Saturday, December 31, 2016

The Ten Best Movies Of 2016

Let's be perfectly honest. I know diddlysquat about movies; what makes them classics and why the pundits consider them great. My wife and I try to attend movies every Friday. To my dismay we usually pick one of her choice. She likes the 'thinking' films, the ones with a message. My personal preference revolve around John Candy Type films.

Michael Medved is a conservative talk show host but he is also learned in the film industry He picked the movie, La La Land as his favorite of 2016. More on that later.

Dan Circucci is a professor at Penn State University. He was kind enough a couple of years ago to include me on his site as one of his favorite blogs. He is also a connoisseur of fine films. Mr. Circucci published his list of the best films of 2016 so I'll run with him. In all honesty I'd only seen two of them. I can go one further. I've only heard of two of these tinsel town bombshells.

10. La La Land
9. Denial
8. Jackie
7. Captain Fantastic
6. Fences
5. Lion
4. The Light Between Oceans
3. Hacksaw Ridge
2. Hell or High Water
1. MANCHESTER BY THE SEA

Yesterday, the Queen and I forked over $13 to see La La Land. I liked it she didn't. The film stars Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone. The movie is a throwback to the 1950's with dancing and songs. It's like watching Cyd Charisse nd Gene Kelly doing their schtick but without a happy ending.

Her Highness was enthralled with Manchester-by-the-sea. Not this dude. If you like films where the main character gets drunk then goes out for more beer only to come home and see his children die in a house fire he started you'll love it. His wife, who survived the fire, leaves the guy. His brother dies of a heart attack. This wouldn't be so bad but his brother's wife turns into an alcoholic and their son is forced to leave home and live with the brother who burned down his home. The son decides he wants to have sex with two girls in his uncles home which seems to be okay with the bro. At this point I was laughing my rear end off at the frivolity of this scenario.

The Queen went to Hacksaw Ridge by herself and asked if I wanted to go with her. The answer was an emphatic "No". When I was a kid I craved WWII movies. Who wouldn't? There was nothing than seeing 'To Hell And Back' starring Audie Murphy as himself. Except, in the WWII films before 1990 one never had to see limbs flying through the air and bodies being blown apart. Those were the good ol' days when we slaughtered the Japs and Germans sans blood.

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