My official predictions for the 91st annual Academy Awards.

Chalk it up to my usual apathy, but I just don't see a lot of excitement coming from the build up to this Sunday's annual Oscar ceremony. I should be more eager, given certain categories will be up in the air, with multiple viable contenders having a shot at the win. The thing is, it's not the usual race that leaves me apathetic. It's that I have no intention of watching the ceremony at all.

In an attempt to give their ratings a boost, AMPAS, under the new leadership of John Bailey, has continually backpedaled on one terrible decision after another. Starting with plans for a Best Popular Film category, a thinly veiled attempt to pander to the masses with films the snobbish Academy deem unworthy of legitimate recognition, such as Black Panther. Then there was the debacle with former host Kevin Hart's homophobic tweet resurfacing, and Hart, rather than show any maturity or regret for it, actively doubled down on defending his words. Then there was the decision to cut most of the Original Song nominees, last year's acting winners not being invited to present, and four technical categories that were going to be presented during commercial breaks. Disgraceful!

Say what you will about Cheryl Boone Isaacs, Dick Poop and all, but at least she had a heart for her job. John Bailey has no soul, let alone a heart. Everything about this year's program feels like money-grubbing, calculated, pandering cynicism incarnate. Apparently we have no time to let deserving people take to the stage and give a heartfelt speech, but we do have time for useless crap like Adam Lambert and Queen opening the show. It's some of the most embarrassing showmanship I've seen since Adam Shankman's disastrous 2010 hack job, and AMPAS would do well to get their act together in time for next year's telecast, starting with ousting its president and finding someone who actually knows what they're doing.

Anyway, now that I'm done ranting, let's predict who's going to win.

Alita: Battle Angel movie review.

It's been a lengthy journey to the big screen for Battle Angel Alita, a popular cyberpunk manga series published between 1990 and 1995, set in a post-apocalyptic scrapyard world. The series garnered a wealth of curious eyes in the years since, earning itself a passionate fandom. One of these fans happened to be director James Cameron, with whom this story begins. Cameron became obsessed with the series after being introduced to it, scooping up the film rights, and pledging to bring it to the big screen.

Obviously this took longer than expected, given Cameron's lengthy 12 year hiatus after Titanic, and instead of Alita, put his full force behind Avatar, and eventually its upcoming sequels, again placing Alita on the back burner. Clearly Cameron wasn't going to have the free time to bring it to life as its director, and in his place, we have Mariachi-man Robert Rodriguez to take charge with Cameron's blessing, bringing Alita: Battle Angel to the screen at last. And for a story as fascinating as that, I just wish the finished film could have been so as well.

How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World movie review.

The How to Train Your Dragon series are some of my favorite animated features of the last decade. Inspired by Cressida Cowell's books, and through directors Chris Sanders and Dean DeBlois, the first film was a tremendously sweet, entertaining, and dazzling adventure that appealed equally to kids and adults. Cut to four years later, where DeBlois took sole director's credit for its sequel, that despite grounding itself with a darker tone, was an incredibly rich expansion with more than a few gut-punching wallops that improved upon the original.

This has largely been owed to the unbreakable friendship between viking Hiccup and dragon Toothless, that has been the focal point and anchor of every entry, especially with how the two matured into their new roles as leader of their respective kinds. But such a friendship has also seen its trials, many which continue into the third entry, and definitive ending to the saga, The Hidden World. Going into this film, I was very excited, but it was also a bittersweet excitement given how I've come to love these characters, and so the film had a lot of expectations to meet. And while I want to give the film some more time (and another watch) to sink in before solidifying anything, I will be bold as to say this... that this could stand as one of the greatest trilogies ever made.

My Top 15 Most Anticipated Films of 2019...

With 2018 put to bed (finally), it's time to look ahead and play our favorite game, "Will Next Year Be Better?" One can only hope it will, because for the first time in a while, I'm feeling apathetic about it. Maybe it's just leftover cynicism, but the year doesn't inspire too much confidence in me. But I'm all for being proven wrong, and seeing that it will be a remarkable year full of wonderful films. I've already seen a couple strong improvements this year. Then again, I've also seen Serenity, so...

Anyway, as always, a countdown of the films I'm most looking forward to in the upcoming year, while keeping my hyperbole in check.

My only rules of exclusion are as follows: It must have either a confirmed release date, or at least have a trajectory to open this year (for this reason, I've left off The French Dispatch and Chaos Walking). It also must have premiered after this list's publication, and I must not have already watched it. Lastly, if it made the list or honorable mentions last year, it won't be eligible for inclusion this year (which explains where Bernadette went).

This list caters mainly to more well known films releasing this year, as independent fare or films releasing during festivals tend to fly under the radar. My personal anticipation may change down the line, but if a film you're looking forward to isn't on here, I either haven't heard of it, I know it exists but it just missed out on the list, or I have little to no anticipation for it (Hopefully King of the Monsters isn't the drudge Godzilla was).


Here are the lucky honorable mentions:
25. Zombieland: Double Tap

24. The Personal History of David Copperfield

23. Frozen 2

22. The Goldfinch

21. The Woman in the Window

20. Ford v Ferrari

19. It: Chapter Two

18. A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood

17. Under the Silver Lake

16. Yesterday


And now, audience, the top fifteen...

The Top Ten Best Films of 2018.

It's not always easy in the real world. In cinema, everything feels so simple, tidy, perfect. Outside, it's much messier, cynical, and at times spirit breaking. We all go through natural peaks and dips in mood, and I certainly had mine across the year. In fact, for the first time ever, I almost wanted to drop my reviewing hobby altogether, sometimes actively forcing myself to do so out of obligation (and I think some of my write-ups suffered for it). I wanted to feel uplifted, but the lackluster slate just wasn't doing it for me.

