GEP's Top 10 of '10

Tonight is Oscar night, and in lieu of writing anything remotely Oscar-related, I've decided to finally reveal my personal Top 10 Favorite Films of 2010. Some of them were nominated for Best Picture awards, so I guess this post has a little bit to do with the Oscars. I'm not going to say much about each film, but know that if it made this list you have my personal guarantee that it is awesome.

10. Restrepo

Filmmakers spend one full year with American troops in the Korengal Valley, AKA, "The Valley of Death."

9. True Grit

A darkly comic Western from the Coen brothers. A precocious 14-year-old girl hires a grizzly, marble-mouthed, frequently-drunk US Marshall named Rooster to help track down the man who shot her father.

8. Toy Story 3

Remarkably moving. I haven't cried this much in a movie theater since the last Pixar movie. For me it goes Toy Story 3, Toy Story, Toy Story 2.

7. Exit Through the Gift Shop

Street artist Banksy documents the dubious rise to fame of Mr. Brainwash. Best doc of the year!

6. Winter's Bone

A teenage girl in the Ozarks searches for her meth-cooking father; has an uncle named Teardrop.

5. Inception

The Christopher Nolan movie about stealing from people's dreams or whatever. It isn't a confusing film, but it is way too complicated to describe in one or two sentences.

4. Kick-Ass

A high school nobody becomes a real-life superhero, albeit a largely ineffective one. Then he meets Big Daddy and Hit Girl and stuff gets real.

3. The Social Network

The Facebook movie. An intense thriller somehow.

2. Animal Kingdom

A young man goes to live with his criminal in-laws after his mother ODs. Everyone is Australian.

1. Scott Pilgrim vs The World

Based on the comics by Bryan Lee O'Malley, director Edgar Wright not only made my favorite movie of 2010, but possibly the coolest movie ever. I lesbians this movie so much!

Honorable Mention


-The King's Speech (if this had been a Top 11 of '10 list, this one would have soooooo made it)

-Please Give (a pleasant trifle of a film)

-Splice (Adrian Brody makes a monster, then humps it)

-The Crazies (Timothy Olyphant runs away from/shoots at/hides from townspeople who've been infected with your standard issue rage disease; a remake of a Romero film I couldn't get through 3 minutes of)

-Fair Game (Oh, Valerie Plame...if that really is your name...)

-8: The Mormon Proposition (Mormons are apparently homophobic bullies...I had a feeling)

Disappointments

-The Town (aptly acted, aptly directed, but so what)

-Shutter Island (ditto)

Want to See List

Monsters; The American (it is in my DVD player right now, waiting for me to press play); Black Swan; whatever Harry Potter we're on now; How To Train Your Dragon; that Joan Rivers thing

Happy Oscaring, everybody!