I have stayed silent for too long. Two months ago, I wrote a review on a film entitled Frost/Nixon. I dismissed it as entertainment, a film that wouldn’t touch an Oscar. I said the film was nothing special, that it would be forgotten soon…

Two months, $10 million, and 5 Academy Award nominations later, apparently I was wrong. Very wrong. Frost/Nixon was nominated for Best Picture, Director, Actor, Screenplay, and Editing. Why? What on Earth would cause such a travesty? I could easily think of 10 films from the summer that were more engaging, entertaining, or God forbid thought-provoking than Frost/Nixon.
Take Wall-E for an example. (My #5 film of last year) Wall-E was hilarious and all that, but it took an incredibly powerful message and delivered it in a way that little 5-year olds could soak it up, remember it, and enjoy the film along the way. Frost/Nixon crams the morals down our skinny little throats. Consider Kevin Bacon’s monologue at the end about how Nixon’s future relies on the interview. It’s a perfect example of how it takes an interesting topic and waters it down to TV Land level.

The bad thing about Frost/Nixon is how it depends on all these symbolisms and exaggerations and yet at the core, we cannot decipher them, or at the very least, care. Why? Because it gives us no one to emphasize with. If Langella didn’t play Nixon so over-the-top (in a terrific performance I grant you) we’d care. If Sheen as David Frost wasn’t such an emotional black-hole throughout the movie we’d care. But it is over-the-top, it is emotionally disconnected, and suffers as a result.

The Academy has fallen for this ploy. And Frank Langella as Richard Nixon is magnificent, as well. But see The Wrestler. Look at the pain that aches and simmers throught Mickey Rourke. You see it in his eyes, you see it in his body language. You hear it when he talks. That was a real emotional experience. This is studio-produced Oscar bait. And the sad thing? The Academy took it.

Best Picture: The Wrestler
Runner-Ups: Slumdog Millionaire, The Reader, The Dark Knight, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Worst Picture: The Love Guru
Runners-Up: Camp Rock, The Happening, First Sunday, Seven Pounds

Best Director: Danny Boyle & Loveleen Tandan, Slumdog Millionaire, 
Runner-Ups: David Fincher, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Darren Aronofsky, The Wrestler Christopher Nolan, The Dark Knight, John Patrick Shanley, Doubt

Best Movie That Everyone Apparently Hated But I Loved: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
Runner-Ups: Cloverfield

Best Actor: Mickey Rourke, The Wrestler
Runner-Ups: Leonardo DiCaprio, Revolutionary Road, Clint Eastwood, Gran Torino, Brad Pitt, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Wall-E, Wall-E

Worst Actor: Mark Wahlberg, The Happening
Runners-Up: Mike Myers, The Love Guru, Pierce Brosnan, Mamma Mia!, Ice Cube, First Sunday

Best Actress: Kate Winslet, The Reader & Revolutionary Road
Runners-Up: Meryl Streep, Doubt, Anne Hathaway, Rachel Getting Married, Melissa Leo, Frozen River

Worst Actress: Reese Witherspoon, Four Christmases
Runners-Up: Paris Hilton, The Hottie and The Nottie, Carmen Electra, Disaster Movie

Best Supporting Actor: Heath Ledger, The Dark Knight
Runners-Up: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Doubt, Robert Downey Jr., Tropic Thunder

Best Supporting Actress: Viola Davis, Doubt
Runners-Up: Penelope Cruz, Vicky Cristina Barcelona, Evan Rachel Wood, The Wrestler, Marisa Tomei, The Wrestler

Really Good Performance In A Really Bad Movie: Justin Timberlake, The Love Guru
Runners-Up: Will Smith, Seven Pounds

Best Screenplay: Wall-E
Runners-Up: Slumdog Millionaire, Doubt, The Wrestler, Burn After Reading,

