posted 01/05/12 02:44 PM | updated 04/05/12 02:15 PM
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What Are Your Fave Films Of 2011???

By Music Rules
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By John Pluntze

Well, since the "Idaho Mountain Express" newspaper recently announced that it's once again looking for submissions from avid area film goers here as to what their "Favorite (Five) Films Of 2011" are, I thought it might be kinda fun for some of the many people who at least sometimes visit the SVO site here to contribute their own online"Top 10 Film Favorites" list.

Since, in any given year, we often don't have the luxury here in the Wood River Valley of seeing, say, "2011" releases until 2012 has already arrived (the way it has now) -- and/or sometimes don't see a certain movie AT ALL on ANY movie screen here in the Wood River Valley (before it's released later on DVD and Blue Ray) -- I'm not concerned if your list has some "2010" releases on your 2011 Film Favorites List. (Also, please feel free to mention some "Honorable Mentions" on your "Top 10 Film Faves" list as well, because I certainly had no trouble at all coming up with a Top 20 list this year!!!)

Okay, so here goes (and please keep the public chastisements and/or ridiculing regarding my own list down to minimum, okay??? (LOL) And yes, this list IS in order of preference:

1)  "THE RUNAWAYS"

(Having been lucky enough to see that superb, 1970s-era all-female rock band, The Runaways -- in both London and Los Angeles -- the hairs on the back of my neck literally stood up watching both Dakota Fanning (as lead singer Cherie Currie) and Kristen Stewart (as co-lead singer Joan Jett) belting out one seriously kick-ass Runaways rock number after another, so much so that Fanning, especially, seemed to almost be eerily CHANNELING Cherie Currie in some her scenes ... particularly the scene where Currie really came into her own (on-stage in Japan, in 1977 during a pivotal time in the band's career), as she sang what's arguably The Runaways' best-known song still to date: "Cherry Bomb").

2) "HANNA"

3)  "BIUTIFUL" (foreign)

4) "THE TREE OF LIFE"

6) "THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATOO"

7) " FAST & FURIOUS 5"

8) "THE WAY BACK"

9) "MARGIN CALL"

10) "HUGO"

HONORABLE Mentions:" The Artist",  "The Way", "Drive", "Friends With Benefits","Contagion", "Puss n Boots 3D", "The Guard", "Meek's Cut Off", "Beginners", "The Debt", "One Day","Cave Of Forgotten Dreams", "Exporting Raymond", "Insidious", "Midnight In Paris","Miss Bala", " Killer Elite",  "Take Shelter", 'Warrior", "Get Low", 'Super 8", "Certified Copy", "Project NIM", "13 Assassins",  "Mars Needs Moms", "J. Edgar", "Transformers: Dark Of the Moon", "Paranormal Activity 3",  "African Cats", "The Help", "Restless", "Mission Impossible 4: Ghost Protocol"

 

Okay, so once you've finished rolling your eyes and/or making some public comments here about some of my (verrry dubious???) choices, please be sure to add your own list -- since it may very well contain one or more movies that the rest of us here HAVEN'T seen yet, but movies we might very well enjoy, once we do hear about them.

 

And yesss, for the record, I DID see Steven Spielberg's (insufferably smarmy/saccharine and incredibly cloying) "War Horse" -- arguably his biggest misfire since the similarly verrry cloying and smarmy "Always", "Amistad", and, more recently, Spielberg's "The Terminal". A much more apt title for it: "The 100 Years War Horse" (because it seems to take THAT long for the movie to finally end!!!) ... a movie that makes glaringly-obvious references to dozens of great films -- everything from "My Friend Flicka", "Gone With the Wind" and "Far From the Madding Crowd", to "National Velvet", "The Quiet Man" and "Paths Of Glory" -- without ever even just ONCE approaching greatness itself. Absolute stall fodder...  :(

