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| I knew he couldnt programme the GPS |
10 Bridesmaids: two very funny scenes and a lot of filler which is more than most films which are all filler.
9 Archipelago: Joanna Hogg's film about a family holiday to the Isles of Scilly. No one saw this which is a shame because it's a kind of To The Lighthouse for our times.
8 Moneyball: The true story of how Brad Pitt and a bunch of geeks turned the Oakland A's into that mighty baseball franchise it is today...oh wait, uh...
7 Cold Weather: No one saw this either. A murder mystery/family drama set in a very rainy Portland.
6 Drive: Everyone saw this. Hollywood stunt man by day gettaway driver by night. It sounds crap but it isn't.
5 Killing Bono: I haven't seen this one, but I was sold on it just by the title alone.
4 We Need To Talk About Kevin: Lionel Shriver's excellent book turned into a great movie.
3 Into The Abyss: A Werner Herzog documentary about death row not quite up there with his classics such as Grizzly Man and Encounters At The End Of The World, but still very compelling.
2 Meek's Cutoff: Kelly Reichardt's feminist, minimalist Western about a bunch of settlers getting lost on the Oregon trail. The lovely Michelle Williams stars.
1 Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy: OK so I haven't actually seen this one either, but I loved the book and the BBC series and the director is the guy who made Let The Right One In which is one of my all time favourites. I know its a risk putting a film I haven't seen at number 1 but hey thats the kind of guy I am.
41 comments:
Haven't seen any of these - and its a good deal cheaper here in Scotland to go to the movies. Drive and Kevin are on my list, though.
Watched The Guard last night. Loved it. Gleeson was brilliant.
(BTW, just finished The Cold, Cold Ground. Great stuff. Review to follow over at Crimesquad.com. If you're doing a blog tour I'd be delighted to be a part of it.)
I feel like I haven't seen any good films this year. Not new ones anyway. Let's hope 2012 isn't as crap as the movie.
Liked your #1, #2, #3, #7 and #8 picks very much. Haven't seen the others. Bruce Greenwood is one of my favourite actors.
I'd throw 13 Assassins and I Saw the Devil on my top 10 list as well.
BTW Adrian don't know if you heard about this.
http://deadspin.com/5871824/even-at-kim-jong+ils-funeral-a-yankee-fan?tag=fans
17 Dollars? Blimey. It sounds like its cheaper to visit a hooker than the cinema in Australia. You'd want to sneak some snacks in for that price ay?
This is a very dodgy sort of list.
I haven't seen anything on it, or actually very much this year at all. But I did love the book We Need to Talk About Kevin, though I still don't know exactly why.
Michael
Hey glad you liked Cold Cold. I shall check out the review. And yeah I'd love to do a blog tour whatever that is exactly...
I've yet to see The Guard but it sounds right up my street.
Frankie
Two people plus snacks is probably less than the price of a hooker.
Matt
Bruce Greenwood is great.
If you watch that clip you could be mistaken into thinking that was George Steinbrenner's funeral. Maybe they're scouting some N Korean pitching talent. They need someone.
Seana
Dodgy because I havent actually seen one fifth of the films on the list? Yes you could say that.
Yes, dodgy because of that. Otherwise, it's a very interesting list.
Looking at the actual sales of books, makes you wonder why the Le Carre sold so well in 2011, beating The Tiger's Wife (the only one I read on the list) by miles.
The article points out that books published in previous years outsold new ones, not really a good sign for books. The Girl With The Dragon series did well, but my favorite thrillers in general were nowhere in sales.
Here's the list"
http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2011/dec/29/bestselling-books-2011-nielsen
On the other hand, we have sold tons and tons of Tiger's Wife and not so many Smiley. Everyone on staff seems to be reading TW and loving it right now, which means of course that I have to boycott it. Tea Obrecht is actually coming to the bookstore in less than two weeks, which will be a good kick off for the new year.
I actually had a customer come up to me and protest that we had Tinker Tailor with movie cover up on our new and recommended table. I think he thought we actually thought it was a new book.
Ah, the public.
Richard
It looks like the only way to sell a book is to either have a movie tie or some other kind of massive publicity machine behind you.
As I've said before I think the making of a best seller goes like this: marketing, luck, more marketing and finally talent.
Seana
Some smartass always likes to try and nail the help doesnt he? Its like when Philip Roth came in to Barnes and Noble and asked if we had his book. Which one I asked and rattled off half a dozen titles.
Kill them with kindness, as they say.
I make a point of never buying a classic book with a recent movie cover. The prime example is Pride and Prejudice with Keira bloody Knightly.
Seana
Or just kill them.
Frankie
Some of those old covers are so cheesy. I have a movie tie in cover of The Great Gatsby from 1973 that looks awful.
Penguin Books never date. All my PG Wodehouse books are Penguin.
Killing them would be my first preference, but my friends continue to remind me that I would not like jail.
We were talking about movie covers the other day. They do help sell the book while the movie is out, but then they lie dead in the water ever after.
Frank
The covers are great on all the old Penguins - the glue and stitching not so fantastic.
Seana
I hate it when the publishers insist on saying "Now A Blockbusting Movie!" on the cover. That feels so pathetic. Can't the book just stand on its own whether its a movie or not?
Funny you say that as my books are falling apart and they smell fusty.
When a book has been made into a movie, it means it must be great!
No, books can't stand on their own anymore. They can barely lie flat on a table without a lot of additional support--movies, book clubs, funny video trailers. It's funny that people actually writing about books is probably the least favorite publicity. And author appearances? Not so much.
