2016 was not the best year for
movies. In fact, I would say it’s
probably the worst in awhile. Most of
the summer blockbusters were pretty disappointing. I think I saw nearly every movie from the
year I want to see, so it's time to give out some fake awards. But first, some thoughts on this year's
movies.
Let’s start with superhero
movies. Those are the biggest things
going now. There were a couple of good
ones, and a couple of stinkers. The
best, for my money, was Captain America: Civil War. This is not because of the airport scene
alone, though that was probably the best scene of the year, but overall it was
a solid addition to the MCU. The second
best was probably Doctor Strange, which was a little more fun than I
expected. Visually it was
astounding. The cape stole the
show. Then there’s Batman v Superman:
Dawn of Justice, the most polarizing movie of the year. I would say it was not perfect, for sure, but
it was a heck of a lot better than many people will say. Ben Affleck was the best live action Batman
I’ve seen, Wonder Woman was awesome, Superman was fine. And, while people make fun of the “Martha”
moment, I could not believe I had never thought of that connection before. I was actually shocked! Deadpool, which so many people loved, I
thought was way overblown. Suicide Squad
was probably the most disappointing movie of the year. Margot Robbie and Will Smith were excellent,
but the rest of the cast was merely good to terrible. The dancing witch is one of the worst
villains I’ve ever seen. Finally, X-Men:
Apocalypse proved that the X-Men trilogies have no idea how to do a
finale. A truly terrible movie.
Science fiction had another solid
year. 10 Cloverfield Lane was the most
suspenseful movie of the year. Rogue One
and Star Trek Beyond were both excellent additions to their franchises. In fact, I would argue that Beyond is the
best of the new Star Trek so far.
Passengers, as I recently wrote, was disappointing though still well
made. Arrival is a beautiful movie with
some interesting ideas that will leave the viewer thinking about them for
awhile, and of course wondering what they just saw. The only terrible science fiction movie was
Independence Day: Resurgence, and boy was that one of the worst movies I’ve
ever seen.
Let’s talk about the overhyped
movies, because there were a few. I
already mentioned Deadpool. Another
majorly overhyped movie was Zootopia, which I thought was merely a decent
animated movie. I thought it was more
annoying than great, and really the spoiled the best scene (DMV) in the
trailer.
Speaking of family movies, I
really liked Fanatastic Beasts. Sure,
it’s not Harry Potter, but it was still quite good. Finding Dory was a very good return to form
for Pixar. Sure, it’s not as good as the
original, but the octopus was a great addition.
The Jungle Book verges on the overhyped.
It was good, but not great as many people made it sound. I thought it was a bit disjointed.
Then we have the disappointing
movies, which is the largest amount of movies this year. I already mentioned Suicide Squad,
Passengers, and X-Men (plus I guess Independence Day). The other most disappointing movie of the
year was Jason Bourne. That trailer had
me really excited for one of my favorite franchises. It wasn’t a bad movie, per se, and it had
some great action scenes as you would expect from a Bourne movie. The biggest problem was, as many people have
said, it was exactly what you expected.
There were no surprises, it was paint-by-number, it only muddled the
storyline unnecessarily. Another
disappointing movie, for me, was Hail, Caesar!
Now I’m not a big Coen Brothers fan, though I really like a few of their
movies. I thought this movie was a
can’t-miss, but it ended up being boring and just bad. And then there was The Girl on the
Train. I read the book because I knew
the movie was coming out. I didn't
particularly like the book, but it was quite suspenseful. With Emily Blunt I figured the movie would be
good, despite the negative reviews.
Well, the reviews were right. The
movie was a mess and had none of the suspense of the book. What a huge swing and a miss.
There’s also a few movies that
were just kind of there. This would
include things like Criminal, Hush (which was pretty dumb), Money Monster,
Risen (interesting concept not done well), and Now You See Me 2 (did we really
need a sequel?).
There was also one very
underrated and underwatched movie. I
remember seeing the trailers for The Nice Guys and thinking it looked
interesting but not something I'd run out to see. So I didn't.
And neither did anyone else. I finally
saw it streaming much later, and I thought it was really funny. Certainly it's not as good as Kiss Kiss Bang
Bang, also from Shane Black, but if you liked that you will like The Nice Guys. And it actually made me like Ryan Gosling,
which I thought was impossible.
One other movie I have not
mentioned so far, because I’m still not really sure what to make of it. Silence.
I really wanted to love this movie.
I did like it…up to a certain point.
(Spoiler) The martyrdom and the
torture of the faithful was powerful, as was the psychological battle of Padre
Rodriguez. But the movie made a huge
turn, for the worse, when he hears Jesus’ voice (as someone else said, how dare
they put words in the Lord’s mouth?) and then completely destroys itself when he
apostasies. It almost make apostasy seem
ok, which is not ok at all. So while it
was a beautiful movie with good acting, I left angry.
What’s left? The best movie of the year: 13 Hours. It was the first movie of the year that I
saw, and it set a high standard. It was
not perfect, but all around it was the best.
It was very emotional (I left the movie very angry, but for the right
reason). It was shot very well. The acting was good. As a friend said, it was like a new Black
Hawk Down. And I finally saw Hacksaw
Ridge. Maybe it was hyped too much for
me, but while I thought it was a good movie, it felt incomplete in some
way. I am happy to see Mel Gibson back
making epic movies since, no matter what you think of him personally, he is one
of the best directors for telling an epic story.
