2012 End of the Year Wrap Up - Sounds of Cinema

Top 10 Films of 2012

What follows are Nathan’s picks of the best films of 2012.

1. Samsara

Directed by: Ron Fricke

Premise: A non-narrative documentary that cross-cuts people and locations across the globe, drawing broad parallels and suggesting that human civilization is trapped in a vicious cycle.

Why It Made the List: Of the cinema of 2012, one of the predominant trends was the epic. Blockbusters like The Hobbit, The Avengers, The Dark Knight Rises, and Breaking Dawn Part 2 had grand scope and large casts but they often fell short of their ambitions because the movies were trying to tell narrow stories on a broad palate. That is the conundrum of epic filmmaking; the bigger the scope, the duller the details. This highlights the achievement of Samsara. It is a film that is truly epic in its breadth and ambition but it works because the filmmakers untether themselves from the constraints of mainstream narrative moviemaking. The title of Samsara refers to a term in Buddhism meaning “circle” or “wheel” in which people are stuck in an endless cycle of ignorance. The filmmakers of Samsara have set about trying to illustrate that on a worldwide scale and in large measure they succeed. Filmed all over the world and juxtaposing imagery of geography, architecture and industry to a slow, meditative score, Samsara has a panoramic view of space and time. The collage of images draws broad and provocative connections between places and peoples and the juxtapositions of the images and what they suggest—both individually and collectively—make this a challenging picture. But the challenging qualities of Samsara are precisely what distinguish it. Contemporary audiences have been conditioned to expect cinema to conform to a narrow narrative style with hyperkinetic camera movement and rapid edits. The filmmakers of Samsara challenge their audience by holding shots for lengthy periods of screen time, forcing viewers to study the images and consider their meaning. This picture demands attention in a way that mainstream cinema does not and what Samsara suggests about humanity is as challenging and engaging as its non-narrative form. Samsara is the kind of film that warrants multiple viewings but that ultimately speaks to why this film is so powerful. A truly epic piece of cinema ought to be so broad that it requires multiple passes by the viewer. In a culture that traffics in fragments and sound bites of artificial outrage and commoditized desire and in which so much of what is created is rapidly consumed and discarded, the patience and pensiveness of Samsara is a radical act. This film may not be suited for mediocre mainstream interests but it is a stunning piece of work whose ambition, intelligence, and skill are unparalleled in any other film of 2012.

2. Life of Pi

Directed by: Ang Lee

Premise: A young man (Suraj Sharma) survives a shipwreck and finds himself stranded in the middle of the ocean on a lifeboat with a Bengal tiger.

Why It Made the List: Man and nature collided in several films of 2012 including The Impossible and The Grey but never with as much complexity and artistry as in Life of Pi. The film is primarily about survival as a young man is stranded at sea with basic provisions and a tiger, but it is more than that. Pi’s story of survival is not just physical but mental and spiritual as well. Lost in the ocean and coping with the elements while also threatened by a carnivorous predator, Pi has to wrestle with the brutality of nature. The tension between the cruelty of life and Pi’s spiritual ideals makes this more than a movie about a boy and a tiger. That tension plays out beautifully in the filmmaking and the performances. This is a gorgeous film, especially while Pi is at sea, and as unforgiving as nature can be there is also a sense of awe in the way the ocean and its inhabitants are filmed. In Life of Pi, beauty and cruelty often coexist and sometimes one portends the other. The physical and spiritual struggles of this film are located in the performance by Suraj Sharma as Pi and Sharma’s performance is one of the most overlooked of the year. As strange as the scenario of this story may be, it manages to capture something quite profound and the mingling of the academic, the feral, and the spiritual in Life of Pi makes it an ambitious movie that succeeds as an adventure, a coming of age story, and a thoughtful meditation on our place in the food chain.

3. Argo

Directed by: Ben Affleck

Premise: A dramatization of a CIA operation to rescue American diplomats from Iran after protesters stormed the American consulate in 1979.

