Ranking Christopher Nolan's Movies

Hello, dear reader!

As director Christopher Nolan turns 50 years old today, I figured this would be a good time to share my ranking of his films. Nolan is one of my favorite directors of all time, and one of the many reasons for this is his unique and unconventional way of telling stories - things rarely take place in the correct order with Nolan's narratives, but rather in a mismatched sequence or even backwards. As a tribute to that, I shall be presenting my list in a different order than usual - I'll be going from #1 to #10, instead of the usual #10-to-#1.

And here we go!

1. Inception (2010)

I mean, it's a total masterpiece. The expert camerawork, mind-bending script and a-list cast that one would expect from a Nolan movie are all at their peak in Inception. The concept of going into people's dreams through advanced technology is fascinating enough on its own, but when you turn it into a heist thriller with layers upon layers of dreamworlds to explore, not to mention the mounting tension of time moving differently in the different layers and the concept of limbo frightening the main characters, you truly have a groundbreaking film on your hands.

And then there's the epic Hans Zimmer score, the tragic backstory of protagonist Dom Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio), and the fact that the film has one of the best endings ever (okay, that one is somewhat of a trademark for Nolan - probably half of his films would make it to my list of the greatest movie endings). No wonder that Inception was my favorite film of the 2010's.

2. Interstellar (2014)

For fans of Stanley Kubricks' 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), this film is 100% the next best thing. Matthew McConaughey gives one of his greatest performances as Cooper, an astronaut who is sent to search for a new home world for humans as a bleak future is making Earth uninhabitable - is it just me or is this movie starting to feel more close to home every day?

McConaughey's journey includes pretty much all the rest of Hollywood's talent, as stars old (Michael Caine, John Lithgow, Ellen Burstyn), new (Matt Damon, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Chastain) and very new (Mackenzie Foy; hell, I forgot that Timothée Chalamet was in this?!) unite to form a truly interstellar cast. In addition to a great ensemble and a fascinating premise, Interstellar delivers as one of the great modern science fiction movies with its awe-striking visual effects, creative plot and mind-bending moments of sheer Nolan. And, as I've mentioned in a previous post, Hans Zimmer's score is so powerful that every time I hear a piece from it I remember the exact feeling I had when I watched this film for the first time in the movie theater.

3. Dark Knight Rises (2012)

Yes, I'm one of those weird people who prefers Dark Knight Rises to The Dark Knight. Both are amazing for sure (what Nolan movie isn't?), but for me personally, this culmination of the trilogy was the best of them all. I'm a fan of big, epic endings, and the film sure delivered on that front. Tom Hardy's Bane was the perfect villain to go against Christian Bale's Batman in his final outing, and what a showdown it was. Nolan had reinvented the superhero movie genre with Batman Begins and perfected it with The Dark Knight; the final installment of the trilogy didn't have as big of an impact on the film industry as its predecessors, but it's simply such a great ending for the series itself and its characters. Each of the trilogy's main characters gets a poetic ending to their arch, leading to some very emotional moments towards the end.

And those final twenty minutes or so are the main reason for the film being this high in the ranking. The movie is damn amazing up until then, but then it gets a whole lot better. The final montage manages to be simultaneously mind-blowing and emotional, as major reveals are made yet an ultimate sense of closure dawns on the viewer. Hans Zimmer's expert work on the soundtrack helps with that, as does Michael Caine's heartstring-tugging performance, in addition to Nolan's powerful and clever script. The Dark Knight trilogy is one of my favorite movie franchises of all time, and this is the film that brings it to a bombastic, perfect end.

4. The Prestige (2006)

I had to put this masterpiece below those in the top three, as it doesn't quite reach the epic scale that I love so much about them. But believe me, it hurts to put The Prestige at only the fourth place. The film has gotten a lot of acclaim its way, but it deserves so much more. The movie takes a mildly interesting premise (a period piece following the rivalry of two stage magicians), and turns it into a piece of cinematic gold thanks to some of the best writing to ever grace the big screen. In part thanks to Christopher Priest who wrote the novel that the film is based on, and in part thanks to Nolan and his brother Jonathan (who I call the Christopher Nolan of the television medium), who wrote the screenplay for the movie, the script is a work of pretty much unprecedented genius.

We've all seen flashbacks being used as a means of spicing up the story in movies. And we've all seen movies with surprising plot twists. But how many movies flash somewhat confusingly backwards and forwards in time whilst featuring so many plot twists that you have to watch it multiple times for it to make sense, but each time you rewatch it, it pays off more than the last time, as the complex big picture of the story gets painted more clearly? There are so many layers to truly understand the story, but watching it multiple times and really getting into it is truly worth it. Adding to the greatness is the fantastic acting by the likes of Hugh Jackman, Christian Bale, Scarlett Johansson and Michael Caine.

5. Memento (2000)

There's a video on Youtube that I recommend to fans of this director. In it, he explains the basic concept of the storytelling style and sequence of events in Memento. And it's nearly 20 minutes long.

While Memento isn't quite the best Nolan film, it's certainly the most Nolan film out there. Even with the absence of both Hans Zimmer and Michael Caine, this is still the film that is the truest to Nolan's style of making a movie, and especially writing a script. The story isn't simply told out of sequence, but (much like this list) from ending to beginning, with most scenes ending right where the previous scene started. Also, there are black-and-white flashback sequences in between to further complicate the plot. I think my third time watching Memento was when I finally properly understood the story from finish to start. Based on a fantastic short story by his brother Jonathan, Christopher Nolan truly made his name in the film industry with this ambitious project - just the second film he ever directed.

The premise of the plot is perfect for the backwards storytelling style: Memento is about a man with short-term memory loss, and he's looking for the man who killed his wife. As he can't form new memories, he uses notes and tattoos to keep up with his own investigation. As confusing and complex as the film is, it's not messy: the script is tightly woven together, and ultimately everything makes perfect sense - you just have to use your brain quite intensively. 

6. Dunkirk (2017)

It says something about the quality of Nolan's filmography that Dunkirk is one of the greatest war movies I've seen, yet it's not even in the top half of this list. I was surprised to hear that a true story from World War II would be the director's next project, as he had spent the years leading up to it making sci-fi epics and a superhero trilogy, but he sure delivered and proved the cynics wrong.

Dunkirk is the only movie where Nolan's directing is even more impressive than his writing. The script is great, too: the story isn't as complex as in most of his works, but still told slightly out of sequence to make the events more tense. But the directing is what makes the film truly great: the realistic intensity of the war is captured magnificently. Up until last year's 1917, I had never seen a war movie that makes the war seem so real and so close. When the soldiers are lined up on the beach, hoping not to get hit by a bomb as the air raid passes them by, the viewer can feel their sheer terror and helplessness through the magnificent sound editing, action choreography, visual effects and cinematography. Dunkirk is an odd one out in Nolan's collection of cleverly written fictional puzzle boxes, but it makes for a showcase of the director's range, and is easily his most gripping film.

7. The Dark Knight (2008)

Often considered to be Nolan's greatest film, The Dark Knight is certainly one of the best superhero movies ever made. Nolan had turned the whole genre inside out with the darkness and (relative) realism of the Dark Knight trilogy's first film, and with this second one, he took things further. The Dark Knight is often described as an Oscar-worthy crime thriller where the characters just happen to wear masks and cloaks, and that's quite accurate. The vibrant darkness of Gotham City and its criminal underbelly and the complicated morals of Bruce Wayne's vigilantism are brought to life in an astonishing fashion by Nolan's sharp directing and a story that leads to a truly dramatic and epic final scene.

But we all know what the best part of the movie is. I couldn't possibly write about The Dark Knight without devoting at least half of the text to Heath Ledger's Joker performance. While it could be argued that Joaquin Phoenix played the character even better in last year's Joker (I still haven't decided which of the two I prefer and my list of best Joker-performances is therefore in limbo), Ledger's performance is still one of the greatest villain roles in cinema history. It was unheard-of that a comic book movie would win an Academy Award for acting, right up until the Oscar went posthumously to Ledger, who tragically died at the age of 28 years between the release of the movie and the Oscar ceremony. Ledger's version of the Joker is a frightening, spine-chilling portrayal of a complex madman, making for the perfect antagonist to Christian Bale's Batman.

