2018 Round-Up
And so the second year of this blog draws to an end, with our hundredth entry and it's time once again to evaluate the year of cinema in hindsight, from those films that have become instant classics, to those who left no impact upon us and already inhabit the bargain bins of the world. In some respects, cinema has made moves forward, in others giant leaps back. The spectre of Weinstein, Spacey and other abusers still hangs over cinema, female, LGBT and minority talent is still under-represented in mainstream cinema, and even more so as we approach the inevitable self-congratulation of award season.
Not only this but a concerning current, best seen in the witch-hunt for James Gunn, begins to show the downside of rent-a-mobs following this or the other periphery cause. In some respects, thus, same old, same old. Cinema is still dominated by franchises, Disney(the company) still has its vicelike grip around the throat of much of cinema culture, white guys still call the shots, and more than a few of these white guys abuse, and indeed continue to abuse their positions of power.
Nevertheless, there is hope beyond this-Black Panther proved that a film festooned with Afro-American talent in front and behind camera was not only bankable, but supremely so, and throughout cinema this year, other voices started to ring above the monotony of white straight men. Despite Disney's now-unbreakable influence on culture, gaps in their armour have appeared over the year, and new voices have begun to break into cinema, both in front and behind camera.
This is not to mention the sterling work of several of my favourite directors, actors and other talent making films of exceptional beauty that have got me through a tougher year, personally, than 2017. This has, at any rate, been a stronger year in cinema, far less cluttered with films that, at least to my untrained eyes, were truly bad. In 2018 I have also begun to look back at the films long since been and gone from the multiplex, and this will continue into 2019. 2018's been a good year.
So, with no further ado, let's start, in a slight turn from last year's roundup, with the five worst films of 2018:
5: Mortal Engines: What happened, Peter? You made Lord of the Rings, one of the best fantasy films ever. You made a damn decent fist of King Kong. Then you made the Hob-. Oh. Needle4ss to say, Mortal Engines starts off as a decent adaption of the Phillip Reeve novel, then merrily heads off in its own, and completely wrong direction. A sanitised, dull, adaption of a much spikier, less pretty, but more enjoyable novel that ends by going through a Star Wars Original Trilogy roulette to formulate its ending. A dull roar of a film.
4: The Predator: Whilst Shane Black seems to work out what a good Predator film consists of about ten minutes before the film ends, his unlikable cast of cracked mercenaries who are picked off over the film and tone-deaf plot that partly revolves around an autistic child character being the next step in evolution. Add to this a poorly paced structure, urban setting, and laughably bad effects, and you want nothing else but to put the original film back on and enjoy Arnie's rumble in the jungle, in a much better film than this.
3: Downsizing: A film that promises much but seems to lose its faculties once it gets to its midpoint. Despite some impressive effects, and a good setup, with climate change and overpopulation meaning humanity begins to look at miniaturisation for a solution, the writers suffer a complete loss of sense with the inclusion of a smuggling plot, casual racism, and a village of completely insane survivalists and ends on a bizarrely sombre note for a film that started as a black comedy. A schizophrenic mess of a film, and a crushing disappointment.
2: Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindlewald: The biggest crime this film committed was letting Johnny Depp, career and acting ability behind him, allegations of spousal abuse following him, and now on complete autopilot continue as pop-punk coiffured alt-right patterned fascist wizard Grindlewald. The other was letting Rowling, whose greed for box office and merchandise takings have now overtaken her care for the world she created, write the script. A mess of plotholes, sidelined characters, poor writing, and sub-M Night plot-twists that all but confirm both need to be booted from the franchise to continue its existence.