The oddest movie cover I've seen recently was for the new movie A Most Dangerous Method. They've slapped the Keira Knightly, Viggo Mortensen cover on it, as of course they would. But I remember this book when it first came out, because I had read some novel or other about the Jung, Freud, Sabina Spielrein triangle and was interested in the subject. But this book is not an adaption of the movie. As Robin Chavers on Goodreads put it,
This was not what I was expecting. I was under the impression that this would be a book in plain english that would discuss in detail the affair between Spielrein and Jung as well as their relationship with Freud. Instead, it read like a 500+ page essay written in psych jargon.
I have a feeling we will be facing some customer dissatisfaction.
As for Penguin covers, one of the more dubious 'non-book items' that was acquired by a previous sidelines buyer was a thermos and blank journal set that were decorated with Kerouac's On the Road Penguin covers. Every time I pass the little display I laugh, thinking that these pricey little items were pretty much the opposite of everything Kerouac was about. The good news is that we haven't had many takers.
You know what's worse than "now a blockbusting movie" on the cover? "Richard and Judy Bookclub choice" I pick it up, read that and promptly put it back on the shelf.
Seana
Jack Kerouac would have hated that shit. I also think its crazy that you can buy an Ernest Hemingway watch, hiking boots etc.
Frankie
They cheap out on the glue.
How about "NOW A COMMERCIALLY INDIFFERENT BUT CRITICALLY HERALDED MOTION PICTURE"?
Jeez, the only film I've seen on this list is Drive, which I thought was good, but not great. I just saw The Artist, which would have to go on my own top ten list. A great film I saw this year on DVD from your own backyard is Lake Mungo. It's an Australian take on the faux documentary ghost story. It's works beautifully as a drama and a supernatural yarn. Here's a link to my review:
http://www.jettisoncocoon.com/2011/07/film-review-lake-mungo-2008.html
Adrian, you may have already seen this, but this link is for the map geek in all of us.
Cary
The last Aussie film I saw was Snowtown which was a bit too much for me.
Seana
I admire his dedication and his obssessiveness but I've got to say that I thought the National Geographic map of the Chicago region looked better. His was just too cluttered.
Have you ever seen those cool semi 3 D maps where the mountainous regions actually come out of the paper? I love those but I think they frowned upon by serious cartographiles.
I have seen those maps but I feel like it was a long time ago. I think I would have to actually use his map to know whether I thought it was too cluttered or if it was in fact useful. I do like that he gives some idea of terrain, which is one of the hardest things for me to understand from most maps.
I always appreciate your favorite movie lists, and will note several on this list.
A question: Can you tell me where you find your list of your top movie thrillers of all time?
I meant to write down several, but forgot. That was the list with a film by Jules Dassen.
Kathy, since Adrian is lost in the Outback for the time being, I took the liberty of digging up that noir list for you.
Tinker, Tailor... is a mess.
Oldman and Hurt are squandered.
This TTSS has Smiley assert that the Americans tortured Karla in India. This is the first version of the story in which that appears.
I guess it serves to give poor Karla a reason to hate the West and takes the burden off the Brits and Smiley. It also satisfy the juvenility of young Britain's thinking.
Believe the original story to be anchored in the Philby squalor: Oxbridge communists/homosexuals betray nation and etc.
Consequently, it does seem odd that Smiley (a man who can't seem to satisfy his wife) has a gay sidekick in Peter and another minion named Fawn.
Moreover, Peter looks like a daft metro/homosexual from Portland, Oregon. From hairdo to cuff length it is unlikely anyone would want to swan around Europe with such a conspicuous idiot.
At one point the narrative does sort of take you and then you are confronted with anachronistic feminist graffiti on a London wall at a time when most such stuff was obscene or plain stupid.
If you're too dull to understand Smiley's voice over, the filmmaker provides you with a very unlikely red sock so that you really get it that Bill Haydon slept with Ann.
Overall, the movie can be compared to an American Western story being filmed by kids who got the costuming and the production design
but couldn't be bothered to study the period or to be true to the era.
Perhaps worst of all, it really doesn't have dramatic engagement.
I could go on. A final point: while I love the story and all of those early LaCarre novels, one should always remember Cornwell's condemnation of Rusdie and sympathy for his antagonists. Moreover, if one does care to withdraw one head from one's keester, Cornwell's relativism vis a vis the West and Communism is thoroughly repellent. Guy can weave a good melancholy spell though.
Seana,
Thanks a lot for the link and best wishes to you for the new year and for lots of good book recommendations and critiques on the blogs that we frequent.
Right back at ya, Kathy!
Larry
Real horror show eh? Well consider my expectations damped.
Its interesting about the Yanks being the villains. In real life it was the CIA who found Philby, Burgess and McClean wasnt it? The Brits were completely clueless, but in LeCarre the Brits are the weary sophisticates and the Yanks the ugly rather stupid Americans.
At least Le Carre unlike say Graham Greene isnt pathological in his hatred of America.
Seana
Thanks for that!
Kathy
Enjoy.
My favourite film of 2011 was Moneyball. Thought it was excellent given the dry subject matter. The first half of Drive was excellent but I didn't buy the transformation in Gosling's character in the second half. Oddly, the same could be said for Gosling in Idea of March too.
Tinker Tailor etc was dull and as boring as hell. Waste of a great cast.
Biggest disappointment for me was The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. I haven't read the book but am a Fincher fan. The central story is weak and isn't strong enough to carry a film of this bum numbing length. Daniel Craig seems to think that taking his glasses on and off adds to his character. It doesn't; it's just irritating. Rooney Mara was excellent though.
Off to The Artist at the weekend and really looking forward to it.
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