Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!: December 2022

12/29/2022

2022 in films - according to Film Excess

The Top 6 of the Year

1. Top Gun: Maverick - Joseph Kosinski + Best Action-Drama of the Year + Best American Movie of the Year + Best $ Return of the Year: 8.75 times the cost + Best Mega-hit Movie of the Year + Best On-Screen Couple of the Year: Tom Cruise and Jennifer Connelly + Most Profitable Movie of the Year: +425.48 mil. $ range

2. Holy Spider - Ali Abbasi + Best Danish Movie of the Year + Best Huge Flop Movie of the Year + Best Political Movie of the Year + Best Poster of the Year + Best Serial Killer Movie of the Year + Best Societal Critique of the Year + Best Thriller of the Year + Best True-Crime of the Year + Most Undeserved Flop of the Year

3. Avatar: The Way of Water - James Cameron + Best 3D Movie of the Year + Best Action-Adventure of the Year + Best Science Fiction of the Year

4. Elvis - Baz Luhrmann + Best Biopic of the Year + Breakthrough of the Year: Austin Butler + Best Music Movie of the Year

5. Bamse - Henrik Ruben Genz + Best Big Flop Movie of the Year + Period Movie of the Year

6. Speak No Evil - Christian Tafdrup + Best Horror of the Year

The Bottom of the Year

1. Le Temps des Secrets - Christophe Barratier + Most Expensive Flop of the Year: 8.3 mil. $ + Worst $ Return of the Year: 0.31 times the cost

[7 titles in total]

Notes:

2022 was an abysmal year on several fronts: The China Virus pandemic finally came to an end, only to be taken over by a worse crisis (especially for Europe), as evil dictator Putin's Russia invaded neighboring country Ukraine, with millions of refugees, thousands of deaths, destruction on a massive scale, an inflation and energy crisis and world instability as a direct consequence. Cinemas have felt the downturn in economic tides harshly, although the hardest blow may be the one continually suffered due to the uptick in streaming and social media absorption, all taking away from shared social experiences in theaters. Many cinematic and exciting releases are shoveled off to streamers with cinemas hungering for prestige products week after week, month after month, with a theatrical plate in 2022 that looked decidedly less interesting than in each year in several decades leading up to it.

All this means less trips to the cinemas, and Film Excess only reflects that in only having 7 reviewed theatrical titles ready for the first annual list of the year here. - A number that will hopefully be considerably higher in 2023, preferably nearer to the average 20-30 titles theatrically experiences new titles reviewed in most years.

In spite of the small number, the Top 10 is topped with 2 masterpieces: Joseph Kosinski's genre-dream, a full throttle entertainment bonanza and a career milestone for Tom Cruise and Kosinski, Top Gun: Maverick is the year's best; Ali Abbasi's grueling, angry and important spotlight on Iran's patriarchal Islamist evils Holy Spider takes silver; with James Cameron's sensational return to his Pandora universe with Avatar: The Way of Water grabs bronze. The list goes on with Baz Luhrmann's best picture to date, the opulent music biopic Elvis; Henrik Ruben Genz's funny and stirring music biopic Bamse; and finally Christian Tafdrup's pitch-black horror satire Speak No Evil.

The Bottom list of the year only packs one title, Christophe Barratier's glossy, so-so Le Temps des Secrets, a film destined to leave the list in future editions of the lists, as it really isn't too shabby after all.

The year's many problems are also reflected in a wealth of flops, as much fewer than usual of the year's films reached success theatrically. This will be reflected also on future editions of the lists, as more films are reviewed.