1: Night School: An unholy, unfunny, unlikable mess of a film, and by far the worst thing this year. Kevin Hart's educationally disabled "hero" was by far the worst thing about a film that veered between simply leaving a bad taste in your mouth, and making you want to leave the cinema altogether, as it threw up jokes ranging from conspiracy theories to body hair left in food, to racism. I'd say Hart needs to stick to standup, but given his summary booting from presenting the Oscars, it's perhaps best he takes a couple of years out from his career to spend time with his family
From here, we move on to those people who have, inadvertently, brought us so much joy with the awfulness of their performances this year. Whilst some names will already be familiar, some better films have held performances that, were it not for the rest of the cast, would have sunk their films into the worst five this year. So, the Five Worst Performances of 2018 are:
From here, we move on to those people who have, inadvertently, brought us so much joy with the awfulness of their performances this year. Whilst some names will already be familiar, some better films have held performances that, were it not for the rest of the cast, would have sunk their films into the worst five this year. So, the Five Worst Performances of 2018 are:
5: Charlie Day (Newton Geizler: Pacific Rim Uprising). Oh, Charlie. Charlie, Charlie, Charlie. Whilst some B-Movie actors stop just short of Saturday morning cartoon villainy, you went the whole hog and basically became an anime villain, scenery chewing et al. From your extra-curricular activities with kaiju brains, to your building drones inside a mecha program, to just going full-wig out crazy for the last third of this film, you brought us so much joy, despite how ridiculous your performance was. Despite how much of a hero you were in the original Pacific Rim, you pushed the perfunctory sequel from watchable to a solid piece of entertainment, albeit inadvertently. At least you were good in Hotel Artemis.
4: Dwayne Johnson (Will Sawyer, Skyscraper). Whilst it's been a good year for Mr Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, basically saving video-game adaption Rampage with his likable charisma alone, the same cannot be said for Skyscraper, where Johnson may as well be in a white vest and barefoot, he's so stereotypically action-movie-star, and unlike Rampage, nothing he can do saves the film. The fact that his character is disabled also indicates that, despite Hollywood being progressive, more still needs to be done to include actors with disabilities playing disabled characters.
3: Benedict Cumberbatch (The Grinch, The Grinch). Whether it's Cumberbatch's cross-Atlantic-hopping accent, his peculiarly fangless Grinch, or the complete lack of any true menace from the character other than mild snark, all three of these factors conspire to make him the least interesting incarnation of the character so far, and without a strong protagonist, the film feels hollow, wobbly, and unfunny, even without Illumination focus-testing this film to breaking point. A boring, neutered performance from an actor who, even in voice-only roles can do so much better than this dull picture.
1 (Tie) Johnny Depp (Gilbert Grindlewald, Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindlewald) & Kevin Hart (Teddy Walker, Night School). Needless to say, these two sit on a joint first place because, simply, both are terrible men, with personal histories that, in a less bankable star, would see them ejected from Hollywood, given far too much of a platform to fail to act whatsover. Whether they're playing a fascist wizard or a high-school dropout, neither of these characters have a likable bone in their body. They both derail their films with ease, because by this point, no-one in the business can say no to them. Hart is simply not funny, and Depp simply does not care. Both of their performances are lacklustre messes that all but make their respective films unwatchable.
One final award to give out before we move onto the best that 2018 gave us: this award goes to the film that, at first, I was greatly looking forward to, either through trailers, word of mouth, or the like, but, after viewing, left me disappointed in what could have been. And that Most Disappointing film Of the Year is: Venom (kinda). Whilst, like a few films I've seen this year, Venom's concepts and narrative have grown on me, such that a rewatch would happily bump it up into the upper half of 2018's films, it wasn't what we were promised, at least from trailers and promotion. Fooled, I know, but Venom is still a great film, and a worthy antithesis for the domination of Marvel by Disney, in its tale of one man and the parasite that loves him, and comes to love and defend humanity through him as well.
Moving swiftly on to the good things of 2018:
Surprise of the Year: Bumblebee. Oh boy, who would have thought that 2018 would be the year to bring us the best Transformers film yet? Bumblebee is a masterclass of how to rejuvenate, and essentially soft-reboot a franchise, from an enjoyable rapport between Autobot and heroine, to two excellently nasty villains, to a rarely replicated Spielbergian sense of wonder that wipes away the taint of Bay at last, to tell a tale that is at once smaller, more intimate and wider and more important than any of the previous films. One can only help that, back on track, Transformers now proceeds into new and exciting territory, and does not merely fall back onto old habits
Before we move onto the final category, that of the five Best Films of 2018, we need to celebrate those actors and actresses whose performances have brought those films to life. Here, I'm going to cheat a little and open the category of Best Actor/Actress up to seven, to allow some of the smaller roles to shine as bright as the frontrunners.
7: Saoirse Ronan (Lady Bird, Lady Bird) Ronan's central performance in Lady Bird as an artistic free spirit trapped by her circumstance marks her as one to watch, a railing mass of teenage self-expression, young adult fears, and tortured artist in one of the greatest, perfectly nuanced portrayals of teenagerhood in recent cinema-her appearance is the best element of an otherwise fantastic film, and proof that Ronan is an actress to watch in the coming year.