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Tags: Movies, music, John Pluntze, Best, of, rock, drive, films, documentaries, 2011, Hugo, Fave Films of 2011, Best Films, animated films, Girl With the Dragon Tat oo, The Runaways, Cherie Currie, Joan Jett, The Way Back, The Guard, Take Shelter, Killer Elite, Fast & Furious Five, Hanna, Terrence Malick, Peter Weir, Biutiful, Exporting Raymond, Meeks Cut Off, Cave Of Forgotten Dreams, Werner Herzog, Margin Call, Midnight In Paris, Miss Bala, Girl with the Dragon Tatoo, Rooney Mara, Project NIM, The Help, Martin Scorsese, Gus Van Sant, Best Films Of 2011, Kristin Stewart, Dakota Fanning, War Horse, Steven Spielberg, Kristen Stewart, Joe Wright, Friends With Benefits, Jennifer Lawrence, The Hunger Games, Winters Bone, The Burning Plain + add tags
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About 'The Tree of Life'...
I'm almost certain that the most hotly-contested film on my "Fave Films Of 2011" list is undoubtedly going to be what was easily the most hotly-debated and talked-about movie of 2011 as well: Terrence Malick's "The Tree Of Life". As with Malick's two previous films ("The Thin Red Line" and "The New World"), some viewers could barely sit through with it even just ONCE, while others (such as myself) saw it TWICE (and, truth be told, I'll probably eventually buy it on DVD, because I own all of Malick's other mesmerizing movies and I never cease to be equal parts amazed and dazzled by his extremely visual -- and often extremely audacious, too -- storytelling style). But even for viewers who WEREN'T baffled (as I was) by that incredibly audacious (and jaw-droppingly beautiful ) "cosmic" sequence that occurs about 25 minutes into the movie, you should really go to http://www.youtube.com and then type into its search engine there the words: "Father Barron Comments On Terence Malick's 'The Tree Of Life'"

The video's only about 10 minutes long, but it may go a long, long way toward making you understand -- and yes, maybe even APPRECIATE as well -- what Terrence Malick was at least TRYING to successfully address in that incredibly audacious "cosmic" sequence ... a sequence that was easily the most unforgettable one of any I saw at the movies in 2011. (By the way, there are clips of that "cosmic" sequence from "The Tree of Life" posted on YouTube, as well as a number of other interesting "Tree"-related videos).

--John Pluntze
Comment by Music Rules
4 months ago
( 0 votes )
RE: About 'The Tree of Life'...
By the way, special effects master Douglas Trumbull ("2001: A Space Odyssey", "Star Wars", "Brainstorm","Close Encounters" "Silent Running", "Blade Runner", etc) was lured back to Hollywood after a nearly 30-year absence from there to create those jaw-droppingly incredible special effects for the "comic sequence" in Terrence Malick's "Tree Of Life"...
Comment by Music Rules
4 months ago
( 0 votes )
Re: "'Fave Films Of 2011'
I no sooner woke up this morning than I noticed several glaring omissions in my "Top 10 Fave Films Of 2011" list that I wrote/posted yesterday afternoon (most notably "Hugo" and "Hanna") -- two films that I think would be on my "Top 10 Faves" list in ANY given film year. (One of the verrry cool things about this extremely user-friendly SVO website is that you can go back and tweak/change your fave films list after you post it!! (LOL)
--John P.
Comment by Music Rules
4 months ago
( 0 votes )
Skip Movies This Weekend, In Favor Of Second City (In Hailey)??
Hey, going to the movies is often very fun -- I love going to them more often than not -- but please make time this weekend to also see that verrry funny and inventive Second City Troupe that's performing both tonight and also on Saturday night, at Hailey's Liberty Theatre, at 7 p.m. ( see http://www.companyoffools.org or call 578-9122 for more info). Hilarious stand-outs for me last night included the "2 Drunk Gals In a Taxi", "The Sweat Pants" and the "Absti-Dance" skits. There wasn't a single movie I saw last year (including "Bridesmaids" and Woody Allen's "Midnight In Paris") that made me laugh HALF as hard as I did last night, watching the Second City Touring Company!!! :)

--John Pluntze
Comment by Music Rules
4 months ago
( 0 votes )
Lots of great YouTube footage of The Runaways!!
I neglected to mention in that "Fave Films Of 2011" article I wrote here a few weeks back that there's a lot of really terrific footage of The Runaways in-concert ... including some surprisingly good footage of them performing in Japan in the mid-1970s, a country that very wisely and cannily appreciated Joan Jett, Cherie Currie and the other members of that shamefully underrated rock band longgggg before any of those "professional" music critics at publications such as "Rolling Stone" and "The New York Times" ever did.