8. Insomnia (2002)

It's the weirdest thing that Christopher Nolan made an awesome crime thriller with Oscar-winner Al Pacino, Oscar-winner Hilary Swank and Oscar-winner Robin Williams in the lead roles, and no one ever talks about it. Sure, it wasn't a high-budget blockbuster like most of Nolan's films, but still - for most directors, a film of this quality would be among their most revered works instead of an underrated gem.

Insomnia is a cooled-down Nolan movie: the story is told in chronological order, and none of Nolan's mainstay-actors appear. But even without his trademark traits, Nolan can still make a fantastic movie. The acting is some of the best to appear in his filmography, as Pacino (one of my all-time top 5 favorite actors) gives one his very best performances as a detective suffering from insomnia, while Williams plays an uncharacteristic villain role - any bad guy played by Robin Williams is an unique bad guy, and his character Walter Finch is unique in a great, memorable way. Swank is also at the top of her game as detective Ellie Burr, the hero of the story. In addition to these powerhouse performances, the film features a beautiful Alaska setting, some unforgettable tension/action sequences, and an ending that's not great in a typical Nolan way (there's no huge plot twists or mind-bending reveals), but just as great in a different way (it leaves the viewer with quite a deep message to ponder).

9. Batman Begins (2005)

By now you might be wondering why I'm still so full of praise for these movies, even though I've reached the bottom two. The answer: to my taste, Nolan hasn't made a bad or even mediocre film in his whole career. Call me a biased fanboy if you want, but I've seriously enjoyed all ten of his feature films, and from the looks of the trailer for Tenet, the number will soon be going up to eleven.

Batman Begins is often dwarfed by the critical acclaim of The Dark Knight and the massive scale of Dark Knight Rises, but even if it is the weakest part of the trilogy, the first installment is still a very good movie and a hugely important one. The superhero movie genre had been dominated by campy heroes in colorful tights punching bad guys, right up until this movie came along. Nolan's version of Gotham City is a dark and realistic portrayal of a town riddled by crime, his version of Batman being a troubled man haunted by his past who decides to become more than just a vigilante - a symbol for the beating heart of his hometown. With the likes of Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Morgan Freeman, Katie Holmes, Liam Neeson and Gary Oldman all in the same cast, Batman Begins is a worthwhile crime drama in its own right, in addition to being a milestone for comic book cinema, the first chapter of a great trilogy, and a big break in Nolan's own career.

10. Following (1998)

It may be the weakest of Nolan's cinematic products, but still very much worth watching for fans of his work - of all the directors whose full cinematography I've seen, Nolan definitely has the best worst film. Just passing the requirements for feature length with its 69-minute runtime, Following is one hell of a directorial debut and a strong sign of things to come.

The film's small budget makes it look and feel very different from the grand-scale blockbusters Nolan would go on to make, but the script is where the familiar feel from the director's other films is very visible. The story is told out of sequence and features its share of mind-boggling twists, proving that Nolan had his signature storytelling style with him from the very beginning. Following is a black-and-white, neo-noir thriller about an aspiring writer who becomes the accomplice of a charismatic thief, and I highly recommend it to people who like Nolan's films but haven't seen this oft-forgotten gem yet.

Thank you for reading! I was originally planning to release this list after Tenet's release so it could be included, but I got frustrated after the third or fourth time it got delayed and just went ahead with my top 10. I'll be sure to let my readers know my thoughts on Tenet and how it would rank here once I've seen it!

Tune in next week for my list of the top 10 Spike Lee joints!

Sunday Special: A Tired Recap Of My 24-Hour 24 Marathon

Hello, readers!

Yesterday, I did something that me and a good friend of mine had been planning for a long time: we watched the first season of 24 in real time. For those not familiar with the series, it takes place in real time (1 episode = 1 hour in the series), and each season follows a 24-hour period in the lives of its main characters. It was quite the epic experience to watch it like this.

I had decided not to a blog about this, but I changed my mind when an opportunity presented itself: a little over halfway through our marathon, we decided to watch one episode from start to finish without breaks (usually we would pause whenever the clock skips ahead in order to have a few short breaks during each episode and to keep in sync with the show's timeline) so that we could have a half-hour nap break. Unfortunately, I quickly realized that I couldn't catch sleep when knowing that I'd be waking up again in less than half an hour. So, as my friend took his power nap, I decided to write some of my thoughts down. The text below was written by me in my tired state.

Top 10 Reasons Why Our 24 Marathon Was Awesome

It's 13:45 as I'm writing this. I've been up for nearly 28 hours, and will be up for 10 more. Here are, off the top of my head, 10 insights as to why this marathon was awesome despite its hardships:

10. It'll make for a proud memory

Yes, I know it's a bit lame and shallow, but I like the fact that I'll always be able to brag to my fellow film&TV enthusiasts (read: "nerds") that I've done this. I'm sure that a lot of people who watch 24 get this idea in their head at some point, but very few actually go through with it.

9. Watching a show like this for a second time is always fun

My friend and I have both seen the series before, and a series like 24 is fun to watch for a second time - remembering many of the big plot twists, it's interesting to watch knowing what will happen and how the series cleverly hints at certain reveals beforehand. Also, there are many subplots that I had forgotten over the years so I got to enjoy them all over again.

8. Ultimate snacks and lots of coffee

This one goes with any decent movie/TV marathon done in good company. Coffee has had a big role in keeping us awake during the process, as did a light-speed bike run to the local shop to get some energy drinks.

7. The breaks make it fun and humane

Oh, the breaks. Remember, every episode of 24 lasts about 40 minutes despite it beginning at the start of an hour and ending at the end of an hour - there are always those few breaks where the clock skips ahead 3-5 minutes (this was where the commercial break would take place during the original TV broadcasts). Throughout the marathon, we've used these breaks for all sorts of shenanigans - warming up food or stocking up on snacks, running around the house or doing a series of pushups to counteract the negative health effects of our screen-goggling, et cetera. A select few times, we'd plow right through an episode without breaks and then enjoy a longer break thanks to the saved time (such as this nap-break that I'm spending writing), but for most of the time we tried to stay in the absolutely same time as the ticking clock of the series. The transition between episodes is especially cool, as each one starts literally 1 second after the previous one ended, and experiencing that without an intermission adds to the experience.

6. A nice departure from reality

Doing things like this often would obviously be unhealthy. Doing things like this once in a while (who am I kidding, I've never done a TV marathon this extreme and neither have you), is a good load of fun - something totally different from our everyday lives. We get to live on this wonderful planet for multiple decades, so why not spend one 24-hour period of it doing these sorts of hijinks just for the unique experience?

Hold up, it's 13:59 and we're about to continue! I'll write the rest of this strange rambling at the next convenient break. 10 episodes to go!

5. The sheer ambition and scale of it all

It's 14:10. Events occur in real time.

This one really took some planning. For most of Thursday and all of Friday, I kept a rigid attitude of minimizing my screen time and maximizing my time outside / moving in general, as a countermeasure to the effects this marathon would have (I want to sincerely thank my health-nut mother for drilling these important values into her couch-potato son). Everything had to be planned so that my friend and I could do everything we needed to in these 24 hours during those 3-minute breaks. I'm lucky that we did all that planning, since this concept is way too ambitious for it to be done half-assed.

4. Enjoying with a fellow fan

This one is obvious, but it's fun to watch a great series with a good friend who appreciates said series just as much. The company, not to mention our constant joking as every additional hour spent awake lowered our bars for humor, is what has truly made this experience so enjoyable.

3. The tiredness and hard parts make it weirdly worthwhile

This marathon was a real test of body and soul, as well as a social experiment of sorts. It wasn't just fun and games - staying awake for this long (remember, there was a full day of being awake before we started our midnight-to-midnight marathon) and constantly keeping up with the show's rigid timeline created some real challenges. There have been headaches, stomach aches, stressful situations of hurry as well as the consistently harder and harder challenge of fighting to keep awake. But it's all been worth it, creating a weirdly epic atmosphere for the whole experience - we didn't simply sit down to watch a bunch of TV. We earned this. I don't know if this makes any sense - I'm extremely tired and writing this in a hurry as our break is about to end.

