Best Movies of 2014

I know this was a really good year for movies because there's several I know I need to see that I haven't yet, and a flawed but very interesting Christopher Nolan film still didn't make the cut. It was a good year for both huge blockbusters and smaller auteur movies, and when both of those happen there's a lot to enjoy.

Best of 2014

10. Godzilla


People complain that the human characters in this movie are boring, and that there's not enough action. To the first complaint, I'd say that I enjoyed watching a big disaster movie where the people actually acted like people, working together with what little information they had to take on an unfathomable threat, and that it's perfectly in keeping with Kaiju tradition for the people to be less interesting than the monsters. To the second, I'd only ask if YOU SAW THAT FUCKING SCENE AT THE END? HOLY SHIT.

9. Dawn of the Planet of the Apes


After Tim Burton's remake seemed like it buried the Apes franchise, it was a surprise when Rise of the Planet of the Apes turned out to be a good, well-considered new take on the concept. That meant the poorly-titled Dawn came with more expectations, but I thought it met them pretty solidly. The human characters are a bit eh, which is a bummer when the whole movie is about how both sides of a war have their good and bad points. But the ape scenes in this movie are so good that they made up for it. Andy Serkis and the rest of his mo-cap friends do a tremendous job bringing the developing ape society to life, and Matt Reeves did great work balancing the quieter moments with some tense action. Actually looking forward to the third movie in a reboot of a decades-old campy sci-fi series.

8. Locke


Locke features Tom Hardy driving a car down the highway in England at night and talking with people on the phone. And almost nothing else. It's a premise that sounds like they're using a highly limited scope to cleverly disguise a dramatic life-or-death story, and the events of the movie do have a profound effect on Ivan Locke's life, but really he's just talking to family members and coworkers as he's trying to explain why he will be missing for the next day or so. It sounds mundane, but the smart script and Hardy's tremendous performance (showing off a great new Tom Hardy voice) make it completely gripping from start to finish. It doesn't sound like it will work, but it absolutely does.

7. The Raid 2


While the first Raid movie was a very tight and narrowly focused beat-'em-up, The Raid 2 is something different. It's half balls-to-the-wall hardcore martial arts action like the original, and half epic Asian crime film. It doesn't completely work, because it's just not the most intriguing or original crime movie. It's still great though, because my god does this crew know how to make an action movie. The fights are as brutal as the first time, and probably a step or two beyond that. They sort of step up in intensity and quality over the course of the story, constantly topping what came before when you thought they couldn't. There's just no one else who makes martial arts movies this good. Any fan of this kind of movie has to get on the Raid bandwagon.

6. Captain America: The Winter Soldier


I'm addicted to comic books. I have a whole shelf full of Marvel trades, and I want a whole lot more. What got me hooked is Captain America, specifically Ed Brubaker's run that began with the Winter Soldier arc, so seeing it get adapted to film so successfully was a total joy. The conspiracy thriller storyline they came up wasn't quite as compelling as they wanted it to be, but I was okay with it, because it was peppered with the best action scenes a super hero movie has ever had. Nick Fury's resourcefulness, Black Widow's grace and skill, Cap's surprising speed, power, and fierceness, they're all captured perfectly in battles that help define who they are and push the story forward. It's sort of an Avengers 1.5, and helps with what Marvel is building toward with cinema's most exciting "shared universe". It also gets some credit for kicking off a big change in Agents of SHIELD that turned it into a mostly entertaining show in the back half of its first season.

5. Gone Girl


I have some problems with this movie. Because even if the story and the creators themselves aren't misogynist, it's very easy for certain kinds of people to take the wrong message from its story. I can't truly hold that against the movie though, which just wants to be a totally bonkers and surprising thriller and succeeds at that completely. The cast is terrific, especially Rosamund Pike and Tyler Perry, and if David Fincher (director), Jeff Cronenwerth (DOP), Kirk Baxter (editor), Trent Reznor, and Atticus Ross (composers) want to make movies together for the rest of their lives, I won't complain. I also really love it when a movie can make you unsure of it as it begins and then turn that around into a positive element successfully. This one stuck with me.

