Richard Kelly = Orson Welles

In that they each only need to have made one film to solidify their respective places in filmmaking history. Maybe that seems a bit hyperbolic, but I just rewatched Donnie Darko for the first time in several years and was just astounded by the confidence, complexity, and vision on display; it's a joy to behold. I was one of the few to have seen Donnie Darko in its theatrical run back in the fall of 2001, and even then I got the sense that I had seen something unique and special. Not even Southland Tales can dim that burning flame. Excelsior, Mr. Kelly!

P.S. — I'm not afraid to admit that this is a drunk-post, so I reserve to right to retract it at the time and place of my choosing.

Scott Pilgrim & the Infinite Awesome

SCOTT PILGRIM VS. THE WORLD

This has been kind of a weak summer movie season. That's not to say it's been a complete disappointment—Toy Story 3, MacGruber, I Am Love, and The Other Guys were all good (for very different reasons), Iron Man 2 and Predators were fun, and I'm looking forward to seeing The Expendables in the very near future—but going in there were really only two films I could honestly say I was really excited about: I've already seen one of them three times, and I just saw the other for the first time less than an hour ago. I can now say with complete confidence that those two definitely make the rest of the summer worth it.

Having just finished (as of last night) the sixth and final volume of Bryan Lee O'Malley's Scott Pilgrim saga, "Scott Pilgrim's Finest Hour," and watched the great Edgar Wright's adaptation, I'm just astounded at what a perfect match these two artists, the graphic novelist and the filmmaker, are for each other. Both the Scott Pilgrim comics and Wright's work—Spaced, Shaun of the Dead, and Hot Fuzz—combine a high-energy, cartoony aesthetic with interesting, realistic, full-bodied characters and genuine, honest stories about those characters' search for meaning and connection in life. Scott Pilgrim, a goofy, well-meaning but immature young man clumsily, painfully feeling his way into adulthood, fits right in with Tim, Daisy, Shaun, and Danny. However, despite the similarities, Wright isn't just reciting O'Malley's story but telling his own, and isn't afraid to make the characters his own. Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is just as much an Edgar Wright film as it is a Bryan Lee O'Malley story.

— SCOTT PILGRIM'S PRECIOUS LITTLE SPOILERS (for both the comics and the film) —

That said, the film borrows very heavily from the comics, especially for its first two-thirds or so (covering roughly the first four volumes). During that part of the film, virtually every change Wright made was merely taking things out rather than adding his own material—though what's there, while originating with O'Malley, still bears Wright's distinct stamp. Despite how much from the comics Wright was able to cram into the film (without overdoing it or slowing down the pace), there are a number of elements that didn't make the cut: Ramona's glowing head, Knives Chau's father and Scott's old friend Lisa from vol. 4, most of the details about Scott's history with Kim and Envy (to which the film merely alludes), the trip to Honest Ed's in vol. 3, the recording of Sex Bob-omb's album, and Scott's battles with various robots in vol. 5. As the film progresses, though, it differs increasingly from the comics: Scott's battles against Roxy, the Katayanagi twins, and Gideon are very different, Envy's "weak point" behind her knees is transferred to Roxy, and Ramona's battle with Knives is moved from vol. 2 to the film's climax. I'm not really complaining or anything, it's just interesting to see the degree of faithfulness to the source material change over the course of the film.

Speaking (some more) of faithfulness to the source material, it's worth mentioning that the film was already in production before O'Malley finished the final volume (which was only released last month), so the two versions of the Scott Pilgrim saga's finale differ greatly. — ÜBER-SPOILAGE TO FOLLOW, OBVIOUSLY — What's interesting are the elements that the two versions share (but utilize in different ways): the NegaScott, the final showdown at the Chaos Theatre, Scott's death, his resurrection thanks to his 1-up. So there must have been some collaboration between O'Malley and Wright regarding these details. However, the overall "message" with which the story concludes differs significantly between O'Malley's version and Wright's. In vol. 6 of the comic, Scott comes to realize that the source of his immaturity is his unwillingness to address his past actions truthfully and learn from them; instead, he's always remembered his past in such a way that he's always the good guy and those he's hurt either were evil or weren't really hurt at all. Though alluded to throughout the series, it doesn't become explicit until Scott visits Kim in vol. 6, when she contrasts the reality of Simon Lee, her harmless high-school boyfriend Scott beat up to date her, with Scott's fantasized memory of a "villain" from whom he had to rescue her in vol. 2. By perpetually lionizing himself and demonizing or ignoring those he's hurt, he never had to change or improve; as Kim tells him, "if you keep forgetting your mistakes, you'll just keep making them again." That puts the entire premise of the series—"Scott Pilgrim vs. the World," the good guy forced to battle bad guys and win the day—into an entirely different light, as an expression of Scott's childish, selfish view of himself and the world. It's only when he owns up to his own failings that he's able finally to overcome Gideon and get another chance with Ramona. The film doesn't include this thematic element other than several references to Scott's being an irresponsible "heartbreaker" and his incredulity at this; instead, the lesson he learns is "self-respect," which involves his admitting to cheating on Knives with Ramona (and vice versa) but has more to do with his fighting his battles for his own reasons rather than just to win the girl. That's fine in itself, but it doesn't fit especially well with the failings we've seen Scott exhibit previously or with how he plans to go forward at the film's end; if anything, doing things for himself rather than others seemed to have been much the problem in his life, and in the end he still ends up winning the girl anyway. This doesn't really take away from the film, but it does make its conclusion a bit less meaningful and "earned" than the comic's. — BACK TO REGULAR SPOILAGE —