2. It's been hyped up for a long time

It's 14:30, and we're halfway through the 10th-last episode.

My friend and I first floated around the idea of watching a season of 24 in real time sometime during high school. Over the course of a few years, it became less and less of a joke each time one of us brought it up. At some point during last spring, we decided that we'd go through with it this summer. It was a hassle to figure out where and when we could do this gargantuan project without disrupting the lives of anyone else and to maximize our own viewing experience. So I've been waiting for this for a long time, and it sure was worth the wait. I may be tired out of my skull and totally off my eating rhythm at the moment, but this is all really awesome.

1. You live the experience

It's 14:43.

This was the whole point of doing the marathon - watching the story of 24 unfold in real time, keeping in sync with the characters. And let me tell you (while I don't recommend you trying this at home unless you truly understand the consequences), the series gains a whole new level of awesomeness when watched like this. Seeing the clock ticking on the screen constantly match with the clock in the room, relating to the characters when they express their fatigue due to being awake so long, going from night to day to night again as the light outside the windows roughly matches the light in the show's Los Angeles set pieces, it's all quite magnificent. You really experience the intensity of the season's events on a whole new level.

Epilogue

That's about it! The rest of the marathon went well, making for an all-in-all great experience. The last episode was especially amazing, and it ending right as the clock turned to 00:00 was quite satisfying. The second season of 24 takes place 18 months after the first, so my friend and I might be doing a sequel to this in January 2022...only time will tell.

Tune in next Thursday for my ranking of Christopher Nolan's movies!

Ranking The 10 Movies My Uncle Recommended

Happy (belated) birthday, Uncle Dan!

When I started this blog last January, you sent me a list of 10 films that you said you'd expect "any Finnish-American young man, particularly my nephews, to fully grasp, understand and appreciate". Some of the recommendations were already favorites of mine, a few were very unfamiliar, and most of them happened to fall into the category of "Classics I've been meaning to watch for a long time but haven't gotten around to it yet" - a perfect push to finally see those films.

I decided that for your birthday I'd do a ranking of all 10 films on your list - I don't know if it was your intention that I'd rank them, but I figured it would be a very Veikko Hoffman way to show my appreciation for the recommendations. But while these movies are here in the order of how much I like them, I want to emphasize the fact that I very much enjoyed all of them - this isn't a "worst to best" ranking exactly, but rather a list of awesome to even-more-awesome to the most awesome.

10. The Outlaw Josey Wales (1976)

Why it's awesome: The Outlaw Josey Wales is certainly a gritty turn from the spaghetti westerns that Clint Eastwood starred in during the 60's. In addition to directing the film, Eastwood stars as Josey Wales - a powerful performance as a cold shell of a man who lost his family and who sets out for revenge. The action scenes are well-choreographed and intense, and the story is captivating. The 2-hour-15-minute runtime is perhaps a bit long for the amount of story that the film has to tell, thus explaining the placement of this very fine western at the bottom of my list.

What it means to me in the context of your movie recommendations: My dad is a huge fan of Clint Eastwood and the western genre, so I can imagine that these were the kind of films that you guys grew up with. Of all the major film genres, westerns are possibly the one that I'm the least familiar with, so it's always nice to catch a classic from that wing of cinema.

9. Caddyshack (1980)

Why it's awesome: It's a comedy classic, and rightfully so. The combination of the totally different brands of humor coming from Chevy Chase's charismatic and quotable performance and Bill Murray's over-the-top oddball performance makes for a chill and hilarious film, entertaining to the core. There are countless quotes so legendary that I knew them well before seeing the movie for myself, and the country club setting makes for a memorable atmosphere and many amusing scenarios (especially the explosive ending). Not only is it a film starring the Saturday Night Live hotshots of the time, but it very much feels like a feature-length SNL skit - in the best way possible.

What it means to me in the context of your movie recommendations: Saturday Night Live and the other projects of its stars make for a cool generational connection. I'm an avid follower of the current SNL era as well as films starring castmembers like Pete Davidson or Kate McKinnon, and Caddyshack must be exactly what that was like when you and my dad were my age. Murray and Chase starring in a movie together must have been quite a treat for SNL fans of the time, and if I'm remembering my cinema history correctly, Caddyshack is considered to be the starting point of so-called "SNL movies".

8. Miracle (2004)

Why it's awesome: It's a beautiful true story about a great moment in sport history. Kurt Russell is fantastic as Herb Brooks, the unconventional coach of the U.S. hockey team that played against the Soviet Union as massive underdogs in the 1980 Olympics yet emerged victorious. The glory of sports is captured majestically into this film, as Gavin O'Connor's directing and Mark Isham's score really emphasize the struggle of giving it all and doing your very best against a tough opponent with slim odds, and the triumphant feeling of overcoming said opponent. Sporting events were always a major symbolic front in the Cold War, and this film captures the tensions between the two superpowers in the sporting world in a powerful manner, while still being more subtle about it than many others (Rocky IV springs to mind).

What it means to me in the context of your movie recommendations: The film served as an important history lesson to me - I had no idea about the whole story before I saw Miracle. In addition to helping me get in touch with such an important moment from modern U.S. history, it's also probably not a coincidence that the sport in the token sports movie of your list was ice hockey - definitely the biggest common denominator in the sporting cultures of Finland and the United States.

7. What We Do In The Shadows (2014)

Why it's awesome: Two words - vampire mockumentary. The premise alone pretty much guarantees the success of the film, especially when comedic masterminds like Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi are directing and starring. Like most mockumentaries, the film follows the main characters in a very casual style as they are interviewed about their everyday lives - those lives just happen to include ancient rituals, sucking the blood of virgins and avoiding sunlight at all cost. The film deals with vampire lore in a delightfully casual manner while hilariously mixing its problems with the mundane issues of paying one's rent and getting into nightclubs.

What it means to me in the context of your movie recommendations: If I remember correctly, you're quite a fan of vampire movies (or maybe old-school monster movies in general). This one might have been just about making sure that I'm familiar with one of your favorite genres? While What We Do In The Shadows is a new film (and a satire), it still is much more of a "real" vampire film than the Twilight-tier stuff that has put the genre back into the mainstream with questionable results. The mixture of old-school vampire lore and modern ironic humor really hit my comedic tastes well, as I'm sure it did with you as well.

6. Jeremiah Johnson (1972)

Why it's awesome: With majestic scenery, beautiful music and a thoroughly engrossing atmosphere, Jeremiah Johnson is quite the mountain man movie. The film's pace is delightfully slow as it really focuses on the aesthetic and setting, giving the film a unique vibe. While Robert Redford's leading performance and the historical context of the era are significant upsides to the film's intrigue, the sheer power of nature itself is the central theme and most important element of the film. It's a tale of man surviving in the wild and becoming one with nature, creating quite a fresh contrast to the fast-paced blockbuster cinema that often dominates our screens.

What it means to me in the context of your movie recommendations: The outdoors, and appreciation for nature, is what comes to mind. For two brothers who grew up with various camping and hiking experiences in a beautiful part of the world, I can see that it's important for you and my dad that this heritage would pass on to the next generation - as it has, among other times, when we did our Yukon float in 2013. This film is a great reminder of that lifestyle, and the majesty of the world once you leave the city and enter the outdoors.

5. Patton (1970)

Why it's awesome: One of the great World War II movies, this winner of seven Academy Awards is an honest and gripping account of the actions and persona of general George S. Patton Jr., played in a sledgehammer performance by George C. Scott. It's not as if I'd have the experience to judge whether a war film is realistic or not, but based on reviews and comments by actual war veterans concerning this film, it sure sounds like this is one of the more factual and realistic movies to portray the second World War. While such movies often focus on the European or Pacific fronts, this one takes a fascinating look at the African front, which comes with some of Hollywood's most impressive set design. The film does a great job balancing its depiction of Patton: his controversial traits aren't shied away from, yet the important and necessary actions he took are on full display.

What it means to me in the context of your movie recommendations: Understanding one's history, I suppose. The events of the war that have shaped U.S. history and the American mindset, as well as cinematic history where Patton made its mark as one of the most important films to depict the war, are both quite interesting and important things to reflect upon.

