by Dale J. Nauertz

Believe the hype, people: 2007 was a great year for movies! As usual, you have to look past all the big ticket items (especially “Transformers”, which sucked) to find greatness. But it is there, just waiting to be discovered by those willing to look. You’ve got to kiss a lot of frogs to find a prince (which reminds me: “Enchanted” is much better than you might suspect with Amy Adams giving one of the finest performances of the year) but they are out there. I’ve kissed a lot of those cinematic frogs and this is my opportunity to reveal the princes I found in 2007. That way, you can kiss less frogs…or something. I know this introduction is kinda lame, so let’s just get down to it…

1. There Will Be Blood!

“Sweeney Todd” is a darker examination of humanity’s capacity for evil, so that’s not the reason this is at the top of my list. “Juno” has more human and natural characters, so that’s not why “Blood” is here either. And pretty much any of the movies on my list is more violent and disturbing. So why the hell IS “There Will Be Blood!” my pick for the Best Movie of 2007? If you’re asking that question, then you obviously haven’t seen it. Daniel Day Lewis gives a towering, majestic performance. It’s not just the performance of the year or the performance of the decade, it’s one of the finest performances in the history of cinema. It’s better than anything Marlon Brando ever did. It’s better than anything Jimmy Stewart or John Wayne ever did. As much as I hate to say it, it’s even better than anything Clint Eastwood or Tom Hanks have ever done. I can’t risk overpraising this performance, it’s just that good. But, no, Lewis’s performance isn’t even the reason this movie is at the top of my list. The reason it’s at the top of my list is because it’s one of the grandest epics in the history of cinema, a triumphant spectacle that is more than mere spectacle. Any single frame of this movie is haunting. P.T. Anderson has made a movie that reminded me of Terrence Malick in its rapturous beauty and haunting vistas…but it’s more personal and engrossing than anything Malick has ever done. It’s filled with subtle little moments, tiny touches that pay huge emotional dividends in the context of events later on. It builds like no other movie this year, like few movies I’ve ever seen. It didn’t leave me hollow inside or drain me or anything like that. In fact, I found it shot through with a wicked sense of gallows humor. It simply provides a powerful, elegant portrait of a man willing to do whatever he has to, play up whatever aspect he must, in order to succeed. Lewis’s portrayal of Daniel Plainview is a portrait of a man who learns early on to ignore his soul, to banish it from his thoughts. He’s a fascinating individual, though Paul Dano’s portrayal of Eli Sunday (who seems to be Plainview’s moral opposite but is, if anything, perhaps even more diabolically corrupt) is nearly as captivating, in an extraordinary movie about souls, their value, and the explosive and deplorable acts that happen in their absence. Every scene, every frame of this movie is epic and stunning in a way totally unique to this film. That’s why “There Will Be Blood!” rises above the sum of its parts. That’s why it’s so remarkable. And that is why it is sitting firmly atop this magnificent list.

2. Hot Fuzz

“Hot Fuzz” is the most fun I had at the movies all year, the loudest and longest I laughed, and the giddiest I got. But beyond that it’s the most finely-crafted comedy in at least a decade. It’s a refreshing change from the shaggy improvisation of movies like “Knocked Up” or “Anchorman”. Every line in this movie is meticulous, every moment works perfectly within the clockwork organization of the plot and is timed for the maximum comedic potential. This film is hilarious, yes, but there are jokes you don’t even get the first time around because they don’t click for you until your second or third viewing. More than any other movie on this list, “Hot Fuzz” DEMANDS a second or third viewing just to confirm the strands of plot it has expertly (and rather ridiculously) tied together the first time, to catch subtle human moments you were laughing too hard to notice, and to discover the little background gags and nuanced movie references you missed before. The plot may be silly, but its also airtight. The gags are uproarious but also grounded in character and setting. The film references peppered throughout are wonderful, but they never disrupt the film’s subtle balance or compromise its originality. Plus, the performances are sweet, the story is satisfying, and the action sequences flat-out rule!

3. Juno

It’s got all the usual trappings of a too-precocious-for-its-own-good indie comedy: an independent soundtrack in which you can almost hear the individual guitar strums, dialogue that’s striving so hard to be clever that it loses all touch with the way actual humans speak, and a wardrobe you might find at a garage sale. For the first fifteen minutes or so, “Juno” grated on my nerves. I was prepared to write a scathing review of this movie. But then the damn movie snuck under my defenses. The dialogue got richer, more natural. The goofy little songs began to fit the plot. The characters got under my skin and made me care. By the end of this movie, I was cringing at the choices these characters might make and the people they might hurt in doing so. I cared about Juno (the magnificent Ellen Page) the guy who got her knocked up (Michael Cera) her parents (J.K. Simmons and Allison Janney, both phenomenal) and the prospective adoptive parents of her baby (Jennifer Garner, who is great as usual and Jason Bateman, who is better than I’ve ever seen him) more than I’ve cared about any other characters this year. When the movie threatens to get sappy, I didn’t even mind. These characters have earned every happy little moment the movie gives them. I loved “Thank You For Smoking”, director Jason Reitman’s debut film. I love “Juno”, his follow-up, even more. This is the movie “Knocked Up” SHOULD have been.