Biggest flops of the year:

[The loss is based solely on the cost and box office earnings for the films. Marketing costs and additional revenue (home video, TV rights and other auxiliary profits) are not taken into account]

1. Le Temps des Secrets - 8.3 mil. $ range

2. Speak No Evil - 2.52 mil. $ range

3. Holy Spider - 1.95 mil. $ range

4. Bamse - 1.83 mil. $ range

= Combined losses: 14.6 mil. $

Biggest hits of the year:

[The gain is based solely on the cost and box office earnings for the films. Marketing costs and additional revenue (home video, TV rights and other auxiliary profits) are not taken into account]

1. Top Gun: Maverick - 425.48 mil. $ range

2. Elvis - 29.4 mil. $ range

3. Avatar: The Way of Water - 7.08 mil. $ range (and counting)

= Combined profits: 461.96 mil. $ range

2022 titles currently on the watch-list:

Dark Glasses, X, When You Finish Saving the World, Good Luck to You, Leo Grande, The Batman, De Forbandede År 2, The Northman, Close, Triangle of Sadness, One Fine Morning, Crimes of the Future, Will-o'-the-Wisp, Jurassic World: Dominion, The Whale, Peter von Kant, Funny Pages, Pearl, Fire of Love, I Love My Dad, The Banshees of Inisherin, Emily the Criminal, Barbarian, The Fabelmans, Moonage Daydream, Freedom on Fire: Ukrain'es Fight for Freedom, Armageddon Time, Tár, Beautiful Beings, Retrograde, Terrifier 2, Blonde, Bones and All, Dahmer - Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story

Previous annual lists:

2021 in films - according to Film Excess

2020 in films - according to Film Excess

2019 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]

2019 in films - according to Film Excess
2018 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2018 in films - according to Film Excess
2017 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2017 in films - according to Film Excess
2016 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]
2016 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2016 in films - according to Film Excess

2008 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]
2008 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2008 in films - according to Film Excess
2007 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]
2007 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2007 in films - according to Film Excess

2006 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]
2006 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2006 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess

2005 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2005 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess

2004 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2004 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess

2003 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]

2003 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2003 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess
2002 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess
2001 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess

2000 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess

1999 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess

1998 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess

1997 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess

1996 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess

1995 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess

What do you think of Film Excess' 2013 lists?

What films would comprise your personal lists?
Anything essential missing on the watch-list in your opinion?

12/27/2022

Her (2013) - Jonze's disheartening hipster sci-fi romance

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Star Joaquin Phoenix's giant face with hipster mustache and a red shirt against a pink background makes up this simple poster for Spike Jonze's Her

In the near future, urbanite Theodore works his way towards finalizing his divorce, while he falls in love with an OS (an artificial intelligence operative system) by the name Samantha.

Her is written, co-produced and directed by New-Yorker master filmmaker Spike Jonze (Being John Malkovich (1999)), whose 4th feature it is.

Joaquin Phoenix (Signs (2002)) impresses again in a very intimate and sympathetic performance here; and Scarlett Johansson (Ghost in the Shell (2017)) is also outstanding in an unusually strong voice performance as Samantha. Chris Pratt (Passengers (2016)), Olivia Wilde (Life Itself (2018)) and Rooney Mara (Una (2016)) are fine, but it is especially Amy Adams (Lullaby (2014)) that one comes to care about here, although I enjoyed Phoenix and Adams as a couple more in Paul Thomas Anderson's The Master (2012).

Her relies on a distinctive and interesting story, which nevertheless has sides to it that bother me: Firstly it is, and continues to be, freaky to fall in love with a computer's voice, (even if Johansson does that voice.) The film shows friendship and romantic relationships incisively, - their weaknesses, frailties and misunderstandings especially, - which is implicitly why people in this really quite disheartening future turn away from each other. Jonze's version of the future is a well-dressed, smoothie-drinking, conflict-averse construction, - a hipster dream/nightmare, which seems incomplete to me: too slick and attractive. And the perspectives in previous Jonze films (his debut Being John Malkovich for one) simply reach farther.

