Now we come to the bottom half of my top ten films of the summer. I liked every one of these movies, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they all turn up in my home video library eventually. The movies in this tier earn an (A-) from me because while …
This hardly deserves to call itself a tier. It’s more like a convenient catch-all featuring two movies that did enough right to deserve better than a dreary (B-) plus one (far, far) better effort that didn’t do quite enough to sneak its way into my top 10. Dividing nineteen movies …
I actually liked all the movies in this tier and would gladly re-watch any of them. Are they perfect? No. Are they prime examples of great cinema? No. Are they entertaining movies? Absolutely. I’ve spent all day reshuffling these four films. Ranking them has been agony. Part of the problem is a …
2013 was such an amazing year for movies that 2014 felt anticlimactic by comparison before it even started. Back in the spring, I kept looking at calendars of upcoming releases and noting, “This is an unusually front-loaded summer. Everything I’ve been waiting for is coming out in May. Hardly any …
This is it. In previous posts, I’ve commented on every film I saw this summer except my top five. I don’t think this last entry needs a long introduction. In ascending order, here are the five final films of my Summer Movie Review 2013: 5.) Despicable Me 2 (A/A-) Why …
At this point in my rankings, I’ve basically come to a count down of my top ten films of the summer, though there are technically eleven movies in these top two tiers. (Had I included Blue Jasmine (which I saw in September) and Mud (from back in April), there would be thirteen films to …
This is the tier I can’t stop rearranging. It’s made up of films that either disappointed or surprised me. Two of them could not possibly meet the high hopes I’d developed over months of near-rabid expectation. One of them impressed me despite my complete non-investment in it, and the other turned out to …
Tier Four (B-) Last summer, I noticed a more pronounced separation between excellent films, good movies, mediocre ones, and Battleship (which I experienced as an attack rather than entertainment, though it was my son’s clear favorite). This year brought markedly fewer excellent films, but far more good ones. Even though this is …
This summer I decided to post my recap in ascending order to build suspense. A few days ago, as I lazily let my thoughts drift back over the summer in a non-specific way, I had a vague sense of disappointment. Overall, I’d say last summer brought a stronger crop of …
17.) Dark Shadows (C+) What I Liked: Johnny Depp as vampire Barnabas Collins, Michelle Pfeiffer as soapy Elizabeth, the spectacular 1970s soundtrack, and the spooktacular visual atmosphere all get an A++. (And yet the movie gets a C+. Do I even need to mention how badly the film falters …