4. The Lego Movie


I was unsure of The Lego Movie early on, but it slowly earned my trust until I was completely in love with it for the entire second half or so. Not only is it a very funny and thrilling family adventure movie, it also has tons to say about everything from the importance of being yourself to why we tell stories in the first place. It's a bit odd for a movie based on a building toy that comes with specific instructions to have a message about why you shouldn't conform to everything that's expected of you, but as a wise man once told me, you shouldn't get caught up in relativism. I'm not convinced that Phil Lord and Christopher Miller are capable of making something that isn't awesome.

3. The Grand Budapest Hotel


Wes Anderson's latest precious art project is one that actually justifies his specific style by putting it up against some real darkness, in this case a sort of fictionalized account of the period leading up to World War II. It felt like he had a lot more to say this time than he usually does, and it all comes across while still being as charming and interesting on the surface level as he always is. It's worth pointing out how good Ralph Fiennes is, because good lord is he a tremendous actor and is this the point when I truly started to realize it. There's tons of his favorite actors all through the movie doing great work, but Fiennes definitely steals the show. You usually don't say that about the lead, but it fits here.

2. Under the Skin


If you collected a random audience and had them watch all of the movies on this list, I'm more than confident this would be the most hated. It's strange, it never explains itself, it doesn't really conform to any expectations of what movies should be. But I was enthralled the entire time. Without explaining too much, it's about a woman who's not what she appears, and lures men to her apartment for unknown purposes. I can't explain much more than that because I honestly don't know much more than that. But it's unique, it's beautifully shot, it's disturbing and occasionally terrifying, and I couldn't take my eyes off it. And it's not affected; all of the obfuscation and strangeness ties directly into the nature of the main character directly. It's small filmmaking at its best.

1. Guardians of the Galaxy


The finest Marvel Studios movie to date features characters most people have never heard of, flying around, making shady deals, and getting in laser gun battles on the other side of the universe. And people say all super hero movies are the same. There's a couple minor characters people may remember from an earlier film, but Guardians is mostly content to stick to new faces and concepts, as its central and titular gang of misfits crack jokes, have growing pains, and eventually work together to try to bring a little good to a galaxy that hasn't given them much in return. The set designs, makeup, and visual effects create a believable and exciting setting, the cast does a great job bringing their unusual characters to life, and the script is stuffed with great laughs and the occasional genuinely touching moment. I'm gushing a bit, but I think Guardians is one of the best summer popcorn movies in years, and the best space opera since the original Star Wars movies. Two of the best new movie characters this year were a talking raccoon and tree. Come on.

Delayed Entry

This is the best movie that wasn't released in 2014 but I didn't see until then.

Inside Llewyn Davis

I wrote last year that I regretted not seeing this, and I wasn't surprised when I did end up loving it. It's not the Coen brothers at their funniest, but it has its share of amusements, and also a great story about a man still struggling to figure out his life after certain events have left him grasping for something to hold on to. Oscar Isaac is wonderful as Llewyn, and the script and direction show the Coens still at the top of their game of creating uniquely wonderful films.

Movie Update 39

You know the drill.

Charade


A comedy/thriller/romance thing starring an aging Cary Grant and a still young looking Audrey Hepburn, who try to track down some money her husband stole before his death before they get killed themselves. It's sort of like an Alfred Hitchcock movie that doesn't take itself quite as seriously, with plenty of twists and turns in its mystery and plenty of murders getting dramatically discovered. The script is really fun and never stops adding new elements, though by the end I was really wondering if so much deception by certain characters was really necessary or advisible. An entertaining movie nonetheless.