Best Action Movie: The Dark Knight
Runners-Up: Wanted, Tropic Thunder, Iron Man

Best Comedy: Tropic Thunder
Runners-Up: Burn After Reading, Vicky Cristina Barcelona, Step Brothers, Role Models

Best Unintentional Comedy: Speed Racer
Runners-Up: N/A

Best Scene: The Ending, The Wrestler
Runners-Up: The Interrogation, The Dark Knight, The Ending, Slumdog Millionaire, Benjamin’s Death, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Best Musical Score: Slumdog Millionaire
Runners-Up: The Dark Knight, Vicky Cristina Barcelona, Wall-E, The Reader

- RM

2008 has been a fantastic year in film. It was the year that Mickey Rourke, Robert Downey Jr, and Tom Cruise all made comebacks. It was the year that for every major disappointment (Australia, Frost/Nixon), there was a giant surprise (Slumdog Millionaire, The Wrestler). It was the year that the line between big awards contenders and booming event flicks was blurred, which made for a lot of fantastic movies. Here’s my favorite movies of 2008.

1. Mickey Rourke should win the Oscar for The Wrestler, an incredibly emotional film with an ending that punches you in the gut. Although it easily could have succumbed to cliche, it doesn’t, which is a minor miracle. The story of a washed-up wrestler, no one could have (or should have) played him other than Rourke. Evan Rachel Wood stands out in 3 scenes as Rourke’s daughter. It’s not a happy movie, but man is it a good one. So good in fact, that it’s the best of the year.

2. A flick I’d barely heard of when it was released, Slumdog Millionaire was funny, suspenseful, somber, beautiful, and resonated with me more than anything else this year. Dev Patel and Freida Pinto are excellent, the script is top-notch, and the direction is stunning. Originally to be direct to DVD, thankfully it wasn’t, and now it’s taking the world by storm. An incredible achievement.

3. Not just another comic-book movie, The Dark Knight was exceptional in all areas. You want great performances? Christian Bale, Aaron Eckhart and above all Heath Ledger will provide that. Giant explosions? Check. A layered, intelligent script? Absolutely. It has more in common with say, Heat or The Godfather than The Incredible Hulk or Superman. The film that action movies will be judged by for the next 20 years.

4. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. An old-fashioned, technically astounding love story, the normally violent director David Fincher is surprisingly restrained here. Although he normally does more violent fare such as Fight Club, he emulates say, David Lean here. The special effects, makeup, and Pitt’s excellent performance come together seamlessly for an unforgettable movie.

5. When animation, science-fiction, romance, comedy, and an adorable title character come together seamlessly, you know you have a special movie. But Wall-E is Pixar’s best movie, a huge feat considering they’re the best, most consistent studio today. A young robot falling in love with a search probe is risky, original, and in the movie undoubtedly touching. Oh, and after the 20th time you see it, it still doesn’t get old.

6. It’s hard for a movie to inspire awe. For a documentary, it’s almost impossible. But Man on Wire, the story of Philipe Petit’s 1974 tightrope walk between the Twin Towers, does it at the drop of a hat. It maintains the suspense of a heist movie but entertains and enthralls, a huge feat for a documentary.

7. Rachel Getting Married has a great cast, an awesome script, and somehow pulls an Oscar-caliber performance out of Anne Hathaway, as a recovering addict going to her sister’s wedding, and the fascinating results.

8. My #8 pick is actually two movies. 2008 was an awesome year for comedies, and I just couldn’t leave these off. Burn After Reading and Tropic Thunder are radically different in content and pacing but have one thing in common: they are hilariously funny.

9. Doubt‘s script needed work, but then again it has four of the best performances of 2008. Meryl Streep is fantastic, I forgive her for Mamma Mia. Philip Seymour Hoffman is excellent, both likable and shady enough to keep us on the edge until the end, which makes you question everything you’ve just seen. The breakout star is Viola Davis, who is devastating in 7 minutes as a mother whose boy may have been molested by a priest.

