By Brenton Thom Ah yes, it’s that time of year again... the time when the New Year hits and for a solid three months (January, February and March) we get all the crummy, cheap movies the studios have been sitting on. And this movie is no exception. With a surprisingly well-known cast, we have Johnny Depp as Charlie Mortdecai, Gwyneth Paltrow as his wife, Johanna, and Paul Bettany as his manservant and muscle, Jock. On top of that, we also have Ewan McGregor, Olivia Munn, and Jeff Goldblum! These are all terrific actors in their own rights. Some of them have won various awards and have a lot of star power behind them. We even have a skilled director/writer, David Koepp, behind the wheel directing. But what went wrong with MORTDECAI? It’s hard to boil it down to just one element, but the script is definitely the biggest issue. The plot is pretty straight-forward. It’s almost a spoof of a James Bond story! A once-rich art connoisseur (Mortdecai) is asked by MI5 to investigate a missing painting and use his underground connections to find the culprit. A series of mistakes and misunderstandings lead to hijinks. What the story really lacks is emotion and any real stakes. The movie is not quite a screwball comedy, but when your average movie goer watches some rich person struggle with some simple things, it’s not at all that funny. The things that work are the elements that have no connection to the story. There is a running gag that Mortdecai grew out his moustache and has become grown to it, while his wife and others are disgusted by it. There is also a running gag of Jock shacking up and being a sex magnet with every women he encounters. These things work fine and are quite funny. But the overall story is lacking. Your main character is a bit of a rich prick, frankly, and if you don’t care for him, it's hard to care about him when he gets into trouble. There aren’t any stakes. What really surprised me about this movie is the director, David Koepp. He has directed some solid movies in the past: STIR OF ECHOES, SECRET WINDOW (also with Johnny Depp), and GHOST TOWN. The guy has even great blockbusters under his belt as a writer, such as JURASSIC PARK, the first MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE, and the first SPIDER-MAN. He has quite a resume, but it boggles my mind that the film has no ‘umph’ or meat to sink your teeth into. Granted, the visuals are pretty good and I like the overall look and style of the film, but I wish Koepp would have dabbled in writing some of the script himself. The script was written by Eric Aronson, a rookie and new writer to Hollywood. I wish he would have maybe done another draft and made expanded on the characters a but. Some of the actors and characters are underutilize and there isn’t enough depth or meat for them to chew on. Now, I’m not trying to completely bash this movie. Like I said, there are some good elements to the flick. I really liked the transitions between scenes/locations, for example. We would start in an exterior and go to a heighten and exaggerated version of the city/country, and travel along the sky to the next location in a unique fashion. Each time we went through that, it was a lot of fun and a neat way to travel to the next location and tell our audience where we are at. Overall, the movie is barely okay. It felt pretty by-the-numbers. As far as comedy goes, I don't think it fully delivers. If anything, it’s a lighthearted action mystery. A little bit of James Bond and not enough stakes. There are a few jokes that are funny, and some of the performances are good, but the movie over all is disappointing. I’d recommend waiting until Blu-ray to see this flick, unless you’re a hardcore Johnny Depp fan and you need to see everything he does on the silver screen. If that's the case, by all means go for it.
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By Brenton Thom BLACKHAT is a crime/action/thriller from director Michael Mann. It stars Chris Hemsworth as Nick Hathaway, a former hacker and coding genius. The premise of the movie is pretty straightforward: everything in the world is connected by the internet, and in the opening scene, a cooling fan in a nuclear power plant in China is shutdown, which causes a chain reaction resulting in it overheating and exploding. An unknown hacker snuck into the control server and flooded it with a virus code. The hacker used malware to hide the attack and prevent anyone seeing what he’s doing. Does this make sense so far? After the catastrophic opening, we meet a mysterious man in a hotel room looking over code. This is Chen Dawai, played by Leehom Wang, whom we find out works for the Chinese government as a Computer Security agent. He meets with the FBI and asks for help to stop this threat. The NSA and other agencies are reluctant, but he informs them that part of the virus that was written by him, and the other half by his college friend, Nick Hathaway (Hemsworth). We then meet Hathaway, our protagonist, who is in prison for cyber bank robberies. Since the government is in need of his help, he demands to get his sentence pardoned. Now that he’s out and has the US government looking over his shoulder, he must track down this mysterious hacker. It is said throughout the movie and that his hacker has declared no motives, such as finance, politics or anything of that nature. So it’s a matter of trying to figure out what is