Why It Made the List: Argo successfully combines the heist film with the espionage thriller and on its surface Argo is a well-crafted story of evasion and escape. It is also a very well designed production and it incorporates a lot of subtle touches like scratches on the film and the inclusion of the 1970s cultural artifacts that give this film an authentic feel. Argo is so well made that this alone is enough to designate it as one of the best movies of 2012 but there is more going on in Argo than just dramatic reenactment. Storytellers dramatize the past in order to comment on the present and Argo was released at the same time that tensions between the West and the Middle East were escalating. The filmmakers had the tragic luck of their film opening a month before the attack on the consulate in Benghazi, Libya. The film isn’t a deep exploration of international relations, nor should it be praised for coincidental timing. But the proximity of this film to current events does highlight the way Argo dramatizes the danger faced by people engaged in diplomatic services. The film also examines the overlap of politics and entertainment and Argo is partially a lighthearted commentary on Hollywood filmmaking and the sometimes fuzzy distinction between reality and illusion. Argo’s ultimate achievement is that it works so well on so many levels. The elements of contemporary relevance are anchored in a tightly made and highly crafted thriller. This is a story that is entertaining while also possessing substance that distinguishes it from a standard espionage adventure.

4. Django Unchained

Directed by: Quentin Tarantino

Premise: Set during the period of American slavery, a bounty hunter (Christoph Waltz) takes in a slave named Django (Jamie Foxx) and mentors him in the bounty hunting business. The two attempt to rescue Django’s wife, who is being held as a house slave on a southern plantation.

Why It Made the List: When Quentin Tarantino first appeared on the scene with Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction he was hailed as a generational moviemaker and in many respects he was, for better and for worse. In the years since Pulp Fiction, critical reception of his work has cooled but in 2012 he delivered one of his most successful films. Tarantino has strived to pay tribute to the exploitation movies that were clearly so important to him but recent projects like Death Proof and Inglorious Basterds were far too self-indulgent. Django Unchained corrects this and it possesses a clarity of purpose and level of discipline that has been absent from Tarantino’s recent movies. Where previous Tarantino films paid tribute to cinema history, Django Unchained is an act of film criticism, and sharp criticism at that. In Django Unchained, Tarantino connects the racism of the past with the cinema of the present. This is a movie about the fear of blackness and specifically black men that Hollywood has been complicit in and the filmmakers set about exposing and undermining it. At every turn Django Unchained makes black men figures of heroism, compassion, and empathy while questioning the cultural myth of the genteel antebellum American South as portrayed in movies like Gone with the Wind. Aside from its success as an act of criticism, it should also be recognized that Django Unchained is a very good movie. The cinematography, set design, and performances are all first rate. The keen script and adept filmmaking results in one of Quentin Tarantino’s best movies.

5. Take This Waltz

Directed by: Sarah Polley

Premise: A married woman (Michelle Williams) is tempted to have an affair with her neighbor (Luke Kirby).

Why It Made the List: There were a number of offbeat romances in 2012 like Your Sister’s Sister, Ruby Sparks, and Hope Springs but writer and director Sarah Polley created one of the most interesting and most accomplished love stories of the year with Take This Waltz. This is a picture that plays upon the usual structure and expectations of a movie romance in smart and even subversive ways. Typical movie romances invite the audience to cheer for the couple to get together. This film creates a situation in which the audience will feel conflicted about the love story in front of them, simultaneously wanting the couple to live happily ever after but fearing the heartbreak that it will take in order to get there and ultimately questioning the very pursuit of romantic love. Take This Waltz is about what happens after the “happily ever after” as a married woman is tempted with the possibility of an affair. But the temptation goes beyond lust or boredom; Take This Waltz is about the vague emptiness of normal life and the film employs clever cinematic techniques to make visible the emotional and ephemeral qualities of the everyday. Some of this is achieved through cutaways and smart blocking of the action but the success of the film is also due to its cast including Seth Rogan, Sarah Silverman, and especially Michelle Williams. Take This Waltz may not be satisfying in the way that garden variety Hollywood romances typically are but it is a movie jam-packed with subtle truths about love and life.