10. Vicky Cristina Barcelona doesn’t sound like a Woody Allen movie. Set in Barcelona, a deep meditation on love with beautiful locations and cinematography. However, the witty script and fantastic ensemble cast bring together Allen’s best film since Manhattan. For the Oscar race watch out for Penelope Cruz as the main’s protaganist’s suicidal, crazy ex-wife.

Honorable Mentions:
Changeling
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Gran Torino
Happy-Go-Lucky
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
Iron Man
Kung Fu Panda
Step Brothers
The Visitor
Wanted

Although my reviews are mostly positive (what can I say, I like movies!), there are always movies every year that are awful. Or bad. Or face-meltingly, heartbreakingly bad. For example, even though I gave Speed Racer an F, I saw it a second time and deemed it a ‘so-awful-it’s-good’ classic.

5 While Vince Vaughn and Reese Witherspoon seems like a good idea on paper, Four Christmases is by no means good, or entertaining, or even watchable. It’s tasteless, poorly-written garbage that couldn’t be less in the holiday spirit. Seeing Vince Vaughn play Moses in a play is priceless. A 2-minute jewel, stuck in a 90 minute piece of garbage.

4. A remake of a movie no one even liked, Prom Night was awful even by horror-remake standards.

3. Even by the low expectations I had for it, I don’t think there was a more preachy or unfunny movie this year other than First Sunday. From its incredibly annoying product placement (Look! A PSP in a Sony-produced movie) to its flat performance from Ice Cube. First Sunday was flat-out dumb.

2.Camp Rock makes High School Musical 3 look like The Godfather in comparison. The leads are charming but undeniably wooden. It’s corny from the very first second, where Demi Lovato literally sings about getting out of bed. I nearly broke into tears when my sister got it for her birthday.

1. The most awful, wince-inducingly bad of the year is undeniably The Love Guru. I love Mike Myers and hoped it would succeed. But then I saw it. When Justin Timberlake is more funny than Mike Myers in a movie, you know than Myers is falling flat. After almost every joke, he literally smiles at the camera for 5 seconds on end. And the end with the elephants? Please. It’s horribly directed by a complete newcomer, Marco Schnabel. After seeing The Love Guru, you literally don’t want to watch a movie for a long time.

Dishonorable Mentions:
- Saw V
- Get Smart: Bruce and Lloyd Out of Control
- Semi-Pro
- The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian
- Hancock (well, the last 45 minutes)

My list of my favorites of 2008 are coming soon. Until then, find a copy of The Love Guru. It’s probably already in the $5 bin at Wal-Mart. Do me, and you, and humankind a favor. Burn it.

2008 is probably the best summer in film ever. It’s had the awesomeness of Iron Man and The Dark Knight, the hilarity of Tropic Thunder, the animated classics Kung Fu Panda and Wall-E, and the disappointment of Narnia and the Love Guru.

And the sheer awfulness of Camp Rock.

Anyway, I will hand out the First Annual Ryan Michaels Awards of the summer.

Best Visual Effects: Iron Man
Best Three Movies with Robert Downey Jr: The Incredible Hulk, Iron Man, Tropic Thunder
Best Surprise: Kung Fu Panda
Biggest Disappointment: The Love Guru
Movie That I Didn’t Have Much Hope For Then Suddenly Really Wanted to See It But Ended Up Being Disappointed: The Rocker
Biggest Hairspray Wannabe: Mamma Mia
Best Performance: Heath Ledger, The Dark Knight
Second Best Performance: Robert Downey Jr., Tropic Thunder
Best Cameo That You Didn’t Expect: Tom Cruise, Tropic Thunder
Funniest Movie: Tropic Thunder
Worst Actor: Anyone from Camp Rock
Best Animated Movie: Wall-E
Most Depressing Ending: The Dark Knight
Most Funny Ending: Tropic Thunder
Best Movie: The Dark Knight

Well, that wraps it up for this summer. See you later this year for the Ryan Michaels Academy Awards!

Cheers,

Ryan Michaels