The Game


One of David Fincher's earlier films, and another one with a script that packs plenty of memorable moments and surprises but doesn't quite end up telling a believable story. Michael Douglas is a wealthy businessman who perhaps takes his job too seriously, and whose life is turned upside down when his brother (played by Sean Penn in a small but interesting part) gives him the birthday gift of a "game" from a company that promises to make his life exciting and unpredictable in the spirit of fun. Things start to go horribly wrong, and you're left to wonder whether it's all part of the game or if the company is actually out to get him and the money he controls. I couldn't really take the premise seriously because it was just too elaborate for anyone to really pull off, but I still enjoyed the movie for Douglas' increasingly perplexed and unhinged performance and Fincher's direction, which was already distinctly in his own style.

The Motorcycle Diaries


A movie about a bike trip that Che Guevara took around South America with his friend and wrote about himself, one that turned him from a normal upper class Argentinian into a political revolutionary who would eventually become one of the world's most notorious radical communists. The movie doesn't go too far into what he would eventually become, but inequality is definitely a bit part of the story, and Guevara is portrayed very sympathetically, almost saintlike in his devotion to honesty and helping people when he can. Ignoring any thoughts you might have about the movie politically, I thought it was a well shot and beautiful movie, if sometimes a boring or tedious one. Not great, but it was certainly interesting to see the perspective.

OSS 117: Cario, Nest of Spies


Before director Michel Hazanavicius and stars Jean Dujardin and Bérénice Bejo made this year's Best Picture frontrunner (I'm guessing) The Artist, they collaborated on this, another tribute to older cinema, though in this case it's 50s and 60s spy movies rather than silent film, and more overtly parodic. Dujardin stars as 117 a suave and talented French secret agent who is sent to clean up a mess in Cairo after his old buddy and partner gets killed while undercover. He meets a local played by Bejo who acts as his liaison in Egypt, and then proceeds to uncover or stumble into a complex web of betrayals and conspiracies that make up the secret underground of the city. 117 is at times both the perfect agent and a joke of one, sometimes effortly dispatching an assailant or slipping into bed with an exotic beauty, sometimes being obnoxiously sexist or intolerant of Islam or missing an obvious clue. The movie slips up with a sour moment now and then, but it's most a very entertaining spoof, and Dujardin is a great leading man, meaningless comparisons to George Clooney aside. They made a sequel, and I'd like to see it soon.

Best Movies of 2011

I was pretty awful about going to the theater this year before autumn rolled around, but I did okay after that and Netflix helped me catch up on a bunch of movies from earlier in the year. This is probably the first year that I've seen at least ten movies I'd consider very good before the year actually ended since... ever. I think it was a solid year, considering I enjoyed all of the Marvel movies and none made the cut.

Best of 2011

10. Source Code

Duncan Jones' second science fiction film is more accessible than his first, and that's not a bad thing when the core idea behind it is still totally solid. The advertising made me really skeptical, but the material ended up working a lot better than expected, and supported a moving human story without overshadowing it. This might be the first time I've seen Jake Gyllenhaal in a heroic leading man type-role, and he does a good job playing a guy who's not perfect but has a good heart and a good head on his shoulders. He carries a movie that's a bit brief but totally memorable.

9. Bridesmaids


Maybe one of the most successfully gender-neutral comedies ever made, Bridesmaids is laugh-out-loud funny without ever forgetting to tell an honest and occasionally really harsh story about a woman gliding through life who starts to see how many things are broken when her best friend gets engaged. The performances are great, and there are very few moments in the film that seem ill advised or that don't at least serve the story. Not the easiest comedy to watch, but a very worthwhile one.

8. Attack the Block


The second best movie about kids trying to survive aliens appearing in their neighborhood this year, Attack the Block combines elements of horror, sci-fi, and comedy expertly to create an experience that is more original and distinctly of a time and place than maybe anything on this list. Some bits are maybe a bit heavy-handed, but the thuggish teenagers are likable, the aliens are scary, and the film succeeds at pretty much everything it attempts.