6. Looper

Directed by: Rian Johnson

Premise: In the near future, time travel is used by organized crime to send victims to the past where they are killed and disposed of. The assassins, known as loopers, eventually end up executing their future selves in order to conceal the operation. When an assassin (Joseph Gordon Levitt) faces his older self (Bruce Willis), the older man goes on the run and leads his younger self in a pursuit that upends the entire operation and the future of organized crime.

Why It Made the List: The year 2012 included the release of several high profile science fiction and fantasy movies including The Hobbit, The Avengers, and The Dark Knight Rises but the best films of this type were generally smaller titles like Chronicle, Safety Not Guaranteed, and Looper, which is not only the best science fiction film of 2012 but also one of the best science fiction films of the past few years. Looper is distinguished by a number of qualities, including a uniquely pared down production design and strong performances by the central cast but the film is most notable as a high concept movie whose filmmakers thought through their premise and matched the novelty of the idea with characters and a story that are equally engaging. Most of the best science fiction films are idea driven and Looper has been made with the same kind of intellectual earnestness as Blade Runner or The Matrix and the filmmakers use the time travel premise to raise very interesting questions about personal responsibility and free will. The thematic issues of Looper aren’t confined to the screenplay; the filmmakers consistently invoke images and scenarios of cyclical systems. What this imagery of self-destructive cycles suggests about human nature is rather dark but the film also offers moments of clarity that make this more than just another sci-fi shoot-em-up. In a year that featured a lot of overdone and overlong fantasy epics, Looper possesses the human qualities that not only makes for great sci-fi but for great movies in general.

7. The Sessions

Directed by: Ben Lewin

Premise: A paralyzed polio survivor (John Hawkes) hires a sex surrogate (Helen Hunt) in order to have his first sexual experience.

Why It Made the List: The Sessions is a movie that flies in the face of Hollywood on multiple levels. Sex as a subject is not rare in American movies or in mass media as a whole but quite often it is presented either with puritanical derision or with pornographic lasciviousness. That alone makes The Sessions a noteworthy film, as its makers deal with the subtleties of human sexuality in a frank but earnest manner. The Sessions also defies mainstream cinema as a movie for adult audiences and about adult characters. The story focuses on the relationship between a paralyzed man played by John Hawkes and a sex surrogate played by Helen Hunt. Hawkes and Hunt give bold but sensitive performances, baring their characters for the audience both physically and emotionally. To top it off, the movie centers on a paralyzed main character. That in itself is extraordinary since the disabled are largely invisible in American movies, but the sensitivity and humanity with which the filmmakers present the main character exceeds most roles in any film. The struggle of Hawkes’ character in The Sessions is a challenge to viewers to think and to feel about sexuality and dignity in a more complex way than mainstream culture usually encourages them to do. The Sessions may not have been widely seen, but it deserves to be as it is one of the most sensitive and sophisticated explorations of sexuality in a mainstream American film in quite some time.

8. The Raid: Redemption

Directed by: Gareth Evans

Premise: An Indonesian film in which a SWAT team raids a high rise apartment complex that houses a drug lord and his narcotics factory. When the SWAT team members find themselves ambushed they must fight their way out.

Why It Made the List: The Raid: Redemption is one of the best action films of recent years and in time it may be regarded with pictures like Enter the Dragon, First Blood, Raiders of the Lost Ark and Die Hard among the great entries in the genre. The allure of an action movie is found in its kinetic qualities; action pictures are about movement both of the camera and of the subjects within the camera’s lens. In that respect, action pictures are potentially the most purely cinematic motion pictures to be found and The Raid is an excellent example of that. This is a furious and gritty picture whose makers set up and execute fights, standoffs, and shootouts with masterful showmanship. Key to that showmanship is the filmmakers’ grasp of rhythm. The Raid breaks into bursts of action but also pauses for dramatic beats that build character and create a coherent narrative. Action films are very much like musicals; fights are like dance numbers and just as the best musicals convey their characters and story through song, so action films do the same through violence and stunts. The Raid is not simply a movie about kicking and punching; matters of honor and duty are expounded upon in the downtime but also dramatized within the action. This fight for righteousness and survival raises cinematic violence into an art form and as brutal as The Raid often is there is also a beauty to it that makes this one of the best pictures of 2012.