But it wasn't all doom and gloom, to be certain. Early in the year, national spirit was high as the Winter Olympics held their bow in PyeongChang in February, giving way to Black Panther becoming a cultural phenomenon, the latest edition of Royal weddings and babies, and greater, more inclusive shifts in the larger political pendulum (even if we still have a ways to go). That's without getting into some of the smaller, but no less meaningful acts of kindness performed by everyday heroes, that remind you of the kindness that people are still capable of. There are still faint glimmers of civilization left in this barbaric sluaghterhouse that was once known as humanity, and so long as it keeps thriving, we have to believe it'll work out in the end.

And even with the weaker set of films than usual, when we needed them most, they showed up, even offering us greater variety in selection (interestingly enough, compared to my last list with 6 Best Picture nominees, I only included 3 this year). Black Panther being an early heavyweight, but also the smash success of Crazy Rich Asians, and a continually great level of creative diversity as well. Not to mention Marvel finally bringing all the pieces together for its spectacular multiplayer smash-em-up Infinity War, whose momentum they'll be attempting to keep up with Endgame this April. So while the doom and gloom may have been much, at least that escapism could always be relied upon, if not to mend it, than to at least ease it. So here's to those bright spots of 2018, and hopefully 2019 won't let us down.

As always, this best of list is purely as it stands at the moment, as I've still not seen some acclaimed films like Cold War, Burning, or Everybody Knows from Asghar Farhadi. I hope I'm able to watch them all soon, but for now, let's get to the real deal.

As always, some quick honorable mentions. Leave No Trace was one of the most understated and emotionally affecting films of the year for me, a terrific showcase for stars Ben Foster and Thomasin H. McKenzie, as a father and daughter navigating the complexities of social interaction. Sorry to Bother You was by far the year's wildest movie, a thoroughly original and at times scathingly funny satire of our Orwellian corporate overreach and homogenization, and makes the unapologetically bonkers mind of first-time director Boots Riley one to watch. Isle of Dogs saw Wes Anderson return to stop-motion with his same irreverent charm and wit, creating one of the year's most beautiful technical showcases with an outstanding hand-crafted build, and wringing great laughs and sometimes tears from its splendid voice cast. If Beale Street Could Talk was a strong return for director Barry Jenkins, taking a snapshot view of the lives affected by the abuse of authoritative power, and the odd and sometimes esoteric places in which love can be found, and taken comfort from. Eighth Grade was an awkward but no less honest portrayal of the waywardness and anxiety of teenage adolescence, featuring a fantastic Elsie Fisher holding the movie together, as its unspectacular, but no less charming and poised audience surrogate.

And without further ado, the countdown of my top ten films of the year begins.
Now, let's shoot something.

The Top Ten Worst Films of 2018.

Let's. Get. This. Over with!

Usually I begin with a longer preamble before jumping into the year, but not this time. I was no fan of 2018. While the slate did offer up good things, it was a total snooze fest as far as the general sense goes. From my perspective, it seemed like the quality of the output was consistently middling. While it got off to a good start with Black Panther, as it went on, it seemed more stagnant than usual, especially in regards to the summer season (Deadpool 2, Solo, Fallen Kingdom, Ant-Man and the Wasp, Mission: Impossible - Fallout, and Christopher Robin among others), whose output underwhelmed me, and I was oddly more taken by the independent fare around that time.

Or if not, it sure felt that way because 2018 was just horrible in genral. If 2017 was a slight improvement in the world mood, 2018 was a downright regression. Not only was it a wild personal ride that wreaked havoc with my anxiety, but a year with events that served only to stoke fear and hopelessness, with tragedies like the school shooting in Parkland, FL setting a grim tone, the fallout and raging bigotry from the Brazil elections, and the various natural disasters of hurricanes, wildfires, and earthquakes. That's without mentioning the madness courtesy of US President Trump's insane leadership, where it was one controversy after another, capping the year off by forcing the States into the longest government shutdown in history. Absolutely disgraceful.

So it was a rough year to say the least, and I'm thankful when these worst of lists finally come around, that way I can unleash some pent up anger. But even someone as self-sadistic as myself can't endure every piece of trash, so I've managed to avoid the likes of Slender Man, Death Wish, The Nun, God's Not Dead 3, Blumhouse's Truth or Dare (Based on the novel "Push" by Sapphire), or Death of a Nation, the latest propaganda piece from modern day Leni Riefenstahl, Dinesh D'Souza.

Anyway, before getting into the main list, here come the dishonorable mentions. Peppermint starred Jennifer Garner back in her Alias action mode, wasting her on a thoroughly unpleasant and ludicrous vigilante story that bordered on glorifying its bloodshed, with major twists that could be seen a mile away. Venom was an utter trainwreck of a spin-off, getting lost within the utter insanity of its production and unintentional humor, but in regards to its trashiness, it was ultimately too innocent to put in the main ten. A Wrinkle in Time squandered the talent of its cast and director Ava DuVernay, valuing colorful visuals over genuinely deep ideological meditation, instead settling for a stripped down and dull Disneyfied rendition of unadaptable source material. Pacific Rim: Uprising felt like a cheap ABC Pilot rather than a true sequel, pushing aside the original cast in favor of boring newcomers, and ultimately feels cheap and unimpressive compared to its exciting predecessor. Alicia Vikander tried her best to elevate Tomb Raider, but even she couldn't save it from the curse of dull video game adaptations, that at times was so incompetent in filming and scripting, you couldn't believe it had a $100 million dollar budget.

And without further ado, let's leave some films rolling in the street.
Like a turd in the wind.