At the end of 2011, I'm looking back on a year that has had a lot of good films, but very few outstanding ones. Here is a list of films I suggest you try and see (if you haven't already) or make sure you avoid - if it's not too late.
THE GOOD
The King's Speech
127 Hours
True Grit
Inside Job
Cave Of Forgotten Dreams
The Fighter
Animal Kingdom
Rabbit Hole
Wake Wood
Archipelago
The Messenger
Bridesmaids
Farewell
Attack The Block
Jane Eyre
Kill List
The Inbetweeners
A Separation
50/50
Black Pond
Deep Blue Sea
The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo
The Artist
THE DREADFUL
There are obvious candidates here like Pirates Of The Caribbean 4, Transformers 3, and anything with Alvin and the Chipmunks. But you know all that already. So here are a few that are much worse than they have any right to be, and a few that might just be overrated.
IMMORTALS - given that Tarsem Singh's previous film, The Fall, was spectacularly wonderful, I had hoped that this would be something better than a carbon copy of 300. It wasn't. It was worse.
ANONYMOUS - why Roland Emmerich, director of such literary masterpieces as Godzilla, 2012 and Independence Day, should feel he was qualified to make a film about the authenticity of Shakespeare's plays is something I don't feel equipped to comment on, but it was a disastrous error of judgement. There is nothing to recommend in this film, apart from the ludicrousness of the story, involving revenge, betrayal, incest, and bad taste.
ONE DAY - it's disappointing when a film is made of a book you like and it is a lousy film. Even more disappointing is when the director of the film has already made an excellent film (An Education) making you hope that she can do something special. Even though Jim Sturgess is miscast as Dexter, and Anne Hathaway as Emma, it is not their fault that the film doesn't work. It's simply that a structure that works on the page can't be successfully translated wholesale onto the screen. Big shame.
