Paste Magazine’s Top 20 Movies of 2008
Whether you’re ready for it or not, December is less than a week away now, and for critics and anyone else in the world of journalism it can only mean one thing: it’s time to break out the Year End “Best Of” lists! Here at Film Junk we’ll be putting our annual Reader’s Choice Awards online fairly soon, and starting to think about our own Top 10 lists for 2008. However, this is one case where many print publications are going to beat blogs to the punch, because their December issues are already hitting store shelves.
The first Best of 2008 list that I’ve seen so far this year comes courtesy of Paste Magazine. As you can probably guess, there’s a big focus on indie and art house films in their Top 20, but they still managed to include a couple of blockbusters for good measure. Perhaps the biggest surprise is their #1 pick, Firaaq — a movie I had never even heard of up until now! Check out the Top 20 below and see if you agree with their choices. You can also check out their Top 10 TV Shows of 2008 and Top 50 Albums of 2008.
20. Iron Man
19. Chop Shop
18. The Pool
17. The Wrestler
16. Paranoid Park
15. Kabluey
14. Rachel Getting Married
13. Vicky Cristina Barcelona
12. Man on Wire
11. Call + Response
10. Ballast
9. Son of Rambow
8. Momma’s Man
7. 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days
6. WALL-E
5. The Visitor
4. Nights and Weekends
3. A Christmas Tale
2. The Dark Knight
1. Firaaq
Comments (5)
That’s not a bad list though I’m disappointed that “Ballast” is so far down plus there are a number of films there that are technically from last year – not sure how they figured that one out. Nice to see a few others on the list that I’ve been curious about – will have to make more of an effort to get those in and “Firaaq”…like you, never even heard of it. Definitely giving that a bit of research time.
Posted by Marina on November 25th, 2008I need to revisit the releases for 2008, some things I forget their release dates, I actually thought Son of Rambow was late 2007.
In no order, today a list would probably include the following (I may be forgetting something at the moment)
Synecdoche New York
Son of Rambow
Rachel Getting Married
Man on Wire
Bigger Stronger Faster*
The Dark Knight
Kung Fu Panda
Wall-E
Burn After Reading
Speed Racer
Forgetting Sarah Marshall
4 Months 3 Weeks and 2 Days (if that counts)
somewhere a bit down:
Hellboy II
Standard Operating Procedure
Role Models, Step Brothers (yup, i dont really discriminate against stupid comedies)
still definitely need to see:
Posted by Goon on November 25th, 2008Slumdog Millionaire
Let the Right One In
Paranoid Park
It’s still way too early to reveal my top ten … though if you really care, you can see reviews or all twelve movies I’ve seen this year on Flixster. Only half of them I’d consider top ten worth at this point, but I still have a bunch of Oscar contenders that I hope live up to their buzz. Then I can put together a decent list even though I haven’t lived up to standard cinephile expectations this year.
I’ve heard the name Firaaq, it played at TIFF this year, but I don’t know anything about it. If it makes a bunch more top ten lists, I might look into it.
Posted by Ashley on November 25th, 2008I’d have to say that these are the contenders in my book:
Synecdoche NY, Let The Right One In, Rachel Getting Married, Pontypool, My Blueberry Nights, The Sky Crawlers, The Wrestler, Man On Wire, Happy-Go-Lucky, WallE and TimeCrimes.
And special shout out to 2006 French film which only finally got its North American Cinema Release: TELL NO ONE.
Posted by Kurt on November 26th, 2008Nice! They put 4,3,2 on their list. I was going to leave it off mine since it’s technically 2007. If that starts appearing on more lists, I’m putting it at #1 or #2 on my list.
Never heard of Firaaq either.
So wow, no “Blindness, Elegy, Slumdog Mill, Benjamin Button, Synecdoche NY, Revolutionary Road, Reader, Let the Right One In, I’ve Loved You So Long” – So I can either assume those movies aren’t that good or the author didn’t bother to wait until all the movies are released on the year to make his list?
Goon, what’s with the asterisk* next to Bigger Stronger Faster?
Posted by Andrew James on November 26th, 2008Leave a Reply