Alright so the world hasn't ended, but we have entered a new era (according to the Mayan calendar). But that's not what I'm talking about today. Over the past year, we've had many sequels, prequels and only a handful of original ideas that came in the form of film. 2 of the biggest film distributors celebrated 100 years of their contributions to the film industry and Disney has gotten bigger thanks to the acquisitions of Marvel, Pixar and more recently, Lucasfilm. Before I start this list, let's go through a few films that didn't quite make the list, that I thought I should mention:
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (Haven't seen it yet, but if I did see it before the creation of this list, it would be on it)
Wreck-It Ralph (Not yet released in the UK, but should expect it in the first half of 2013)
Brave (Not seen it yet)
Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted (Not seen it yet)
Rise of the Guardians (No offence to anyone, but the film doesn't really appeal to me, especially as Justin Bieber's voice is in it)
Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn (Doesn't appeal to me and that will be no surprise to many of you)
Ice Age: Continental Drift (Hated it because the filmmakers are really running on thin ice)
The Amazing Spider-Man (Have not seen it yet)
Paranormal Activity 4 (Have not seen it yet)
So without further ado, let's begin the list:
10: The Pirates! In An Adventure With Scientists/Band of Misfits
Pirates, Aardman and Comedy are 3 of my favourite things when it comes to stop motion films, and this one is no acceptation. We have pirates, we have treasure, we have The Queen and her hatred for pirates. What more could you ask for. The film itself is loosely based on the book of the same name by Gideon Defoe and while I haven't read the book myself, this film is very fun to watch and you really have to appreciate all the hard work that Aardman do to make a film like this. The average stop motion film would take hours, but a feature film like this, would take years to create and perfect, and considering that it was Aardman's first stop motion film 3D, it manages to deliver on all levels. A must see for any Aardman fan.
9: Men in Black 3
In recent years, many franchises that haven't seen the light of day for years, have been brought back to either reboot the franchise or take advantage of the new technology that we have now such as HD and 3D. Men in Black has been left aside for 10 years and only now, do Sony decide to bring it back. Now initially, I wasn't expecting much from this film as it showed Tommy Lee Jones at a very old age in his life and you would think that he would do one last film before retirement as well as Will Smith, who has now let his children go into the film industry to basically follow his footsteps. When I eventually watched this film, I was pleasantly surprised as it was using an original story, kept true to the original films and while I may not be a huge fan of slapstick humour, this one definitely made me laugh. If you loved the original films, you'll no doubt love this one too.
8: The Woman In Black
Serving as Daniel Radcliffe's first film after the end of Harry Potter and based on the book of the same name by Susan Hill, The Woman in Black, in my opinion, is a very good supernatural horror film that makes Paranormal Activity, obsolete (considering how the series is going). The story is great, character development is good (especially with Radcliffe) and the supernatural aspect of it, while it may cause you to have a heart attack, works incredibly well. Its one of the best supernatural horror films of this year and I look forward to more.
7: Skyfall
So celebrating the 50th anniversary of the James Bond 007 franchise, Skyfall is considered to be the best of Daniel Craig's films so far as well as beating the 40th anniversary film, Die Another Day (which I thought was OK apart from the constant cliches and the terrible CGI effects). In this film, we see a more darker and emotional side to Bond as well as M, who is being hunted down by a former MI6 agent who of which was once a field agent for MI6 but was betrayed by M who wanted to save 6 captured from the Chinese, in exchange for him. He later on became a cyberterrorist and begins to infiltrate the MI6 base in London. Only Bond can stop him. It's a very good film that packs in a lot of action, violence and many of the cliches from previous films, that are used in a better way to Die Another Day. We also get some old friends in the film as well. Love it.
