I laughed, I cried...I saw a lot of movies

As I shared yesterday, I saw quite a few movies in 2009. Some of them were unexpectedly good while others we unexpectedly bad, and yet others delivered exactly what I was expecting. Here is my look back at the best - and worst - of 2009 cinema (based, of course, only on the movies I managed to see.)

**Beware some items contain spoilers

Best 3-D movie of the year
Now last year, I wouldn't have dreamed of adding this category to the list because the 3-D movies I'd seen were so gimmicky and not all that fun to watch. But of the half-dozen three-dimensional films I saw in 2009, one was clearly the winner.

"Avatar" takes the prize for its awesome HD-quality scenery, lightweight 3-D glasses and for making me forget I was actually watching a 3-D film. Director James Cameron reportedly worked on the film for 10-15 years, waiting for the perfect technology in which to build the world of Pandora. The animated parts of the film and the live-action parts are almost seamlessly entwined with a new motion-capture technology that Cameron dubbed "performance-capture" for its ability to get the real emotion from the actors who play the animated characters. As a side effect, the animated characters bear a striking resemblance to the actors playing the parts. The storyline was a little light, but if "Avatar" is the vehicle in which the new era of film making is ushered in, then bring it on.

Biggest tearjerker of the year
Now there are two movies that could take the prize for this one - "Marley and Me" and "Up." I'll admit that both these movies had me crying in the theater. Disney Pixar's "Up" condenses a lifetime into just a few minutes to let viewers see the heartbreak that left an old man a grumpy curmudgeon. But the man's whimsical journey to South America in his house (with balloons tied all around it to make it float) and the discovery of a Boy Scout stowaway is lighthearted and funny for most of the movie. But "Marley and Me" draws out the aches and pains of a lifetime over two hours. The movie is about a couple who adopts a bad dog, has kids, give up or change their careers and never seem to be all that happy.

But the thing that clinched it for me was the scene in which Owen Wilson takes old Marley into the vet to be put to sleep. Perhaps it was because my own aging cat had started to lose some weight in recent months (we actually had to put Bailey, who lived 12 good years, to sleep in September,) but even thinking about this movie makes me tear up a bit.

Best comedy of the year
At least half of the movies I saw in 2009 can be categorized as comedies, but it's really easy to pick out the front runner. So many of the movies, especially the romantic comedies I saw, just weren't all that funny.

But I did go see "The Hangover" after it had been out for a few weeks because I kept hearing people say how funny it was. Plus Bradley Cooper is super cute. The movie follows three groomsmen as they try to find the groom they lost in Vegas the day of his late afternoon wedding. The thing I liked about the movie is that it wasn't really predictable and it had that same crazy, zany, "let's backtrack and see how we got here" as "Dude, Where's My Car?" Ed Helms was the star in the movie for me as an engaged guy whose uptight fiancee keeps him on a short leash - until he let's loose in Vegas. He even pulled off the missing tooth, which made him look a little bit hillbilly-ish.

Best romantic comedy
There weren't a whole lot of good offerings in this category in 2009, though I saw quite a few romantic comedies. The one that made me laugh the most was "The Proposal" with Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds. Bullock plays a high-powered publisher who finds her control snatched away when her green card expires (she is Canadian.) To keep her job, she promises her assistant, played by Reynolds, a promotion if he will marry her long enough so she can stay in the country.

Of course, nothing is that simple, and the couple ends up in Alaska to visit the groom-to-be's parents when a suspicious ICE officer believes they are faking the marriage. Betty White plays Reynolds grandmother and she is a hoot, though a cameo by actor Oscar Nunez (who plays Oscar on "The Office") could have been skipped. The chemistry between Reynolds and Bullock just works well and the movie is genuinely funny, and a little moving.

Worst trend of the season
I'm not the first one to say this as I've read other critics who feel the same way, but one of the worst thing about the movies this year is that so many of the female characters were portrayed as sappy, dippy useless creatures. It started with Kate Hudson and Anne Hathaway in "Bride Wars" in January and continue all the way to last week's "It's Complicated."

The characters in "Bride Wars" drove me absolutely bonkers as two best friends who are driven apart when they both select the same date at their dream venue for their weddings. One, I'd like to believe that most women don't plan out their weddings starting at age 6 (or at least I never did,) and two, I really hope the brides who have invited me to be in their weddings don't turn into whack jobs like that. The main fault in the movie is that it wasn't very funny.