9. Zero Dark Thirty

Directed by: Kathryn Bigelow

Premise: A dramatization of the decade long manhunt for Osama bin Laden, focusing on the efforts of a CIA agent (Jessica Chastain).

Why It Made the List: Zero Dark Thirty is director Kathryn Bigelow and screenwriter Mark Boal’s follow up to their 2009 film The Hurt Locker. That film was generally praised for its apolitical stance, as it blocked out the partisan rancor from the home front in order to construct a portrait of modern warfare. When the filmmaking team of The Hurt Locker used a similar approach in Zero Dark Thirty they found themselves lambasted by critics and politicians who attacked Zero Dark Thirty under the auspices that it glorifies torture. It does not do that but the film is ambiguous on the morality of torture. Because the torture scenes are so strong and because Zero Dark Thirty is so morally opaque, the film has run afoul of those who want to see torture methods unquestionably rebuked. It is unfair to criticize the film for failing to carry a message that its makers never intended and none of this should obfuscate the fact that Zero Dark Thirty is enormously successful at what its makers were trying to accomplish: immersing the audience in the frustration and danger of being on the frontlines of a covert war. Zero Dark Thirty is a tough and at times challenging film because its makers stubbornly refuse to give in to rightwing jingoism or leftwing pacifism. What remains is a stark portrayal of modern warfare in the post-9/11 era that confronts the audience with the ugliness that Hollywood and the mainstream press has avoided while refusing to indulge the grandstanding and easy answers that they typically provide.

10. Moonrise Kingdom

Directed by: Wes Anderson

Premise: A pair of preteens (Jared Gilman and Kara Hayward) runs away from home and are pursued by their parents, guardians, and law enforcement.

Why It Made the List: Wes Anderson is a director who personifies the quirkiness that often characterizes independent filmmakers. His movies have often been highly crafted but also extremely insular. Viewers who get his work love it but Anderson was often so enamored with his own hipness that his movies could be off-putting. Moonrise Kingdom is a unique course correction. The film retains Anderson’s signature style but it also opens up the filmmaking to a wider audience and the result is one of the director’s best efforts. Like some of Anderson’s other work, Moonrise Kingdom includes narration and conspicuous camera work. These techniques are employed with a sense of purpose and the film shows a level of maturity and discipline that exceeds Anderson’s other work. Ironically, that maturity is employed in a film that focuses on pre-teen characters. Moonrise Kingdom does not idealize children or childhood; Anderson demonstrates an understanding that childhood is messy and stressful and he does not condescend to his juvenile characters or patronize the audience. In fact, the filmmakers take risks, pushing their main characters into some difficult situations, forcing them to make choices, and deal with the consequences of their actions. The deliberate narrative structure of Moonrise Kingdom is a step away from the more whimsical storytelling of Wes Anderson’s earlier movies but it is a welcome change. This is a movie about finding love, growing up, and taking responsibility and when that substance is paired with a more disciplined filmmaking style, Moonrise Kingdom emerges as one of Wes Anderson’s most enjoyable feature films.

Honorable Mentions

What follows are films that were either runners up to the Top 10 list or other pictures that came out in 2012 that are worth mentioning.

The Avengers – The payoff to four years of origin stories was a fun adventure, although not much more than that.

The Bay – Director Barry Levinson tried his hand at found footage horror with better than average results.

Beasts of the Southern Wild – One of the critical darlings of 2012, this film has some striking imagery and impressive performances.

Bernie – A quirky crime drama about a mortician and his relationship with a wealthy but difficult woman.

Chronicle – The best superhero movie of the year.

Cloud Atlas – A flawed but ambitious adaptation of David Mitchell’s novel.

Compliance – A grueling dramatization of how people defer to authority.