But what, you may be asking, about the film as its own beast, independent of O'Malley's comic? Pretty darn great. I'm already a substantial fan of Wright's work, and Scott Pilgrim fits right in: energetic, imaginative, hilarious, with real characters dealing with real issues. Though Scott isn't dramatically different from the kinds of characters Michael Cera generally plays, he isn't just channeling George Michael Bluth for the umpteenth time; Scott's much more of a spazzy slacker than the uptight, rather nebbish Bluth boy. Mary Elizabeth Winstead's Ramona is exactly the right melding of sexy, sympathethic, and cold, coming across, like O'Malley's Ramona, as multifaceted rather than schizophrenic. The rest of the cast is great too, especially Kieran Culkin as Wallace, Scott's gay room- and bed-mate. Strangely enough, while Sex Bob-omb frontman Stephen Stills mostly hangs in the background in the comics, I really liked him in the film (played by one Mark Webber). Each of the evil exes gets his (or her) moment to shine, except for the Katayanagi twins, though, to be fair, they don't make much of an impression in the comic either. My socks were thoroughly knocked off when the Vegan Police who showed up to exact vegan justice on Todd for his vegan transgressions were played by Tom Jane (who just wants his kids back!) and Clifton Collins (who just wants his testicle back!). (Funny, Jane appeared in an episode of Arrested Development with Cera, while Collins appeared in Mike Judge's Extract with AD alum Jason Bateman, so feel free to use that info the next time you're playing six degrees.) Since music is a pretty significant part of the story, it's a good thing that the original music composed for the film (by Beck, among others) happens to rock. And no mention of the film's music would be complete without saying how much it warmed my geeky little heart to hear samples from The Legend of Zelda, like mother's milk to one raised in bygone days on the NES.

Indeed, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World is awesome, surprising no-one.

Digging into the ol' O&MTM mail bag...

In response to a recent comment by "M" (taking a break from sending 007 on his latest mission, I assume) asking which directors' films would I see, no questions asked, knowing only that they were the director. An interesting question. The Coen Brothers and Nolan were the first to come to mind. Tarantino, Aronofsky, P.T. and Wes Anderson, Fincher, Spike Jonze, Guillermo del Toro, Judd Apatow, Edgar Wright, and Jody Hill would fit the bill as well. (As you've probably noticed, these are all relatively recent filmmakers, with only the Coen Brothers' directing career beginning earlier than 1990. This list may make me look like some philistine who never watches anything older than Star Wars, but a glimpse at our "Movies We've Seen in 2010" sidebar list easily puts the lie to that. Rather, I've limited the list to living directors; otherwise, Kubrick would certainly lead the pack.) 

There are several other directors for whom this would generally apply, were it not for one or two counterexamples from their respective filmographies. Spielberg would have qualified, were it not for The Terminal, which I've never had the slightest interest in seeing. I've been a Terry Gilliam fan since childhood, but I've heard too much negative to feel too enthusiastic about seeing Tideland. I'm also a Lynch fan, but I confess that I haven't yet mustered the courage to see Inland Empire, from what I've heard the Lynchiest of his body of work. Scorsese is certainly one of the greatest filmmakers of the past fifty years, but his last few films, though mostly quite good, haven't been up to his earlier career's high standard, and from what I've heard Shutter Island is merely OK but not Scorsesian. There was a time when I probably also would have said Ridley Scott and Tim Burton too, but lately both of their careers have tended more toward predictability, mediocrity, commercialism, even self-parody. (Is there any more fitting word for Burton's Alice in Wonderland?)