Spike Jonze: The day after ... The Oscars 2014

Top 10: Best films about filmmaking

2002 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess

Adaptation (2002) or, Charlie Kaufman's Fictional Life

1999 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess

Top 10: Best fantasy movies reviewed by Film Excess to date

Being John Malkovich (1999) - Jonze, Kaufman and Malkovich's great triumph

Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: 23 mil. $

Box office: 48.5 mil. $

= Flop (returned 2.10 times its cost)

[Her premiered 12 October (New York Film Festival) and runs 126 minutes. Jonze had had the first idea for the film in the early 2000s when first encountering an early AI voice system. He later based much of the script on his divorce from Sofia Coppola in 2003. Shooting took place in 'mid 2012' in Shanghai, China and in California, including in Los Angeles. Samantha Morton voiced Samantha but was replaced with Johansson in post production. The film opened #23 to a 260k $ first weekend in 6 theaters in North America, where it peaked at #10 and in 1,729 theaters, grossing 25.5 mil. $ (52.6 % of the total gross). The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were France with 3 mil. $ (6.2 %) and Italy with 2.7 mil. $ (5.6 %). It was nominated for 5 Oscars, winning for Best Original Screenplay. It lost Best Picture to 12 Years a Slave, Production Design to The Great Gatsby, Song (The Moon Song by Karen O and Jonze) to Let It Go from Frozen by Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez and Score (Will Butler, Owen Pallett) to Steven Price for Gravity. It also won an AFI award, 1/3 Golden Globe nominations, was nominated for a Grammy and won 2 National Board of Review awards, among many other honors. The film additionally made in excess of 4.9 mil. $ on home video copies in North America. Jonze has returned with 12 shorts, music videos, a documentary etc. but no feature since. Phoenix returned in Inherent Vice (2014); Adams in American Hustle (2013); and Johansson in Street of Dreams (2013, video) and HitRECord on TV (2014, TV-series) prior to her theatrical return in Chef (2014). Her is certified fresh at 94 % with a 8.50/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Her?

12/20/2022

Avatar: The Way of Water (2022) - Cameron outdoes himself with amazing adventure

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Central characters and a dazzling image of high adventure from the film make up this poster for James Cameron's Avatar: The Way of Water

Many years after US Marine Jake Sully joined the Na'vi people of Pandora in his Avatar body, he has built a family with Neytiri with 4 children. But now the human 'sky people' force them to leave their home and seek sanctum with the Metkayina 'reef people'.

Avatar: The Way of Water is written by Rick Jaffa, Amanda Silver (Eye for an Eye (1996), both) and Ontarian master filmmaker, co-writer/co-producer/director James Cameron (Piranha II: The Spawning (1981)), with Josh Friedman (The Black Dahlia (2006)) and Shane Salerno (Armageddon (1998)) contributing story elements. It is Cameron's 11th feature and the sequel to his Avatar (2009), still the highest-grossing film of all time (2.923 bil. $.)

One of the longest-anticipated films in history, Avatar: The Way of Water arrives at a critical time for the theatrical business, and hopefully it will reinvigorate it and bring some patrons back in the cinema seats. It is pretty much all you could have hoped for and actually a greater film than the first one. My history with Avatar is that it completely blew me away in 2009, but that I have later revisited it in more humbling home surroundings and found that its simplistic, cliched narrative politics worked against its visual magic.

That seems less the case in Way of Water, although the militaristic-industrial humans are still the villains. The simple romance story of the first film is now enlarged to be a family story with wider themes of parenthood, rebellion/coming-of-age, unity, loss and love giving meaning to most every minute of the film's epic span. The story, which echoes both Cameron's Aliens (1986) and Titanic (1997), is good, and it doesn't matter so much if you aren't clear the first time around at every turn who each blue character is, because more than a plot- or character-driven vehicle, Avatar movies are visual adventures. The 3D technology, accelerated frame rate and especially the completely amazing wonders of mechanical and natural designs that the film throws at us are exhilarating on a level that few films can match. You've simply gotta see Avatar: The Way of Water at the cinema to go to this new water world of Pandora.

It is hard to critique the performances of a film that's so much motion-capture and so little live-action. How do we know if the strong performances are really thanks to the actor and not a team of expert animators, basically? Sam Worthington's (Everest (2015)) Sully has less adventure in Way of Water as he wrestles with fatherhood and protecting his family. Zoe Saldana (Missing Link (2019)) is fierce as the more intuitive Neytiri. Jack Champion (Truck Slut (2018, short)) is a new, charismatic member as the caught-in-the-middle boy Spider. Edie Falco (Landline (2017)) is a welcome addition as General Ardmore and likely to return. And Stephen Lang (Death in Texas (2020)) is fantastic as the evil ex-Marine Quaritch.

