2008 Most Anticipated

[JCPhoenix]

I figured it was getting close enough to the end of the year to make a post on this...

I didn't include the following movies because these look like they're going to be 2009 or later releases: Adventureland, Atlas Shrugged, Avatar, Black Swan, The Colossus, The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, Ender's Game, Failan, The Fantastic Mr. Fox, The Fighter, Flicker, The Food Chain, The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus, The Informant, Interstellar, Justice League, Land of the Lost, The Long Play, Master of Space and Time, Monsters vs. Aliens, Number 13, On the Road, Onimusha, Pedro Paramo, Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, Ponte Tower, Quid Pro Quo, The Road, Ronin, Shutter Island, Snow and the Seven, The Spirit, Splice, War in Heaven, Watchmen, Westworld, White Jazz, The Wolf Man, World War Z, The Unforgettable, Untitled Mann/DiCaprio/Logan Project, Y: The Last Man

I'm actually looking forward to another twenty or so movies in addition to the below, but I decided to stick to the numbers that I've used previously (40+runners-up) as that's already quite a large number .

All plot outlines taken from IMDb.com, The Hollywood Reporter, or Wikipedia

RUNNERS-UP
Black Water Transit, Burn After Reading, The Children of Huang Shi, The Reader, Vantage Point, Snow Angels, The List (aka The Tourist), Bright Star, The Day the Earth Stood Still, 21

40. MIRRORS
Director: Alexandre Aja (High Tension, The Hills Have Eyes)
Screenwriter: Alexandre Aja & Grégory Levasseur (High Tension, The Hills Have Eyes)
Cast: Kiefer Sutherland, Paula Patton, Cameron Boyce, Amy Smart
Plot Outline: A mall security guard becomes wrapped up in a mystery involving a particular department store's mirrors which seem to bring out the worst in people.
Why I'm Interested: I love High Tension despite some of its flaws in the latter part of the movie. And The Hills Have Eyes was above-average for a Hollywood horror remake, not to mention Jack Bauer in a horror movie? Sweet.

39. THE OTHER SIDE
Director: David Michaels (feature debut)
Screenwriter: David Michaels (feature debut), Phil Reeves (Happy, Texas)
Cast: Jason Lee, Giovanni Ribisi, Eddie Izzard, Woody Harrelson, Dave Matthews, Katie Holmes
Plot Outline: An over-achieving science scholar tries to solve a bizarre mystery involving the residents of a remote island and ultimately discovers something she could have never predicted.
Why I'm Interested: I was initially interested last year by the premise and the fact that Ryan Gosling was set to star. Now that he's gone from the project, the premise still seems intriguing to me nonetheless.

38. VALKYRIE
Director: Bryan Singer (The Usual Suspects, X2, Apt Pupil)
Screenwriter: Christopher McQuarrie (The Way of the Gun, The Usual Suspects), Nathan Alexander (feature debut)
Cast: Tom Cruise, Bill Nighy, Kenneth Branagh, Carice van Houten, Tom Wilkinson, Eddie Izzard, Stephen Fry, Terence Stamp, Thomas Krestchmann
Plot Outline: Based on actual events, a plot to assassinate Hitler is unfurled during the height of WWII.
Why I'm Interested: Well, considering my favorite movie is The Usual Suspects and this is the first reteaming of McQuarrie, Singer, and Ottman (the editor) since then, it's not hard to get why I wanna see this movie. The reason it's not farther up is because of 1. Cruise - whose movies I consistently like or love but who, for some reason, always turns me off of the upcoming movies he stars in (even though I end up loving most of them) and 2. the fact that we all know what happens which takes a bit of the thriller part of this away.

37. FRANKLYN
Director: Gerald McMorrow (feature debut)
Screenwriter: Gerald McMorrow (feature debut)
Cast: Ryan Phillippe, Eva Green, Sam Riley, Bernard Hill, Susannah York, Art Malik
Plot Outline: The story of four lost souls in a futuristic London society where there is no separation between Church and State.
Why I'm Interested: The premise sounds cool and the genre tags on IMDb have listed Drama/Fantasy/Romance/Thriller - and I'm always down for genre-bending films. Add to that a big interest after seeing Sam Riley's eerie performance as Ian Curtis in Control.

36. IN BLOOM
Director: Vadim Perelman (House of Sand and Fog)
Screenwriter: Emil Stern (the upcoming Tenderness)
Cast: Uma Thurman, Evan Rachel Wood
Plot Outline: A woman's survivor's guilt from a Columbine-like event twenty years ago causes her present-day idyllic life to fall apart.
Why I'm Interested: I loved the depressing powerhouse that House of Sand and Fog was and I think it's a shame that movie got lost in the shuffle that year. Vadim Perelman showed a deft hand with actors in that movie and I expect no less in this character-driven sophomore outing.

35. THE YOUNG VICTORIA
Director: Jean-Marc Vallée (C.R.A.Z.Y.)
Screenwriter: Julian Fellowes (Gosford Park, Vanity Fair)
Cast: Emily Blunt, Rupert Friend, Miranda Richardson, Jim Broadbent, Paul Bettany, Mark Strong, Thomas Krestchmann
Plot Outline: A dramatization of the turbulent first years of Queen Victoria's rule, and her enduring romance with Prince Albert.
Why I'm Interested: I wouldn't normally have more than a passing interest in this project seeing as this is a vehicle for Emily Blunt, whose performance in The Devil Wears Prada I found quite overrated (solid work but nothing really out of the ordinary). But C.R.A.Z.Y. blew me away (it was my favorite film of 2005) and it's exciting to see Canadian talent breaking out into the U.S. industry which happens so little nowadays.

34. MAMMOTH
Director: Lukas Moodysson (Fucking Åmål, Lilja 4-ever)
Screenwriter: Lukas Moodysson (Fucking Åmål, Lilja 4-ever)
Cast: Gael Garcia Bernal, Michelle Williams, Marife Necesito
Plot Outline: During a vacation in Thailand with his wife and daughter, a successful New Yorker (Bernal) tries to radically change his life.
Why I'm Interested: Mainly because I've always been curious about Moodysson's films (I've been meaning to see Lilja 4-ever for a while) and also because Bernal has had one of the most consistently great filmographies in the past few years.