Of course, the nice thing about the great filmmakers, even ones who, at times over the course of their careers, become hit-or-miss, is that even the misses are usually at least interesting misses, failures that still contain some vision or spirit and are still worth visiting, if only once.

Actors, on the other hand, are a completely different matter; they're by no means merely incidental to a film's final quality, but generally they have a far smaller role to play in making a film what it is. In cinema, the creative buck stops at the director, so in the end the success or failure of an actor's performance is the success or failure of the person directing him. So I honestly can't see myself watching a film solely on the basis of a particular actor's being in it.

A movie worth writing about

INCEPTION. This has been a long time coming, and I would like to say the time has been spent mulling over my thoughts. But, well, that would be a lie. Every time I open my Google Reader I see that it says there are two posts waiting for me to read and I feel guilty. So while waiting for Thirsty Thursday this week, I'll put some thoughts to proverbial paper. Keyboard I guess.

Having seen the movie (trailers) twice, I can say that those who say one has to see it more than once to "understand it" are either being what the kids call a "hater" or exaggerating. I got it for the most part the first time but there are certainly layers of meaning that come out after seeing it a second and -- what I hope will soon be -- third time. The first screening was mainly consumed with following the twists of plot and it was not until revisiting the move that I was able to appreciate the full extent of the scope of Christopher Nolan's filmmaking. Watching Memento in between, I found myself focusing on how well he had transitioned from a small-scale to a grand-scale director.

Inception has that complex storytelling packed full of nuance, metaphor, and layers of meaning found in movies generally relegated to small budgets and art-house theaters. But partly as a result of his commercially successful Batman franchise, Nolan has been given a studio budget and produces his movies in a way that reminds me of classic epics from the studio age where a director could fill the screen with his vision. From beginning to end, Inception is an immersive movie where the level of production value fills the screen with his vision. This is a movie that should properly be experienced on a large screen. In Memento we follow one character and use creative filmmaking to tell an individual story with the focus at all times on Leonard (Guy Pearce). For Inception the lead actor might be Leonardo DiCaprio, but party due to its ensemble cast, the real main focus is the world and the dreams. The characters are each more important for how they serve as our conduit into the understanding of Nolan's exploration of the concept of reality. More on why DiCaprio's Cobb is the most-developed character will have to wait.

I also got the sense of a more classic style of filmmaking in the actors chosen. DiCaprio might be a movie star but one known for using his post-Titanic career to position himself as a serious actor instead of a matinee idol. Start culling through the rest of the cast and you pull people known for providing strong performances in movies, not as btox-office draws. I get the sense that in making this movie Nolan pretty much said "I want a Joseph Gordon-Levitt-type actor" or an "Ellen Page-esque ingenue" and instead of trying to find someone to fit the bill, he got those actors. I have a running idea in my head that I go back to of who would be my dream ensemble if I were casting a movie (a topic I think worth making a post about, now that I think of it) and there's a sense I get that he did the same thing. And cast them.

Alright those are general ideas I can write about for those who are living under a rock and therefore not seen this movie. Now begins...

SPOILER ALERT

Now that is out of the way, the question is what I think the movie is about. As I discussed with you before, I do not think that the top -- his totem -- is going to fall. Although I have avoided reading analysis before writing this I did see one twitter post that made me think. Whoever it was wrote that it didn't matter if it fell or not because he was happy -- although it was written somewhat more eloquently. My reasoning for why it does not fall are somewhat related to that. The question of whether the whole movie is a dream is not something I will probably ever be able to tell for sure, although as I think of it again, I start to consider how much every character seems to act how he would expect -- specifically how certain he is of Ellen Page's reaction. Anyhow, that is for another post. The main idea I felt after coming out was that reality did not matter to him anymore and so his creation of his own world where he could be content is what mattered to him and so that's what he chose to do. Watching it more I think I'll be able to look more at the idea of how Nolan is exploring denial and how the idea of happiness itself is not an authentic but instead manufactured concept. Again, that might be for later.

The other part of the post that I couldn't really say before the spoiler cutoff is how much I admired the pacing of the movie. The movie holds suspense for roughly the last hour by cutting those different dreams together that are so different not just in atmosphere but also in the type of suspense created. From the idea of a falling van and a race against time and

an action-movie fight, we get a run of the different ways a movie can use its tools to keep an audience enthralled. Again, filmmaking on a grand scale. Nolan really shows in this movie how his ability as a small director and large-scale director can both be used at the same time.

Also, I think I might need to see the movie again. Soon. But there's my start to the discussion.

