POPFILTER

VS.

THE END OF THE YEAR

 

There are two facts about film critics — critics of all pop culture, really — particularly around this time of year:

 

1)      They force themselves to make a top ten list, even though they bitch about it the entire time, and find it terribly arbitrary.

2)      If they found out that no one read them, they would still write them anyway.

 

Maybe it’s because at this point it’s a habit, as if the year cannot end until their list is complete. Or maybe all of the bitching is simply just posturing, and they actually LOVE making these lists. I wouldn’t be surprised if either is true, and in fact it’s probably both. I know it is for me (for the purposes of this article, we’re all going to assume I’m a professional-ass critic, making the big bucks). One of the biggest differences between me and professional critics, besides all of the ones you’ve already thought of, is this is what they get paid to do. I have to find spare time to watch and review all of these movies, either for the website or the podcast. That leaves me with the same December every year: “Holy fuck, I barely watched any movies, or at least any of the movies I was supposed to. Now I have to watch three movies a day to catch up.” And that mindset leaves me seeming more like normal moviegoers who don’t pretend people give a fuck about what they think.

My guess is that most readers of websites like this fit into the same category, which fits roughly between Manhola Dargis and my mom. Many of the movies they see made less than two million dollars domestically. They don’t watch movies whose titles start with the words “Tyler” or “Perry”. They don’t freak out because the only movies people want to see are sequels, prequels, or reboots, but instead calmly buy tickets for the movies that are only showing on one screen at their local megaplex. They found the time to see at least two movies this year in which Mark Duplass was involved (I went three for eight, by the way). This group of people will see a top ten list, and will have seen half of the movies, three of them will be on their list, and two of them they will have never heard of, and…AND…the fact that they haven’t heard of these movies will excite them, not anger them, leaving them screaming about how Ted was left off of the list. The problem is that these unseen or unheard of movies begin to add up, and to get yourself to the point where you can make a respectable top ten, or at least have a conversation with somebody who does, means you’re going to have a shitload of movies to watch in December/Early January. You’re not going to get to all of them.

 

Let’s say you make your list now, and 21 Jump Street is there at number ten. There are two arguments for why this is:

 

1)      21 Jump Street was terribly underrated, and the fact that more critics aren’t putting this film on their top ten means that they just didn’t understand the film.

2)      I only saw fifteen movies this year. I thought 21 Jump Street was pretty okay.

 

Now even if their reasoning is the second option, they’ll probably say it’s the first one. Either you don’t give a fuck about top ten lists, or you want yours to sound the smartest. There’s no middle ground for this one. So you bullshit about how wonderful 21 Jump Street was, or you do everything in your power to make sure your number ten was still a great movie. And fuck you if you think 2012 was just a shitty year for movies. It wasn’t, and you’re a dick.

The other, more personal reason for cramming during time of year is that this is most likely the last chance I’ll give myself to watch these movies. I haven’t seen Wreck-It Ralph yet. I would really like to.  Looking at my top ten list as it is now, it doesn’t seem very likely that Wreck-It Ralph is going to make it on there. But if I don’t fit it into this cram sesh, I’ll probably never see it. I’ll have moved on to the films of 2013, or filling in blanks from my past, because the fact that I haven’t seen every Bergman movie is supposed to keep me up at night. Seeing Wreck-It Ralph goes from a certainty to very improbable.

 

I have a list of what I want to see before my final top ten list gets turned in, which will be revealed on the episode of the PopFilter Podcast that drops on the January 25^th, a month after everyone else’s comes out. It’s making it so I have to see about three movies a day until then. That’s not going to happen, so I have to prioritize. What do I know I will love? What do I think has the best shot of bumping something off? What will I feel bad about missing? Below are the ten films I would see if I could only see ten more films. Looking at this list, I would say that no film on my current top ten list is safe, and my current top ten is a list of all great movies. So again, fuck you to the people who said that 2012 was a weak year for movies.

 

Also, I haven’t seen Les Miserables and The Hobbit yet. You have to prioritize, and I just don’t think they stand a chance of making my list. I’ll see them later if the Academy tells me to. Oy, that’s a whole other column.

 

TOP TEN MOVIES OF 2012 (HAVEN’T SEEN EDITION)

 

1. ZERO DARK THIRTY
2. AMOUR
3. ARGO
4. ONCE UPON A TIME IN ANATOLIA
5. SKYFALL
6. HOLY MOTORS
7. THE KID WITH A BIKE
8. SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK
9. THE SESSIONS
10. MONSIEUR LAZHAR

Watch all ten of these movies, and if 21 Jump Street still makes the list, then it fucking earned it. And boy, do you love that movie.

-Ryan Haley