driving this person. The cons: some of the hacking and coding stuff is unrealistic. Unless you know computer terminology or understand networking it’s not really coherent. But for the general audience, they should understand it just fine. Chris Hemsworth as Hathaway is also problematic. Hathaway is this genius coder who went to MIT and is incredibly book smart, but Chris Hemsworth is a large guy. He’s got muscles and is ripped. Realistically, why would a nerd be so huge? Most of their time is spent behind a computer or book, not pumping weights. There iss a bit of dialogue where he mentions that before he went to prison, he would get in fights, so that makes you wonder how this genius guy could sculpt his body at the same time. Another odd con is the sound quality. Like Michael Mann's previous film, PUBLIC ENEMIES, BLACKHAT has terrible sound mixing. There are points where audio fluctuates through dialogue and becomes either incredibly quiet or too loud. The action scenes with the movie were loud (and that’s not really a con, it’s more a pro), but the consistency of the audio was a serious problem. The pros: this movie has some cool visuals and simulations to show data packets travelling through lines and processors as bits of ones and zeroes. Realistically the whole thing happens in nanoseconds, but because it's a movie, they slow it down and show you the paths these packets take and where they travel to. The movie is solid and an enjoyment to watch for the first 2 acts. You care for the characters and for the most part everything seems realistic. My biggest concern is the movie's third act, and specifically the reveal of the hacker and his motives. Now if you don’t want any SPOILERS, I suggest you skip to the next paragraph. In the marketing (and even within the film) we are constantly told this hacker is not about politics or money, making it some big mystery why he's doing these things. In the end, however, turns out it was all just about money after all... a big convoluted plot for money. He even hacks the Chicago stock exchange (millions of dollars, mind you) for cash. He uses that money as capitol to invest in an ore field, and plans to use the attack to destroy a bunch of mining fields just so he can get even more money. So, it was a complete lackluster ending. All this work and mystery just for money. It was a big letdown. Overall, I enjoyed this movie, with exception of the third act. I would recommend it to general audiences. The audio is a bit dicey but I’d definitely recommend this movie for home viewing. If you like to see action movies and want to see some excitement on the screen and a bit of mystery, definitely check it out. By Brett Blake 2014 was an unusually strong year for cinema. Despite not having a huge number of films that I completely “loved,” it did have many, many movies I liked a great deal. Some of these may prove to be all-timers (movies that I’ll return to over and over), some may not, but there was far more good than bad to come from the world of film over the past year. Being the hopeless movie buff that I am, creating my end-of-year favorites list is always a lot of fun for me. It also usually involves a bit of hard work as I try to determine my preferences (did I like this film over that film, and by how much?), but this year things seemed to slot into place easily, and I arrived at ten films that - for whatever reasons - truly spoke to me, or frightened me, or thrilled me, or moved me. With that said, I’d like to give a quick shout-out to a few “Honorable Mentions,” and then dive right into my “Top Ten” list. In the interest of full disclosure, and so you can view the following list with a bit of context, here are some of the notable movies that I have yet to see: AMERICAN SNIPER, SELMA, WILD, MR. TURNER, THE LEGO MOVIE, THE INTERVIEW, and BIG HERO 6. Honorable Mentions Each of these are very good/great movies that just barely missed out on making it into my top ten:
My Ten Favorite Films of 2014 10. GODZILLA (directed by Gareth Edwards) Imagine a giant monster movie by way of JAWS and CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND, and you have Gareth Edwards’ modern interpretation of Godzilla. Some complained about the lack of screentime for the titular “King of the Monsters” himself, but even when he’s not around, the action is so engaging, so inventively staged that I have no problem with Godzilla’s scarcity, and when he does show up, it’s absolutely worth the wait. Alexandre Desplat’s thundering score is one of the best of the year, and the sound design for the monsters in the film is Oscar-worthy, lending the beasts a weight and ferocity that helps them achieve a kind of verisimilitude. 09. THE IMITATION GAME (directed by Morten Tyldum) Alan Turing’s story has been unfortunately little-known in the decades since his death, and by wrapping it inside a World War II espionage tale, the filmmakers have made the man’s enormous contributions to history - as well as his somewhat tormented personal life - accessible to the masses. The film is handsomely made (it evokes the 1940s particularly well), it has a quite witty screenplay (which brilliantly highlights Turing’s homosexuality without making it the focus of the narrative), and it features tremendous work from Benedict Cumberbatch as Turing. Cumberbatch’s performance is one of his very best, and he embodies the complex Turing in ways that are both compelling and sympathetic. He’s also surrounded by one of the better supporting ensembles of 2014 (led by the likes of Keira Knightley, Mark Strong, and Charles Dance). 