7. The Tree of Life

The Tree of Life is less about really understanding what's going and more about just soaking in an experience that Terrence Malick puts on the screen. I can't claim to understand everything that happens in this movie or how certain parts related to each other, but it's always beautiful to look at and I found myself at times profoundly affected by how well certain elements of life, particularly growing up, were captured, understanding things that I wasn't aware anyone besides me could remember. If you let it grab you, it's hard to get it to let go.

6. The Adventures of Tintin

An adventure film so relentlessly fun and exciting that I almost breathed a sigh of relief once the credits started rolling. There's not a lot of meat on these bones, but what is there is always driving forward with a sense of innocent wonder, asking "why not?" and latching onto possibilities that live action productions just wouldn't have the budget to try out. Steven Spielberg maybe isn't as deep as some of the other famous directors, but when he can still make movies as sharp and enjoyable as this one (along with the help of hundreds of animators, I'm sure), I still can't help but consider him one of the best alive at his job.

5. Hugo


A movie that made me believe in the possibilities of 3D again. Although it's mostly about kids, Hugo is one of Martin Scorsese's most personal movies, reveling in his love of cinema, both overtly and more discretely with the way it celebrates and pays homage to what has come before. The cast is solid, the story is intriguing with a sweet sentimental core at its center, and it's hard to overstate just how nice the movie is to look at, whether you paid for the 3D tickets or not. In case you forgot, Scorsese can do a lot more than gangster movies.

4. Super 8


This was my most anticipated movie of the last summer, and it delivered on pretty much every expectation. It combines the more charming elements of older family science fiction movies with the more visceral thrills of something closer to horror, and does so without either side really getting short shrift or feeling underdeveloped. There's not much here that hasn't been done before, but usually it just isn't done this well, and I had a hard time worrying about small problems when the whole thing was just sitting right with me otherwise. And it's hard to get over just how good the kids in it were.

3. Warrior


The biggest surprise of the year was just how much I ended up loving this movie, despite it resting on material that sounds like a mix of movies made for Lifetime and TNT. The simple fact though is that Gavin O'Connor knows what he's doing behind the camera, and he had three actors working for him who fit their characters perfectly, and were simply great in their roles. It's not the most realistic sports story, and it doesn't have the benefit of being based on anything true. But the human element that drives it makes it work, and it's so spot-on emotionally that the end result is much more powerful than I was expecting.

2. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo


Another case of the people behind a film elevating relatively mundane (if notably popular and gritty) material, although in this case it was pretty much entirely expected. David Fincher is able to apply a specific feel and general standard of quality to his work without ever getting too flashy or obvious with it, and that continues with Dragon Tattoo, the first film in a planned trilogy that he actually hasn't signed on to finish yet. I can only hope he does, but I can't imagine having to get through parts two and three done by someone else, wondering what he could have done with it. The two leads give totally magnetic performances, and it's just so well shot and scored that numerous flaws inherent in the story just don't add up to much in the end.

1. Drive


I'm giving you a night call to tell you how I feel
I want to drive you through the night, down the hills
I'm gonna tell you something you don't want to hear
I'm gonna show you where it's dark, but have no fear

There's something inside you
It's hard to explain
They're talking about you boy
But you're still the same

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

If you started looking closely at the structure of the story of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, you could probably find a number of flaws and weird issues with it. It takes a long time for its two leads to meet and the plot to really get going, and there's a very long final section after the film climaxes before it actually sputters to an end, which might work in a book, but seems unnatural in a movie. But there are times when the effect that a film has goes beyond how well its story adheres to standard conventions of the medium and the odd little things stop bothering you. The script for this second film adaptation of Stieg Larsson's book is definitely flawed, and it's hard to say how much of that is the fault of the book itself. But everything else about the movie helps elevate the material and create a movie that's not quite my favorite this year but darn close. Everything from David Fincher's impeccable direction to the work by people like the cinematographer and editor to the outstanding performances from basically everyone in the cast to the once again pitch-perfect music by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross.