33. CROSSING OVER
Director: Wayne Kramer (Running Scared, The Cooler)
Screenwriter: Wayne Kramer (Running Scared, The Cooler)
Cast: Harrison Ford, Sean Penn, Ray Liotta, Ashley Judd, Summer Bishil, Cliff Curtis, Alice Braga
Plot Outline: Crossing Over is a multi-character canvas about immigrants of different nationalities struggling to achieve legal status in Los Angeles. The film deals with the border, document fraud, the asylum and green card process, work-site enforcement, naturalization, the office of counter terrorism and the clash of cultures.
Why I'm Interested: Both Running Scared and The Cooler oozed with style and this looks like it might finally be the project that boosts Kramer's profile up. Also, the inclusion of two up and coming actors, Summer Bishil (who was fantastic in Alan Ball's Nothing is Private despite my lack of enthusiasm for that film) and Alice Braga (great in both City of God and Lower City) has piqued my interest.

32. TOKYO!
Director: Bong Joon-Ho (The Host), Leos Carax (The Lovers on the Bridge), Michel Gondry (Eternal Sunshine)
Screenwriter: Bong Joon-Ho (The Host), Leos Carax (The Lovers on the Bridge), Michel Gondry (Eternal Sunshine)
Cast: Ayako Fujitani, Satoshi Tsumabuki, Nao Omori, Ryo Kase, Ayumi Ito, Teruyuki Kagawa, Yu Aoi
Plot Outline: A cinematic triptych of three Tokyo-set stories.
Why I'm Interested: I love these kinds of movies where three directors take on a subject. Tokyo is a cool looking city and I can see it being a fertile environment for creativity - and when you add Michel Gondry to the mix, I am absolutely, 100% there.

31. REAL MEN CRY
Director: Brian Goodman (feature debut)
Screenwriter: Brian Goodman (feature debut), Donnie Wahlberg (feature debut), Paul T. Murray (Very Mean Men)
Cast: Ethan Hawke, Amanda Peet, Mark Ruffalo
Plot Outline: Childhood friends Paulie and Brian are forced to survive on the tough streets of South Boston through a life of petty thievery.
Why I'm Interested: There seems to be a big resurgence of Boston-area films of late, especially after The Departed but this one sounds interesting to me because the writer/director is basing this on his own real life experiences. The cast helps and who isn't intrigued by Donnie Wahlberg writing a screenplay?

30. WANTED
Director: Timur Bekmambetov (Night Watch, Day Watch)
Screenwriter: Michael Brandt & Derek Haas (3:10 to Yuma, Invincible)
Cast: James McAvoy, Angelina Jolie, Morgan Freeman, Terence Stamp, Common, Thomas Krestchmann
Plot Outline: A young man (McAvoy) finds out his long lost father is an assassin. And when his father is murdered, the son is recruited into his father's old organization and trained by a man named Sloan (Freeman) to follow in his dad's footsteps.
Why I'm Interested: I love assassin movies, the cast is solid, and the trailer made this look like it could be entertaining. At the same time, the trailer also looked like this could be a piece of crap ala Lucky Number Slevin, another project I was very pumped for at the time. I'm cautious but optimistic about this.

29. WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE
Director: Spike Jonze (Adaptation, Being John Malkovich)
Screenwriter: Spike Jonze (feature debut), Dave Eggers (feature debut)
Cast: Paul Dano, Forest Whitaker, Catherine O'Hara, Michelle Williams, Catherine Keener, James Gandolfini, Tom Noonan
Plot Outline: An adaptation of Maurice Sendak's classic children's story, where Max, a mischievous little boy, creates his own world - a forest in habited by fabulous wild creatures who crown Max as their ruler.
Why I'm Interested: The concept is perfectly suited to Spike Jonze's style who alongside Michel Gondry and Charlie Kaufman, make up a trio of geniuses with similar sensibilities. Also very curious about Eggers (who previously wrote A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius) tackling a film.

28. THE CHANGELING
Director: Clint Eastwood (Million Dollar Baby)
Screenwriter: J. Michael Straczynski (feature debut, creator of Babylon 5)
Cast: Angelina Jolie, Amy Ryan, John Malkovich
Plot Outline: A mother's prayer for her kidnapped son to return home is answered, though it doesn't take long for her to suspect the boy who comes back is not hers.
Why I'm Interested: The premise sounds genuinely creepy. Eastwood's had a resurgence as of late and it's nice to see him do a project without Haggis on board. And I am also curious to see Amy Ryan's follow-up to her great turn in Gone Baby Gone (though I found the movie itself lacking).

27. MARGARET
Director: Kenneth Lonergan (You Can Count on Me)
Screenwriter: Kenneth Lonergan (You Can Count on Me, Gangs of New York)
Cast: Anna Paquin, Matt Damon, Mark Ruffalo, J. Smith-Cameron, Matthew Broderick, Jean Reno
Plot Outline: A young woman (Paquin) witnesses a bus accident, and is caught up in the aftermath, where the question of whether or not it was intentional affects many people's lives.
Why I'm Interested: First, this project is still scheduled for 2007 on IMDb but I find that very unlikely now, also considering a recent interview with Nico Muhly (the composer) which indicates that he's just started working on the score. In any case, that said, this project looks fantastic partly because of its solid cast, but mostly because I LOVED You Can Count on Me and I'll see anything Lonergan puts out.

26. MR. NOBODY
Director: Jaco van Dormael (The Eight Day, Toto the Hero)
Screenwriter: Jaco van Dormael (The Eight Day, Toto the Hero)
Cast: Jared Leto, Diane Kruger, Rhys Ifans, Sarah Polley, Anders Morris
Plot Outline: Nemo Nobody (Leto) is a 120-year-old mortal, the last of his kind living among happy immortals. Nemo relives real and imaginary memories of a previous marriage.
Why I'm Interested: I love movies that deal with immortality, the aging process, and its various effects as can be seen by my #6/#8 picks below and my picking The Fountain two years ago as my most anticipated film. Nonetheless though, the casting of Sarah Polley and Jared Leto are nice little extras - especially Polley. It's nice to see her branching out slightly higher profile films again with this and Splice.

25. BORN
Director: Daniel Simpson (feature debut)
Screenwriter: Daniel Simpson (feature debut), Paul Kaye (feature debut)
Cast: Jennifer Connelly, Paul Bettany
Plot Outline: As they settle into their new home in a quiet English town, a married couple is terrorized by the husband's creations -- claymation figures that come to life, and begin to act out a nightmarish scenario.
Why I'm Interested: Seriously, who doesn't wanna see a movie with Jennifer Connelly running around terrorized by claymation figures?