08. THE BABADOOK (directed by Jennifer Kent) The finest horror film of the year, THE BABADOOK is at once supremely chilling on a narrative level and enormously satisfying on a thematic level. It deals heavily with issues of depression and resentment, with the titular creature acting as a metaphor for one woman’s complicated feelings towards her young son. Essie Davis and Noah Wiseman form this mother/son pair, and they’re great in quite demanding roles. Director Kent creates an unsettling atmosphere, and it is from this tone that most of the scares spring. This is not a jump-out-of-your-seat-style scary movie; it’s a film in which the ideas - and the implied feelings of the characters - are as creepy as any of the visuals. The editing and sound design are accomplished, and the design of the title character is very effective, vaulting him/it into the ranks of the all-time classic screen boogeymen. 07. A MOST VIOLENT YEAR (directed by J.C. Chandor) A spectacular mood piece, and a rumination on the compromises one must make (or perhaps not make) in order to prosper in life. Oscar Isaac provides one of the best performances of 2014 as a fundamentally good man under huge pressures from all sides as he tries to finalize a make-or-break deal for his upstart company. The 1981 period detail is great (though not overplayed), and the atmospheric cinematography is truly beautiful, using shadow in an intellectual - rather than shallow or gimmicky - way. A MOST VIOLENT YEAR is deliberately paced, and it lacks many of the things one would expect from a conventional crime thriller (as the central question is really whether Isaac’s character will allow himself to become morally compromised), but for those willing to go along with the contemplative storyline, it’s quite a rewarding and powerful film. 06. GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY (directed by James Gunn) This is what a big popcorn blockbuster should look like. Easily 2014’s most fun film, a refreshingly upbeat blast of excitement that has more laughs than any outright comedy released in the last year. Marvel’s C-list motley crew of unlikely heroes provided the studio with yet another feather in the “Marvel Cinematic Universe” cap, and a big part of the movie’s success has to come down to the chemistry between the five lead characters (two of whom are digital creations). Director Gunn was able to capture such a sense of camaraderie, of genuine affection between the characters, that you can’t help but like them all. Much like GHOSTBUSTERS, a great part of the movie’s appeal is in the interplay between our heroes, and GUARDIANS nails it. That the movie also has a surprising amount of heart only adds to its effectiveness. 05. NIGHTCRAWLER (directed by Dan Gilroy) Jake Gyllenhaal’s performance as Lou Bloom is truly something special. It is not only Gyllenhaal’s best work to date, but it’s also one of the most singularly strange characters to be featured as the lead of a film in quite some time. Alternately charming and repellent, creepy and goofy, Bloom is a fascinating creation, a man totally lacking any ethical boundaries, willing to do whatever it takes to climb the ladder upwards. Even just purely on the level of a character study, NIGHTCRAWLER would be an amazing film, but it also has an additional layer of media satire which adds extra richness and resonance to the story. One of the great pleasures of going to the movies is when you get to see something original, something you haven’t seen before; Gyllenhaal’s Lou Bloom is most certainly original, and I guarantee you’ve never seen a character quite like him in any film before. 04. DAWN OF THE PLANET OF THE APES (directed by Matt Reeves) 2011’s RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES was a pleasant surprise, but its sequel, DAWN, takes things to a whole other level. It adds social commentary (without being stridently political), complex characterizations, and a nuanced storyline about the tragic inevitability of conflict and violence between societies. Intellectually, the movie has a lot going on, which makes it thematically satisfying, but it also has a visceral punch that fulfills the expectations of a blockbuster. The action, though sparse, is hard-hitting, and the visual effects are frequently spectacular. Andy Serkis and the other members of the ape cast are able to fully emote in ways that are entirely convincing, and the computer imagery often borders on being completely photo-realistic. That, in itself, would be a great accomplishment, but the movie has more to offer than just amazing special effects, and that’s why it’s one of the great science fiction films of this decade. 