Mark's Oscars

Hello reader,

In response to my buddy at http://www.melanism.com blog's challenge to his readers, I have pain-stakingly gone through wikipedia's list of movies every year since the year of my birth, 1980 and used several of my fingers to type out my favorite movie from each year. This is a very frustrating process that takes longer than you might expect, except, if you're like me, and strangely have a favorite movie every goshdarn year. There are a few notable exceptions: Lean on Me couldn't edge out Say Anything in the 80's; Mumford had no chance against American Beauty in the 90's, and nobody this year, not Wall-E's beautifully simple romance or the forceful fun of Iron Man holds a candle to a movie I am going to see within one week.

Additionally, if you want to know my evaluation process and methodolgy: I grade movies based upon 1) entertainment value (whether it's fun to watch or funny), 2) emotional evocativeness (whether the movie connected with me on a personal visceral level or inspired me/got me bawling), 3) intellectual provocativity (whether the movie was thoughtfully prepared or the movie left me pondering/not wondering).

I take into account the plot, the story, the dialogue, the acting, the chemistry, the audio-visual splendor, the directing, and probably a few more things (and mostly in that order). For the purposes of this list, I evaluated how much I appreciated the movie at the first time I saw it, how rewatchable it was over time, and how much I appreciate the movie now. But, mainly, there is a strong emphasis on now.

Then, after evaluating all of those things in depth, I toss them out the window and just make decisions.

You'll notice that very few of these movies correspond with Oscar winners; though, I'm more surprised that some of them do, which proves that even the Oscars get it right some years. To be fair to all of the movies I listed below, I'm totally ashamed for listing every one of them for reasons varying from their sentimentality, their silliness, their cliched-ness, or their utter lack of realism, and yet simultaneously I'm unabashedly proud (except for the aforementioned shame) of these choices as well because these are movies, and there is no such thing as a real movie, or a truly original movie that is not overly sentimental or silly. They are movies, and even accurately depicted unedited documentaries are never wholly precise. The movies below as well as movies in general are simple in their complexity and that is what makes them awesome. So, deal with it.

Incidentally, melanism also has a list of favorite albums by year as well, but I don't know enough about music to make informed decisions.

Let's see... is there any other way to stall and buy me more time to think over my list? I guess not.

So...

Here goes...

I guess...


Mark's Favorite Movies By Year: Starting in 1980

1980- Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
1981- Superman II
1982- Gandhi
1983- Trading Places
1984- The Terminator
1985- Rocky 4
1986- Ferris Bueller's Day Off
1987- Evil Dead 2
1988- Die Hard
1989- Say Anything
1990- Edward Scissorhands
1991- Silence of the Lambs
1992- Bram Stoker's Dracula
1993- The Fugitive
1994- Ace Ventura: Pet Detective*
1995- Tommy Boy*
1996- Independence Day
1997- L.A. Confidential
1998- The Zero Effect
1999- American Beauty
2000- Gladiator
2001- Amelie
2002- About a Boy
2003- Big Fish
2004- Garden State
2005- Serenity
2006- Little Miss Sunshine
2007- Juno
2008- Dark Knight (as long as it doesn't suck)

It's a fun activity. But, clear a little time.
What's your list America? And, feel free to chime in, rest of the world.

Great big hug,
-The Papa Bear

* I made an error on the years and had to make a correction: I reluctantly erased Forrest Gump from my list, because I found out that possibly my favorite comedy of all time was actually a 1994 release (and not 1995). Also, I missed that Garden State was released in 2004, so I replaced Win a Date with Tad Hamilton. On the plus side, I was able to insert the most excellent Tommy Boy into the list. Enjoy.