24. CITY OF EMBER
Director: Gil Kenan (Monster House)
Screenwriter: Caroline Thompson (Edward Scissorhands, The Addams Family)
Cast: Bill Murray, Tim Robbins, Saoirse Ronan, Martin Landau, Marianne Jean-Baptiste, Mary Kay Place, Toby Jones, Liz Smith
Plot Outline: For generations, the people of the City of Ember have flourished in an amazing world of glittering lights. But Ember's once powerful generator is failing ... and the great lamps that illuminate the city are starting to flicker.
Why I'm Interested: It sounds like one of the few genuinely original and interesting fantasy ideas out there considering the mass amounts of fantasy flicks being rushed out into theatres in the next few years. Also, the cast, writer, and director are all great in my books.

23. THE BATTLE OF RED CLIFF
Director: John Woo (The Killer, Face/Off)
Screenwriter: Zou Jingzhi, Lan Xiaolong, & Wang Qian (Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles)
Cast: Tony Leung, Takeshi Kaneshiro, Koyuki, Zhao Wei, Chang Chen, Zhang Fengyi
Plot Outline: Based on the events during the Three Kingdoms period in Ancient China in which specifically told in the title, The Battle of Red Cliffs.
Why I'm Interested: John Woo going back to Chinese-language films will hopefully mean a return of the great John Woo rather than the uneven director we've seen in the past few years. The fact that he is trying to make this a historical epic rather than an actioner or martial arts film also helps pique my interest (he's hired the screenwriters of Crouching Tiger as well as To Live and Farewell, My Concubine to do polishes on the script). And of course it's got a very solid cast.

22. I, LUCIFER
Director: Dan Harris (Imaginary Heroes)
Screenwriter: David Logan (Circus), Dan Harris & Michael Dougherty (X2, Superman Returns)
Cast: Daniel Craig, Ewan McGregor, Stephen Samson
Plot Outline: Based on Glen Duncan's bestseller, God is giving Satan a last shot at redemption: Satan must live out a blameless life as a human.
Why I'm Interested: Theological films like this that deal a bit with the afterlife always interest me and I've always heard interesting things about the book.

21. JUMPER
Director: Doug Liman (The Bourne Identity, Swingers)
Screenwriter: Simon Kinberg (Mr. & Mrs. Smith), David Goyer (Batman Begins, Dark City), Jim Uhls (Fight Club)
Cast: Hayden Christensen, Samuel L. Jackson, Diane Lane, Jamie Bell, Rachel Bilson, Tom Hulce, Michael Rooker
Plot Outline: A genetic anomaly allows a young man to teleport himself anywhere. He discovers this gift has existed for centuries and finds himself in a war that has been raging for thousands of years between "Jumpers" and those who have sworn to kill them.
Why I'm Interested: I read this book back in elementary school and remember really digging it. The teleporting effects in the trailer were top-notch and all I'm really expecting out of this is a big blast of fun.

[JCPhoenix]

20. THE LOVELY BONES
Director: Peter Jackson (The Lord of the Rings)
Screenwriter: Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh, & Philippa Boyens (The Lord of the Rings)
Cast: Saoirse Ronan, Mark Wahlberg, Rachel Weisz, Susan Sarandon, Stanley Tucci, Amanda Michalka, Michael Imperioli
Plot Outline: A young girl who was brutally raped and murdered, watches the effects of her death on her family from Heaven, as her parents drift apart, her father becomes obsessed with vengeance and her sister grows into the woman she would never be.
Why I'm Interested: I read the book a few years ago and while it didn't quite live up to my expectations based on its premise, I think it could make a great film with some polishes. That said, this would've been higher up on the list when Gosling was attached. Weisz attached does boost this up a lot for me though as she's currently my favorite working actress aside from Kate Winslet.

19. SHANTARAM
Director: Mira Nair (The Namesake, Monsoon Wedding)
Screenwriter: Eric Roth (Forrest Gump, The Good Shepherd)
Cast: Johnny Depp
Plot Outline: A heroin addict incarcerated for a robbery escapes prison and reinvents himself as a doctor in the slums of Bombay; his ties to the crime underworld there lead him to Afghanistan, where he partners with a mob boss locked in a battle with Russian criminals.
Why I'm Interested: Depp and drug-running equals a cool combination. Add a little bit of flavor with the Indian setting of Bombay and Mira Nair - the perfect director to catch that, and you got a very promising looking movie.

18. THE HAPPENING
Director: M. Night Shyamalan (The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable)
Screenwriter: M. Night Shyamalan (The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable)
Cast: Mark Wahlberg, Zooey Deschanel, John Leguizamo, Spencer Breslin
Plot Outline: A paranoid thriller about a family on the run from a natural crisis that presents a large-scale threat to humanity.
Why I'm Interested: I hated The Village with a passion. I hated Lady in the Water even more. But this is the one, last try I'm gonna give Shyamalan's films based on the goodwill he built up through Sixth Sense and Unbreakable. The premise sounds genuinely cool and apocalyptic films are right up my alley.

17. THE ARGENTINE/GUERRILLA
Director: Steven Soderbergh (Traffic, Out of Sight)
Screenwriter: Peter Buchman (Jurassic Park 3, Eragon)
Cast: Benicio del Toro, Franka Potente, Benjamin Bratt, Jordi Molla, Yul Vazquez, Catalina Sandino Moreno, Edgar Ramirez, Julia Ormond, Marc-Andre Grondin
Plot Outline: In 1956, Ernesto 'Che' Guevara (Benicio Del Toro) and a band of Castro-led Cuban exiles mobilize an army to topple the regime of dictator Fulgencio Batista./In 1964, Argentine revolutionary Ernesto 'Che' Guevara (Benicio del Toro) travels to New York City to address the United Nations.
Why I'm Interested: These two films feel like they've been in development and production for forever. But I think it will definitely be worth the wait...del Toro as Che Guevera is casting genius. I was surprised to see Canadian actor Marc-Andre Grondin has a supporting role in this film; I guess he's moving up in the world after a great turn in C.R.A.Z.Y.. I am a little wary of Buchman's involvement however; especially considering his love of the piece-of-shit known as Eragon (the book).

16. CLOVERFIELD
Director: Matt Reeves (The Pallbearer)
Screenwriter: Drew Goddard (feature debut, writer on Lost, Alias, Buffy)
Cast: Mike Vogel, Jessica Lucas, Lizzy Caplan, Michael Stahl-David, T.J. Miller, Odet Jasmin
Plot Outline: Revolves around a monster attack in New York as told from the point of view of a small group of people.
Why I'm Interested: It's all about the ingenious marketing campaign for this one; it's definitely got me hyped. J.J. Abrams' involvement helps as does Drew Goddard writing (he wrote some of the best eps of the shows mentioned above). And I love monster attack movies and the idea of doing one from the home-video perspective is awesome.

