***½
The Departed (Martin Scorsese) - ***½
The Blossoming of Maximo Oliveros (Aureus Solito) - ***½
Monster House (Gil Kenan)- ***½
Inside Man (Spike Lee) - ***½
Cars (John Lasseter) - ***
The Banquet (Feng Xiaogang) - ***
Superman Returns (Bryan Singer) - ***
Snakes on a Plane (David R. Ellis) - ***
V for Vendetta (James McTeague) - ***
Manderlay (Lars Von Trier) - ***
Mission: Impossible III (J.J. Abrams) - **½
Pirates of the Carribbean: Dead Man's Chest (Gore Verbinski)- **½
Lady in the Water (M. Night Shyamalan) - **
X-Men: The Last Stand (Brett Ratner) - **
Poseidon (Wolfgang Petersen) - **
The Da Vinci Code (Ron Howard) - *½

[MovieWes]

01. A Scanner Darkly (d. Richard Linklater) ****
02. Cars (d. John Lasseter) *** 1/2
03. The King (d. James Marsh) *** 1/2
04. United 93 (d. Paul Greengrass) *** 1/2
05. Thank You For Smoking (d. Jason Reitman) ***
06. Superman Returns (d. Bryan Singer) ***
07. X-Men: The Last Stand (d. Brett Ratner) ** 1/2
08. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (d. Gore Verbinski) ** 1/2
09. Monster House (d. Gil Kenan) ** 1/2
10. The OH in Ohio (d. Billy Kent) ** 1/2
11. Mission: Impossible III (d. J.J. Abrams) **
12. The Da Vinci Code (d. Ron Howard) **

[OscarGuy]

****
none

*** 1/2
V for Vendetta
Thank You for Smoking
Cars
Inside Man

***
Over the Hedge
X-Men: The Last Stand
Superman Returns
Friends with Money

** 1/2
The Pink Panther
Poseidon
Scary Movie 4
The Lake House
The Da Vinci Code
Pirates of the Caribbean 2

**
Ice Age: The Meltdown
Mission: Impossible III
The Promise

* 1/2
none

*
Doogal

1/2 *
none

0
none

[Eric]

bumped

[Damien]

Pen, I'm glad you re-instituted this thread because I had been looking for it off and on for a week or two and thought I had lost my mind.

Still haven't seen much:

4 Stars:

1. C.R.A.Z.Y. (Jean-Marc Vallée)
2. Sophie Scholl: The Final Days (Marc Rothemund)
3. Been Rich All My Life (Heather Lyn MacDonald)

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

3½ Stars:

4. Clean (Olivier Assayas)
5. Army Of Shadows (Jean-Pierre Melville)

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

3 Stars:

6. Whole New Thing (Amnon Buchbinder)
7. Water (Deepak Mehta)
8. The Devil Wears Prada (David Frankel)
9. A Stadium Story
10. Stagedoor (Alexandra Shiva)
11. Giuliani Time (Kevin Keating)

[criddic3]

moved up.

[Franz Ferdinand]

****
Children of Men
Pan's Labyrinth
The Queen
Letters From Iwo Jima

***½
Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan
The Departed
V For Vendetta
Thank You For Smoking
The Prestige
Dave Chappelle's Block Party
Cars
Stranger Than Fiction

***
An Inconvenient Truth
The Lake House
Strangers With Candy
Little Miss Sunshine
The Road to Guantanamo
Mission: Impossible III
Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
World Trade Center
Little Children
Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby
The Devil Wears Prada
The Pursuit of Happyness

**½
Miami Vice
Dreamgirls
A Scanner Darkly
Babel

**
Superman Returns
Nacho Libre
Death of a President

*½
X-Men: The Last Stand

*
The Da Vinci Code

[Penelope]

I thought we'd started a Top Ten of 2006 thread, but I couldn't find it. Well, anyway, I guess I'll start one, as this may be one of my last posts for awhile!

No 4 or even 3 1/2 star films, yet; hopefully, in the few days I have in Delaware next week with my sis before I head off to Prague, we can see Little Miss Sunshine...until then, for the time being:


1. V for Vendetta -- ***
2. An Inconvenient Truth -- ***
3. Inside Man -- ***
4. Something New -- ***
5. X-Men: The Last Stand -- ***

6. The Devil Wears Prada -- ** ½
7. Superman Returns -- ** ½
8. She’s The Man -- ** ½
9. Thank You For Smoking -- ** ½
10. Eight Below -- ** ½
11. The DaVinci Code -- ** ½

12. Failure to Launch -- **
13. Tristan + Isolde -- **
14. My Super Ex-Girlfriend -- **
15. The Lake House -- **
16. Poseidon -- **

17. Stick It -- * ½