All Things Incepted

If you're anything like me, you can't get enough Inception information, analysis, and theorizing. So I thought I'd compile some of the better pieces on the film that I've found lately in the ol' series of tubes.

(And be forewarned, a lot of these contain substantial SPOILERS, so click the links at your own peril.)

• For a couple weeks leading up to I-Day, CHUD's Devin Faraci wrote a series of articles dealing with various aspects of the film, ranging from the rotating-hotel fight sequence to Hans Zimmer's score to a video showing us what Inception would have been like had it starred Tommy Wiseau and Greg Sestero.

• Devin also wrote an article analyzing the film's meaning as he saw it, both at the immediate level (i.e., "how much of it was a dream?") and at a more "meta" level of what Nolan was trying to say with this film. A very interesting read.

• At Cinematical, Peter Hall has a piece that first examines six of the interpretations of the film already floating around (keep in mind, the piece was published only three days after Inception's release—what a movie!), and then points out five plot holes that he perceived. (Most of these "plot holes" didn't bother me at all when I watched it, because there seemed to me to be perfectly intuitive explanations—not necessarily the only or the correct explanations, mind you—for them. But that's probably a subject for another post.)

• For a bit of an inside scoop, New York magazine has an interview with Dileep Rao, who played Yusuf the dream chemist. Luckily, the interviewer doesn't waste time with boring stuff about how he got attached to the film, how he enjoyed making it, what he thought of the other actors, etc., but instead goes straight for what we're really interested in: how does stuff like limbo and kicks and different dream-levels work? Answers to your nitpickiest questions, straight from the horse's mouth (or at least as close to the horse as we're ever likely to get). (However, Rao, like me the first time I watched it, is under the impression that the third dream-level, the mountaintop hospital, is Fischer's dream; but as one "Viewdrix" convincingly explains in the first comment, the dreamer in that level is actually Eames. I guess no one's a 100% reliable source when it comes to Inception explanations.)

• Finally, if you haven't already spent enough time on Inception—and I spent five hours watching it last weekend—then /Film has a two-hour-or-so-long podcast in which David Chen, Devindra Hardawar, and Adam Quigley discuss their impressions and interpretations, and about halfway through are joined by the New York Press's (in)famous critic Armond White, whose, shall we say, less than positive review has already created enough waves in filmreviewdom for Roger Ebert to address the controversy. (Though White's obviously a very intelligent and learned critic, I have a fundamental, visceral inability to take seriously someone who not only thought that Gentlemen Broncos was better than Inglourious Basterds, but called it "the 2001 of 2009." Though, on the other hand, he's right that Crank 2 was better than Avatar, so who knows what to think.)

The Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of

INCEPTION

I know that lately this blog has been neglected to the point that we should worry about hearing from Blog Protective Services, but it seems like it's been a while since I saw a film that really motivated me to throw my thoughts out into the electronic ether. Inception (trailers) is that film.

— YOU MUSTN'T BE AFRAID TO SPOIL A LITTLE BIGGER, DARLING. —

The first and foremost thing I have to say about Inception is: You see things you've never seen before. I don't mean that hyperbolically, but literally (unless you happen to have the imagination of a Fellini or an Arthur C. Clarke). The kind of sheer imagination on display in Inception is a rare and precious thing, especially in today's Hollywood and especially given the amount of resources usually necessary to pull it off convincingly. The city of Paris folding over onto itself; a freight train plowing down the middle of a busy city street; people fighting in a rotating hotel hallway; crumbling skyscrapers falling into the sea like a glacier. Even for these purely visual aspects of the film, to think that they all came from one imagination gives me even greater respect for Nolan—who both conceived of them as writer and executed them as director—that I had before.

In addition to the breathtaking visuals, the story itself is a marvel. For almost the entire running time—two and a half hours that flew by as quickly the second time seeing it as the first—it seemed that at least every ten minutes some new element entered the story that made me stop and think, "That's really cool," or "That really interesting," or "I can't wait to see where this will lead." Starting in the first fifteen minutes with using a dream within a dream to compound the subject's vulnerability, on through the use of totems, the dream-projections' violent reaction to dream invasion (and the extent to which anti-invasion training can take that, as seen once the team enters Fischer's subconscious), the differences in the perception of time between waking and dreaming (and its exponential multiplication as more dream-layers become involved), the necessity of a "kick" sensation to wake the dreamers, the revelation that the Mal who keeps appearing in dreams isn't an outside invader like the team but Cobb's own projection of his dead wife, Cobb's responsibility for her death and how that was done—Inception's story was so fascinating, so engaging, and so well and intricately constructed that it never gave my interest a chance to flag.

