FilmMattic

Top 10 Films of 2010       If you're like me, then it is always a good practice to quantify things by developing top ten lists.  Maybe ten is an arbitrary number, but for most, it is a uniformly agreed upon starting point for valuing highly competent works.  Realizing that standards may inevitably differ across the overwrought cyberspace of film critiques, I am preparing to field off an onslaught of contentious debate regarding my selections.  The staunch lines of sensibility have been irrevocably drawn.  Opinions have been readying for my impending execution.  Target acquired.  Unleash the vitriol.       Before any formal attacks can be mounted though, I must provide a little more insight into the formation of my list.  Quite frankly, the first ... really two-thirds of 2010 have offered up a fairly sobering array of movies—which unrequited film fans like myself forcibly and painfully must endure befo...

      Review: The Fighter      Seldom does a film that is constrained by a hackneyed premise leave one with an indelible feeling of jubilation once the end credits roll.  The cumulative result of a highly gifted actor's performance and age-old storytelling with the hero overcoming insurmountable odds style-pathos, The Fighter creates this jubilant effect and positively sends a euphoric tingle down just about anyone with a warm heart's spine.

       In a purposeful effort to establish a familiar trend with my "Person of the Week" selections, another actor scores the coveted title.  Instead of finishing up my last minute Christmas shopping yesterday afternoon, I ventured to the Cinema and watched The Fighter.         If you are part of the fortunate early few to have seen this film, then you can quickly infer who my selection is ... without turning any heads, congratulations Christian Bale.  Such an ingenious master of his craft, Bale thoroughly owns his character in The Fighter. His absorbing rendition of real life professional Boxer/Trainer, Dick "Dicky" Eklund, is fully engrossing.         The realization of Bale's on screen charisma is as potent a force of memory as the physical charisma of any gifted athlete.  Witnessing Bale perform on the screen is equivalent to witnessing Michael...

            The follow-up victor to my Person of the Week segment follows in theme with the rationale behind selecting my inaugural winner—a film actor.        In lieu of his highly acclaimed new film, The Fighter— playing the lead role of real life junior welterweight Boxer, "Irish" Micky Ward—Mark Wahlberg will be taking the reigns from James Franco as the Person of the Week.  In a close race, Wahlberg nudged out the sagacious James L. Brooks, award winning Director of the upcoming film, How Do You Know.       As he was pejoratively once known, Marky Mark has managed to successfully carve out a career that has brokered two competing feats.  Not only has Wahlberg trumped most of his fan's wildest expectations, but he has also defied the wry eye of some of his most cynical of haters.         After a short lived but pronounced singing and mod...