Best Superhero Movie: Captain
America: Civil War
Best Action Movie: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story
Best Comedy: Finding Dory
Best Family Movie: Fantastic
Beasts and Where to Find Them
Best Suspense: 10 Cloverfield
Lane
Best Science Fiction: Arrival
Best Drama: 13 Hours: The Secret
Soldiers of Benghazi
Best Movie: 13 Hours: The Secret
Soldiers of Benghazi
Worst Superhero Movie: X-Men:
Apocalypse
Worst Action Movie: Criminal
Worst Comedy: Hail, Caesar!
Worst Family Movie: Risen
Worst Suspense: Hush
Worst Science Fiction:
Independence Day: Resurgence
Worst Drama: Money Monster
Worst Movie: Independence Day:
Resurgence
5 Favorite Movies:
Rogue One
Captain America: Civil War
Fantastic Beasts
Star Trek Beyond
10 Cloverfield Lane
5 Best Movies:
13 Hours
Captain America
Hacksaw Ridge
Rogue One
Arrival
Best Actor: Andrew Garfield
(Hacksaw Ridge)
Honorable
mentions: Andrew Garfield (Silence), Chris Pratt (Passengers), Russell Crowe
and Ryan Gosling (The Nice Guys)
Best Actress: Amy Adams (Arrival)
Honorable
mentions: Jennifer Lawrence (Passengers), Emily Blunt (The Girl on the Train)
Best Supporting Actor: John Goodman (10 Cloverfield Lane)
Honorable
mentions: Daniel Bruhl (Captain
America), Ben Affleck (Batman v Superman), Adam Driver (Silence), Will Smith
(Suicide Squad)
Best Supporting Actress: Angourie
Rice (The Nice Guys)
Honorable
mentions: Alison Sudol (Fantastic Beasts), Rebecca Ferguson (The Girl on the
Train)
Now, let's talk about my favorite
part of the movies, the music. I hate to
say that they have been on the decline recently, but so many of them are just
white noise any more there's nothing really to distinguish them. So, very few stood out for me this year. I'm just going to name those that are worth
mentioning, in no particular order:
Arrival (Johann Johannsson) - the
best music in this movie isn't even the score, it's a track by Max Richter at
the beginning and end
Batman v Superman (Hans Zimmer
and Junkie XL) - another lackluster Hans Zimmer effort, with the exception of
the fantastic Wonder Woman theme
Captain America: Civil War (Henry
Jackman) - yet another mediocre Marvel score
Doctor Strange (Michael
Giacchino) - finally a Marvel score that stood out, with some really
interesting Eastern/70s sounds
Fantastic Beasts and Where to
Find Them (James Newton Howard) - this would be solidly middle of the pack
Harry Potter music
Finding Dory (Thomas Newman) - a
solid follow up to Finding Nemo
The Girl on the Train (Danny
Elfman) - Elfman in his most forgettable
Hacksaw Ridge (Rupert
Gregson-Williams) - the music is fine
Independence Day: Resurgence
(Harald Kloser & Thomas Wander) - like the movie, the music pales in
comparison with the fantastic original
Jason Bourne (John Powell &
David Buckley) - while it's hard to go wrong with Powell's Bourne music,
there's nothing really that interesting here
The Jungle Book (John Debney) -
uses the original Disney music well
The Legend of Tarzan (Rupert
Gregson-Williams) - I listened to it, can't say I remember it
The Magnificent Seven (James
Horner & Simon Franglen) - the last music the iconic Horner wrote, it's
great to hear the original theme spliced in
The Nice Guys (David Buckley
& John Ottman) - some decent 70s sound, but like most Ottman there's not
much to remember it
Passengers (Thomas Newman) - I've
listened to this more than any other this year, and it's so good it makes me
want to see the movie again
Rogue One: A Star Wars Story
(Michael Giacchino) - I wrote about this more before, but again I'll say he did
very well in the short time he had
Star Trek Beyond (Michael
Giacchino) - another good addition to the franchise
Suicide Squad (Steven Price) -
there are moments that are good
X-Men: Apocalypse (John Ottman) -
see: Ottman comment on The Nice Guys
10 Cloverfield Lane (Bear
McCreary) - does a great job of building the suspense
13 Hours (Lorne Balfe) - like the
movie, reminiscent of Black Hawk Down
Best Score: Passengers (Thomas Newman)
Best Drama Score: Passengers
(Thomas Newman)
Best Animated Score: Finding Dory (Thomas Newman)
Best Science Fiction/Fantasy
Score: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (Michael Giacchino)
Best Action/Adventure Score: Captain America: Civil War (Henry Jackman)
Best Horror Score: 10 Cloverfield
Lane (Bear McCreary)
Best Genre Score: The Nice Guys (David Buckley & John
Ottman)
Best Composition: Michelle (from 10 Cloverfield Lane, Bear
McCreary)
Best Theme: Is She With You?
(from Batman v Superman, Hans Zimmer and Junkie XL)
Best Love Theme: Spacewalk (from Passengers, Thomas Newman)
Best Action Sequence: The Tunnel (from Captain America, Henry
Jackman)
Best Use of Classical/Source
Music: On the Nature of Daylight (Max
Richter, in Arrival)
Composer of the Year: Michael Giacchino