15. BE KIND REWIND
Director: Michel Gondry (The Science of Sleep, Eternal Sunshine)
Screenwriter: Michel Gondry (The Science of Sleep)
Cast: Jack Black, Danny Glover, Mia Farrow, Mos Def, Melonie Diaz, Marcus Carl Franklin
Plot Outline: A man (Black) whose brain becomes magnetized unintentionally destroys every tape in his friend's video store. In order to satisfy the store's most loyal renter, an aging woman with signs of dementia, the two men set out to remake the lost films, which include Back to the Future, The Lion King, and Robocop.
Why I'm Interested: Because Michel Gondry is a visual genius, plain and simple. Eternal Sunshine is one of my favorite films ever, The Science of Sleep is great, and his music video work is some of the most astounding, mind-bending tv work ever produced. And the idea for this film is right up his alley.

14. MY BLUEBERRY NIGHTS
Director: Wong Kar Wai (In the Mood for Love, 2046)
Screenwriter: Wong Kar Wai (In the Mood for Love, Chungking Express), Lawrence Block (feature debut)
Cast: Norah Jones, Jude Law, David Strathairn, Natalie Portman, Rachel Weisz
Plot Outline: A young woman (Jones) takes a soul-searching journey across America to resolve her questions about love while encountering a series of offbeat characters along the way.
Why I'm Interested: Plain and simple, it's WKW doing an English movie. Not only that but with Portman and Weisz. That in itself would be enough to bring it to near the top of my list. Unfortunately, I'm approaching this a little more cautiously after the mediocre/bad reviews this got at Cannes.

13. THE TIME TRAVELER'S WIFE
Director: Robert Schwentke (Flightplan, The Family Jewels)
Screenwriter: Jeremy Leven (The Notebook), Bruce Joel Rubin (Jacob's Ladder)
Cast: Rachel McAdams, Eric Bana, Ron Livingston
Plot Outline: A romantic drama about a Chicago librarian (Bana) with a gene that causes him to involuntarily time travel, and the complications it creates for his marriage.
Why I'm Interested: The inclusion of McAdams gives this a boost above the normal romantic drama for me. The time-traveling idea - even more so.

12. THE FALL
Director: Tarsem Singh (The Cell)
Screenwriter: Dan Gilroy (Two for the Money), Nico Soultanakis (feature debut), Tarsem Singh (feature debut)
Cast: Lee Pace, Catanca Untaru, Justine Waddell, Julian Bleach, Leo Bill, Marcus Wesley, Robin Smith, Daniel Caltagirone
Plot Outline: In a hospital a little girl with a broken collar bone meets a bedridden man who starts telling her a fantastical story which reflects his state of mind. As time goes by fiction and reality start to intertwine in this uplifting epic fantasy.
Why I'm Interested: Because The Cell hosted some of the most incredible visuals I've seen in a film and because everything I've read or heard about this film says it's even more visually stunning. It just aggravates me that I missed this at the TIFF last year and worse, no word on a release date as of yet. But I put it in this 2008 list because I really think it'll come out this coming year especially with its win at Sitges for Best Film.

11. THE DARK KNIGHT
Director: Christopher Nolan (Memento, Batman Begins)
Screenwriter: Christopher Nolan & Jonathan Nolan (The Prestige)
Cast: Christian Bale, Heath Ledger, Morgan Freeman, Gary Oldman, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Cillian Murphy, William Fichtner, Aaron Eckhart, Anthony Michael Hall, Michael Caine, Morgan Freeman
Plot Outline: Batman and James Gordon join forces with Gotham's new District Attorney, Harvey Dent, to take on a psychotic bank robber known as The Joker, whilst other forces plot against them, and Joker's crimes grow more and more deadly.
Why I'm Interested: Because 1. Batman is the best superhero. 2. From Following through to The Prestige, Nolan has not let me down once. 3. Did you look at the retardedly stuffed cast? Best cast ever for a superhero movie? I think so. In general, I don't usually look forward to sequels all that crazily but this is one of the few exceptions.

10. SYNECDOCHE, NEW YORK
Director: Charlie Kaufman (feature debut)
Screenwriter: Charlie Kaufman (Eternal Sunshine, Adaptation)
Cast: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Michelle Williams, Catherine Keener, Emily Watson, Dianne Wiest, Hope Davis
Plot Outline: A theater director (Hoffman) struggles with his work, and the women in his life, as he attempts to create a life-size replica of New York inside a warehouse as part of his new play.
Why I'm Interested: It's fucking Kaufman, I think that's enough.

09. THE BROTHERS BLOOM
Director: Rian Johnson (Brick)
Screenwriter: Rian Johnson (Brick)
Cast: Adrien Brody, Rachel Weisz, Mark Ruffalo, Rinko Kikuchi, Norah Zehetner, Robbie Coltrane
Plot Outline: A con man (Brody) gets the tables turned on him by his girlfriend (Weisz), when he decides to perform one last con with his brother and their silent partner.
Why I'm Interested: It's got a great cast (love Weisz, Ruffalo, and Kikuchi based on her performance in Babel) and a cool premise. And Johnson last did Brick which oozed a lot of style (though I like it less on repeat viewings). In any case, the cast paired up with the director are enough to boost this high on my to see list.

08. TREE OF LIFE
Director: Terrence Malick (Days of Heaven, The Thin Red Line)
Screenwriter: Terrence Malick (Days of Heaven, The Thin Red Line)
Cast: Sean Penn, Heath Ledger
Plot Outline: Unknown
Why I'm Interested: It's Terrence Malick. Doing a movie called TREE OF LIFE. With cinematography by Emmanuel Lubezki. If that combination doesn't output sheer heaven in pictures, I don't know who else could. What's more, from the bits and pieces you can find online, it sounds like a part of it will be about the origins of life (if this is the same project as his project Q from before). And honestly, Terrence Malick doing his own Fountain-esque project is just one of the best ideas anyone's ever had.

07. STATE OF PLAY
Director: Kevin Macdonald (The Last King of Scotland)
Screenwriter: Matthew Michael Carnahan (The Kingdom, Lions for Lambs)
Cast: Brad Pitt, Edward Norton, Rachel McAdams, Robin Wright Penn, Jason Bateman, Helen Mirren
Plot Outline: Based on the BBC mini-series of the same title, a team of investigative reporters work alongside a police detective to try and solve the murder of a congressman's mistress.
Why I'm Interested: Brad Pitt and Edward Norton's first collaboration since Fight Club? Holy fucking shit yes! Let's not forget Ms. McAdams in the film either, or the fact that Kevin Macdonald directed one of last year's most underseen films, the intensely riveting Last King of Scotland. Everything about this project just reeks of awesomeness.

06. THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON
Director: David Fincher (Fight Club, Se7en)
Screenwriter: Eric Roth (The Insider, Munich)
Cast: Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett, Tilda Swinton, Julia Ormond, Elle Fanning, Elias Koteas, Jason Fleyming
Plot Outline: Tells the story of Benjamin Button, a man who starts aging backwards with bizarre consequences.
Why I'm Interested: This is all about the combination for me. I'm a sucker for any high concept gimmick which is probably why Click and Stranger Than Fiction ended up in abnormally high in my lists previous years but it's all elevated by the fact that Fincher is doing it and that we're getting another Fight Club (and Se7en) reteaming here with Fincher and Pitt. Adding a quality screenwriter, Blanchett and Swinton doesn't hurt. This has been on my top 10 list in the past two years but I'm just happy it's finally happening for sure.

05. BODY OF LIES
Director: Ridley Scott (Blade Runner, Alien)
Screenwriter: William Monahan (The Departed, Kingdom of Heaven)
Cast: Russell Crowe, Leonardo DiCaprio, Carice van Houten, Vince Colosimo
Plot Outline: A former journalist injured in the Iraq war is hired by the CIA to track down an Al Qaeda leader in Jordan. Based on the novel "Body of Lies" by David Ignatius.
Why I'm Interested: Okay, so there have been an abundance of political films lately but this looks a lot more promising than the ones that came out this year. For one, you got Ridley Scott on board (with Crowe yet again). For another, you got one of the best actors of this generation (DiCaprio). And on top of all that, you got Monahan, one of the best screenwriters around right now doing the script (and for those of you Kingdom of Heaven detractors - see the director's cut before bashing it completely). Honestly, this sounds more like a thriller along the lines of Blood Diamond imo - only with more potential cause the talent on this supersedes the talent on that film.

04. THE INTERNATIONAL
Director: Tom Tykwer (Run Lola Run, The Princess & the Warrior, Perfume)
Screenwriter: Eric Singer (feature debut)
Cast: Clive Owen, Naomi Watts, Ulrich Thomsen, Armin Mueller-Stahl
Plot Outline: An Interpol agent (Owen) attempts to expose a high-profile financial institution's role in an international arms dealing ring.
Why I'm Interested: I love CIA/spy movies. I'm all over that kind of stuff and we got Mr. Badass (aka Clive Owen) playing an agent. If that's not enough, they had to throw in Naomi Watts into the mix and bring in almost the entire team from Perfume: The Story of a Murderer. Considering that film was my favorite movie last year, and considering Tom Tykwer directed another favorite movie of mine (The Princess & the Warrior), his track record with me is pretty stellar. And just to throw in a WTF, Terence Chang and John Woo are producing. Nothing that will affect the final result but it certainly piques my interest.

03. THE PINEAPPLE EXPRESS
Director: David Gordon Green (George Washington, All the Real Girls)
Screenwriter: Seth Rogen & Evan Goldberg (Superbad)
Cast: Seth Rogen, James Franco, Gary Cole, Bill Hader
Plot Outline: A stoner (Rogen) and his dealer (Franco) are forced to go on the run from the police after the pothead witnesses a cop commit a murder.
Why I'm Interested: There's a severe lack of comedies on my list but I think a big reason for that is because a lot of them tend to sneak up on me out of nowhere rather than have a crazy hook that gets me pumped up. With that said, this movie has a hook that has pumped me up and then some. Now, I still haven't seen Superbad (definite rental the day it comes out though) but this project has intrigued me ever since I first heard about it. I think Seth Rogen is pretty funny and James Franco is pretty cool, but there's several other things that have really elevated this to an absolute must-see in my books. 1. It's a stoner comedy. And I love my stoner films. (Out of all the films that were playing at TIFF, I picked Smiley Face (killer first half btw) as one of my four to go see. That's how much I love my stoner flicks.) 2. Not only is it a stoner comedy, it's a stoner action-comedy. We don't get that too often and I'm certainly down for that. But the biggest thing that makes me go WTF is that David Gordon Green who directed the slow, lyrical (though at times muddled) George Washington is directing this. That, by itself is enough to get me into the seat for this.

02. REVOLUTIONARY ROAD
Director: Sam Mendes (American Beauty, Road to Perdition)
Screenwriter: Justin Haythe (The Clearing)
Cast: Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet, Kathy Bates, Michael Shannon
Plot Outline: A young couple living in a Connecticut suburb during the mid-1950s struggle to come to terms with their personal problems while trying to raise their two children. Based on a novel by Richard Yates.
Why I'm Interested: DiCaprio and Winslet are two of the most consistently great actors working today. I"ve heard stellar things about this novel and have been curious to read it for a while. In addition, Sam Mendes is pretty much a God. I absolutely love the style and feel of a Sam Mendes film. He has a very classic kind of elegance to his directorial style that I can see being a perfect fit for this kind of film (I only wish he had put that to use to make The Golden Compass like he was considering at one point) and I still haven't gotten my share of suburban dysfunctional family dramas, considering how great some of them have been over the last few years (Mendes' own American Beauty and Field's Little Children come to mind). Add to that the novelty of being a period piece and it's all enough to boost this to #2 on my must-see list.

01. BLINDNESS
Director: Fernando Meirelles (The Constant Gardener, City of God)
Screenwriter: Don McKellar (The Red Violin, Last Night)
Cast: Julianne Moore, Gael Garcia Bernal, Mark Ruffalo, Sandra Oh, Danny Glover, Alice Braga, Maury Chaykin, Don McKellar
Plot Outline: A doctor's wife becomes the only person with the ability to see in a town where everyone is struck with a mysterious case of sudden blindness.
Why I'm Interested: I never thought I'd see the day when a Canadian production (or in this case a Canadian-Japanese-Brazilian co-production) with top my most anticipated list but there you go. Let's see...why am I looking forward to this project? The question should be, why wouldn't I be interested...we got Fernando Meirelles who created a masterpiece in City of God and a near-masterpiece in The Constant Gardener (and whose style I love). You've got a cast that has Ruffalo, Moore and Bernal - all three actors I absolutely love. This will be a nice comeback for Moore (finally). Bernal is one of the most consistent actors for me with every film I've seen of his so far being an 8/10 or over. And Ruffalo stunned me with You Can Count on Me and has done interesting projects ever since (Eternal Sunshine, Collateral, Zodiac). Alice Braga is a nice bonus (good in City of God, really liked her in Lower City even though the film wasn't very good). The book is supposedly incredible. The storyline sounds amazing. This film sounds incredibly unique - the characters don't even have names in the film and one of the requirements for Don McKellar getting the rights from the author was that there would be no visible way to tell what town or where this is. On top of all this, you have an excellent Canadian screenwriter writing the film and finally getting a higher-profile project (and what a project it is). I absolutely cannot wait for this film to come out.