There are some bells and whistles, but at its core Dragon Tattoo is a mystery story. I started trying to write a quick synopsis here, but it quickly got too long, so I'll try to make it more succinct. Daniel Craig plays Mikael Blomkvist, a journalist who agrees to look into the apparent murder of a girl forty years earlier, a member of a family that runs a large business in the country. Rooney Mara plays Lisbeth Salander, another journalist and an unfriendly, possibly psychotic girl who's been a ward of the state since childhood. Eventually they both end up working on the case together, though not before there's a lengthy sequence ending in a very satisfying revenge as a long way of establishing who Lisbeth is and what she's willing to do. The film is somewhat disjointed up to this point, but once the pair get really cracking on the mystery it picks up, with a suitably creepy series of twists and revelations leading to a tense and thrilling conclusion. That the film goes on for a while after that conclusion is mostly irrelevant.

As I mentioned, the cast is quite strong, with film veterans such as Christopher Plummer, Robin Wright, and Stellan Skarsgård turning in solid supporting performances to help drive things forward. Craig is good in pretty much everything, and he is nicely out of his element as the middle-aged Blomkvist, who occasionally gets in too deep for his own good. The star of the show really is Mara though, having the tough job of portraying both an eminently skilled researcher and hacker and a highly vulnerable and damaged woman, and making them be the same person. There's a lot of tough material, and she nails all of it. It just wouldn't be the same movie without her succeeding as totally as she does. I questioned Fincher's decision to tackle material another filmmaker had already brought to the screen in apparently fine fashion, but while I still haven't seen Niels Arden Oplev's version I can't imagine it being this memorable. It's a Fincher movie through and through.

Movie Update 12

At this point I'm starting to see the finish line on the list of classic movies I compiled last year (and have repeatedly expanded on since), about in time for Netflix' two disc plan with streaming to increase in price. I might just watch regular old crap for a while after that, though there's plenty of lists I haven't gone through yet, mostly consisting of winners of various awards. Anyway, movies.

American Graffiti


This is the first non-Star Wars film directed by George Lucas that I've seen... not very surprising, since only one other such film exists. It's an entertaining and charming nostalgia-laden film about mid-century cruising culture, which consisted of teenagers in California hooking up and aimlessly driving their cars around town while listening to music. It's obvious Lucas has a history with this sort of thing, and it comes through in the movie, which is too light on plot to really be a sex comedy or anything like that, but tells a simple and interesting story about two high school graduates struggling with whether to go to college at the other side of the country while summer comes to a close. The young cast is pretty good, it's funny, and it's shot well enough to make you forget for a little while what Lucas' career has turned into. Nothing too incredible, but a good film.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button


I liked this more than I expected, but it's still pretty far from the best work by David Fincher. Despite the apparent grab for awards with the sentimental, broadly-reaching script and big name cast, you can still definitely tell it's a Fincher movie from the specific color scheme and interesting using of CGI (the effects to create young/old Benjamin are far from real looking, but they're definitely interesting) among other things. And I liked most of the performances, especially surprising ones like Mad Men's Jared Harris as a salty, drunken sea captain. It's just much too long of a movie for how much story it has. It's like screenwriter Eric Roth couldn't think of anything beyond combining an intriguing short story concept with an earlier-set version of Forrest Gump. Some cool ideas, but the experience is kind of a drag.

La Dolce Vita


This is the third film by Federico Fellini that I've seen, and I was again impressed by some things he did without being really drawn in or terribly entertained by the work itself. It's very much a 60s European art film, and is very identifiably good at that. I was somewhat intrigued by the episodic nature of the story, as it progresses through various mostly unrelated events, examining the mindset of the central character. Really though, the part that grabbed my interest the most was when Anita Ekberg was just sort of walking and dancing around on screen, so maybe I'm not quite the target audience. This is another film that was quite long, and I got through it fine but wouldn't want to watch it again.

