By MCN Editor editor@moviecitynews.com
BYO Naked Top Ten Lists
Post your top movies you saw in 2018.
On first entries: NO TIES, NO COMMENTARY.
UPDATE: Okay… that’s a good start on lists, now start the back-and-forth!
April 19, 2024
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It shows how out of it I was in trying to be in it, acknowledging that I was out of it to myself, and then thinking, “Okay, how do I stop being out of it? Well, I get some legitimate illogical narrative ideas” — some novel, you know?
So I decided on three writers that I might be able to option their material and get some producer, or myself as producer, and then get some writer to do a screenplay on it, and maybe make a movie.
And so the three projects were “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” “Naked Lunch” and a collection of Bukowski. Which, in 1975, forget it — I mean, that was nuts. Hollywood would not touch any of that, but I was looking for something commercial, and I thought that all of these things were coming.
There would be no Blade Runner if there was no Ray Bradbury. I couldn’t find Philip K. Dick. His agent didn’t even know where he was. And so I gave up.
I was walking down the street and I ran into Bradbury — he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” — and I’d forgot who he was.
So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging — I was with her at that moment — she said, “Talk to him! That guy really wants to talk to you,” and I said “No, fuck him,” and keep walking.
But then I did, and then I realized who it was, and I thought, “Wait, he’s in that realm, maybe he knows Philip K. Dick.” I said, “You know a guy named—” “Yeah, sure — you want his phone number?”
My friend paid my rent for a year while I wrote, because it turned out we couldn’t get a writer. My friends kept on me about, well, if you can’t get a writer, then you write.”
~ Hampton Fancher
“That was the most disappointing thing to me in how this thing was played. Is that I’m on the phone with you now, after all that’s been said, and the fundamental distinction between what James is dealing with in these other cases is not actually brought to the fore. The fundamental difference is that James Franco didn’t seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. There’s not a case of that. He wasn’t using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had — if that were what the accusation involved — the show would not have gone on. We would have folded up shop and we would have not completed the show. Because then it would have been the same as Harvey Weinstein, or Les Moonves, or any of these cases that are fundamental to this new paradigm. Did you not notice that? Why did you not notice that? Is that not something notable to say, journalistically? Because nobody could find the voice to say it. I’m not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, “You know, it’s not this, it’s that”? Because — let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, that’s what it lacked. That’s what they were not able to deliver. The one example in the five that involved an issue of a sexual act was between James and a woman he was dating, who he was not working with. There was no professional dynamic in any capacity.
~ David Simon
1.) Venom
2.) Solo
3.) Mandy
4.) Peter Rabbit
5.) Sorry to Bother You
6.) Avengers: Infinity War
7.) Hotel Artemis
8.) Mission Impossible: Fallout
9.) Overlord
10.) Black Panther
1. You Were Never Really Here
2. The King
3. Roma
4. Leave No Trace
5. Isle of Dogs
I still need to see quite a few of the festival darlings, year-end awards sensations, etc. Maybe then I could fill out the other five.
Wait.
What?
No ties?!
Of what little I’ve seen:
1. The Ballad of Buster Scruggs
2. Support the Girls
3. First Reformed
4. Eighth Grade
5. Can You Ever Forgive Me?
6. BlacKkKlansman
7. The Mule
8. A Star Is Born
9. Black Panther
10. Action Point (so sue me)
1. First Man
2. Roma
3. Mission Impossible Fallout
4. A Quiet Place
5. Blackkklansman
6. The Ballad of Buster Scruggs
7. Solo A Star Wars Story
8. Ready Player One
9. Hereditary
10. Black Panther
Abbreviated list so far. Haven’t seen nearly enough. Number one is definitive though.
1. The Ballad of Buster Scruggs
2. Free Solo
3. Annihilation
4. Upgrade
5. Mandy
1. On Body And Soul
2. First Reformed
3. The Other Side of the Wind
4. Ismael’s Ghosts
5. Cold War
6. Happy As Lazzaro
7. If Beale Street Could Talk
8. Shoplifters
9. Madeline’s Madeline
10. Burning
1. Roma
2. Vice
3. Isle of Dugs
4. The Rider
5. BlacKkKlansman
6. Can You Ever Forgive Me?
7. First Man
8. The Ballad of Buster Scruggs
9. Burning
10. Minding the Gap
1. The Other Side of the Wind
4. Lean on Pete
5. If Beale Street Could Talk
6. Private Life
7. Wildlife
8. The Favourite
9. Cold War
10. Eighth Grade
Year-to-date:
1. Black Klansman
2. Annihilation
3. Can You Ever Forgive Me
4. Widows
5. Sorry to Bother You
6. Love Simon
7. Revenge
8. Bad Times at the El Royale
9. A Star is Born
10. Spiderman: Into the Spider-Verse
Mandy, Creed II, and The Night Comes for Us are just outside my Top Ten so far.
Still need to see: Roma, Vice, Vox Lux, If Beale Street Could Talk, and probably Green Book.