Coriolanus – Directed by and starring Ralph Fiennes, this was a bold adaptation of Shakespeare’s play.

The Dark Knight Rises – Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy came to an end in this impressive, if somewhat uneven, conclusion.

Dredd– Where most of this year’s science fiction and fantasy was clean and sterile, Dredd was a tough action thriller simultaneously beautiful and ugly.

Flight–This story of substance abuse was a unique project for director Robert Zemeckis and features strong performances by Denzel Washington and Kelly Reilly.

Flowers of War – An underappreciated dramatization of the 1937 invasion on Nanking.

Game Change – This dramatization of the 2008 presidential campaign is a stirring drama and features excellent performances by Woody Harrelson, Ed Harris, and Julianne Moore.

The Grey – One of the peasant surprises of the year, The Grey marries the showmanship of mainstream entertainment with the introspection of an art house picture.

Hatfields & McCoys – A television mini-series about the historic rivalry.

How to Survive a Plague – A documentary about the efforts of ACT UP to prompt the federal government into supporting AIDS research in the 1980s and 90s.

The Intouchables – Essentially Driving Miss Daisy with more likable characters, this French film is lighthearted but very enjoyable.

The Invisible War – This documentary on sexual assault in the United States military is a tough but important film.

The Island President – A profile of President Nasheed of the Maldives and one of the best documentaries on the impacts of climate change.

Les Misérables– An ambitious attempt at redefining how musicals are made. As a whole it is uneven but the supporting cast is first rate.

Liberal Arts – This midlife crisis drama examines life after college.

Lincoln – Steven Spielberg’s historical drama features a number of great performances. It’s too safe and emotionally flat to make it into the top ten but it is nevertheless a good film.

Marley – A very impressive documentary about musician Bob Marley.

The Master – Paul Thomas Anderson’s latest project was a study in the tension between individuality and the desire to be led.

ParaNorman – The best animated film of the year was a surprisingly mature and intelligent story.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower – This was one of the better coming of age stories of recent years and an antidote to stupid teen comedies.

Ruby Sparks – This offbeat comedy was also a thoughtful consideration of romantic comedies and the way women are regarded by male storytellers.

Silver Linings Playbook – A film more notable for its performances than its plot, Silver Linings Playbook was a unique romantic comedy.

Skyfall – The latest James Bond picture was among the best entries in the series.

Sleepwalk with Me – An interesting mix of dramatic and documentary filmmaking.

Good Buzz List

These are films that were released in 2012 and have strong word of mouth, and in some cases award nominations, but Nathan was unable to see them in time for the year end summary, usually because they did not open here.

Amour – Director Michael Haneke’s new film about an elderly couple coping with the challenges of old age won the Golden Globe for Best Foreign Language Film.

Bully – This documentary about high school bullying was the subject of a very public ratings fight between the Weinstein Company and the MPAA.

The Central Park Five – Ken Burns’ documentary on the racially charged 1989 rape case has been nominated for a lot of awards.

Celeste and Jesse Forever – A romantic drama starring Rashida Jones and Adam Sandberg as a couple who remain friends after a break up.

Hitchcock – This dramatization of the making of Psycho has earned praise for the performances of Anthony Hopkins as Alfred Hitchcock and Helen Mirren as Alma Reville.

Holy Motors – This film was consistently awarded the best foreign language film award by festival juries and critics groups.

Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God – A documentary about the Catholic Church child abuse scandal from filmmaker Alex Gibney.

Robot & Frank – An indie film about an elderly man who is given a robot to keep him company has earned praise for Frank Langella’s performance.

A Royal Affair – This Danish film was nominated for the Best Foreign Language Film award at the Golden Globes and has been praised by many critics.

Rust and Bone – This film has been nominated for several awards including a Golden Globe nomination for Marion Cotillard as Best Actress.

Hyde Park on the Hudson – This dramatization of President Franklin Roosevelt’s relationship with Margaret Suckley has been generated considerable buzz for the performances by Bill Murray and Laura Linney.

Great Performances

This is a list of some of the great performances in 2012, although not all of them were in great movies.