Just how well constructed this story is, just how much thought and care Nolan put into it over the decade or so he was working on it, is made particularly evident in the film's centerpiece, the team's invasion of Fischer's subconscious. Not only do they use three dream-layers to plant the idea deeply enough without his noticing, but each layer serves a particular purpose: the first (the rainy city) plays off the resentment Fischer feels toward his father; the second (the hotel) establishes distrust between Fischer and Browning; the third (the mountaintop hospital) creates the positive, emotional basis for the idea, the "catharsis." Eventually, all three layers are active simultaneously and affecting one another, seen most dramatically in the first layer's effects on the second, from the tumble-cycle hallway effect as the van flips over to the weightlessness created when Yusuf drives it off the bridge.

As we've already discussed, the various layers have distinct roles not only in the team's plan, but also in the narrative and drama of the film itself. In the first dream-layer, the van's slow (from the other layers' perspectives) fall toward the river below serves as the ticking clock against which everything else must race; in the second, Arthur must use both brawn to fight off subconscious security and brain to figure out how to create the kick necessary to awaken his sleeping teammates in a zero-gravity environment; the third is a classic action sequence with guns, explosions, and an army of faceless bad guys; in the fourth, limbo, the drama and suspense are emotional rather than action-based, as Cobb must finally confront and overcome the destructive pain and guilt he feels about Mal. These four layers are simultaneously interwoven in a tour de force of stunningly effective storytelling and editing, a cinematic Swiss watch.

Of course, all these scenarios would be insufficient without interesting characters and talented actors, and Inception has both. DiCaprio's Dom Cobb joins the ranks of protagonists haunted by their past familiar from Nolan's filmography: Guy Pearce in Memento, Al Pacino in Insomnia, Hugh Jackman in The Prestige, and, the exemple par excellence, Christian Bale in the Batman franchise. Like them, Cobb is essentially a loner but is forced by necessity into uneasy alliances of convenience with others, imbuing him with an intriguing tension. The other members of the team are much more peripheral, but that doesn't mean they're one-dimensional or without color: the professional Arthur's longstanding but often tense working relationship with Cobb; Eames and Arthur's barbed exchanges; Ariadne (I see what you did there, Nolan!) as the simultaneously eager but cautious outsider, a role both giving an opportunity for explanatory exposition for the audience's sake and providing a fresh pair of eyes to perceive the damage and danger caused by Cobb's obsession with Mal; Saito acting both distantly first as target then as suspicious employer, and closely as an active member of the team. In addition to these, we get Batman alums Michael Caine and Cillian Murphy, as well as too-brief appearances by Pete Postlethwaite, Lukas Haas, and Tom Berenger (who's been AWOL from marquees too long, if I might be permitted a little Platoon reference). Though the amount of screen time some of them get is limited, they all come across as real, vibrant characters.

Inception was a joy to experience, and my hope is that its success will make it easier for similarly ambitious and visionary stories to get produced. I've already heard it described as the kind of film—like The Matrix over ten years ago, and Star Wars and the early Spielberg films twenty years before that—that will send kids to film school in the years to come, and I think the fact that it's so imaginative that it doesn't just put its creator's imagination on display, but also sparks its audience's imagination, makes that prediction a pretty likely one. We'll be fortunate if budding filmmakers find inspiration in Inception, with its creative vision, intelligence, thrilling action and suspence, moving drama, technical mastery, intriguing characters, and vast ambition. Inception is the cinematic total package.

P.S. — For this post's title, I was also considering "Beyond Your Wildest Dreams" and "Immaculate 'Inception,'" but I think you'll admit they're a bit over the top; and, after all, you can never go wrong with the potent combination of Hammett, Houston, and Bogie.

Oh hi, Tommy!

So tonight I played football beneath the Washington Monument with famed cinéaste Tommy Wiseau. Actually, it wasn't really football, though it's played with a football; it's called "haw" (as in, "Let's go eat, haw?"), and it's very popular in LA, where groups of as many as a dozen play it in the limited spaces available there. Tommy's a cool, friendly guy—he offered Mike a job on his legal team—he taught us a new game, and then we watched his semi-nude photo shoot beside the monument. Quite a wild, memorable evening. Hats off to you, Mr. Wiseau.

¡Feliz Cinco de Mayo!

The new trailer for the Real Mexican Hero, Machete (previously seen in one of the faux-trailers during Grindhouse). And just look at that cast: Danny Trejo, Cheech Marin, Bobby D., Steven Seagal, and of course, Capt. Frank Lapidus himself, Jeff Fahey (though sadly it looks like they couldn't get Mark Pender back as the guy who shoots Machete; too busy with the Max Weinberg 7, I guess). That's enough to get anyone's beans jumping.