5 (Draw): Michael B Jordan (Erik "Killmonger", Black Panther), Josh Brolin (Thanos, Avengers Infinity War). Pitted against Chadwick Boseman's regal T'Challa, and dominating Black Panther, is Jordan's Killmonger, by far one of the Marvel Cinematic Universe's greatest villains-a well intentioned, and empathetic extremist who aims to use the weaponry of Wakanda to subjugate the world-Killmonger acts as both a critique of toxic masculinity, and of international isolationism.
Yet, even Killmonger is overshadowed by the mighty and terrible Thanos, and it is he who arguably steals the show in Infinity War, Brolin giving the Mad God an inevitable gravitas, a nemesis for the Avengers, a mixture of philosopher, warrior and extremist, and it is his actions that drive the plot of the film, leading to one of the most infamous sequences of cinema this year-one can only wonder how Marvel will possibly bring Thanos to his knees in Avengers Endgame.
4: Margot Robbie (Tonya Harding, I Tonya): At the centre of this Rashomon-on-ice retelling of the life of disgraced former Olympic ice skater, Tonya Harding, is Robbie's pitch-perfect portrayal of Harding, alternatively graceful and graceless, victim and violent plotter in the incident that would eventually mar her name forever, bringing across perfectly the duality of Harding as a person, and peeling back the layers that make up an ultimately contradictory person, and truly American heroine in one of the best sports films ever made.
3: Ryan Reynolds (Deadpool/Wade Wilson, Deadpool 2). Now indellibly linked with the superhero, such that it's now impossible to think of anyone else playing this role, in or out of the iconic red and black suit, Ryan Reynolds now turns Deadpool into a bigger, bolder, stranger franchise, with a mourning, widowed Wade now (unsuccessfully) building his own team to rescue a young boy, in a film that pushes the envelope of an already great franchise wider, whilst critiquing male anger, the entire superhero genre, and even the lack of LGBT characters in mainstream super hero cinema in one of the best performances of Reynolds' career to date.
2: Tom Cruise (Ethan Hunt, Mission Impossible: Fallout). Six films in, it's quite possible that the Mission Impossible films are, quite possibly, the only thing stopping Tom Cruise from simply taking over the world in a one-man globe-trotting stunt show, given his utter devotion to pulling off as many jaw dropping stunts, including one that left him out of action for weeks, per movie as possible. Even for those who dislike Cruise the man, Cruise the actor is quite possibly the last great action movie star left in the business, an unstoppable acting force of nature.
1: Sally Hawkins (Elisa Esposito, The Shape of Water): At the centre of Guillermo del Toro's fantastical fairy tale romance is Elisa, a mute young woman who communicates entirely through sign language, who falls in love with Doug Jones' sensuous sea creature, and eventually seeks to free the creature from a governmental lab where the creature is kept. It is her innocence, her love, her dedication to the creature, and the budding romance between the mismatched couple that eventually blooms into open eroticism with a frankness missing from modern love stories in cinema. Hawkins imbues Hawkins with none of the typical tropes of disabled characters, but instead makes her a strong, independent, intelligent young woman, rarely held back by her disability.
And thus, finally, we come to the best films of the year:
5: Avengers: Infinity War (Dir. Anthony and Joe Russo)
The culmination of every single Marvel film to date, and starring several dozen of Marvel's heroes against the Mad God Thanos, this film could have been a confused mess, but at its heart, it is a smart, intelligent, if fan-serving masterpiece, a magnificent balancing act of characters, plots and a neat tying up of character arcs and ending of stories, through which Josh Brolin's Thanos stalks, that brings over a decade of Marvel films to a shattering close with a single click. Avengers: Endgame is sure to be a highlight of 2019.
4: The Incredibles 2 (Dir Brad Bird)
If the first Incredibles film was a love-letter to superhero and spy movies, then the second film is, if anything, a more accomplished take on familiar elements, with Helen Parr (Elastigirl) taking up the mantle to bring back superheroes to the mainstream and respectability, whilst husband, Bob (Mr Incredible) has to look after their children as all three of them struggle with their own problems, in a film that perfectly encapsulates what it means to be a parent, and to deal with the pressures of raising children, normal or super-powered.