Arbitrage – Richard Gere is very good as a beleaguered Wall Street executive.

Beasts of the Southern Wild – Quvenzhané Wallis is very good as Hushpuppy in this fantasy film.

Bernie – This film included two standout performances by Jack Black and Matthew McConaughey.

The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel – The central cast was a who’s who of sexagenarian British actors.

Chronicle– Dane DeHaan brings a lot of reality and a dimension of tragedy to this story of a teenage boy who acquires superpowers.

Coriolanus – Ralph Fiennes is terrific in the title role.

The Dictator – If only the movie had been up to the same level as Sacha Baron Cohen’s performance this would have been a much better film.

End of Watch – Jake Gyllenhaal and Michael Peña are very good as the leads in this cop drama. Smaller supporting roles are also well cast.

Flight– Denzel Washington gives one of the best performances of his career in Flight and Kelly Reilly is also notable as the unsung hero of the film.

Game Change – Ed Harris and Julianne Moore are impressive as John McCain and Sarah Palin in this dramatization of the 2008 presidential campaign although it’s Woody Harrelson as campaign strategist Steve Schmidt and Sarah Paulson as advisor Nicolle Wallace who make the biggest impression.

God Bless America – Joel Murray plays a man who goes on a murderous crusade to purge society of its most obnoxious citizens. Murray is much better than the movie he is in.

Hatfields & McCoys – The entire cast of this historical epic is solid but Bill Paxton deserves special recognition for his role as the patriarch of the McCoy family.

Hope Springs – Tommy Lee Jones gives one of his two great performances this year in this film.

The Intouchables – François Cluzet and Omar Sy make a very entertaining odd couple.

Killer Joe – Matthew McConaughey gives one of several great performances of 2012 in this film.

Les Misérables– The supporting cast of this film was very impressive including Anne Hathaway, Eddie Redmayne, Samantha Barks, Sacha Baron Cohen, and Helena Bonham Carter.

Liberal Arts – Josh Randor, Elizabeth Olsen, and Richard Jenkins are very good in this film about people at various points in their lives.

Life of Pi – Suraj Sharma is terrific, carrying the movie for the bulk of the running time.

Lincoln – Daniel Day Lewis is great as Abraham Lincoln but the film also has important and more interesting supporting performances by Tommy Lee Jones and Sally Field.

Magic Mike – This film has a pair of surprisingly strong performances by Matthew McConaughey and Channing Tatum.

The Master – Philip Seymour Hoffman and Joaquin Phoenix are excellent in this film as a cult leader and one of his followers.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower – The core cast—Emma Watson, Ezra Miller, and Logan Lerman—help make this one of the best high school films in many years.

Rampart – Woody Harrelson is very impressive in this cop drama.

The Sessions – Character actor John Hawkes gets to take a central role in this film and he is terrific as a polio survivor, as is Helen Hunt as a sex surrogate.

Seven Psychopaths – The ensemble cast of Colin Farrell, Sam Rockwell, Christopher Walken, Tom Waits, and Woody Harrelson make this disjointed movie worth a watch.

Silver Linings Playbook – Bradley Cooper, Jennifer Lawrence, and Robert De Niro are terrific in this offbeat comedy.

Take This Waltz – Michelle Williams continues to prove she is one of the best actresses of her generation. Seth Rogan and Sarah Silverman also impress in supporting roles.

The Words – This otherwise forgettable film has strong performances by Bradley Cooper, Zoe Saldana, and Jeremy Irons.

Bottom 10 Films of 2012

What follows are the very bottom of the cinematic heap for 2012.

1. Project X

Directed by: Nima Nourizadeh

Premise: Three high school students attempt to raise their popularity by throwing a house party but in the course of the night it spirals out of the control.

