My Tops of 2012 - July

TED was very funny. I laughed a lot during it. It will continue to live on television and quotes between friends. There is not much else to say beyond that, though I will say it has the potential to be the best comedy of the year.

ROCK OF AGES was an awful, largely boring film. This so-called trip through the 1980's, after being heavily scrubbed, white-washed, and given a commercial sheen, suffers from bad acting, bad mash-ups, bad dance choreography, and wasted potential and misdirection with Tom Cruise's Stacee Jaxx.

THE FP is even worst than the above. This ultra-dumb low-grade sci-fi flick is another one of those "short films blown to feature length" failures. It has acting that ranges from oak-wooden to obnoxious, a lame score that rips-off John Carpenter, and a very degrading portrayal of women, even when judged against, say, the films from Troma Studios. It never goes beyond its one-joke presence, that the video game Dance Dance Revolution is used for fights and human sport, and drags throughout its miserable running time.

THE DARK KNIGHT RISES was great as the last entry of the Nolanverse but only so-so as a film itself. Sometimes it feels like a re-hash of the previous films, to diminishing results, but some of the performances and the always entertaining score by Hans Zimmer were fantastic and memorable.


Best Films of 2012


1. The Avengers

2. Chronicle

3. The Secret World of Arrietty

4. The Hunger Games

5. The Cabin in the Woods

6. 21 Jump Street

7. The Grey


Worst Films of 2012


1. Project X

2. Dark Shadows

3. The FP

4. The Devil Inside

5. Rock of Ages