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328 days ago
2008, the year of death, decay and the wisdom of the beautiful loser. The year movie stars examined their own mortality and fading beauty via their on-screen personas (Brad Pitt, Mickey Rourke and Clint Eastwood, who managed to be as cute as Sarah Silverman while delivering his racial humor -- I'm still wondering if that was his point -- and I'm still fond of his weirdly toned movie.) The year Heath left us and Mickey came back and Robert Downey Jr. became a superhero. The year that actually made me examine the deeper implications of Quiet Riot's "Bang Your Head" (real and appropiate title, "Mental Health"). Here's my top ten movies of 2008: Starting with... The Wrestler I never gave up on Mickey Rourke -- ever. One of my favorite actors, the mysterious, seductive American exotic with that whispery voice that was at once sexy and conspiratorial, the actor who always leans into his conversation, as if you were the only person in the world, ...332 days ago
I've always loved Santa Claus, but not only for the supposed gift giving and seasonal sweetness (which is wonderful of course.) No, I love Santa, in part for frequently appearing so... disturbed . Santa Claus is just inherently creepy. Any guy who knows when you’ve been sleeping, when you’ve been awake and when you’ve been bad or good is going to create a little tension in your life. And though one usually thinks of Santa as that jolly old fat man in a red suit riding a sleigh stuffed with presents, in world history, he’s quite a bit darker. For instance in Austria, Santa used to partner up with a devil figure named Krampus who would beat the naughty kids with switches. Santa and Satan? (Come to think of it, that would make for a really good movie -- Krampus sounds scary or...really pretentious). But speaking of movies (and what else would I be speaking of?), cinema well understands not only the goodwill and joy that the holiday’s can bring but also the anxiety and ...341 days ago
Welcome to the second annual MSN Movies' Top 10 films poll. We are continuing our, ahem, long tradition of presenting 10 view points from 10 critics that add up to some sort of hodgepodge representing the best movies of 2008. The method is simple: 10 critics vote for their 10 favorite films. Films are assigned points based on their ranking -- and ta-da: What develops is a list that no one is happy about but sure causes much heated debate -- at least among ourselves and hopefully with you as well. I have no doubt that this year, you'll have plenty to say. See, it was a weird year at the movies. As in, outside of a few splendid titles, Hollywood stunk up the joint. Why? Remember that writers' strike? Turned out to not be good for anyone, movie-goers included. Instead, to find great movies, you had to look outside of Hollywood offering and span the globe or duck into art-house theaters. And because of this, the voting in this year's poll was all over the place. Forty-four films ...
343 days ago
I realize there are probably multiple reasons why Sean Avery was kicked off the Dallas Stars and yes, his comments regarding ex girlfriend Elisha Cuthbert ("sloppy seconds") were on the far side of classy but...come on. All of these people need to sit down and watch the hockey classic "Slap Shot" for a little foul mouthed reflection. From Puck Daddy : "Falling on his sword in front of his teammates and attempting to convince them that, like Michael Richards and Mel Gibson before him, the issues that motivated his detrimental behavior had been medicinally addressed. "The problem, however, was that the Stars made it publically and perfectly clear they weren't going to listen. Mike Modano, who is the Dallas Stars, said Avery had tarnished the franchise. Coach Dave Tippett, whom Avery directly insulted by calling his 'sloppy seconds' press conference, told the media that 'I find it hard to believe that Sean could come back in that dressing room and ...344 days ago
