My Favorite Movies of 2010

I was hesitant to make a top 10 movie list this year because, really, who cares what I have to say? But then I started thinking, Yeah... who cares what I have to say? Without the title of "movie critic," I can just choose whatever movies I want -- the ones that I truly enjoyed the most -- as opposed to movies that I know are technically great or that any film fan should definitely see, but may not be as emotionally pleasing to my Big 12-school-educated mind. I know that a "favorite movie list" from an Internet writer my age is supposed to include Inception and Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, it's almost blasphemy for it not to, but mine doesn't.

I enjoyed both quite a bit, and I know I'm in the minority, but I thought Inception was a fun summer action movie that was taken too seriously and Scott Pilgrim vs. The World couldn't decide who its audience was; though fun, it was a strange hybrid of characters in their early 20s mixed with references targeted at people in their late 30s. So, with that in mind, these are not, I repeat, not the greatest 10 films of 2010 -- these are just the 10 that I happened to enjoy the most.

10. The Karate Kid

Before The Karate Kid, most people knew Jaden Smith as the adorable on-screen (and real life) son of Will Smith in The Pursuit of Happyness. In contrast, I was most familiar with Jaden Smith as the little kid who tries to get Will Smith to play "Wild Wild West" on his Willennium album. Regardless, I was not looking forward to this The Karate Kid remake in the least. I certainly like the original film, but I'm not part of the Bill Simmons cult who think that the original film is some sore of Holy Grail that can never be remade, Yeah, it did seem unnecessary, and it was also unreasonably long. But: I loved every second of it. During the shadow scene with the car lights I actually had to hide my face because I was tearing up. Christ, I'm tearing up just thinking about it right now. Moving on...

9. Going the Distance

With all apologies to Michelle Orange, who, long before I started here, had one of the most enjoyable and well-behaved feuds that I've ever seen with Distance leading man Justin Long (as someone who grew up in the Midwest, it reminds me of the Cardinals-Cubs rivalry), for a silly romantic comedy, I enjoyed the hell out of this. Maybe it the was the presence of Jason Sudeikis, whom I always love, or Charlie Day, but, every time I thought GTD (as we call it in our secret Going the Distance chat rooms) was going to go one direction, it would tease that direction and quickly go another. Example: Long is flirting with a female co-worker at the bar while he's in a fight with Drew Barrymore. The next morning, of course, the co-worker is at Long's apartment, so cue the next 45 minutes where Long has to prove what an idiot he was and win Barrymore back. But she was there with Charlie Day, and thus the typical "one of the characters accidentally strays" storyline was thankfully avoided. And, again, did I mention Jason Sudeikis is in this movie? He even has a mustache!

8. Buried

Shades of Armageddon and Deep Impact, Dante's Peak and Volcano, School Ties and Bebe's Kids (those last two may or may not be related), Buried was, well, buried by the presence of 127 Hours. Yes, I enjoyed 127 Hours more than I did Buried. Then again, to be fair, the entire narrative of 127 Hours does not take place with Aron Ralston's hand stuck under a boulder: Every single second of screen time in Buried is spent with Ryan Reynolds trapped in an underground coffin; unbelievably, I was riveted the entire time. I have no idea how that's even possible. Sure, I was depressed for the next fours days, but riveted nonetheless.

7. True Grit

I go back and forth on the Coen brothers. I really like A Serious Man, Fargo, Raising Arizona and O Brother, Where Art Thou. On the other hand, I have no use for The Big Lebowski. Look, I get it: I get why it's such a cult favorite, but it just never did much for me. So I had apprehensions about their Jeff Bridges reunion here; if the Coens were looking to make an open ended, kind of weird Western, I wasn't interested. True Grit is nothing like the Coens' previous films; it's a fairly straightforward Western that just happens to be incredibly well-made. I never felt like I was watching a film that was hoping to be nominated for an Oscar.

6. The Other Guys

The funniest movie of the year. I'll give two examples (spoiler alert?): I can't remember a time I laughed harder at a scene than I did when Sam Jackson and Dwayne Johnson both thought it was a good idea to jump off the roof of a New York City building in an effort to catch a band of criminals. Their long, slow-motion plunge to their deaths had me rolling. The second: when Mark Wahlberg is repeatedly fooled into accepting bribes. He's good in The Fighter, but this is his definitive performance of 2010.

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