03. BIRDMAN (directed by Alejandro González Iñárritu) BIRDMAN, with its extraordinary cinematography, is the visual, cinematic achievement of the year. The usage of long takes has often been seen as a gimmick, and perhaps an argument could be made that it still is a gimmick in this case, but it lends the movie such a dynamic energy that I can’t imagine the movie working the same without it. But even if you take the photography away, you still have a biting, darkly funny story about the pursuit of respectability, and you still have Michael Keaton at the center of it all, on the doorstep of a sure career resurgence (not that he really needs one, but he certainly hasn’t been as present in movies of late as I would have liked, for example) in a role seemingly tailor-made for him and his own personal baggage. Then on top of Keaton, you also have Edward Norton at his most humorous and Emma Stone as good as she’s yet been so far in her (relatively) young career. On a technical level, the film’s almost a masterpiece, but the story it's telling is just as deserving of recognition as the filmmaking that brings it to life. 02. GONE GIRL (directed by David Fincher) If GONE GIRL had nothing else besides Rosamund Pike’s extraordinary lead performance, it would still be one of the year’s better films. Add to that David Fincher’s precise direction, sharp writing, moody cinematography, a game cast (led by under-appreciated work from Ben Affleck, who himself is backed up by great turns from such people as Carrie Coon, Kim Dickens, Neil Patrick Harris, and - shocker of shockers! - Tyler Perry), and a deliciously twisted plot, and the result is not simply one of 2014’s better films, it is one of 2014’s best films. The narrative has the veneer of a prestige thriller, but underneath it all, we have a pretty pulpy (some might say trashy) story that is handled with just the right balance of ultra-black humor and seriousness to make the whole package enormously entertaining. Still, this really is Pike’s film, and she deftly pulls off a complicated balance of tones that could have made the character - in lesser hands - into a preposterous, misogynist caricature. It’s a phenomenal performance, and (in my opinion) the single best piece of acting of 2014. 01. WHIPLASH (directed by Damien Chazelle) I was skeptical going into this film. A story about a young jazz drummer? That can’t be anything too special, right? How incredibly wrong I was, because WHIPLASH is a triumphant, exhilarating (it even says so right on the poster!) movie, a movie that makes jazz rehearsals and performances into mini-setpieces of excitement, tension, and suspense, aided by tremendous, flashy (in a good way) editing and camera work. Even beyond the construction of the filmmaking, the story offers a fascinating portrait of an unusual and combative (to say the least) relationship between the characters played by Miles Teller and J.K. Simmons (in the performance of his life, and one of the most memorable of 2014). The story does not play out in a conventional way, and the contours of the narrative ebb and flow beautifully as the movie drives towards its absolutely stunning, virtuosic climax; the final fifteen (or so) minutes represent the most magnetic and thrilling cinema of the entire year. WHIPLASH is an incredible film, an amazingly vibrant and energizing experience that I can’t wait to revisit.
So there it is! Taste being, of course, subjective, I'd love to hear what some of your favorite movies of 2014 were, and whether you think I'm way off-base on any of my picks. Also, keep an eye out in the coming weeks for a podcast featuring the Celluloid Dog Blog crew going into even more detail about the movies of 2014! By Brenton Thom INHERENT VICE INHERENT VICE is the seventh feature film by director Paul Thomas Anderson. The film is basically a 1970s detective noir story. As I watched the movie, I couldn’t help but think about CHINATOWN and THE BIG LEBOWSKI in their similar aspects. To say the least, the plot is very complicated and quite convoluted. But basically a dope-head private investigator, Doc Sportello (Joaquin Phoenix), is hired by his ex-lover to prevent a nefarious scheme being perpetrated against her current lover. Doc is also hired to look for someone that owes another person money. Doc ends up falling into a rabbit hole with different parties and law enforcement, all of them connected to a central plot device involving drugs smuggling, murder, and sex. As I said, there is a lot going on and if you don’t pay attention you will definitely get lost. There are a lot of names thrown around and a lot of little subplots going on that you have to work hard to keep track of. One thing that is a good are the performances. All the actors play characters that are all unique in their own way. There are plenty of funny beats, and they play off each other with good chemistry. Much of the performances also involve subtle stuff that’s not said verbally, which I think is outstanding. The movie shows a different side of Los Angeles that we are not used to seeing, and there is this whole subculture and underground side that isn't normally depicted in movie. The film feels realistic in the sense that these are actual people in a real situation, but there are also funny moments to help break up the complex storyline. This movie is similar in one way to Paul Thomas Anderson’s previous movie (THE MASTER,) which was thematically dense. Upon further viewings, the viewer could get a better sense and see deeper story threads that weren’t visible the first time through. To the average movie viewer, I’m not sure if they’d enjoy this film. They might find it too boring or too complex to wrap their heads around it. But for the movie lovers/fans of Paul Thomas Anderson, it’s a definite must. This filmmaker has changed and honed his craft, and in the process, he's created some very complex movies. He makes use of good costumes, locations, characters, and