The Favorite Films Of My Lifetime: 2008

Let's start this differently.  Take a look at these Academy Award nominees for Best Picture.

The Favorite Films Of My Lifetime: 2006

This year turned out to be really easy, but contained a lot of my absolute favorites from the entire decade.  I remember being severely disappointed in the Best Picture nominees for this particular year.  And while I liked The Departed and think Scorsese's career deserved a Best Director statue, I was rooting against its Best Picture win, because its a remake and a lot of it (including full sequences and framings) were ripped straight from the original.  Also, this was the year of the Mexican director, but of the 3 that made big time films, they picked the one that wasn't even that good of a movie as a Best Picture nominee.  But, what can you do.

The Favorite Films Of My Lifetime: 2001

Well, I supposed you could say this is the "golden post" of this series.  Today's my birthday, and...this was an interesting year.  While there are some big big notables in 2001, there was also a lot of really shitty movies that were released.  I'd mark the year as overall weak, but when you pick out your favorites and "Best" films of this year it looks much stronger.  And how about that Best Picture winner?  I almost forgot that movie existed.  Is anybody still big on A Beautiful Mind anymore?  Does anybody even remember Gosford Park or In The Bedroom?  Yet, Fellowship and Moulin Rouge! still get plenty of discussion today.  That's why time is far more key than whatever the Oscars does "in the now".  And I hope this little lookback is kinda sorta proving that.

The Favorite Films Of My Lifetime: 1993

 1993's list is a fun looking one.  There's plenty of variety to it.  This one also struck me as its one that seems to be comprised of film that look like they could appear on a lot of people's favorite films of all time lists.  I was also totally forgot that The Fugitive was a Best Picture nominee that year.  With all the lists of Best Picture nominees we've been going with it surely stands out among them as its one that seemed to be the general audience's champion for that year (of those nominated).  Anyway, let's take a look at those.

del Ranko: Ranking The Films of Guillermo del Toro

So here we are, another retrospective in the can.  And I must say...the most challenging of all to finish.  It wasn't because I didn't like the films, no no no.  It just caught me at a busy time.  But as promised I finished.  And there's a little surprise in here, too.  Guillermo del Toro loves monsters and creatures and his whole filmography celebrates them.  He doesn't have interest in getting away from that and I'm glad.  Most directors will use horror and sci fi as a launching pad to "prestigious" films, but Guillermo has no desire.  I love that we have a director who enjoys playing in the sandbox and perfecting it.  Of all the directors out there, not one pays as much detail to every ounce of a creature's being or supernatural mechanics being used in a film.  You'll never utter "how does that work" leaving a del Toro movie.  Its surprising to thing he's been making films for around 20 years.  Hats off to your future endeavors, Mr. del Toro!

Guillermo del Toro Retrospective: HELLBOY II: THE GOLDEN ARMY

Hellboy II: The Golden Army
2008
Starring: Ron Perlman, Selma Blair, Doug Jones, Seth MacFarlane, Luke Goss, Anna Walton, Jeffrey Tambor
Rated: PG-13

And after Pan's Labyrinth we're right back to Hellboy.  This sequel was commissioned shortly after the first's release and supposed to be put out in 2006, but Revolution Studios went out of business, putting the sequel on hold.  Universal studios picked up a backdeal on Revolution's films and put this one forward.  del Toro always wanted to at least craft a trilogy out of the Hellboy character and here was a second stab at it.  The film expands upon and improves the universe set in the first film.  It feels more comfortable with itself and makes for a much better film than the first go-round.

Guillermo del Toro Retrospective: PAN'S LABYRINTH

Pan's Labyrinth
2006
Starring: Ivan Baquero, Maribel Verdu, Doug Jones, Sergi Lopez, Ariadna Gil
Rated: R

Guillermo del Toro followed Hellboy by once again returning to Mexico and delivering another fairy tale.  Of all 3 stories (yeah, I'd count Cronos), Pan's Labyrinth really accomplishes being fully realized that of a new modern fairy tale.  This is del Toro's biggest passion project of his career and one he sacrificed all he possibly could (and lost 45 lbs according to him) to see fully realized as he intended it to be.  The result works, as Pan's Labyrinth is a masterpiece of modern cinema.