Though I enjoyed "It's Complicated," mostly, the one thing that drove me crazy was that Meryl Streep's Jane is a strong, independent woman who gives in to ex-husband Jake's advances knowing full well he has no intentions of leaving his current wife for her. Jane settles for way less than she deserves just to keep from being alone.

Other annoying female characters include the ensemble cast from "He's Just Not That Into You," Isla Fischer's character in "Confessions of a Shopaholic," Katherine Heigl's character in "The Ugly Truth," Julie Powell in "Julie and Julia," and Sandra Bullock in "All About Steve." I'd like to think women don't have to play dumb or sacrifice their careers just to be in a relationship...but perhaps that is why I'm single.

Worst romantic comedy of the year
There are a few movies in the running in this category including a few mentioned in the category above. I really disliked "The Ugly Truth," "He's Just Not That Into You," and a few others. But the winner has to be "All About Steve" since there wasn't a whole lot of romance or comedy in the movie. In it, Sandra Bullock plays a nerdy cruceverbalist (which means someone who likes crossword puzzles) who is introduced by her parents to the son of friends. Bradley Cooper plays the dreamy cable news cameraman Steve. After one date (that lasts about 30 seconds), Mary decides to follow Steve around the country after he makes some flip remark about how he wishes she could come along with him (when what he really means is "boy I am sure glad I have to go to work to escape your craziness.") Mary can't take a hint when she first finds him and he brushes her off, but hopefully viewers who haven't seen it will take a hint and skip it.

Strongest female performance
Given how weak so many of the female characters were this season, the creators of "Blind Side" deserve some kudos for bringing Leigh Anne Tuohy to life on the big screen. Bullock played Leigh Anne as a strong Southern woman who controls her husband, stands up to her hoity-toity friends and isn't afraid to put a few gangbangers in their place. The movie is about a homeless teen who is taken in by a well-off rich family, with Leigh Anne as its matriach, who eventually help him finish high school, go to college and become the No. 1 draft pick for the NFL this year. The movie is based on a true story so it's hopeful that women aren't as crazy as filmmakers often want to portray them.


Biggest surprise movie of the year
Sometimes the best movies are ones I don't know much about, and of which I have little expectations. That was the case with "Bandslam," a little movie geared at the Disney and Nick teen set. I didn't know anything about it expect that Lisa Kudrow is in it and it was about a band competition. Will (Gaelan Connell) is a nerdy kid who doesn't fit in at school. When he and his mother move to a new town, he expects more of the same. But somehow he catches the eye of pretty, popular girl Charlotte Banks (Alyson Michalka,) who is enlists Will to be the manager of her band. She just wants to win the Bandslam competition for the year, and Will just wants friends. The movie has more depth than an average teen movie and has way cool music. I even downloaded the soundtrack to my iPod.

Worst movie of the year
There were quite a few movies I saw this year that I didn't like, but the honors of worst movie has to go to something that didn't just fall a little short of the mark. It goes to a movie that had bad acting, horrible dialogue, little plot and decapitations in the first three minutes of the movie.

The honor goes to "Ninja Assassins," a movie I only saw at the suggestion of my sister who wanted to see it. The movie was gory and just plain bad. I recommend everyone but teenage boys skip the bloodfest and see a real ninja movie instead.

Best movie of the year
There are a few contenders for the honor of best movie (which went to "The House Bunny" last year). But it really must go to a movie that put it all together - meaning a good story, humor, good dialogue, well-developed characters. It needs to be something I would see again and something I would add to my home movie collection.

My favorite movie of the year was a sweet, but heartbreaking movie that came out under the radar. It stars Amy Adams, Emily Blunt and Alan Arkin as a broken family that keeps trying to hold itself together. Adams plays a single mom who is having an affair with a married detective who sees how shabby her life is when she is cleaning the house of a rich client who turns out to be a former classmate. Rose decides to take some initiative and start her own cleaning business - cleaning up homes after people have died or committed suicide. It sounds morbid - and it is - but it gives Rose a sense of control that has been lacking in her life.

Other movies worth seeing:
Gran Torino
Paul Blart: Mall Cop
Coraline
Disney's Earth
The Soloist
Julie and Julia
Ponyo
9
Zombieland
The Men Who Stare at Goats

Avoiding the words of other reviewers

Since I write a movie column for my weekly paper, I try really hard not to notice what other people are saying about a film before I see it. This means avoiding the entertainment page on the L.A. Times Web site, skipping the movie reviews in the New Yorker (which is generally easy since I am a few months backlogged on them) and never, ever watching reviews on TV.