Nashville


Robert Altman is definitely known for those ensemble casts, and this is a premiere example of that. Nashville is about the coming together of many people, lots of them musicians, at a political rally for a candidate that is never actually seen. Much time is dedicated to the musical performances, and it's quite a long movie, giving fair shake to a lot of different stories. It's a well put together film, and while I'm not familiar with a lot of the cast, they all tend to do good jobs. I didn't like a lot of the movie though, which I found to be incredibly uncomfortable and hard to watch. It's the product of a very dark sense of humor, some real proto-cringe type stuff. I understand what they were going for, but too much of it was too far on the painful side of the spectrum without being that funny. It's just personal taste, and I respect the movie, but I had trouble with it.

Sullivan's Travels


Sullivan's Travels is about a comedy director who thinks people don't know enough about the real suffering going on in the world, and tries after a few false starts to discover real trouble so he can honestly make a movie about it. I tend to like movies that hold up mirrors to Hollywood, and Travels does it about as well as any. It's a nice snappy 40s road comedy, which happens to take a strange, dark, and surprising turn near the end. It's a little off-putting, but not enough to really damage a film that's otherwise got a pretty good point to make about what people really want to get out of cinema, and is honestly just entertaining on its own. The biggest issue is perhaps the movie trying to get me to believe a girl who looked like Veronica Lake would have trouble getting a break in Hollywood, but that's pretty much how movies work. Somehow not as famous as other movies of similar type and quality from the period, but deserving of a watch.

The Social Network

It's not actually my favorite movie of 2010, but The Social Network represents, possibly by far, the best coming together of writing, directing, and acting that I've seen from last year. There's just immense skill on display through the entire thing.  Aaron Sorkin's screenplay is so great that you could be justified in posting the entire thing on a webpage for memorable quotes. The structure is clever in doling out information while leaving you anticipating the next scene, and the dialogue is just unbelievable. And while the negative connotation of that word could be applied, it doesn't matter because the point isn't for the characters to sound real, but just to be constantly entertaining to listen to. It's the same thing with the inaccuracies in the story - the broad strokes of Facebook's creation seem to be mostly correct, so who cares if things that happen between characters are changed for dramatic effect? It's a movie.

Meanwhile, David Fincher's direction is excellent as well. He's not the most consistent filmmaker I can think of, but with the right project he can knock one out of the park, and even the lesser movies he's directed still have his style, which makes most things more interesting. He gets great collaborations out of his cinematographer and composers, including Trent Reznor, who provide a memorably and unsettling score. Even with the script, the movie might not have worked without the sinister mood all these people worked to create, and seems key to making a film hinging on something as pop culture-focused as Facebook still work.

And the cast is great from top to bottom. Jesse Eisenberg finally and definitively casts aside the Michael Cera comparisons with his depiction of Mark Zuckerberg, a brilliant programmer and wordsmith but someone who doesn't really know how to act around people. His relationship with friend and site co-founder Eduardo Saverin is key to the story have any emotional resonance, and Andrew Garfield more than holds up his side of that in the role. There's something odd about the film's version of Sean Parker, the guy behind the business side of Napster who impresses Zuckerberg with his business ideas and eventually becomes a partner. The movie seems to conflate him with the more famous Shawn Fanning, and it's also strange how he seems more like a rock star than a young, bright business man, which is further encouraged by him being played by Justin Timberlake. But it somehow works for the film's purposes, and Timberlake does a fine job. Fincher's use of technology to enhance a movie without using obvious, overbearing effects has always been intriguing, and having Armie Hammer play both of the Winklevoss twins because he was right for the part instead of just picking two real twins pays off. Women aren't really a big part of Zuckerberg's life after he gets the Facebook idea, even leading to some accusations of misogyny in the film, but Rooney Mara and Rashida Jones are both good in supporting roles as the ex-girlfriend who sets the whole thing in motion and a junior lawyer who sympathizes with his position.