4. A River Runs Through It (1992)

Why it's awesome: A River Runs Through It is a beautiful and deeply emotional tale of two brothers in rural Montana. The brothers (brilliantly played by Craig Sheffer and Brad Pitt) grow apart throughout the years, yet still maintain a connection and a caring for one another. Philippe Rousselot's Oscar-winning cinematography, Mark Isham's nostalgic soundtrack and the themes of brotherhood, religion and fly fishing make for a very memorable and thought-provoking film. Between the beautiful scenery and bittersweet dialogue that dominates much of the film's runtime, there's a lot to be learned about life from this Robert Redford classic.

What it means to me in the context of your movie recommendations: This was one of the more obvious ones - the concept of two brothers who grow up fly fishing immediately rang some bells. I can only imagine how much some of the film's themes and overall atmosphere coincide with memories from your own youth. Of course, the theme of brotherhood carries on to me as well - I'm sure anyone with close siblings can relate to many of the film's ideas and lessons.

3. The Bridge On The River Kwai (1957)

Why it's awesome: There's so much to love about The Bridge On The River Kwai. The setting of prisoners of war building a bridge in a Japanese prison camp is grim and exciting. The production quality and visual effects were groundbreaking, even revolutionary for the time being (I constantly forgot I was watching a film from the 50's as everything in it has held up so well). The acting by Alec Guinness and company is excellent. And, of course, the film has one of the most tense, nail-biting, edge-of-your-seat final acts in cinematic history. So, while Patton is one of the better World War II movies out there, this one is ranked even higher in my book.

What it means to me in the context of your movie recommendations: Much of the same reasons as Patton: understanding the history of one's country, the sacrifices that previous generations have made, and the marks that said history has left on the world. It's no wonder that there are so many classic films about World War II in particular - it is a major turning point in world history, and its different stages and fronts make for settings that are intriguing to follow in a movie - and very gripping, once you keep in mind that all of this really happened.

2. Glengarry Glen Ross (1992)

Why it's awesome: Is Glengarry Glen Ross the most skillfully acted film of all time? If not, it certainly comes close. Seriously, all of the major performances are absolute gold nuggets in the field of acting. There's Al Pacino being his pitch-perfect self as the genius and slightly rogue salesman Ricky Roma, Jack Lemmon pouring out all of his legendary acting prowess into the good-hearted yet sharp and mean has-been salesman Shelley Levene, Alec Baldwin absolutely stealing the show by giving an awards-worthy performance despite only appearing in one scene, talented villain-actor (as well as real-life villain) Kevin Spacey giving a nuanced performance as the agency's boss, and so many others. The intense depiction of the moral backstabbing, high-stakes competition and chaotic corruption that goes into real estate sales at the highest level is absolutely fascinating to behold, but the level of acting is what really makes Glengarry into the masterful work that it is.

What it means to me in the context of your movie recommendations: With this one, I honestly have no idea. Maybe it's just one of your all-time favorite films or features a bunch of your favorite actors? I'd be interested to hear if there was a specific reason for this film being on your list or some grander element that it represents.

1. The Blues Brothers (1980)

Why it's awesome: I mean, where to start? Between starring the hilarious duo of John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd, having a kick-ass blues/rock soundtrack, guest starring absolute legends such as Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles and James Brown, and featuring a chase sequence that wrecked a world-record amount of cars, The Blues Brothers is 133 minutes of absolute chaotic insanity that is massively entertaining to follow. Caddyshack is an excellent SNL film for sure, but for me, The Blues Brothers is in a league of its own.

What it means to me in the context of your movie recommendations: We're both musicians, not to mention film enthusiasts and fans of good comedy. So it makes absolute sense that we'd both really be into this film. Many of the films in your recommendations were ones that I hadn't seen (or had seen a long time ago and had to re-watch), but The Blues Brothers is one that has been a favorite of mine for a long time - and while I very much enjoyed watching the other nine, none of them were quite enough to challenge the first-place standing of The Blues Brothers on this particular list.

Thanks for the recommendations, Uncle Dan! I hope you had a good birthday - I would've posted this on the actual day, but I figured that since it's just one day away from my usual posting day of Thursday, I might as well keep in my routine and publish this on the day after.

Next week I'll be back with a more usual list - a ranking of Christopher Nolan's movies!

Ranking The X-Men Movies

Greetings, reader!

The X-Men film franchise turned 20 years old last week, as the very first installment of the series premiered on July 12th, 2000. The franchise has spawned twelve movies thus far, including an original trilogy, a prequel/reboot trilogy, a trilogy of Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) solo films, two Deadpool (Ryan Reynolds) movies, and whatever Dark Phoenix (2019) was. Before the franchise breaks new ground with the upcoming horror-superhero mixture The New Mutants (hopefully 2020), let's revisit all of the previous X-Men movies with this ranking!

12. X-Men: Dark Phoenix (2019)

Putting Dark Phoenix in the last place was a no-brainer; after all, not much brain work went into making this embarrassment of a film. Not only does it suffer from being a sequel that has no need to exist, its existence actively hurts the franchise: Apocalypse was such a closure-filled full-circle ending for the story of the original X-Men characters, that I can't think of any reason why anyone thought adding one more film as a weird epilogue to leave a bad aftertaste would be a good idea (except for making money, of course).

I haven't read the X-Men comic books, but I've heard several times that Dark Phoenix is one of the greatest storylines in them. When it was adapted for The Last Stand, fans of the comics were disappointed in how poorly that story was adapted. With this film, they tried to re-adapt the same storyline, only to repeat all of the same failures. In addition, this film is absolutely zero per cent fun, as all of the entertaining banter and subtle humor of the franchise is gone - but the film also isn't serious in an awesome way like Logan. It's just a huge bummer as all of the characters are sulky all the time. While I hugely appreciate the work of James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Sophie Turner and others in the franchise, their talents are quite wasted with this messy and disappointing script.

11. The Wolverine (2013)

This is a tough one - I really appreciate what The Wolverine tries to do as a movie. The clear vision of a more slow-paced Wolverine movie in an exotic setting that really lets Hugh Jackman show off his acting skills is a great idea on paper. There's just something in its execution that makes the film - and this is just my subjective opinion - extremely boring.

Seriously, The Wolverine is one of the least interesting superhero movies I've watched. I appreciate how good Jackman is in the role, how the character of Wolverine is fleshed out, and how the Japanese setting feels different, but there's just so much pointless dialogue and filler storytelling that I find it to be a very hard film to get invested in. Granted, I've only seen it once - I tried to rewatch it once to see if my initial opinion was just based on watching the film in the wrong frame of mind, but I didn't even get through it due to a majority of the movie being vastly uninteresting. But, like I said, I do appreciate the idea of a character-driven, slow-paced Wolverine movie, and I'm grateful that director James Mangold nailed that idea on his second try (more on that later).

10. X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009)

It's strange how Wolverine is absolutely one of the most fascinating characters in the X-Men universe, yet his first two solo films were quite the pair of let-downs. I do prefer X-Men Origins: Wolverine to The Wolverine slightly, due to a significant upside similar to what I liked best about 2018's Han Solo prequel: there are a bunch of fan-service moments and easter eggs that are quite fun to see in an origin story movie. We find out how Wolverine got his name, his powers, and even his jacket: this is the kind of stuff that many viewers complain about due it not being "necessary", but in the context of an entertainment-driven comic book movie, I see it as a lot of fun.

However, the film should've had some more substance in addition to its occasional moments of fun - maybe then it would be higher in my ranking. While the films delivers everything one would expect from a Wolverine origin story, it doesn't deliver hardly anything else. Hugh Jackman tries his best, but the script he's given isn't good enough to make for a truly great performance. The film seems to explore Wolverine's origin primarily on the surface, but not from deep within: Wolverine is such an interesting character that a deeper dive into his psyche and motivations might've worked wonders for this film. All in all, it's a flawed and somewhat shallow film, but not without its awesome moments - overall worth watching for X-Men fans, even if it's not likely to top anyone's lists.