4. Sweeney Todd

It’s a dark little tale, grippingly told, that will haunt you for days. And the songs will haunt you even longer. I had no idea Tim Burton could make a movie this vicious, bloody and baroque. It’s a stunning achievement, by a director I’ve admired forever. It’s his most mature and harrowing work. When I first saw it, I thought it was second only to “Ed Wood” on his resume. Having seen “Ed Wood” again, I now think “Sweeney Todd” is second to nothing. Of course, my opinion on things like this changes from day to day, depending on mood and my cynicism toward the human race. On days when I’m feeling forgiving, I’ll choose “Ed Wood”. But there are days when I can see where Sweeney is coming from when he sings “there’s a hole in the world like a great big pit and the people of the world are there in it and the people of the world are filled with shit”. On those days, I will relish every drop of blood in “Sweeney Todd”, the darkest movie of the year.

5. Zodiac

As a standard-issue serial killer thriller, “Zodiac” is a disappointment. The killings aren’t fun to watch or sufficiently gruesome at all. Instead they are squirm-inducing and genuinely chilling, which is only part of what makes David Fincher’s film about the Zodiac killer and the men who tried to track him down so brilliant. The other ingredient of its brilliance is that it’s a fascinating portrait of obsession, not just on the part of the killer but on the part of the men who spent decades attempting to track him down. That the killer was never actually captured only makes the story more mesmerizing. The movie isn’t just clicking off the minutes until the killer is revealed and incarcerated. It’s a much trickier beast than that, putting us in the shoes of the men who ruined their family lives and drove themselves nuts (or into an early grave) chasing a maddeningly elusive phantom and attempting to bring him to justice. All the performances are great, the atmosphere is moody, obsessive and at times unnerving, and the pace is slow but steady and never boring. Fincher uses few of his usual visual tricks in this movie. He doesn’t need to. The emotional heft and riveting story on the screen are more than enough. He’s put together what is possibly the finest film of his career.

6. Waitress

“Waitress” has a quality that few movies possess: whimsy. “Waitress” is beautifully whimsical. It’s quirky without being overbearing (a quality most quirky things cannot manage), it’s delightful without being sappy, it brims with heart and humor and the unassailable greatness of pie. It’s also sad, dark and surprisingly complicated for what should be a trifle of a romantic comedy. Keri Russell is wonderful as the titular waitress, Nathan Fillion is charming to the extreme as her dreamy doctor and Andy Griffith puts in a marvelous supporting turn as a crotchety old bastard. It’s too bad that director Adrienne Shelly was murdered shortly after completing this film. After witnessing her triumphant, wonderful debut I would have faithfully gone to every movie she made. The second best movie of the year about unplanned pregnancy.

7. Beowulf

As far as pure spectacle goes, “Beowulf” is astounding. I might wish Robert Zemeckis were making quirky, energetic movies like he used to, but I can find no fault with the spectacular, envelope-pushing majesty of this one. This movie is literally eye-popping. If the Academy weren’t composed of such fuddy-duddies then this would have gotten a nomination for Best Animated Film (it’s better than anything that is nominated…though “Ratatouille” is pretty darn good). Oh well, that doesn’t make “Beowulf” any less stunning or entertaining and, in the long run, that’s really all that counts. Not only is it a visual feast, but it’s solid from a character and story standpoint as well. It captivates the eyes and the mind, posing some interesting moral conundrums during its running length to go along with all the awesome dragon and beastie battles. Grendel, for example, is a tragic character that is not only rendered eerily but gains our begrudging sympathy. Like Daniel Plainview in “There Will Be Blood!”, the character of Beowulf gains the fame and success he so desperately seeks…but he loses a lot of his soul to get there. Surprisingly magnificent.