P.S.—For a textbook example of what happens when you completely miss the point of something, take it far too seriously, and have a severely underdeveloped sense of humor—a perfect storm of misinterpretation—see sociopolitical commentator and metallic-headwear enthusiast Alex Jones's take on this trailer. (I guess Linklater hasn't given him a cameo in one of his films for a while, so he has to find other means of keeping his profile up.)

Owen's Best of 2009

Let me preface this with a few comments. First, I based this list simply off of films that were considered "2009 releases" (specifically, the "2009 films" category on Wikipedia), even though some were released merely in New York and LA, or even just shown at a festival, and weren't shown in DC until 2010. I know that in the past I've railed against considering a film to have been released in a particular year just because it was released somewhere that year, even when that somewhere was nowhere near where I was at the time. I mean, if I lived in Cambodia, or Bodunk County, Alabama, or somewhere else where it may take a while for a film to get distributed, I probably wouldn't have taken that stand; but I live in the United States, and since I've been compiling "Best Of" lists I've lived in Portland and DC, both sizeable metropoles that get immediate mainstream-film distribution and OK (in DC's case) to quite good (in Portland's case) smaller- and independent-film distribution. It didn't—and, to a great degree, doesn't—make sense for me to consider a film to be released in a particular year when it wasn't released in either of those considerable cinematic markets in that year. My cinematic world doesn't and shouldn't revolve around New York and LA.

However, I've also found it tedious to keep track of when a particular film was released in a particular city, compared to simply going through the Wikipedia list (based on earliest release, regardless of how limited) and checking off the films from that year that I'd seen. So I guess my laziness has finally outweighed my curmudgeonliness. Also, since so many of the "good movies" are released in the late fall and winter, treating January 1 as a hard and fast dividing line means that films released as part of the same "awards season" end up in two different years—thus, Flags of Our Fathers (released in Portland on October 20, 2006) is on my 2006 list, while Letters from Iwo Jima (released in Portland on January 19, 2007) is on my 2007 list—despite being regarded by everyone else as released in the same year and ranked alongside one another on the same "best of" lists. The difficulty of that position manifested itself most clearly when, but for my making an exception, No Country for Old Men and There Will Be Blood wouldn't have been on the same list. So—until I change my mind yet again—my lists will be based on a film's earliest American release, not its release where I am.

This probably seems silly to everyone but me, but there it is. And after all, isn't that the entire purpose of blogs, letting their authors air their silly, inane personal quirks, concerns, and hang-ups?

Second, the inconsistency in length of my lists. My first list (2006) was the only one to follow my "Jan. 1 - Dec. 31 release where I am" position strictly; my second (2007) made an exception for There Will Be Blood (released in DC in Jan. 2008), so I added an eleventh spot to keep from bumping my tenth-ranked 2007 film (Zodiac) into the "honorable mentions"; my third list (2008) had films released in DC over thirteen months (Jan. 1, 2008 - Jan. 31, 2009), so an extra spot seemed appropriate for an extra-long period. Each time, though, I was annoyed at having to leave films I considered worthy of ranking out of the ranked positions and relegating them to the honorable mentions; ten (and even eleven) just wasn't enough. So, in the spirit of nomination inflation—I'm looking at you, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences!—I've lengthened the 2009 list to fifteen films. Of course, I still find myself getting annoyed at not having enough room in the ranking for some films—this time, Away We Go (to which I gave the number 15 spot before remembering The Hurt Locker, which Wikipedia didn't list under 2009 films because of its showing at the 2008 Venice Film Festival), Broken Embraces, District 9, Gomorra, Observe and Report, and Up, to name a few—so it's very possible that my next list will be Owen's Top 20 of 2010.

Finally, this year I've included a "dishonorable mention." I didn't go with a full list of all the terrible 2009 films I saw (to mirror my honorable mentions), just the worst one. I don't want to dwell too much on cinematic negativity, or let it dampen a post that should be about celebrating all that's best in film, but I also think that it's not entirely out of place, for two reasons: in order to give a warning to anyone who runs across it in the future, and as evidence that, yes, I do occasionally see bad movies—not just "entertaining bad" or "so-bad-it's-good bad," but "terrible-and-painful-with-no-redeeming-qualities bad," which certainly qualifies in that film's case.

Well, enough of my dreaded verbosity, and on with my 15 Best Films of 2009.