Guillermo del Toro Retrospective: HELLBOY

Hellboy 
2004
Starring: Ron Perlman, Selma Blair, Doug Jones, Karel Roden, John Hurt, Jeffrey Tambor, Biddy Hodson
Rated: PG-13

So, yeah, I didn't finish this series before Pacific Rim came out last weekend.  Last week was a bit crazy for me and I had to end up putting this retrospective on hold.  Time was not something that was available for me to have to complete it.  I could have written about the last 3 entries in this series without viewing them, yes.  But to be true to my restrospective format, I like to enter each essay coming off a fresh viewing of the film I'm discussing.  I don't ever want to get away from that.  And being that the last 3 films in this series are kinda lengthy, I needed the time to A) watch them and B) write about them.  Lots of things piled up last week and I had to prioritize and I wasn't able to fit them in.  But, alas, I'm back and hopefully can finish this off this week.  I don't plan on something like this happening again, but you never know.

Guillermo del Toro Retrospective: BLADE II

Blade II
Starring: Wesley Snipes, Kris Kristofferson, Ron Perlman, Leonor Varela, Luke Goss, Norman Reedus, Matt Schulze
Rated: R


Guillermo del Toro was brought back into Hollywood thanks to having a big fan in David Goyer.  When it came sequel time for Blade and Stephen Norrington bowed out, Goyer went with a director he was a big fan of.  And this time, for Guillermo, these guys were going to sit back and let him do his thing.  This was going to be a bit more free reign than his first foray.  He accepted the script provided and didn't really make any major changes.

Guillermo del Toro Retrospective: THE DEVIL'S BACKBONE

The Devil's Backbone
2001
Starring: Marisa Paredes, Eduardo Noriega, Federico Luppi, Fernando Tielve, Inigo Garces
Rated: R

After an enormously crushing experience with Mimic, Guillermo del Toro returns to Mexico to make what he considers one of his most personal projects, The Devil's Backbone.  He had thought his days as a big Hollywood director, and his chance to put his fingerprints on it, were likely over.  Not that the opportunities weren't present, but that he himself was not willing to put all the weight of dealing with a big studio production and dealing with the suits on his shoulders again.  Strangely enough, going back to Mexico would gain him more notoriety as a young and upcoming visionary master.  The door to Hollywood would instantly open back up after this film became incredibly acclaimed by those viewing it in 2001.

Guillermo del Toro Retrospective: MIMIC

Mimic (Director's Cut)
1997
Starring: Mira Sorvino, Charles Dutton, Josh Brolin, Jeremy Northam, Giancarlo Giannini, F. Murray Abraham
Rated: R

Up until a few years ago, Guillermo del Toro seemed to refrain from wanting to talk about his first foray into big time Hollywood filmmaking.  When Scott Mendelson and I saw him at a Q&A in 2008, one of his stipulations before questioning began was the he would not take any questions regarding Mimic, his 1997 monster thriller.  Guillermo was always upset with this film and he almost never worked in Hollywood again.  His experience was one that was a nightmare, but shared by many a director in the mid 1990s.

Guillermo de Toro Retrospective: CRONOS

Cronos
1993
Starring: Federico Luppi, Ron Perlman, Tamara Shanath, Cladio Brook, Margarita Isabel
Rated: R

And the retrospective fire keeps on burning!  This one will be a little different.  Previously, we would just follow a franchise's entire run.  This time, we'll look in at a director's oeuvre.  And I've decided on one of my absolute favorite working directors, Guillermo del Toro.  del Toro is a man who's an incredible visionary and gives the utmost attention to every detail in every mechanism and monster he creates.  He prefers to create monsters and try to crutch on practical effects whenever possible.  If you have a film of his that has interviews or a commentary, you'll know how engaging and incredible it is to listen to this man talk film.

TRAILER: Pacific Rim #2

Oh...wow. The scale of this movie is insane. So far, its not just my Guillermo del Toro fanboy loving this, this looks like the very definition of why we go to the movies. Big monsters! Big robots! That's all we need. I don't see any reason anyone WOULDN'T want to see this on the biggest screen imaginable. For those of you pirating bootlegs...are you really going to "get" the impact of PACIFIC RIM watching a camcorder'd copy of a guy sitting in a theater on your laptop screen? This movie is saying "THEATER OR NOTHING ELSE". This movie one of the biggies on mine and probably every other movie buff's hit list for summer 2013. I haven't done a whole lot of digging other than released footage and photos as I'd like to be as clean going in as I can. I'm really excited, this feels like it could be one of those epic cinema going experiences.

 PACIFIC RIM cancels the apocalypse July 12!