Best & Worst Movies Of 2002

[Guest Karnage]

With only a month left in the year, it's safe to say which are the best movies of the year and the worst movies of the year.

 

So which movies do you think are the Best/Worst of the year 2002?

[Guest Edwin MacPhisto]

I've seen a lot fewer films this year than I usually do, but the cream of the crop:

 

Punch-Drunk Love

Spirited Away

Lilo & Stitch

The Road to Perdition

 

I also had unexplainable passion for xXx and Red Dragon, which were big-budget Hollywood madness that I still enjoyed deeply. I'm also not sure if Super Troopers came out this year, but if did, what amazing farce.

 

Bad movies I avoided as best I could, but I was thoroughly amused by the whimsy of Jason X.

[Guest CoreyLazarus416]

BEST:

The Ring has to be on the list. It's probably the best straight-up creepy movie in decades.

 

WORST:

**looks at XXX**

[Guest Ravenbomb]

psh. All I've seen this year is MIIB, Powerpuff Girls and The Ring, and 2 guesses as to which one of those is the best. But I am seeng 2Towers...

[Guest raptor]

I didn't see too many movies, but I liked:

Spider-Man, Knockaround Guys, Austin Powers III, Red Dragon, XXX

 

In the middle:

Scorpion King (fun as an action movie), Die Another Day (too cheesy to be cool, but the Cars made up for it)

 

Hated:

MIIB

[Guest godthedog]

best movie, far and away, was 'y tu mama tambien'. no competition whatsoever.

 

the only other really good movies i got to see were 'punch drunk love' and 'jackass'. this is the worst year for movies in recent memory.

[Guest Incandenza]

Y Tu Mama, Tambien was the best, definitely. As for worst, um, I didn't go to many movies this year. Uh...Goldmember sucked.

[Guest Edwin MacPhisto]

I missed Y Tu Mama Tambien in its theatrical run and now the Blockbuster by my college has one copy that's almost always out. God-damn frat boys just renting it for the sexifying...

[Guest godthedog]

i've always found it's kind of pointless to do a list of worst movies for any given year, because the movie industry always puts out a ton of total shit every year without fail. even 1999, which i contend is the greatest year in the history of american movies, was filled with crap. i only judge a year by the amount of great stuff it produces.

[Guest MDH257]

The Best Movies I've seen this year:

 

Igby Goes Down

Y Tu Mama Tambien

Road to Perdition

Moonlight Mile

The Emperor's Club

 

I saw The Emperor's Club on Thanksgiving night and was suprised by how great it was. I thought it would be a dedicated teacher movie in the vain of "Mr. Holland's Opus", which is a good movie BTW. But, it goes in an unexpected direction. It becomes a morality play and dosen't cop out at the end by giving the central characters a false redemption.

I really think anybody here who got turned off by the ads should go see the movie.

 

Moonlight Mile is another one that suprised me by being great. You think it's going to be a typical weeper about a grieving family, but it's a lot smarter than that. There's only one part where the movie breaks down and gives one of the actor's an "Oscar clip" scene, but at least there's no scene where somebody breaks down and cries while giving a big speech (at least one that I remembered). Plus Dustin Hoffman and Susan Saradon let Jake Gyllenhall have the top billing that he deserved even though they could have flexed their muscle and pushed him to third billing.

[LaParkaYourCar 0]

I thought "Emperor's Club" looked like a "Dead Poet's Society" rip-off.

[Guest MDH257]

I thought "Emperor's Club" looked like a "Dead Poet's Society" rip-off.

That movie came to mind too. The movie starts out like that and Kevin Kline wants to turn his worst student into his best. Now I know we've all seen that plot before as well, but the movie takes that and goes into areas where "teacher" movies uusually don't.

[Guest Smell the ratings!!!]

There were so many bad fucking movies man...

 

I have to say Minority Report was the best one this year. To be fair, I didn't see Tu Mama and I heard good things about it.

[Guest Edwin MacPhisto]

I didn't splooge over Minority Report like most people I know who saw it. Something about it was very flat; the opening 20 minutes and a lot of the moments leading up to the showdown in the hotel room are fantastic, but that whole extended plot AFTER that business really slowed everything down. Movie went from being more intimate to being unnecessarily wide-reaching, and sloppily so.

 

I'm hoping Catch Me If You Can pulls Spielberg out of his shitty-third-act slump, but am not too optimistic.

[Guest C.H.U.D.]