Why It Made the List: Project X is not a comedy. It’s an al-Qaeda recruitment video. After all, who could, after watching this movie, not believe that America must be destroyed? Project X represents a zenith of Hollywood’s attempt to turn stupidity, sexism, and homophobia into comic virtues. The three lead characters start the film as homophobic misogynists who no one at school recognizes and by the end of the film they are homophobic misogynists who everyone at school knows by name and admires for their stupidity. It isn’t the carnality or the debauchery that is the problem here. Project X celebrates the triumph of “bro” culture and it is a cinematic monument to stupidity.

2. The Devil Inside

Directed by: William Brent Bell

Premise: A pseudo-documentary about an American woman who travels to Rome to investigate the demonic possession of her mother.

Why It Made the List: The Devil Inside is a lazy attempt to cash in on the overplayed found footage trend. It fails to be scary and much of the film is just incoherent. What is clear is that the filmmakers had no idea what they were doing and didn’t even bother to finish the script. There is no conclusion to this film; it just stops. The official running time of The Devil Inside is eighty-three minutes but it only reaches that length because of deliberately slow end credits that inflate the picture’s length. It barely qualifies as a feature film.

3. The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 2

Directed by: Bill Condon

Premise: The second half of the fourth and final Twilight story. Having birthed her daughter and converted to vampirism, Bella and her companions must confront vampire elders who believe the child is a threat.

Why It Made the List: Breaking Dawn – Part 2 wrapped up the Twilight saga and it may be the worst finale of any major fantasy series. This is an awful looking movie with sloppy special effects, awkward acting, ugly lighting, and terrible set design. But what is worst about Breaking Dawn Part 2 is how lazy it is. This is the culmination of a five-movie story and yet nothing happens. Subplots are abandoned left and right and the ending pulls the equivalent of an it’s-only-a-dream cheat, resulting in a conclusion that is anticlimactic, stupid, and makes the whole Twilight series a ten-hour waste of time.

4. Playing for Keeps

Directed by: Gabriele Muccino

Premise: A former professional soccer player (Gerard Butler) begins coaching his son’s soccer team. As the team improves, the new coach tries to reconcile his relationship with his son and ex-wife (Jessica Biel) while also courting the affections of soccer moms.

Why It Made the List: Playing for Keeps opens like a satire of youth sports but the movie quickly becomes a PG-13 sex comedy, as the soccer moms continually throw themselves at Gerard Butler’s character. The comedy genre has recently featured some awful depictions of women, but Playing for Keeps distinguishes itself with a cast of female lunatics driven to pathological behavior in pursuit of a little league soccer coach. In the end, Playing for Keeps attempts to be a heartwarming family movie about a man reconciling with his ex-wife while nailing the mothers of his son’s soccer team.

5. Piranha 3DD

Directed by: John Gulager

Premise: A sequel to the 2010 film Piranha 3D. Following the events of the first film, a school of piranha invades a waterpark.

Why It Made the List: Piranha 3D, released in 2010, was trashy but it was also a guilty pleasure. The makers of the sequel intend to play up the sleaziness but they are so incompetent that they can’t even get the nudity right, much less the gore. This film isn’t the descendant of Alexandre Aja’s remake or Joe Dante’s original; it’s a late night cable TV skin flick with CGI fish. It is one thing to make an exploitation film but quite another to fail so completely at it. Piranha 3DD isn’t even enjoyable trash.

6. Last Ounce of Courage

Directed by: Darrel Campbell and Kevin McAfee

Premise: The mayor of a small town (Marshall R. Teague) decides to put up Christmas decorations on city property in defiance of a big city lawyer (Fred Williamson) who claims that such religious demonstrations violate the constitutional separation of church and state.

Why It Made the List: Last Ounce of Courage is ostensibly about America’s tradition of religious freedom but it is really a dramatization of the War on Christmas nonsense. Whenever the filmmakers inject exposition about freedom of speech or religion they get it laughably wrong and the movie’s depictions of religious oppression are straw-man arguments that have no basis in reality. In fact, the movie plays very much like an early South Park Christmas episode but without any of the irony.

7. Bachelorette

Directed by: Leslye Headland

Premise: A trio of women (Kirsten Dunst, Isla Fisher and Lizzy Caplan) gather for their friend’s wedding. The night before the ceremony the group hits the town for an evening of debauchery and misadventures ensue.