The late James Horner's (Titanic (1997)) original theme is wonderful. The action is fabulous and thrilling, the sense of wonder is rare and powerful, and Avatar: The Way of Water also has moments of moving poignancy.

You have no business doing anything but going to a cinema to see this movie! Off with you!

Related posts:

James Cameron: The 2000s in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess

2009 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED III]
2009 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]
2009 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]

2009 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess
Top 10: The best action movies and TV-series reviewed by Film Excess to date
Top 10: The best adventure movies reviewed by Film Excess to date

Avatar (2009) - Cameron's simplistic action-adventure wins with visuals

Solaris (2002) - A suffering space question mark (co-producer)
Aliens (1986) or, Alien War

Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: Reportedly 350-400 mil. $

Box office: 441.7 mil. $ and counting

= Too early to say

[Avatar: The Way of Water premiered 6 December (London) and runs 192 minutes. Production was announced in 2010. The release was delayed 8 times, as writing, visual effects technology, especially concerning shooting motion capture underwater, and other issues dragged out, until the corona pandemic hit and further complicated matters. Shooting took place from September 2017 - September 2020 in California, including in Los Angeles, and New Zealand, including in Wellington. The film opened #1 to a 134.1 mil. $ first weekend in North America. Cameron has stated that it will need to break 2 bil. $ globally to be considered a success. The film was shot back to back with Avatar 3, set to release in December 2024. The future of Cameron's further two planned sequels are as of yet uncertain due to their enormous costs. The film has won an AFI award, is nominated for 2 Golden Globes and won a National Board of Review award, among other honors. Cameron is returning with Avatar 3 (2024). Wortington returns in The Georgetown Project (2022); Saldana in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (2023); and Lang in Avatar 3. Avatar: The Way of Water is certified fresh at 78 % with a 7.10/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Avatar: The Way of Water?

Donald Sutherland has passed away

Born in Canada, Sutherland battled polio as a child. His first credit was in Suspense (1963, TV-series) and his first film was The Castle of the Living Dead (1964). Later credits in his remarkable career include The Saint (1965-66), The Dirty Dozen (1967), M*A*S*H (1970), Kelly's Heroes (1970), Klute (1971), Don't Look Now (1973), 1900 (1976), Casanova (1976), The Eagle Has Landed (1976), Ordinary People (1980), A Dry White Season (1989), JFK (1991), Outbreak (1995), Fallen (1998), Virus (1999), Fierce People (2005), Pride & Prejudice (2005), Lord of War (2005), The Hunger Games (2012), The Undoing (2020, miniseries) and many more. He passed away at age 88. R.I.P.

Roger Corman has passed away

Born in Detroit, Michigan, Corman had a sprawling, intellectually hungry life as a youth and young man before arriving with his first film in 1955, Five Guns West. He would follow that with titles such as Apache Woman, It Conquered the World, Attack of the Crab Monsters, Teenage Cave Man, A Bucket of Blood, House of Usher, The Little Shop of Horrors, The Pit and the Pendulum, The Intruder, The Raven, The Terror, The Masque of Red Death, The Tomb of Ligeia, The Wild Angels, The Trip, Bloody Mama and many more. As a producer he was behind almost 500 films. Arguably among the most important filmmakers of the 20th century, Corman passed away at age 98. R.I.P.

William Friedkin has died

Born in Chicago, Friedkin accrued TV credits prior to his advance to the big screen as the director of Good TImes (1967), The Birthday Party (1968), The Night They Raided Minsky's (1968) and The Boys in the Band (1970) before his major breakthrough, The French Connection (1971), for which he won his only Oscar. He followed it up with the even bigger smash, The Exorcist (1973), arguably the best horror film of all time, for which he was Oscar-nominated. Later credits include Sorcerer (1977), Cruising (1980), To Live and Die in L.A. (1985), Rampage (1987), Rules of Engagement (2000), Killer Joe (2011) and The Devil and Father Amorth (2017, documentary). Friedkin passed away at age 87. R.I.P.