[ilovemovies]

The Runner-ups: Drillbit Taylor, Four Christmases, Punisher: War Zone, The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, Untraceable, Tree of Life, 88 Minutes, I Could Never Be Your Woman, Be Kind Rewind.

45. The Box
44. Mad Money
43. State of Play
42. Passengers
41. The Changeling
40. Cleaner
39. Wanted
38. He's Just Not That Into You
37. Powder Blue
36. The Day the Earth Stood Still
35. Speed Racer
34. Rogue
33. The Curious Cage of Benjamin Button
32. The Happening
31. Pathology
30. Rambo
29. The Incredible Hulk
28. WALL*E
27. The International
26. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
25. The Reader
24. Revolutionary Road
23. Daybreakers
22. Eagle Eye
21. Lakeview Terrace
20. Babylon A.D.
19. The Lovely Bones
18. Stop-Loss
17. Charlie Bartlett
16. Midnight Meat Train
15. Pride and Glory
14. Body of Lies
13. Bond 22
12. 10,000 B.C.
11. The X-Files 2


And the Top 10 are:


10. The Other Boleyn Girl
9. Get Smart
8. Iron Man
7. Jumper
6. Valkyrie
5. Vantage Point
4. Cloverfield
3. The Dark Knight
2. Star Trek
1. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of Crystal Skull

[Drewza89]

I can already tell that 2008 is going to be a much better year than 2007 concerning movies.

EDIT: My top 18 as of 12/19/07:

1) The Dark Knight
2) Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
3) Iron Man
4) Rambo
5) The X Files 2
6) Bond 22
7) Speed Racer
8) Punisher: War Zone
9) Star Trek
10) Harold and Kumar Escape From Guantanamo
11) The Incredible Hulk
12) Shutter Island
13) Wall-E
14) The Changeling
15) 88 Minutes
16) Cleaner
17) Get Smart
18) Pride and Glory

[Rick-James]

Steven Spielberg's
INDIANA JONES AND THE KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL

Peter Jackson's
THE LOVELY BONES

Bryan Singer's
VALKYRIE

Christopher Nolan's
THE DARK KNIGHT

Spike Jonze's
WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE

Coen Brothers'
BURN AFTER READING

J.J. Abrams'
STAR TREK

That's pretty much it as of now.

[fonxx]

Thats a great list, but for me, "The Dark Knight" is number one by far, I mean, I´ve never anticipated a movie like that one.

[JackassFan]

5) The X-Files 2
4) Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
3) The Dark Knight
2) Sweeney Todd (UK release)
1) Cloverfield

[Cronos]

Cloverfield

[corran horn]

In order of release:

Iron Man (5/2)
Indiana Jones & the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (5/22)
Children of Huang Shi (5/23)
Incredible Hulk (6/13)
Wall-E (6/27)
Hellboy 2 (7/11)
Dark Knight (7/18)
The International (8/15)
Crossing Over (8/22)
Burn After Reading (9/12)
Blindness (9/19)
Valkyrie (10/3)
Body of Lies (10/10)
Curious Case of benjamin Button (12/19)
Revolutionary Road (12/19)

Not yet given a date:

Geurilla/The Argentine
Changeling
State of Play
Defiance: Ed Zwick's new film with Daniel Craig, Liev Schreiber, and Jamie Bell about Jewish resistance fighters in WWII Poland


Pretty great catches, JCPhoenix!

[Hannibal21]

1. The Dark Knight
2. Funny Games
3. Snow Angels
4. My Blueberry Nights
5. The Lovely Bones
6. The Brothers Bloom
7. Revolutionary Road
8. Be Kind, Rewind
9. Tree of Life
10. The Battle of Red Cliff

For now at least....I will be updating this list though, I'm sure there are plenty of good movies coming out next year that I have not yet heard of.

[xseanymacx]

What's the quickest way to find release dates? Is there a site with a 2008 release list?

Iron Man & The Dark Knight are my two biggest right now.

[ilovemovies]

Originally Posted by xseanymacx

What's the quickest way to find release dates? Is there a site with a 2008 release list?

Iron Man & The Dark Knight are my two biggest right now.

comingsoon.net

[SamSanchez]

These are what I'm looking t othe most for next year:

Fantastic Mr. Fox [dir. Wes Anderson] (if it comes out next year)

Burn After Reading [dir. Coen Brothers]

Mammoth [dir. Lukas Moodysson]

Blindness [dir. Fernando Meirelles]

Be Kind Rewind [dir. Michel Gondry]

My Blueberry Nights [dir. Wong Kar-Wai]

Dark Knight [dir. Christopher Nolan]

Synecdoche, New York [dir. Charlie Kaufman]

Tree of Life [dir. Terrence Malick]

Curious Case of Benjamin Button [dir. David Fincher]

Funny Games [dir. Michael Haneke] <--the original is one of my favorites, the remake doesn't look as good, but still high hopes

Righteous Kill [dir. Jon Avnet]




Pretty interested and will check out:

Lovely Bones [dir. Peter Jackson]

The Happening [dir. M. Night Shyamalan]

The Argentine/Guerilla [dir. Steven Soderbergh]

Cloverfield [dir. Matt Reeves]

Brothers Bloom [dir. Rian Johnson]

Body of Lies [dir. Ridley Scott]

The International [dir. Tom Tykwer]

Pineapple Express [dir. David Gordon Green]

[xseanymacx]

Originally Posted by ilovemovies

comingsoon.net

Thanks!

[dman476]

These are the ones I'm most interested in:

Synecdoche New York
Burn After Reading
Suburbicon
The Brothers Bloom
Tree of Life
Wall-E
City of Ember
I, Lucifer
Be Kind Rewind
Blindness
The Dark Knight
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Body of Lies
The International
The Pineapple Express
Nothing is Private
Cloverfield
Indiana Jones 4
Revolutionary Road (my # 1)

[Le_Big_Mac]

1. The Dark Knight
2. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
3. Wall-E
4. Cloverfield
5. My Blueberry Nights

[ilovemovies]

Oh shit! How could I have forgotten about Righteous Kill?!

I'm going to have to edit my list now.