The goal is that when I watch a movie, I won't be doing it with any preconceived ideas, and also it saves me from anyone ever accusing me of copying someone else's ideas since I do my best to write my columns in a bubble.

I don't know if other movie reviewers do the same thing - any of them around Los Angeles have the opportunity to watch screenings of the films and meet with the filmmakers long before the movies are released so they write before all the reviews are published. But since I sort of stumbled into this column at the paper because I like movies, and studied film as an undergraduate, I don't really have the opportunity of heading to Los Angeles for those screeners every week (our travel budget at the paper keeps me mostly within the city limits of Hollister.)

I do, however, read movie reviews on a regular basis after I've seen a movie and written about it. It is reassuring when my take on a movie is similar to movie critics who have been doing this for years - they just usually write what I want to express in a better way than I can.

This weekend I have plans to see either "Away We Go," which has been out for more than a month, but just came to Morgan Hill for two showings a day, or I might see "Funny People." The problem is I made the mistake of visiting the Los Angeles Times this week and saw a headline that implies "Funny People" might not be so hot. This was reiterated by a family member who saw a similar headline on another Web site.

So it will be one or the other...and the decision might just come down to which film plays at the most convenient time.

Teen movie to TV transition

It's been done before - the attempt of a popular movie to transition to the small screen as regular series. And nothing is a better base for the experiement than a teen comedy.

Some of the past spin-offs include "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," a movie I love to watch from time to time - who doesn't love a campy vampire movie? I never got into the television series, though I watched quite a few "Angel" episodes at Gold's Gym while working out on the elliptical machine. The TV version of the vampire hunter lasted seven seasons so it seems to have been a success.

"Clueless" was another attempt to win the on-screen success on the little screen. I love the movie, and have probably watched it 20 times. It makes me laugh. It's the reason I have a soft spot for Paul Rudd and Alicia Silverstone. I never watched it because my favorite actors were replaced with others. It lasted three seasons.

The latest in line is "10 Things I Hate About You," which debuted on ABC Family a few weeks ago. "Sneak peeks" can be seen online at abcfamily.go.com and the show airs Tuesdays at 8 p.m.

The movie version came out 10 years ago and starred Heath Ledger, who was relativiely new to American audiences. He wooed Kat Straford (Julia Stiles) as bad boy Patrick Verona in the retelling of "Taming of the Shrew." In it, Kat's younger sister Bianca (Larisa Oleynik) just wants to be popular, but their strict father will only let her date if Kat gets a guy (he thinks Kat isn't interested in dating.) Cameron (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) pays Patrick to get Kat to fall for him in hopes of getting Bianca. The movie is clever and laugh-out-loud funny. Ledger showed the early acting chops that would make his career in years to come, and Oleynik and Gordon-Levitt had plenty of chemistry since they starred together on "Third Rock from the Sun."

So far I've watched one episode and the thing I liked least about the movie came along with it. Larry Miller is back to play dad to Bianca (Meaghan Jette Martin) and Kat (Lindsey Shaw). Ethan Peck, grandson of Gregory Peck takes on the Patrick Verona part.

I'm not quite sure what to think of it so far, but the one thing that would bring me back is Shaw. She played Claire Tolcheck in a short-lived Fox sitcom called "Aliens in American." She's gone from ditzy, popular girl to rebel and it suits her.

An 'Ugly' side of romantic comedies

When I went to the movies this weekend to see "The Ugly Truth," it was mostly to get some fodder for the weekly movie column I write for the Weekend Pinnacle (www.pinnaclenews.com/life.)

I figured it was going to be predictable, but maybe it would have a few laughs. As it turns out, the laughs were few and far between. The humor in the movie can only be described as raunchy and it was one that brought to life one more strong female character (Katherine Heigl as Abby) who turns into a dithering idiot when a cute guy walks in the room.

The whole time I was watching the movie, I felt like the Mike Chadway character (played by Gerard Butler) was based on a Web site that promotes the Ladder Theory. Google it for more, but the premise of the theory is basically that women are cruel and men will sleep with any woman. It's pretty crude, but so much like the words that came out of Mike's mouth in the movie I thought there must be a connection.

For more on "The Ugly Truth" and "Taken," visit www.pinnaclenews.com/life and click on "Movie Lines" Friday after noon.