Top 15 of 2009

1) Where the Wild Things Are

2) Antichrist

3) Inglourious Basterds

4) In the Loop

5) The White Ribbon

6) Moon

7) The Brothers Bloom

8) A Serious Man

9) The Hurt Locker

10) Un Prophète

11) A Single Man

12) Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire

13) The Informant!

14) Watchmen

15) Adventureland

Honorable Mentions: Away We Go, The Baader Meinhof Complex, Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans, Big Fan, Black Dynamite, Broken Embraces, Bronson, Crank: High Voltage, Crazy Heart, District 9, Drag Me to Hell, Duplicity, Extract, Fantastic Mr. Fox, Friday the 13th, Funny People, G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, Gomorra, The Hangover, Harry Potter and the Half-blood Prince, I Love You, Man, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, The Last Station, Monsters vs. Aliens, Observe and Report, Paranormal Activity, Red Cliff, Revolutionary Road, The Road, Sherlock Holmes, Star Trek, Up, Up in the Air, World's Greatest Dad, The Young Victoria, Zombieland

Dishonorable Mention: Gentlemen Broncos

The Origin of Batmanuel

LOST

Fooled you! Sorry if you were genuinely looking for a post about the origin of the character that Nestor Carbonell played on the short-lived live-action TV adaptation of The Tick. However, I'll do the next best thing and talk about the much-anticipated origin of Richard Alpert in "Ab Aeterno," as well as "Recon" and "The Package." So enough fooling around, and on to Lost.

"Recon," our first Sawyer-centric episode of the season, gives us a glimpse, in its flash-sideways, of perhaps the greatest cop-show-that-will-never-be of all time, Ford and Straume. It also shows us some interesting aspects of Sawyer's character and nature. As far as we know, everything about the lives/life of the original timeline's Sawyer and alterna-Sawyer was the same up to and including their/his parents' deaths. In the original timeline, this drives him into a life of, essentially, following in the footsteps of the man who destroyed his childhood as a con man; in the new timeline, it compels him to join the LAPD in order to take down con men (and women) and eventually to get to Anthony Cooper. Instead of being a born criminal, Sawyer—both of them—is teetering on the line between the law and crime, with some small event early on—apparently his writing the letter to "Mr. Sawyer," using Jacob's pen—nudging him toward channeling his feelings of hate and revenge one way or the other. During his date with the smoking-hot alterna-Charlotte, he even says that he realized this early on—"I got to a point in my life where I was either going to become a criminal or a cop."—and chose the law. No doubt that's why he can play a con man in his sting operations so well. (That opening scene was a terrific little play on our expectations. Also, did you notice that the woman alterna-Sawyer was stinging called him "dimples"? I guess Sawyer isn't the only one quick with the nicknames.) It also reflects original Sawyer's fifth-season role as "LaFleur," head of DHARMA security (ironically, conning his way into a position of authority and trust). In both timelines, Sawyer walks a fine line between the right and wrong sides of the law, jumping back and forth as the situation requires, giving yet another example on Lost of moral ambiguity, of a blurring of the line between detective work and conning, law and crime, good and evil.

As for the original-timeline scenes of "Recon," we get our first real look at the returned Charles Widmore and his armed Geek Squad (I wish I could claim credit for having thought of that) of Liz Lemon, that nerdy data guy on Jason Statham's crew in Paul W.S. Anderson's Death Race, and what I can only assume will prove to be a bunch of red shirts. Widmore seems to be anti-Loophole, but of course that doesn't necessarily mean he's pro-Jacob. (For one thing, there's an obvious contrast between science-oriented Widmore and the low-tech Others, e.g., keeping Loophole out through sonar pylons vs. lines of ash. Speaking of the pylons, does this mean that Widmore's joined forces with the Hanso Foundation, the folks in Ann Arbor behind the DHARMA Initiative?) I wouldn't put the murder of the Ajira survivors on Hydra Island past either Widmore or Loophole; both can be pretty ruthless when it comes to getting what the want, or even to merely tying up loose ends. Meanwhile, Sawyer seems to have reverted back to his looking-out-for-number-one con man mode from the first season, telling both Widmore and Loophole what they want to hear in order to get what he wants, i.e., off the Island. The plot thickens . . .