[Rawlin67]

1.The Dark Knight
2.Iron Man
3.Cloverfield
4.Wanted
5.Valkyrie
6.Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Cyrstal Skull
7.Vantage Point
8.Bond 22
9.Death Race (Jason Statham is mah boy)
10.Pride and Glory
11.The Eye
12.Hellboy II: The Golden Army
13.The Incredible Hulk
14.Get Smart
15.The International
16.Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanomo
17.Be Kind Rewind
18.Jumper
19.The Happening (only because The Village and Lady in the Water sucked enough to make me want to see how bad this could be)
20.The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor


id have to go to the website and look up others but those were just 20 i know that are coming out that i am anticipating.

[AndrewDB]

10. Speed Racer
9. Wanted
8. 10,000 B.C.
7. Be Kind Rewind
6. Star Trek
5. Wall-E
4. Bond 22
3. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
2. Synecdoche, New York

And my number one most anticipated movie of 2008?

The Dark Knight

[Scarfather]

Be Kind Rewind
The Brothers Bloom
Burn After Reading
City of Ember
Indiana Jones (Maybe)
The Man from London
Shantaram
Synecdoche, New York
Where the Wild Things Are

That's it, this is going to be one of the shittier years like 05 or 03. I can feel it.

[SamSanchez]

Originally Posted by Scarfather

Be Kind Rewind
That's it, this is going to be one of the shittier years like 05 or 03. I can feel it.

I agree somewhat, from the ones I listed, only about three of those am I incredibly amped for (Tree of Life, Burn After Reading, My Blueberry Nights), and other than that, maybe Dark Knight as well. But unless we have other things announced, or if there are some surprises, it may be a slow year.

And nice at listing Bela Tarr's Man From London....I forgot to add that to my list.

[corran horn]

Originally Posted by SamSanchez

I agree somewhat, from the ones I listed, only about three of those am I incredibly amped for (Tree of Life, Burn After Reading, My Blueberry Nights), and other than that, maybe Dark Knight as well. But unless we have other things announced, or if there are some surprises, it may be a slow year.

And nice at listing Bela Tarr's Man From London....I forgot to add that to my list.

Sad to hear you say that. I think 2008 shows more promise than this past year did (in terms of summer releases; fall releases look equally strong). Maybe your interest will perk up once we get more info about the fall releases.

Oh, and Scarfather, 2003 was a GREAT year. Any year that gives one Return of the King, Mystic River, Master and Commander, X2, etc is a great year for me. 2005 was a letdown, though.

[DarkKnight81]

The Dark Knight

[Jig Saw 123]

1. The Dark Knight
2. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
3. Cloverfield
4. Bond 22
5. Saw V
6. Hellboy II: The Golden Army
7. Iron Man
8. The Incredible Hulk
9. The Happening
10. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
11. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
12. Star Trek

[Rawlin67]

Originally Posted by Scarfather

Be Kind Rewind
The Brothers Bloom
Burn After Reading
City of Ember
Indiana Jones (Maybe)
The Man from London
Shantaram
Synecdoche, New York
Where the Wild Things Are

That's it, this is going to be one of the shittier years like 05 or 03. I can feel it.

i agree with you on 05. Other than King Kong and Sin City, there wasnt really much out there for me to be psyched about that year. and yeah 2003 did have some good hits, but overall, i found it to be pretty lackluster.

[APzombie]

Great lists all around.

for me, the top five are fanboy based.

1. Indiana Jones & the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
2. The Dark Knight
3. Milk
4. Bond 22
5. The Pineaplle Epress
6. Blindness
7. Body of Lies
8. Be Kind Rewind
9. Tree of Life (though I imagine it won't really come out for years)
10. Cloverfield

[SamSanchez]

Originally Posted by corran horn

Sad to hear you say that. I think 2008 shows more promise than this past year did (in terms of summer releases; fall releases look equally strong). Maybe your interest will perk up once we get more info about the fall releases.

Oh, and Scarfather, 2003 was a GREAT year. Any year that gives one Return of the King, Mystic River, Master and Commander, X2, etc is a great year for me. 2005 was a letdown, though.

I really think it will be very hard to top this year especially with the known titles for next year. With all the quality films that came out this year:
No Country For Old Men
Before the Devil Knows You're Dead
Darjeeling Limited
Eastern Promises
Hot Fuzz
12:08 East of Bucharest
Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
The Lives of Others
Wind That Shakes the Barley
Zodiac
Black Book
The Boss Of It All
Children of Men
Inland Empire
Lust, Caution

And potentially good ones that I still need to see:
Rescue Dawn
This Is England
Sunshine
3:10 to Yuma
Across the Universe
There Will Be Blood
Into the Wild
4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days
Margot at the Wedding
Cassandra's Dream
I Am Legend
I'm Not There
Paranoid Park
Sweeney Todd
Syndromes and a Century
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly



This year was a pretty good year...and granted though, my saying that next year doesn't look too stellar is only based on what is known as of now...hoping it'll change.

[xseanymacx]

Oh, I'm also anticipating KILLSHOT because that damn movie needs to be released all ready!

[SamSanchez]

After doing a little more research on my own, I will also be interested in at least checking these out (assuming they will all be released next year):

La Terza Madre [dir. Dario Argento] <--techinically 2007, but may get a wide release next year
Vicky Cristina Barcelona [dir. Woody Allen]
Silence [dir. Martin Scorsese]
God's Puzzle [dir. Takashi Miike]
Diary of the Dead [dir. George A. Romero]
Certified Copy [dir. Abbas Kiarostami]
Red State [dir. Kevin Smith]
Zack and Mari Make a Porno [dir. Kevin Smith]
Black Swan [dir. Darren Aronofsky]
Death of the Reel [dir. Guy Maddin]
Pattern Recognition [dir. Peter Weir]
Life During Wartime [dir. Todd Solondz]
Emerald City [dir. Jim Sheridan]

[Drewza89]

Originally Posted by xseanymacx

Oh, I'm also anticipating KILLSHOT because that damn movie needs to be released all ready!

Yeah, I'm also getting tired of them putting it off. They'll probably release it straight-to-dvd, unfortunately.

[ilovemovies]

I thought 2005 was a pretty damn great year. 2003 was pretty good too.

2006 and 2007 have been pretty meh though. 2006 I just barely was able to get a somewhat satisfying top 10. It was a really crappy year for great movies.

[yorrick brown]

1.hulk 2
2.the ruins
3.dark knight
4.iron man
5.pineapple express
6.cloverfield
7.bond 22
8.star trek
9.the long weekend
10.mother of tears

[SamSanchez]

Originally Posted by ilovemovies

I thought 2005 was a pretty damn great year. 2003 was pretty good too.