6: Dredd
As I said in my review, this film is badass. It stays true to the character's comic book counter part and is one of the best 3D films I've seen all year. We see Dredd, who has agreed to do an evaluation for the Judge's new recruit, Cassandra Anderson who claims to be Psychic. He takes her to the block known as Peach Trees where what seems to be just a simple matter of finding out who the killer is, turns out to be (in the words of Admiral Ackbar from Star Wars IV: Return of the Jedi) a trap. In that case, Dredd and Anderson, venture into the block to find the culprit and bring her down to justice. Badass as it sounds, it's a great film that could be the beginning of a new trilogy. Just hope that it doesn't go the same way as the original Judge Dredd (played by Sylvester Stallone) did.
5: The Hunger Games
The Hunger Games, while on the cover may look like a Twilight(ish) film, is one film that will blow you away. Based on the book by Suzanne Collins, this film shows us what a punishment for rebelling could look like. In this case a boy and girl between the ages of 12 and 18 must take part in a battle to the death against other districts in the nation of Panem. That really is the film in a nutshell. It an OK film for the most part and it can get confusing at times, but never the less, it's still a pretty good film, if you're in to this kind of film.
4: The Expendables 2
Action films can't get any better than this. Serving as a sequel to the previous film, Barney (played by Stallone) is given another mission by Mr. Church (who currently serves as his boss and is played by Bruce Willis) to simply acquire an item from a downed airplane in Albania with the assistance of his team of mercenaries called The Expendables and technical expert Maggie Chan (played by Yu Nan) which Church sends to help the team. But what was meant to be a simple mission, turns out to be a battle against another mercenary group that intend to threaten the world with a deadly weapon, with some deadly consequences. It may give you a never ending headache because of the volume of the gunshots, but regardless, is a very good film that is even better than the first, thanks to there being more action heroes put in, as well as an extended role for Willis and Schwarzenegger. Great film.
3: Prometheus
In my defence, I have not seen any of the Alien films (apart from Alien VS Predator which is outside of the main stream storylines of both trilogies) so a lot of this, didn't quite make sense to me. A group of archaeologists discover star maps in Scotland in the year of 2089. 4 years later, 2 members of that group of archaeologists, end up on the spaceship known as Prometheus and are given the task of finding what are known as Engineers (which is an alien and not an actual engineer) by what we assume to be the late Peter Weyland who is CEO of Weyland Corporation. As they embark on this expedition, they discover more than what they bargained for, with deadly consequences. A great Sci-Fi film which does leave a lot of unanswered questions, but you have to admire the great CGI elements and how much work was put into this film, so well done to those responsible.
2: The Avengers
It was very obvious that this would come along after the success of the Iron Man films as well as The Incredible Hulk, Thor and Captain America: The First Avenger. It's the first film to feature a group of solo heroes together to battle evil forces (in this case, Thor's "adopted" brother, Loki who has acquired the tesseract) and is considerably one of the best superhero films to date. Many people would put this as there number 1 film of the year, but I feel that it is a good film, but for me, it won't be enough to be number 1. My number 1 film of the year, goes to a particular hero that does most of his work in the city of Gotham. That film is:
1: The Dark Knight Rises
When I was doing this list, I was for a while deciding on which film has been more memorable and was good in character development and the story work. That film then ended up being the final film of Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy in which we see a much more emotional and uneasy Bruce Wayne (played by Christian Bale) who since the death of Harvey Dent (who became Two-Face in the process), has since given up being Batman. It eventually then becomes clear that the criminal activity is going up and will continue to grow, if the terrorist known as Bane (played by Tom Hardy) is stopped. With the help of Selina Kyle (played by Anne Hathaway), Bruce gets his costume out once more, and must now lead an army of police officers to stop Bane and free Gotham from his control. It's considerably one of the most powerful films that I have ever seen, and is also based on some of the best Batman stories ever. A great film that delivers on all levels. Well done Nolan.
So that's my top 10 films. As we get close to Christmas Day, I'll be doing 2 more top 10s which will be my top 10 favourite songs of the year and my top 10 Internet videos (both of which will not have me go in depth like I have done with this one and the others) and I also have something special planned for Christmas Day and Boxing Day so look forward to that.
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