3: The Shape Of Water (Dir. Guillermo del Toro).
Del Toro's fantastical fairytale of interspecies romance is not merely a tale of the love between a fishman and a mute young woman, but a critique of differences, of love, forbidden or not, crossing boundaries, not only in the fishman and Elisa's budding romance, but also in its Cold War setting, its focus upon the lack of rights for minorities, ethnic and LGBT. Together with this, it is an exploration of cinema and artistry, and its ethereal, fairy-tale setting that shows Del Toro at the height of his narrative and visual powers.
2: American Animals (Dir. Bart Layton)
A nigh perfect mix of documentary and drama, this retelling of the farcical attempted heist of several volumes of John James Audubon's Birds of America by a quartet of hapless students is a masterpiece of storytelling, visual and narrative, in which the very memories of our would-be thieves, including fantasist Warren and artist Spencer, once friends, are pitted against each other in a tale every bit as artificial but beautiful as Audubon's paintings, in which the very fabric of the narrative twists and turns between fact and fiction. A rare, beautiful, modern classic of American narrative film.
1: Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (Dir. Peter Ramsey, Robert Persichetti Jr. & Rodney Rothman)
Into the Spider-Verse is the best film this year for two simple reasons-it is one of the single most visually stunning films of the last decade, pushing the entire medium of cg films forward in a way films haven't done since Pixar were new on the scene, but more importantly, particularly in the year when Spider-Man's beloved creator, Stan Lee, finally passed on, it tells a simple and vital story-anyone can be a hero, radioactive spider or no radioactive spider, mask or no mask, collection of fellow spider-people or no collection of spider-people. Into the Spider-Verse is vital watching because no superhero film, even among Marvel's unstoppable oeuvre, has nailed it as perfectly, as succinctly, with the humour, pathos and energy that Into the Spider-Verse has.
We look forward to seeing you in 2019! Thank you for reading! Happy New Year to you all!
Before we move onto the final category, that of the five Best Films of 2018, we need to celebrate those actors and actresses whose performances have brought those films to life. Here, I'm going to cheat a little and open the category of Best Actor/Actress up to seven, to allow some of the smaller roles to shine as bright as the frontrunners.
7: Saoirse Ronan (Lady Bird, Lady Bird) Ronan's central performance in Lady Bird as an artistic free spirit trapped by her circumstance marks her as one to watch, a railing mass of teenage self-expression, young adult fears, and tortured artist in one of the greatest, perfectly nuanced portrayals of teenagerhood in recent cinema-her appearance is the best element of an otherwise fantastic film, and proof that Ronan is an actress to watch in the coming year.
5 (Draw): Michael B Jordan (Erik "Killmonger", Black Panther), Josh Brolin (Thanos, Avengers Infinity War). Pitted against Chadwick Boseman's regal T'Challa, and dominating Black Panther, is Jordan's Killmonger, by far one of the Marvel Cinematic Universe's greatest villains-a well intentioned, and empathetic extremist who aims to use the weaponry of Wakanda to subjugate the world-Killmonger acts as both a critique of toxic masculinity, and of international isolationism.
Yet, even Killmonger is overshadowed by the mighty and terrible Thanos, and it is he who arguably steals the show in Infinity War, Brolin giving the Mad God an inevitable gravitas, a nemesis for the Avengers, a mixture of philosopher, warrior and extremist, and it is his actions that drive the plot of the film, leading to one of the most infamous sequences of cinema this year-one can only wonder how Marvel will possibly bring Thanos to his knees in Avengers Endgame.
4: Margot Robbie (Tonya Harding, I Tonya): At the centre of this Rashomon-on-ice retelling of the life of disgraced former Olympic ice skater, Tonya Harding, is Robbie's pitch-perfect portrayal of Harding, alternatively graceful and graceless, victim and violent plotter in the incident that would eventually mar her name forever, bringing across perfectly the duality of Harding as a person, and peeling back the layers that make up an ultimately contradictory person, and truly American heroine in one of the best sports films ever made.
3: Ryan Reynolds (Deadpool/Wade Wilson, Deadpool 2). Now indellibly linked with the superhero, such that it's now impossible to think of anyone else playing this role, in or out of the iconic red and black suit, Ryan Reynolds now turns Deadpool into a bigger, bolder, stranger franchise, with a mourning, widowed Wade now (unsuccessfully) building his own team to rescue a young boy, in a film that pushes the envelope of an already great franchise wider, whilst critiquing male anger, the entire superhero genre, and even the lack of LGBT characters in mainstream super hero cinema in one of the best performances of Reynolds' career to date.