Louise Fletcher has passed away

Born in Alabama to deaf parents, Fletcher got her first credits in late-1950s TV-series.She took a 10 year-long sabbatical to devote her time to motherhood after the release of A Gathering of Eagles, but then came back and soon saw her career's most important part, as Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975), for which she won her sole Oscar. Later credits include Exorcist II: The Heretic (1977), The Lucky Star (1980), Brainstorm (1983), Two Moon Junction (1988), Cruel Intentions (1999), A Perfect Man (2013) and many more. Fletcher passed away at age 88. R.I.P.

Jean-Luc Godard has passed away

Born in Paris, France, Godard lived much of his life in Switzerland. He wrote for French film criticism magazine Cahiers du Cinema and became foundational for the New French Wave that inspired new waves in scores of other countries across the world with his Breathless (1960). Later credits include A Woman Is A Woman (1961), Vivre Sa Vie (1962), Le Petit Soldat (1962), Contempt (1963), Alphaville (1965), Pierrot le Fou (1965), 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her (1967), Weekend (1967), Every Man for Himself (1980), King Lear (1987), Century of Cinema (1995, documentary), Goodbye to Language (2014) and many more. Godard died of assisted suicide at age 91. R.I.P.

Wolfgang Petersen has died

James Caan has died

Caan was born the son of Jewish immigrants from Germany in New York. He got his start on TV in the early 1960s. His credits include El Dorado (1966), The Rain People (1969), Brian's Song (1971, TV movie), The Godfather (1972), - for which he earned his only Oscar nomination, - Slither (1973), The Gambler (1974), Funny Lady (1975), Rollerball (1975), Silent Movie (1976), Hide in Plain Sight (1980), - the only film he also directed, - Thief (1981), Misery (1990), Honeymoon in Vegas (1992), Bottle Rocket (1996), Eraser (1996), Dogville (2003), Elf (2003), Las Vegas (2003-07), Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (2009) and many more. Caan passed away at age 82. R.I.P.

Jean-Louis Trintignant has died

Born in Vaucluse, France, Trintignant's theatrical debut as an actor was in If All the Guys in the World... (1955). Later credits include ...And God Created Woman (1956), The Seven Deadly Sins (1961), Inferno (1964), A Man and A Woman (1966), My Love, My Love (1967), A Man to Kill (1967), The Great Silence (1968), Z (1969), The Assassination (1972), Three Colors: Red (1994), Amour (2012), Happy End (2017) and many more. He also wrote and directed two films in the 1970s. Trintignant passed away at age 91. R.I.P.

Ray Liotta has died

Adopted from an orphenage at a young age, Liotta got hooked on acting in high school. He had various TV credits in the late 1970s and early 80s, with his film debut in The Lonely Lady (1983). Later credits include Something Wild (1986), Field of Dreams (1989), Goodfellas (1990), Cop Land (1997), Hannibal (2001), Blow (2001), Narc (2002), John Q (2002), Identity (2003), Observe and Report (2009), Youth in Revolt (2009), The Details (2011), Killing THem Softly (2012), The Place Beyond the Pines (2012), Shades of Blue (2016-18), The Simpsons (2018, TV-series), Marriage Story (2019), The Many Saints of Newark (2021), Black Bird (2022, TV-series) and many more. Liotta passed away at age 67 in his sleep while on production in the Dominican Republic. R.I.P.

Philip Baker Hall has died

Born in Ohio, Hall didn't start acting until he was 30. His long list of credits include Zabriskie Point (1970), Miami Vice (1987, TV-series), Midnight Run (1988), Ghostbusters II (1989), Cheers (1993, TV-series), Hard Eight (1996), The Rock (1996), Air Force One (1997), Boogie Nights (1997), Seinfeld (1991-98), Rush Hour (1998), The Insider (1999), Magnolia (1999), The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999), Bruce Almighty (2003), Dogville (2003), The Zodiac (2005), Zodiac (2007), Curb Your Enthusiasm (2004-09), Mr. Popper's Penguins (2011), Modern Family (2011-12) and many more. Hall passed away at age 90. R.I.P.

Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!

Eagerly anticipating this week ... (14-24)