9. X-Men: The Last Stand (2006)

The original trilogy of X-Men films ended with this polarizing climax that left many fans disappointed. While I do agree that the film doesn't quite hold up to its two predecessors, I still like it more than most, and found it to be a very satisfying (if flawed) ending for the trilogy. The primary flaws are the fact that the script is a bit too focused on delivering an explosive climax, making the film much less philosophical and complex than its predecessors, and that the directing isn't nearly as good. Bryan Singer had directed the two first films very skillfully, but for The Last Stand he was replaced by Brett Ratner, who did a semi-sloppy job. Directing aside, my respect for Singer and Ratner as people is equally low, as both faced major accusations in the Me Too -movement - a very upsetting trait for the two original X-Men directors to share.

Everything else in The Last Stand is pretty awesome. There are emotional moments, payoffs to three-film-spanning character archs, and exciting battle sequences. The ultimate showdown that the trilogy had been building up towards is not exactly Avengers: Endgame (2019), but it still comes together in quite an exhilarating fashion.

8. Deadpool 2 (2018)

To be honest, this film might be considerably higher on my list if it weren't for the fact that it doesn't have the positive shock value of the first Deadpool film due to being the second one to be released. Basically everything in this film - the clever meta humor, Ryan Reynolds's performance, the directing and production values et cetera - is just as great as it is in the first one. It just isn't as revolutionary and groundbreaking here. But for viewers like myself who loved Deadpool and wanted more, this sequel sure delivers.

The merc with a mouth is back, for more quips, more violence and more fourth-wall-breaking. The plot has its forgettable moments, but the film is so hilarious and entertaining that it really doesn't matter. Also, I'm a huge fan of meta humor (avid readers of this blog will know this due to my constant raving of the self-aware commentary in Community (2009-2015) and Rick And Morty (2013-Present)), and this film outdoes even the first Deadpool in how meta it gets. The more outrageous and layered meta-storytelling gets, the better (at least in my book), and Deadpool going back in time to stop Ryan Reynolds from starring in Green Lantern (2011) is one of the most earth-shatteringly meta things I've ever seen - I think it's outdone only by the Rick And Morty episode "Never Ricking Morty".

7. X-Men (2000)

Now that we've had The Dark Knight (2008), Logan (2017) and especially Joker (2019), I'd say that by today's standards, the original X-Men movie feels a bit cheesy and not like one of the more serious comic book movies. But let's not forget that 20 years ago was a very different time for the genre - for the time being, X-Men was a game-changing comic book movie due to how serious of a film it managed to be. Sure, there are campy action sequences and whatnot, but the film also begins with a flashback to a Nazi concentration camp in 1944, to establish very grim and real-feeling motivations for the film's villain. The adversarial relationship of Charles Xavier (Sir Patrick Stewart) and Magneto (Sir Ian McKellen) isn't the typical good-guy-bad-guy dynamic of popcorn superhero cinema, but rather a complex feud based on some interesting philosophical questions.

While many X-Men films are even better than the first one, the original is to be thanked for all that followed. The film's biggest asset is definitely the acting: no superhero movie before it had featured nearly as impressive of a cast, and very few after it have come to the same level. It's not just that there are big names like Stewart, McKellen and Jackman in the fold: an important distinction is that they're not there to cash an easy paycheck as is often the case with a-list actors appearing in blockbusters. The actors truly give it all with their performances; Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen are among my all-time favorite actors, and in both cases, their respective performances in the X-Men franchise are honestly among the best roles I've seen them in. Especially by superhero movie standards but also by overall cinematic standards, the acting in X-Men is phenomenal.

6. X2: X-Men United (2003)

X2 takes everything that worked about the first film and makes it slightly better. The actors get to show even more of their range, the story is paced wonderfully, and the ethics get even more complicated. The beginning of the film channels Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980) with its way of slowly and intriguingly returning to our favorite characters through various scenarios, after which the stakes of the story start to escalate.

X2 has it all - awesome fight sequences, memorable dialogue, cool mutant powers and an emotionally charged ending that leaves things wonderfully open for the final installment of the trilogy. It would be ranked even higher, but somehow the prequel/reboot trilogy pushed my buttons so uncannily with its updated style, that even at its best, the original trilogy doesn't quite hold up to it in my book.

5. X-Men: Days Of Future Past (2014)

The second installment of the reboot/prequel trilogy did something magnificent: by adapting the famous Days Of Future Past story arch from the X-Men comics, it managed to bring the cast of the original trilogy into the same movie with the cast of the reboot/prequel trilogy. We jump back and forth between future and past, getting to see both Ian McKellen's and Michael Fassbender's versions of Magneto, as well as both Patrick Stewart's and James McAvoy's versions of Professor X. Coupled along with Hugh Jackman's one and only Wolverine, this makes for the X-Men movie with the best acting by a long shot.

The time travel itself is very well written, as the concept of one's consciousness temporarily shifting into an earlier version of themselves is fascinating and very different from most versions of time travel in movies. There are also many individually awesome sequences, a favorite of mine being the Pentagon heist that immediately put Quicksilver (Evan Peters) very high on my list of the best X-Men characters. All in all, Days Of Future Past is an ambitious effort that worked out wonderfully.

4. X-Men: Apocalypse (2016)

Most fans didn't like the final installment of the reboot/prequel trilogy all that much, but I sure did. While Apocalypse (Oscar Isaac) isn't quite the fleshed-out villain that Magneto was, he is the perfect villain to go up against in an epic final standoff (I'm saying "final" because I try my best to be in denial about Dark Phoenix's existence) - an immensely powerful, absolutely evil ultimate big bad who has intriguing lore behind him and who poses an unforeseen level of threat to the main heroes.

Speaking of heroes, another reason for this film ranking so high on my list is that one of the franchise's best characters, Charles Xavier, is at his absolute best here. James McAvoy gives it all in a tour-de-force performance, as the character's motivations and personal arch reach a point of absolute heroism and tying up all of the franchise's main themes in a beautiful manner. There are also nice full-circle moments as the film sets the table for the original trilogy's events (all the more reason to be pissed about Dark Phoenix messing the timeline up) towards the end of the film.

However, perhaps the biggest reason for Apocalypse being this high on my list is that it has undoubtedly my favorite scene of the entire franchise and one of the greatest superhero movie moments ever: the Quicksilver mansion scene. From Eurythmics's Sweet Dreams (Are Made Of This) creating a perfect soundtrack for the scene and the overall combination of humor, intensity and skillful directing, this is a masterful scene that I often find myself re-watching from Youtube because it's so damn entertaining.

3. Deadpool (2016)

If you're wondering how such an awesome film is only on third place, I'm wondering the exact same thing. Deadpool is inches away from first place, as my top 3 films from the X-Men universe are practically a three-way tie; the hardest part about making this post was deciding what order they were going to be in. However, if I had to say, this meta masterpiece would have to be barely edged out by the two (very slightly) even better films.

So, what makes Deadpool great? Well, for starters, there's the humor, and then...well, it doesn't really need anything else. It's one of the absolutely funniest movies ever made. The opening credit sequence made me laugh more than some comedy films in their full length. The meta humor shows no boundaries and is absolutely delicious, and Ryan Reynolds is the perfect actor to deliver the punchlines. Sure, the action choreography is well-done and the story is interesting, but let's be honest - none of that is what makes Deadpool into such a modern classic. It's the unique, unbridled and absolutely rambunctious mix of clever meta jokes, adolescent toilet humor and grotesque dark comedy wrapped into a perfect mix of sheer entertainment that gets the job done. This movie doesn't merely break the fourth wall - it utterly destroys it with a sledgehammer.

2. Logan (2017)

I'm not a baseball fan of any kind, but even my mind goes to a baseball analogy when thinking about the solo films of the character Wolverine. Strike one (the first Wolverine movie was disappointing), strike two (the second one was even worse in my book), and then, with your last swing, you hit a home run. Hope had seemed lost for us ever having a properly good Wolverine film despite him being the best part of multiple X-Men films, but with their last try, the bastards did it. Logan was Hugh Jackman's ninth and final appearance in the role, and what a bombastic send-off it was.