I can't really list my best and worst for the year until the end of December. After all, some of the stuff coming out this month could make the "best of" list, including Gangs of New York and The Two Towers.

[Guest cynicalprofit]

TRON was the best movie this year!

 

Seriously, nothing this year stands out as being worth of best but Ive got nomineses(sp) for worst comming out my ass like poop.

[Guest hardyz1]

There's a certain second part of a trilogy coming out December 18 whose predecessor was screwed last year...

 

The only movies I saw this year that came out this year were Goldmember and Signs. Signs was pretty decent, Goldmember was good but disappointing.

[Guest EricMM]

Did Collateral Damage come out this year?

 

It sucked hard hard hard.

[Guest Spaceman Spiff]

One Hour Photo was pretty good.

 

While it could have been a lot better, I enjoyed Attack of the Clones. But then again, I'm a huge Star Wars mark.

[Guest Madmartigan21]

Y Tu Mama Tambien is HANDS DOWN the best movie of the year so far? I think NOT. It's only like the third best FOREIGN LANGUAGE movie I've seen this year. Wait a minute, I've seen THREE foreign language movies this year? Something must be wrong with me.

 

1. Changing Lanes and Far From Heaven are this year's front runners to date as far as I'm concerned. These two movies have been untouchable this year, IMO.

 

and the rest off the top of my head in no particular order:

 

- Solaris - Not for everyone, I suppose. But I loved it.

 

- Minority Report - The Steven Spielberg hate on this board seems so bizarre to me.

 

- Spider-Man - Probably the best possible Spider-Man movie that could have been made.

 

- Read My Lips(French - Sur mes lèvres) Here is the plot summary from the IMDB, with some added text by me at the end:

Young secretary Carla is a long-time employee of a property development company. Loyal and hardworking, first to arrive and last to leave, Carla is beginning to chafe at the limitations of her career and is looking to move up. But as a 35-five-year-old woman with a hearing deficiency, she is not sure how to climb out of her humdrum life, though she is confident in her own abilities. Into her life comes Paul Angeli, a new trainee she decides to hire. Paul is 25 years old and completely unskilled, but Carla covers for him when the need arises because of his other qualities - he's a thief, fresh out of jail and very good-looking. It's a case of good meeting bad.

 

She eventually usesher lip reading skills, to help him rip of a crime boss. OK, so I didn't add MUCH text, but I don't want to give too much away.

 

- Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner - (Language: Inuktitut) Since I'm VERY lazy, here again is the plot summary from the IMDB:

Long ago in the Arctic territory of the Inuit nation, an evil spirit is summoned by a miscreant shaman to spread violence and discord leading to the death of the local chief, Kumaglak, at the hands of the usurper, Sauri who also proceeds to break the spirit of his other rival, Tulimaq. Years later, that conflict continues even when Tulimaq's sons, Amaqjuaq, the Strong One and Atanarjuat, the Fast Runner, have become the best hunters of the tribe. Sauri's short fused son, Oki, becomes profoundly jealous of the brothers and it deepens when Atanarjuat fairly wins away his betrothed. The conflict reaches its climax when an indiscretion on Amaqjuaq's part sparks an act of murderous revenge that leaves Amaqjuaq dead and Atanarjuat fleeing naked into the wilderness to face certain death by exposure. Yet for all these events the curse has caused, Atanarjuat soon learn that there are forces of light that are coming to help him, but he must make fateful decisions that will determine not only to his own fate, but that of his tribe as well.

 

-Thirteen Conversations About One Thing- This was released in May I believe. The wrong time of year for this kind of movie. Had it been released in Decemeber, it would at the very least be getting some kind of Oscar "buzz".

It has a very good cast including Alan Arkin, John Turturro, and Matthew McConaughey. Again from the trusty IMDB:

A man approaching middle age decides to change his life. A rising young attorney's plans are thrown into disarray as the result of a single act. A woman faces her husband's infidelity. An envious businessman seeks revenge on a cheerful coworker. And an optimistic young cleaning woman awaits a miracle. These ordinary people all find themselves asking the fundamental question philosophers have pondered throughout history: What is happiness, and how do one achieve it?

 

- Signs - Fan-fucking-tastic until just about the very end. At which point the "message" of the movie bothers me. But not so much as to ruin it.

 

- Although they won't stand up as the year's best, I also enjoyed We Were Soldiers, The Ring, The Sum of All Fears, and One Hour Photo. I've heard some VERY good things about The Salton Sea, but I haven't seen it yet.