So the movie is pretty brilliant from start to finish, with all of the elements I've described thrown together and allowed to thrive for two hours. There aren't really any particularly special moments that stood out to me and made me exclaim at how good the movie was, but consistently excellent filmmaking is worth applauding too. I'm not sure if it will quite earn too many of the incredibly talented people involved the academy awards they might deserve with The King's Speech (another film I hope to see soon) kind of looking to me like an unstoppable juggernaut at this point, but whatever the case it's still a great movie just absolutely packed with killer dialogue and great performances. There's just so many quotes running through my head right now. It would be a shame to settle for just one, so I'll instead just say you should see this movie if you haven't yet.

Alien³

Unlike Aliens, Alien 3 doesn't do much of anything that the first movie didn't. It answers the question of how to make a single one of the creatures scary again after Ripley fought off hordes the last time: replace the marines with bald, British criminals and take away their weapons. This time, the alien bursts out of an animal instead of a person, resulting in slightly different physiology. In some ways, it's the best looking of the first three films, with superior gore effects and a good looking alien. But whenever the shot is wide enough to see the entire thing visible, it ends up being horribly composited with the rest of the picture and actually looking worse than if they just cheated more with the camera work.

This was actually David Fincher's first feature film, though unfortunately not a very good one, and thanks to disputes with the studio he's basically disowned it. It's hard to say how much of the movie's badness is the result of outside tampering and how much is it just being a bad movie. It seems more hateful than the first two. The series is known for the vast majority of its characters dying, but this one kills off three survivors from the last movie in the beginning for no real reason. The setting is weird, and the surrounding cast this time is kind of dull, with every person sort of being the same dude. Aliens expanded on the series' scope, and Alien 3 draws it back, just trying to make some money without doing much that'll make it seem worth the time. Honestly, I can't think of many reasons I shouldn't just call it awful. The ending is unexpected and pointed, thought it didn't stop them from making yet another sequel five years later. I'm gonna go think about something else now.

Se7en

One of my friends has been trying to get me to see this for maybe a decade now. I'm not sure why it took so long. David Fincher's Fight Club is one of my favorite movies. Maybe being repeatedly told to see it was subconsciously pushing me away. Whatever it was, it's definitely a good film. It's part crime movie, part suspense. Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman are a couple detectives in a strange city where everything looks run-down and it always rains. Pitt just moved to town to replace Freeman, who's set to retire at the end of the week, but a string of related murders start showing up, pointing to a serial killer obsessed with his own sense of justice and the seven deadly sins. It's a slow burn as they examine the aftermath of his painstaking, disturbing work and try to find connections that will lead to him before he finishes the job. It's clear that he's toying with them, almost challenging them to catch him while he goes about his business. As a look at the possible endpoint of what a human mind might be capable of putting together, it's intriguing and chilling at the same time.

In between checking crime scenes, the movie takes some time to develop the detectives when they're off the job. Pitt comes home to his wife played by Gwyneth Paltrow and their three dogs, while Freeman goes to the library, rarely able to stop thinking about work. There are a couple scenes where Paltrow confides in Freeman, the only man besides her husband she knows to turn to in a new city that she hates. It's unclear at first what the point of this stuff is besides preventing the entire movie from being a creepy detective story, but as the depths of the killer's horrifying plan are unraveled the truth becomes clear. Kevin Spacey has a good role, one of the more interesting in his career (which was nice to see, because it's been a while since I've seen him do a whole lot). It all builds to a huge downer of an ending, one that the studio fought against but ultimately had to happen for the movie to totally work. I should be more diligent about seeing Fincher's films, because he's certainly one of the most interesting directors of the last couple decades.