Logan feels more like a gritty western than a traditional superhero movie. It's serious, it's slow-paced and it's cynical - in an absolutely perfect way. The film feels true to the character's essence, allowing Jackman to top all of his previous performances in the X-Men universe and accomplish an amazing swan song for the role. Jackman gives his everything, as does Patrick Stewart, who plays Charles Xavier for the last time here as well. As raw and grim as the film is, it's still one with a lot of heart and many of the franchise's most emotional moments.

1. X-Men: First Class (2011)

That's right. For me, the first reboot/prequel film is better than Deadpool, Logan, or anything from the original trilogy. There is no big individual reason for that - none of the film's single elements is as impressive as the grittiness of Logan or the humor of Deadpool. But, First Class has a multitude of small elements that I absolutely love and that form an end product that is beyond anything else from the franchise in terms of pure enjoyment.

For starters, the casting. I'm convinced that out of all the people in the world, James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender are literally the best possible picks to play the younger versions of Xavier and Magneto. Jennifer Lawrence, Kevin Bacon and others come together to form an impressive supporting cast. Then there's the soundtrack - infinitely more epic than any other X-Men movie score. Then there's the intrigue of the prequel format - seeing how the X-Men got formed, why Charles is in the wheelchair, how his feud with Magneto started et cetera makes for a huge amount of moments ranging from cool easter eggs to powerful and epic revelations. And then there's the plethora of epic moments in the film's story: Wolverine's hysterically funny cameo, the fist-pumpingly awesome training montage and the dramatic final fight sequence to name a few.

All of that comes together to create an entertaining film with an absolutely magical atmosphere. For me personally, no other X-Men movie feels so fresh and exciting or has as much re-watch value. First Class is the highpoint of my emotional investment in the franchise, its story and its characters.

Thank you for reading! Next week's post will be a bit different and for a significantly smaller target audience than my usual posts, but I'll be back for normal posting in two weeks with a ranking of Christopher Nolan's films!

Top 10 Worst Movies Of All Time

Oh, hi, Mark!

I've been itching to do a blog on the worst movies of all time for quite a while now, but I felt like something was missing. I hadn't done enough research - sure, I've seen plenty of awful movies for the purpose of filling out a top 10 on the subject, but I felt like I can't do such a list while being true to myself as long as I had avoided a certain experience. I knew what had to be done. I knew what I had to do in order to feel experienced and prepared enough to do this list.

So, I finally watched Cats (2019). It would've felt wrong to write about the worst movies ever without seeing the already-iconic terrible film that had everyone talking last year. Now that I've seen it - did it make my top 10? Or are there even worse movies out there? Read the list below to find out!

Here are my dishonorable mentions: A Nightmare On Elm Street (2010), Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull (2008), Moonraker (1979), Rage (2014), The Room (2003)

10. Date Movie (2006)

Generally, I don't find the parody movies by Jason Seltzer and Jason Friedberg to be as bad as most movie buffs do: the Scary Movie franchise is legitimately funny, Epic Movie has its moments while being very sloppy as a whole, even Superhero Movie is worth watching once for some of its laughs. But Date Movie is unforgivable.

The film forgets that it's supposed to parody a certain genre and its tropes - unlike the other Seltzer & Friedberg films, this one doesn't have any clever commentary on the genre it's spoofing. They could have done a lot with rom-com clichés, but instead they go insanely overboard with the spoof genre's typical crude and simple humor, to the backdrop of a barely explored romantic "story". The films that it chooses to spoof don't even make any sense - King Kong (1933)? Kill Bill (2003)? X2 - X-Men United (2003)? In a date movie parody?? Jesus, what a mess.

9. Planet Of The Apes (2001)

First of all, one of my blog's most avid readers is a huge Tim Burton fan and I don't want to ruin our friendship, so hear me out: Tim Burton is a fantastic director. I love his work on most of the stuff I've seen from him. This film, however, is a glaring exception in my book.

Even here, Burton does a fine job directing, and the makeup department does an impressive job. But when a film's substance is aggressively bad (in my opinion), visual accomplishments and production quality aren't enough to redeem it. I'm a big fan of the original Planet Of The Apes (1968) and (most of) its sequels, and this remake is just so insulting to the original. Nothing in the story really works - gone is the thought-provoking substance, memorable dialogue and intriguing culture of the original, replaced by a film that fails miserably when it tries to be similar and ends up feeling like a poor copy, while also failing when it tries to be different as it isn't different in any particularly interesting ways. Mark Wahlberg is an awesome actor, but he is stiff and unnatural in this role - undoubtedly due to a bad casting choice or a poor script. And don't get me started on the film's ending - it tries to one-up the original's iconic twist ending by going for something that makes zero sense and really frustrates a viewer like myself.

8. Eragon (2006)

Christopher Paolini's Eragon (2002) is an awesome fantasy novel. Stefen Fangmeier's cinematic adaptation takes the character and place names from the book, and then tries to be Lord Of The Rings for 104 minutes. Chaotically disregarding the plot and the best parts from the source material and turning them into a wide array of fantasy clichés, Eragon was a very disappointing film to watch. The book itself isn't exactly revolutionary, but it does have interesting original characters and settings. The film turns all of the characters into shallow archetypes, and uses the places and story events of the book as equally shallow backgrounds to what feels like a weirdly serious parody of the fantasy genre.

7. The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 2 (2012)

Now, in Twilight's defense, I haven't seen any of the other films in the franchise except for this last one, which obviously isn't the right way to watch this. While most of the reasons why I intensely dislike this film still stand, I'm sure I would've appreciated it a bit more if I had seen the previous movies instead of getting a summary of their events from my friends before seeing this one. So, I'm biased, yet I still wanted to include this film on my list, because I do consider it to be one of my least favorite movies for a multitude of reasons.

Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart are skillful actors, but they come across as extremely wooden and poorly directed in this film. The film's overall aesthetic and atmosphere feels weirdly off-putting. The villains are laughably stereotypical, and the big twist close to the end is the exact antithesis of a payoff. I know that it's a bit unfair of me to criticize a film without knowing its full context, but then again, I disliked the film so much that it destroyed all of my motivation to watch any of the other Twilight films, and that says something.

6. Noah (2014)

No matter what your own religious views are, the tale of Noah's Ark is a very interesting story. It's also a short one - it would make for a great short film or TV movie. It does not make for a great over-2-hour film. The film essentially takes the key events of the Noah's Ark story, and fills in the blanks with a whole bunch of stuff that has nothing to do with the Bible and everything to do with making money with Hollywood clichés that feel totally out of place in this context. For devout Christians, this is insulting to their scripture, and for non-Christians who just like good movies, it's insulting to the art of storytelling and adaptations.

Between the weird rock monsters, the wide array of characters that either don't exist or are barely mentioned in the Bible, the terrible dialogue and the overall bleak and boring atmosphere, I didn't find really anything to enjoy in this mess of a film. Even the parts that could've been good (I was actually quite excited to see this film beforehand) were ruined by how much the film was dominated by bad writing and off-putting style choices.

5. Cats (2019)

Congratulations, this Jellicle musical made it to the top five!

Where to even start with this one...watching it was in a way an enjoyable experience, but that is one hundred per cent thanks to the company I watched it in and the amusement we got from how bad the film was. I haven't seen the original musical, but from what I've gathered, the original is the reason for my favorite part of the film (some of the songs are musically okay - yes, that's the best part of the entire movie) but also my least favorite part of the film (the "plot" being absolutely frustrating). Of course it could be that the plot works better on stage - all I can say is that it most definitely does not work on the silver screen. It's just a bunch of one-dimensional characters introducing themselves one by one, singing about the one trait they have, and then not doing anything for the rest of the film.

Also, the visual effects haunt me to this day. To be fair, creating cat-human hybrids that look natural in a film is a very hard task - but surely they could've done a better job than this? The characters just look so very wrong. And to think that this came from the guy who directed The King's Speech (2010).

4. Police Academy 5: Assignment: Miami Beach (1988)

No other film franchise has had as much of a systematic drop in quality with each film than Police Academy. The first one is a downright hilarious comedy classic. The second one is significantly sloppier, but features a lot of good humor and a satisfying final act. The third one is already a real mess, but still with a few moments of good comedy. The fourth one has one or two genuine laughs to the backdrop of an extremely lazy plot and many unfunny attempts at humor. And then there's this one - I haven't seen parts 6 or 7, because Assignment: Miami Beach was the final straw for me.

