10 movies I liked a lot in 2010

Now we're getting into the good stuff. These ten films were almost perfect, but for some minor detail that kept me from loving them forever.

Number 20



The dialogue, the setting, the acting, and the mood are all as great as everyone says they are. I loved it right up until the "25 Years Later" jump, which is where it lost me. I know people who appreciated that closure, but I would've preferred it another way.

Number 19



A powerful and moving love story, but I couldn't get behind the couple, as I've said before. And even though I suspect that was exactly the reaction I was supposed to have, it kept me from fully embracing this movie.


Number 18



I was shocked to like this as much as I did, but in some ways it's better than the original. Jackie Chan is no Pat Morita, but he acts his heart out in this thing and so does Jaden Smith. If it was an original story, it would've been a lot higher on this list.

Number 17



An enjoyable, light-hearted spy movie. Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz aren't my favorite actors, but they were perfect for this harmless bit of fun.

Number 16



A powerful character study combined with an intriguing mystery. Two things keep me from loving it though. One is the knowledge that the series will never be properly completed, but more than that: though I empathize with Lisbeth, I don't actually like her.

Number 15



If you have to adapt a cheesy action show from the '80s, this is exactly the way to do it. It had everything I liked about the show (the characters' ticks and relationships; the traps and plans; the explosions) and none of the stuff I didn't (guys stumbling away unscathed from airplane crashes). Like The Karate Kid, it loses points for being a remake, but not as many because unlike the other '80s remake, this one has an original plot.

Number 14



A solid action movie that proved you don't have to have a villain to keep the excitement level up. I'm not really sure why I didn't love it more. Maybe it was Chris Pine's relationship with his wife. I didn't really buy how that subplot played out.

Number 13



It was a pretty good year for action movies. This is another solid one that entertained me the whole way through. It was exciting and funny. There's one thing I didn't care for, but it's a spoiler, so I won't go into detail. Just something I thought wasn't resolved very well. Ask me in the comments if you're curious.

Number 12



A fun, funny movie about Vikings and dragons with some great 3D flying sequences.  My only beef (and I know this isn't fair to say) is that it kills me to know that Dreamwork's is going to drive this into the ground the way it did Shrek and Madagascar and plans to do with Kung Fu Panda. That takes a lot of the fun away for me. Not the movie's fault, but that's how it is.

Number 11



It's got a great, tightly woven story with awesome twists and revelations, some really nice acting, super special effects, and an unforgettable soundtrack. The only thing keeping it out of the Top Ten for me is the ambiguity of the ending. I don't have any doubt about what happened three seconds after the fade, but I really hate having to argue about it with other people.

Let Me In (2010)

As the title suggests, Let Me In accepts the legend that a vampire can't enter a house unless she's first invited. It's one of my least-favorite vampire traditions (tied with Can't Cross Running Water), but Let Me In makes it work by - if not explaining it - at least showing what happens when a vampire breaks the rule.

That's not the only thing to like about the movie. Even though I'm very poorly read in Hammer's horror output from the late '50s through early '70s, it was a thrill to see their name in front of a horror film again. More than that though, it's the story about loneliness that makes the film so interesting.

Kodi Smit-McPhee (The Road) plays a twelve-year-old boy named Owen who doesn't have any friends. He's a really cute kid, but his parents' divorce is screwing him up and his mom dresses him weird and he doesn't have a lot in the way of social skills. He's being picked on by a bully at school named Kenny (Dylan Minnette, who played Jack's son in the last season of Lost) and as the movie begins, Owen's trying to build up courage to use a knife to make Kenny stop. Enter Abby (Chloë Grace Moretz from Kick Ass), a girl Owen's age who moves into Owen's apartment complex with her dad.

I won't tease out what you already know. Abby's a vampire. And in her way, she's just as lonely as Owen. The two strike up a friendship, then a romance.

It's no coincidence that Owen's studying Romeo and Juliet in school. Owen and Abby are star-crossed lovers. What's nice is that the movie doesn't carry the analogy too far. It could have made Owen part of a family of vampire hunters or something, but there's no need for that. Vampires and humans are enemies and we all know it without having to be told. Owen and Abby should not be together. And yet they are.

The consequences are disturbing. My brother-in-law and I spent a lot of time talking about the movie afterward. Let Me In doesn't pull any punches or make it easy for the audience to root for the couple. Abby isn't some "good" vampire who only steals from blood banks or drinks from animals. She and her father kill people. Innocent people. She's so sweet and lovable when she's with Owen, but the movie never lets you forget who and what she really is. There's no justifying it.

I wanted Owen to connect to someone. He's got his mother, but she's going through her own crap with Owen's absent dad and has chosen to do it mostly alone.  She's loving to a point and superficially supportive, but she never once has a real, meaningful conversation with her son and ends every night on the couch by herself with a big glass of wine. Owen's not a perfect kid either, but he doesn't deserve what he's getting. His loneliness is heartbreaking.

So is Abby's, though she could very well deserve it. The movie doesn't tell us whether or not she has other options than killing innocent people in horribly violent ways. She seems to lose control when she's hungry, but there's at least one occasion when she's vamped out that she's able to keep herself from attacking Owen. Still, she has to run away to do it and it's not a tactic she can employ indefinitely in every occasion. But see, that's me trying to let myself off the hook for liking her. The film makes a point not to justify her actions. It wants you on that hook. She's cute and sweet, but she's a serial killer. It's impossible not to want her to find comfort in her loneliness, but you're sort of a bad person if you sympathize with her too much.

You cannot want her and Owen to be together. That they are is - like Romeo and Juliet again - a tragedy. But the movie does an excellent job - better than any production of Shakespeare's play I've ever seen - of putting you right there in the relationship and making you understand why they both need it so badly.