 

 

I liked Y Tu Mama Tambien a great deal. But I didn't find it without its faults. Some of the sexuality I couldn't buy into. I know there was a deeper point to it, much more than appears on the surface. But a great deal of it still seemed totally gratuitous, as merely an attempt to shock. Also the coincidences with this great beach just happening to turn up where they turned down a dark "road" and the locals they meet there knowing of an even better beach, seemed was a little too contrived. And the final revelation of

 

SPOILER....

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her death seemed almost tacked on. I know it was actually hinted at with her crying those times. But since the movie misleads you to believe its because of her marriage, knowing it was really because of her cancer seems like something out of a cheap tear-jerker.

[Guest Lord of The Curry]

I'm going the same route as C.H.U.D because I'm quite certain that come December 18th I will be pissing everybody off with my constant ranting about how The Two Towers is the best film of the year.

[Guest Kahran Ramsus]

From what I've seen...

 

BEST: Changing Lanes

WORST: The Scorpion King

 

I tend to avoid movies I don't think I am going to like, unless I get dragged to them, so I avoided the worst of the worst.

[Guest Gamengiri2002]

So far:

 

The Best:

 

Insomnia

Adaptation

Punch Drunk Love

Road to Perdition

Changing Lanes

 

The Worst:

 

MIBII

Austin Powers in Goldmember

Minority Report

Collateral Damage

The Time Machine

 

Do with them what you will

[Guest MDH257]

A couple of points

 

1.) I didn't think Y Tu Mama Tambien's final revelation was supposed to be a tear jerker. I thought it was supposed to be a Usual Suspects/Sixth Sense type of revelation that made you go back and look at the events of the movie in a different light. BTW, I saw Read My Lips and The Fast Runner. Both are good movies, but I still think Y Tu Mama is better.

 

2.) It is too early to be making a definative list of the years best movies

 

3.) Changing Lanes is one of the most underated films of the year. The ads didn't convey what an intellegent film it is.

 

4.) I liked Far From Heaven and Solaris, but I doubt most people will. Both movies are very slow (that's not always a negative) and I thought of Solaris as 2001 meets Vanilla Sky. If you want closure and everthing spelled out for you, then you probably won't like Solais.

 

5.) My top ten of the year (so far)

I've sure about these 10, but the order is somewhat arbitrary

 

1.) Igby Goes Down

2.) Y Tu Mama Tambien

3.) The Emperor's Club

4.) Road to Perditon

5.) Moonlight Mile

6.) Bowling for Columbine

7.) Brotherhood of the Wolf (it was released in France in 2000, but I saw it in the theater in Feb.)

8.) Secretary

9.) Changing Lanes

10.) Frailty

 

Plus I'm still looking forward to:

Adaptation, The Quiet American, Personal Velocity, About Schmidt, LOTR: Two Towers, Gangs of New York, Catch Me If You Can, The Hours

 

And I plan on seeing:

25th Hour, Antwone Fisher, Chicago, Confessions of a Dangerous Mind

 

We'll see how the year turns out

[Guest starvenger]

Most of the movies I've seen have fallen into the "perfectly acceptable" or "eh" category. I will probably call The Two Towers the "best" at the end of the year but for now:

 

Best Overall: Insomnia

Best mindless blockbuster: Spider-Man

Miss Congeniality: My Big Fat Greek Wedding (it won't win anything but I can't help but love the movie)

 

Worst mindless blockbuster: MIB II

Biggest disappointment: Red Dragon/Star Wars II: Hey look it's 2 minutes of Yoda fighting!!

[Guest Narcoleptic Jumper]

I'm fairly confident that THE TWO TOWERS will be the most in-fucking-credbile movie of all time.

[Guest Vern Gagne]

What movies released so far could be nominated for an Academy Award. The same question for individual performances.

[Guest El Satanico]

That Academy Award question deserves it's own thread.

[cawthon777 0]

Best: Spider-Man, Signs

Worst: Resident Evil, Men in Black II ... Scooby Doo would be up there but all the drug references saved the film ... Austin Powers 3 was dissapointing.

 

And what movies had me saying "Uh....what just happened?" as the end credits rolled: Frailty, Reign of Fire

[Guest saturnmark4life]

I can honestly say two towers will be the best, cos i don't think i've seen a good film all year.

 

The following films would be described by the guy who runs the site in my sig (plug) as 'shit factories'

 

spiderman

xXx

star wars

goldmember

 

all unfuckingbelievably SHIT.