First of all, a big chunk of the iconic original cast had gotten the sense to metaphorically jump out the car before it runs off a cliff. Gone is Steve Guttenberg's Mahoney, gone is Bruce Mahler's Fackler, gone is Kim Cattrall's Thompson. The ones that are left, such as David Graf's Tackleberry and Bubba Smith's Hightower, have long overstayed their welcome - they were once hilarious characters, and now just tired actors doing the same jokes over and over again for their paycheck. I recall zero legitimately funny moments from this film - now that I think about it, I have no idea how I got all the way through it. I'm getting bored just thinking about the movie.

3. Home Alone 4 (2002)

Home Alone (1990) and Home Alone 2: Lost In New York (1992) were my absolute favorites during my childhood (to be honest, they still are: I watch one or the other every year around Christmas and they never fail to move me to tears of blissful childhood nostalgia). Home Alone 4 was my first (and worst) ever experience of bad sequels. When I saw it at the video rental store as a little kid I got excited and wanted to rent it for movie night with my dad, and my dad tried his best to talk me out of it - he had enough life experience to know that Home Alone 4 might not be a great film. But little Veikko loved the first two movies and couldn't imagine why the fourth one would be any different, and thus insisted on getting the film. Dad, if you're reading this - I really should've listened to you.

Even as a little kid I was able to tell that this was just a badly made movie. Everything felt so lazy and messy. After Macauly Culkin had left the franchise, well, they should've stopped making Home Alone movies, but instead they had done a third one with a different lead actor playing a different character. Then, inexplicably, Home Alone 4 is about the same character, Kevin McCallister, but played by a different actor? And one of the two villains from the original films returns even though he is played by a different actor? And this sequel to films that people love for a) the awesome booby traps and b) the feeling of Christmas magic has zero awesome booby traps and no magical Christmas atmosphere? I'll leave it at that since I'm getting a headache from thinking about this movie.

2. Sharkenstein (2006)

I'm a bit bitter towards a certain friend of mine who insisted we quit watching Birdemic: Shock And Terror* (2010) when I wanted to watch a bad movie for fun, but who later made me sit through this majestic piece of crap.

The Syfy channel has a whole subculture of cheap and terrible monster movies that have absolutely amazing titles - Piranhaconda (2012), Mega Shark Vs. Mecha Shark (2014), Lavalantula (2015) and its sequel 2 Lava 2 Lantula (2016) - you name it. The only one I've actually seen from start to finish is Sharkenstein, and it did an effective job in keeping me far away from the rest of Syfy's monster movie offerings.

It's the classic story, a tale as old as time, of scientists cloning Hitler's brain and imposing it on a shark who then goes on a rampage and kills a bunch of people while being called Sharkenstein. The acting is absolutely horrendous, only to be vastly outdone by the egregious quality of the CGI. The film's most memorable part is undoubtedly the scene where the runtime is shamelessly padded by having one of the characters literally recite titles of monster movies for several minutes, without any particular reason or logic to it. It goes without saying that this supposed horror film is zero per cent scary. The cinematography and editing are absolutely awful. The directing is appalling, and the script is just as good as you might expect from a Syfy movie about a shark with Hitler's brain.

*Based on the first two thirds of Birdemic, it would definitely be a top contender for this list - but I can't include it in the ranking because I haven't seen the whole thing.

1. The Emoji Movie (2017)

Step 1: Take a typical Disney film for children.

Step 2: Remove all of the humor, all of the emotion and soul, all of the heart, all of the positive lessons, all of the likable characters, all of the creativity in the animation, all of the exciting worldbuilding, and all of the magic.

Step 3: Replace everything you removed with a whole bunch of shameless and blatant product placement.

After seeing The Emoji Movie, I'm 100% sure that this was how it was made. I'm a glass-half-full viewer, so it takes a lot from a movie for me to call it "bad". Many films are flawed but still good, so only about 1 movie in every 50 I see are ones that I'd characterize as bad. The rest of the films on this list are bad (in my opinion), but this is something more. The Emoji Movie is evil. Bad movies can be fun to watch due to them being ridiculous - hence the phrase "So bad that it's good". I had moments of amusement when watching Sharkenstein or Cats. Watching The Emoji Movie simply filled me with rage.

It's just the world's most shameless product placement disguised as a kid's movie. Sure, The Lego Movie (2014) has product placement in it, but so what - it also has awesome characters, clever humor and good lessons. If there's any lesson to be found in the soulless joyride of The Emoji Movie, it's "People are slaves to their smartphones and that's a good thing" or "Purchase as many apps you can" or "Tell your parents to purchase these apps for your device, we want to make money and really don't care". The movie is a fucking disgrace. I don't usually use expletives on my blog, but it doesn't do the Emoji Movie justice to talk about it without some profanity. The Emoji Movie is the absolute antithesis of Disney and children's cinema, it's the most aggressive cash grab I've ever seen, it's insulting and unsettling and depressing to watch, and it's easily the worst movie I've ever seen.

I've never given a 1/10 rating to any film, because in my personal rating philosophy, a 1/10 would be literally the worst possible film - it could have NO redeeming qualities and every aspect would have to be as bad as can be. The Emoji Movie is the only film I considered giving a 1/10 rating to - in the end, it was saved by having one okay joke in the midst of the terrible attempts at humor, as well as the animating being partially good (while very subpar). Think about how awful a feature length film has to be when the best part of the film is that there is ONE JOKE that is remotely amusing. Everything else is garbage. I can't recommend any of the films on this list, but the other 9 you can watch out of morbid curiosity if you want to. This one - do not watch it under any circumstances.

Well, I finally got that off my chest! Cleansing is good for the soul. Tune in next week for a significantly less aggressive tone as I rank the movies in the X-Men franchise!

Top 10 Movies To Watch On July 4th

Greetings, reader!

Two days from now will be the Independence Day of my second native country, the United States of America. If you're looking to celebrate with a movie, here are ten recommendations on what to watch, each representing a piece of American culture that I find to be important to my identity in relation to my American heritage. I hope you enjoy!

Side note: If you happen to be an American with access to the streaming service Disney Plus (I'm cursing that it's not available in Finland yet), the Broadway musical Hamilton will be released there tomorrow. I didn't include it on my list due to it being a filmed theater performance and not a feature film, yet I recommend watching that more than any of the films on this list if you have a chance. I saw Hamilton live in London (and have listened to the cast recording more times than is healthy), and I can assure that nothing embodies the spirit of July 4th more than that absolute masterpiece.

Honorable mentions: Hidden Figures (2016), Miracle (2004), National Treasure (2004), Saving Private Ryan (1998), Top Gun (1986)

10. Do The Right Thing (1989)

This might not be the most obvious pick - Do The Right Thing is an often gripping film that criticizes certain aspects of American society. Still, it represents and even celebrates one of the most important aspects of American culture: diversity. The diversity that has always made the United States unique and strong is on full display in this film, as we follow a neighborhood with a strong presence of African-Americans, Asian-Americans, Italian-Americans, Latinos and others, each with their own fascinating subculture explored in the film.

Of course, as you may expect from a Spike Lee movie, everything doesn't go great between the different factions as the film delves into racial tensions in a realistic and grim manner (all in the name of a positive and important message). Still, I consider Do The Right Thing to be a very appropriate pick for July 4th, as a sobering look at what still needs fixing in the U.S., as well as what makes the country strong and gives it hope during hard times.

9. Citizen Kane (1941)

Ah, Citizen Kane - truly the Citizen Kane of movies, if you ask me. This American classic is not only one of the most important films in cinematic history, but it makes it onto this specific list due to the way it reflects on the idea of "the American Dream". The ideal of the self-made man, who rises from rags to riches in the land of opportunity, has always been a big part of the American mindset, and is on full display here - in addition to writing and directing the film, Orson Welles stars as Charles Foster Kane, a business tycoon whose life is followed in detail through flashbacks.

Of course, the film looks at the American Dream -ideal somewhat cynically, questioning what truly matters in life and what goals are worth fulfilling. Still, the story of Citizen Kane is a very American one, and along with the film's historical impact on American cinema, that makes it a very worthy watching choice for July 4th.