actors, and you could argue the movie looks like it was a documentary of that area. Overall, I’d have to say this movie wasn’t so fantastic that I’d recommend someone to see this in theaters. I did enjoy seeing it up on the big screen, but it’s a movie that could wait for home, and that’s mainly for how dense it is and the need for further viewings to get the most out of it. WILD The movie WILD is based on a memoir by Cheryl Strayed, and it stars Reese Witherspoon as Strayed, herself. The movie is slightly similar to the other book adaptation, EAT, PRAY, LOVE, in which a privileged white woman goes on a journey of self-discovery, but WILD is not really about a privileged white woman. No, Cheryl, as played by Witherspoon, is a woman who grows up with an abusive father, runs away with her mother and brother, and they struggle to afford to live. As the story progresses Cheryl deals with the sudden loss of her mentor and mother and the responsibilities of growing up and not having her mother around for advice. The movie intercuts her hiking through the wilderness with her memories reflecting on her past mistakes and choices in life. Like the song, Cheryl’s goal is to walk 1000 miles to get beyond her troubles. Her hike goes through the Pacific Crest Trail from the Mojave Desert in California all the way up to Seattle, Washington. Her journey is a painful one, physically and emotionally, because she uses this experience to reflect and use that energy to put all those memories behind her. It's a solid performance by Witherspoon. I haven’t seen her do something this realistic in a long time, and she does deliver, but I think the real performance is from Laura Dern as her mother, who steals the film. Dern’s performance outshines Witherspoon’s for even the small moments that she's onscreen. All the subtleties of growing up and her constant love for her children are conveyed, and made me care for the loss of her mother. The movie can be quite inspirational. After watching the trek, it made me want to do hiking of my own and explore our fine country trails. But for a story about a person going into the wild to hike, there's actually not too much of it. When we do see magnificent beauty shots of the environment, it cuts away too quickly before we can take it in. That might be the intention of the director - beautiful things may not last and if you blink, it’ll be gone before you know it, which is a theme with Cheryl and her mother. Overall I would recommend people see this movie on the large screen if you want to see beautiful landscapes and solid performances, but I think for the general movie audience, they could wait until home to see it. It was a solid movie. By Brett Blake As we leave behind 2014, and as I begin to put together my personal “Best of” list (coming soon!), I feel it’s important to take a moment here to highlight some noteworthy films from 2014 that, for whatever reasons, didn’t get the kind of exposure they deserved, which is just a long-winded way of talking about movies I think more people should see; movies which are (for the most part) nowhere to be found on most critics’ “Top 10” lists, or which did not find huge audiences when they were released, but which should be part of the overall discussion about what kind of year we just had for cinema. I’m not arguing that any of the following movies were among the absolute very best of 2014, but they all represent solidly entertaining and worthy films that more people should check out. I did a similar article last year (which you can read HERE). Some of the following movies (most of them, actually) were received well by critics, but they’ve been mostly forgotten in the big conversations about the films of 2014. And frankly, this piece gives me an excuse to highlight some very good movies that aren’t quite going to make the cut of my “Best of 2014” list. All that having been said, here are seven underrated/underseen films from 2014… THE GUEST From the filmmakers who brought us last year’s similarly underrated YOU’RE NEXT, THE GUEST is a terrifically fun throwback to the vaguely-exploitative action-thrillers of the 1980s. The filmmakers don’t fully ape a 1980s style or aesthetic, but they do pay homage to it in many ways, and the outlandish yarn they spin is brought to life primarily through a tremendous lead performance from Dan Stevens. Stevens manages to be both deeply charming and profoundly creepy, and he carries the movie with total ease. The movie was well-liked by most who saw it, but it was hampered by a very limited release pattern, thereby limiting the amount of good buzz that could be generated in its favor. In any event, fans of intense-but-fun genre films are in for a treat. A WALK AMONG THE TOMBSTONES Another throwback to an earlier filmmaking era, this film feels more akin to the serious adult dramas/thrillers that were commonplace in the 1970s. It’s a hard-nosed, no nonsense crime story with a great lead performance from Liam Neeson, continuing his streak of playing older badasses, but what sets this performance apart is the weariness that Neeson brings to the role. This is a dark tale, full of unpleasantness, but Neeson anchors it all in a way that’s easy to stomach and buy into. Director Scott Frank emulates a classical (and classy) style of filmmaking, and the look of the film - somewhat cold, somewhat contemplative - lends the movie an elegiac tone that works