--John Pluntze
Comment by Music Rules
3 months ago
( 0 votes )
See "Hunger Games" star Jennifer Lawrence" in "Winter's Bone", "Burning Plain"...
Fans of Jennifer Lawrence -- and I guess now that her new film, "The Hunger Games", has already made more than $200 million at the box office just in the U.S. alone!! -- would do well to rent the superb, poignant and extremely powerful 2010 drama, "WINTER'S BONE", that also stars Lawrence; both she and the movie are really amazing. Same can said also for 2008's "THE BURNING PLAIN" (starring Charlize Theron, Kim Basinger and Jennifer Lawrence) ... another cinematic gem that sadly didn't get much attention initially at the box office, but hopefully will now that Lawrence is a full-fledged star (and deservedly so).
Comment by Music Rules
1 month ago
( 0 votes )
'Salmon Fishing' Definitely a BIG-Screen Movie....
I saw "Salmon Fishing in the Yemen" last night at the Magic Lantern with a few friends of mine, and I think it's very safe to say that that romantic-comedy-melodrama would be on my "Top 10 Fave Films" list in ANY given film year. And it's definitely a movie you should see on the BIG screen, too (since it was filmed at some gorgeous locations in both Scotland and Morocco). It features some of the very best acting work I've ever seen from Ewan McGregor ("Moulin Rouge"), Emily Blunt ("Charlie Wilson's War", "The Devil Wears Prada") and Kristin Scott Thomas ("The English Patient"), and also some of the very best directing work I've seen yet from Sweden-born Lasse Hallstrom ("My Life As a Dog", "The Cider House Rules", "Chocolat", "Dear John", "The Hoax").

An absolute gem of a movie -- and one to genuinely treasure... :)
Comment by Music Rules
1 month ago
( 0 votes )
RE: 'Salmon Fishing' Definitely a BIG-Screen Movie....
I'm really elated that sooooo many people here in the Wood River Valley have evidently enjoyed that wonderful "SALMON FISHING IN THE YEMEN" movie so much that it will start its FOURTH hugely-popular week at the Magic Lantern here in Ketchum this coming Friday. It's really a movie to rally around -- which is obviously what's happening here in the Wood River Valley, anyway!! :)
Comment by Music Rules
2 weeks ago
( 0 votes )
"2012 Fave Films" Listing Without a Doubt.... :)
I know we have a way to go before another "Fave Films" list (for 2012) will be posted here -- but having just rented/watched for the first time 2011's "Young Adult" film, I have to say THAT would be on my "Top 10 Fave Films" list in ANY given year without a doubt!! Charlize Theron (who's NEVER been better in a movie) may not exactly be portraying the most sympathetic/empathetic character on the planet -- anymore than George Clooney was in director Jason Reitman's previous film, "Up In the Air" (Reitman's other terrific films are "Thank You For Smoking", and "Juno") -- but Theron and the other A++++ actors in this often VERY dark/black comedy (which include Patrick Wilson, Jill Eikenberry, Elizabeth Reaser, and "King Of Queens" co-star, Patton Oswalt (whose stellar work in this movie is a world away from ANYTHING I've seen him do on TV, or in other movies he's likewise co-starred in) are so uniformly superb, not to mention the writing by Diablo Cody (Oscar winner for "Juno"), that I, for one, found her to be a verrry endearing and wonderful character to spend time with ... even if she unabashedly IS something of a lost (and sometimes extremely selfish/self-centered) soul.

Definitely not a film that everyone will "enjoy", per se, but just as definitely a film that deserves high, high marks for what it takes on/deals with, where deeply-flawed individuals are concerned.
Comment by Music Rules
1 week ago
( 0 votes )
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