2006 and 2007 have been pretty meh though. 2006 I just barely was able to get a somewhat satisfying top 10. It was a really crappy year for great movies.

All I could think of right now for 2006 are Pan's Labyrinth, The Departed, The Prestige, Death of Mr. Lazarescu, and The Fountain. I'm sure there's more I enjoyed, but as far as quantity of great films, I doesn't seem like it was THAT great. But then again, I don't think I was that many films in general that came out last year.

[Rawlin67]

The Departed, Pans Labyrinth, Clerks II, and Children of Men were my faves from last year. and the Descent, cant forget that one.

[ilovemovies]

The Departed, Pan's Labyrinth, Children of Men, The Prestige, Clerks II were good movies but I don't think they are great movies.

I totally disliked The Fountain.

To me, the best of 2006 was World Trade Center, V for Vendetta, The Good Shepherd, Invincible and The Pursuit of Happyness. With M:I-3, Babel, Little Children, The Good German and Superman Returns finishing off my top 10. The only other movies I gave an 8/10 that year were Silent Hill and Lucky Number Slevin. That's only 12 8s and up for 2006. 12 8+'s is pathetic. Although I will say I haven't seen The Painted Veil yet and I want to. That movie looks like it could be great. But even if that movie is great, that's still only 13 8+'s and that's still prett pathetic. 2006 was an incredibly weak year.

[SamSanchez]

Good Shepherd and Good German were pretty bad in my opinion. Quite possibly the two biggest let downs of the year. I did like V For Vendetta and Little Children was great....I forgot that one. As for Children of Men....I'm not sure if we should count as 2006 or this year...is it got its wide theatrical release on Jan 5th of 2007.

But really, Invincible and Pursuit of Happyness weren't GREAT by any means in my opinion, and Babel, although I really did enjoy was flawed on several counts....but I guess this goes to further prove it wasn't that great a year.

Oh yeah, and I also thought Clerks II took the overrated film of the year award for 2006. So yeah...it was an incredibly weak year in retrospect.

[Killersmith]

Next year seems like an amazing one for movies. Here's my list:

1. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
2. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
3. The Forbidden Kingdom
4. My Blueberry Nights
5. The Dark Knight
6. Synecdoche, New York
7. Revolutionary Road
8. The Pineapple Express
9. Pattern Recognition
10. X-Files 2
11. Burn After Reading
12. Wall-E

[JCPhoenix]

Personally, I thought 2006 was a solid year all around and a better one than 2005...

2006 had movies like The Last King of Scotland, Half Nelson, The Painted Veil, Volver, The Departed, Little Children, The Lives of Others, The Science of Sleep, The Descent, United 93, The Prestige, Perfume, and Children of Men to name a few. For me, 2006 had a lot of solid/very good movies but not a lot of "blow-me-away great" movies.

I wasn't too down with 2005 right after the year but over the past few years I've seen a few more 2005 movies that I missed and it improved the year decently for me.

2005 had Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, C.R.A.Z.Y., Nobody Knows, Lord of War, The Constant Gardener, Mysterious Skin, Batman Begins, 3-Iron, etc...

2004 had a lot of solid flicks too but 4 movies I absolutely love so that really pushed it up. 2003 is awful though, the only movie I was blown away by was City of God and even the solid movies were a weaker bunch in general.

This year is looking like another year with many solid entries but not too much blowing me away (at least as of yet, only Assassination and No Country were in the top tier for me and of those two Assassination was the only one to truly blow me away) but of course there's still a month and a half to go...and this is usually the make-or-break month of the year so, we'll see.

As for 2008, I think it's a very promising line-up for both 2008 and 2009. Nowhere near as great as my anticipation was for 2006 but it all looks like there's some really interesting/great stuff coming out.

Also - looking at other lists here, some movies I missed that probably would've made some part of my list are Defiance and Daybreakers.

[Hannibal21]

I know for a fact that I'm in the minority when I say this, but in my mind 2005 is one of the best years of this decade. It certainly had one of the best, most enjoyable summers for cinema (Batman Begins was breathtaking and the best superhero movie I've ever seen, 40-Year-Old Virgin is one of the best comedies of the past 10 years, Wedding Crashers made me laugh like hell, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory lived up to my expectations, Hustle and Flow, Sky High, & Star Wars were very pleasant surprises, Red Eye was up until the ending one hell of a tense thriller, etc.) that I can remember, it saw the release of quite a few art house/independent movies that blew me away (Broken Flowers, Three Burials, Cache, & Mysterious Skin, for starters), and it produced a movie that entered my top 50 of all time (Brokeback Mountain, one of those rare Oscar buzz movies where the hype was 100% justified) as well as a lot of high quality, highly anticipated films during the late winter season that did not end up at all disappointing. To my recollection, I think I've given about ten movies that year a 9/10 grade. It was just a satisfying year and I felt there were a larger quantity of genuinely good films and surprises than most other years of the 2000s. Not to mention, compared to 2000-2006, the number of extraordinary performances given in movies that year was simply...overwhelming, some may even be among the top 5 acting of the decade in their respective categories.

2006 definitely grew on me as I saw more movies but the gigantic amount of hugely disappointing films (some were just bad, some merely did not live up to their potential), a rather bad summer, and just an overall fewer amount of mind blowing movies, made it just a solid but not great year in my mind. There were a couple of excellent performances (especially in the lead actress category), but few stood out as award worthy.

2004 was consistently great all throughout the year. 2003 was mediocre, probably the worst year this decade. 2002 was memorable mostly for the top tier performances (Day-Lewis, Nicholson, Kidman, and especially Julianne Moore).

As of right now, I have really been quite impressed with 2007. Ratatouille and Jesse James will be amongst the top 50 films of this decade and there have been more than several really impressive entries throughout the seasons. This summer, at least, matches summer 2005 when it comes to the quality of movies (on second thought it may even be better - Knocked Up, Ratatouille, Harry Potter, Hairspray, The Simpsons Movie, and the overlooked Bug & Stardust, etc.).

I'll give 2008 the benefit of the doubt.

[APzombie]

for an idea of the past few years, here are my top ten:

2006
L'Enfant
Children of Men
The Lives of Others
The Departed
Pan's Labyrinth
The Prestige
Notes on a Scandal
Casino Royale
Little Children

2005
Munich
Match Point
Cache (Hidden)
Batman Begins
Capote
Brokeback Mountain
Downfall
Good Night, And Good Luck
The New World
A History of Violence