Why It Made the List: Bachelorette is eighty-seven minutes of despicable people getting themselves into trouble because of their own stupidity and self-absorption and then lashing out at everyone else for their misfortune. Nearly everyone in it is an awful human being, but especially the three leads who manage to be even more vacuous, idiotic, and narcissistic than the women of Sex and the City. Even a dumb comedy needs to be smartly produced but this film is so shallow and idiotic that it’s nearly unwatchable.

8. One for the Money

Directed by: Julie Anne Robinson

Premise: An unemployed woman takes a job as a bail bondsman and is assigned to bring in an ex-boyfriend.

Why It Made the List: One for the Money was the second attempt at adapting the book by Janet Evanovich, the first being a made-for-television picture originally broadcast in 2002. Although this new version of One for the Money had the backing of a major studio and a recognizable star, the film still looked like a television production, and a cheap production at that. Matters weren’t helped by a script that didn’t even try to make sense and a lazy leading performance by the increasingly irritating Katherine Heigl.

9. 2016: Obama’s America (2012)

Directed by: Dinesh D’Souza and John Sullivan

Premise: A documentary about President Barack Obama’s early influences, analyzing his past and his relationship with his father in order to define Obama’s worldview. The filmmakers conclude that Obama possesses a post-colonial, anti-capitalist ideology that drives his administration’s policies.

Why It Made the List: The problems with 2016: Obama’s America have nothing to do with partisan politics and everything to do with bad moviemaking. The writer of discredited books and the producer of discredited documentaries joined forces to make what they may have hoped to be the rightwing equivalent of Fahrenheit 9/11 but this hackneyed mess has much more in common with Reefer Madness. In the midst of the 2012 presidential campaign there were plenty of topics worthy of discussion but this film just added to the rancor of racism and conspiracy theories.

10. The Watch (2012)

Directed by: Akiva Schaffer

Premise: A group of suburban men begin a neighborhood watch group and discover an alien invasion is imminent.

Why It Made the List: The Watch is one of those pictures in which it seems that everyone in front and behind the camera had a different idea of what the picture was supposed to be and each of them works against everyone else. The picture shifts radically between goofy situational comedy, light action, and horrific violence and none of it works. This is that rare kind of film in which the viewer may actually feel sympathy for the actors trapped in it.

Trends of the Year

Conservative Films

There were a considerable number of pictures with conservative themes or that played to a right-wing viewership, especially in regard to matters of faith and military might. Unfortunately, most of these movies weren’t very good.

Violent Satire

There were several films this year that violently lashed out at popular culture to mixed effect.

Animated Films

This year saw an impressive crop of animated films from a wide range of studios.

Domestic Horror

The horror films of 2012 were almost exclusively about hauntings and possessions, usually located in domestic settings.

Musicals

With the exception of Les Misérables, the Hollywood musical continued its descent into irrelevance with several high profile (and financially underperforming) musicals that weren’t very good.

Modestly Scaled Sci-Fi and Fantasy Films

The major box office draws this year were big-budget sci-fi and fantasy extravaganzas based on established brands including The Avengers, The Dark Knight Rises, The Hobbit, and The Hunger Games. But there were also quite a few smaller, original genre films released in 2012 and some of them were better and bolder than any of the mainstream hits.

Cinema Verite

Pseudo documentaries and found footage pictures continued to be a force in the cinema of 2012 although the format is increasingly showing signs of wear and tear. There were also a number of films that adopted the style of found footage movies (Chernobyl Diaries, Silent House) or incorporated the idea into the story (Sinister).

Man vs. Nature Stories

There were several films this year about man and nature and quite often man’s dominance over the earth came into question.

Off-Beat Romances

Romances are about desire but in several films of 2012 characters and audiences were confronted with filmmakers who questioned what they wanted and why.

Box Office Disappointments

Although a few films of 2012 were among the biggest box office hits of all time, the year also saw the release of several high profile busts, including some of the biggest losses of all time.

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