2: Tom Cruise (Ethan Hunt, Mission Impossible: Fallout). Six films in, it's quite possible that the Mission Impossible films are, quite possibly, the only thing stopping Tom Cruise from simply taking over the world in a one-man globe-trotting stunt show, given his utter devotion to pulling off as many jaw dropping stunts, including one that left him out of action for weeks, per movie as possible. Even for those who dislike Cruise the man, Cruise the actor is quite possibly the last great action movie star left in the business, an unstoppable acting force of nature.
1: Sally Hawkins (Elisa Esposito, The Shape of Water): At the centre of Guillermo del Toro's fantastical fairy tale romance is Elisa, a mute young woman who communicates entirely through sign language, who falls in love with Doug Jones' sensuous sea creature, and eventually seeks to free the creature from a governmental lab where the creature is kept. It is her innocence, her love, her dedication to the creature, and the budding romance between the mismatched couple that eventually blooms into open eroticism with a frankness missing from modern love stories in cinema. Hawkins imbues Hawkins with none of the typical tropes of disabled characters, but instead makes her a strong, independent, intelligent young woman, rarely held back by her disability.
And thus, finally, we come to the best films of the year:
5: Avengers: Infinity War (Dir. Anthony and Joe Russo)
The culmination of every single Marvel film to date, and starring several dozen of Marvel's heroes against the Mad God Thanos, this film could have been a confused mess, but at its heart, it is a smart, intelligent, if fan-serving masterpiece, a magnificent balancing act of characters, plots and a neat tying up of character arcs and ending of stories, through which Josh Brolin's Thanos stalks, that brings over a decade of Marvel films to a shattering close with a single click. Avengers: Endgame is sure to be a highlight of 2019.
4: The Incredibles 2 (Dir Brad Bird)
If the first Incredibles film was a love-letter to superhero and spy movies, then the second film is, if anything, a more accomplished take on familiar elements, with Helen Parr (Elastigirl) taking up the mantle to bring back superheroes to the mainstream and respectability, whilst husband, Bob (Mr Incredible) has to look after their children as all three of them struggle with their own problems, in a film that perfectly encapsulates what it means to be a parent, and to deal with the pressures of raising children, normal or super-powered.
3: The Shape Of Water (Dir. Guillermo del Toro).
Del Toro's fantastical fairytale of interspecies romance is not merely a tale of the love between a fishman and a mute young woman, but a critique of differences, of love, forbidden or not, crossing boundaries, not only in the fishman and Elisa's budding romance, but also in its Cold War setting, its focus upon the lack of rights for minorities, ethnic and LGBT. Together with this, it is an exploration of cinema and artistry, and its ethereal, fairy-tale setting that shows Del Toro at the height of his narrative and visual powers.
2: American Animals (Dir. Bart Layton)
A nigh perfect mix of documentary and drama, this retelling of the farcical attempted heist of several volumes of John James Audubon's Birds of America by a quartet of hapless students is a masterpiece of storytelling, visual and narrative, in which the very memories of our would-be thieves, including fantasist Warren and artist Spencer, once friends, are pitted against each other in a tale every bit as artificial but beautiful as Audubon's paintings, in which the very fabric of the narrative twists and turns between fact and fiction. A rare, beautiful, modern classic of American narrative film.
1: Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (Dir. Peter Ramsey, Robert Persichetti Jr. & Rodney Rothman)
Into the Spider-Verse is the best film this year for two simple reasons-it is one of the single most visually stunning films of the last decade, pushing the entire medium of cg films forward in a way films haven't done since Pixar were new on the scene, but more importantly, particularly in the year when Spider-Man's beloved creator, Stan Lee, finally passed on, it tells a simple and vital story-anyone can be a hero, radioactive spider or no radioactive spider, mask or no mask, collection of fellow spider-people or no collection of spider-people. Into the Spider-Verse is vital watching because no superhero film, even among Marvel's unstoppable oeuvre, has nailed it as perfectly, as succinctly, with the humour, pathos and energy that Into the Spider-Verse has.
We look forward to seeing you in 2019! Thank you for reading! Happy New Year to you all!
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