In the next episode, "Ab Aeterno," we take a break for the most part from both the Island goings-on and the flash-sideways timeline to delve into one of the great mysteries of the series, Richard Alpert, a.k.a. Ricardus, a.k.a. Ricardo. This episode both gives us a heaping pile of answers to long-standing questions, and a lot of great character and background material showing us what makes the Island's three most mysterious inhabitants tick. Richard doesn't age thanks to Jacob, because he was refused absolution from a crooked priest and was afraid of dying and going to Hell. He arrived on the Black Rock, which was cast inland in a huge storm, crashing into and breaking the Taweret statue. The Island (via its "unique energy," perhaps) keeps Loophole trapped there, preventing him from wrecking havoc upon the rest of the world. Jacob brings people (the Black Rock, the Others, Oceanic 815, maybe DHARMA and Desmond) to the Island to prove to Loophole mankind's essential worth (perhaps in order to "defuse" his evil should he ever escape the Island). But far from being a mere info-dump, "Ab Aeterno" gave us a real sense of the rivalry between Jacob and Loophole—they've been trying that knife trick for centuries!—and showed us that Richard's story is really a tragic one: a simple man lost in a strange new world, willing to kill to get back the woman he loves, a pawn in a game beyond his comprehension, cursed with eternal life and what seems like a doomed mission, spending lifetimes in service to a being only to find his master murdered and his life and effort rendered apparently meaningless. But Hurley's ghost-whispering at the end infuses the distraught Richard with new purpose, and I'm looking forward to seeing what he does with it.

In "The Package," we pick up both the original timeline and the new timeline after our hour with the immortal Canarian: Widmore and Loophole are parrying and thrusting back and forth, and we find out what led alterna-Jin to be in that freezer and what happened after Sayid found him in "Sundown." As was speculated earlier, Jin and Sun aren't married in the new timeline; and far from her leaving him, the trip to LA is their opportunity to run away together, beyond (so they think) her father and his boss's malevolent reach. Unfortunately, three of the characters we love to hate from the original timeline—Keamy, Omar, and Mikhail—are waiting at the other end to complete the set-up that Mr. Paik has arranged by sending Jin with payment for his own hit, which Sun couldn't replace (having closed her account). Sayid's Gun Kata ends up resolving most of this, but the episode ends with two elements which may be more examples of the original timeline influencing the new: alterna-Mikhail loses an eye, and Sun is pregnant. In the original timeline, she and Jin were only able to conceive on the Island (perhaps related to its healing properties), so that may explain why they don't have off-Island fertility problems in the new timeline, i.e., Jin and Sun's on-Island fertility "bled over" into the new timeline, where off-Island Jin and Sun should be infertile. Alas, their story ended on a hell of a cliffhanger, so we'll have to wait and see if they finally get the happiness in the new timeline that has evaded them in the original.

In the original timeline, Widmore's people nab Jin (keeping him in good old Room 23), apparently to get information about the Island's various energy pockets that Jin studied during his stint with DHARMA in the '70s (again, pointing to the energy being tied to keeping Loophole prisoner on the Island). Widmore gives us more vague references to what would happen if Loophole escaped—"Everyone we know and love would simply cease to be."—but it remains frustratingly unclear (assuming he's telling the truth in the first place). Loophole takes a trip back to Hydra Island for a parlay with Widmore. (When they were getting the outrigger ready, I was hoping this would be our explanation for the event last season, when Locke, Sawyer, and the other time-skippers were followed and fired upon while rowing from the old beach camp to the Orchid station ("The Little Prince"). Guess not. On second thought, it couldn't have been, since when the time-skippers found their outrigger at the beach camp the camp was abandoned, whereas at the moment Jack, Ben, Ilana, et alii are there.) Speaking of the beach camp dwellers, there was some nice character interactions in those scenes, and I like that they have a new sense of purpose thanks to Richard's return, but the whole thing with Sun's hitting her head while running from Loophole and losing the ability to speak (but not write) English seemed straight out of Gilligan's Island; they might as well have had a coconut fall on her head. Granted, it led to a nice scene of her and Jack talking on the beach, and perhaps there's a genuine medical explanation for it, but the whole scenario struck me as a real narm moment.

Meanwhile, on the submarine dock on Hydra Island, we get the dramatic return of Desmond David Hume (and with him, Mr. Motorboat himself, Henry Ian Cusick). This was great because it not only creates a nice parallel between the new timeline, where Jin's supposed delivery to Keamy is the "package," and the original, where Desmond himself is the "package" Widmore's brought to the Island (foreshadowed during Sawyer's visit to the sub in "Recon"), but also is long overdue, both for the character himself and for the great importance that he's supposed to have for how the rest of the series plays out.

P.S. — Just in case you needed a little more awesome in your life, this guy delivers the goods with a series of classy, minimalist posters for each episode of the first three seasons. I especially liked the ones for "Two for the Road" and "Flashes before Your Eyes."