well against the seedier nature of the crime plot being told. When people say “they don’t make ‘em like this anymore,” this is the kind of movie they’re talking about. Very solid thriller cinema. WILLOW CREEK A bigfoot story in the style of THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT. That’s WILLOW CREEK in a nutshell, but what makes it a truly unique experience is the sense of humor it brings to the table. Yes, it does hit all the marks you expect from “found footage” chillers, but the opening section - particularly - is a legitimately funny and warm look at the bigfoot aficionado community, and it is this lightness that makes the eventual darker turn in the story work so well. And once we get into that darker section, we are treated to a bravura sequence involving our heroes being trapped in their tent at night while something - bigfoot, or something else? - stalks them from outside; it’s a spectacular scene (running well over ten minutes), one that is really frightening and which makes the movie worth a look entirely on its own. Luckily, the stuff that comes before it is good in its own way, too. In a year that featured several Sasquatch-related films (and at least one other that was found footage), this was the clear standout. LOCKE LOCKE is a textbook example of a film that lives or dies in the hands of its lead actor, as the entire story is occupied solely by one character and in one location. Tom Hardy rises to that challenge and delivers the performance of his career as a man dealing with simultaneous personal and professional crises as he makes a late night drive to take care of some pressing matters. It’s a credit to both Hardy and the filmmakers that a story which takes place entirely inside a car is as dynamic and engrossing as it ends up being; we witness a man under pressure from various sides, and watching Hardy navigate and deal with this pressure is truly captivating. Some might complain that the story and style of the movie would lend itself better to a stage play (and, indeed, it would work incredibly well on the stage), but there’s an immediacy and intimacy that comes from being inside the car with Hardy’s character that can’t be matched by what the stage could offer. Hardy’s work here is some of the finest of 2014. GRAND PIANO A stylistic marriage between the films of Brian De Palma and Alfred Hitchcock. GRAND PIANO is enormously entertaining, with masterful camerawork, razor-sharp editing, and a superb musical score that would have been right at home in any of Hitchcock’s “golden period” films. The exact plot is a puzzle which gradually reveals itself to the audience, but the central narrative - involving Elijah Wood’s concert pianist dealing with a deranged psycho threatening to kill him during a performance - provides for many great moments and beats. The suspense is finely-tuned throughout, and the movie as a whole is a classy thriller that deserved a wider release than it got. Any fan of Hitchcockian cinema will find a lot to enjoy in this one. IN FEAR One of the best horror films of the year (though I guess some would argue it’s more a thriller than an outright horror movie), IN FEAR - like LOCKE, in a way - features characters primarily inside a car as outside forces conspire to do them harm on an overnight trip through the English countryside. The lead performances from Iain De Caestecker and Alice Englert are very strong, and the staging of the action by director Jeremy Lovering is rock-solid; he creates an overwhelming sense of unease, and the atmosphere generated by relatively simple shots of things like dark, winding roads and shadowy figures just on the edge of the frame are incredibly effective. The ultimate reveal of what’s happening to the protagonists might not work for everybody, but I found it to be a thematically satisfying conclusion to a cracking suspense yarn. EDGE OF TOMORROW If we’re talking strictly about box office, there is no film from 2014 that deserved more of an audience than it got than this one. It is the kind of blockbuster we all wish every blockbuster could be, and it’s got everything you could want: strong characters, fun action, a healthy (but not obtrusive or gross) sense of humor, and a genuinely intelligent execution of its ideas. Tom Cruise has never been better (at least in an action capacity), and he’s given a great character arc to play; Emily Blunt matches him step for step and gives one of the most badass performances of the year as a no nonsense soldier who is gradually revealed to have more layers than one might expect. It’s a massively satisfying and entertaining movie, which makes its under-performance at the box office all the more puzzling; one could lay the blame at the feet of its marketing campaign, which was - frankly - terrible, as it sold a totally different (and far more dour) movie than the one we really got. If you only see one film that I highlighted in this article, make it this one; if I could offer you some kind of money back guarantee, I would, because I can’t imagine most people not having a blast with this one. So those are just some of my picks. I could probably come up with several additional lists of underrated or under-seen films from 2014, but these seven are the ones I feel the strongest about. What would some of your picks for under-appreciated films of the past year be?
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