8. Thirteen Days (2000)

If the previous two films sounded too cynical or too centered on imperfections for your taste, then here's a much more straight-forward choice about great people doing great things. Thirteen Days follows the true story of the Cuban missile crisis in 1962, from the point of view of the Kennedy administration. Bruce Greenwood, Steven Culp and Kevin Costner star as President John F. Kennedy, Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy and Special Assistant Kenny O'Donnell, respectively. No matter what your political beliefs and party alignments, the actions these people took to prevent a war in a dire situation is a vastly respectable moment in American history, and definitely one worth celebrating.

Praised for its historical accuracy, Thirteen Days is a tense and fascinating movie about leadership in the White House during a crisis. The difficult path to a diplomatic solution that resolved the crisis is one of the major turning points in the Cold War, and this movie captures its importance in a powerful manner. Watching it on July 4th would definitely make for a reflection on what we have, how close we came to losing it, and how these people prevented that from happening.

7. Rocky (1976)

I obviously had to have one sports film on this list. American sports films are awesome. I chose Rocky even though it isn't a true story or about the US triumphing over an other country on the world stage, like many of the great American sports movies. I chose Rocky because it's an underdog story. It's about the American everyman, a down-on-his-luck working guy who may not have the brightest mind but has a massive heart. It is an ode to the unsung heroes of the world, a film where every viewer can see themselves or someone they know (and like) in Sylvester Stallone's lovable protagonist Rocky Balboa. The movie is more realistic and subtle than many stereotypical sports movies, yet ends up being just as glorious.

Also, if you feel like watching this movie but wish that it was even more of an obvious 4th of July choice, swapping its subtle complexity for vast amounts of pure and campy patriotism, I have good news for you: that movie exists. It's called Rocky IV (1985), and it's a classic in its own right.

6. The Straight Story (1999)

One of the greatest films by David Lynch, The Straight Story tells the true story of Alvin Straight, a man who drove a lawnmower from Iowa to Wisconsin in a many-week journey in order to reconnect with his estranged brother at the age of 73 years. On his journey, he encounters a lot of different characters, as Lynch uses the story to create an in-depth exploration of rural America.

Much of the film's runtime is dedicated to the protagonist (played by Richard Farnsworth in a tour-de-force performance) talking with a bunch of different people who he comes across on his journey. The dialogue is absolute gold, as these various characters each tell their own stories in a fascinating manner - there's a pregnant woman who ran away from home, a war veteran haunted by his past, a priest who has a profound conversation with Straight and so on. The film explores and celebrates the everyday folks of Midwestern America with a fascinating look at the culture they live in and the lives they lead, and therefore I see it as a very appropriate 4th of July pick.

5. Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)

Quite an obvious choice, wouldn't you say? Besides the obvious fact that the Marvel superhero leading the movie is literally dressed in the stars and stripes while carrying the moniker Captain America, there are a bunch of additional elements that make this early MCU film into quite a quintessential all-American blockbuster. It's pure fun and pure heart, as the complex morals of the later Captain America films hadn't yet entered the picture - this one takes place during World War II, and consists largely of Captain America (Chris Evans) punching a bunch of Nazis. Hell yes.

It's an immensely entertaining tale of good vs. bad, with Evans being pitch perfect as the comic book embodiment of American ideals of heroism while Hugo Weaving (known for his fantastic roles in every fantasy and science fiction movie ever made) is delightfully hammy as the nasty villain Red Skull. Filled to the brim with chase sequences, explosions, glorious soundtrack pieces and lessons about heroism, Captain America: The First Avenger is a July 4th choice you can't go wrong with - unless you prefer a more serious look at World War II, in which case...

4. Hacksaw Ridge (2016)

...This might be the movie for you. I chose Hacksaw Ridge to represent a whole bunch of American war movies for this list - if you like, you can substitute it for Saving Private Ryan (1998), Patton (1970) or others of the like. For some viewers, it might seem like a strange choice to watch such a gripping film on a day of celebration, but for others it makes perfect sense - celebrating independence by remembering those who fought for their country's freedom. After all, my other native country Finland airs its most iconic war film Tuntematon Sotilas (1955) every year on the Finnish independence day.

The reason that I chose Hacksaw Ridge is that out of all the great American war films I've seen, it's the one I'd be most likely to want to watch on July 4th. It's based on a true story, and it manages to celebrate heroic actions without glorifying or romanticizing war - even a passionate pacifist like myself can get fully behind rooting for Desmond Doss, the first man in American history to win the Medal Of Honor without firing a single shot. Doss (played in this movie by the ever-talented Andrew Garfield) was a pacifist himself, yet he felt compelled to join the troops after Pearl Harbor - so he became a medic, and one who never carried arms. As much as he faced criticism at first for his choice not to participate in combat, he became a hero on the battlefield after saving countless lives on the Pacific front. The grim nature of war isn't shied away from, yet Doss's actions of real-life heroism are celebrated with just the right tone.

3. Forrest Gump (1994)

If The Straight Story is a subtle and norm-subverting look at the lesser-known aspects of American culture, then Forrest Gump is the exact opposite: well-known events in U.S. history and classic elements of American culture are jammed down the viewer's throat at light speed - and I mean that in the best way possible. This winner of six Academy Awards takes the viewer on a journey of all things American, viewed through the lens of mentally challenged and absolutely lovable protagonist Forrest Gump (Tom Hanks). He hilariously winds up being a part of every major event in American history from the late 50's to the early 80's, making this very much the We Didn't Start The Fire of movies.

So, if you can't decide whether you want to spend July 4th watching a football movie, an Elvis movie, a Kennedy movie, a Vietnam War movie, a Civil Rights movie, a Watergate movie or an entrepreneur movie - why not watch all of them rolled into one? And it's just fitting that the film stars Tom Hanks, perhaps America's most beloved and likable actor.

2. Independence Day (1996)

What better way is there to celebrate July 4th than with a film that literally revolves around said day, along with the most Hollywood elements imaginable, such as American icons from Will Smith to Randy Quaid teaming up to fight aliens? Independence Day may not be a cinematic masterpiece like Forrest Gump or Hacksaw Ridge, but it's a hellishly entertaining and thoroughly American story about a bunch of badasses standing up to evil. Various explosions, one-liners and "Hell yeah!" moments ensue.

And then there's President Thomas J. Whitmore's (played by Bill Pullman in a performance so awesome that this fictional president may have done more for the country than some real-life presidents) legendary speech. Think what you will about the movie otherwise, that speech is something that I'd imagine would make every single American's heart pump with excitement and national pride. If you don't feel like watching the film this Independence Day, at least watch that scene.

1. Selma (2014)

There are several reasons why Selma is sitting here at first place. For starters, the film's central theme is one of the most important pillars in the American mindset: standing up to injustice. From George Washington and the revolutionary war, through Rosa Parks and Dr. King and the Civil Rights movement, all the way to the protests against police brutality and systemic racism that are going on right now, the act of standing up against oppression is a thing most Americans take pride in and consider to be a pillar of their culture. A whole lot of bad things have happened and are happening in the U.S., but it is important to remember that there are always those who stand up to it and fight to make things better.

An embodiment of this phenomenon in its most universally respected form (peaceful protesting) is Dr. Martin Luther King. Selma tells the story of the march that he lead from Selma, Alabama to the state capital of Montgomery, in protest of voter suppression based on race. It is an absolutely beautiful true story about standing up to injustice with solidarity, being the bigger person, and choosing unification over division. Dr. King is an American hero whose life deserves celebration, and watching this film is one of many ways to reflect on his accomplishments and what he stood for. The Common ft. John Legend song Glory in the soundtrack is an emotionally powerful ode to the Civil Rights movement, and it rightfully won the Oscar for Best Original Song. Selma would've made it to this list of mine anyways, but it is even more topical and worth watching right now, as its themes coincide with what is going on in the U.S. at the moment in a sobering manner.

Thank you for reading - I wish a happy 4th of July to all! Next week's post will be a significantly different entry from my usual praise-filled lists - I'll be releasing my list of the top 10 worst films of all time. Stay tuned!