8. 1408

Better than the Stephen King story it is based upon, “1408″ is a search for truth and redemption for Mike Enslin (John Cusack). Enslin is a fascinating character: a snarky cynic staying in haunted places in order to write books he hates about them for a profit. He’s wrapped himself so tightly in his cynical armor that he doesn’t seem to realize that he wants to experience the supernatural more than anyone else. He yearns for the hope that proof of the spirit world would give him, any hint that his deceased daughter might actually be out there somewhere (this is, as you might guess, the event that prompted him to don his defensive armor of cynicism in the first place). That all changes when he checks into Room 1408, a room that thrashes right through his armor and hits him in all the tender spots he didn’t know he had. 1408 is more psychologically rich than a simple haunted hotel movie has any right to be, and it cleaves a lot closer to the bone than I expected. That’s all because of Cusack’s natural, fearless performance. It’s his best work since 2000’s “High Fidelity” and it exposes both a mean streak and a soft white underbelly that Cusack has kept hidden up to now. His performance easily carries the movie (which is good, because it has to) and the horrors unleashed in Room 1408 are more than mere ghosts or axe-wielding psychos. The horrors of Room 1408 get under the skin (Enslin’s and our own) and challenge Enslin’s sanity. It’s a dark night of the human soul, a crucible in which Cusack will either get stronger or break. “1408″ is a great film that looks like a B-film, a movie with a lot more meat on its bones than it appears. It’s compelling stuff, and it more than belongs on this list.

9. Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead

It took a while for this movie to really grab me, but it did, tightly, and it never let go. It begins like the standard “desperate guys try to break the law but everything goes horribly wrong” movie. You’ve got two schlubs (Ethan Hawke and Phillip Seymour Hoffman) who are in over their head (Hawke’s an immature little shit with lots of debts, Hoffman’s a greedy shit who’s embezzling to fund his drug habit). They know of a jewelry store they can knock off (it belongs to Albert Finney and Rosemary Harris, their mom and dad). They attempt to knock it off but fuck it up. Then everything spirals further and further out of control. In the first forty-five minutes or so, things go south in ways you can see coming. But once the snags start coming fast, furious and from left field, the movie’s grim fatalism really kicks into high gear. By the end, the movie’s revelations and surprises hit me in the gut. Sidney Lumet has crafted a tight, efficient, hard-hitting crime drama that generates real impact. It’s not the finest movie he’s made, or the finest crime drama of the year, but it’s haunting, piercing stuff that cuts you with edges you never expect. “Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead” is a rather routine story told with raw, gripping power.

10. No Country for Old Men

No, it’s not the greatest movie of the year. But before its jarring left turn in Act Three (a bold move, to say the least, though not one I really care for at the moment…the years may change my stand on that) “No Country For Old Men” is spellbinding. It weaves a nearly palpable atmosphere of dread and trepidation. The cinematography is gorgeous, the performances are astounding (especially Bardem and Brolin) and the storytelling wraps a dense net around you…which tightens with every moment…until it comes unraveled. Even so, “No Country for Old Men” is powerful stuff. Standard greatness from the great Coen Brothers.

Runners up…

“Ratatouille” is a cute, playful exploration of creativity and criticism. It’s about the magic of food and the joyful act of creation. It sags a little in parts, but it’s still thrilling, wondrous and surprisingly effective with single moments that are as good as anything else I’ve seen this year. With “Cars” Pixar was pandering to Nascar Nation. Here, they’re going for the opposite end of the societal spectrum. However, that has nothing to do with why I think it’s the superior film: it’s better because of its plucky, vibrantly detailed lead character and its sweet, playful storytelling. It’s unique, classy and winning.

“3:10 to Yuma” is a great Western with natural, effective performances and a snappy pace. It’s not quite as good as 2003’s criminally underrated “Open Range” but it’s a lot of fun with absorbing characters and great action. The only problem is that it establishes its characters so believably that when they do some unbelievable things at the climax it feels like incredible bullshit.

“Grindhouse” was second to “Hot Fuzz” as the most fun I had in a theater this year, and second only to “Beowulf”’s 3-D IMAX presentation as the most unique theatrical experience. The two films in it (”Planet Terror” and, to a lesser extent, “Death Proof”) were immensely entertaining. But what really elevates “Grindhouse” as an experience are the fake trailers, ads, and other bits of ephemera sprinkled throughout. “Grindhouse” was a loving tribute to the act of actually seeing a movie and, as such, I loved it. Also, its bold experimentation was underrated. If only more modern filmmakers had the guts to give us such a unique experience at the movies.

“The Darjeeling Limited” is a trifle, really. But it’s a wonderful trifle. I loved Owen Wilson, Adrien Brody and Jason Schwartzman as three troubled brothers on a spiritual journey in India. I love the exotic feel of the film and the hilarity of its character-based dialogue and situations. Though, as much as I loved spending time with these characters in these places and situations, I just wish the movie would have had a bit more of a point. However, this movie comes from Wes Anderson, who sometimes hides his point in unexpected moments to be discovered on repeat viewings. Who knows? Two years from now this might be my favorite film of 2007.

Then again, the same goes for all the movies on this list.

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 7th, 2008 at 6:59 pm and is filed under Dale Nauertz. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.