1. Annihilation
2. Hereditary
3.Blackkklansman
4. First Reformed
5. Mandy
6. Mission Impossible: Fallout
7. You Were Never Really Here
8. Hold The Dark
9. Suspiria
10.Spider-Man: Into The Spiderverse
Runner Ups:
The House That Jack Built
The Night Comes for Us
The Endless
Isle Of Dogs
Upgrade
Ready Player One
The Ritual, mainly because the monster was cool as hell
Franchise Jury Prize: Black Panther/Avengers/ Ant-Man 2/ Deadpool 2/Halloween for all delivering more or less.
Meh:
The Meg
Revenge (I don’t get all the love. Thought it was fairly pedestrian. And I have to admit rape/revenge is one of my least favorite sub-genres)
Re:My List
I still have a lot I want/need to see:
Sorry To Bother You
Vice
Buster Scruggs
First Man
Venom
Roma
The Favourite
Aquaman (got tickets for the day after Christmas)
and many others I’m forgetting.
Love the variety in all these lists. I disagree with some but I love the rainbow of opinions. I love this blog and I love this group.
Hope you all have a great Christmas!!
Man, after Moviepass went kaput I haven’t seen hardly anything at all. But now I have a lot of great suggestions from you all. Thanks!
Between this thread and the “Criminally Overlooked” one, I’m gonna have to give Upgrade a 2nd chance. I walked out feeling ‘meh’, but maybe I was just having a bad day.
Upgrade was the best action movie I saw all year (yes I saw Fallout). It’s efficient and tight and does the best parts of venom (person not in control of their body kicking ass) a lot better. Loved the ending too.
Mandy is the one I initially was like meh but now see as significant the more I think about it. I need to see it some more but it might be a major work.
10. The Old Man and the Gun
9. A Quiet Place
8. Annihilation
7. The Ballad of Buster Scruggs
6. Madeline’s Madeline
5. Blindspotting
4. The Favourite
3. Mission: Impossible – Fallout
2. The Death of Stalin
1. The Rider
The Favourite
Mandy
Border
Are my top three. Genre had an excellent year, as did Marvel specifically. I can’t believe how generally excellent those movies are becoming.
Roma was solid but maybe for me it suffered too much from overhype?
I don’t get the love for Buster Scruggs, I turned it off after skipping through the first four episodes. But I don’t get Barton Fink either 🙂
Buster Scruggs is an acquired taste for sure….but half of the segments are pretty strong.
On the main blog page we’ve been encouraged to start the back-and-forth in this thread, so let me mention a few movies I just didn’t get:
You Were Never Really Here: I sensed what Ramsay was going for here, I think, but it just didn’t come together. The psychology behind the protagonist, suggested through flashbacks, seemed facile. Others find the film profound. I don’t know how to bridge the gap.
BlacKkKlansman: I’m a fan of several Spike Lee films, but this one plays as such a one-note harangue/cartoon that I found it easy to dismiss early on. And I’m even a sometimes fan of “Bamboozled”! (Talk about a harangue!) There were a few moments that spark to life, and the ending is just horrifying/awful. But it didn’t justify the, dare I say, dull/boring story that preceded it. Hey, that guy’s a racist. And that OTHER guy? He’s a racist too! And the third guy is the most racist of all of ’em! OK. Got it.
If Beale Street Could Talk: This was my second Jenkins film. I’m OK with “Moonlight” – didn’t love it, but appreciated its aesthetic and its performances. This film felt kind of one-note and boring to me. Interest waned early. I watched the whole thing, hoping it’d be rekindled. Nope. Now everyone has it in their Top 10 lists. Not me.
A Star Is Born: I’d never seen the earlier versions of this story. It started strong, but it slipped away in the second half. Why? I’m not sure, but I’ve heard others claim that the second half is a big drop-off from the first. I definitely lost whatever interest I’d had in the film to that point.
Really, though, I prefer to talk about the films I loved rather than the ones I didn’t. My reasons for not liking the above films are admittedly thin, but they’re honest. I won’t lie and say I liked, or even admired, a film that just didn’t work for me. Part of me wonders if “Beale Street” simply suffered from being seen late during screener-glut season, when patience wanes and I see too many movies too close together. But it was during that screening surge that I saw “Buster Scruggs” and other movies I loved, so it’s hard to blame the crunch for not liking a certain film.
Ben is Back – Julia Roberts is a force of nature in this film and really transforms. Can she be nominated?
Having delt with addicts in my life, the film was authentic (even though some had a problem with the second act). This film cracked me open. Kathryn Newton was also strong in a small role.
Of what I’ve seen:
1. BlacKkKlansman
2. A Star Is Born
3. Sorry to Bother You
4. A Quiet Place
5. Spider-Man into the Spiderverse
6. Green Book
7. The Ballad of Buster Scruggs
8. Won’t You Be My Neighbor?
9. Annihilation
10. Hereditary
Also really liked: Searching, Mission Impossible 6, The Favourite, Game Night, You Were Never Really Here, The Death of Stalin, Upgrade, Bumblebee, and the trio of Black Panther, Avengers 3, and Ant-Man & the Wasp.
Didn’t enjoy as much as I’d hoped: First Man, Vice.